| I decided I just don't care for the "Dead Authors" title for this reading goal, it just does not sound right, so I will be renaming it "Dearly Departed" for the future. I didn't set an actual number goal for 2013, but as I sit here hearing the fireworks ringing in the New Year I can look back and see that I squeaked in 49 books that fall into this category. I am amazed at how this list grew over the course of the year. I did have a great deal more started that I just did not get completed before the clock expired on the year, so they will have to carry over into 2014. List by month can be found on this post. Tags: 2013 Reflection, Dearly Departed |
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Well the end of the year snuck-up on me, as seems to be par for the course. In total I had hoped to complete 75 books this year, alas, I only was able to wrap-up 68. Had I finished a few more of the 20 or so hanging around my currently reading all would have worked out fine. I am aiming to complete 75 for 2014, hopefully I can surpass that goal by the 7 I was short this year. With my genre challenge I certainly read outside my normal comfort zone. I enjoyed many of the treasures I found along the way and have grown to appreciate more fantasy/science fiction. I still can't say I found a love for romances, I just don't find myself getting swept of my feet. Taking the good with the bad, spending all this time discovering new genres and authors left much of my time in fiction land and less in my Non-Fiction history reads. I have a hard time picking top books, I tend to get absorbed into my reads and not turn a very critical eye towards them. I know inquiring minds want to know, so I have created a top ten picks in no specific order for the year, reviews are linked to title.
[Notice: Original posting 2014-01-01 at Plethora of Books Blog: http://bookchallenges.weebly.com] Tags: 2013 Reflection, Top 10
As 2013 is winding down to an end I can check off my Genre Challenge as completed. This challenge from the Dead Writers Society on Goodreads was designed to push our comfort zone of genres and explore what can be found outside ones safety net. My overall goal boiled down to twenty-four reads, averaging two per month. I ended up reading a total of twenty-eight books for this challenge, a few months only had one read so some stronger months helped me keep pace. You can see my entire list by genre in this blog entry. I started the New Year off traveling around the world, under the sea and to the center of the earth with Jules Verne. February being proclaimed the month of love by florist and jewelers romance was in the air, this is not my favorite genre but I did pick a regency romance by Georgette Heyer. March could possibly be deemed 'careful what you wish for' on the blarney stone as the animals on the farm realized in my Orwell selection. In April I moved to the western front and selected three well known novels to explore the wilds of expansion in America. May is filled with a frenzy of brides finalizing wedding plans, but just who did the lady in my Wilkie Collins selection marry? June was a time to reflect, I reflected back to a woman ahead of her time, a pioneer in research of radioactivity, the first woman to win the Nobel Prize. July was a magical month set in children's fantasy books complete with dragons, castles and an umbrella toting nanny. Smack, August led back to reality as war was front and center, from the battle fields of WWI to the after-math of Hiroshima. To lighten the mood from August, September was for myths, fables and fairy tales. Just who was Beowulf and this creature known as Grendel? October brought my least favorite genre, because I like to sleep at night, horror. I selected two books that were filled with short stories, along the lines of ghost stories for around the camp fire, these worked well for me, I didn't spend the days looking over my shoulder and the nights freaked out by every sound. November brought some historical fiction my way with two fascinating selections, Wallace Stegner's look at the west his grandparents lived in and Daphne du Mauier telling of her great-great grandmother, Mary Anne's life as a mistress to the Duke of York. I finished the year laughing with three men in a boat! Will start populating with reviews as I have time to squeeze in between all the reading I have scheduled. [Notice: Original posting 2013-12-28 at Plethora of Books Blog: http://bookchallenges.weebly.com] Tags: 2013 Reflection |
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