Bout of Books 14 Wrap Up

I can’t believe Bout of Books 14 is already over! My fourth time participating in the week-long readathon was a blast, as always, and I’m sad to see it go! BUT now I have a reason to look forward to January! I’m going to do a little wrap up of what I read and the challenges I participated in this week.

Total number of pages read: 1,354 (WOOOO!)

What I read this week:

• The Curious Tale of the In-Between by Lauren DeStefano
• The Dead House by Dawn Kurtagich
• The Day the Crayons Came Home by Drew Daywalt and illustrated by Oliver Jeffers
• Wherever You Go by Pat Zietlow Miller
• Rosie Revere, Engineer by Andrea Beaty
• The Rose Society by Marie Lu
• These single issue comics: Robin: Son of Batman #2, We Are Robin #2, Prez #2, Thor #8, Bat-Mite #1 and 2

My favorite read of the week: Hands down, The Rose Society. It’s almost not even fair to the other books.

Challenges participated in this week:

• Fictional World Travel Challenge
• the MASH challenge
• #4SeasonsBooksCovers challenge
• Road Trip Challenge
• What to Read Next Challenge

Other notes about the week: I’ve got to say, I’m pretty impressed with how much I read this week while working a full-time job, a part-time job, blogging, going to a book festival, and sleeping. I’m also really happy to say that I liked every single book I read, which is awesome. All of the challenges I participated in were super fun and different. I got to participate in the Twitter chat on Saturday, which was overwhelming and wonderful, as always. I can’t wait for the next round of Bout of Books.

If this is the first you’re hearing about Bout of Books or you want to learn more, make sure you go follow the Bout of Books blog because that’s where all the info is about the readathon and where they’ll update us on upcoming events.

Bout of Books 14

That’s right! Bout of Books is back! If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you know how much I love this week long read-a-thon full of super fun challenges, amazing Twitter chats, and all the laid-back reading that I love. And, like I have for the past 3 Bout of Books challenges, I’ll be participating! If you haven’t been following my blog for a while (HI!!!), then let me tell you a little more about Bout of Books:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, August 17th and runs through Sunday, August 23rd in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 14 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team

I’ll post about my TBR and goals a little closer to the start of Bout of Books 14. If you’re interested in signing up but want to know more, feel free to ask me any questions, or check out the Bout of Books blog!

Bout of Books 13 – Wrap Up!

Bout of Books 13 is over! 😦 As always, I had an absolute blast, found some new people to follow on Twitter, read a bunch, and just had a wonderful, bookish week with a bunch of other book nerds.

What I read:

The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan (finished it) – ~134 pages [Check out my review]
Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu – 325 pages (ARC) [Review soon!]
Young Avengers, Volume 1: Style > Substance – 120 pages
Hawkeye: My Life as Weapon – 136 pages
The single issue comics (320 pages, single issues are 32 pages each): Convergence #2, Return of the Living Deadpool #1, Wytches #5, The Walking Dead #138, 139, 140, Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor #4 and 5, Divergence #1, and Batman and Robin Annual #3
Valiant by Sarah McGuire – ~286 pages (74%)

TOTAL PAGES READ: ~1,321 (I say approximately because two of these are eARCs which do not have page numbers)

Challenges participated in: 

The Bookish Survey challenge hosted by Lori at Writing My Own Fairy Tale
Character Face Off hosted by LuLo FanGirl – I put Ronan Lynch up against Celaena Sardothien. Who do you think won?
The Favorite Read Photo Challenge from Once Upon a Chapter. You can see my entry on Instagram.

Other stuff:

I got to participate in the last half of the first twitter chat and all of the second chat! The Twitter chats kept their spot as my favorite thing about Bout of Books. I always have an absolute blast meeting new bookish people and attempting to keep up with the craziness that is these chats. I love them.

I’m looking forward to participating in Bout of Books 14 in August! If my posts or tweets have convinced you to participate (you really, really should!) head over to the BoB website and follow them to learn more about the next readathon!

Bout of Books Challenge: Bookish Survey

As you may or may not know, today is the first day of Bout of Books 13! YAY! Lori at Writing My Own Fairy Tale is hosting the first challenge, a short bookish survey. Super easy and fun!

1. How do you organize your shelves? A lot of my books are still packed up from when I moved to Scotland, so I currently only have two bookshelves in my room: one where I keep books I own but haven’t read and the other with books I have read. They are in alphabetical order by the author’s last name; I know, not very exciting, but I don’t want to break them up by color or something and separate series. My TBR shelf also holds my trade paperbacks and graphic novels and the books I have checked out from the library.
2. What is one of your favorite book that’s not in one of your favorite genres? Hmmmm. This is an interesting question. My favorite genres are fantasy and contemporary, which covers most of my favorite books. OH! Duh. My favorite book not in one of my favorite genres is The Falls by Ian Rankin, which is crime fiction. I love this book and all of Ian Rankin’s books. I like crime fiction, but I’m particular about it, and I don’t read as much as I should.
3. What is the last 5 star book you read? Audiobook: I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson, which is incredible. Physical: Magonia by Maria Dahvana Headley.
4. What book are you most excited to read during the read-a-thon? I’m reading a mix of comics and books, so the comic/trade I’m most excited to read is Loki: Agent of Asgard, Volume 1 and the book I’m most excited to read is Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu. Or Tiny Pretty Things by Lori Rader-Day. I’m excited about everything I’m reading; that’s why I picked them out!
5. What book do you recommend the most? I feel like I could ask my readers what book I recommend the most and they’d be able to answer for me, but it’s The Humans by Matt Haig, which I recommend to every single living person I can.

Bout of Books 13: TBR, Goals, & Updates

IT HAS BEGUN. Again. Bout of Books 13 kicks of today, and as always, I’m so excited! I shared my TBR on Instagram and Twitter yesterday, but I wanted to post it here as well. This week, I’ll be reading from this pile:

Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu / The Secret Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes / Little Pretty Things by Lori Rader-Day / Hawkeye: My Life As Weapon / Loki: Agent of Asgard / Stephen King’s The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born / Young Avengers: Style & Substance / and several single issues I need to catch up on.

Not pictured: The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan (which I’m currently reading) and Trigger Warning by Neil Gaiman (my current audiobook).

GOALS:

– Can I say none? I just started my new, full-time job last week, so I don’t have as much time and I’m still learning the ropes. I don’t want to really set any goals because I don’t know what I’ll have time for. However, a few things:
– Make time every day (at least 30 minutes) to just sit down and read. Do nothing else.
– Participate in at least 2 challenges because they are FUN.
– Participate in both Twitter chats (This Saturday is one of my two Saturdays this month to work at the library, but I should have time to chat a bit)

That’s it. No other expectations or goals, and no pressure on myself to read that whole stack. It’s not going to happen, but I’m going to try.

UPDATES:

Monday

Pages read today: I was reading an eARC, so I read 42% of a book today, which I believe is about 134 pages of this book
Total number of pages: 134
Read today: The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan
Number of books I’ve read today: 42% of 1
Total number of books I’ve read: 42% of 1
Challenges participated in: The Bookish Survey challenge hosted by Lori at Writing My Own Fairy Tale, which was fun!
Notes about today: I found out yesterday morning that I had to close at the library…after I was already at the library at 8 a.m. SO that sucked, but I ended up making it home around 8:25 so I was able to participate in the last half of the Twitter chat, which was crazy fun as always. I’m glad I was able to finish The Gracekeepers, which was beautiful. Can’t wait for more BoB!

Tuesday

Pages read today: 208
Total number of pages: 342
Read today: Young Avengers, Volume 1: Style > Substance (120 pages) and Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu (88 pages)
Number of books I’ve read today: 1.3
Total number of books I’ve read: 1.75
Challenges participated in: Character Face Off hosted by LuLo FanGirl – I put Ronan Lynch up against Celaena Sardothien. Who do you think won?
Notes about today: I didn’t have as much time to read today, but I read a whole trade paperback of Young Avengers at work and started Devoted, which I’m really loving so far. It’s disturbing and fascinating at the same time.

Wednesday

Pages read today: 79
Total number of pages: 421
Read today: Devoted by Jen Mathieu
Number of books I’ve read today: Part of 1
Total number of books I’ve read: Almost 2 (by adding up the several parts)
Challenges participated in: None. I’m not a big fan of poetry or haiku.
Notes about today: I didn’t read as much as I wanted to today. I’m loving Devoted, and I wish I could just sit down and finish it in one go.

Thursday

Pages read today: 93
Total number of pages: 514
Read today: Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu
Number of books I’ve read today: Part of 1
Number of books I’ve read total: I’m going to say two (parts of several to make to whole)
Notes about today: Thursday was a long day and I just didn’t have time to read as much. I also completely forgot to do my update on Friday morning, so this is late. Oh well.

Friday

Pages read today: 521 (65 pages of Devoted, 136 pages – Hawkeye: My Life as Weapon, and ten single issue comics at 32 pages each)
Total number of pages: 1,035
Read today: I finished Devoted by Jennifer Mathieu (which I really liked; review soon), Hawkeye: My Life as Weapon (which wasn’t the best thing ever but I enjoyed it, and these single issue comics: Convergence #2, Return of the Living Deadpool #1, Wytches #5, The Walking Dead #138, 139, 140, Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor #4 and 5, Divergence #1, and Batman and Robin Annual #3. WOW!!
Number of books I’ve read today: I don’t even know how to count this anymore.
Number of books I’ve read total: Ditto above
Notes about today: Another busy day, but when I got home from work, I was just like, “I want to read ALL the comics!!” It was a pretty good reading day!

Saturday

Pages read today: 32% of Valiant by Sarah McGuire
Total number of pages: ~1,157
Read today: I started Valiant by Sarah McGuire
Number of books I’ve read today: 32% of Valiant
Number of books I’ve read total: I don’t even know how to count this anymore
Challenges participated in: I did the Favorite Read Photo Challenge from Once Upon a Chapter. You can see my entry on Instagram. My favorite read of BoB 13 was Devoted!
Notes about today: I was a Saturday Librarian yesterday, but I got to participate in the last BoB 13 chat! I also participated in the Favorite Read Photo Challenge, which was easy and fun! I was going to start a different book, but I decided to go with Valiant by Sarah McGuire and it’s not quite what I was hoping for but I’m not NOT enjoying it, if you know what I mean.

Sunday

Pages read today: 42% of Valiant
Total number of pages: ~1,300?
Read today: Valiant by Sarah McGuire
Number of books I’ve read today: 42% of Valiant
Number of books I’ve read total: I don’t even know how to count this anymore
Notes about today: Today was a pretty chill day. I was able to read almost a half of Valiant, which has picked up a bit since yesterday, so that’s awesome. I’m sad that Bout of Books 13 is over! Can’t’ wait until August.

Bout of Books 13 – Sign Up Announcement!

Hi, lovelies! I’m sure you’re all super surprised that I’m participating in Bout of Books 13, right? 🙂 This will be my FOURTH time participating in Bout of Books. I’ve just started a full time job so I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to read, but that’s one of my favorite things about BoB – no requirements for how much you read and no pressure to read ALL the books if you can’t. I love meeting people (virtually, of course) from all over the world and doing the Twitter chats (they’re the best even though they are NUTS). If you’ve ever thought about participating, or you’re interested now, I really encourage you to sign up. I haven’t looked back since I signed up for the first time. It’s super low-key and you get to set your own goals!

If you decide to sign up too, I would love to know what your goals are and what you plan to read! Link me up! Go sign up on the Bout of Books blog!

Some info about Bout of Books 13:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, May 11th and runs through Sunday, May 17th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 13 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team

I haven’t picked a TBR or goals or anything yet. I’ll be deciding on those this weekend when I have to think about a plan. Let me know if you’ll be participating too, so we can encourage each other and talk about our progress!

#ReadingMyLibrary Challenge | Week Two Update

Week two of the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge was…not great. I’ve been under a lot of stress recently and I don’t know if it’s that or what I was reading, but I didn’t make much headway this week. As you might remember from last week’s update, I had started The Orphan Queen by Jodi Meadows. I’m pretty sure I’m going to have to DNF it. I read a little over a hundred pages, and I just felt like I had read it before, like it was similar to A LOT of other books I’ve read. So I took a break and picked up Compulsion by Martina Boone, which I really like, but it’s taking me SO long to read it. I also took a break from my Jackaby audiobook. Do you ever just have days (or weeks) where you really enjoy what you’re reading but you don’t really feel like reading? Does that even make sense?

BUT Thursday I raced through more than TWO HUNDRED PAGES in Compulsion and finished it up on Friday, so I think I’m doing better. Fingers crossed I’m not falling into a slump.

Each week during the Challenge, we’ve chosen a topic to discuss during our weekly update. This week’s topic is:

Books you would like to suggest to your library.

Well, I feel a little bit like a cheater because I usually get to order a lot of the books that I want to read each month. I do all of the YA ordering at my library (as well as suggesting several adult titles per month), so, of course, my list is pretty much all books I either want to read or have found through other book bloggers as ones they’d recommend. Because of this, I’m going to share the list of YA and MG books I ordered in April. Because we’re a small library, we have a relatively small budget each month, but I think I did a pretty good job of getting a wide range of books. This list does not include the easy reader/picture books we ordered or the few non-fiction books. [All titles linked to Goodreads, of course!]

The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh
The Queen of Bright and Shiny Things by Ann Aguirre
Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen
Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Magical Creatures by Maggie Stiefvater and Jackson Pearce
Mosquitoland by David Arnold
Made You Up by Francesca Zappia
I Am Princess X by Cherie Priest
Denton Little’s Deathdate by Lance Rubin
Anything Could Happen by Will Walton
A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste
Lois Lane: Fallout by Gwenda Bond

What books would you suggest to your library? Let me know so I can expand my collection!

LINK YOUR WEEK TWO UPDATE BELOW!

And don’t forget to enter the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge giveaway!

#ReadingMyLibrary Challenge: Week One Update

This was a short first week for the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge – only four days! BUT I was able to read all of Beautiful You by Chuck Palahniuk and about 100 pages of The Orphan Queen by Jodi Meadows. Beautiful You made me feel really weird and uncomfortable and I’m not sure what I thought of it overall. Still processing. Orphan Queen is pretty cool so far. It took me a little bit to actually start it though; I read the first three pages several times before I processed what was happening. I think it was a side-effect of finishing Beautiful You. I’m also listening to Jackaby as an audiobook and I really like it. Nicola Barber is the narrator and she’s amazing with voices.

According to Amazon, I saved $33.40 by checking these books out from the library instead of purchasing them. Woo!

Each week during the Challenge, we’ve chosen a topic to discuss during our weekly update. This week’s topic is:

Tell us a little about your library (include a picture if you can!).

I work at a small library in a small town near central Mississippi. The population of the town is a little under 3,500 though not nearly that many people are registered at the library. We are part of the Central Mississippi Regional Library System, which comprises 20 branches in four counties. We’re pretty small, but we have a lot of amazing patrons, from kids to adults. We’ve got all your basic services, like faxing/copying/scanning, inter-library loan (though I’ve been here for 10 months and haven’t done one yet), computers, free wi-fi, newspapers/magazines, movies, and, of course, books. Some pictures? Like I said earlier, we are pretty small, so most of my pictures are from the same place because you can see almost everything from there.

This is from the circ desk looking out at the library.

We have two stuffed animals in the library, each done by the circulation person before me who recently retired.

You can see pretty much the whole library from here, except the computer area behind me to the right.

A small study area.

The children’s section.

Half of my YA shelves. Told you we were small.

I should’ve taken some more pictures of the computer areas and such, but I forgot. Ooops. But as you can see, the library is rather tiny. But I like it. 🙂 It’s a wonderful place to work and I have an awesome branch manager.

Alright, so there’s my week one update for the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge. Now it’s your turn! What did you read this week? Link up below!

THE #READINGMYLIBRARY CHALLENGE HAS STARTED!

Hello, everyone! Today is April 1, which means the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge has begun! And no, this isn’t an April Fool’s joke! No worries if you haven’t signed up yet; sign ups are open until Wednesday, April 15, so you still have a whole TWO weeks to sign up. Also, don’t forget that you only have to read ONE library book to participate, and why wouldn’t you? If you’re already going to be reading books from the library, just sign up and enter for a chance to win our giveaway!

Here’s the beginning of my #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge! I started the audiobook of Jackaby yesterday (oops), and today I can’t decide if I want to read Beautiful You by Chuck Palahniuk or The Sin Eater’s Daughter by Melinda Salisbury. You don’t need to remind me how ridiculously different those two are. I know. I just can’t decide which I want to start with. I’ll probably just pick right before I head to work – whichever one catches my eye first.

What are you going to read first?

A little more info on the weekly updates since we’ve had some questions. These updates do not need to be super detailed or anything. They’re not even required, but more of a fun way to see what everyone is reading! My posts will discuss (and probably contain pictures of) what I’ve read that week. I’ll answer the weekly questions and talk a little about the challenge. I will probably include how much money I’ve saved that week by checking out the books from the library instead of buying them. That’s it! If you want to just tell us what you’ve read and nothing else, that’s cool too! Up to you. Just have fun! Each week, I will include the linky in my own weekly update post, but it’ll also go HERE on the Weekly Updates page.

Once you create your sign up post, don’t forget to enter the #ReadingMyLibrary Challenge giveaway for your choice of book up to $15 from The Book Depository!

National Readathon Day – I’m making #timetoread

Today is National Readathon Day! I don’t know if I’m technically too late to sign up, but I don’t really care. I’m making time to read today in support (mostly because I was going to make time to read today anyway!).

National Readathon day is sponsored and put on by Penguin Random House, GoodReads,Mashable, and the National Book Foundation. Join in the Readathon by reading from 12-4 p.m. in your own time zone.

I thought I’d do a post for this so I could share what I’m going to be reading. I’m FINALLY going to be reading My Heart & Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga, which I first heard about in June (?) of last year and have been wanting to read since then. I started it yesterday and I’m already loving it, as much as you can love a book about a girl who wants to kill herself. I’m pretty sure it’s going to live up to my own personal hype. Yay!

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How I'll be spending #nationalreadathonday! Finally reading #myheartandotherblackholes! I started it yesterday and I already love it. Are you making #timetoread today? #books #bookstagram #amreading #ilovebooks #bookgram #bookaday #bookporn #jasminewarga #bookish

A post shared by Stefani (@stefanisloma) on Jan 24, 2015 at 6:35am PST

Will you make #timetoread today?