Sunday Salon: Readathon Redux

I spent yesterday participating in the 24-hour readathon, hosted by Dewey at The Hidden Side of the Leaf. Having finally gotten some sleep, I can say that the day was a tremendous amount of fun. I loved hearing what everyone was reading, how they were doing, and knowing that I was doing the same thing as lots of other bloggers around the world. It was also nice because for once I didn't feel guilty about spending hours and hours reading. I also had the opportunity to be reader of the hour around 7pm, which was awesome, because tons of people visited my blog. Since I didn't get around to charting my final progress last night, I figured I'd do that today. So, here's how I did:

Books Finished:

Douglas Coupland, All Families Are Psychotic

Sue Monk Kidd, When the Heart Waits: Spiritual Direction for Life's Sacred Questions

Kaye Gibbons, A Virtuous Woman

Alex Boese, Elephants on Acid

Joyce Carol Oates, The Female of the Species

Admittedly I had started some of these already. I also read approximately 50 pages of Benjamin Lebert's Crazy, which I can't wait to continue.

So, all in all, I'd say that was a pretty successful readathon. I can't wait for the next one!

Sunday Salon: The Can't Finishes

I'm currently in the middle of a book that I think I just can't finish. This is a rarity for me. I'll read just about anything, and I generally just can't leave books unfinished, even if I don't like them. The book in question is my new Early Reviewer book, Any Given Doomsday by Lori Handeland. I was looking forward to it because I enjoy a good thriller every now and then, especially at this time of year. I'm about 2/3 through, and it's reading much more like a bodice-ripping romance novel than a thriller. There's only so much pulsing and throbbing that I can take. There's also a lot of sexual violence, which I'm finding disturbing. This is the first really bad review I'm going to have to give in the ER program. I've done mediocre reviews for sure, but I'm just not able to grasp on to anything here. I'm going to finish the book, because I need to review it, but I find myself taking more and more frequent breaks from reading it.

So, for discussion, what about you? When you get a really bad book do you force yourself to finish, or do you drop it in favor of the next one? How often do you find yourself in possession of a book you just don't like?

Sunday Salon: The Challenge Bug

I have recently discovered the joy of reading challenges, and I've discovered that there are many, many more of them in the book blogger community than I'd ever thought. It all started with me signing up for a few reading challenges on Librarything. I started with the 50 Book Challenge: read fifty books in a calender year. The 50 book challenge was my gateway drug. I then joined the 888 Challenge: read eight books in each of eight categories. This was quickly followed by the Dewey Decimal Challenge and its cousin, the Library of Congress Classification challenge. These are more long-term projects that involve reading something from each number of the Dewey Decimal System, and each category in the LC catalog. As I've gotten more into blogging and visiting other people's blogs, I've discovered that there are loads of reading challenges out there. I've decided to join several more. This week I joined the RIP III challenge, hosted by Carl at Stainless Steel Droppings. This is the perfect seasonal challenge. It involves reading a certain number (you choose, 1, 2, or 4) of scary books between now and Halloween. I've joined the Book around the States Challenge, reading a book set in each state of the union plus DC. I've also got myself in line to join The Second Canadian Book Challenge: read thirteen books by Canadian authors by next July. I've also just discovered and plan to join up with 342,745 Ways to Herd Cats. This challenge requires every participant to compile a list of ten books they love. These lists are compiled into one giant reading list and every participant then reads four books that are new to them. There's a great long and eclectic list from which to choose. I've got several more challenges in the hopper too. I'd join all of them today, except I need to blog about each of them and five posts in a day by yours truly is a little bit much. You'll see much more blogging about reading challenges in the coming weeks. So, how about you? Are you involved in reading challenges? Which are your favorites? Want to pimp a challenge you're hosting? That's cool too; I'm always looking for new ones!

Sunday Salon: The Perfect Weather

Normally I am first in line to complain about the weather in the Pacific Northwest. All that rain, grey sky, and chill get monotonous. It rains more or less non-stop from the end of October through May, and June is iffy. The payoff, though is the summer. In a good year it can be sunny, clear, and beautiful every day in August and September. Unfortunately that does not appear to be the norm for this August. We had a couple of beautiful weeks, but we've now slipped back into the cold, grey rain and fog. The weather stinks, but it is good for one thing: reading. I really believe there's no better environment to curl up on the couch with a good book than when it is cold and rainy outside. The sound of the rain is a soothing sort of white noise, and with the house warm and cozy, with a cup of tea, it's pretty much my ideal reading environment. So, that's precisely what I did today, and I read a whole book. Granted, it was only 160 pages, but it's still a book from the TBR pile that I've now completed. The book I read was Anna Quindlen's Imagined London. It's basically a travel narrative in which Quindlen discusses how the real London relates to the literary city, as it's been chronicled in 500 years of literature. It was a bit slow-going at first, as it begins with a stream-of-consciousness narrative, and the real thrust of the book is the last chapter, wherein Quindlen gets into the real literary criticism. My review will follow on here in a few days. I generally enjoyed the book, but it definitely requires some knowledge of London (either literary or real) to be of any sort of interest. So, I feel like I've accomplished something today. Not bad for a Sunday.

Sunday Salon: At Off Hours...

This is my first Sunday in the Salon, as it's only in the past couple of weeks that I've been really working on getting this book blog thing going. Me being me, I managed to choose one of the busiest Sundays to try and squeeze in quality reading time. Today will be spent moving new furniture into my house, so this morning has involved a lot of moving of old furniture to make way for new furniture, and running to the grocery store for ingredients for the dinner I'll be cooking the friends who are so kind as to help me. I'm a trooper though, and I've managed to squeeze some reading into all of that. Most of my Sunday Salon reading this week happened in the wee hours of the morning. Last night I stayed up until about four reading my early reviewers book for Librarything- Wife in the North by Judith O'Reilly. It's a great book and a really fun read. It's the memoir of a die-hard urbanite who moves to the countryside in the north of England. I'll talk about it more when I review it, but I can fully identify with O'Reilly, having recently moved far away from the urban areas I love. I'm not sure I'll be able to get much more reading done today, but that's fine. I got a good chunk of Wife in the North done. And hey, new furniture is always a good thing.