Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion
2017 Weekly checkins
>
Week 40: 9/29 - 10/5
Hi all! Weirdly summery in Michigan again this week, but i'm not complaining, I like the heat!
I had another busy weekend, and was still catching up on some comics titles. So I only finished two books this week (one of them having just finished up today).
Dark Matter - this fell a little flat for me. the premise was really interesting, but I didn't like a lot of the storytelling. I also wasn't a fan of the ending. I can't really go into more specifics without spoilers.
Girl in Translation - I LOVED this one. It is another case for why i like doing reading challenges. I'm using this for my Read Harder book with an immigration central narrative. I don't know that this would have ever come to my attention otherwise. It was such a good read. The story was rather heartbreaking at time, since while it was fiction, a lot clearly was pulled from the author's own life. Yet the tone and the liability of the main character kept it from being so depressing and discouraging that I didn't want to read it.
Next up will be Seeing Red which will be my book by a Central American or South American author, set in Central or South America.
For the question of the week, I was surprised by my results!
Mercedes Lackey 89
Piers Anthony 53
Anne McCaffrey 48
Laurell K. Hamilton 35
Neil Gaiman 29
I had no idea Mercedes Lackey had written that many books, much less that I'd read so many of them. My goodreads is only books that I either still own, or have read since I started my account three years ago. I think if it went all the way back to childhood, Bonnie Bryant would have surpassed that. I LOVED the Saddle Club, and I read all of them, and some of the spin offs. There were at least 100 of the core series.
Wow, I only have 4 more books to go, and I'm in the midst of two of them! Then my final two will be easy reads: The Curse of the Blue Figurine (book I loved as a child) and How to Tell If Your Cat Is Plotting to Kill You (cat on the cover).This is good news, because I'm inching toward the top of the Leviathan Wakes library hold list, and I'm itching to read it. So hopefully I'll be done with my formal challenge books by the time I get it! (And I owe it to the challenge in a way - it was my original "recommended by a librarian" book.)
Finished this week:
Psycho on audio. Compelling, quick read. It was cool to hear the original story, with much more story from Norman's point of view than the movie allowed. Super weird at times, and of course kind of disturbing, but a very cool story. I really liked Lila's character.
Ongoing:
Warcross - kind of meh, but the occasional giggle is helping buoy up the YA-ness and over-concern with how characters and venues look. (I have no doubt this will make a cool, lucrative movie that stuns the senses, but visualizing detailed pictures is not something I enjoy while reading, because I'm terrible at it!)
A Night in the Lonesome October - I'm leading a read-along here! So much fun reading this with seasoned veterans and interested newbies. Loving it as always, and it's even harder to keep to one chapter a day when hearing Zelazny read it.
QOTW:
1 Stephen King 14
2 Jane Austen 7
3 Neil Gaiman 5
4 H.P. Lovecraft 4
4 John Scalzi 4
Yeah, sounds about right. Although it only represents my reading in the last decade or so. Maybe I should update my historical information in GR to give David Eddings, Mike Carey, and others their fair shot. :)
Hello everyone! I am so close to finishing the challenge, but I have saved some biggies for the last ones to read.
I'm currently reading The House of the Spirits for a book by an author from a country I have never visited.
I'm also readingThe Fiery Cross for a book over 800 pages.
My list of most frequently read authors is:
Liane Moriarty
Taylor Stevens
George RR Martin
Diana Gabaldon
Alice Hoffman
John Grisham
Kate Morton
This was surprising to look at and compare to my personal list of favorite authors. But most of those on my personal list have written books I have not read thus far.
Sara wrote: "Happy Thursday and welcome to another edition of the weekly check-in!There's only three months left in the year. How are you doing on your challenge list? Do you have any books left that you've b..."
Sara, I loved listening to The Golem and the Jinni on audio. It was one of my first audio books and helped get me hooked.
I finished 2 books this week, both very good:LaRose - beautiful prose, a heartbreaking story
Exposure - evocative of a time and place in history, interesting shifts in POV, and suspenseful
I'm still 2 books away from finishing the Popsugar list, and I'm not really in a hurry.
QOTW: I used to read single authors until I ran out of books, but that was before I started keeping track in GR and growing my TBR list through recommendations and ratings. I'd guess Maeve Binchey, Andrea Camilleri, James Patterson, Kurt Vonnegut, and a few others would be up there. According to my records on GR, though, my top 2 are Barbara Vine/Ruth Rendell (same person, 9 total) and Neal Stephenson (8).
I'm actually finished but I figured whatever I read from here on out might help others so...I didn't finish much this week though. Kale to the Queen would work for those looking for a book about food. Julia Vanishes would work for a book about an interesting woman.
I also read a couple manga The Case Study of Vanitas, Vol. 2 & The Girl from the Other Side: Siúil, a Rún Vol. 1
QOTW - Hmmm that is a good question. Jim Butcher, Agatha Christie C.S. Harris, Charleine Harris, JD Robb, JK Rowling, Hiromu Arakawa, Maggie Stiefvater, Neil Gaiman, Kim Fielding, Brandon Sanderson, Rick Riordan, Ellis Peters, Preston & Childs, Alan Bradley and honestly probably a lot more mangaka in addition to Arakawa should be on here.
Greetings all!I've been making some progress on the list lately. I've been lucky that some books I happened upon fit prompts I hadn't crossed off yet, so hooray for list editing.
32/40 - 41/52
I finished Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch for the re-read that makes me smile.
I finished that audiobook and needed a new one to sleep, but I was so tired I wasn't in the mood to begin any of the books I had. I remembered the Prime audiobooks channel in the Audible app and found The Velveteen Rabbit. I needed a V for the alphabet thing so I went with that.
Now I just need X and Z.
In a moment of weakness, when I bought Make Way for Ducklings last week, I also bought a Peter Sís book I've wanted for some time. Tibet: Through the Red Box has become my book involving travel.
After seeing so many posts from people staring at the looming wall of 800 pages, I'm glad I jumped on the Read That One First And Start It In Late December bandwagon. Whew!
I am, however, giving the side-eye to my unfamiliar genre book. I'm excited to read it, but I'm not sure I'll make it. I've been finding it nearly impossible to read a print book without falling asleep for months. It took me two days to read Tibet and it's a picture book! The two paper books I'm slooooowly reading I started in May and July! The trouble is I chose ergodic literature and already have my copy of S. If anyone has tips on how to not fall asleep...
QOTW: I think this list says a lot about me haha
1 Agatha Christie 43
2 Eric Carle 25
3 Charles M. Schulz 22
4 P.G. Wodehouse 20
5 A.A. Milne 17
6 Dr. Seuss 13
7 Gary Larson 11
7 Rhys Bowen 11
9 J.K. Rowling 10
10 Edward Gorey 9
(PS - I don't have kids!)
Larissa wrote: "Ramona and Her Father for "a book with a family-member term in the title" Ramona was big part of my life when I was a kid. I listened to an audio version of a couple of her books almost nightly. I hadn't read this one before. It was so adorable and realistic and I never knew it was based in Oregon where I live now."You should pop up to Portland and do the Ramona Walk. I keep meaning to re-read the Ramona and Henry books and do it myself. Here's a map.
Dani wrote: "The Sign of Four I'm not using for any prompts. I have the 63 hour full collection of Sherlock Holmes stories narrated by Stephen Fry and this was what was up after A Study in Scarlet. I'm excited and a bit daunted to tackle the rest of the content."
Luckily most of the rest are short stories. The Hound of the Baskervilles and The Valley of Fear are novels, but the rest will give you lots of great places to stop after a nice bite-sized story.
Sarah wrote: "Hi everyone. Autumn is well and truly here in Yorkshire.
I also read War Horse. I did see the film a long time ago but couldn't remember all the details. I am not the most knowledgeable about WWI so it definitely enlightened me on quite a few aspects o the war."
Don't miss the play! It's currently touring the UK. The horses are AMAZING. Coincidentally, I'm wearing my WarHorse Joey puppet blueprint T-shirt today!
Oh, I forgot to mention that I compiled all of your 2018 prompt suggestions (and unsuggestions), and they have been sent to Tara from Popsugar. No way to predict how many of our suggestions may appear in the 2018 list, but we provided 422 ideas!
Mod
I hadn't really thought about it, but that's what I used to do, too, "back in the day" - back before there was an Internet to help! if I stumbled upon a good book at the library, I'd read every other book the library had by that author (or every book I could find in the bookstore - which was WaldenBooks back then, right? wasn't that the big mall store?) and there was a competitor ... Doubleday books?
This week I finished Born with Teeth. This has me at 50 out of 52 completed. I am still halfway through 51 (the one I put off most of the year).Most read authors:
Heidi > Reviews > Most Read Authors
1 Scott Nicholson 19
2 Tamora Pierce 18
3 Diana Gabaldon 11
4 George R.R. Martin 8
5 P. Seymour 5
I haven't read anything for the challenge this week as I'm only missing the prompt for a book bought on a trip. I have yet to go on a trip this year! But I am reading The Dwarves just for fun right now.As many others, my top read authors are not totally precise because I have not added every single book I have ever read - but it is a good indicator.
#1 Jennifer Crusie (15 books)
#2 Kathy Reichs (14 books)
#3 Anne Rice (13 books)
#4 Jill Mansell (11 books)
#4 Marian Keyes (11 books)
#5 Michael Crichton (9 books)
Elyse wrote: "Nicole wrote: " I guess I could go back and fill in all the books I can think of that I've read, but that would be awfully time consuming..."Oh I have absolutely done that. lol. I did used to kee..."
The more I think about it, the more I want to do it. There are so many that I read ages ago that I wouldn't be able to give a fair rating to, because I don't remember enough details, but even if I just marked them as "Read," that would be enough to add them to my list. I may go in stages so that it's not so overwhelming. Maybe I'll start with books I remember reading as a child or teen, then work my way up through college, young adulthood, and then more recently.
Elyse wrote: "Nicole wrote: "Oh, I am in such big trouble reading through all these comments. I usually read some, but not a lot, just because I keep adding new books to my already enormous TBR list. Today, not only am I addin..."
teehee my To-Read shelf here is 12,000+...you're doing find at 1,300. lol!
Wow! That is a lot of books to read! I also add them as I see books that I want to read, whether I own them or not, but I haven't active on GR as long as you have, either. I may end up at 12,000+ eventually, too! I was actually thinking I need to go through mine while the list is still comparatively short (compared to yours and others) and try to narrow out the ones that I only added because they would fulfill a prompt from this year's challenge, and then I ended up reading a different book instead. There are also some I debated over adding or not, and I am sure if I went back through my list, I would be likely to take some of them off because I don't really think they sound that great after all. As with adding all my previously read books, though, that will be a time-consuming process.
I haven't read anything in the last week. *sigh* My book club is meeting on Wednesday and we're reading Atonement so I'm going to see if I can dig into that one. If I do, I'll use it for "takes place during the war."There are 9 prompts remaining for me in the regular challenge and I'm losing steam and focus.
Question of the Week
I'm confident the authors I've read the most of are romance writers. I've probably read 100 Nora Roberts' books. I didn't use Goodreads back when I was reading NR. I don't read much romance any more though.
On my Goodreads list, we have:
J.K. Rowling - 8
Neil Gaiman - 5
Jhumpa Lahiri - 4
So, I went in & added a lot of previously read books to my "Read" shelf & realized as I was thinking back to certain authors & series, I left a lot of people off of my list of authors that I just guessed on. Including authors I read as a child or teen, here is where I think I am now:Janet Evanovich (27)
Ann M. Martin (22)
Carol Higgins Clark, R.L. Stine (tied at 14)
J.K. Rowling (13)
P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast, Dean Koontz, Mary Higgins Clark (tied at 12)
Beverly Cleary (11)
Judy Blume, Marissa Meyer (tied at 6)
Sara wrote: "Oh, I forgot to mention that I compiled all of your 2018 prompt suggestions (and unsuggestions), and they have been sent to Tara from Popsugar. No way to predict how many of our suggestions may app..."Yay, great!! I bet it has an impact on what they choose, but we'll see.
It'll be interesting to see what they make of our list of things we don't want. I know there's no pleasing everyone, but I have to admit I'll be disappointed if it feels like they ignored our feedback.
Nicole wrote: "Elyse wrote: "Nicole wrote: " I guess I could go back and fill in all the books I can think of that I've read, but that would be awfully time consuming..."Oh I have absolutely done that. lol. I d..."
Whew that will be time-consuming. lol. If you do it, tackle a little at a time! I kind of add books will-nilly and get a lot of book-related emails. Plus I'm a free e-book addict (1,450) and NetGalley addict (424). lol. I'm a big YA fan so I basically add any new YA to the list as well. I add a lot of books that aren't released yet as well so I don't lose them. I know I will never read every book on the list but I have record of them for later!
Elyse wrote: "It's always fun to check this every once in awhile. Will take a lot to dethrone LKH. lol1. Laurell K. Hamilton - 35
2. Pittacus Lore - 24
2. David Eddings - 24
4. Jodi Picoult - 19
4. John Flanag..."
Ann M. Martin jumped up to 3rd place tie for 4 because I never added the BSC books I read! I got up to 13, I think. And I've read some of her California Diaries books.
Hi all,Forgot to do the check in! We are going away for the long weekend, in Canada it's Thanksgiving. So happy Thanksgiving to all the Canadians!!
I'm at 34/40 and 2/12.
Getting much closer to being done this challenge. I own a couple of the books I plan to read, so that helps. The others will come from my local library.
I needed a bit of a palate cleanser! I've read some dark, often depressing stuff this year. My mother-in-law gave me a stack of books! So I'm reading Blueprints. Pretty light, but it does have a darker tone for a romance/chick-lit.
QOTW:
Let's dig into the stats!
1. Emily Chase (34) - wrote the Girls of Canby Hall Series
2. Kathy Reichs (23)
3. Maeve Binchy (22)
4. Betsy Haynes (13) - wrote the Taffy Sinclair books!
5. Ian Rankin (12)
6. Nicholas Sparks (12)
Mod
Not gonna lie, I have purchased books exclusively for the cover. Luckily they sometimes turn out to be good books as well.
I have been in a bit of a reading slump the past few weeks and I'm stuck at 39/52 completed. I have so much going on lately at work and home that I am finding it hard to focus on a book for any length of time. I may need to swap out a few planned challenge books for a page turner to get back in the groove.QOTW: I don't read a ton of series so the number of books for my top read authors is relatively low:
1. J.K. Rowling 7
2. Wally Lamb 6
3. Shel Silverstein 5
4. Ken Follett 4
5. Steven D. Levitt 3
Hi, I'm Trina. New to the group, though not new to the challenge. I've finished two books in the last week, bringing me up to 42 read:A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet, which I didn't like a whole lot.
The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonder of Consciousness by Sy Montgomery was fascinating and a pleasure to read.
10 to go! I am working on Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy for my espionage thriller category. I've chosen all the other books remaining except for my used book sale one. I'll browse garage sales and secondhand shops once I've done everything else.
QotW:
1. Tamora Pierce: 17, I think?
2. Seanan McGuire/Mira Grant: 10 1/2 (started but didn't finish one)
3. J. K. Rowling: 10
4. L. M. Montgomery: 8
5. Jane Austen: 6
L. Frank Baum should be in there, but I have no idea how many Oz books I read when I was in elementary school in the 1980s.
Mod
A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet, which I didn't like a whole lot ..."
I expected that book to be great and I was so disappointed. It's a romance in which he kidnaps her and ties her up and no just no that's not funny and I'm not feeling the romance. I think I will eventually try to read the second book in the series, just to see if it got better.
Hi, Nadine. I read A Promise of Fire because the Vaginal Fantasy Book Club chose it as the book of the month to discuss this week. I would have finished reading it even if it wasn't for that, and I will probably read the next in the series, but I wasn't feeling it, either. The whole kidnapping and consent stuff was icky, and she annoyed me by being so melodramatic about pretending not to like him.
Nadine wrote: "Cornerofmadness wrote: "QOTW: I used to read single authors until I ran out of books, every book I could find in the bookstore - which was WaldenBooks back then, right? wasn't that the big mall store?) and there was a competitor ... Doubleday books? In the Northeast, the mall chains were Waldenbooks and Coles. Waldenbooks was sort of a precursor to Barnes & Noble in style, while Coles always seemed to be one step up from an iverstock outlet store for cheaper publishers. IMHO.
In Toronto, I remember Coles and WH Smith in the malls and then The World’s Biggest Bookstore downtown, which had twice the options at least.
Mod
I was in NJ and I don't remember a Coles in our malls; back in the 70s/80s the chain stores were all in the malls, the only standalone stores were tiny individual local bookstores (and my town DID NOT HAVE ONE! SOB!!!!)
(but we did have a delightful used book store, one of those tiny shops in a strip mall that was just packed with stacks of books that had overflowed from shelves)
I almost sobbed, WH Smith, one of my all time favourite bookstores. Coles, also good, but WH Smith has a special place in my heart!!!
I remember Waldenbooks, B. Dalton and Crown Books.
Mod
Still have 5 categories to read to complete both challenges, so close but so far!!Challenge total:
38/40 + 9/12 = 47/52
I did manage to finish another book this week but sadly it did not fit into any of my remaining challenge categories.
Completed:
I Let You Go - great paced suspense with few twists and turns I didn't anticipate.
Rating: 5 stars
Currently reading:
Making slow progress with Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on Audible, with 8.5hours remaining so about 2/3 of way through.
Enjoying the October group read of The Bear and the Nightingale and 200 pages into the book. Excited to see a sequel in this Winternight Trilogy with a 5 December release date for The Girl in the Tower!
With always wanting to try new authors, I have to really enjoy the book and looking back through my lists to see my most read authors, I wasn't surprised to see relatively low totals:
1. Peter James - 6
2. Jo Nesbo - 5
3. Helen Garner - 4
3. Tess Gerritsen - 4
4. Rachel Abbott - 3
4. Mark Billingham - 3
4. Graham Masterton - 3
7. J.K.Rowling - 3
Hi. I'm Jessica. I'm brand new to this group. I fully anticipate completing the challenge in 2018 and I will try to knock a couple out before the end of the year.I just finished reading Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo which covers the first book in a series I haven't read before prompt.
I intend to start The People We Hate at the Wedding by [author:Grant Ginder|
I do not follow authors often. Most of the authors on my list are from series.
1 Neal Shusterman 7
1 J.K. Rowling 7
3 Melissa de la Cruz 5
3 James Patterson 5
5 Ann Brashares 4
5 Jaclyn Moriarty 4
This week I finished the Advanced Challenge, which means I am officially done with both challenges! My last book was Pledged: The Secret Life of Sororities, and it was my "book you got at a used book sale."My Top Authors are:
Charlaine Harris (13)
Linwood Barclay (8)
Jennifer McMahon (7)
John Green, Marissa Meyer, and Jodi Picoult (6)
I know Jodi Picoult should be higher, because I have read everything she has written, but I don’t have her marked off on Goodreads, because I only include the books I’ve read since I started using Goodreads.
I finished two books for this check-in period (neither fit a prompt):* The Widow's Guide to Sex and Dating, and
* Good as Gone.
Both books were included in the mystery box of books I won over the summer from a local NYT best-selling author. Both were mysteries in their own ways. The first was the only non-mystery in the box. But once I realized the author had been on the Real Housewives of NY, the mystery was solved because the author who sent me the box is a huge RHONY fan. The second book was an ARC that had no title -- it just had a placeholder on the front: "A Novel of Suspense." I tracked the actual title down by searching by ISBN when I added it to my "to read" Goodreads list :)
I came close to finishing Seabiscuit: An American Legend before the end of the check-in period, but didn't finish it until yesterday. I'm using it for the final advanced prompt that I needed to complete: A book you got from a used book sale. I picked up a copy at a sale at my local library since it had been on my "want to read" list for ages. This means I'm 12/12 of that part of the challenge! :-D
I started reading these three after I finished Seabiscuit: An American Legend:
* Memoirs of a Polar Bear (to be used for "A book from a nonhuman perspective");
* Why Not Me? (for this month's book club pick -- it was my recommendation :)); and,
* Exposed (since it was on the 7-day express display at my library and I've enjoyed this legal thriller series by Lisa Scottoline).
Overall, I'm doing well with my challenge list! I just need to complete four more books and have titles in mind for three of them. The one I'm putting off is "A book you bought on a trip." I don't typically buy non-coffee-table-type books when I travel or already read the books I bought and didn't really want to re-read something just to check off the prompt, so I'm really struggling with this one. I think I'm just going to expand my definition of "trip" to include a trip to my parents and use a book that I picked up at a local indie mystery bookstore near their place. They live pretty close to me, so I haven't been counting visits to their place as "trips," but I think that's the only way I'm going to check that prompt off before the end of the year.
QotW:
When I checked my most read authors list, I wasn't surprised by the ones at the top. However, when I took a closer look at the full list, I realized my list is slightly off because I haven't tracked every book I've ever read by several of the authors who appear on my list. I didn't go back and add books I'd completed prior to joining Goodreads for several of them -- J.K. Rowling and Barbara Kingsolver jumped out in particular. I also noticed that some of my fave authors aren't ranked higher simply because they haven't published more yet, but I've read all of their novels -- Tana French, Allison Leotta, and Shamini Flint fall into that category.
Here's who's listed at the top on my Goodreads most read authors list:
1. Sujata Massey (15)
2. Laura Lippman (14)
2. Charles Todd (14)
4. Louise Penny (13)
5. Janet Evanovich (10)
5. Colin Cotterill (10)
5. Jasper Fforde (10)
Theresa wrote: "Nadine wrote: "Cornerofmadness wrote: "QOTW: I used to read single authors until I ran out of books, every book I could find in the bookstore - which was WaldenBooks back then, right? wasn't that t..."Waldenbooks, Little Professor's and B. Dalton's were the in-mall ones in the Pittsburgh area back then. I worked for Waldens (which was a Borders books affliate)
this week I finished only one book
Fool Me Once that I used for the advanced list "best seller from 2016"I gave up on a book, which I hate doing, because the story was just too contrived and unbelievable. It would have been for "book bought at a used book store/sale". The Secret Wedding was not worth the quarter I paid for it. I picked up another book from the used books for sale room at my library next time I'm there.
I am in the middle of two books.
The Iron Wyrm Affair for "steampunk book"and
Guest of the Revolution for "book mentioned in another book"of the 52 categories between the regular and advanced list I have now read 45. Very much on on track.
QOTW
I only check read on goodreads after the first read of a book so I can't check it that way. But I would have to say that Jim Butcher, specifically the Dresden Files, are my most read books. They are old friends that I love to visit and whenever a new book in the series is due out, I re-read the whole series.
Next would probably be JD Robb because of the sheer number of books in the "In Death" series, of which I've only managed to read half so far.
And after that would probably be a tie between Amanda Quick and Sabrina Jefferies.
Cornerofmadness wrote: "Theresa wrote: "Nadine wrote: "Cornerofmadness wrote: "QOTW: I used to read single authors until I ran out of books, every book I could find in the bookstore - which was WaldenBooks back then, righ..."I find it sad that malls no longer have bookstores. they were like my treat for having to be in a mall in the first place.
How bizarre lol I haven't been in any malls in my memory that didn't have a bookstore. There's a Coles in my local mall in my small town in rural Nova Scotia lol
Of the malls I can think of around here, two have B&N, one has Amazon Books, the outlet mall has Book Warehouse, one has a branch of the library and one has nothing but is walking distance from Powell's City of Books.
Here in Colorado I find that the Barnes and Noble is not in the malls but is usually a stand alone store right near them. Back home in Toronto malls usually have an Indigo Books or a Chapters.
Now that I see where people are finishing their most read authors, I was right that if I included manga, the numbers would skew. Here they areTite Kubo 59
Hiromu Arakawa 32
Hiro Mashima 24
Hajime Isayama 23
Yana Toboso 23
Katsura Hoshino 21
Jim Butcher 19
Nozomu Tamaki 17
Kazue Kato 17
Kentaro Yabuki 15
Kaori Yuki 14
Adachitoka 13
Dean Koontz 13
Maki Murakami 13
Atsushi Ohkubo 12
C.S. Harris 11
J.D. Robb 11
Shirow Miwa 11
Shiho Inada 11
Jacqueline Winspear 11
Peach-Pit 11
Bisco Hatori 11
Indigo owns chapters and Coles. Those are the only 3 we have around here but there's one in or near every mall, sometimes both.
I remember back when Indigo had only a few stores and their own cafes , rather than Starbucks. I went to university in Kingston and I used to study in their cafe almost daily. I still spend a lot of time in them when I’m back in Canada visiting my parents - I used to wait at the Indigo in Yorkdale for my mom to get off work and then catch a ride with her out to the small town I grew up in. Though I’m sure the fact that they have such a monopoly on bookstores in Canada is controversial, I only have pleasant memories of them.
We got our first snowfall of the season today, but it's already mostly melted off. That's pretty normal for Northern Colorado, though this is a few weeks earlier than usual. Last week I read The Ballad of Black Tom, which is a new take on an old H.P. Lovecraft story. This week I read the HPL story, The Horror at Red Hook, and it was pretty awful, but I can see why it was of interest to a modern author of color. Victor LaValle tackled HPL's obvious racism and xenophobia head-on, and while he maintained the 1920s Brooklyn setting, the parallels to today's world were frighteningly clear.
I have two prompts that I'm struggling with. I have a book picked out for the "month or day of the week name in the title" prompt -- Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream -- and it fits several other challenges I'm doing, so I don't really want to change it, but it fails to excite me. I started it a few years ago for a book club, and I thought it was interesting and well done, but when I set it down, it was just very easy to leave it and pick up something else. Then I'm not sure what to read for the "lifespan of a character" prompt. When I looked at the prompt thread here, the only titles that sounded intriguing to me were ones that came with caveats that they *almost* fit the prompt. So right now I'm hoping that something I read for a book club or some other challenge just happens to fulfill that prompt.
QotW:
I didn't think it would be all that accurate to use the Goodreads tool for this, since I have only a small fraction of my reading listed here, but it showed Agatha Christie for my most read author by a wide margin, and I'm sure that's right. I started reading her work when I was in elementary school, and I've read almost everything she ever wrote at least once. Right now I am anxiously awaiting delivery of pre-publication manuscripts of several obscure plays she wrote. I keep reminding myself they're probably obscure for very good reasons, but I'm still excited to read them.
Looking over the rest of the list, I see a few strong contenders for 2nd place: Sue Grafton, Judy Blume, Lawrence Block, Dorothy L. Sayers.... I'm guessing Grafton wins, as I am up to U in her Kinsey Millhone series. Or maybe Lilian Jackson Braun. I'm not sure how many Cat Who books I'd read when I gave up on her ghostwriter.
Jackie wrote: "... My most read authors: Agatha Christie with 41! Not that surprising considering she's easily my favorite author. My goal is to read her entire bibliography. ..."
Me too! I'm trying to go more or less in publication order, including original publications of short stories. Figuring this out is turning out to be quite the puzzle of its own. Elena Santangelo's Dame Agatha's Shorts is probably the single most helpful resource I've found so far, but there's been a lot of new info popping up since that came out. I hope Elena does a new edition in the not-too-distant future.
Hey guys,Got one book done this week so I'm still a book behind at 39/52 (30/40 and 9/12). I'm determined to get caught up before this Thursday!
I read The Expats for an espionage thriller. It wasn't bad but didn't seem like too much espionage if you're looking for one that isn't too heavy.
I'm going to reread the Harry Potter books for 7 of my remaining prompts so I'm trying to tick off the remaining 6 before I start all those but struggling trying to find a steampunk and holiday other than Christmas.
Anyone have any issues with Overdrive lately? Two of the holds I've had recently have changed to say I'm now #0 on 0 copies. I'm pretty new to Overdrive, does that mean that my library no longer has the ebook? Is it worth it to continue waiting?
QOTW:
Favorite authors, although skewed because I haven't added many of my books before GR (like harry potter):
1. Stephen King - 41
2. Veronica Roth - 8
3. Richard Bachman - 6
4. E.L. James - 4
4. James Dashner - 4
6. Ransom Riggs - 3
6. Mira Grant - 3
6. Suzanne Collins - 3
Mod
Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge
Books mentioned in this topic
The Nightingale (other topics)The Land of Painted Caves: Library Edition (other topics)
Me Before You (other topics)
The Namesake (other topics)
The Nightingale (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Lilian Jackson Braun (other topics)Agatha Christie (other topics)
Sue Grafton (other topics)
Judy Blume (other topics)
H.P. Lovecraft (other topics)
More...
39 / 40 novels & 39 / 40 graphic novels
5 / 12 extended novels & 6 / 12 extended graphic novels
With all my challenges combined: 115/134
I will definitely finish the regular challenge, not sure about the extended one as work gets busier this month.
This week I finished
- The Friday Night Knitting Club (day of the week in the title)
- The Invisible Library (bought on a trip*)
- reMIND: Volume 1 (comic recommended by a librarian) – it also has a cat on the cover
*Note: I didn’t technically buy The Invisible Library, but I got an ARC copy at Emerald City Comic Con, which I paid to attend, so I am counting that.
In progress
- Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology Are Revolutionizing an Art Form (Read Harder prompt) – I’m reading a chapter every so often.
- Outlander (more than 800 page) – I’m listening to the audiobook when I have a long drive.
- The Inhabited Woman (used book sale) – slow going
I picked the Inhabited Woman because it fits a very specific Read Harder Challenge prompt and I stumbled on a used copy, which fit the extended prompt for this challenge. I don’t dislike it, but I don’t seem to be particularly excited about it either. I put it on hold while I read my last couple of books. Now I am trying to figure out if I want to reconfigure my lists and read another book instead.
In the meantime...
Just today Kazuo IshiguroKazuo Ishiguro was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature. I was already planning to read The Remains of the Day for the book with an unreliable narrator prompt, so I will probably start that tonight. That is book #40 of the main challenge for me.
QOTW:
My top 3 Good Reads authors seems pretty spot on for recent years:
1. Neil Gaiman
2. Brian K. Vaughan
3. William Shakespeare
3. Seanan McGuire
5. Joss Whedon
Comics are going to skew this list as I originally used Good Reads only to track my comic reading and comic writers are a very prolific lot. Lately have I added other books.
For 2017 my top authors are:
-Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples (7)
- Seanan McGuire (5)
- Noelle Stevenson (4)
- Roxane Gay (3)
- MariNaomiMariNaomi (3)
- John LewisJohn Lewis, Andrew AydinAndrew Aydin, & Nate PowellNate Powell (3)
Roxane Gay conveniently published 3 books this year that all fit reading challenge prompts. MariNaomi was a find from this year's Emerald City Comic Con and I really enjoyed reading her work, which also fit 3 reading prompts. I'm not sure how much writing Noelle Stevenson did on Lumberjane's vol. 2-4. That book is a team effort and she is one of the creators. (Doesn't mean I don't adore her. I listened to the audio book of Nimona for the challenge.) I got my comic book reading group to read March: Book One and I finished the trilogy, such great use of the comic medium to tell John Lewis' story of his part in the civil rights movement. Ultimately, a Saga re-read tops the number of per author books read this year.
Although...Tuesday was my birthday & I treated myself with a trip to the bookstore for the latest Seanan McGuire book in the October Daye series, The Brightest Fell. The plan is to read this after I finish my 2017 reading challenge. My kittens (October & Raj) are both named after characters from the series, so I might breakdown and read this soon. Which might, in turn, get me started reading some of her other short stories in the series. So Brian K. Vaughan may be unseated before the year ends.