Bout of Books Update #2 - Tuesday & Wednesday

Tuesday:

Bit of a slower reading day than Monday, even though I was home earlier from work.  I was feeling really tired and icky, and sometimes curling up in bed with youtube videos and Netflix is the only option!  I am pretty useless in the evenings at the moment, I can't wait for my maternity leave to start so that I can rest a bit more in the day and maybe actually socialise with my husband in the evenings.  I did read for one hour and continued with We Need New Names, which was on the fast track to becoming a 5 star read.

Day: 2/7

Books Started: 1 (We Need New Names)

Books Completed: 0

Time Spent Reading: 1 hour

Pages Read: 140 (this book is unputdownable)

Wednesday:

I actually slept through most of the night on Tuesday, so was feeling much perkier on Wednesday.  Was able to leave work at a very decent hour and headed to my parents house for dinner.  My car has it's MOT this Saturday (and really needs to pass it), so my Dad kindly spent some time checking it over for me and giving it the Dad seal of approval.  Tom also washed it, so now it looks like a car that is loved, rather than a car that has been neglected!  We spent a lovely evening out, had a great dinner and I definitely felt more refreshed afterwards.

I managed to meet my goal of reading for one hour, which meant that I finished We Need New Names (and it definitely was a 5 star read, can't wait to write my review of this one).  I was going to be good and pick my next read from my readathon stack, but Michel Faber's The Fire Gospel was just calling to me.  It's about the discovery of a controversial fifth gospel and the way the world reacts.  It's pretty short, so I should finish it within 2 days.

Day: 3/7

Books Started: 2

Books Completed: 1 - We Need New Names

Time Spent Reading: 1 hour

Pages Read: 135 

I'm loving the readathon so far, and I'm excited that there are still 4 days to go!  How are you getting on?

Bout of Books Update #1 and Classics Club Spin Number Announced.

Day: 1/7

Books Started: 1 (We Need New Names)

Books Completed: 0

Time Spent Reading: 1 hour and 30 mins

Pages Read: 130

I'm going to try to post updates throughout Bout of Books as much as possible.  I don't think I'll have time to take part in any chats or challenges, but I should be able to update on my progress a few times throughout the week.

I'm really pleased with my reading from the first day.  Monday is my busiest work-day as I have meetings in the evening as well as a full day's teaching load, so I'm thrilled that I managed to squeeze in an hour and a half of reading, exceeding my goal of one hour.  It helps that We Need New Names is such an engrossing book.  It's about a girl called Darling living in a shanty town and dreaming of escaping to the West and it's simply written but very powerful.  I can't wait to pick it up again tonight, especially as I'm almost half way through already.

Tonight I'm on track to meet my goal of an hour, but I can't see myself exceeding it by much.  I think I'll get close to finishing We Need New Names, so I'm already starting to think of what I should read next.  Maybe A Girl is a Half Formed Thing?

In other bookish news, the Classics Club announced the lucky spin number as #1, which means I'll be picking up Lord of the Flies soon.  I'm quite excited to start it - my husband loves it - so it's good that I've had a push to finally take it off my shelf.  As a teacher, I find group dynamics between groups of children fascinating, especially the way children act completely differently when they are away from their parents.  Hopefully I will enjoy it!

If you're taking part in the readathon, how are you getting on?

And are you pleased with your spin number?

Bout of Books #10: Signing Up & Goals

Next week is the Bout of Books readathon, and after much deliberation, I've decided to take part.   I've participated once before and had a lot of fun, so it'll be nice to join in.  My goals this time are going to be modest, as I'm working and 36 weeks pregnant.  However, I do need to rest more, so sitting down in the evening with a book can only be a good thing.  Got to get as many books in as possible before the baby is born!  With that in mind, my only goal is to read for one hour a day. I'm not fussed about how many pages I read or how many books I finish.

As I'm a fickle reader, I've picked out a wide range of books that I can choose from, depending on my mood.  The stack on the left are shorter books I own, and the stack on the right are from the library.  These are the books I'll be choosing from:

Library Books:

• A Girl is a Half Formed Thing by Eimar McBride - This one's on the Bailey's Prize short-list, so I grabbed it when I saw it on the new books shelf.  The style of writing seems to be quite unusual, so I have a feeling I'll either love it or hate it.
• The Vintage Girl by Hester Browne - My easy read pick, I know I'll just race through this one.  It's a romance about a girl who is cataloguing heirlooms in a Scottish castle.  Perfect escapism!
• The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight - Another quick, easy read.  A teenage girl misses her plane and then falls in love with someone whilst stuck at the airport.
• Baking Cakes in Kigali by Gaile Parkin - This has been on my wishlist for a while.  It's set in Rwanda and is the story of a woman running a baking business, through which she comes to know the stories of the women in her community.

Books I Own:

• 10 Billion by Stephen Emmott - This is a non-fiction book about what will happen to the planet when the human population reaches 10 billion.  It's mainly graphs and images, so is the quickest book I have on my potentials list.  I will definitely be reading this at some point.
• Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones - Set in Bourgainville, a tropical island on the brink of civil war, a white teacher uses Great Expectations as his only textbook.
• A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers by Xiaolu Guo - This was on the Orange Prize shortlist a few years back.  Zhang is a Chinese migrant to London, who falls in love with an older English man, despite not being able to speak English.
• We Need New Names by NoViolet  Bulawayo - I am determined to finally read this, I've been wanting to ever since it was first published.
• Minaret by Leila Aboulela - Najwa comes from a wealthy Sudanese family, but circumstances have made her into a cleaner in London.
• The Birth of Love by Joanna Kavenna - A story centred around childbirth through time may not be the best choice right now, but I am drawn to it.

So those are my potential reads - but I reserve the right to change my mind entirely and read nothing from the list!  As I won't be able to read them all, are there any books you think I should pick out first?

Bout of Books 8.0 Update #2

I've been having fun with Bout of Books all week.  Normally I am a strictly monogamous sort of reader but when I am off work, I find that I'm much more able to read multiple things at once and still keep up with the plots of all of them.  I've not read constantly, but I have been enjoying the reading I have managed to fit in.  At the moment, I've finished two books and am mid-way through two more.

After my last update on Wednesday, I continued with The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan and A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick.  I've been reading A Reliable Wife with Elena this week and she has already finished it.  I'm a bit behind as I've been reading maybe 20-50 pages or so a day rather than focusing all my attention on it.  I wasn't a fan of the opening sections as the writing is pretty weak at times, but it has improved as I have gone on.  I'm currently 166 pages in and have just over a hundred left.  I will probably finish this one today.

I'm still loving my reread of The Eye of the World, the first book in the Wheel of Time series.  Before starting it I could remember literally nothing (I first read it about seven years ago) but it's surprising how quickly it has all come back.  There's nothing like epic fantasy to escape to in the holidays.  I'm currently 327 pages in, which is not even half way yet.

And then this morning I visited the library to pick up some holds, one of which was Storybook Love, the third volume in the Fables series, about fairytale characters living in secret in New York.  Graphic novels are perfect for readathons so I picked it up straight away and literally flew through it.  I found it to be a mixed bag, I loved two of the four stories, but the other two felt like filler.  It was 190 pages.

I'm hoping for some quality reading time this weekend as my husband is at the Frightfest film festival, which is basically a five day long festival of horror films.  Horror films are really not my thing, so I've opted to stay at home.  It is pouring with rain outside and the temperature has dropped, so it's the perfect day to ignore the housework/ prep for September I should be doing and curl up with a book.

If you're doing Bout of Books, how are you getting on?

Statistics:

Books Started: 4

Books Completed: 2 (Dare Me and Storybook Love)

Pages Read: 326 + 190 + 166 + 327 = 1009 (awesome!)

Bout of Books Update: First Two and a Half Days

Already my Bout of Books TBR has gone out of the window!  I started in a good position on Monday as I had just finished a book on Sunday night for the Dog Days of Summer readathon, so I was able to choose whatever book I felt like to read.  I was all set to pick one from the TBR pile when my husband suggested we visit a larger town near us that has the best library ever.  It's in the same county, so my card still works, and they had so many good books that I couldn't resist checking out a few.  When I got home, I started reading Dare Me by Megan Abbott, which I've been meaning to read for ages now.

Dare Me turned out to be a good readathon pick as it's completely addictive.  It's superficially about a group of high school cheerleaders but it's really about obsession and the darker side of adolescence.  I couldn't put it down and finished it up Tuesday lunchtime.

Next, I picked up The Reliable Wife, which I am reading with the lovely Elena from Books and Reviews.  It's about a man who orders a bride but it doesn't go quite as he planned.  It promises to be a gothic type of story and although I like where the plot seems to be going, I'm not a big fan of the writing style so far, especially the point of view shifts mid chapter.  I like it enough to continue it, but it's not turning out to be as good as I had hoped.  I've read 50 pages so far.

And then on a whim, I picked up The Eye of the World last night, book one in the massively epic Wheel of Time series.  I have read this book before, I think I got up to book eight when I was at university and then I abandoned the series when Robert Jordan passed away and what was going to happen with the series seemed uncertain.  However, the series is completed now (fourteen books!) and I really did enjoy them, so for a few months I've been thinking about rereading and then finishing the series.  I picked up The Eye of the World only intending to read a few pages but I was soon sucked in and it's now too late - I'm going to have to read them all!  I'm currently up to page 118.

For the rest of today, I'll be continuing with A Reliable Wife and Eye of the World.

Stats so far:

Books Started: 3

Books Completed: 1 (Dare Me by Megan Abbott)

Pages Read: 326 + 50 + 118 = 494

Readathon Sign-Ups and Goals

 

I'm going to be participating in two readathons this week; the Dog Days of Summer Readathon hosted by The Estella Society and Bout of Books 8.0.  I'm still on summer holiday and was planning to read a lot anyway, so taking part in the readathons was an easy decision.

I am a fickle reader and I don't really like the pressure of setting goals for myself.  In fact, my only goal is going to be to read as much as I feel like it, when I feel like it.  I'm not going to aim for a page count or number of books, I'm just going to allow myself to read whenever I feel like it without feeling guilty about it.  When it comes to books I want to read, I've decided to focus on unread books off my shelf rather than kindle books, library books or review copies.  I've picked out some books that I think I might feel like reading but it's not set in stone; I'll read what I feel like and so may end up reading something completely different.

Here are the books that are taking my fancy at the moment:

From top to bottom (links to goodreads):

1. Across the Empty Quarter by Wilfred Thesiger - I've had the complete set of the Penguin Great Journeys books for years without reading any of them.  This one is about survival in the desert in 1947 and is the perfect length for a readathon.
2. The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan - This is the only book I am certain to read as I just finished book four last night and need to know what happens next.  I'm starting this today and will finish it either today or tomorrow.
3. Chinese Cinderella by Adeline Yen Mah - I've read a few books by this author so am interested in this autobiography.  Adeline's mother died giving birth to her and so she was made to feel unwelcome and unwanted.
4. A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick - I've had this book for a loooong time.  It's a gothic story about a mail order bride and I know I will love it, I just need to actually read it.
5. A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki - This is one of the only books on the Booker prizer long list that interests me.  It's about sixteen year old Nao, who keeps a diary whilst she is bullying, which is later washed up by the 2011 Tsunami.
6. A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers by Xiaolu Guo - This is about Zhuang, a recent arrival in London who falls in love with an older Englishman.  The book is actually structured as a dictionary, which I think is rather cool.
7. Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion - This was a birthday present back in March.  It's not my usual type of read, but I have been assured I will like it.
8. French Milk by Lucy Knisley - Graphic novels are perfect for readathons.  This is about Lucy's travels in France with her mother.

Have you read any of these?

Which ones should I definitely make time for next week?

Bout of Books 8.0

I took part in the last Bout of Books read-a-thon and it was a lot of fun, so I'm signing up again.  I'll still be on my summer holidays, so I'm hoping to get a ton of reading done.  I've already been reading a lot more than usual, so upping the ante even more should mean I get through a ton of books.  Which is awesome, because at the moment I'm in an "I want to read all of the books now, why can't I read faster?!?!" kind of mood.

The read-a-thon runs from the 19th to 25th of August, sign-ups are here if anyone else is interested in joining in.