Tag: Reading

The Classics Club

The Classics Club: One Year Check-In

Geoff W

I was really hoping to time my one year check-in for The Classics Club for the exact date, but that just didn’t work out. I forgot I’d joined as early as I did. (I may have joined a little later, but I’ve set my end date as March 8, 2012.)

I’ve really enjoyed participating in the club and even though I’m right on track 20/100 books read I am starting to wonder if I can keep up the pace for the next four years. I managed to squeeze in with my twentieth novel this month (thus the late post), so I’m right on schedule, but long-term I’m not sure if I want to continue to dedicate a third of my reading to Classics. Who knows though, mostly I’ve only read older classics, maybe it’s time I take a break and read some of the newer classics from my list or re-read a few favorites? Any one else go through this sort of thing already?

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Updates

February 2013 Recap

Geoff W

2013 02-24 Snowy NightThis month flew by! I can’t believe how fast the month went and that it’s already March! The coolest thing this month was experiencing my very first BLIZZARD! If you want to see an awesome post with the dogs I live with click here. We’ve gotten a lot of snow off and on this month, but still not as much as the winter of 2010/11. To the right is a lovely picture I took Sunday night (Feb 24). Most of the snow is now gone after two solid days of rain.

On a random note I’ve made a couple of changes to my blog. I’ve added a few different ways of looking at the books I’ve read in the past. It’s no longer just by year, but you can now see by author and by series. I hope they are helpful to you, the readers, but mostly they’re there for me (assuming I remember to keep them updated).

In addition I realized when an author contacted me yesterday that I’ve had some pretty cool things happen since I started this blog so I created a sort of YAY ME! page which you can see here. I’ve called it ‘They Like Me, They Really Like Me!’ from that infamous Sally Field’s Oscar acceptance speech. I’m sure there are things missing, like my first ARC, and I hope there are more to come, but I thought it was kind of neat looking back. It’s amazing how social media has leveled the playing field between authors and readers.

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Meme, The Classics Club

The Classics Club – February 2013 Meme

Geoff W

For February the hosts of The Classics Club have asked What Classic has most surprised you so far and why?

And I’m not sure if it’s just the books I’ve read or the questions themselves, but I constantly seem to be going back to the same book to answer these questions. I’m glad I checked to see what the next few questions were or I would probably have given up on the monthly memes after this month.

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Updates

January 2013 Recap

Geoff W

Well I’m not sure how January was for the rest of you, but it flew by for me! I’m still trying to figure out where the month went! Not much to look forward to in February—it’s back to Single’s Awareness Day for me this year. I’m sure I’ll get plenty of books read and probably steer clear of romance novels for the month.

I hit my three-month anniversary at my new job and I’m glad to say I’m still loving it! Going into a busy period coming up, so fingers crossed all continues to go well. There were some major ups and downs in my personal life, but you know that’s how life is, so I’m just moving forward and making myself better as I can.

2013 01-22 Books from my SisterRecent Acquisitions
So I didn’t stick 100% to my no books rule, but I did REALLY well! I didn’t spend any of my money (all gift cards) and only purchased THREE books and they were all less than $3 because they were Kindle Daily Deals! (If you remember my two cop-outs were Kindle Daily Deals and Booker Prize winning novels for really cheap, and one of the three qualifies for both!) I purchased The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, 11/22/63 by Stephen King and The Siege of Krishnapur by JG Farrell. In addition my sister bought me the three books in the picture above because she had money left over after selling text books 😀

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Meme, The Classics Club

The Classics Club – January 2013 Meme

Geoff W

For January the hosts of The Classics Club have asked a relatively simple question, What is the best book you’ve read so far for The Classics Club—and why?, which I’ve already answered here (Go, Anne Brontë! Go!). So I will be doing part two, Or, if you prefer, what is your least favorite read so far for the club, and why?

My first thoughts were that I really wished there were a simple answer, like that I had a burning passionate hate against one book, but I don’t really. As with most books, I have found something to enjoy and something that’s not quite how I would like it. However, the more I thought about it, one did come to mind. You might think it’s Dickens, who I feel needed a good editor – TOO much in the middles, or you might think it was one of the Russians, but no not them either. It was the lovely local Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The House of the Seven Gables.

I mean, I said it in the first sentence of my response to the book: “Very long review short: I didn’t like this book.” You can go there to read my response if you’re actually interested in it. Just suffice to say I had issues with just about everything in the book and I definitely don’t remember The Scarlett Letter being that difficult and I read that in high school – when I HATED reading anything I didn’t want to read.

Hopefully there aren’t many more than can knock this out of the bottom slot, because if there are it is going to be a long four-and-a-half more years to go in my conquest of (some of) the Classics.