Exceedingly Mundane

If there’s one thing I love, it’s books. Books and cooking, as Dianne talks about in her blog, Unfinished Work. And here she is, posting this great set of questions that you know I just have to answer! Thanks Dianne!

1. Where do you most often buy your books? Online? Secondhand stores? Big name bookstores? Various places – online at usually Amazon.com and locally at library sales and bookstores. I have a Borders Reward card, so I like to buy there, but I’ve also been known not to leave Barnes and Noble empty handed! I prefer to get books as gifts and get them from the library though, being the frugal person that I am 🙂

2. If you buy online, which do you prefer – B&N or Amazon.com? Ebay? Christianbook.com? or elsewhere? Oops, answered that above. Usually Amazon.com. Love their wish list feature and I also like reading the reviews there.

3. Do you put your name in your books? If so, are you a bookplate or stamp person? I only put my name in books if I loan them out, or if they are gifts from someone. I write in the inside cover or inside front page who gave it to me and what holiday and year. I have never used a bookplate or stamp, just my own handwriting.

4. How do you feel about loaning books to others? I am a bit possessive of my books and prefer to only loan them to family or friends, when I know I will get them back. I don’t like loaning them out and losing them. That’s happened once before, years ago, with a book that I loved, a first edition of an author I like to read, and I never got it back. Once bitten, twice shy.

5. Do you highlight or mark your books as you read? Nope, I don’t mark in my books in any way.

6. How often do you visit your local library? Regularly. Usually every couple of weeks.

7. Do you collect any certain kind of book? No, I mostly read women’s fiction and Christian fiction, and I do like to get books by certain authors I know and like. But I don’t really collect any, per se.

8. What do you do when you’re done with a book and no longer want it? Usually hang on to it! As I said, I’m a bit possessive about my books. If they are paperback or I didn’t really enjoy them, I will put them in a garage sale or donate them somewhere. My hardbacks and paperbacks by authors I really enjoy stay with me in my bookshelves. 🙂

9. Do you keep a list of or catalog the books you own? No, but I want to do this. We have a system like this for our DVD collection and I’ve been *meaning* to do this for my books. One of those projects on my never-ending to-do list.

10. Any other weird book habits you’d like to share? Hmm, that I don’t mar my books in any way. I don’t write in them or turn down the corners. It’s only bookmarks for me! I don’t like to bend the spine too much, I don’t like to bend the paper jacket/cover over to mark a page, etc. I’m a little particular about how I care for my books!

Okay, so let’s hear it from you other book lovers!

I won’t tag anyone in particular, but I’d love if you would play along, and thanks again to Dianne for this great meme!

Reading Lists, Part Two

1. So, last week we asked you if you kept a list of books that you’re interested in, wanting to read, wanting to buy, etc. This week, we want to know–do you keep a list of the books you’ve READ? Yes, being a list-maker extraordinaire, you know I have a list of this too :mrgreen:. I’ve been doing this for several years now.

2. If so, how? In a journal? A notebook? On the computer? On the computer. Before I started my blog, I used to make a Word document for each year. I still do, but now, I transfer that to my blog regularly. My 2005 Reading List is here and my 2006 Reading List (so far) is here. 🙂

P.S. My answers to last week’s questions, Part 1, are here.

I finished another book last night (“At First Sight” by Nicholas Sparks), one that I got for Christmas last year (gasp!). Yes, I tend to buy books or receive them as gifts and then hold on to them, savoring them and basically “saving them for a rainy day”. It’s a sickness, I tell you, a sickness. 🙂 Anyway, I added this book to my Fall Reading Challenge so that I would go ahead and read it before Christmas this year!

I really love Nicholas Sparks, I always have. I have read every book he has ever come out with, and loved some, and liked all the others. This one was a follow-up to a book I own and have read, “True Believer”. I enjoyed both of these books, but I didn’t just love this one. It was a bit sad, and for me personally, a bit hard to read. I don’t want to ruin it for anyone, so I won’t go into specifics, but I will say that books that involve infertility and pregnancy are hard for me, just because of my situation. We couldn’t conceive, so reading books about people who have trouble and then can are often hard for me to read. This book was a bit sad, but I’m proud to say that I didn’t cry like I did with “The Notebook”. I bawled when I read that one! I did like it though, and am glad I read it. I really love the way Nicholas Sparks writes, and I loved what he wrote in this fiction book about marriage, relationships, trust and commitment.

For the record, that makes 64 books read so far this year, with a total of 22,520 pages read. Up next is another book on my Challenge list, another one I own. I’m going to read the next book in the Stephanie Plum series for me, “To The Nines”. I am really trying hard not to plow through these books. I love them and they are so light and entertaining. I’m trying to hold back and pace myself! I’m actually really glad I planned this one next. I need something lighter and funny after the book I just finished. 🙂

I finished another book in my Fall Reading Challenge last night, “The Reading Group” by Elizabeth Noble. I have had this book on my library list for a while, and I finally decided to check it out and read it. I liked it, but I didn’t love it. I think that if I had read it at another time, maybe earlier in the year, I would have liked it a lot more. I seem to be a lot busier lately, and a lot less “into” my reading. I guess I’m in a bit of reading rut 😀

I liked the book, but it did take me quite a while to get into it. I don’t think it’s that the fact that’s it’s chick lit, as I normally love this genre. Nor do I think because it’s British, because I usually really like British fiction (think Sophie Kinsella). I think it’s the fact that there were so many characters and I really had trouble keeping them straight for quite a ways into the book. Thankfully, there was a “cast of characters” type page in the front, that I had to repeatedly keep referring to. It listed the main characters (5 in the reading group), their spouses, children, extended family, who was friend with whom, who worked with whom, etc. It just took me a while to get invested in the characters I guess, and get them all straight!

For the record, that makes 63 books read so far this year, with a total of 22,243 pages read. Next up to read is another book on my Fall Reading Challenge list, a book I own that it sitting on my bookshelf — “At First Sight” by Nicholas Sparks. This book is a follow-up to one I read earlier this year, True Believer, also by Sparks. I hope it’s good!!!

I finished another library book last night (one that is on my Fall Reading Challenge), “Sophie’s Heart” by Christian author Lori Wick. My sister Gail had previously read this book and recommended it to me. She wrote a review of it here on our main site, Hambones.org.

I agree with what Gail wrote. This book is like a modern day fairy tale, told from the Christian perspective. Sophie is a young woman, living in Czechoslovakia with her grandmother. She works as a translator and speaks 5 languages. Her dream is to come to America, which she does. She starts off with a menial job of busing tables in a restaurant in Chicago. She meets a lady at a Bible study group at church, and is introduced to her brother, Alec, a widower who recently lost his wife and is struggling to raise his 3 children alone. Sophie ends up going to work as their housekeeper, and the book follows her life in America. It’s a good book, although a little on the long side (I thought it could have wrapped up a little sooner, but it was still engrossing). My attention span seems to wane after about 325 or 330 pages or so, and this book was 425 pages 🙂

For the record, that makes 62 books read so far this year, with a total of 21,814 pages. Up next is another library book, also on my Fall Challenge List, called “The Reading Group”, by Elizabeth Noble. After that, I’ll try to finish the other books on my challenge list. I have 4 more to go, then I hope to switch to some of the Beverly Lewis books I’ve bought, or the ones that Tim gave me for my birthday. So many books, so little time!

I thought I would post a quick update to my fall reading challenge. You can read the original post here. I originally had 10 books (all fiction) on my list, then I picked up an extra one from the library on my last trip. So, I currently have 11 books on my list, and I have finished 4.

The latest two I have finished are both part of series books that I am reading. The first one I finished is “204 Rosewood Lane” by Debbie Macomber, which is the second book in the Cedar Cove series. The second one I just finished is also the second book in a different series, the “No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” series by Alexander McCall Smith. That book is entitled “Tears of the Giraffe” and follows the story of Precious Ramotswe, lady detective in the country of Botswana. I won’t do individual reviews on these books, as they are both part of a series. I will say this – I do like both of these series. I love the Cedar Cove series, which I expected, because I really like Debbie Macomber and the “women’s fiction” that she writes. As for the other series, the Ladies Detective series is really starting to grow on me. I wasn’t sure about those books, but about 3/4 of the way through the first book, it started to grab me and grow on me. In this second book I read, the characters continued to evolve and I guess I’m getting more attached to them. So, I will keep on with both of these series, and I look forward to reading more. In fact, up next to read for me is the third book in the Cedar Cove series, “311 Pelican Court.” It’s also on my Fall Reading list, so I’m slowly working my way through the books I had planned to read.

For the record, with these 2 recently completed, that makes 59 books read so far this year, with a total of 20,708 pages read. After I finish “311 Pelican Court”, I plan to go back to the library (albeit, a different branch) and get more of the books on my list. There are 3 more on my list that I own, sitting on a bookshelf, and I will get to them last, I think. The pull of the library and bookstores is really strong for me, so this is going to be a constant struggle to stick to my list and not deviate and buy/check out more and different books to read.

I won, I won! Karen, over at Write from Karen was having a drawing for a free book. Why, you ask??? Because she’s a wonderful person, a gifted writer, and an avid reader. Oh, and it’s all a part of the Buy a Friend a Book program. I had never heard of this before, but it’s a great idea. I’m all about books, reading, and the love of reading being passed on to everyone, especially kids. Karen drew my name this morning in her drawing, and is sending me a book from my Amazon wish list. Isn’t that sweet?!

Be sure to go check out Karen’s blog, it’s one of my favorites, and also the BAFAB program

Last night, I finished a library book I got on a whim last week. I went looking for two of the books on my Fall Reading Challenge list, and since they only had one, I picked up this book instead. Since I just loved and adored “The Red Tent” by Anita Diamant, I had high hopes for this other book by her. But, either I wasn’t in the mood, or more likely, I just didn’t like the subject matter as much, because I didn’t enjoy this book nearly as much as Red Tent. It’s about the people living in a dying area of Massachusetts called “Dogtown”, in the early 1800’s. There are several interesting characters, but the book just sort of meanders and basically all of the inhabitants die or move, thereby leaving Dogtown to a memory. It was a bit depressing, and not all that interesting, really. I am not sorry that I read it – it does me good to break out of my mold of only reading women’s and Christian fiction, so good to broaden my horizons a bit. But, I don’t think I would recommend it to anyone.

For the record, that makes #57 for the year, with a total of 20,102 pages read. Up next is a book on my Fall Challenge reading list, one that I am really looking forward to, called “204 Rosewood Lane”. Since I discovered Debbie Macomber last year (“The Shop on Blossom Street was the first I read by her), she has since become a favorite. I recently started her “Cedar Cove” series, and have read the first book. The sixth book, “6 Rainier Drive” was recently released in paperback, so I look forward to reading the next 5 books in this series. They should be quick reads, and if the subsequent ones in the series are anything like the first one (“16 Lighthouse Road”), I will thoroughly enjoy them. 🙂

I finished a really good book last night, my second by Southern author Dorothea Benton Frank. I had previously read “Shem Creek” by Frank and really enjoyed it. I really liked this one too, and I don’t know if I could pick which one I liked more. Both good stories, well told, and very Southern in the storytelling. This book flipped back and forth between the present day (1999,2000) and the early 60’s to tell the story of Susan Hamilton Hayes and her family. It was a very engrossing read, and I’m sort of sad that the book is finished.

For the record, that makes #56 for the year, with a total of 19,841 pages read. Also, this is the first book that I have completed for the Fall Reading Challenge. (I have linked to the Challenge on my sidebar, and will try to remember to keep that original post updated as to my reading accomplishments.)

I went to the library yesterday, to pick up two books that are on my challenge list. I couldn’t find one of them (“Tears of the Giraffe”), so they ordered me a copy from another branch. I got one from my list “204 Rosewood Lane” and also picked up a recent book by Anita Diamant from the New Release shelf. Sigh. Off track already! Oh well, I love to read, and I can easily substitute one book for another. I don’t know which one I will start first, I will have to see what I’m in the mood for!

Katrina over at Callapidder Days posted a great challenge to get us all reading more. She’s having a “Fall into Reading” challenge and I am going to try to participate. You can read more about it here. Here’s the general idea:

As a quick refresher, the purpose of this challenge is for us to establish some goals for our reading this Fall and then work toward them. Whether you have a pile of books that you’ve been intending to read but just haven’t yet, or you need a gentle prod to finish some books that you started but then abandoned, or you would just like a little accountability as you work through your reading stack, this is the place for you. Read for entertainment, read to learn, read to improve your life, read to be inspired. Just read!

I set a goal last year to read 30 books, and when I had met that goal, I upped it to 35 and finished right around Christmas. This year, I set what I thought was a very ambitious goal for myself, to read 52 books, which works out to one per week. Since I’ve already achieved that goal, I haven’t really set a new number, but just wanted to read whatever and whenever. Most of the books I read do come from the library. It’s just plain more economical for me! 🙂

I do have several books on my bookshelf that I have purchased and want to read. But the majority of books I want to read, including several that are a part of a series, will come from my local library. In addition, I always like to leave a little flexibility as to finding new books, getting good book recommendations, or just plain happening across a book that strikes my fancy. 🙂 Please know that I reserve the right to substitute one book for another at any given point between now and the end of the year. (P.S. I mostly read fiction, I find non-fiction pretty hard to finish!)

I always try to write a blurb when I finish a book, and post it here, so check back if you’d like!

Here’s my list…

Sullivan’s Island by Dorothea Benton Frank (in Progress, Own) – DONE!
204 Rosewood Lane by Debbie Macomber (#2 in a series, Library) – DONE!
311 Pelican Court by Debbie Macomber (#3 in a series, Library) – DONE!
Tears of the Giraffe by Alexander McCall Smith (#2 in a series, Library) – DONE!
Miss Julia’s School of Beauty by Ann B. Ross (Miss Julia series, Library) – DONE!
Sophie’s Heart by Lori Wick (Library) – DONE!
The Reading Group by Elizabeth Noble (Library) – DONE!
At First Sight by Nicholas Sparks (Own it) – DONE!
To the Nines by Janet Evanovich (Own it)
Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella (Own it)
Last Days of Dogtown by Anita Diamant (Library) – DONE!

OK, I’ll use this entry and update it as I go along!

1. Tues, Sept 26, 2006 – it didn’t take me long to get off track! I went to the library to get two books from my fall reading list. They didn’t have one of them on the shelves, as they were supposed to. Seems to be lost or misplaced. So, they ordered me a copy from another branch. No biggie. The problem is that I always browse the “New Release” shelf up front when I go in. I saw a recent book by Anita Diamant, who wrote a book I read earlier this year and just loved – “The Red Tent”. I couldn’t just leave it sitting there, so I got that one, and one from my list (“204 Rosewood Lane”). So…. it didn’t take me long to deviate from my list! I’ll have to add this one, and hopefully I can still read the others I had planned and listed. 🙂

ADDED to list – “The Last Days of Dogtown” by Anita Diamant (Library)

2. Wed, Sept 27, 2006 – Finished “Sullivan’s Island” from my challenge list.

3. Tues, Oct 3, 2006 – Finished “The Last Days of Dogtown”, library book I picked up on a whim and added to this reading list.

4. Tues, Oct 10, 2006 – Finished “204 Rosewood Lane”, library book; second in the Cedar Cove series by Debbie Macomber. I LOVE these books, and am going to be so sad when I get to the sixth one (all she has written to date)

5. Tues, Oct 10, 2006 – Finished “Tears of the Giraffe”, library book; second in the No 1. Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith. I like these books, they are simple, and written in a different kind of “voice” but they are growing on me. I plan to keep going with this series

6. Friday, Oct 27, 2006 – I haven’t updated, but I have finished 3 more books from the challenge list – 311 Pelican Court, Miss Julia’s School of Beauty, and Sophie’s Heart. I got all 3 from the library and enjoyed all of them! I’m really looking forward to reading the last Miss Julia book (I think there’s one more out I have not read), as well as working on the remaining 3 books that Debbie Macomber has written in the Cedar Cove series. I think she’s going to continue with this series, and I love it. I even went and signed up for her newsletter, which came in the mail the other day, so I will know when she writes more books 🙂

7. Thursday, Nov 9, 2006 – I finally sloshed through “The Reading Group” by Elizabeth Noble. As I posted in the blog entry about it, I did like the book, but I didn’t just love it. But, I really think it was me. I am either in a bit of a rut, or else this book did not just grab my attention right now, with everything else we have going on. I did like it though, once I figured all of the characters out and could keep them straight without having to flip back to the page outlining who was who 🙂

8. Wednesday, November 15, 2006 – Finished another book on my list (one that I own), “At First Sight” by Nicholas Sparks. I own both the first one, “True Believer” and this follow-up book and have read both. Good books, but not spectacular. Still enjoyed it though! Two more on my list to finish 😀

9. Tuesday, November 28, 2006 – Finished the last two books on my list, To the Nines by Janet Evanovich and Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella. Both are books I own, and this challenge really helped me to pull books off of my own bookshelf and read them. And it helped me stay out of both the library and the bookstore.

CHALLENGE COMPLETE!!!

I finished another book from my “pile” last night – “The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” by Alexander McCall Smith. This is the first in a series of books about a lady detective in the country of Botswana. I knew McCall Smith was a Scottish writer, and I thought I was going to be starting a series about people in Scotland. I bought the wrong book though, as that is a different series. This book was good, not outstanding, but good and different. It was more like a series of short stories, as each chapter was devoted either to the main character, Precious Ramotswe, one of her friends or family members, or a case she was working on. Most of the chapters were short vignettes of cases in Botswana that she worked on. The books are filled with local color, words, places, and stories of life in that part of Africa (near South Africa and Namibia). It was different from the normal books I read, and therefore good for me to read, to break out of my norm. I think I will try to read some of the others in this series later, but I will try to get them from the library and not buy more of them. I also plan to start at least one or two of the other series by this author. In addition to all the other “series” type books I have either started or want to start by many other authors! 😀

For the record, that makes #55 for the year so far, with a total of 19,393 pages read. Up next is a book I picked up recently at a library sale, “Sullivan’s Island” by Dorothea Benton Frank. I read my first book by this Southern author recently (read the review here), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a light, engrossing, very quick read, and I hope this one is very similar.

If you’re currently reading a book, or have one to recommend, be sure to leave me a comment! Not only do I love comments but I am always looking for good books or new authors to check out.

I finished a really good book last night, that I had bought at Borders. It’s the first in a series of books about a group of friends and family in the fictitious town of Cedar Cove Washington. I had to buy the paperback at the bookstore because my county library system had lost their copy of the first book in the series, but they do have all the others. I’m a bit OCD though, and I always like to read the first book first.

“16 Lighthouse Road” was a really good book, if you like this type of women’s fiction, which I do. The first book set up the town and we are introduced to a group of family and friends as main characters. I believe the series will build on these, as well as probably add new characters along the way. The first book covers Olivia Lockhart, mother of 3, who is a local judge and lives at 16 Lighthouse Road. It also encompasses her mother Charlotte, and her daughter Justine and son James. There’s her best friend Grace, whose husband Dan mysteriously disappears in this book, and Grace’s two grown daughters Kelly and Mary Ellen. Grace lives at 204 Rosewood Lane, which happens to be the next book in this series, so maybe we’ll learn what happened to Dan in the next book. Then, there’s the young couple we meet at the beginning of the book. Cecelia and Ian Randall appear before the judge (Olivia) and want a divorce, but she does not grant it and wants the young couple to work things out. They had recently suffered the loss of their infant daughter and were having trouble communicating. All in all, several different plots going with some really good characters, and I look forward to reading more about them, and meeting more of the members of Cedar Cove in the next several books in the series.

For the record, that makes #54 so far this year, with a total of 19,158 pages read. Up next is my first book by Scottish author Alexander McCall Smith. He has several series of books as well. I bought “The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” to start with, as it begins a series as well. I was thinking since he was Scottish, this series was set in Scotland. Apparently, I neglected to read the jacket cover (which I did just now), and I see that this book revolves around Precious Ramotswe, the only lady private detective in the country of Botswana. Apparently, the author lived for a while in Botswana and was a professor at the University there. So, this will be a bit different type of book for me. I’m looking forward to it! 🙂

I stayed up late last night and finished a book I had borrowed from my sister Gail, “Montana Sky” by Nora Roberts. I really enjoyed it! Gail’s review is already posted here on Hambones.org, so I will try to add my comments later this weekend.

I had only read one trilogy by Nora Roberts before this book, which I also enjoyed, but this one was a bit different. This book had a bit of murder mystery to it, and I really enjoyed that aspect of it, mixed in with the romance. I didn’t like the references to the gore and other murderous aspects, but they weren’t that bad and I was able to pass over them without it bothering me. Unlike a lot of other, more “hard-core” murder mystery or forensics type thrillers.

For the record, that makes #53 so far this year, with a total of 18,781 pages read. Up next is a paperback I picked up in Borders a few weeks ago called “16 Lighthouse Road”. I’ve checked out several Debbie Macomber books from my library before, and noticed that she has a series of books set in a small town in Washington state, called the “Cedar Cove” series. I wanted to start with the first one, and after searching and searching with the librarian, we discovered that the library’s one copy of the first book in the series had been lost or misplaced. So, I bought the first one in paperback, and plan to check the rest of the series out of my local library. I think I will really enjoy these books; I always like Macomber’s characters and her style of writing. Good “women’s fiction”, as I like to call it! 😀

I finished the last book in the Lori Wick trilogy “The Tucker Mills Trilogy” last night, “Leave a Candle Burning”. Wick is a Christian writer and these are very clean, very charming, very old-fashioned books. They are set in Tucker Mills Massachusetts in the 1830’s, and cover many of the same people in each book, but each book focuses on a new couple that meet, fall in love, and get married. My review of the trilogy is up here on Hambones.org.

For the record, that makes #52 for the year, with a total of 18,343 pages read. Up next is a book I borrowed from my sister Gail, that she recently read – “Montana Sky” by Nora Roberts. I hope I enjoy it as much as the three books I just read by Nora Roberts – they were really good, easy reads.

Not only did I attend my first ever NFL preseason game on Saturday, but I also went to my first ever “Friends of the Library” book sale. I had seen them mentioned before in the paper, but had just never tried to go. Since Tim had gone early to play golf with Don, and Gail was running some errands, I went up to my local library to check out the book sale.

Let me just say, for a bookworm like myself, I was in heaven. I was surprised at how many books they had, how many of them were fairly new, and what good prices they had on them. I asked a lady at the desk, and she said they had them twice a year, but I honestly thought I saw them in the paper more often (maybe 4-5 times a year). Then again, maybe different branches have them at different times of the year (I have 2 branches fairly close to my house). All I can say is that I am definitely going to go again. It doesn’t bother me to read a used book if it’s in good shape. As much as I like buying new books, I like buying books for a very cheap price even better!

The hardbacks were $2, the large paperbacks and softbacks were $1 and the small paperbacks were 50 cents. I got 7 books for 7 dollars – one hardback, 4 large paperbacks and 2 small paperbacks. I went ahead and loaned one to Gail to read, since I have plenty to keep me busy for a while. In fact, after the sale, I wandered back out into the library to check out books, then berated myself for the number of books I have purchased, that are sitting at home waiting to be read. Plus, I had more in hand, so I decided to leave without checking out any regular library books. It was hard, believe me, really hard! 😆

Here’s what I got (I’m also going to add them to my sidebar):

Hardback of “King of Torts” by John Grisham (we only lack 2 in our collection)
Large Paperback of “Confessions of a Shopaholic” by Sophie Kinsella (loaned this one to Gail)
Large Paperback of “Sullivan’s Island” by Dorothea Benton Frank
Large Paperback of “The Sunday Philosophy Club” by Alexander McCall Smith
Large Paperback of “The Preacher’s Daughter” by Beverly Lewis
Small Paperback of “The Devil Wears Prada” by Lauren Weisberger (saw movie but never read book)
Small Paperback of “Ten Big Ones” by Janet Evanovich (bought hardback of “To the Nines” but it’s still waiting to be read)

Sigh – I loved it, and ended up taking Gail back up there with me again later. I do love the library and now there’s something new to love – library book sales!