Avidmom's Miscellaneous Reads 2023

(Just some of the books acquired for classes. My book collection expanded quite a bit over the last two years!)

It feels great to be back at Club Read! I graduated with my BA in English right before Christmas. The last few years have been a never-ending cycle of read, research, write, and repeat. Now that I am no longer a student with assigned readings, I am looking forward to reading whatever I want, whenever I want!

Current Reads (January 2023)


I am halfway through In Five Years and have barely started the Clear book.

2023 Reading List

>1 avidmom: Congratulations

Yes, congratulations on your degree and newfound freedom to read as you will. From the looks, Norton anthologies have grown since I last owned one. I love the spines.

Good to see you back!

Congrats! good to see you back.

Congrats on your degree! Enjoy reading whatever you want now

>4 baswood: Thank you! It was certainly more work than I was expecting.

>5 labfs39: Thank you! The Norton Anthologies usually came in a set of 3 or 4 books. I am glad I had an excuse to buy them. :)

>6 japaul22: Thank you! It is so good to be back. I have really missed this group!

>7 stretch: Thank you!

>8 Nickelini: Thank you! I feel a bit rebellious reading what I want. LOL.

Congratulations on completing your degree and the return of your reading agency :-).

huge congrats on your degree. That's a lovely image. And, it's really nice to see you back and posting.

Being done with school as an adult is the best feeling. Everything just expands for a while. Enjoy your reading!

>10 rhian_of_oz: Thank you! Loved the things I had to read for school; but feels good to have that freedom to choose again. And NOT have to analyze it to death! LOL

>11 dchaikin: Thank you Dan! Some of those books in the picture I plan on reading again (maybe). ;)

>12 lisapeet: It certainly is a great feeling. I took the first week of January off work and just basically slept a lot! LOL

Serle's In Five Years has the privilege of being the first book read of 2023. I started it on New Year's Eve and finished it on New Year's Day. It was lovely and rainy here (lovely because I did not have to venture out into the wet!) which added to the coziness of the read.

My son found this on a box-store shelf and thought the plot sounded interesting - not interesting enough to buy the book, but interesting enough to check it out of the library. He did not get very far into it and gave up around the second chapter. (I think maybe this was just a little too "chick-lit" for his tastes.) I was looking for a cozy, "don't have to think too much about it" read and figured this one would fit that bill. It certainly did.

The story is a first-person narrative told by Dannie, an up-and-coming successful young New York attorney. Dannie has always lived her life by a definite plan. So far, Dannie's internal plan and her external life has matched up. She has the attorney-gig she always dreamed of, is engaged to her significant other, and is still close to her beautiful, impulsively romantic best friend from childhood. Everything is going just as it should be until Dannie has a vision of herself five years into the future living in a different apartment with another man. Things get complicated when she (predictably) meets vision-guy IRL. How does she get there from here? Of course, the majority of the book answers that question.

Even though the story was highly predictable, I did like it. It was a perfect little rainy afternoon escape.

I'd give it a solid three stars.

I enjoyed Atomic Habits - hope you're getting something out of it. I now habit stack my vitamin taking with filling my water bottle in the morning, and I'm actually managing to remember to take them for a change!

>15 AlisonY: I've only made it through the first few chapters. Really liking it so far - especially his take on how our identity influences our habits.

(Just keeping my place here ... will review later)

Hello! Nice to hear from you. Hope you have had fun reading serendipitously this year. I look forward to hearing what book adventures you've been on.

Hi >18 labfs39: Thank you for stopping by! So far this year I've read one book & listened to the Perry book. LOL I have dabbled in more than that; but I can't seem to stick to anything over the last few months (except binge watching mind numbing sitcoms - that I can do.😂

Nice to see an update from you. Hope you’re well.

>19 avidmom: I think we've all had months (years) like that. For a while I was watching Korean dramas (k-dramas) all the time. Sparked an interest in learning Korean and I learned a lot about the culture, but yeah, not much reading happened. :-)

From the author of The Martian. I really liked this one.

>22 avidmom: I loved this one too! Even more than The Martian.

>22 avidmom: I need to get this one read. I haven’t pushed through the earlier chapter amnesia has become something of sticking point.