Bout of Books 11 Starting Line #boutofbooks

Books I hope to finish:
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• The Cuckoo's Calling
• The Word Exchange

Books to work on:
• Bittersweet
• The Lady and the Unicorn
• Mrs. Hemingway
• The Invention of Wings

I hope to update sometime either in morning or before I go to sleep, with a separate post.

Bloggiesta sign up

I realize that I putting this up a little late, but I figure whatever.  Here are my plans:

• post 3 or 4 book reviews
• catch up on blog-related emails that have been piling up since a week ago Friday (the 11th)
• listen to a bunch of my book-related podcasts
• read up to at least 40% of The Goldfinch
• write up a start up post for the High-Summer Readathon
• write up my Sunday Salon and What Are You Reading? posts

Spring into Horror Read-a-Thon Starting Post

I know some of you are thinking I am nuts, but I'm not.  Trust me.  This isn't like what I did for most of Saturday and for a little bit of Sunday; its a little more saner than that.

It's a pretty simple readathon really in that you only have to read one book that is horror, paranormal, thriller, mystery, etc.   The rest of the read-a-thon you can read whatever you wish to.  If you wish to sign up, you can still do so here.

Here are the books that I am planning on reading during the read-a-thon:
• The Mysteries of Udolpho
• His Majesty's Hope
• The Pursuit of Mary Bennet
• The Count of Monte Cristo
• Bittersweet
• A Tale of Two Cities

If you wish to find out more about the read-a-thon, you can find out more here (it's also the starting line).  I hope to post most evenings as to what I have read, probably closer to midnight Pacific.

#readathon Hour 0 – Kick Off Meme

To kick off the read-a-thon, the mods at the 24 hour read-a-thon are asking a few questions this fine morning:
1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?
2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?
3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?
4) Tell us a little something about yourself!
5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to?

1) I am reading from Abbotsford, BC; its about a 90-minute drive from Vancouver, BC.
2)  I am looking forward to The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman; heard its really good.
3) I am looking forward to the wine that I bought a couple of days ago; its called Apothetic Red (I'll tell you later, but it's something like that)
4) I used to live in Brazil about 30 years ago.
5) One thing I'll do different from last one is not blow up at people.

#wintersrespite Starting Post

There is nothing that goes better than winter and reading, at least in my books.  And one of my fellow bloggers clearly thinks the same way.  And honestly what better excuse could there be.

And for me, this seems like the perfect way to get myself reading again, after about a week or so off from reading on a regular basis.

Here are my plans for the week:
• finish the first epoch of The Woman in White
• get a bit more of The Count of Monte Cristo, War & Peace, and Winter's Tale completed.
• try to get a bit more into Possession and Flight Behavior
• start reading The Goldfinch

I will see how things go and I am hoping that I get most, if not all of it crossed off.

#thankfullyreading Weekend 2013 Starting post

Since I am going to see Catching Fire this evening, I thought I would get my starting post up before I leave.

I am really looking forward to this and I am hoping to get lots of reading done over the next few days, but depending on what I end up doing, it could be a bit of bust.  But I am going to try nonetheless

Here are what I am planning on reading:

• Lady Catherine and the Real Downton Abbey
• Winter Solistice
• Thunderstruck
• Sarum
• War and Peace
• The Count of Monte Cristo
• Villette
• The Snow Child

If you wish to join, you can do so here: http://www.jennsbookshelves.com/2013/11/04/thankfully-reading-weekend-2013/

Wonderfully Wicked Read-A-Thon Goals

I am starting this really late; totally forgot about this.  I realize that there still is another full week ahead, but I still feel as though I am late to the game.  But nonetheless here I go.

If you want to join, you can sign up for the read-a-thon at http://www.myshelfconfessions.com/wwreadathon/.  You don't need to have a blog to do it.  You can see the dates that it runs in the picture next to this post, but you have only about 4 more days to actually sign up.

Here are my goals:
• section for Northanger Abbey read-a-long at Unputdownables
• The Cuckoo's Calling (at least get into a considerable bit of the book)
• The Count of Monte Cristo (at least until about Chapter 42 or so)
• Book 9 of War & Peace
• start reading The Good Earth
• Longbourne by Jo Baker

I realize that its quite a bit of reading, but these are just goals and some of these are quite doable.  I will update each evening with a separate post.

#Readathon Starting Line

Morning fellow readers!!

Dewey has created a short questionnaire.  Here are the questions/answers:

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?  Abbotsford, BC
2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?  Getting a bit of War & Peace completed
3) Which snack are you most looking forward to? Probably the 10 pm pizza I am going to make...
4) Tell us a little something about yourself!  Lived in Brazil when I was younger.
5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? I am taking a dinner break about half-way through and I am going to have some caffeine at around 7 or 8 pm.  I am also not going to be posting every hour.

Off to do some reading!!  See you in about a couple of hours.

A Winter's Respite Read-a-Thon - Starting Post

I have done this readathon before and I have always looked forward to this one every time I have done it. And this year is no exception.  The readathon by Michelle (The True Book Addict) through Seasons of Reading.

Due to the fact that its my birthday week, I don't know how much I will be able to get done, especially during the weekend, when I would get a lot of reading done.  But that isn't going to dissuade me from getting reading done, as there will probably be a lot of time read when I am not engaged in other activities.  But who knows...

Here is the list of books that I plan to tackle:
• The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag
• Persuasion
• Pride & Prejudice
• War & Peace
• The Whole Truth
• HP and the Order of the Phoenix
• Definitely not Mr. Darcy

Time will only tell how much I will get done.

Bout-of-Books 6.0 Goals (1/7-1/13)

The beginning of the year means many things to me, but it also means the beginning of tackling the number of reading goals that I have set out for myself.  And this is such a way to tackle them as close to the beginning of the year as possible.

My goals for this week are:

• complete this past week's reading for my Persuasion readalong

• to start reading War & Peace for a year long readalong

• get more of Pride & Prejudice completed (its the 200th anniversary of the publication of the book)

• to complete Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix 

and • to get more of Anna Karenina completed.

Hopefully I can finish all the stated goals.  I hope to update my blog each evening before I go to bed.