WWW Wednesday 6/17/2015

In interesting, nerdy news this week, I figured out that if I were to read one Boxall book every week, it will take me 17.5 more years to read it. A long time, but doable. I don’t think I’ll be dead by then…hopefully.

What are you currently reading? The Quest by Frederik van Eeden For Study:  The Ramayana by Ramesh Menon   What did you just finish reading? The Empty Family by Colm Toibin (Review Today) The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell   What do you think you’ll read next? Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte The Appeal by John Grisham Swerve by Vicki Pettersson (Also picking up library books tonight or tomorrow so…you know this always changes.)

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M is for Mystery

R loves John Grisham so much we have an entire shelf of them. Every time we go to a book sale, he picks a new one up, one he doesn’t have. I’ve made sure to catalog them all on my Goodreads app–so he knows which ones are already on our shelves.

I’ve read one or two, the rest are on my TBR list. They all stand stoically in a row together–no way I’m moving them over to my actual TBR shelf…there’s just too many!

Technically, I think they are classed as “Legal Thrillers,” instead of mystery, but close enough to count!

Read This Month

I can’t believe tomorrow is already October. We’ve been in Dallas a month and a half, and things are finally starting to cool down. Or…at least as much as Texas cools. The State Fair just opened up, and my lucky husband gets to take a work trip over there today. I’m so jealous! Hopefully we can make it over there soon.

I read a ton of books great books this month. Now that I’ve set a schedule for myself, I’m getting quite a variety again. And I’m allowing myself to ditch books if they aren’t up to par, which I had stopped doing at one point. Gotta stop wasting time. Some books just aren’t blog-worthy.

(Which, on that point. Aaron’s Rod is on the list below, but I’m not going to do a post about it. I got about 65% through it before I had to give it up. Far enough to count it as “read” but I’m not going to bore you guys with a terrible post. Not DH Lawrence’s best work, let’s leave it at that.)

And now, the books!

 

Read this month:

Throne of Glass by Sarah Mass

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by JK Rowling

Justine by Lawrence Durrell

The Innocent Man by John Grisham

The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by JK Rowling

Atlantia by Ally Condie

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman

The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco (which didn’t make it onto the list in the picture…oops!)

Bird Box by Josh Malerman

Aaron’s Rod by DH Lawrence

WWW Wednesday 9/10/2014

 

 

What are you currently reading?

The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs

 

What did you just finish reading?

Justine by Lawrence Durrell

The Innocent Man by John Grisham

Throne of Glass by Sarah Maas

 

What do you think you’ll read next?

Harry Potter 3 by JK Rowling

Winter’s Tale by Mark Helprin

The Protector by Gennita Low

 

The Innocent Man

My husband has about a bazillion John Grisham books, so they make their way into my TBR list every now and then. I had expected fiction when The Innocent Man appeared next on the list, but nope. This was nonfiction.

And the fact that this is a true story just royally pisses me off.

This is a story about two men, actually, who were tried AND CONVICTED, for a murder they did not commit. One was sentenced to life in prison, and the other, a man who was severely mentally ill, sentenced to the death penalty.

That’s horrible in itself, but that’s not even what made me so angry. Just the horrendous treatment of Ron, the abuse, the neglect. All of it. You have this bipolar, schizophrenic man in need of daily monitoring and he is repeatedly left to his own devices and constantly broken down and ridiculed. Grisham points out in almost every chapter where Ron will stop taking his medicine because he’s depressed or doesn’t understand what the medicine does (which is a symptom of his disease). And then he was in prison, the absolute abuse from the guards who knew how to push his buttons and make him collapse into a psychotic mess. Ugh. I just wanted to scream for someone to help him.

As far as writing style goes, I wasn’t a big fan. This was very reportish, not so much a story. There wasn’t much dialogue or live action, it was all very journalistic. Obviously I had very strong opinions about what I was reading, but it was a very boring read really. Also, Grisham kept going off on tangents about other cases and people out of nowhere. Unless you have a strong law background, those aren’t going to make a lot of sense.

This is probably a 2 star book for me. I have strong feelings about Ron for a few different reasons, but I didn’t really enjoy the book itself at all.

 

Introduce Yourself

Good morning everyone!

Today kicks off the Books & Cupcakes September Photo Challenge! Most of these posts will be book related, but her first challenge was “Introduce Yourself.”

So, here goes. This took several rough drafts…I’m basically the world’s worst selfie taker lol.

Who am I?

There’s so many directions I could take this post in. The basics:  27, married, living in Dallas at the moment.

In m head, I’m a leather wearing rockstar cowgirl. But in reality, I’m more of a hufflepuff-tshirt yoga pants wearing bookworm. Both are good, I think. I love coffee, but I can only have decaf, sigh. Beer and wine are my passion. I love excellently prepared food, but most of the time I am happiest eating a simple plate of meat and cheese, some chewy bread, maybe some oil for dipping. I love fashion…on other people. I have a hard time buying things for myself or taking the time to get into complicated outfits. I’m much more comfortable in jeans and a tshirt.

My husband is my best friend, and and we have a blast together. He’s about as big of a movie buff as I am a bookworm, so our walls are filled with shelves (although my bookshelves are probably half full of his John Grishams and Stephen Kings, so he does read too). It’s his job that required us to move, and will probably move us again, more than once. It gives us a chance to travel around and explore new places, which is great for us!

If you haven’t figured it out already…I read everything. There’s not much that is off limits. I really haven’t even touched the limits of my electicness on the blog, because I’ve been reading so much YA and fantasty lately. Trust me…I have a LOT of crazy things on my list. There’s nothing linear about me. I’m maybe a little bit nuts.

Oh. I also collect pigs. Wanna see?

 

Yep, I’m a dork. I have a few more floating around, but that’s the majority of them.

So, that’s me in a nutshell. Time to get working…I have a LOT to get done today!

TBR Pile

Even though I love my Kindle, it will never be a replacement for real books. I love going in and pulling books off my shelves, and there is nothing better than reorganizing those shelves. I’m quite anal about books–everything MUST be in alphabetical order. However, now that I’ve seen how other bloggers sort their shelves, I have been thinking about reconfiguring some of mine. That may be a project after we move in August…OH YEAH…you don’t know yet. WE ARE MOVING TO DALLAS!!!!!!!! Which means I get to unpack all my books, which I’ll be honest, is my favorite thing about moving. Expect lots of blogging that day.

I did create a To Be Read shelf the other day. I had so many I couldn’t fit them all! Guess I better get to readin’. Here’s everything that’s on that shelf, plus a few.

 

This pile doesn’t include all the “husband” books that I haven’t read. That list includes basically all of John Grisham’s collection, a good portion of Stephen King’s, and most of Tom Clancy’s too. He has a bunch of sports and political books, but I don’t care so much about those.

I also took a Book Haul picture for May. I was surprised at how big this stack was. Don’t get used to this…or maybe you should! I would like this trend to continue, but we’ll see. I would like to keep increasing my collection, but I’m also not the type of person to spend money on myself either.

 

I can’t wait to read all of these! That Raymond Chandler book is gorgeous. The cover is sort of a squishy leather, and the pages are lined in silver. The ribbon is a little frayed, but other wise it’s in fantastic condition.

Yay books! What did you pick up this month that you are looking forward to reading?

Favorite Last Line

It was really good to spend some time with my book collection on Saturday. And yes, I really did go through every single one to find my favorite First Line, Dedication, and Last Line. I even reorganized my shelves to make room for the new ones I’ve recently acquired. I pulled out the books I haven’t read yet  and gave those a shelf of their own. I did leave the multitudes of John Grisham, Tom Clancy, and Stephen King, along with several sports and political books, that belong to my husband. Those may get read eventually, but they are not high on my To Read list for now. OK…I do want to read the Stephen Kings. But those pretty much have a shelf of their own as it is!

I had a few contenders to this category at first. And then I got to Thomas Harris. And he just wins everything. When it comes to shock factor, creep factor, and just down right leaving an impression, you really just can’t beat Thomas Harris.

And that’s really the whole point of a last line, right? Especially when there’s going to be another book. Look at this. *shudder*

 

 

After I read that, all the other pictures I had taken of last lines got deleted. If watching Hannibal hadn’t made me want to go back and reread the trilogy…that last line did. Man, oh, Man, Mr. Harris. You give me nightmares, in the absolute best way possible. (Is that weird? That might be a bit weird…)