Bye, bye 2010! Recapping the reading

2010 was a crazy year what with the stress of trying nearly the whole year to sell my house.  In my attempt to "declutter" and "stage" my house for potential buyers I wound up packing up books that I was intending to read!  More stress!

According to Goodreads stats (far more accurate than my count-your-reading-journal-pages method), I read 91 books this year , 9 more than last year, but I only read 28,809 pages compared with 29,709 pages last year.  This probably reflects my attempts to infuse a little young adult into my reading repertoire.  I had intended to try and break the 100 book barrier but the craziness of December put the kibosh on that.  If I had to choose my favorite book from the year it would be a tie between Jasper Fforde's Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron (an author I have an obvious favorable bias towards) and Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak; I read both at the beginning of the year and they are still with me.  Least favorite book was Vixen; it wasn't so bad I wanted to light it on fire, but it really got under my skin with the cliches and seemingly poor research.

I participated in a few challenges this year.  The Women Unbound Challenge was the one I completed, even reading one book beyond what I'd planned.  Sadly, I didn't get the Complete Booker Challenge 2010 finished; I got three of six Booker-winning novels read but just never got to the other three (I did read one Booker short-list, so not a complete bust).  I'm going to have to think on the future of challenges in 2011.

My Nostalgia Project stalled out with its initial subject - Flowers in the Attic.  Too intense.  The Booker Project and Newbery Project are coming along swimmingly, the Newbery especially, but the Best American Project had to go on hold when I had to pack all my Best American books in order to how the house.  I didn't make much reading progress on the Nobel Project but I did acquire more books to help me in the endeavor (and I can't quite decide with Vargas Llosa to read...too many good choices there).

In honor of the International Year of Chemistry in 2011, I started a blog specifically for reading chemistry-related books (readingchemistry.blogspot.com).  I cross-posted a few science/chemistry posts from this blog and will probably continue to cross-post in the future.

This year I also made my first foray into requesting review copies...which added a whole new level of stress because now I feel obligated to read and finish the book I've requested.  Thank goodness I didn't go nuts and ask for many more review copies - packing and moving has gotten me far, far behind on the ones I have right now!

That's it for 2010 - bye, bye and so long!

Bookspotting: September 14, 2010

LOTS today!

Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind
Old-ass prose translation of the Illiad 
One Day by David Nicholls
Two copies of Eat, Pray, Love
Eclipse
Murder in Havana by Margaret Truman
Old library book
At least one newspaper

And what was I reading? I was reading l8r, g8r but now I'm clinging to the standing strap for dear life (have a terrible sub driver today and it's scary)

Bookspotting: September 1, 2010

It's been a while since I did a "Bookspotting" post but we didn't have as many people riding the bus in the summer (plus, I was doing a lot of knitting, harder to spy on people when you're not looking up).

The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
A purple Sookie Stackhouse (too far away to read title)
An ancient copy of Franny and Zooey by JD Salinger
Many, many class notes
The guy with two full sleeves of tattoos is reading a Nora Roberts mass market...anachronism?  Good for him?

And what was I reading?  Jonathan Franzen's Freedom - it downloaded to my nook overnight!

Bookspotting: June 10, 2010

Beyond Reach by Karin Slaughter
Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen
A zillion newspapers (the University of Nebraska-Lincoln just voted to join the Big10, big news in Hawkeye-land dontchaknow)
Someone knitting a green sock (yay! another knitter)

And what was I reading? No reading, I was knitting my fuzzy blue sweater - the sleeves are almost done!

Bookspotting: June 3, 2010

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Howl's Moving Castle (I kid you not, given the unhappy news about Diana Wynne Jones today)
Gentleman who usually reads well-thumbed SF/Fantasy mass-market paperback is reading new(er) trade paperback titled something like "Believe in the Hope" (or similar)

And what was I reading? I was knitting on the sleeves of my fuzzy blue sweater (only a few more inches left before I can get back to the body)

Bookspotting: April 29, 2010

Grave Peril
A Wolf at the Table
Kiss Me While I Sleep
Three DIs (The Daily Iowan, the big story was about $11 million found to be missing from the UIHC billing...oops)

And what was I reading? Runaway by Alice Munro for Literature by Women (I also played a game of Sudoku)

Bookspotting: April 20, 2010

44 Scotland St by Alexander McCall Smith
Two nooks
Three newspapers
Copy of Redbook (looked old)
House Rules by Jodi Picoult
One kindle
Hand-held video game whatever (Nintendo DS? I dunno)

What was I reading? The New Yorker (I'm a few issues behind)

Bookspotting: January 15, 2010

Bookspotting's been pretty thin since Mother Nature decided we should get a taste of temperatures best suited for latitudes north of the Arctic Circle. No one was reading on the bus (except me) and absolutely NO ONE was reading at the bus stop. Not even me. I was focused on not developing frostbite. Now that we've returned to somewhat more humane winter temperatures a few readers are emerging from hibernation.

Nora Roberts Irish Born
Dragonlance, no idea of title but did recognize the logo on the spine
The Nanny Diaries
Two hardcovers in stretchy covers

And what was I reading? The Omivore's Dilemma

Bookspotting: December 4, 2009

The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley
Blood Done Sign My Name by Timothy Tyson
Now Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham

It's a pretty thin crowd (on an early bus due to the need to leave town this evening) and nearly everyone else is on a cell phone.

And what was I reading? A Truth Universally Acknowledged edited by Susannah Carson

Bookspotting: November 5, 2009

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo 
An Ann Rule true crime (mass-market - title not visible)
The Dangerous Days of Daniel X
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle
Another mass-market paperback, looks new
USA Today
Three. Screaming. Children. All from separate families. And some woman taking up 4 seats with her ginormous stroller she won't fold up.

And what was I reading? The Satanic Verses and thinking mean thoughts about people who insist on riding the bus during rush hour (i.e. when the bus is guaranteed to be packed) and taking up waaaay more space than they need.

Bookspotting: October 13, 2009

The Help by Kathryn Stockett
13 1/2 by Nevada Barr
Something in French (my French is limited)

Slim pickings - the non-literature-minded masses were either attached to cellphone/iPod or, like my benchmate, arguing over the merits of receiving jail-time or probation when assaulting the mother of one's child (aka "bitch-slappin' ma baby-momma"). True story.

And what was I reading? A.S. Byatt's The Children's Book (only 175 pages to go). Lovely.

Bookspotting: October 2, 2009

Stephen King The Stand
Same lady reading Lorraine Bracco
Nick Hornby Juliet, Naked
One The Lost Symbol
Mm ppbk Charlaine Harris (yellow)
Forgotten Realms Dissolution (?, had a hand over title)
One more mm that is about 7 seats ahead and I can see it

The mentally challenged guy is having an INTENSE conversation with some random dude who is really intoxicated; drunk guy is interested in where you can get the best Hawkeye gear in town. True story.

The traffic is worse than normal today, also true story.

And what was I reading? Nothing, I was composing this one-handed while hanging onto the hand-hold, trying not to fall over.

Bookspotting: September 29, 2009

Spotted on the morning bus:

Two copies of The Lost Symbol (possibly three, but no dustjacket on that one and spine printing looked about right)
Library copy of Lorraine Bracco's On the Couch
Terry Pratchett's Reaper Man
A book about making baby food, but I didn't catch the title
Several note packs for "Foundations of Clinical Practice I"
Some loudmouth complaining about his greedy "baby-mama" to what sounded like his momma (seriously, shut up because no one wants to know you're a lazy deadbeat dad)

And what was I reading? The Satanic Verses

Bookspotting: September 2, 2009

• Library binding edition of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (on the Aunt Marge chapter; how do I know this? because I had to stand over that poor person for 15 minutes and I hope she didn't mind my reading over her shoulder while I tried to avoid hitting her in the head with my backpack)
• Alex Haley's Roots
• new E.L. Doctorow - Homer and Langley
• one Don Quixote in Spanish (we're in the second week of classes)
• two medical students reading anatomy notes

And what was I reading? Nothing, I was trying not to fall over when the crazy bus driver stopped short every time.

Bookspotting: September 1, 2009

The Time Traveler's Wife
Mother Jones (pretty sure that was the title, but I can't get a search to pop up the correct book for me, black dust jacket with title in red lettering)
The South Beach Diet
A hard cover library book that looked suspiciously like An Irish Country Doctor, but I couldn't see the title to be sure
A rather dog-eared looking Bible (I've never seen this passenger read anything else, not even a newspaper)
The Daily Iowan and The Press-Citizen (local newspapers, one collegiate, the other town)
The Teddy Kennedy issue of Time

And what was I reading? I was knitting on my cardie, all the better to spy on people.

Bookspotting: August 21, 2009

"Bookspotting" is something I used to do for fun on the old "Book Explorers" board at BNBC (it was moderated by Ande from the Literary Ventures Fund); I called it "booksnooping" then but since I've just finished Trainspotting - and I think the correct term is "trend-spotting" as far as fashion goes - I like "bookspotting" better. Since the "Book Explorers" board is no longer active I'll just Bookspot on my blog and share what I see others reading in the Iowa City area.

The rules for Bookspotting are very simple: spy on your fellow humans to see what they are reading without actually bothering them to ask for title and author.

On the morning bus:
The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters
JAMA
A Sookie Stackhouse mass market (old cover art, not the TV-show tie-in)
A sword-and-sorcery fantasy mass market that has seen better days
(the bus was a bit thin this morning)

Current books-in-progress: Her Fearful Symmetry (Niffenegger's characters are always off-the-wall)
Current knitted item: now into the second skein for my 16-button cardie, just stockinette stitching for the next 7 inches (and since it's unseasonably cold for Iowa in August I might be needing it soon)
Current movie obsession: I was going to watch Videodrome last night....but it was the Project Runway season premiere so I watched three hours of PR while I knitted on my cardie (what was up with keeping Mitchell, who sent a nearly nude model down the runway, over Ari, who clearly made a finished garment that, although it was pretty-far out there, should have been given another shot)
Current iTunes loop: Chill Tracks playlist