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September Reading Wrap-Up and Third Quarter Check-In
2010 at 7am Posted by Rebecca Schinsky
I usually forgo the “Oh my gawd, y’all, can you believe another month has gone by?” rigmarole, but the last few weeks have brought an undeniable change in seasons to Richmond, and I have run head-on into obsession with all things autumn. So yes, another month has gone by, and I’m trying to wrap my head around it.
September was a busy month for me, as I traveled to the Decatur Book Festival, family visits in Kansas City and St. Louis, the NAIBA conference in Atlantic City, and the SIBA conference in Daytona. I always look forward to having plane time for reading, but these kinds of trips generally mean I don’t get any reading done except when I’m on the plane, so I’m pretty pleased to find that I completed seven books in September. And two of them were chunksters! Read more
August Reading Wrap-Up
2010 at 5am Posted by Rebecca Schinsky
Nothing says good reading month quite like a wide variety of genres, topics, and writing styles, and that helps explain why I was so happy with my August selections. These books were all over the board, from narrative nonfiction to memoir to literary fiction to YA to southern women’s fiction, and I never got bored. Not a once.
Without further ado, here’s what I read in August. Covers link to relevant reviews/posts.
And, oh yeah, there was this one, possibly the only YA book I’ll read this year.
It’s a tie between Mr. Peanut and A Visit from the Goon Squad for best book of the month, but these were all worthwhile (even Mockingjay, which I hated) for the thoughts and discussions they provoked. What was the best book you read in August? Looking forward to anything in particular this month?
July Reading Wrap-Up
2010 at 9am Posted by Rebecca Schinsky
For some reason, I spent most of July feeling like some kind of superpowered speed reader, so I have to admit I’m a bit surprised to look at my reading list and discover I only read six books last month. Maybe it was the fact that two of them (Mattaponi Queen and The Typist) were one-sitting reads? I’m used to going on reading binges in the middle of the summer when it’s too hot to do anything else, and, well, I just can’t figure this one out.
What I can tell you is that last month was one of the more satisfying months of my reading year thus far, and the variety was fantastic, and, well, I guess that’s what really matters. Without further adieu, here’s what I read. Covers link to my reviews/discussions.
And then there’s this little beauty, the source of my current misery and constantly aching body.
All told, July was a solid reading month, and there’s nothing on this list I wouldn’t recommend. Where’s My Wand? got me out of the memoir slump; Mr. Rosenblum Dreams in English was truly delightful; and Mr. Peanut kept me turning pages and dying to read more (which is a good thing, as I read a manuscript and will be re-reading the final copy this month for a Q & A with author Adam Ross).
What were the best books you read in July?
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2010 Rebecca Schinsky
June Reading Wrap-Up & Second Quarter Check-in
2010 at 5am Posted by Rebecca Schinsky
It seems appropriate that on this, the second anniversary of my blog (insert confetti throwing here!), I should take a little time to sum up not only my reading for the last month but my progress toward the goal of reading deliberately.
All in all, 2010 has been a year of very satisfying reading thus far, and June was no exception. Here’s what I read (covers link to my reviews):
My review of Taroko Gorge goes up tomorrow, and I’ll be featuring American Music in two weeks. I thoroughly enjoyed everything I read this month, with the exception of the very “meh” How Did You Get This Number, but really, it just felt good to be back in the reading groove after May was full of bookish goodness but light on reading.
My fancy spreadsheet (yes, I’m nerdy enough to have a spreadsheet to track my reading) tells me that I’ve read 37 books so far this year, for a total of 10,911 pages. I’m on track to read about 75 books this year, which is a significant decrease from the 99 I read last year, but the quality of this year’s reading has already surpassed last year’s by so much that I really don’t care about the number.
Twenty-one of my reads have been review copies, and the other sixteen were from my personal TBR list, but I think those numbers are a bit deceiving because almost all of the books I’ve accepted for review were books I was already planning to read. In the last six months, I’ve made major changes to the way I think about review copies and how I decide which pitches to accept, and they have made my reading much more enjoyable.
I’m hesitant to name favorites at this juncture because I like the end-of-year hindsight, but The Unnamed, Day for Night, and Matterhorn were all pantyworthy, and I’m still thinking about Flow, In the Land of Believers, The Handbook for Lightning Strike Survivors, and The City and The City. If I can keep up this streak for the next six months, it will be a very good year indeed.
You can see the full list of everything I’ve read and reviewed in 2010 here.
Now tell me: how’s your reading going in 2010? Best (or worst) books so far?
May Reading Wrap-Up
2010 at 7am Posted by Rebecca Schinsky
I will heretofore refer to May as “the month in which being crazy about books means doing very little reading.”
Why?
Because I only finished 2 books this month! Granted, one of them is the 600-page Matterhorn, but I must have been smoking something when I decided to read it in the run-up to BEA and then take it to New York with me. I did some good reading on the flight up, but I don’t think I cracked the spine at all during my week there. Though I had hoped to finish it pre-BEA, I’m actually quite glad that it took longer than I expected and ended up coinciding with Memorial Day.
Anyway, May was the month in which I launched this sassy new blog design, announced a new business venture, discussed my recent streak of reading really fabulous books, attended the Junior League’s Book and Author Dinner and just barely resisted the urge to toss my panties at Abraham Verghese, and revealed the Get in Bed with a Book Blogger campaign I’m doing with SIBA. I guest posted at BookPage about advice for new bloggers and attended Book Expo America and the Book Blogger Convention (welcome, new friends!).
It was a very book-centric month. But the reading? Not so much.
Here’s what I finished:
And here’s one I didn’t finish. I blame the week I spent trying to read it for some of this month’s slowness.
The good news is that both of the books I finished were amazing and all of the amazing bookish energy at BEA has me psyched up for a better reading month in June. What’s the best book you read in May?
