Category: Personal Project

30x30, Personal Project

30 x 30: #15 Finish reading Harry Potter y la Piedra Filosofal

Geoff W

2014 08-27 Harry Potter en Español!I did it! And now there are only two items left on my list, both of which will end/happen on my birthday! I bought this book when I was still taking Spanish classes regularly and was like oh what a great way to test myself. (I think I have a copy of Roald Dahl’s Matilda floating around in Spanish too somewhere.) And I’ve finally read it.

I’ve tried multiple times in the past to read it and gave up within the first few chapters and I almost did this time too. I started it back in August read two chapters and promptly stopped again. I was trying to look up every single word I didn’t know or recognize and took me a couple of hours for the first chapter (less than 15 pages) and I got super discouraged. So I let the book sit on my bedside table for almost four months and when I got to the final five items on my list I knew I needed to seriously get to it, especially as I’d completed my re-read of the Lord of the Rings.

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30x30, Books

Book 320: Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal – J.K. Rowling

Geoff W

[Check out my more recent re-read of the first Harry Potter book from July 2018.]

I’ve had a copy of this book on my bookshelf since undergrad. I bought it when I was still taking Spanish classes and could probably have read it a hell-of-a-lot easier back then that now, but I never made it past the first few chapters no matter how many times I tried. This time, with my 30th birthday looming and it being one of the final three items on my 30×30 list I pushed through and finished it!

I’ll talk more about reading it in Spanish in my 30×30 item post, this is just a recap of the story. This is the second time I’ve read the first Harry Potter book while blogging, the first was back in July 2012. And as with every time I re-read the first novel in the series I’m amazed at how much world-building (adapting) Rowling does in such a short novel. Sure she spreads it out over the first few, but introducing so may ideas and people within such a short span AND telling a story wow.

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30x30, Personal Project

30 x 30: #17 – Finish Pride and Prejudice fan-fiction novel

Geoff W

2014 12-10 Darcy's Dream PreviewSo the beauty about this being my 30×30 list is that I get to determine when an item is done. As I said at the beginning of the month, when I posted about NaNoWriMo I planned on calling this one complete even if I didn’t finish it completely. And I am going to call Finish my Pride and Prejudice fan-fiction novel my 28th completed list item leaving my tattoo and finishing Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal as my final two items!

The novel originally started out as a joint project between my friend Caroline and I, but due to creative differences, AKA she wanted to write an erotica novel and I wanted to write a romance novel, it became my project. The book is tentatively titled Darcy’s Dream and I’ve reached my unofficial goal of 25,000 words. I originally thought it would be enough for the story, a novella if you will, but I’m a little over what I think is halfway through the story I want to tell. If you zoom in on the picture you can get a brief preview of it but keep in mind it hasn’t been edited and only two people have read it since I wrote that portion a few months ago! (I haven’t even gone back to read it yet.)

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30x30, Personal Project

30 x 30: #13 – Re-read The Lord of the Rings

Geoff W

2014 12-09 LotR Cover ShootIt took me a lot longer to write this recap than any of the others because I’ve been so busy living life. One of the things I really wanted my 30×30 list to do was to restart my excitement for life and the little things and it’s done exactly that! At the same time I’m also glad I waited as I got to add the cool picture below to this post!

I added this to my list because let’s face it I needed to re-read it. The last time I read it was in high school just before Peter Jackson’s trilogy was released. I read them quickly and didn’t really take them in (I was still in my “I only read Star Wars novels.” phase. I remember the second book being such a struggle because it felt like it took SO long to read. It did take me a month to read, but looking back there’s no telling what that reason was. This time, however, I flew through all four of them in less than a month and I read books between the them! You can read my reviews of the books:
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30x30, Books, Quotes

Book 319: The Return of the King (LOTR #3) – J.R.R. Tolkien

Geoff W

With this book, and my previous reading of The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, I’m one step closer to finishing my 30×30 list. What better way to start off my response than with Treebeard/Fangorn’s words to Galadriel: “It is sad that we should meet only thus at the ending. For the world is changing: i feel it in the water, I feel it in the earth, and I smell it in the air. I do not think we shall meet again.” (290)

It’s so true though! What a sad, beautiful and perfect ending to this epic novel (apparently it’s counted as one in a lot of lists). I mean I knew it was great and I remembered a lot of it, but nowhere near as much as was included in the book. I even read Appendix A which gave the brief history of the race of men and Gimli’s heritage which was excellent to learn more about them. I didn’t go into the other appendices as they were a bit too technical for my liking, but I did seriously consider buying a few more Tolkien Middle-earth books when I saw them at the used bookstores last weekend and I may yet!

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