75 Books...More or Less! discussion
Archive (2010 Completed)
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Stacie's 75 New Reads for 2010
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Yeah, I'm with Andrea, if it is a book and you read it this year, whether a re-read or not...count it! =) You are soooo close!!!!
Joy wrote: "Yeah, I'm with Andrea, if it is a book and you read it this year, whether a re-read or not...count it! =) You are soooo close!!!!"Thanks for the support guys :) I am keeping track of my re-reads too, but I just set a challenge for myself to read 75 books that were new (to me, anyway) this year. Last year I did a lot of re-reading ('comfort reading') but still added tons to my TBR pile. The idea was that challenging myself to 75 first-time reads would help get my TBR pile under some semblance of control... and no, that's not exactly how things worked out, LOL! Almost all of my reads this year were new additions to my TBR pile... so while said pile didn't grow too much this year, it certainly didn't shrink any. Thank God for my Nook... at least now I'm not in danger of being crushed by my books if there's an earthquake ;p
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I, to have a bad case of "additis" I think I did ok on the skimming down on my TBR shelf, but I also added and pulled from the library as well...oops...
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71. The Witches- Roald Dahl (My favorite so far of Dahl's books, though I've by no means come close to reading all of them. This is cute and sweet- well, as far as those terms can be applied to Dahl's wonderful brand of twistedness, lol- with a surprising amount of action. Oh, and the illustrations (by Quentin Blake) in my version are perfect!)208pp
72. Packing For Mars- Mary Roach (I laughed so hard I'm sure people must have thought I was crazy. We're not talking 'chuckles' or 'titters' or 'giggles'... we're talking full on 'belly laughs'... 'gales' of barking laughter... 'put the book down for several minutes because I'm laughing too hard to read' laughter. Roach deftly shows that the line between brilliance and absurdity is very fine indeed- if it exists at all- and she manages to do it in an affectionate and entertaining way.) 336pp
73. Full Dark, No Stars- Stephen King (Good, but not my favorite collection by him. The 'monsters' in these four stories are of the human variety, and so more viscerally horrifying than vampires or evil aliens... but since the 'human monsters' are also for the most part the main characters it was kind of hard to invest myself in them. I finished the collection feeling slightly... dissatisfied.) 368pp
74. The Modern Scholar: Astronomy 1- James Kaler (I really wanted to like this. I love learning new things so this should have been right up my alley... but good Lord...! There was just so much math! I'm not talking complex formulas or equations or such... just basic principles... but there's a reason I studied English in College. Math and I are not friends! Getting through this felt like running a marathon... with my knees tied together. Yes, I did come out knowing more about astronomy than I did when I started, but nowhere near as much as the material covered... so much of it went right over my head. This was an audio format and it was incredibly difficult for me to follow without any visual aides. Some of the problem might have been that I kept falling asleep, though. I'm counting this, even though I didn't really understand about a third of it, because it was so hard fought... but I don't feel qualified to review or assign a rating to it. I will say that all the parts that dealt with history and cultural significance were fascinating- and I really wish there had been more of them ;p)7hr 46min
75. Monster Island- David Wellington (I'm having a hard time coming up with a review for this one. On the one hand, it really isn't that good... it contradicts itself all over the place, there are plot holes large enough to drive a shambling zombie army through, and the characters are either two dimensional or unbelievable. On the other hand, I still liked it. It was fast paced and fun... or at least most of it. When his zombies stopped acting like zombies they lost what made them so horrifying and became kind of 'ho-hum'.)288pp
76. Stories Behind the Best-Loved Christmas Songs- Ace Collins (This was a free offering from Barnes and Nobles so I shouldn't complain too much. Still, if I'd known it was going to be a thinly veiled evangelical platform with no sources to back up it's historical claims, and several elementary errors that cast suspicion on every conclusion I wouldn't have wasted my time.)154pp
77. Embroidery: Or, the Craft of the Needle- W.G. Paulson Townsend (The plates and descriptions of embroidery pieces make this book were well worth the time... provided that you are interested in embroidery and can look past the fact that since it was written in 1907 the author has some pretty condescending opinions of the 'fairer sex'. I found it interesting but I think it wouldn't hold much appeal appeal for anyone not really interested in historical embroidery.) 338pp
78. Pandora's Seed- Spencer Wells (This started out well but fell apart. The last third of the book is disjointed- and the soapbox is very pronounced- and nothing actually ties together. By the time I got to the end I was just grateful that it was over.)256pp
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No worries! Thanks for the congrats :) I may be able to finish one more before year's end but I'm pretty satisfied with my total for this year. Not as many as last year (even factoring in my re-reads), but most of what I read this year was good... or at least was good enough that it was worth the time I spent reading it, LOL! I think that with next year's double challenge I'll actually break the 100 book mark- something I haven't done since I got out of High School.
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...And the last one of the year is...79. The History of the Medieval World- Susan Wise Bauer (I really liked that this book covered more than the European medieval world... Bauer covers China, India, Arabia, Korea... even a little bit on Mayan and Aztec Mexico. I also liked that, since I listened to the audiobook, I didn't have to try to figure out how all the names should be pronounced!)
22 hrs. 45 mins.
13hr, 31min