Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic 50 Book Challenge

Well, I'm always up for more sci-fi anyway!

I don't care if it's dated--ever read The Chronicles of the Lensmen (or is it "Lensman?") by E.E. Doc Smith? That's like ORIGINAL sci-fi, from way back in the '20s or '30s, and I thought it was pretty awesome when I borrowed the series from my dad last year.

Chris said:

and Alcyone said:

I am so incredibly thrilled to see there are those who share both my closet addiction and an interest in Hispanic literature. But I read both sides of the Atlantic.

I just got done with Bastos's "Hijo de hombre/Son of Man". Unfortunately, that was not just for fun. Never is these days. Good thing I like it a lot.

I'm with LabRat. Only 50? Gosh, not counting fanfic, I've read over 30 books so far this year. Um...might try that LibraryThing site, although it would be the work of a week to input all my books...might be worth it, though.

SuperRoo, you might possibly try Diana Palmer. I'd suggest checking out your local public library for these to see if you like them. Her quality has seriously gone down in the past three or four years, but the previous stuff was wonderful. As Krissie said, romances are formulaic, and Diana Palmer is absolutely that way, BUT she keeps the focus on romance, not sex, and some of her books are superb. Another of my favorites is Vicki Lewis Thompson's Nerd in Shining Armor - funny as all get out, not too steamy. For much, much steamier, try Lori Foster. She's...wow, a great writer, but it's definitely about the sex, not the romance.

Anywho, you might try those three writers, find out where your comfort level is, then check them on Amazon. Most of the romance writers have lots of lists attached that can lead you on to other writers that you might like. Here's an example:

[Sorry, mmmouse, I had to delete the url link as it was seriously distorting the rest of the thread due to its length. I did try various ways of shortening it within the post, to no avail. - Admin]

Gosh, I hope that works - you guys make linking look so darn easy!

Anyway, have fun!

mmouse

PS Just finished Point of Impact by Stephen Hunter (adventure? and the novel on which the movie Shooter is based), The Great Influenza by John M. Barry (history, about the 1918 flu pandemic), Spring Forward by Michael Downing (history, about the insanity we call Daylight Saving time), Miss Potter by Richard Maltby Jr (absolutely charming book about Beatrix Potter), and Ghost Rider by Greg Cox, which was so good I went to see the movie.

Next up is Black Light by Stephen Hunter because I LOVED Point of Impact and want to read more about Bob Lee Swagger.

I'd be like you and LabRat, mmouse, except for a certain thing that I did a couple years ago.

It was spring break from my college, and I decided I wanted to re-read the entire Dragonriders of Pern series. So, I started reading. I read, and I read, and I read. I read 8 books in 8 days before I started to feel a little burned out.

I didn't finish the series again until after school was back in session, but I think the pressure that I'd put on myself to read that series so fast kind of turned me off of reading any book for more than a couple hours/chapters at a time.

Now, I have to switch between fanfic, actual books, and other activities frequently, or I just have no motivation to do anything whatsoever.

Add to that the fact that I read Anna Karenina as this year's second book for me. That book took a TON of concentration, so I had to be fully awake mentally to be able to read and comprehend what was going on in the book.

So, I spent even less time every day reading than usual. It took me two months to read it, which is currently my record for the longest time taken to read a book--Little Women comes in second, with only two weeks.

Anyway, while I would normally be able to read more than fifty books in one year (or at least I could before Spring 2004), I'm not so sure I can do it anymore, considering it's already April and I've only read four (I finished Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets yesterday) so far.

Oh, and as for the cataloguing books at LibraryThing? I have 518, and not including the 30 or so I'd catalogued before I moved, it only took me 2-3 days to catalogue them all.

But then, I have a laptop, so I was able to take the computer up to my room and watch TV while I did my cataloguing from the bed.

DSDragon,
Thanks for the info! I, too, have a laptop, but I share it with the husband, and so only have it for an hour at night. However, my job wanted me to go to full-time, and with three kids who are more important than any job, I decided to quit and stay home. That means that for the next couple of months, I'll have the computer all to myself during the day, and so maybe I can put all my books in.

Off-topic, I'm really looking forward to having more than an hour, so that maybe I can get past the ARGH arc. Never saw season 4, have the DVDs, refuse to skip ahead, but, ARGH! Can't get past that darn not-wedding!

Phooey. Anyway, reading has always been my refuge, my escape from the world. And for Christmas, my beloved got me a Sony e-book, and man, does that thing rock for fanfic! It makes it so easy to download my favorites and read them again and again. So, actually, my reading rate has really dropped. Of course, I'm like LabRat in another way - those second-hand book stores are the best discovery for a reader.

Firmly yanking /me back on-topic. When I had to read (in college), I hated it. I only found one book in college that I wouldn't have read if left to myself but greatly enjoyed despite being forced to read it. So I'm very sorry that you burned yourself out, especially on such a good series. Bummer, that. Anna Karenina is a tough read, and yes, it took me five bloody long weeks to read that monster. I kept having to go back and find out who was who again. I finally broke down and did a chart of who is who, even a minor mention got written down. Bloody confusing, that book. And the translation I had used convoluted English that sometimes required diagramming the sentances to figure out what had actually been said.

Anyway, /me is scuttling back to my hole.

Thanks, DSDragon.

mmouse

Um ..... *looks rather sheepish* I would love to join this but I think I might have already passed the 50 book mark. I just read three different books tonight.

I tend to speedread. I tend to read everything. Wish I knew about this at the beginning of the year so perhaps I could have kept a better track of all the books I have read.

But here's a list of what I have read so far:

- Artemis Fowl
- Yeats: Selected Poems by Seamus Heaney
- Complete Collection of Nonsense Poetry by Edward Lear
- four Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett
- Three Fushigi Yugi books
- Three Case Closed volumes
- One Maison Ikkoku volume
- One Dramacon volume by Svetlana
- Farewell My Lovely and The Big Sleep Phillp Marlowe Novels by Raymond Chandler
- Wandering Angus (can't remember exact title) by Alexander McCall Smith
- Two volumes of Spike Milligan's war memoirs
- Two Lipsticks and a lover by Helen Frtiz Powell
- The unadulterated cat by Terry Pratchett
- Three Perry Mason novels by Erle Stanley Gardener - Amorous Aunt, Daring Decoy and one other that I can't remember.
- reread The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Three Invisible Detective novels by Justin Richards
- Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
- a novel/thesis on philosophy that I haven't finished digesting yet.

I think that's about it that I can remember. Which means I have read 30-31 books so far for the year that I can remember.

Had I known I would have slowed myself down to keep pace from the start of the year.

Sorry.

The Little Tornado.

Is anyone still shooting for this? I'm trying to catch up in vain. I'm on #10 right now. I just finished "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" by Jonathan Safran Foer. Really awesome book. Probably my favorite that I have read this year. ^_^

I'm now onto "A Long Way Down" by Nick Hornby. I'll let you know how that is going.

Here is my full list so far:
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/jojo_da_crow

I have a few recommendations that I wanted to share, even if I'm afraid to keep track of how much I read!

The Weather Warden series by Rachel Caine. It is a fun fantasy/SF series with a bit of romance thrown in. The sixth book just came out this month.

The Katie Chandler books by Shanna Swendson. Another fun fantasy series--but this one is more like Chick Lit with a definite romance thread woven into it. Three books in this series, and both of these series are best if you read them in order.

For straight romance, I love anything by Kathleen Gilles Seidel , particularly her older books "Until the Stars Fall", "Again" and "Summer's End". I own at least 10 of her books.

Oooh! What an awesome thread. I can't believe I missed it. I've read over 50 books, I think, but I haven't been keeping track. Anyway, I just wanted to recommend a book. Anybody read Twilight by Stephenie Meyer? It's located in the teen section (which was a blast from the past when I walked over there, let me tell you) but it's pretty long and definitely a wonderful read. From the back it looks a little strange. Vampires... eh... but it's wonderful. One of my absolute favorites! Okay. Long Twilight spiel done. Just... wanted to let everyone know it existed. It's actually a series, but only the second and third books are out. They're good, but nowhere near as wonderful as the original.

Goodbye 2007! Did anyone read 50 books? I didn't; only got to 30. Here's my list:

Family Tree by Barbara Delinsky
The Last Anniversary by Liane Moriarty
Made in America by Bill Bryson
Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words by Bill Bryson
Blue Screen by Robert B. Parker
The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
Forever in Blue by Ann Brashares
The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson
Sea Glass by Anita Shreve
Whitehorn Woods by Maeve Binchy
Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers
The 2-Second Commute by Christine Durst
The Paris Option by Robert Ludlum
Spare Change by Robert B. Parker
The Longest Night: The Bombing of London on May 10, 1941 by Gavin Mortimer
Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich
Parenting With Love And Logic by Foster W. Cline
Ethel and Ernest by Raymond Briggs
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Twilight by Stephenie Meyer
Died in the Wool by Rett MacPherson
Now and Then by Robert B. Parker
Home to Holly Springs by Jan Karon
Birth: The Surprising History of How We Are Born by Tina Cassidy
A Practical Handbook for the Boyfriend by Felicity Huffman
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
Austenland by Shannon Hale
Murder In Chinatown by Victoria Thompson
The Sugar Camp Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini

Lisa

^_^ I'm so glad some of you did this challenge with me! I didn't quite make it either sadly. Mostly because 95% of my books were read after July. I slacked a bit.

This year I am taking the challenge again because it had been so long since I had read so many books. I used to read all the time but it fell by the wayside. I did enjoy reading again this year. Here is my list in the order I read them:

1. Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment - James Patterson
2. Dragonflight - Anne McCaffrey
3. The Secret - Julie Garwood
4. Ransom - Julie Garwood
5. The Bride - Julie Garwood
6. The Wedding - Julie Garwood
7. Perfect - Judith McNaught
8. A Wrinkle in Time - Madeleine L'Engle
9. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel - Jonathan Safran Foer
10. A Long Way Down - Nick Hornby
11. The Golden Compass - Philip Pullman
12. The Subtle Knife - Philip. Pullman
13. Stardust - Neil Gaiman
14. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
15. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
16. Wicked Lovely - Melissa Marr
17. A Girl's Guide to Vampires - Katie Macalister
18. Sex and the Single Vampire - Katie Macalister
19. Dark Lover (Black Dagger Brotherhood, Book 1) - J.R. Ward
20. Lover Eternal (Black Dagger Brotherhood, Book 2) - J.R. Ward
21. Lover Awakened (Black Dagger Brotherhood, Book 3) - J.R. Ward
22. Lover Revealed (Black Dagger Brotherhood, Book 4) - J.R. Ward
23. The Enchanted Land - Jude Deveraux
24. Lover Unbound (Black Dagger Brotherhood, Book 5) - J.R. Ward
25. Stardust of Yesterday - Lynn Kurland
26. Fantasy Lover - Sherrilyn Kenyon
27. Dragonswan - Sherrilyn Kenyon
28. Night Pleasures - Sherrilyn Kenyon
29. Night Embrace - Sherrilyn Kenyon
30. Dance with the Devil - Sherrilyn Kenyon
31. City of Bones - Cassandra Clare
32. Darkfever - Karen Marie Moning
33. Bloodfever - Karen Marie Moning
34. Someone to Love - Jude Deveraux
35. Secrets of a Summer Night - Lisa Kleypas
36. Not Quite a Lady - Loretta Chase

Well, I seriously missed this goal last year. I didn't even break 20 books! Hopefully, I'll do better, and stick to fiction this time. (It was the non-fiction which caught me last year, since I spent many months reading one book, and only just finished it today.) Here's the list of 15½ books I read in 2007 (in alphabetical order by title, since I didn't keep a chronological list):

• The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them) by Jack M. Bickham
• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy -- this one took me two months to read, even though I read as much as I could as often as I could. Before the last book I read last year, this was the longest it had ever taken me to read a book, followed only by Little Women, which only took me two weeks. Now, it's the book that took the 2nd-longest amount of time.
• The Catteni Cycle by Anne McCaffrey (I can't remember if I have the order right here or not, but there are four books in the cycle):
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• Freedom's Landing
• Freedom's Choice
• Freedom's Challenge
• Freedom's Ransom

[*]The entire Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling (YAY for DH!):

• <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Sorry, I'm American, so my book says "Sorcerer.")
• Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

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[*]How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card
[*]Winter Rose by Patricia A. McKillip (this was actually the first book I read last year)
[*]Plot by Ansen Dibell (half last year, half this year) -- I had a reason to finish this book (I wanted to start reading a book that was mentioned in OSC's book that I listed above, but wanted to finish Plot before I started a fiction novel), but just could not find the motivation to finish reading this book in a timely manner, despite the promise of something much more interesting afterward! It was rather frustrating, actually.</ul><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">
I also started reading The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui, but I'm not counting that as actual reading, because a) I haven't even wanted to finish it in months, and b) it's on my PDA.

And now, to start on my 2008 reading!

ETA: By the way, JoJo, was that the first time you'd read [i]Dragonflight, or had you read it before? Have you read any of the rest of the Pern series? I've read the whole thing (plus anything else I've been able to get my hands on by Anne McCaffrey, and I absolutely adore it! I have to say though, that Anne McCaffrey is only my second favorite author, but she comes in very close after Orson Scott Card.

GRR! The board keeps adding stupid HTML font tags to my post, and whenever I try to edit them out, they just keep showing up again!