jjmcgaffey's reading for 2016

Hi, all! I've been doing the 75 Book Challenge for the past several years, but I've decided to give Club Read a try instead this year.

I'm Jennifer; I live in the SF Bay Area, with two cats and no one else. My parents live just down the road, so I visit them a lot; I've also got two (younger) sisters, one living about 25 minutes away and one about 4 hours away, both married (and the farther one has two sons). I'm a Foreign Service brat who grew up moving from country to country; it's very strange to me that I've lived in the same house (OK, apartment) for ten years and in the same town for twelve.

I read mostly genre fiction - fantasy and science fiction (I don't distinguish, they get grouped together as SF (Speculative Fiction)), romances, mysteries, animal stories, childrens stories, etc. - and non-fiction such as biographies, sciences (archaeology to zoology!), craft books, etc. And cookbooks, though they don't really get _read_ as such. I don't read horror, and I basically don't read literary fiction - for the same reason, I dislike being depressed by my books.

Reading plans have never worked for me - when there's a "next book" on the pile, I'm apt to shy off and read something (almost anything) else. So I'm keeping my plans general.

I own waaaaay too many books, and too many of them are unread. So I'm giving myself three challenges this year; to read 150 books (number picked out of the air, though I achieved it easily in 2015), to read 50 BOMBs (Books Off My Bookshelf - owned at least 1 year and never read), and to discard 25 books. I have this problem, you see, where I can't possibly discard an unread book - it might be wonderful! So reading BOMBs and discarding books go hand in hand. Though sometimes I reread a book and wonder why I kept it, which helps with the discards.

Last year I blew away my discards challenge, mostly by dumping my entire collection of one author whose works apparently I can't read any more (though I used to like them). I also succeeded easily in reading 150 books (passed 200, in fact). But I failed at BOMBs, mostly because I didn't concentrate on them - I got a nice stack to read in December, but...y'know, there's a few other things going on in December! So I'm also going to make a mini-challenge to read at least four BOMBs a month - that'll deal with most of the challenge easily. And I'll renew my rule that I must read two books new to me (library books, BOMBs, or new buys all count) for each reread I do.

Books Read:



BOMBs:



Books Discarded:

Reading Rules

Two new books for each reread; cannot read in arrears.

Four BOMBs per month.

Reading January - March
# indicates re-read, % indicates borrowed book, @ indicates ebook, * indicates Book Off My Bookshelf (BOMB), ! indicates ER book (or similar early review source)

January
1. The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax - #@ - by Dorothy Gilman.
2. The Tightrope Walker - *@ - by Dorothy Gilman.
3. Velveteen Vs. the Junior Super-Patriots - @ - by Seanan McGuire.
4. Velveteen Vs. the Multiverse - @ - by Seanan McGuire.
5. Dreamers - !@ - by Donna Glee Williams.
6. Return to War - * - by P.M. Griffin.

February
7. The Genuine Article - @ - by Patricia Rice.
8. The English Heiress - @ - by Patricia Rice.
9. The Irish Duchess - @! - by Patricia Rice.
10. The Taste of Conquest - @* - by Michael Krondl.
11. The Reckoners - !@ - by Doranna Durgin.
12. The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax - @# - by Dorothy Gilman.
13. Valor's Trial - #% - by Tanya Huff.
14. Superhero Universe: Tesseracts Nineteen - @! - by Claude Lalumiére.
15. The Truth of Valor - % - by Tanya Huff.
16. Switcheroo - @! - by Aaron Elkins.
17. Dark Watcher - #@ - by Lilith Saintcrow.

March
18. Bath Tangle - *@ - by Georgette Heyer.
19. La Desperada - @!* - by Patricia Burroughs.
20. The V'Dan - @ - by Jean Johnson.
21. A Civil Contract - *@ - by Georgette Heyer.
22. An Exchange of Gifts - % - by Anne McCaffrey.
23. Hunter, Healer - #% - by Lilith Saintcrow.
24. The Marriage Contract - * - by Anna Adams.
25. An Ancient Peace - % - by Tanya Huff.
26. Closer to the Heart - % - by Mercedes Lackey.
27. Permeable Borders - % - by Nina Kiriki Hoffman.
28. Railroad Rising - !@ - by J.P. Wagner.
29. Wastelands 2 - % - by John Joseph Adams.
30. Sweep in Peace - % - by Ilona Andrews.
31. Interim Errantry - @ - by Diane Duane.
32. Shadows of Self - % - by Brandon Sanderson.
33. Dying On the Vine - % - by Aaron Elkins.
34. Faerie Blood - @ - by Angela Korra'ti.
33. Shadows of Self - % - by Brandon Sanderson.
35. A Point of Honor - # - by Dorothy J. Heydt.
36. Bone Walker - @ - by Angela Korra'ti.
37. A Dangerous Talent - % - by Aaron & Charlotte Elkins.
38. Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue - * - by John H. McWhorter.
39. Knitting Rules! - @ - by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee.
40. Assembling California - % - by John McPhee.
41. The Unknown Ajax - *@ - by Georgette Heyer.
42. Touched by Magic - @# - by Doranna Durgin.

Reading April - June
# indicates re-read, % indicates borrowed book, @ indicates ebook, * indicates Book Off My Bookshelf (BOMB), ! indicates ER book (or similar early review source)

April
43. Wolf Justice - @# - by Doranna Durgin.
44. Clean Sweep - %# - by Ilona Andrews.
45. Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen - % - by Lois McMasters Bujold.
46. Free-Wrench - @ - by Joseph Lallo.
47. Trouble in the Brasses - @# - by Charlotte MacLeod.
48. Treecat Wars - @ - by David Weber.
49. Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle - @ - by Georgette Heyer.
50. From a High Tower - @ - by Mercedes Lackey.
51. Uneasy Relations - #% - by Aaron Elkins.
52. Skull Duggery - % - by Aaron Elkins.
53. Empress - !@ - by Alma Alexander.
54. Geology of the San Francisco Bay Region - % - by Doris Sloan.

May
55. Picture Miss Seeton - !@ - by Heron Carvic.
56. Dawn of the Flame Sea - @ - by Jean Johnson.
57. The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed - * - by John McPhee.
58. Spike of Swift River - # - by Jack O'Brien.
59. Silver Chief to the Rescue - # - by Jack O'Brien.
60. Silver Chief, Dog of the North - % - by Jack O'Brien.
61. Return of Silver Chief - % - by Jack O'Brien.
62. Sprig Muslin - @ - by Georgette Heyer.
63. All a Woman Wants - @! - by Patricia Rice.
64. Chains of Command - @! - by Marco Kloos.
65. Redemption Bay - @% - by RaeAnne Thayne.
66. The Goblin King - % - by Shona Husk.
67. Fire Touched - % - by Patrica Briggs.
68. Every Heart A Doorway - % - by Seanan McGuire.
69. No True Way - @ - by Mercedes Lackey ed.
70. Crucible - @ - by Mercedes Lackey ed.

June
71. The Quiet Gentleman - @ - by Georgette Heyer.
72. Three Hands for Scorpio - * - by Andre Norton.
73. Venetia - * - by Georgette Heyer.
74. Castle Hangnail - - by Ursula Vernon. (hmmm, I don't have a marker for a new book that I own...)
75. Traveller - * - by Richard Adams.
76. Cousin Kate - * - by Georgette Heyer.
77. The Spanish Bride - * - by Georgette Heyer.
78. Lord Grenville's Choice - @ - by G.G. Vandagriff.
79. Charity Girl - * - by Georgette Heyer.
80. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up - % - by Marie Kondo.
81. Top Traitor - # - by Peter O'Donnell.

Reading July - September
# indicates re-read, % indicates borrowed book, @ indicates ebook, * indicates Book Off My Bookshelf (BOMB), ! indicates ER book (or similar early review source)

July
82. Little Orphan Annie Vol 7 - # - by Harold Gray.
83. Little Orphan Annie Vol 8 - # - by Harold Gray.
84. Dead Reckoning - @ - by Mercedes Lackey.
85. Little Orphan Annie Vol 9 - # - by Harold Gray.
86. The Collected Kagan - @ - by Janet Kagan.
87. Best Cartoons of the Year 1956 - - by Lawrence Lariar.
88. Best Cartoons of the Year 1957 - - by Lawrence Lariar.
89. The Corinthian - * - by Georgette Heyer.
90. Avarice - @ - by Annie Bellet.
91. Silence - % - by Mercedes Lackey.
92. A Call to Duty - @# - by David Weber.
93. A Call to Arms - % - by David Weber.
94. Ripper Jax - - by Peter O'Donnell.
95. The Winter Long - @ - by Seanan McGuire.
96. Penric and the Shaman - @ - by Elizabeth Moon.
97. A Study in Sable - % - by Mercedes Lackey.
98. Sleeping with the Enemy - @ - by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller.
99. Complete Little Orphan Annie Vol 10 - - by Harold Gray.
100. Complete Little Orphan Annie Vol 11 - - by Harold Gray.

August
101. Five Decades of the X-Men - % - by Stan Lee.
102. Alliance of Equals - @ - by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller.
103. A Red-Rose Chain - % - by Seanan McGuire.
104. Deft Fingers - - by Jean Garside.
105. The Martian - @ - by Andy Weir.
106. Whisper of Magic - @! - by Patrica Rice.
107. Dragons in the Earth - @ - by Judith Tarr.
108. Theory of Magic - @ - by Patricia Rice.
109. Merely Magic - @ - by Patrica Rice.
110. Fridays with the Wizards - @ - by Jessica Day George.
111. Steel Victory - @ - by J.L. Gribble.
112. Steel Magic - @! - by J.L. Gribble.
113. The Witches - # - by Roald Dahl.

September
114. Miss Seeton Draws the Line - @! - by Heron Carvic.
115. A Heart in Sun and Shadow - @ - by Annie Bellet.
116. The Natural History of Selbourne - * - by Gilbert White.
117. Hope(less) - @ - by Melissa Haag.
118. Clay's Hope - @ - by Melissa Haag.
119. Making the Rounds - !@ - by Allan Weiss.
120. Rudyard Kipling - * - by Martin Fido.
121. Little Orphan Annie Vol 12 - - by Harold Gray.
122. The Door in the Wall - * - by Marguerite de Angeli.
123. April Lady - *@ - by Georgette Heyer.
124. Alien Artifacts - @ - by Joshua Palmatier.
125. Frederica - *@ - by Georgette Heyer.
126. My Planet - * - by Mary Roach.
127. Old Bones the Wonder Horse - - by Mildred Mastin Pace.
128. Miracle on 34th Street - - by Valentine Davies.
129. Hellspark - @# - by Janet Kagan.

Reading October - December
# indicates re-read, % indicates borrowed book, @ indicates ebook, * indicates Book Off My Bookshelf (BOMB), ! indicates ER book (or similar early review source)

October
130. A Daughter of the Land - *@ - by Gene Stratton-Porter.
131. The Ghost Army of World War II - @ - by Rick Beyer.
132. By The Light of the Moon - @ - by Jodi Vaughn.
133. The Princess Troll - !@ - by Leah Cutter.
134. Hill Country Man - !@ - by Loralee Lillibridge.
135. Interloper at Glencoe - !@ - by Julianne Lee.
136. Beauty and the Werewolf - @# - by Mercedes Lackey.
137. The Reluctant Widow - @* - by Georgette Heyer.
138. UnF*ck Your Habitat - !@ - by Rachel Hoffman.
139. Beauty and the Beast - - by Charles Lamb.
140. Enchanting the King - @ - by E.D. Walker.
141. Chaos Choreography - - by Seanan McGuire.
142. The Dragon in the Sock Drawer - @ - by Kate Klimo.
143. Mirabile - @ - by Janet Kagan.

November
144. Chalice - # - by Robin McKinley.
145. The Interior Life - @# - by Dorothy J. Heydt.
146. Barrenlands - @# - by Doranna Durgin.
147. The Bear and the Nightingale - !@ - by Katherine Arden.
148. The Last Vhalgenn - !@ - by Kayelle Allen.
149. Year of the Unicorn - # - by Andre Norton.

December
150. Her Father's Daughter - @ - by Gene Stratton-Porter.
151. The Falling of the Moon - !@ - by A.E. Decker.
152. The Murder Frame - - by Peter O'Donnell.
153. Ghost Talkers - % - by Mary Robinette Kowal.
154. The Meddlers of Moonshine - !@ - by A.E. Decker.

Reserved in case I need it.

Welcome to Club Read, I'm sure you'll enjoy it! :D

I have that same inability to get rid of a book without reading it first. Welcome to Club Read. I look forward to following your reading!

Good luck with your plans! And, of course, good to see you here!

Welcome to Club Read, Jennifer!

Thanks! Good to see you all, and looking forward to reading with you (books, and threads!).

Popping over from the 75ers to say "Hi!" Jenny. *waving madly*

I have the exact same problem with discarding unread books. I've finally managed to at least get over having to finish every book I start, even if I hate it, but I can never get rid of a book I haven't even tried yet. What if it's brilliant?! For that reason I'm also trying to read as much as possible from the (shameful) amount of unread books I already own.

Hi, humouress! Good to see you! I've rounded off my 2015 thread, though this one isn't technically active yet...

Yes - this past year I actually intentionally abandoned four or five books. And slogged through a lot more that weren't quite as terrible...but it's a start. I didn't do well on my BOMBs challenge last year - thus the rule this year (2016, I mean) that I have to read some BOMBs each month, rather than leaving it to the last minute. That's a large part of these threads, and my personal challenges therein - reading my owned-but-unread books and dealing with them!

Books read
1. The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax #@ by Dorothy Gilman. Review - Fun as always - though oops, I'm starting off the year with a reread. Well, I started it last year, so too bad. But two new reads needed next.

Currently Reading
Still Sorcerer to the Crown. Theoretically The Kin. But I think I'll pick one from my pile of BOMBs, to get on with that challenge.

Discards
Nope. Not even though I have this in both paper and ebook (read it as an ebook, this time).

New/Reread
-1 reread - oops, starting off with a broken rule. But I'll fix that quick enough, and stick by it the rest of the year.

And there we go - first book finished before the end of the first day. I'm changing up how I list things a little this year - mostly because the huge list of books-with-reviews in the starting posts were pretty screwed up (in terms of touchstones). So now the reviews will be in with the books, and the listing posts will just be listings - no touchstones or links. Though if reviews are wanted up there, I can do that...but I don't think anyone followed any of my review links last year, because LT changed how it handled links at some point last year and screwed up all my links, and I didn't discover it until late November (and I was _not_ going back to fix all of them!).

I'm also leveraging my book stats spreadsheet - it's going to make the post listings for me as well. I'll enter the name of the book and the author in the first sheet, and it will pass off to the Posting sheet - where I'll also put in the review link, a short review, and the codes for the books. And it will automagically make the numbered, punctuated, and touchstoned line for that book, and the numbered and punctuated one for the listing at the top. Lazy, me? Do it once and do it right. I'll still have to put in the other notes, but those I can do on the fly - easier than the actual listing (and more variable, so can't do them automatically anyway).

Happy New Year!

ETA I'd love to see how you tweaked the spreadsheet, if you don't mind sharing your version back with me.

Books Read
2. The Tightrope Walker *@ by Dorothy Gilman. Review - Lovely - how have I not read this before? Very Gilman. And yay, a BOMB - though I read it as an ebook.
3. Velveteen Vs. the Junior Super-Patriots @ by Seanan McGuire. Review - I'd read all these stories before, on Seanan's website. Nice to have them as one thing, though. And great stories!
4. Velveteen Vs. the Multiverse @ by Seanan McGuire. Review - I _hadn't_ read all of these - got behind in my Velveteen reading. Which I'm glad about, because encountering them as chapters of a book made for a richer story, I think. And this is _very_ rich. Can't talk about it without spoilers, though!

Currently Reading
The Kin, Sorcerer to the Crown, and Return to War by P.M. Griffin. All good, but I wanted something light...and didn't really get it, all three of these are pretty intense. And very good. And rather funny.

BOMBs
The Tightrope Walker - which I discovered after the fact. I didn't realize I had this as a paper book as well. Well, it gets moved from the "unread" books (wherever it may be) to the keepers. Though I may just keep the ebook - well, both for now.

Discards
Nope.

New/Reread
All three new to me (so The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax is paid for).
.5 reread paid for, now.

>18 ronincats: Sure, I sent it to you. Do ask if something's confusing, there are a lot of places where I just put in numbers and it does magic stuff in another field...

Books Read
5. Dreamers !@ by Donna Glee Williams. Review - Good story, but not as good as The Braided Path (by her, which was fantastic). Odd ending - not a cliffhanger, but very inconclusive. Received from the publisher (directly).
6. Return to War * by P.M. Griffin. Review - Good, but getting repetitious. I'm going to stop reading the series for a while - I have one more book. I'll keep an eye out for the rest, though.

Currently Reading
Still The Kin and Sorcerer to the Crown (theoretically). Also The Taste of Conquest by Michael Krondl - nonfiction about the spice trade in the Middle Ages and later; and The Genuine Article by Patricia Rice, a historical romance that's...not bad, but not really sparking my interest.

BOMBs
Return to War.

Discards
Nope.

New/Reread
Two more new books, so 1.5 reread paid for.

So I'm reading a lot of things, but nothing is getting finished (or much advanced) - I read a chapter or two at a time, a couple times a day.

It's not like I have nothing else to do, though - see next post.

Back in December, as part of productive procrastination (there's nothing to get chores done like having a big task you don't want to do!) I cleaned out all the pots on my balcony, and planted spinach and carrots in one and New Zealand spinach and golden peas (sugar snap type) in two more. About a week ago, I looked out and found a whole bunch of sprouts. If all the peas survive, I'm going to be drowning in them - there are some 20-30 plants! There are grass-like sprouts, which I think are the spinach, in the one pot; they're not carrots, because many of them are trapped in their seedcoats and the seeds are much larger than carrots. And similar grass-like sprouts in with the peas, which may be NZ spinach - in both cases, obviously the first leaves are very different from the harvesting ones.

And yesterday I made it out to my community garden plot, between the rains. This is a 16x16-foot plot, that I've separated into 12 assorted-size beds (4x4 for the largest, 1x2 for the smallest) so I can do Square Foot Gardening (sort of). This will be my third year there.

Almost everything is dead, as expected - even the mint isn't showing leaves, and that's surprising. And no sprouts from the asparagus - hope it survived. The NZ spinach out there is doing well and really needs to be harvested (that is a ridiculous plant, it's supposed to be heat-hardy as spinach is not but it does just fine in the Bay Area's mild winters too. Year-round plant). There's one trail of leaves in the oregano (which was two plants, each about 2 feet across). There's a nice big solid clump of parsley that something has nibbled down to stubs (snails?); if I can find and remove whatever's eating it, I should get some parsley and later seeds (since this is a last-year's plant). There are a couple strawberries that have leaves, but they're old plants - no idea if they'll actually produce berries, or runners. I bought some Beach Strawberries, which are California natives, and are supposed to spread, produce (small, but tasty) berries whenever there's enough water, and be hardy year-round. We'll see.

I have to weed the bed before I can plant them. There's quite a lot of mallow, lots of something I don't know with rows of little round leaves (it blooms white and is beginning to do so - eek, pull it quick before it seeds!), and an infuriating tide of grass coming from the bed next to mine. They're commercial gardeners (I think) - which means they grow one crop and abandon the bed until the next year. The bed was entirely full of grass last fall, and it spilled out and covered the path between their plot and mine; I pulled as much as I could, but in autumn the soil is really hard and I couldn't clear it completely. They've been out this year - their bed is cleared...but the path is still completely grassy, and it's invading my bed! Grrr, mad at them. The strawberry bed is on that side, so that's an urgent project.

The other thing I bought along with the Beach Strawberries is a pot of Yerba Buena - it's a hanging plant, and apparently it makes very nice herbal tea. We'll see - I've got a hanging pot for it, and I'm supposed to clip the ends of the branches so that it will go bushy and hang all around instead of making a single strand. So I'll have lots of leaves for making tea with.

And the other garden project in the near future is scrubbing out my Aerogarden pots (I have two, both bought used) so that I can use them for starting seedlings. I save seeds from my heirloom/OP tomatoes, and from some of the hybrids as well (sometimes the tomatoes are very nice, from Sungold). This year we're trying Magic Mountain, which we (my mom and I) were buying in the farmers' market. They are utterly delicious small red tomatoes, and according to the descriptions and the guy who was selling them they're resistant to a lot of tomato problems - they don't split, and they don't get some common diseases. So I'm growing some from saved seed and some from bought seeds - MM is an F1 hybrid, not expected to grow true from seed. But it should be interesting. Also planning to start basil and other herbs, a lot of other tomatoes (Dr. Carolyn is another favorite, a white/yellow cherry with fantastic flavor), maybe some other strawberries...whatever catches my interest. But I need to be ready to start them by mid-February so they're big enough to go into the ground in mid-April, before the rains stop.

Oh my! Stop! You're making me jealous! Even though our winters are warmer these days here in the northeast, we're likely never going to be planting in January. My daughter, who is temporarily home from college, is attempting to grow basil indoors. Not looking good.

I have a little garden spot in our back yard, from which I can "square foot garden." I've been pretty successful, but our frost date is Mid-May. Need to look up Aerogarden pots. I've never heard of them.

They're indoor pots - the ads talk about harvesting herbs and tomatoes in the dead of winter, but from my experience the pain of dealing with plants big enough to harvest would outweigh the pleasure of having fresh tomatoes (herbs might work) in the winter. However, they're fantastic as seed-starters - they're aeroponics (water sprayed on the roots, more or less constantly) and come with built-in lights on a schedule. Put in water and fertilizer, put in your seeds, and watch the plants grow. Half my tomatoes last year were started in an Aerogarden - though I left it rather late to transplant them, and the roots got ridiculous. 8-inch plant with 12-inch roots is a little hard to get into a pot, or the ground. The plan is to start stuff in the AG and transplant it to medium pots at about 3-4 inches height, so it gets used to being in dirt while it's still small (usually I start them in 6-cells and transplant at about that size).

And yeah - just about every year we have a day or two with the low below freezing, but usually only for about half an hour in the middle of the night. All but the most tender plants can usually survive that. On the other hand, winter=rainy season=lots and lots (and lots and lots) of weeds growing that you have to deal with before you can plant your own stuff. When I leave gardening until March, the plot is usually totally overrun - works better when I start weeding in January. There's not a lot of stuff I could plant out at this point - the peas, we'll see how the spinaches do, ditto the carrots (if any germinate - it was old seeds); I could plant some brassicas, but for my garden they're very large for a small harvest. Oh, and garlic - need to get that in the ground (and that bed is on the same side as the grasses too - needs weeding and compost, soon!). The standard way of planting garlic is plant in the fall and harvest in the summer, but planting in January works too, here.

>22 jjmcgaffey: Aah, it was lovely just to read about your garden. We are still buried in snow. I just bought a few little pots of tulips at the grocery store - for indoors of course.

Ah, very energetic. I should have a crop of peas to pick next week--I'll try to take a picture tomorrow to post in my thread.

Good luck with your gardening projects, Jennifer.

The big question I ask myself every year? Should I weed my vegetable beds in November after the harvest or should I leave it until March the month before planting. Of course if I weed (and I mean digging over) in November I will still have to do it again in March, but maybe it won't be so bad. I have a love/hate relationship with my vegetable plot.

Here is one set of peas, finally.

Grass is popping up like crazy in all my garden beds as well.

>28 baswood: My problem is, now that the rains have started, a) I have to find a relatively dry day to get out there and weed, and b) it's clay soil so it's not a good idea to work it over when it's wet. It is nice and loose so weeding isn't hard, but I can't do much beyond the weeding. I need to get some compost so I'll have it ready for when there's a gap in the rains (assuming there will be one this year - El Nino puts even more question marks than usual on the rains).

And yeah, I could have weeded late in the year before the rain started - but the soil was hard and dry and it was a literal pain to weed. I think I like weeding in January/February - I just need to make sure it doesn't drag on into March/April with my poor plants waiting in little pots to get into the ground.

>29 ronincats: As I said in your thread - nice crop! And I can't find all the pods on my own peas, when I can use my hands to help - there's always a couple pods that escape notice until they're fat and round. Then they're only good for saving for next year (which is a good thing...but not too many!).

Very jealous of your gardening. I keep a few indoor pots of herbs (and a peace lily) but wish I could do more. Trying to decide what herbs to do this year.

>24 jjmcgaffey: Thanks for the explanation. Agree with you about the tomatoes (and without that sun-kissed taste, what sense would it make, really?), but you're right about herbs. For them, I'm wondering if an investment in an Aerogarden pot might make sense.

>32 theaelizabet: Well, as I said, I bought both of them used - I don't think I paid over $20 for either. At a hundred dollars or more, no, I wouldn't consider them worthwhile...but then, I'm excessively cheap (about almost everything but books!). I paid almost as much for new lights for both of them, and dirt pods and the cases to hold them. But they do make great seedling pots.

I don't know - for me, I'd just keep an eye out in yard sales and the like. But if you can afford (and feel you can afford - a completely separate question) a new Aerogarden, it'd probably be quite useful - and being new, it'll be a good bit more advanced than mine. I suspect at least one of mine was dumped because the owner bought a new version, with LED lighting.

Oh! You're making me so jealous! And missing even more living in SoCal where one can garden year round. Yesterday I cleaned up my indoor plant area in order to get ready to start seedlings for transplanting outside in late-May/early-June. Last year, I installed a grow light for that purpose in an old shelving unit, and it worked pretty well to start some herbs. This year, I'm going to get ambitious and start not only herbs but flowers, cukes and zucchini, and whatever other seeds I have that will survive being transplanted. I harvested seeds from a number of plants from last summer's garden and will be trying those as well as ones I bought. Then I'll plant another straw bale garden out back on the cement slab which is the one place where there's enough sun to support a vegetable garden.

My January daydreams are all about gardens.

I hadn't heard about the Aerogarden pots either but will check it out and see if I can find one I can afford. :)

Have a great weekend!

Well, I'm still reading, but I haven't finished a thing. Too much else going on - not particularly interesting else, but else. Lots of jobs (Did I mention...hmm, looks like not. I run my own home computer repair business. So I have work when people need me, and not otherwise - it goes up and down), quite a bit of cleaning up (I am fighting with hoarding tendencies. They sort of got the better of me last year, and my house was paths (wide, but paths) between stacks of stuff. I'm now doing a grand cull of stuff - not books so much, but stuff. Clothes I haven't worn in years, craft materials for crafts I'm not all that interested in, tools that are duplicates or don't really work (just got rid of a Dremel drill press - it would be wonderful, if it would actually hold my Dremel), etc.), and reading in the gaps.

I'm almost finished with The Taste of Conquest, and have recommended it to my parents - the subject is mildly interesting, but it covers the history of Lisbon in some detail (well, that part of it that relates to the spice trade) and since they lived there they should enjoy it. Ditto the mentions of Cabo Verde. Working through The Genuine Article, which is not bad - it took a while to catch me and it's still not a favorite, but reasonably enjoyable. Actually the part I'm enjoying most is the different light on O'Toole and the Marquess, who I got to know in the first book I read in this series, The Marquess. Which is the immediate sequel to this. And...what else? Theoretically reading Sorcerer to the Crown. I haven't gotten very far - I suspect it will get more interesting pretty soon, as he leaves London. But it's only on my tablet (because I got it as a PDF, so it needs the larger screen to be legible), which requires actually thinking about sitting down and reading it. The Genuine Article is on my phone, which is always with me; The Taste of Conquest is a paper book, at the table, so I read a bit with every meal. I have a feeling - oh, right, The Kin is the other one I'm theoretically reading. I'll get back to it at some point. That's an ebook, but I don't remember if it's on my phone or my tablet.

OK, that's enough LT. Back to cleaning up.

Hi, I can identify with you. I got pulled off-task yesterday by the husband to go out and run errands, but I pulled everything off the top of my mini-rolltop desk this morning and am sorting and tossing paper like crazy.

Doesn't it feel great, when it's done? I need to remember to take Before and After pictures - the problem is I keep wandering from spot to spot. So take pictures of everything now and the next set when I finish each bit.

Hi there, jennifer. Are you going to post a review of The Taste of Conquest? Curious to know what you think. I know about this book and have it on my wishlist.

I've been 'spring cleaning' for years - I take ages to start a room, so everything gets messy in the meantime, but when I finally start, I do a thorough job. Then I get almost to the end and I can't decide where to put the last odds and ends (which I've probably put aside as I went along because I couldn't decide where it should go in the first place), so I stop there and move on to the next room. Which would be fine if it weren't for the kids, so of course it doesn't stay static and it's a never-ending process :0(

Oh, but it's those last little odds and ends that kill ya!!

I noticed :'(

>38 deebee1: Yep, as soon as I finish it. I'm still working on Amsterdam. But I'm enjoying it - he has an interestingly snarky outlook on history and the motivations that drove the spice wars.

>39 humouress: Heh. That's how I used to catalog my books, before I found LT - by the time I'd gotten finished listing a section (genre, room, whatever), I'd have added and removed enough that the catalog was pretty well useless. LT saved me from that...who will save me from my junk?

Actually, if it were junk, it would be easy. The problem is it's all good stuff, or could be with a little work. I need to concentrate on whether I'll be supplying that little work, or whether I'll actually do what the stuff is for - and if I won't, it needs to go OUT!

I know! ... oh, wait. Out?

Yes, OUT! Look, this stuff is blocking me from my books! (shot taken just now, without moving from the couch I'm sitting on. There's a path about 2 feet wide from the edge of the couch to the beginning of the stacks... I have made progress in the hall (that's over to the right, where the hats are hanging on the wall) and in the bedroom (straight ahead through the wall of books). The living room is the last to get worked on).

BTW, while I'm putting up pictures - here's my peas, a couple days ago (the 27th, actually).



No flowers yet, let alone peas, but a decent size for January. The thing in the nearest corner is a New Zealand spinach, as are all the tiny little sprouts you probably can't see scattered over the dirt. Those are Earth Boxes, about 1.5 foot by...4 feet, maybe? They're "self-watering" pots, or the more accurate "sub-irrigated pots" - the black tube in the far right of each box leads down to a reservoir that holds about 4 gallons, and the plants can wick up water from that through the soil. Very useful - though much less important right now, with days of rain interrupted by short periods of no rain.

>44 jjmcgaffey: Oh, blocking you from books? You should have said. No, I have a pathway to my books (currently).

>45 jjmcgaffey: Nice plants. I shall admire from afar.

I had an IT-type question I thought of asking you, which I cannot at the moment remember. I shall return anon ...

Sure, ask when you can think of it.

I'm not really totally _blocked_ from the books - there's a narrow passageway to the right of the grey shelves. But I can't look at them properly, let alone sort them out and figure out what I have and put them in the right places. If it's a book I've had for a while and already shelved correctly, I can find it and pull it out (usually). But not the newer ones that are stacked somewhat at random. And I've already bought a book I know darn well I have, but it's somewhere...on those shelves, or in a box, or something. Couldn't find it, really wanted to read it, and saw it at the library sale - so deliberately bought a duplicate. When I get things cleared out, I'll get rid of one or the other, but having to buy a book because I can't find the one I own is rather embarrassing.

And I actually finished two books! I'll post about them below (no, not The Taste of Conquest, yet).

Books Read
7. The Genuine Article @ by Patricia Rice. Review - OK - not bad to read, but not wonderful. I kept wanting to shake the two of them.
8. The English Heiress @ by Patricia Rice. Review - Again, not wonderful, though it was fun to see Michael get his comeuppance.

Currently Reading
The next one in the series, The Irish Duchess; I don't think it will be much better (or worse) than the rest of the series. Plus Sorcerer to the Crown and The Kin, and The Taste of Conquest - nearly done with that one.

BOMBs
None

Discards
Eh. They're both ebooks, I guess I'll hang on to them. I might want to reread, someday.

New/Reread
Both new to me. I got The Marquess as an ER book a while ago (and read it late last year), and then got the fourth book in the series as an ER book. So of course I had to read the first and third (these two).

Nice that I was able to read The English Heiress so quickly, after The Genuine Article took so long (almost a month - I just wasn't attracted to it). Of course, I read it instead of doing the cleanup I'd planned for today...don't care.

January stats
6 books read
1 reread
5 new books
1.5 rereads paid for

1571 pages read, average 261.8

2 BOMBs

5 ebooks, 1 paper book

0 discards

3 SF&F
1 general fiction
2 mysteries

6 F, no M authors

Pretty pitiful start to the year, for me - last year I read 9 books in January. Ah well, I've made a good start to February...

Oops! I forgot my new rule - I'm two BOMBs short for January. Work on that in February.

I did get some stuff done today - I scrubbed out my Aerogardens, in prep for starting seeds in them. Also I bought (on Amazon) the seed-starter top - it's just a styrofoam shape with holes in it, and dirt plugs for putting the seeds into, but it should help me start a bunch of seedlings at once. And get them out quickly, so they don't overgrow like my starts did last year - I had to pull their roots apart, because the Aerogarden is perfectly capable of supporting quite large plants and I let it do so instead of getting them out and into dirt early on. The seed starter has much smaller holes much closer together, so it should encourage me to get them out quickly.

Also tended the garden - oh, I don't think I said here. So I have one pot that I planted spinach and carrots in, and decided that all that had come up was spinach - it was grassy leaves (long skinny). Well, those seedlings have started to get second leaves - and half of them are carrots (ferny leaves)! Funny things I didn't know. There are differences - the carrot first leaves are slimmer and slightly lighter green - but I didn't know what their first leaves looked like, and didn't notice the differences.

And emptied the litterbox, and washed dishes, and did various chores. But I didn't get around to clearing any new areas. Oh, and part of the reason I didn't get a lot done was that I had a client job that took almost 3 hours - helping her format an Excel spreadsheet for import into Quickbooks. I hate Quickbooks - I use Quicken (and am often annoyed at it) but Quickbooks is awful unless you're a trained accountant. Bah. But we did finally get the stuff in.

And I see I haven't talked about this here - for the last couple weeks, I've been doing a thing called "intermittent fasting"; my sister put me on to it. It's very close to the way I usually eat, with just a few changes in timing, and it's made a noticeable difference to my weight - I'm down almost 5 pounds over two weeks. The form I'm using is that I eat all my meals within 8 hours of the day, and fast for 16 (though I'm asleep for 7-8 hours of that). I drink a lot of water while fasting; I could also drink tea, but with no sugar/honey and no more than a splash of milk. Or coffee the same (though I wouldn't, I hate the taste of coffee). So I eat my first meal of the day at noon, and my last at about 7:30 so I'm done by 8 pm. No evening snacks, nor eating dinner at 11 pm; no rush to grab breakfast before I go out in the morning. I do try to be home to have a proper breakfast at noon, though sometimes I end up eating a food bar or the like and then having breakfast a little later, if I'm out (as I was today, with my client). It doesn't matter if you slip a little, just go back to fasting the next day, or eat a little earlier or later (slide your fasting hours around a little). I'm also exercising a bit in the morning, and walking 5000 steps nearly every day (didn't manage it today, though). It really works for me - I'm feeling more focused than usual, as well as losing weight. And it doesn't feel like dieting - I'm eating nearly as much, and whatever I feel like, during that 8 hours. Ice cream, cookies, my usual breakfast and dinner, whatever - doesn't matter, as long as it's within the proper time. It's great, for me!

So your carrots were masquerading as spinach?

That's interesting about intermittent fasting. I'm glad it's working for you. I get so confused as to what's best; having a decent breakfast was supposed to be important, and I've been doing it on autopilot for decades now (not being a morning person). My younger son has an 'eat often but small' metabolism, which I suspect I had at his age, and he's wiry and energetic - whereas the rest of us are hmmm... But lifestyle seems to be bringing him around to the 3 big meals a day schedule.

Yeah, there's that thing about "Breakfast is the most important meal of the day!". But I'm still eating breakfast, I just don't do it until after noon (and half the time that's when I ate it anyway). I'm not hungry when I first wake; I do get hungry usually before noon, but I drink some water and it goes away (which is supposed to mean I wasn't really hungry). Dunno, it works for me - try it and see!

Well, the whole pot came up in little grassy leaves - long skinny leaves, paired. Some of them were still trapped in their seed-coats, and those I could tell were spinach; _now_ I can see that there are some of the grassy leaves that are slimmer and lighter green, and are now producing the ferny carrot leaves, but the difference was small enough I thought it was just variation within a type. The ones that had the seed coats on, and some others, are producing broad leaves, and are therefore identified as spinach...I didn't know that both spinach and carrot first-leaves were grass-shaped. So are the first leaves for NZ spinach, but those were in a different pot so I could tell.

It's actually been a difficulty, now that I have the community garden plot - I find that I don't know what a lot of plants look like in their first leaves. And when I have to weed where I scattered seed, that's a problem... I need to plant more things in my pots, where I can tell what's coming up with reasonable surety, so I can learn their early shapes and therefore weed better and more safely in the plot.

>50 jjmcgaffey: Loving your garden updates. I need to get planning on my herbs for this season.

My mom is a big proponent of drinking lots of water when hungry. She's completely stopped snacking and anytime she's hungry in between meals she just drinks a big glass of water (apparently a lot of hunger pains are actually thirst?).

That's what I was referring to in >52 jjmcgaffey:. I know it's true for me, but I'm told it's true for a lot of people - we're really bad at listening to our bodies and hearing what's really needed. So if you feel hungry (or feel a craving), drink a glass of water and wait a few minutes; if the hunger goes away, it was actually thirst you were feeling, and misinterpreting. If the hunger doesn't go away, then you're actually hungry - so go ahead and eat, with the advantage that you've also had some water.

Funny story, in the "listening to your body" vein - I used to strongly dislike strawberries. Not the flavor - it was fine in jam, or candy, or whatever - but fresh strawberries were just too tart for me, they made my jaws ache. I never ate them. Then I went to college; I was on a meal plan, and ate quite a bit and quite well. Then one day I went in, and they had a huge heaping bowl of strawberries in a bed of ice. And despite my back-brain saying "Wait a minute, you don't _like_ strawberries!" I got a cereal bowl full of them and sat down and ate them all right then. I figured out not long afterward that I was short of Vitamin C (and strawberries have more, per ounce, than citrus does), and my body knew what I needed. I do _try_ to listen to my body...on the other hand, it also regularly produces cravings for sugar and chocolate, and I don't believe that's for my health. So I listen, but I don't necessarily go along with the cravings.

>54 jjmcgaffey: Yeah and a lot of these urges we're listening to in our bodies are hard to read because we're so far away from the lifestyle that developed them - ready access to food, water, etc. I think it's something most of us struggle with. Cooking has helped me a good bit in that I feel a lot better health-wise largely because I think I eat much healthier but also a bit less.

But are you quite sure that chocolate cravings aren't genuine? Because I have those.

And hey, doesn't chocolate have something like iron or antioxidants... or... something ...?

No?

Oh, okay then.

Yeah well. That's one reason I like the intermittent fasting - if I get a chocolate craving between noon and 8 pm, I can just go ahead and have some. And then I drink water so I don't have some more, and more, and...

Hey! I read a book! Two, even!

Books Read
9. The Irish Duchess @! by Patricia Rice. Review - Eh. Too much sex and misunderstandings for my taste.
10. The Taste of Conquest * by Michael Krondl. Review - Interesting! I liked the Lisbon section best, because I've lived there. The various food mentioned make me want to make a lot of them. And the overview of events, particularly in the 1600s, is fascinating - so much going on so early!

Currently Reading
The Reckoners, by Doranna Durgin - not bad, though she does love to make her characters wallow in not-understanding. And The Kin and Sorcerer to the Crown. I need a new non-fiction book for the table...if I can find Mauve, I'll read that. Speaking of being blocked from my books.

BOMBs
The Taste of Conquest. The Irish Duchess is old enough, but it doesn't count because it's not a physical book. It is an ER book, though, so yay for that.

Discards
I think I'll get rid of the whole Marquess series - but I may not bother, since they're ebooks (and therefore wouldn't count as discards anyway). I'm loaning out the Taste of Conquest - to my parents, possibly to others - but I think I'll keep it, I might want to reread.

New/Reread
Both new, so 3 rereads paid for.

Hmmm, I've stalled after the first 4 chapters of The Reckoners, which I got as an ER ebook, because it just seemed too stock in characters and plot. So it gets better?

>59 ronincats: Welllll...It is pretty standard - no real surprises, once the world is set up. At least, not for me - I like Durgin and have read, I think, all her fantasy. I enjoy it, but the patterns get familiar after a while. But then, it's the same with Andre Norton - her stuff was both extremely formulaic and often very good. The Reckoners isn't _very_ good, but it's good; I enjoyed it, and I'm looking forward to the next book. I finished it in two days, after dragging through quite a few books, so...yeah.

Books Read
11. The Reckoners !@ by Doranna Durgin. Review - Hmm. As I think about it, what I remember is pretty poor and cardboardy. That's not how I felt while reading it, though - enjoyed it and want to read the next one.
12. The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax @# by Dorothy Gilman. Review - Lovely as always. It does have some major coincidences in it, but they don't really drive the plot. My first read in 10+ years, but I remembered almost all of it (I've probably read it 10 or more times before now).

Currently Reading
I need to get started on BOMBs - only one so far this month, and two last month so I'm already two behind. So I'm going to focus on some paperback romances I'd pulled out in December. Read! Theoretically still reading The Kin and Sorcerer to the Crown. And looking for my next non-fiction - if I can't dig up Mauve, I think I'll read the book about bananas (and hope it's as good as Taste of Conquest).

BOMBs
Neither, they're both ebooks. Need more!

Discards
Nope. One good, one old favorite.

New/Reread
One of each, for 3 rereads paid for.

Reading and not posting again. February:

Books Read
13. Valor's Trial #% by Tanya Huff. Review - So I found the first of Torin Kerr's new series...and realized I didn't remember what had happened in the last couple books. So I got this and Truth to reread. Lovely as always.
14. Superhero Universe: Tesseracts Nineteen @! by Claude Lalumiére. Review - ER book - a collection of short stories. A few good, a few really (really) bad, most in the middle.
15. The Truth of Valor % by Tanya Huff. Review - And I went to reread this - and realized I'd never actually read past the first chapter. So new Torin, yay!
16. Switcheroo @! by Aaron Elkins. Review - Very...well, very Skeleton Detective. Nice twist at the end(ish).
17. Dark Watcher #@ by Lilith Saintcrow. Review - Lovely as always. I do love Lilith's romances (her straight fantasy is too grim for me, but with a guaranteed HEA it's better). And now of course I want to read the rest of the series (have most of them, I think).

BOMBs
Only The Taste of Conquest

Discards
None - all good books (or good enough, at least).

New/Reread
Three new, two rereads in this batch. Comes out to 2.5 rereads left, for the month.

February stats
10 books read
3 rereads
7 new books
2.5 rereads paid for

3034 pages read, average 386.9

1 BOMB
3 ER books
1 Netgalley book

7 ebooks, 3 paper books

No discards

4 SF&F
1 non-fiction
3 romances
2 mysteries

8 F, 2 M authors

And still waaaay behind on BOMBs - up to 3 for the year (instead of 8). But at least I'm aware of it and will be working on it throughout the year (instead of waiting until December!).

Books Read
18. Bath Tangle *@ by Georgette Heyer. Review - I could have sworn I'd read this before, but it's completely unfamiliar - and quite funny, as they run themselves into the most absurd tangles. I knew what Ivo was up to before the characters figured it out, though.
19. La Desperada @!* by Patricia Burroughs. Review - Ugh. Spineless men and spineless and brainless women. No. I quit half-way through, skimmed and decided that was quite enough.
20. The V'Dan @ by Jean Johnson. Review - Fun! Well, no, maybe that's too light a term. Lovely story, continuing from The Terrans - and ending at a crisis point. Not quite a cliffhanger - it's not in the middle of the fight - but there's a lot of questions. And the chapter from the next book attached to the end only opens up more.

Currently Reading
Theoretically, still The Kin and Sorcerer to the Crown. Actually, Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue by John McWhorter (interesting non-fiction with a new angle on the development of English); The Marriage Contract by Anna Adams (mildly interesting contemporary romance, which seems to be skipping all the most interesting parts); and A Civil Contract by Georgette Heyer(enjoyable historical romance).

BOMBs
La Desperada (counts because it's an ER book, even though it's an ebook) and Bath Tangle (counts because I own it in paper, though I read it as an ebook). 5 BOMBs total (so I've completed January, by the beginning of March...).

Discards
La Desperada. Ugh. Not worth keeping even as an ebook.

New/Reread
All three new - so 4 rereads paid for.

Books Read
21. A Civil Contract *@ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Interesting - a twist on the "marriage of convenience becomes True Love" story. Not true love, exactly, but the better marriage mate, that's for sure. Wish Adam realized that.
22. An Exchange of Gifts % by Anne McCaffrey. Review - Cute and rather pointless. The world doesn't seem to differ much, despite Gifts. And I knew what his secret was as soon as he was on the roof.
23. Hunter, Healer #% by Lilith Saintcrow. Review - Good as always. It completes the story in The Society very nicely - and a good solid end (though she _could_ write more there...).
24. The Marriage Contract * by Anna Adams. Review - Um. Not particularly good. With what we (the readers) know, her actions make no sense - and both of them are determinedly stupid about things.
25. An Ancient Peace % by Tanya Huff. Review - Nice. Good to see what Torin's up to, and the next step along the way - though the bad guys are a bit much in being determinedly nasty.
26. Closer to the Heart % by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Cute, and much more Herald-y than the other Mags series (as I also said about Closer to Home). A good bit about Amily growing into her responsibilities, several revelations about other characters, and lots of fun with Mags' adventures. And a simple ending (though I wonder if he had a Gift, to divert so many to his service) - maybe too simple, but not bad.

Currently Reading
Continuing with Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue. Actually picked up Sorcerer to the Crown again (and was reminded how I hate PDFs...). Also reading Wastelands 2 edited by John Joseph Adams, mostly for the Seanan McGuire story...which is rather nasty. That sums up the book so far, too...I'm afraid Adams likes stories that are just too depressing for me. I will read the whole thing, though, I'm only about a quarter of the way in.

BOMBs
A Civil Contract (although I read it as an ebook, I own it in paper) and The Marriage Contract. Progress! I'm up to 8 for the year, covering what I should have read in January and February...

Discards
The Marriage Contract. Also possibly the paper version of A Civil Contract, but I'll think about that. The rest are all library books.

New/Reread
5 new and one reread, so my total is currently 5.5 rereads paid for.

Oh, and I forgot I'm also reading Railroad Rising by J. P. Wagner - which is...almost a very good book. Interesting setting, fascinating magic system(s), wooden characters and dialog. The author needs more practice writing - this is about at the level I could create, and most published books flow a lot better. There's also some problems with the spellchecker - if s/he wants to use words like "wrathy", the spellchecker needs to be introduced to them early, so you don't get nonsense like "Two of the lords became so worthy they had to leave the room"... And yet, I'm finding it interesting and worth reading. Assuming J. P. keeps on going, I suspect this is a book that will be rewritten before it's reissued, like Patricia Briggs with Masques and Christopher Stasheff with King Kobold. This is an ER book.

Books Read
27. Permeable Borders % by Nina Kiriki Hoffman. Review - Lovely lot of stories - expanding on some familiar characters, and some new ones.
28. Railroad Rising !@ by J. P. Wagner. Review - So nearly an excellent book - wish they'd decided to finish it rather than release it as it was when the author died. Also wish I could have read more from him.
29. Wastelands 2 % edited by John Joseph Adams. Review - Ugh. Well-written, but way too grim for me. A couple stories I enjoyed, but overall not for me.
30. Sweep in Peace % by Ilona Andrews. Review - Expectedly lovely - a great followup to the first book, and I'm eagerly awaiting the third.
31. Interim Errantry @ by Diane Duane. Review - Lovely - I'd read the first two parts already, but Duane is always worth a reread. And the third one is a great story and advances Kit and Nita's arc considerably.
32. Shadows of Self % by Brandon Sanderson. Review - Very well-written, but too grim and twisty for me really to enjoy. Even the gods get things wrong...
33. Dying On the Vine % by Aaron Elkins. Review - A very standard Skeleton Detective story - perfect for a day when my brain didn't want to do much.

Currently Reading
Still working on Sorcerer. Need to read A Dangerous Talent - library book due soon. Also Assembling California and Geology of the San Francisco Bay Region, also from the library. But I think the next one I'll start is A Point of Honor by Dorothy J. Heydt - an old favorite, multiple reread.

BOMBs
Not a one. Mostly library books. I need to read some - haven't read any for March, yet (up to 8 for the year, which takes care of January and February).

Discards
No, not really. Railroad Rising, a bit, but it's an ebook so I don't think I'll really get rid of it.

New/Reread
All new, for a total of 9 rereads paid for at the moment. Good reason to reread...

I've been a bit sick recently - not anything visible, just complete lack of energy and motivation. Which has led to a lot of reading, and a lot of finishing books-in-process (that way I don't have to think what I want to read, just get the books I've started done). It's nice, sort of. But there's a lot of stuff I should be doing, that's not getting done...bah. Including entering a whole bunch of books I bought at the White Elephant sale at the beginning of March, and maybe even reading some of them.

I noticed your absence on the threads and am sorry to hear you haven't been feeling well. Hope you get your energy back.

Eventually. I've been reading, and posting a little - not here, though. I better get my energy up, next weekend is going to be a busy one! My sister's coming down for a visit, on Saturday I'm going to an SCA event (daytripping), and on Sunday, for my mother's birthday, we're going to Santa Cruz Boardwalk. Oh yeah, and re: birthday - Friday I need to make her cake, and make her presents. That's _next_ weekend, not this one - this one I just have Easter on Sunday and at least one plant swap on Saturday. Possibly two, though I haven't gotten details on the second yet. Roight. Spend today sleeping so I can be up and doing tomorrow...

Speaking of plants, we just went to the indie nursery today and bought loads of vegies and herbs so I'll be spending this next week grubbing out the peas and getting my summer plants into the beds and pots. So, although no plant exchange, plenty of plants in my immediate future.

Books Read
34. Faerie Blood @ by Angela Korra'ti. Review - Lovely - great characters, interesting twists on standard urban fantasy creatures. Next, please!
35. A Point of Honor # by Dorothy J. Heydt. Review - Comfort reread - glorious as always.
36. Bone Walker @ by Angela Korra'ti. Review - A bit darker - more at stake - than the first book; same great characters, new creatures, and new aspects of established characters. Love it.

Currently Reading
Same as last - Still working on Sorcerer. Need to read A Dangerous Talent, Assembling California, and Geology of the San Francisco Bay Region, all library books. And also still reading Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue at the table.

BOMBs
Nope.

Discards
Nope.

New/Reread
Two new (ebooks) and one reread - still 9 paid for.

>70 ronincats: I've just gotten peas off my pea plants...unfortunately, I don't like them. They're yellow (Golden Snap Peas) and they taste bitter to me, right off the vine. Pretty flowers, but the crop isn't worth harvesting (sigh). So I may be pulling mine, too.

And I started those tomatoes in the Aerogarden - for (my) future reference, things grow _fast_ in there. I transplanted them into cups a week or so ago, so they've got (a lot) more horizontal room, but they're already too tall for the lights - 6-8 inches and pressing up against the light. I'm not sure whether to try to plant these outside and hope it's warm enough to keep them alive, or to trade these away and start another batch that won't be ready to go into the ground (I hope!) until mid-April which is when they're most likely to do well. Hmmm.

I've been off the boards, too, but just becauseRL is busy. I hope you've got your energy back. I'm afraid I'm not familiar with any of the books you've mentioned, except for the Young Wizards one; I've recently bought the whole series of the New Millennium editions as e-books (which they were kind enough to keep e-mailing the link of to me until I managed to download it)(have I mentioned I'm not such a technophile?).

I've recently been raiding the nurseries too, but ('scuse RL interruption) not for edible plants; I'm trying to prettify my pool surroundings. Actually, I've just been introduced to a nursery much nearer and much, much larger than the ones I usually frequent, so I tend to visit quite often, at the moment.

I'm trying to curb my enthusiasm, because we're running out of space to be able to walk around the pool without falling in, but I have a thing for pots. So I buy the plants, and then I need to get pots to put them in (we have decking around the pool) and I might happen to by one extra that just calls to me. And then I need another plant, but I might just happen to buy ... you see how it goes.

>73 humouress: No apologies needed - I love talking gardens almost as much as I love talking books. Always nice to hear what others are up to (and gardens vary so much - in location, in climate, in available space...). The other thing I like writing, and reading, about is crafts - but all I've been doing recently is knitting and braiding, and not much of that (and it's the middle of a project for both - neither the interesting planning, nor the triumphant completion, just the chug chug of getting it done).

I've decided I'll plant these tomatoes and also plant more seeds for another batch, in case these die off. There's always willing hands for extra tomato starts. First I need to pot up the stragglers - three tomatoes that started late and didn't get over an inch until I moved out the big ones, and a bunch of herbs (2-3 basils and some cilantro and parsley). Next lot will have more herbs in it, I think.

I've been reading, but don't have time right now to post about them. Nothing much, though I did finish Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue and enjoyed it to the end. And the author is not only male but black - which I didn't realize until I checked his bibliography to see what else of his I might like, and found that most of his books are about the American Black culture, or about creoles (the languages, not any of the peoples sometimes identified with that word). I might try one of his creoles books. I really don't pay attention to race, or sexual orientation, of authors - I keep seeing these challenges to "read POC authors!" or "read LGBTQ authors!", and while sometimes I find, usually after the fact, that an author I've read and enjoyed falls into one or both of those categories, that's not why I read their books - it's because I want to read those _books_. Gender, a little - though I've been rather disconcerted, in tracking recently, to discover just how skewed-female my reading is. I do _notice_ that one author is male and another female, I just didn't (until recently) pay any attention to how many of which I read. I did notice McWhorter was male (John is rather obvious), had no idea he was black until I saw his bibliography and bio.

Nah; I never even bother to pay attention to authors' gender. Though I might sometimes notice if their protagonist is the opposite gender to the author, going by name (which isn't always what you assume). André Norton was a poser for a while (for me).

I think I was surprised when I discovered she was female, but that was soooo long ago I'm not sure. I think I would have been about 9 or 10.

Arrgh! I don't _want_ to track gender of the protagonist! And so many books have two, or don't quite have just one - just finished The Unknown Ajax, in which the primary character is male but we never get inside his head (we only see his actions), and the secondary character is female and we do get inside her head just a little bit. Mostly 3rd person omniscient. No. Not _gonna_. But I think, vaguely, that I see a variety of combinations - female author/male protagonist, male/male, female/female, male/female (probably in order of commonness, and f/m first because I read so many more female authors). And f/m&f and m/m&f, and m&f/m&f...(not gonna track them, I'm not...).

This tracking thing is addictive.

Erm ..... I'm going to switch the lights off and back slowly and quietly away now....

Our February was warmer than our Mays and Junes around here--I think I could have put my warm weather plants out then if I wanted to.

The Unknown Ajax is one of my top three Heyers. That climactic scene is masterful!

And thanks for the feedback on my thread about the Durgins. The book I read just didn't match what I'd been hearing about her, so that was helpful.

>77 humouress: Yeah...I went from just listing my books, to reviewing each one, to now (since last year) tracking gender of authors and genre, pages, and publication date of the books. Plus where I got them and if they're Early Reviewer-type (I get them from three or four places, nowadays!). Plus if they're BOMBs, new, rereads... The data is fascinating, but it's getting so I spend huge amounts of time filling in the spreadsheet. I did improve that though. Last year I spent some time filling in the spreadsheet and twice as much time creating and formatting my posts - this year I took a couple hours and changed the spreadsheet so _it_ formats my posts for me, I just have to put in the book data on the tracking page, then go put in a short review, tag the book, and copy-and-paste the review link. Then copy-and-paste the numbered and formatted entry(s) for this thread. It still takes me a while to get around to posting, but not for lack of time to create the post.

Still not gonna track protagonist genders.

>78 ronincats: We've had hot weather already too - and very cold, colder than it usually gets around here. Ridiculous. The tomatoes are doing fine though, still in cups but outside on my porch (which is pretty sheltered). I'll get them into the ground, or at least into big pots, at some point.

Carrots are growing well - the tops are nearly a foot high. The roots are only just beginning to take shape, though. And the (ordinary) spinach in among them is starting to crinkle, and spread. The New Zealand spinach is doing a bit too well - the one big seedling is no longer a seedling, it's sent out tentacles a couple feet on all sides (spilling out of the pot). I need to move the other seedlings to the plot, so they don't take over the world, and harvest the big one. I need to empty out that pot entirely, as it's infested with mushrooms, so the big one is getting transplanted like it or not; I'll harvest it down to small again first, then when (if) it's begun to recover from that shift it to another pot. I'll empty the other Earthbox too, but that one's soil is OK so I'll reuse it (with a generous admixture of fresh potting soil and compost). The third Earthbox is the one with the carrots and spinach, I think that one's just staying as is - it's (relatively) fresh soil anyway, since I didn't buy the pot until late last year. The tomatoes go into the two older Earthboxes, which is why I need to refresh their soil soon. Well, six of the tomatoes do. The other...twenty or so?... will go into the community garden plot, so I need to go weed that. And I'm being so busy these days (and also feeling lazy) that the weeding isn't happening.

Right now I'm playing hooky from my taxes. I will get them done on time, since we get the three-day extension this year...despite going to a developer conference tonight (already done, and home from that), an HOA conference most of the day tomorrow, and the library book sale (as well as church) Sunday. And a big job for a client on Monday, rescuing a failing hard drive and then upgrading to the latest OSX for her. Hmmm...I better get back to work. Don' wanna, wanna read LT...adulting is hard.

So I got my taxes done, went to the book sale (where I bought a bunch of books, which I haven't yet entered...), have done a lot of jobs recently, and just got back from a weekend camping trip at Golden Beltane (the 50-year anniversary of the founding of the Society for Creative Anachronism). Lots of fun, lots of busy, lots of not entering books, posting on LT, or reading. I read some, but April had half the books March did. Today I'm feeling a bit under the weather - not sick, exactly, but completely lacking in energy to do stuff. So I'm reading, and am finally inspired to post here (not quite a month since my last one...).

Carrots and spinach continue to do well, NZ spinach is still taking over the world because I still haven't harvested it, or cleaned out the Earthboxes, let alone planted my tomatoes. I gave some away to people who would actually plant them (gave a lot of spares to the Earth Day table of Alameda Backyard Growers, for one), and have started a new set of seeds; they're up to an inch or two tall, and I'm keeping a sharp eye on them. Pot up while they're small, once they get a solid second set of leaves (some have them already). Oh, funny - quinoa is an incredibly quick germinator. I literally had sprouts by the end of the second day after I planted (planted in the afternoon, next day nothing, by afternoon of the next day there were little red bumps in those cells, by afternoon of the day after that there were visible stems standing up). I'd be afraid to try radishes in the Aerogarden, they might sprout before I got the bowl over to the base! Strawberries, too - they're supposed to take 2-3 WEEKS to sprout, they showed up just over 6 days after planting. Aerogarden really does change the equation.

Still haven't gotten to the plot, either, and that's getting urgent. I'm going to have a lot of weeds to deal with, particularly as it continues to rain. Ah well, it will get done eventually.

Books in the next several posts.

Books Read
37. A Dangerous Talent % by Aaron & Charlotte Elkins. Review - Pretty good, though similar in some ways to the golf mysteries.
38. Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue * by John H. McWhorter. Review - Nice! Interesting angle on the formation of English - the ways the grammar has changed, rather than just the vocabulary. Good stuff, worth rereading I think.
39. Knitting Rules! @ by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee. Review - Interesting - a bit too rah-rah on knitting (which I enjoy, but it's not my primary craft). Going to try to follow her sock instructions, though.
40. Assembling California % by John McPhee. Review - Very interesting - learned a lot.
41. The Unknown Ajax *@ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Fun - actual LOLs a couple times. And amazingly for a Heyer, no complete idiots. I like both the hero and heroine, and the secondary characters aren't bad.
42. Touched by Magic @# by Doranna Durgin. Review - Great as always. Reandn's story is so rich…

Currently Reading
Tell you later, since this is so behind the times.

BOMBs
The Unknown Ajax (I read an ebook, but I own it in paper) and Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue - a(nother) great non-fiction book.

Discards
Hmm, I don't think I have any. I may get rid of the paper version of Ajax, since I have it as an ebook (and that's much easier to find to read...). The rest are either library books or ebooks, or something I have no intention of getting rid of (I lent my parents Bastard Tongue, but I'm getting it back).

New/Reread
Four new, one reread. Now 10 rereads paid for.

March stats
24 books read
3 rereads
21 new books
10 rereads paid for

8472 pages read, average 353

6 BOMBs, 10 total for the year (nice! almost caught up...)
2 ER books
0 Netgalley books

12 ebooks, 12 paper books

2 discards, 2 total for the year (yay, some finally!)

14 SF&F
2 non-fiction
6 romances
2 mysteries

19 F, 7 M authors (about my normal skew)

For the entire month of April...
Books Read
43. Wolf Justice @# by Doranna Durgin. Review - Good. Not as good as the first book, mostly because the opponents(?) are utterly irritating. But still a rich story.
44. Clean Sweep %# by Ilona Andrews. Review - Lovely. Read it as it was being written - this is slightly modified, nothing much. Still fun.
45. Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen % by Lois McMasters Bujold. Review - Nice to see another Cordelia book - not at all like Miles'. Fun, though the retcon was a little odd.
46. Free-Wrench @ by Joseph Lallo. Review - Interesting - I like Nita, she jumps before she looks but tends to (eventually) land on her feet. Looking forward to the second book.
47. Trouble in the Brasses @# by Charlotte MacLeod. Review - Lovely as always - one of my favorites of this series, for no reason I can discern. I do like Sir Emry and Lady Rhys - and Madoc, of course.
48. Treecat Wars @ by David Weber. Review - Interesting. YA, and some time spent on the Trouble with Relationships - but also a lot on deeper aspect and darker events.
49. Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle @ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Quite good, though not a favorite - too deep to be funny, too funny to be deep.
50. From a High Tower @ by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Nice - a happy Rapunzel story is rare. Nice to see Rosa again, too, and the circus is fun.
51. Uneasy Relations #% by Aaron Elkins. Review - Oh, funny - this was a reread, and I didn't remember it! It had been almost 8 years, but still. Good standard Skeleton Detective. Oh, and I can discard the copy I own…
52. Skull Duggery % by Aaron Elkins. Review - Another good standard Skeleton Detective, with some nice angles on his usual tropes.
53. Empress !@ by Alma Alexander. Review - I really wish she hadn't changed the names - I'd rather have read a historical about Justinian and Theodora in Byzantium, even if the story didn't exactly follow history. Reading about Callidora in Visant left me distracted trying to figure out the original story. And the Wheel instead of the Cross was just annoying.
54. Geology of the San Francisco Bay Region % by Doris Sloan. Review - Very good - and particularly interesting following Assembling California. A lot of the same information, presented entirely differently. This one inspired me, even more than McPhee, to want to go look at what she was talking about.

Currently Reading
Still can wait.

BOMBs
Not a one.

Discards
One - Uneasy Relations. I should take a look at all my Skeleton Detective books - some I'll keep, if I can remember the story from just looking at the title. But they've gotten pretty repetitive now, and I can do without (they're in the library, anyway).

New/Reread
8 new, 4 rereads. Which exactly balances, so I still have 10 rereads paid for.

April stats
12 books read
4 rereads
8 new books
10 rereads paid for (still)

3773 pages read, average 314.4

0 BOMBs, 10 total for the year (whoops, falling behind again)
1 ER books
0 Netgalley books

7 ebooks, 5 paper books

1 discards, 3 total for the year (need more!)

6 SF&F
1 non-fiction
1 general fiction
1 romances
3 mysteries

9 F, 5 M authors (more balanced than usual...)

See? Exactly half as many books read in April as in March...and May is likely to be worse, it's my busy month. At least the book sale isn't this month, for a change - it'll be back here next year, though. Read a bunch now to make up for the last couple weeks when I won't be reading at all.

Books Read
55. Picture Miss Seeton !@ by Heron Carvic. Review - Fun - an old favorite re-released as an ebook (I don't think it ever was, before).
56. Dawn of the Flame Sea @ by Jean Johnson. Review - Lovely setup to a new world (with some definite links to the Destiny world, at least in terminology). It's short, and it is pretty much just setting the scene - but worth reading anyway. Great characters.

Currently Reading
Actually - The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed by John McPhee (not bad, not as interesting as the geology books to me), and The Seer by Sonia Lyris. That one got a lot of good reviews, both professionally and from people whose taste I trust...but it's really not catching me. For one thing, it's a huge book; for another, everyone with any authority seems to be really obnoxious (and carefully trained to be that way - I wonder if Retharn realized what he was creating with his Cohort? Or is he just a sadist with a clever trick to make people let him abuse their children, and didn't realize consequences?). I find it difficult to read for any length of time, which means it's taking forever. I've just started Sprig Muslin by Heyer; I started Chains of Command by Marco Kloos, but stalled and went on to other things; and theoretically I'm still reading Sorcerer to the Crown and The Kin, but it's very theoretical at this point. I'd have to restart The Kin, so I'm going to drop the illusion I'm reading it. Sorcerer is still going - I actually read a bit of it in March or April - so I'll still count that.

BOMBs
Nope.

Discards
Nope...well, I don't think so. Again, I might get rid of the paper book now that I have the ebook of Miss Seeton. But I'd have to think about it.

New/Reread
One of each, so 9.5 rereads paid for at this point. And I think I'm going to read that down for a while - I want comfort reads, right now.

Books Read
57. The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed * by John McPhee. Review - Disappointing - not very interesting, and then no payoff at the end.
58. Spike of Swift River # by Jack O'Brien. Review - Fun fluff, with an entirely predictable (type of) ending.
59. Silver Chief to the Rescue # by Jack O'Brien. Review - _Slightly_ deeper than fluff, but not much. Fun read, though.
60. Silver Chief, Dog of the North % by Jack O'Brien. Review - Fluff - Silver Chief's taming is so unlikely it taints the rest of the story for me.
61. Return of Silver Chief % by Jack O'Brien. Review - Better fluff, though the "secret mission" is also wildly unlikely.
62. Sprig Muslin @ by Georgette Heyer. Review - The adventure is mostly annoying, though the romance is not bad - better than A Civil Contract.
63. All a Woman Wants @! by Patricia Rice. Review - Eh. Quite decent characters in awkward, unlikely and annoying situations. And I kept expecting it to link/turn into another Marquis book.

Currently Reading
Still, theoretically, Sorcerer to the Crown. Progressed quite a bit on Chains of Command. Redemption Bay by RaeAnne Thayne - hope I can read it all, it's the free serial from B&N this month but this month is extremely busy (see below). And The Seer, I suppose - don't want to, but I'll slog through it for a while yet.

BOMBs
The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed. And All a Woman Wants, because it's an ER book so it counts despite being an ebook.

Discards
The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed - I don't need to ever read that again. I'm seriously considering getting rid of both of the O'Brien dog books, as well - cute, but not really worth it. The rest are borrowed or ebooks.

New/Reread
5 new, 2 rereads - 10 rereads paid for currently.

I'm wiped tonight, but I really want to post - so I'll give a quick skim. Last week I finally got my rear in gear, emptied and scrubbed out two Earthboxes, and planted 6 tomatoes. Three in a nice clean Earthbox, three in the one Earthbox I'm not cleaning out because it's full of carrots - I harvested the carrots from the middle of the box. I also pulled out all the spinach, which sort of bolted as it germinated - the carrots grew so tall and thick the spinach got no light. Not good companions (notes for future years). The second scrubbed Earthbox has dirt in it but not plants yet (soon). I'm also harvesting (a few a day) blueberries off one bush. And my second set of seedlings from the Aerogarden are in cups under a light - they'll go out for hardening off next week. That's the tomatoes and the quinoa (the latter germinates incredibly fast - like radishes). The basil (of three varieties - sweet, Thai, and "Summerlong" (which is supposed not to bolt so fast) and the alpine strawberries are still in the Aerogarden getting to sufficient size to be transplanted.

The reason everything is "next week" or later is that this week is Maker Faire. Thursday and (today) Friday I spent basically all day volunteering at the Faire, doing setup - it's always fun, seeing behind the scenes, but I'm wiped. Today was particularly bad because we had nothing to do all afternoon - boring. Sunday my parents, my sister, and I will go back and actually see the Faire.

Saturday Mom and I will do a walk in the morning - it's around the Estuary, with wildlife experts pointing out what lives there (including a pair of peregrine falcons nesting). Then my HOA's annual meeting - I'm on the Board so I can't duck it. Then church, so that we can leave for Faire ridiculously early in the morning. And possibly I'll get my laundry done after church - or not, and come home and go to sleep early.

Then - well, Wednesday they're going to come and install U-Verse (instead of my current DSL line). I'm cancelling my landline - I haven't gotten a single call on it in six months or a year that wasn't an ad (political or otherwise). The cost of my internet goes up by about half, and the speed by three times. Nice.

Thursday I go help set up Baycon - Bay Area Science Fiction Convention. It's over on the peninsula this year, and I cannot remember what hotel it's at...but not too far from where Maker Faire is. But for Baycon, I'll stay there - setup Thursday, setup and the con starts Friday, and then it runs until Monday. I'll be helping out throughout, and also on various panels. My sister-the-writer is coming, with her family, and our parents as well. It'll be fun.

The week after Baycon I get to collapse - well, aside from helping all my clients who I've put off until then. Then the next week is the election and I'm running a polling station. Fun! May, and now into June, is really exhausting. Fun, but exhausting.

This is why I need to get everything I can planted...which didn't really work, here it is Maker Faire weekend and half my tomatoes are still in cups. Ah well. I'll do what I can - I do have some time next week, Monday and Tuesday and possibly Wednesday depending on how long the install takes. But also some client work those days.

Reading? What's that? I try to squeeze it in when I can...

I'm exhausted just reading about all that! Also a bit envious...

Lots of fun, lots of work. Con-lag is a real thing - I got back home 10 pm Monday night, and have done essentially nothing Tuesday and Wednesday. Not quite true - I'm completely unpacked, I've washed dishes, assembled laundry, showered and dressed each day, and Tuesday I actually left the house and went to the Farmers Market. Then came home, ate, and sat on the couch reading and napping all day. Wednesday much the same - I got the unpacking done, then sat and read. Now I've finally mustered up the energy to enter my reading for the last week or so, though I don't think I'll review tonight. Actual work tomorrow and Friday, as well as finally getting my laundry done, watering the plants, little stuff like that. And calling my election team to make sure they're up for setup Monday and working Tuesday, and picking up the election stuff. And it's past midnight and I really should be in bed...

So I was pretty well recovered from the con by Saturday. Mom and I went out to a flea market and some yard sales, then we mostly sat around and read the paper, and did a crossword. Mom's recovering from walking pneumonia (which she had at the con...not so much fun for her), while Dad was in the run-up to surgery to replace his hip, which meant he couldn't take any painkillers. He was pretty much immobile.

Sunday I went to church and so did Mom - Dad was out. Mom got a lot of comments because she wasn't singing with the choir as usual (see: pneumonia). Went home with her and read some of the Sunday paper, then I picked plums with some of my garden group (and took home a bagful, intending to make jam). Dinner and a little shopping afterward with Mom (Walgreens for lemonade, dropping off her ballots and returning some library books).

Monday things started to gear up for the election. I sorted through the stuff and made sure I had what I needed, then went up to the polling place to do early setup. One person was supposed to join me - and she did, but not until the last minute. At least she got to see the place and meet our liaison. The other two - one had said she couldn't make it (when she finally called at noon today), the last hadn't contacted me - she finally called while I was setting up, after I'd reported the lack of contact to the office, and she will be there Tuesday (whew). Oh, I didn't mention - I was woken Monday morning by a call from the only one of my clerks who I'd actually spoken to, telling me she'd broken her arm badly and would not be working Tuesday (actually, she'll be in surgery). So for a while there I was thinking it would be two of us working on Election Day (minimum is 3, 4-5 is better (allows for breaks). But it looks like it will be 4, whew.

And while all this was going on, Dad was having his hip surgery (Mom was with him). And I also managed to bake two things this morning before setup - prince-biscuit and zwieback, both bready, long-keeping things. I'm taking some of each to the election with me, you get very hungry sitting around for so long (it's a 15+ hour day, if all goes well).

Haven't gotten to the community garden (the weeds are probably up to my waist...agh!). Also I have lots of tomato seedlings trying to climb out of their tiny pots - I really need to get over there and get them into the ground! I did plant 6 of the seedlings in pots on my porch. Also harvesting blueberries, and carrots, and NZ spinach. And I have a volunteer morning glory - very nice, the first leaves were butterfly-shaped and the real leaves are heart-shaped, and the flowers are lovely white-and-purple trumpets. Which I mostly don't see, because they're morning glories and recently I've been either sleeping late or up and out... Also herb seedlings, which also really need to be planted. I may put some of them in pots.

And like that. Also reading, quite a bit - especially while I was recovering from the con, I think I read something like 6-8 books in two days. I have been noting them down, but no time to post yet. Right now I'm reading Venetia (Georgette Heyer) and enjoying it a lot. I'll take that and another Heyer with me to the election - no idea how busy we'll be, I've had times when we never had a chance to breathe and others when we had about 20 people all day (from 7 am to 8 pm). So I'll bring stuff to do and see if I need it.

The good thing is, this is the last big thing I'm doing for quite a while - there's lots of small stuff (making jam, for one!) but no other all-consuming tasks, or trips, or anything planned for...well, until the 4th of July. So maybe I'll get caught up with myself. We'll see.

I'm exhausted just reading this!

Yeah...it seems I only post when I've been doing a bunch of stuff. Then there are the months at a time I don't post at all, or possibly post a few reviews, because I haven't been doing much of interest...

Oh, we had a pretty heavy turnout for the election. Not sure of numbers, but about 200 people doing full normal votes, a large number who couldn't do a straight vote (where it's scanned right at the polling place), but voted provisional (which were/will be scanned at headquarters). Mostly because they were registered to vote by mail and didn't have their VBM ballot to turn in (didn't get it, lost it, or the vast majority "Oh, that? I didn't know I needed to bring it."). And another huge number just stopping by to drop off their VBM ballots, despite the ballot dropbox half a block away. Works for me. Actually, that was a good thing - a lot needed things filled out that hadn't been (mostly addresses), which they did when we pointed out it needed it.
No idea, of course, of numbers who voted for anyone - no discussion of politics allowed at the polling station, anyway (so I didn't even see news about the returns). But a heavier turnout (admittedly, in a station that was new to me and all my team) than I'm used to, even for a primary. Good! More people voting is an unalloyed good.
Came home and collapsed - in bed by midnight, slept until 1045. Now beginning to feel human, and have seen some of the returns. About what I expected, I think.

AS a citizen, Jenn, thank you for your service!

Books Read (to end of May)

64. Chains of Command @! by Marco Kloos. Review - Slog. If you like grim and gritty military SF, go for it (it's well-written), but not my thing.
65. Redemption Bay @% by RaeAnne Thayne. Review - Cute fluff. Decent characters, the back-stories are a little soap-opera though. It just didn't catch me.
66. The Goblin King % by Shona Husk. Review - Interesting but again, it didn't catch me. I'll read the sequel if I come across it, but I'm not looking for it. A little too frustrating, for one thing - like a point-and-click game where you think you've clicked everything but there's no advancement.
67. Fire Touched % by Patrica Briggs. Review - Lovely as usual. Some of the threads are beginning to tie back together - Mercy's allies and not-enemies are beginning to take their places for the big climax.
68. Every Heart A Doorway % by Seanan McGuire. Review - I like it. I don't quite love it, partly because it's so short, but I like it a lot - and I know she's writing more in this universe(s), so that will be fulfilled.
69. No True Way @ by Mercedes Lackey ed. Review - Several excellent stories, none bad (for a change - most anthologies have at least one I really dislike). Interesting how many of them have turned into serials, with the story advancing in each volume of the anthology.
70. Crucible @ by Mercedes Lackey ed. Review - Same - all at least decent, and some excellent.

Currently Reading

I'll fill this in later, once I've posted up to the current time.

BOMBs

None in this lot, sigh. Still 11 for the year.

Discards

None here, but I have decided to discard the O'Briens. So 3 for May and 6 for the year so far. Way behind, but at least there's some progress (as with BOMBs).

New/Reread

All new (and a lot of library books) - so 13.5 rereads paid for.

May stats
16 books read
3 rereads
13 new books
13.5 rereads paid for

4436 pages read, average 277.3

1 BOMBs, 11 total for the year
1 ER books
2 Netgalley books

8 ebooks, 8 paper books

3 discards, 6 total for the year

6 SF&F
4 animal stories
1 non-fiction
4 romances
1 mystery

9 F, 9 M authors (some overlap - I counted the two anthologies as one of each).

Books Read (for June up to current time)

71. The Quiet Gentleman @ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Middling-good, for a Heyer. Gervase is a know-it-all, but the answer was in fact well-seeded - once it was revealed, I thought of several scenes in a different light. I'll need to reread this one, after a while.
72. Three Hands for Scorpio * by Andre Norton. Review - Meh. Border Marches=High Hallack, in terms of magic and Ancient Ones, etc. Rather uninteresting adventures. At least they didn't get married off within the book, though.
73. Venetia * by Georgette Heyer. Review - Cute. I like that it's the rake that holds by propriety - and Venetia neatly turns things around and gets her way. A favorite among Heyers.
74. Castle Hangnail by Ursula Vernon. Review - Lovely! Kid's book, but one worth reading for anyone. I'm really hoping there will be more in this world (not as yet).
75. Traveller * by Richard Adams. Review - Bleah. Poor choices of narrative tricks combined with me not being interested in the Civil War made this a really bad book.

Currently Reading
Too many things. Sorcerer to the Crown and The Seer, theoretically - I'll get back to them eventually. Lord Grenville's Choice by G.G. Vandagriff - a Regency romance that's pretty bad so far. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo - interesting, I disagree with a lot of it (particularly her numbers re: books!). Need to finish that soon, it's a library book and there are (of course) a lot of holds on it. Cousin Kate by Georgette Heyer - this is part of why the Grenville book is so bad, I'm reading a bunch of Heyers to boost my BOMB numbers, and with these as comparisons a lot of Regency romances would be bad. I think that's all at the moment.

BOMBs
Three - Three Hands for Scorpio, Venetia, and Traveller. I think I'm going to have to read nothing but BOMBs for a while - I haven't been enforcing this rule, so I have to catch up. OK - Heyer, and some old SF (but not the ones I just got, they're not BOMBs yet).

Discards
Two - Three Hands for Scorpio and Traveller. Yay!

New/Reread
All new, so 16 rereads paid for. You know, this is getting less useful as I get better at reading new books...maybe I should make only BOMBs count, or up my matching numbers (3:1 instead of 2:1, or even more). I'll consider switching at the end of June, the half-year mark.

The Quiet Gentleman is not one of my favorite Heyers, although I do like Drusilla. Venetia was a favorite in my 20s, although just mid-range now.

It's been so long since I read Three Hands for Scorpio that I don't remember it at all. I have it though, as I have a complete collection of Norton even though some of her later stuff wasn't that good.

The Life-changing Magic changed how I fold my clothes in my drawers forever, but I think all LTers have ended up disagreeing with her on books!

Yeah - that's kind of the indictment for Three Hands. For a Norton book to not be memorable...

I'm finding that I've read far fewer Heyers than I thought. Right now The Unknown Ajax is still tops with me, but Venetia is right up there - but I have a stack of 10-15 Heyers that I don't think I've read any of (yay BOMBs!), that I'm planning to get to in the near future.

The funny thing is that, while I don't stretch my clothes or much worry about wrinkling (and I do fold over my socks!) I've been putting my t-shirts in the drawer on their sides so I can see all of them for years. It does make it a heck of a lot easier to see what you have and choose the right one. I suppose I will go to YouTube and see what her folding technique is.

And yeah - any real reader is going to disagree with her. Some people have just too many unread books - over 40! (LOL)

:-)

The Unknown Ajax is tops for me as well, with Cotillion next.

Haven't read Cotillion yet - it's in the pile. I'll move it up...

Books Read in June

76. Cousin Kate * by Georgette Heyer. Review - Fun, not a favorite. Most of the characters are pretty thin.
77. The Spanish Bride * by Georgette Heyer. Review - Less interesting to me than her romances – history interfering with the romance, romance with the history. Interesting setting, though, Wellington’s campaigns in Spain and Portugal.
78. Lord Grenville's Choice @ by G.G. Vandagriff. Review - UGH. The distillation of the misunderstanding trope, my least favorite. Quit half-way through, when Felicity ran from the ball.
79. Charity Girl * by Georgette Heyer. Review - Cute but not particularly good. A sweetened version of Sprig Muslin – same plotline, nicer catalyst (no spoiled brat here).
80. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up % by Marie Kondo. Review - Some interesting ideas, some disconnect on basic concepts. I might use some of what she says.
81. Top Traitor # by Peter O'Donnell. Review - This one particular story (Top Traitor) started bugging me, so I reread (and read the whole book while I was about it, of course). Lovely as always.

Currently Reading
See next listing.

BOMBs
Three Heyers.

Discards
The Spanish Bride and Charity Girl - glad I read them, no particular interest in rereading (and I can probably get them from the library if I do want to, someday). Also discarding Lord Grenville's Choice - doesn't count because it's an ebook, but I'm actually going to delete it. UGH.

New/Reread
Five new books and one reread. I'm getting really good at this. 17.5 rereads paid for...but I think I'll leave the rule the way it is, I'm starting to want rereads now.

June stats

11 books read
1 rereads
10 new books
17.5 rereads paid for

3341 pages read, average 303.7

6 BOMBs, 17 total for the year

2 ebooks, 9 paper books

4 discards, 10 total for the year

2 SF&F
1 animal stories
0 children's (I counted Castle Hangnail as SF)
1 non-fiction
6 romances
1 graphic novels

9 F, 2 M authors. Usual skew.

Half-year stats

80 books read
15 rereads
65 new books (yeah, I'm getting good at this!)
17.5 rereads paid for so far

24799 pages read, average per book 310. Average per month about 4100 (though in fact pages/month differs wildly, since books/month differs).

17 BOMBs so far this year (should be 24, still need to work on this)
7 ER books (cleared _some_ backlog, and read _some_ of the new ones... Actually, I'm doing pretty well. I've reviewed 49 of the 76 books I've received.)
3 Netgalley books

41 ebooks, 39 paper books (very close!)

10 discards so far this year (should be about 13. Pretty close)

35 SF&F
5 animal stories
6 non-fiction
2 general fiction
21 romances
1 graphic novels
10 mysteries

60 F, 26 M authors - just over 2/3rds female. I'm not working for that, it's just what I'm reading...and a bunch of Heyers hasn't helped. Hmmm...wonder what the count is for unique authors? Nope, about the same - 48 unique authors (with some oddities in the count*), 34 F and 18 M, just under 2/3rds female.

*For instance, Illona Andrews is both male and female (because they're a writing team); I also counted the anthologies as one male and one female, didn't bother to count the actual individual authors. But since the oddities are the same between the full and the unique list, doesn't make much difference.

Lovely, exhausting day. Last night I went to a potluck with my gardening group; it was final plans and prep for today's parade walk. Today I rode my bike about a mile to where the parade set up; we had breakfast and finished setting up the decorations on the truck. Then, over a 3-mile course, I rode just over 7 miles (lots of looping back, in order not to get way ahead of the rest of the group - about half of us were walking, the rest riding bikes (and one longboard)). Also I managed to fall over right at the beginning, before the parade officially began; I was doing a loopback, so was another biker, and I was looking at the truck and not paying attention. Turned to straighten out and found myself aimed at another bike; couldn't stop in time and stay upright, so I fell over. Skinned my knee slightly, nothing major, though I have a nice thick scab now. And my other knee decided it didn't like this biking thing; normally I ride (freewheel) with my left leg straight and my right leg bent, which means that the right leg does the big push to get started again when I slow down too much. It was my right knee complaining, so I had to switch - which is amazingly hard, like folding your arms the "wrong" way (everyone has a preference, and it's hard to do it the other way. No relationship to handedness, as far as I can tell, just a preference). And my knee was still complaining, but less. Lots of fun, lots of yelling ("Alameda Backyard Growers! Grow some, keep some, give some away - to the Food Bank!" - and the Food Bank truck was right ahead of us this year, so we pointed to them at the end of each yell), biking very slowly and looping back and around the group and the truck. And at about the 7/8ths mark, I realized it would be easier to go slow if I geared down...yeah, I'm not brilliant.

Finished the course, then we gathered at the house of one of our leaders for lunch-ish and de-decorating the truck and bikes. Sat around and talked and ate for about an hour and a half. Then I got up and got on my bike to ride to my parents' house, to go to the barbecue their condo puts on every year. And oh, OWWW! My knee(s) were completely eclipsed. I think that the last time I rode my bike was...possibly last July 4th, possibly the one before that. I don't bike much - I think about biking now and then, but mostly don't actually do it. The reason for the 4th of July is that the road in front of my house is blocked off for the parade, so biking to wherever I'm going is the only alternative to walking there. My seat bones did NOT like this biking thing...ow, ow, ow. Got to los padres and left my bike in their storage room; we went to the barbecue (yum - I don't get burgers and dogs much) and talked and ate and left. It hurt to sit on the folding chairs, it hurt to stand - I was having fun, but also I hurt. Borrowed the parents' massage chair, which helped my knee a little but not my seat bones (didn't hurt them, but didn't help). Oh, and I took an aspirin when I got there, that helped a bit. Mom and I did a couple crosswords, then I bummed a ride home. Another aspirin, sitting with my feet up, and using a cold pack on both knees, plus putting some gauze on the skinned knee, has helped considerably. I'm even thinking about sleeping in my (loft) bed tonight. The alternative is the couch, which isn't bad but less comfortable than going flat...I'll see if I can get up into the bed.

I am utterly wiped, still sore of knee and butt, slightly sun-scorched, rather hoarse, very well fed, and quite happy. Lovely day.

So I said "see next post" for what I was currently reading...and didn't do that post. Ah well, here's what I'm reading and have read now.

Books Read
82. Little Orphan Annie Vol 7 # by Harold Gray. Review - Again, one particular story started bugging me, I wanted to read the Alden one. I skimmed through the first part of the book until I got to it. So satisfying, I love it. Finish it in the next book.
83. Little Orphan Annie Vol 8 # by Harold Gray. Review - Finish of the Alden story, and the next couple stories. Again ends in the middle - nice stories, though Alden is better.
84. Dead Reckoning @ by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Eh, not bad but nothing exciting. I don't like zombies anyway, and the characters are rather flat.
85. Little Orphan Annie Vol 9 # by Harold Gray. Review - End of the Tecums, then a good story spoiled by trying to make the bad guy good. The first part is good but Peter La Plata's reformation just doesn't work. Then a nice segue to a simple adventure, enjoyable...except for Punjab playing Red Indian, and fooling the real Indians with his stereotyped nonsense. Oh well.
86. The Collected Kagan @ by Janet Kagan. Review - Oh, lovely. I've read a few of her stories before, and I LOVE her novels - this is (I think) all her short stories, and they're all great. Read it!
87. Best Cartoons of the Year 1956 by Lawrence Lariar. Review - Cute, glad I read it, now I can get rid of it.
88. Best Cartoons of the Year 1957 by Lawrence Lariar. Review - Ditto - very similar to 1956 book.
89. The Corinthian * by Georgette Heyer. Review - Cute, not exciting. I didn't love either of the protagonists; on the other hand, neither drove me nuts either.
90. Avarice by Annie Bellet. Review - Great world, great characters. I want to see more.

Currently Reading
I actually went to The Seer intending to abandon it; read the end and (accidentally) a bit in the middle, and have decided to slog through at least some more. It's going to take a while - I'll try to get it done this year. And probably the same for Sorcerer to the Crown - at least, I haven't read the end, but I don't hate where it is; I just don't seem to be able to get into it. Still hanging on there. Currently actually reading Silence by Mercedes Lackey; I'd read a large excerpt (the first 4-5 chapters) several months ago (though I don't seem to have recorded that anywhere), then couldn't get hold of it. I got it out of the library, along with several other books I really want to get to... Also, as an ebook, reading A Call to Duty by David Weber and Timothy Zahn. I read that when it came out, in 2014, and among my library books is the sequel, A Call to Arms. So I have to reread Duty to figure out what was going on. At least, I want to, though I could probably pick up the story. I did reread the short story (in one of the Harrington Universe anthologies) that started the whole thing. I think that's all I'm reading at the moment...

BOMBs
The Corinthian is the only one.

Discards
The two cartoon collections are out.

New/Reread
Three rereads to six new books. 18 rereads paid for.

My reading has been rather curtailed recently. So in early June, my dad got a hip replacement. For several months before that, he'd been pretty much out of it - either in too much pain to concentrate on anything, or on too many pain meds ditto. The hip replacement was a real necessity. And while it was major surgery and was taking a while (not unexpectedly) to heal, the day he came home from the hospital (2 days after the surgery) he was already a lot better - a lot more with-it - than he had been in months. It was so nice to have him back...He was getting better quite quickly - walking with a walker, then graduating to occasionally using just his cane, and even, around the house, just walking. And we went to the Alameda County Fair at the end of June; he rented a wheelchair, and used it as a walker when he felt up to it and then sat in it and wheeled himself or we pushed him when he got tired. It was a great day.

However, last week (two weeks ago? Yes, actually, Friday a week ago) he was complaining that he couldn't catch his breath. Mom was also having a hard time breathing. So she drove the both of them to the ER; found she had pleurisy (which is mending of itself - they didn't want to put her on antibiotics because she'd just finished a run of them for bronchitis)...and Dad had (small) blood clots in his lungs. So he went back on blood thinners (which he'd been on after the surgery, to defend against exactly this) and spent several days in the hospital. As usual, they keep finding things wrong with him, but can't figure out exactly what's going on. His heart is enlarged, there's the blood clots, he _doesn't_ have pneumonia (thank goodness)...but if he goes off supplemental oxygen he's gasping for breath in no time. He was in the hospital most of last week, came home...Thursday? and spent the last several days around the house mostly lying still and trying to breathe. He has oxygen at home, which has been the source of unending struggle - wrong bottles, wrong filler, replacement bottle was also wrong, people kept not showing up, home health nurse came but she didn't have the right machine to do the blood test that was the point of her coming...Mom's been run off her feet (particularly as she usually shares cooking and cleaning duties with Dad, and he's not up to even making the coffee). Between doing all the chores and arguing with the medical people on Dad's behalf, she's stressed out. I try to help, and remind her to use the massage chair (when Dad's not in it) and the like - self-care. So I've been spending more time than usual at their house, which really cuts down on my reading.

Today is a ray of hope - more incompetence from various medical people (the nurse was supposed to come and test Dad, never showed up...), but for whatever reason he's a lot more active and alert today than he has been for the past several days. Still very limited physically (still on the oxygen), but all there mentally. And he was well enough that Mom felt willing to come yard saling with me - what we do almost every summer weekend. Anti-stress, and we got some really nice stuff (I now own a Lodge cast-iron griddle/grill that will fit on the bridge burner on my stove, yay! It'll take some cleaning before it's actually useful, but for $5 I'll take it). And I took Dad into Oakland to get the test done while Mom had some time alone at home - admittedly she was cooking for part of that time, but I think some alone time was helpful in itself.

We were planning to go up to their time share this week - leave last Friday and come back next Saturday - but the doctors nixed it. Mom managed to get it switched to October, so we'll still get to enjoy that time. Hopefully Dad will continue to improve, Mom will get less stressed, and I'll have more time to read (and do other stuff) in the rest of July.

Oh, and in the midst of all this, both Mom and I got new phones (the same phone - Samsung S7 Active). And Dad got a new tablet, with cellular data connection (not that he's used that yet). So I've been spending a lot of time configuring new devices. And I finally got around to reconfiguring the desktop the parents gave me...last year? the year before? when they decided they wanted the space more than a shared computer (since they both mostly used their laptops). I set it up with an SSD boot drive and a 1.5 Tb data drive, installed Win 7 on it (it already had Win 7, but I'd forgotten the password to the administrator account so I couldn't get in to do anything useful. And anyway that drive was signaling that it wasn't fully functioning. So I just pulled it and installed a fresh copy to the SSD, using the same license key), and upgraded to Win 10 at not quite the last minute. So now all my computers are 10. This is my idea of fun and relaxation, but it does cut into my reading time too...

Heh. Just found an error in my spreadsheet - it didn't affect the book numbers, but it did affect my stats. The stats calculation page was missing one book in March - I actually read 25 books that month, not 24. So 81 total by the end of June. It was a library book, new, by a male author - so my stats are slightly off since March. Ah well, not going to rewrite them - I'll edit my early July post to get the numbers right (rereads, basically), and put up the correct stats from now on.

Wish you well with your parents (and machines and software). 81 books is impressive.

Sorry to hear about all the stress your parents and you have been going through, but glad your dad is doing better.

Yes - he's improving by leaps and bounds. He's back to punning, so I know he's feeling better. The home health nurse came (a different person), and he realized when she asked what he was taking that, for the first time in _years_, he was _not_ using any pain medication. His hip may have been a problem for longer than we realized...

Also, it turned out (when she admired some of their artwork) that she's from Sierra Leone, where the parents lived for 2+ years in the 90s (they were evacuated when there was a revolution there, in 1997). Connections! I visited them there, but never lived there - a couple weeks at most.

On Monday, I picked plums with ABG (Alameda Backyard Growers, my gardening group). I brought some plums to Mom and took some myself - she's making jam and so am I, from the same recipe. It will be interesting to see how different they are. I've made plum jam 3-4 times, with different amounts and ingredients each time and very different results. But all of them have been very good to fantastic. It's fun.

I read a book! Actually, I'm reading lots of books - more to the point, I finished a book. Which, along with 5 others, is due back at the library on Sunday...I'll be renewing some of them, at least.

Books Read
91. Silence % by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Not bad - quite different from the rest of the SERRAted Edge series, but fun to read. More?

Currently Reading
Mostly A Call to Duty in order to read A Call to Arms. Which is one of the books due back on Sunday.

BOMBs
Nope.

Discards
Nope.

New/Reread
New book - library book. So 18.5 rereads paid for - and the next several books are going to be new, since they'll be the library books.

So glad to hear that your father is recovering! I wish him all the best.

(Also, he's basically Santa Claus in my mind—I literally imagine him in a red suit.)

Every year... He plays Santa at the church breakfast, and comes in to the Christmas Eve masses for the kids. Of course, he's also played Moses, and God. And Agamemnon, and Julius Caesar, and MacBeth...

Looks like life is still busy. Glad your parents are feeling better.

Books Read (in July)
92. A Call to Duty @# by David Weber. Review - Again, fascinating to see the beginnings of the Manticore we know.
93. A Call to Arms % by David Weber. Review - Story develops - the short that started this appears in this book. New twists.
94. Ripper Jax by Peter O'Donnell. Review - Four stories, three excellent and one good. Love Modesty.
95. The Winter Long @ by Seanan McGuire. Review - And Toby's life is upended _again_ - everything she thought she knew just went poof. Again.
96. Penric and the Shaman @ by Elizabeth Moon. Review - Lovely - good to see Penric and Desdemona again, nice to see what the shamans have been up to, fun.
97. A Study in Sable % by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Like it a lot. It's always nice to see Nan and Sarah and the birds; the story is interesting, and Sherlock isn't allowed to take it over.
98. Sleeping with the Enemy @ by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller. Review - One old, one new story. Neither one particularly strong, but interesting and worth reading.
99. Complete Little Orphan Annie Vol 10 by Harold Gray. Review - A couple good stories, and the return of Shanghai Peg. “Daddy”s reported deaths, however, are getting positively annoying.
100. Complete Little Orphan Annie Vol 11 by Harold Gray. Review - Hmm. Twice here, Annie runs away leaving a villain behind her (she thinks). I don’t think she’s ever done that before. Odd. And yet another “Daddy” death.

Currently Reading
See next

BOMBs
None in this lot.

Discards
None here.

New/Reread
One reread (to prep for the new next book), 8 new. 21.5 rereads paid for.

That takes care of July - see next for stats, then August's books so far.

July stats
19 books read
4 rereads
15 new books
21.5 rereads paid for

4878 pages read, average 256.7

1 BOMBs, 18 total for the year (only 10 behind! sheesh)

7 ebooks, 12 paper books

2 discards, plus 14 not from read books, 26 total for the year (yay, goal achieved!). A bunch of duplicates and books I'd read long ago but never got rid of (some because I couldn't find the silly things).

10 SF&F
2 general fiction
1 romance
6 graphic novels

9 F, 11 M authors (how odd, more male than female! Mostly Harold Gray, for Little Orphan Annie; a few David Webers, etc.)

Books Read
101. Five Decades of the X-Men % by Stan Lee. Review - Bleah. I recognized at least one story (the first) - it was annoying as a comic, as a text story it was unbearable. Some of the others were OK, but none caught me - I skimmed.
102. Alliance of Equals @ by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller. Review - Lovely as expected. Lots of continuing, little beginning, no endings.
103. A Red-Rose Chain % by Seanan McGuire. Review - Another amazing Toby Daye book, with more revelations about Toby and her world (revelations to Toby, that is. As well as the reader).
104. Deft Fingers by Jean Garside. Review - Mildly interesting, mostly because of the echoes of the current craft resurgence. But her instructions are totally opaque.
105. The Martian @ by Andy Weir. Review - Magnificent. Utterly wow. I'll watch the movie (and I seldom watch movies) and reread and and… love it.
106. Whisper of Magic @ by Patrica Rice. Review - Not bad - good characters, interesting setting and concept. Worth reading, though I'm not sure I'll reread, and I want the rest of the series.

Currently Reading
Not much. Still, theoretically, The Seer and Sorcerer to the Crown. But I'm not inspired to pick either up. I've got a couple ER e-books I'd like to get to, and a Kickstarted novella...and I really should read a paper book or two, to get moving on BOMBs (way behind!). And a non-fiction book for the table. But I don't have any lined up at the moment.

BOMBs
Not a one.

Discards
Probably Deft Fingers, though I want to try at least one of her patterns before giving up. The only bad one was a library book, so I just returned it (doesn't count).

New/Reread
All new to me - 6 new, for 24.5 rereads paid for. I really gotta get back to rereading...but I'm enjoying the new books enough it's not urgent.

I just got back from a week in Tahoe, at my parents' timeshare. We go up every year; my sisters join us, often but not always, and usually only for a while. One sister was at Pennsic the whole time, so didn't come; the other joined us for two and two half days (came in the afternoon, stayed a full day, in late morning we all went up to her home). We did very little - partly because Dad is still limited in his activity (though he's now got a portable oxygen concentrator, so he's not tethered to oxy tanks - just to keeping the gadget charged), and partly because Mom's pretty well exhausted, taking care of everything she and Dad usually share. So we did a little bit of thrift shopping, a short visit to a used book store, one visit to the beach to wade for a few minutes, skipped the Tahoe Shakespeare show (it wasn't a particularly exciting show this year, and it's a long walk to the theatre. Fun, but not worth it this year), and did very little else - so everything we usually do, but not much of it. And one extra - we went out to a dark place near the lake and watched for the Perseid meteors. We didn't stay after midnight - went home at just past 10 pm, actually - and didn't see a lot of ordinary meteors for moonlight and smoke (which make, unfortunately, for a very lit-up sky!). We did see a few, though, and three spectacular fireballs. So it was worth the trip.

Oh, we watched two DVDs - Pete's Dragon (the original, in prep for seeing the new one) and A Wrinkle in Time - fun, both. Though Pete's Dragon is really a very silly show. Then we went up to Reno with my sister, and saw the new Pete's Dragon in the theater - it's much more logical and reasonable, with much richer characters, better FX (unsurprisingly), a better ending, and overall is both an excellent movie and better than the original version. Though if you wanted to, you could easily perceive it as a sequel rather than a remake - after all, in the original, Elliot goes away to help some other kid... The only thing the new one lacks is the songs (which helps to make it a more reasonable story - people suddenly bursting into song and choreographed dance is part of why the original is so silly). I found, when I watched the DVD, that I recognized all the songs though I haven't seen the movie for 20+ years, and I didn't know any of them to sing (which would keep them alive in my head). The new movie only has one song, though it's a nice one and I'd like to learn it.

And (as more-or-less usual) we all kept damaging ourselves. I got something in my eye during the meteor watching, and it was worse the next day when we went up to see the movie. I still managed to watch, but Mom had to do the drive home because my eye kept blurring up. And then the night before we were headed home, Mom tweaked her back, so I did most of the drive home (though she did the first bit, through the mountains). Dad actually managed not to harm himself further, which is a nice change - he's come home from Tahoe with serious damage the last several years (the worst was the year he grabbed a splintery wooden bollard to get into a boat, and we spent the next several days picking splinters out of his whole hand).

It was fun, and less exhausting than usual. Boots has forgiven me, Troy is still a little unhappy with me for being away so long. And my balcony garden is also very unhappy, though I did get a lot of things planted in Earthboxes before I left, so they didn't suffer as much as they could have. We'll see if the seedlings in cups in a plastic box survive, the box dried up completely and they're pretty wan and sere. Lots of chores to catch up on today. Laundry tomorrow and then I'll be pretty much caught up. And I got a little reading done, though surprisingly little given how much else we didn't do... I read all of The Martian (finally!), and absolutely loved it. I've had bad luck with the books everyone else loved recently, but this one lived up to the hype.

Welcome home, Jenn. Sounds like a good time was had by all, and hope your eye has cleared up.

I was messing around the Seanan McGuire website, since Once Broken Faith is coming out next month, trying unsuccessfully to download .mobi files of the short stories, and saw on her blog that you were one of the three winners of an ARC of the book--congratulations!!!!

Also greatly enjoyed Alliance of Equals. And The Martian was one of my top two in 2015, I believe. I read it when the buzz was just starting.

Oh well done!

I think knowing someone who's actually won something like this will be the closest I get to winning myself :0)

I've gotten this ARC, and a paperback she was giving away another time. And various-and-sundry others, from Goodreads giveaways or author giveaways or whatever. If you enter enough, you'll win some, I figure... I enter a lot of giveaways, for books and other things. I won a laptop, once - that's the biggest prize I've ever won, from Tiger Direct.

Oh good, it's only been two weeks I've disappeared from my own thread this time. I've been reading a lot (really a lot! Feeling sick one day and I read 5-6 books...) but not posting. I'll get to it, but not tonight.

The garden is doing OK, though a lot of powdery mildew (which I get every year, drat it!). Going to try the milk spray again and see if it helps. I've harvested some tomatoes, including some new varieties that are going to stick around next year. But my mom is drowning in Spike tomatoes (very spiky leaves - the opposite of potato-leaved tomatoes, dark red salad-sized tomatoes with green streaks, and _very_ acid. Lovely), and my two plants (which I planted, oh, three weeks ago?) haven't set a fruit yet. No, not quite true - there's one or two marble-sized green fruit on one. My, what a difference getting it planted in time makes...bah.

I get powdery mildew every year also--it's the pits! Our tomatoes are about done bearing, as are the cucumbers, the latter due to the mildew. So I'll let everything rest up until next month, when I'll start the winter garden in earnest.

Just finished A Red-Rose Chain and then The Winter Long in preparation for Once Broken Faith arriving tomorrow.

Books Read August
107. Dragons in the Earth @ by Judith Tarr. Review - Lovely. So good to see a new Tarr - great horses, fascinating mix of myths and cultures. Next, please!
108. Theory of Magic @ by Patricia Rice. Review - I liked her - interesting person, and I like "abused woman learning to trust" narratives. He's rather annoying, though he has reasons. Overall OK, not wonderful - like the others I've read, glad I read it, probably won't reread, want the rest of the series.
109. Merely Magic @ by Patrica Rice. Review - Not bad, though a little formulaic - it's supposed to be how the Malcoms and (other family) connected in "modern" times, but the patterns are pretty much the same as the later books.
110. Fridays with the Wizards @ by Jessica Day George. Review - This one I liked. I found the previous one or two annoying, but the puzzles and the attitudes and motivations here worked for me. And still a great world.
111. Steel Victory @ by J.L. Gribble. Review - OK, wow. I have some problems with the timeline/AU, but fantastic story.
112. Steel Magic @! by J.L. Gribble. Review - Still great world, still puzzles in the timeline/culture patterns, not quite as good as Victory but definitely worth reading and rereading.
113. The Witches # by Roald Dahl. Review - Cute, silly, very Dahl in word choice and in the ending (which is a beginning). Glad I read it but I don't think I'll bother to reread (again).

Currently Reading
See next month's post

BOMBs
None

Discards
The Witches - cute, but not interesting. The rest are ebooks, and keepers anyway.

New/Reread
The Witches was the only reread - so 6 new, 1 reread, 26.5 rereads paid for at the end of August.

I was feeling sick on the 17th, so read 3.5 books - the Tarr, the two Rices, and half the George. Really boosted my numbers.

August stats
13 books read
1 rereads
12 new books
26.5 rereads paid for

3459 pages read, average 266.1

0 BOMBs, 18 total for the year - very behind.
3 ER books

9 ebooks, 4 paper books

2 discards (counting Deft Fingers), 28 total for the year

7 SF&F
2 children's
1 non-fiction
3 romances

11 F, 4 M authors

Books Read
114. Miss Seeton Draws the Line @! by Heron Carvic. Review - Cute as always. Mel’s first appearance. From NetGalley.
115. A Heart in Sun and Shadow @ by Annie Bellet. Review - Lovely. Classic Celtic fairy tale, but managed a good happy(ish) ending as well. ER.
116. The Natural History of Selbourne * by Gilbert White. Review - Fascinating, though more for history of science than for his observations. Fossil clearly didn’t mean the same thing…
117. Hope(less) @ by Melissa Haag. Review - Neat new type of werewolf; orphan girl with powers is a little cliché, but it's well-written. Love the companion book.
118. Clay's Hope @ by Melissa Haag. Review - Good romance, excellent because it's the other side of the story in Hope(less) - great view of how we always think everyone else knows what they're doing while we flounder.
119. Making the Rounds !@ by Allan Weiss. Review - Bleah. In order to make the stories work, this Jewish wizard of words has to misunderstand his own language and forget the rites for High Holy Days...might have been ok in isolation, but this many stories in a row were intolerable. ER.

Currently Reading
Rudyard Kipling, by Martin Fido - very interesting, but I don't think Fido really likes Kipling at all. Weird viewpoint(s). April Lady by Georgette Heyer is my next ebook, and Once Broken Faith by Seanan McGuire is my next fiction paper book. About time! I've had it (the ARC) for more than a week...sheesh.

BOMBs
Selborne. I've had it for ages, glad I finally got around to reading it.

Discards
Nope. Mostly ebooks, and I think I'm going to hang on to Selborne for a while longer. I want to compare it to some other books, in terms of the history of science.

New/Reread
One reread, 5 new books - 28 rereads paid for. And an ER book!

Books Read
120. Rudyard Kipling * by Martin Fido. Review - If he disliked Kipling and his work so much, I wish he hadn’t bothered to write about him. Though I did learn some things about Kipling’s world.
121. Little Orphan Annie Vol 12 by Harold Gray. Review - Eh. Two frustrating stories, one excellent, one (partial) annoying. There is a good story, which I expect I'll reread - skip the rest.
122. The Door in the Wall * by Marguerite de Angeli. Review - Bleah. Saccharine story, historically inaccurate, over-explanation of things the character should have known.

Currently Reading
April Lady, by Georgette Heyer - not a favorite, she's being an utter idiot. Reading it in paper now, in the hopes it will go faster than as an ebook. I have Seanan McGuire's Once Broken Faith to read, but I'm doing so many things I don't seem to have time to sit down and read - and I know I can't put down a Seanan book. Some day I'll have free time...

BOMBs
Two - the Kipling bio, and The Door in the Wall.

Discards
Two - the same two as the BOMBs. Yay, out! Also a couple non-fiction books that I'll never use - one on stenciling, one on Depression glass. Things I thought I might want to know, one day...nope, don't need them.

New/Reread
All new, this lot - 29.5 rereads paid for.

I'm slogging a bit - nothing wonderful. But I can at least be pleased about reading BOMBs and getting discards (more than I need for the year! Still behind on BOMBs, though - but at a much better place than I was this time last year). And I do have a wonderful book waiting, if I can find the time for it. Also falling behind in reviews, but I'm trying to catch up - I've reviewed all the last lot, just a few before that that I need to write down before I forget about the book.

Have you read any of Seanan McGuire's InCryptid series? It starts with Discount Armageddon. I've just read two of the October Daye series. I find the Incryptid series to have more of a sense of humor and it's not as dark.

ETA: I looked up Dawn of the Flame Sea but it's a Kindle novella. I get my books from the library so I'm not going to be able to read that one. :(

Hope you've been able to get to Once Broken Faith by now, Jenn. April Lady is also not a favorite of mine--Nell is indeed an idiot.

I've been gone most of the month and so only read 5 books in September--3 of them October Daye books as I reread books 8 and 9 in prep for the new one.

Hope all is well with you.

>129 Morphidae: Yep, I think I've read all of Seanan's books...oh, no, I haven't read the latest InCryptid, but I've read all the rest. Not Mira Grant - I tried Feed and too much for me, but I love Seanan. And yes, InCryptid is more amusing. I'm not sure about less dark, though - the philosophical underpinnings of InCryptid are pretty intense (what is a person, who deserves to live, when is lying acceptable and when not) and there are probably as many deaths, though usually of less central characters, as in Toby's adventures. Though the rearranging of the protagonist's universe happens less there. Have you read her Velveteen Vs. series? Not sure those are in libraries, though - there is a print version, but it's e-first. Most of the stories are available on her site, free, if you want to look.

Do you read ebooks at all - have you a device you're willing to read on? Because most libraries have a good selection of ebooks these days - I just spent the last hour surfing a couple library sites to collect (wishlist) a bunch more books I want to read from there. Basically I don't buy a (new) book unless I've read it and know I want it, so libraries are very useful that way. Dawn of the Flame Sea is in a couple libraries here, and I just put a hold on the second book in the series (which isn't released yet), when I went to check on that.

>130 ronincats: Nope, Once Broken Faith is still hanging fire. My parents just got back from their Europe trip, and between doing my stuff and getting things for them, and now trying to help my dad get his phone (he had a Note 7...complications with the return and getting a new one), I still haven't had time. Soon! We're going on a week's trip to their timeshare, where it's COLD (ok, you midwesterners and New Englanders can laugh at me, but highs in the 50s is COLD to me), so we'll probably be spending a lot of time inside. Reading time!

Yeah, Heyer seems to enjoy writing idiots, including as her protagonists. It's why I don't like most of her mysteries. But many of her romances have _mostly_ sensible people, or idiots who get smarter at least. Not this one, but many.

>131 jjmcgaffey: I guess I should say less depressing for the MC's or as you say, "rearranging of the protagonist's universe." I just feel so DEPRESSED after reading a Toby vs. an Incryptid.

I do read ebooks and when my library has them, I will order an ebook if that's all they are offering. In this case, they did not have Dawn of the Flame Sea. Though I have to admit I didn't check ILL. Does ILL offer ebooks? Hmm.

>132 Morphidae: Hmmm...don't know. I just get cards for all the libraries I can reach. But there are a lot of ebooks in the Los Angeles library I'd love to get...

I suspect not, but I think I'll investigate.

Toby doesn't depress me, but I can see your point - and there are some very well-written books/series I avoid for the same reason. Velveteen is usually funnier than InCryptid...though there are some rearranging the universe stories mixed in.

>133 jjmcgaffey: Oh, I'm reading the Toby ones. Just slowly and I have to be careful of my mood beforehand.

Books Read (September)
123. April Lady *@ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Bleah again - _everyone's_ stupid in this Heyer, instead of the usual everyone but the protagonists are. Misunderstandings trope squared (at least).
124. Alien Artifacts @ by Joshua Palmatier. Review - Middling-good - many interesting stories, none fantastic, none bad. Interesting concept, too.
125. Frederica *@ by Georgette Heyer. Review - Fun fluff - I like both the protagonists and most of the secondary characters.
126. My Planet * by Mary Roach. Review - Not interested. She mostly makes fun of herself and her family – but I don’t want to read about someone who doesn’t like herself. Not funny, not interesting.
127. Old Bones the Wonder Horse by Mildred Mastin Pace. Review - Sweet little horse story, for kids. I’ll look for more by this author.
128. Miracle on 34th Street by Valentine Davies. Review - I’d never read this, and I’ve never seen (the whole) movie. Fun story, and probably worth rereading.
129. Hellspark @# by Janet Kagan. Review - Lovely as always, a long-time favorite.

Currently Reading
See October's post

BOMBs
Three - April Lady, Frederica, My Planet. Doing pretty well, though I'm still behind...

Discards
Two - April Lady and My Planet. Yay for getting rid of books I've been hanging on to!

New/Reread
Six new, one (many-time) reread. 31.5 rereads paid for.

September stats
16 books read
2 rereads
14 new books
31.5 rereads paid for (getting ridiculous. I'm going to have to get sick and do nothing but rereads to use these up...)

3799 pages read, average 237.4

6 BOMBs, 24 total for the year. Getting there!
1 ER books
1 Netgalley books

8 ebooks, 8 paper books (some of the ebooks I also have in paper, though - so now I can discard some of them and know I want to keep others).

4 discards, plus 2 not from read books, 34 total for the year. Nice.

4 SF&F
1 animal stories
2 children's
3 non-fiction
4 romances
1 graphic novels
1 mysteries

10 F, 7 M authors

Books Read
130. A Daughter of the Land *@ by Gene Stratton-Porter. Review - Weird - not a favorite Stratton-Porter (too dark), but probably worth rereading.
131. The Ghost Army of World War II @ by Rick Beyer. Review - Fascinating - images and words from soldiers in a deception unit. Quick read.
132. By The Light of the Moon @ by Jodi Vaughn. Review - Good paranormal romances - took annoying tropes and made them function. Looking for more by her.

Currently Reading
Coast Lines by Mark Monmonier - an interesting book, but I got it as a PDF which is really ANNOYING. For one thing, I can't read it on my usual platform - the PDF won't flow to the size of my phone screen, and making an epub from it is a total mess. For another, it's full of endnotes...which aren't links, they're just numbers (in the PDF, let alone in the epub. At least they're superscripts in the PDF). I'm reading it on my big tablet, the most useful device for a PDF, but it's heavy and awkward enough (it's only a 10.1, but I'm used to my 7" tablet or preferably my phone!) that it's hard to get in to it. The content is good, but the format is bad enough it's interfering with my ability to read it. I'm going to try to take the PDF apart (make it a Word document, make links out of its endnotes, separate out the headers and footers and page numbers, etc) and put it back together as a proper epub so I can actually read it. Oddly enough, the images are the least annoying part, even though I have to click and zoom on them (on the phone - they're big enough to see on the big tablet). But if I can set them up to auto-zoom to the width of the page, that would help too. We'll see. I got this for free from the University of Chicago - they give out a free ebook of a non-fiction book they've published, one every month. This was a few months ago. I'm going to tell them about the format problems, in the hopes that they'll fix it up.
Also (about to) read The Princess Troll by Leah Cutter - new ER book I got (ebook), it should be a quick read. And I am _going_ to get to Once Broken Faith this week! I'm staying with my parents at their timeshare - for various reasons, we intend it to be a nice, quiet, low-activity week. I brought a bunch of BOMBs along, as well as Once Broken Faith - going to try to read mostly on paper. Aside from The Princess Troll.

BOMBs
A Daughter of the Land - I read it as an ebook, but I also own it in paper. I may discard the paper version, it's not a book I love.

Discards
None yet.

New/Reread
All three new. 33 rereads paid for.

>134 Morphidae: Oh, good. They're excellent stories - but yeah, I can see being picky about your mood before starting.

So...I was away from my thread enough that I didn't mention that my parents went to Europe for a month, early September through early October. They were joining a pilgrimage organized by our church, but being them they went a week early to spend time with friends in Portugal, joined the pilgrimage and got hustled hither and yon across Portugal, France, Spain, and Italy, then the members of the pilgrimage went home and my parents went to spend a week visiting friends in Macedonia. It didn't work out perfectly - they keep forgetting, or disbelieving, just how rushed and orchestrated these group tours are. So when they got to Macedonia they did see friends, but they also spent a lot of time catching up on their sleep and resting their legs which had been nearly walked off with the pilgrimage (despite them not actually walking the pilgrimage - it was buses, mostly, but in each city they'd be rushed through a dozen or so churches and holy places...). They got home last Monday, and yesterday - Friday - we headed out for their (re-)scheduled week* at this timeshare. It's a very different place, in terms of weather and probably of people, in early October than in late June. We'll see. But as I said in the previous post, we're all quite willing for a quiet week.

While they were gone, so I wasn't forming my schedule around them (particularly on weekends), I found myself doing a lot more, in the sense of going out to various events. So between that and taking care of their house (and plants) as well as mine, I can use a rest as well.

*I forget if I mentioned - the reason we're here in October instead of June is that at the end of June, when we usually come, Dad was freshly out of the hospital from the pulmonary embolisms that hit him after his hip replacement. He was on full-time oxygen and pretty much flat on his back, and coming here just wasn't happening. Despite this being a hot-springs site, and famous for convalescents... So it had to be rescheduled after Stardust (their other timeshare), and there wasn't time before the pilgrimage so it had to be after, but not long after because we'd be into fall... I don't think we'll be here in October another year, but in fact the weather hasn't been bad so far. Nippy at night, but we're not out at night much anyway.

And I've gotten back into Habitica in a big way. Found a party to join, which had some problems because there were enough people in it that Habitica couldn't handle the numbers; so we split the party into two and made a guild to let people continue to interact with other members of the original party (I went to the new one). It's worked out quite well. The party is doing quests pretty much continuously; the guild regularly has challenges, if only to talk in the guild. This has triggered me to join several other Habitica challenges. Currently I'm doing one to draw something every day from August 31st to December 31st. It's neat - I can see myself improving, not by much but it's there. I can also see where I fall down, and choose things to draw to push myself in those particular ways. I'm also doing a Couch to 5K challenge - using an app (Samsung Health, actually) to direct myself in gradual workouts towards actually running a 5k race. I joined a little late, or Samsung Health does slow work - it's a 10-week progression in the app, but I'm supposed to run a race before Thanksgiving, 8 weeks away (aggh! Thanksgiving is 8 weeks away!). So I'll be pushing myself a little. I walk far and fast, but I don't run...this will be a task. And I may end up walking the 5k - that won't be particularly difficult to complete, though I won't be a fast finisher. And some easier challenges - to read a poem or two every day (it counts if I recite one, right?) and to give someone a sincere compliment every day. It's nice. I'm not doing any more Habitica reading challenges, though - they're too easy, or too orchestrated. Read a book a week - I'm reading several; read this particular book - no, don' wanna, wanna read this and this and this... Basically it's not a challenge for me, or it's not interesting, so not worth doing.

>138 jjmcgaffey: I love that you are still so active in Habitica. It's still going strong, eh?

>139 Morphidae: Oh yeah. They've updated a whole bunch of things - the new app is a 1000% improvement over the old one, and they're currently working (I'm told) on a website redo to fix the lag and so on there. I'm still just using it free, but they've got some new gem bundles I'm going to look at - I can't convince myself to pay a monthly fee even to support this great site (I went lifetime on LT right away - Habitica doesn't offer a lifetime deal).

Jennifer- I noticed you have been reading quite a few Georgette Heyer novels this year. It seems some are better than others. Even if some of the regency stories are fluff, I plan on reading some in the near future.

>141 This-n-That: Yes, I got a bunch of them as ebooks, which for whatever reason I find easier to start than paper books. Well, one reason is that the paper books are in boxes - if I'm lucky, sorted by genre and author; if not, just lumped with all the books I bought _that_ time. The ebooks are just easier to find! But that aside - yes, I like Heyer. I don't love all her books, and some I actively dislike, but most of them are worth reading - good fluff or better. The biggest problem I have with Heyer is that if I've been reading a bunch of hers, I can't read any other Regencies - they're all so much worse than hers I can't stand them.

Books Read
133. The Princess Troll !@ by Leah Cutter. Review - Interesting book - I really want to read the first in the series, though. Confusing.
134. Hill Country Man !@ by Loralee Lillibridge. Review - Perfectly adequate romance, not exciting.
135. Interloper at Glencoe !@ by Julianne Lee. Review - No. I've tried three times and I officially give up, I can't read this.
136. Beauty and the Werewolf @# by Mercedes Lackey. Review - Lovely as always, a nice antidote to Interloper.
137. The Reluctant Widow @* by Georgette Heyer. Review - A gothic-ish romance - not bad, not a favorite.

Currently Reading
UnF*ck Your Habitat by Rachel Hoffman - I've been using the app and following on Twitter for a while, but the book lays out more of the philosophy behind the challenges she gives. Interestingly similar and different from Kondo... Also theoretically still reading Coast Lines, and Once Broken Faith. I don't know why I was able to put that down, but I was, and I haven't picked it up again. I will, though, I want to see what happens.

BOMBs
Three! Two ER books and the Heyer. Though the ER books are ebooks - they still count, they're catching up on what I should have read long ago.

Discards
Interloper at Glencoe is gone - I actually deleted it from my ebooks. Don't want to ever read it. But again, ebook, so it doesn't count.

New/Reread
Four new books and a reread - 34 rereads paid for.

Books Read in October
138. UnF*ck Your Habitat !@ by Rachel Hoffman. Review - Nice to get a bit of the philosophy, and more detailed structures - I've been using the app and Twitter for quite a while.
139. Beauty and the Beast by Charles Lamb. Review - Interesting versification of the original story - it matches the modern story very closely.
140. Enchanting the King @ by E.D. Walker. Review - Interesting mix of history and fairy tale, that goes off in its own direction. Worth reading.
141. Chaos Choreography by Seanan McGuire. Review - Good as expected - Vicky being Valerie and dancing again, with complications.
142. The Dragon in the Sock Drawer @ by Kate Klimo. Review - Barely adequate kids' story. Flat, simplistic, and predictable, despite the interesting concept.
143. Mirabile @ by Janet Kagan. Review - Reading the ebook - it differs quite a bit from the paper one, fascinating. I'll have to do a comparison read soon, I think bits are added and subtracted (I've read the paper one often enough I've nearly memorized it…). I suspect this is the original magazine stories, rather than the "cleaned up into a book" versions - not sure why, I think they have the same publisher so rights shouldn't be a problem.

Currently Reading
See post for November

BOMBs
None.

Discards
None - I've gotten rid of Dragon in the Sock Drawer but it's an ebook, doesn't count.

New/Reread
All new except the last - and that's sort of new, since the ebook differs from the familiar paper version.

October stats
14 books read
2 rereads
12 new books
35.5 rereads paid for

3795 pages read, average 271.1

4 BOMBs, 28 total for the year; 22 to go. Doing better, but still behind.
3 ER books (one current, two from 2012 - yay? Finally done, at least)
1 Netgalley book

12 ebooks, 2 paper books

0 discards, 34 total for the year

5 SF&F
2 children's
2 non-fiction
1 general fiction
4 romances

12 F, 2 M authors - and there goes the near-parity I'd been managing. Oh well.

Not bad. A decent number read, two old ER books cleared out and a current one done. Need to read more BOMBs, but I'm way ahead of where I was at this time last year (I think I had...5?). And I've already passed the goal for discards.

Books Read
144. Chalice # by Robin McKinley. Review - Needed a solid reread tonight - great as always.

Currently Reading
Still Once Broken Faith, still Coast Lines. Also The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden - very good story based on Russian folklore/fairy tales. I'm somewhat familiar with that setting and its creature, but only somewhat - it's a good story but rather a struggle to read. Also just started Year of the Unicorn by Andre Norton - one of my favorite Witch World stories, for no particular reason. I need good rereads right now.

BOMBs
None yet.

Discards
None.

New/Reread
Using up my rereads, yay!

I was running a polling station on Election Day, and in there we're not allowed to talk politics so we can't check reports about the election. So after a very long day (it's 15-16 hours, from arrival and setup to breakdown and leave), I got home and got the whole load of news on how the election was going. Ghahh. I slept OK last night (didn't have a lot of choice - my eyes kept closing), but today I've been pretty much inert. Which is about 3/4 said very long day (mostly on my feet), and 1/4 the election results - I'm only marginally affected, but if Trump actually carries out the policies he's been pushing I probably lose health insurance at least. I keep thinking I need to do something to prepare, but I can't think what - aside from getting all my checkups done before January 20th. I don't have any chronic illnesses - or at least, not ones that noticeably affect my life...yeah, I'm better off than a lot of people will be over the next four years. White and middle-class - but female and with a variable income (I'm a freelancer). We'll see how things shake out.

But that's why I'm doing rereads right now - half comfort, half not enough brain to process new stuff (even good new stories).

>147 jjmcgaffey: Comfort reads sounds really good right now. :)

Books Read
145. The Interior Life @# by Dorothy J. Heydt. Review - Great as always. Just re-released by the author – wonderful, more people should read this!
146. Barrenlands @# by Doranna Durgin. Review - Good, rich, now I need to read Changespell…
147. The Bear and the Nightingale !@ by Katherine Arden. Review - Interesting, weird - based on Russian folklore, which I'm only partly familiar with.
148. The Last Vhalgenn !@ by Kayelle Allen. Review - Don't like it - weak worldbuilding, annoying characters, completely unconvincing romance.

Currently Reading
Still have Once Broken Faith and Year of the Unicorn sitting around - I need to get them read. Coast Lines I'm putting aside until I can do some cleanup - the PDF needs some work (footnotes), and it's hard to read PDFs anyway (I can't read them on my usual devices). I really need to work on BOMBs, I say as I rest my elbow on 4 library books and a bunch of others...sigh.

BOMBs
Nope. Rereads and ER-type books.

Discards
The Last Vhalgenn. Not worth reading. Doesn't really count, since it's an ebook, but that's OK.

New/Reread
Two rereads, two new books - 33.5 rereads paid for (not going to use them up this year). But that's pretty good, for starting from zero for the year - I read more than twice as many books-new-to-me as old favorites.

BOMBs - I'm unlikely to make my goal (I'd have to read 22 books in the next month and a half, and nothing but BOMBs. Not going to happen, bar my getting sick enough to lie in bed and read - and then I wouldn't be able to pull out BOMBs to read). Oh well. I'm still well ahead of last year.

I'm sucking on my BOMBs goal as well. You've got two really good books sitting around--start them!

>149 jjmcgaffey: Well, you had a hefty BOMBs goal, so you shouldn't be too hard on yourself. Plus, a reader has to make time for library books when they become available.

>151 This-n-That: Yeah...I've got a hefty load of BOMBs to get rid of, is the problem! But yeah, progress is progress, even if it isn't as much as I hoped for. And they're good library books.

>150 ronincats: I've started both OBF and Unicorn - that was the problem, they were hanging fire. I finished Unicorn last night (I'll post later), so that's good. No idea why I stalled on the two of them; I've read several books completely between starting and finishing those two. Though it may be just that they're on paper, so I have to have them in hand - I can read an ebook at home or on the go, and I've been on the go an awful lot recently.

Hmmm, I haven't posted about events - last Sunday I ran (well, walked, mostly) a 5K, my first race. Whether it will be my last, I'm not sure. I think I enjoyed doing the C25K more than I did the race - it certainly cost less (I have a $30 tshirt! Whoopee!). I'm really not motivated by competition - challenge, yes, but that's against me and my past efforts, not beating someone else. I think I'll go back to Zombies, Run! and see how I feel about that. I still don't run - it's not ever something I've done easily, and currently I've done something to my right calf so that it aches more or less constantly and utterly refuses to let me run more than a few steps at a time. But I walk a lot faster - my time for the race was a 15:48 mile, and I've done that or nearly in the C25K app workouts a couple times too. I used to be pleased when I managed an under-20-minute mile. So I'll keep pushing. Maybe I'll start with the ZR C25K app - I chose an easier one for this, ZR doesn't really understand "couch" or "non-runner". The first day it has you running - only for 10-15 seconds a time, but over and over. Maybe I can do that now that I've finished a real C25K, that starts out with several weeks of walking longer and faster before it has you start to run.

I'm spending a little time every day on opposing Trump's problematic policies and choices - calling my reps and various government agencies that have a role to play. And far too much time reading Twitter and seeing what the latest outrage is. But I'm keeping it low-key - self-care, I'm too likely to go into a spiral if I focus too much on what might/will happen. Ghahh.

Thanksgiving will be low-key again - me and my parents, so it's not worth cooking a full meal. We're going to a restaurant that does a great Thanksgiving buffet (same place we went last year). We're gearing up for the caroling party on December 10th, and then Christmas when everybody comes - though for various reasons, it will actually be December 26th that people come this year. BTW, if anyone's in the SF Bay Area and would like to come sing carols and eat and talk for a few hours on the evening of December 10th, ping me - the more the merrier! It's indoors, we don't go around to houses - it got too complicated, particularly as my parents aged.

Oh dear. Open Road Media has done a terrible/wonderful thing - they've put essentially all their backlist up on Amazon Kindle, for free! 5k books, of many and assorted types. The sale runs until December 20.

I collected 256 books - some of them are YA or otherwise small and light, but still. However, some of them are books I own in paper, that I haven't gotten around to reading. So now I can (once I find them) dump those paper copies - I can not get around to reading the ebooks instead, and that saves room on the shelves/boxes! That's my excuse...

Books Read
149. Year of the Unicorn # by Andre Norton. Review - Old favorite revisited – I like the beginning better than the end, but it’s enjoyable throughout.
150. Her Father's Daughter @ by Gene Stratton-Porter. Review - Weird romance, heavy racism. Fantastic descriptions of S. California land and plants, though. Also heavily typoed Gutenberg version.
151. The Falling of the Moon !@ by A.E. Decker. Review - OK, though heroine was rather annoying (she got better though).
152. The Murder Frame by Peter O'Donnell. Review - Four good stories, with lots of familiar characters showing up and glimpses of Modesty and Willie's pasts. Excellent.
153. Ghost Talkers % by Mary Robinette Kowal. Review - Great worldbuilding, story didn't catch me (I don't like thrillers much). Enjoyable nonetheless.

Currently Reading
The Meddlers of Moonshine, an ER book - the sequel to The Falling of the Moon (above - which the author gave me so I'd know what was going on in this book). It's taking me quite a while to read. And I swear I'll finish Once Broken Faith before the end of the year!

BOMBs
Not a one. I'll try to find and finish a couple before the new year, but not at all sure it will happen. Hmm, maybe a Heyer.

Discards
None - I think I'll even keep Her Father's Daughter, for the plants. It's an ebook and wouldn't count, anyway.

New/Reread
One reread, one library book, one sort of ER, one old ebook, and one brand-new book. Variety. 34.5 rereads paid for, anyway.

I haven't been reading a lot - too much else going on. The caroling party was last week - Dad was teaching, Mom wasn't feeling well, neither of my sisters could come - I did a lot of work for the setup. Though Mom did do all the cooking (though I baked some things) and Dad made the eggnog. It was a much smaller party than usual - not sure why, though late invitations and a day of heavy rain may both have contributed. But we sang and had fun and most of the spare food went home with others, so a success. Then the next day we went to Christmas Revels, which was fun as usual - set in Wales this time, with A Child's Christmas in Wales as the frame for the songs and skits.

Trying to get the balcony garden cleaned up before the end of the year. Knitting a pair of slippersocks for one nephew, and I need to make bags and candy for most of the rest of the family. Trying to clean up my house a bit (it's still rather too hoardy for comfort). Getting new clients, helping old ones, freezing (ok, not literally, we've had one night with a low of 39F. But that's COLD around here!), trying to avoid getting my feet wet because I don't own any waterproof shoes and the rain is being very heavy off and on...and so on.

November stats
6 books read
4 rereads
2 new books
32.5 rereads paid for

1607 pages read, average 267.8

0 BOMBs, 28 total for the year; 22 to go
0 ER books
1 Netgalley books

4 ebooks, 2 paper books

0 discards, 34 total for the year

5 SF&F
1 romance (with a fantasy setting, but)

6 F, 0 M authors

Wow, that's scant. I only read 6 in January, too, but only one of those was a reread. See if I can do better in December. I've beaten my reading goal, though (in December).

Wow, thanks for the heads up on the Open Road Media Kindle sale on Amazon! Lots of totally free books!

May I recommend, if you don't have them, The Ladies of Mandrigyn and The Witches of Wenshar and The Dark Hand of Magic by Barbara Hambly and the early Lyra books by Patricia Wrede, especially The Raven Ring. Way too much Piers Anthony on there, but lots of vintage sf&f to choose from! Andre Norton, Jane Yolen, Poul Anderson, Robert Silverberg, John Brunner, Fritz Leiber--33 pages of free books just in this genre!

I already own (in paper) both the ...what's his name? Something Wolf. The Hambly series, anyway. And allllll the Patricia Wredes! But now I own them in ebooks as well, yay. I did get a bunch of Piers Anthony - those are among the ones I have in paper and can now get rid of, 'cause if I actually want to read them I have the ebook. Got a lot of Norton, too, and a few others. Did you notice the G. Harry Stine? Just one, though. Also got a lot of Durrell (Lawrence - I just learned there's at least a few Geralds as well, need to pick those up). I've been watching the BBC The Durrells in Corfu series - interesting, with a very different focus than Gerald's books (not so much the animals, for one!). Now I want to reread Gerald's Corfu trilogy, and apparently Lawrence wrote about it too...as well as diplomatic service shenanigans. I got a lot of kids books too - Coville and Bellairs. I'll see if I like them. And all the Zilpha Keatly Snyder there was - though my beloved Black and Blue Magic was not among the free ones. But it exists as an ebook! I'll be keeping an eye on that one. Oh, and all of the Peter Dickinson books - they're his mysteries, not his fantasies (aside from his AW mystery Skeleton in Waiting. Oddly enough, only that one, not the first in the series King & Joker). But Dickinson is always worth reading.

How do you look at them by genre? I was just looking at everything by Open Road Media, sorted Price: Low to High. Which was really annoying because every time I changed pages stuff moved around - I _know_ I missed books (though I searched for the authors I like, that I knew were on the list, afterward).

This is the Christmas tree at the end of the Pacific Beach Pier here in San Diego, a Christmas tradition.

To all my friends here at Library Thing, I want you to know how much I value you and how much I wish you a very happy holiday, whatever one you celebrate, and the very best of New Years!

Thank you, Roni!

I had family here for Christmas - for just after Christmas, technically. None of them are churchgoers, and my parents are - I volunteer at the church too. So Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are busy for us, and my sisters and their families found it rather boring. So this year they showed up the afternoon of Christmas Day, and we celebrated on the 26th - a big dinner, and presents. It worked very well; probably going to do the same next year.

So between the church activities, and family stuff, I haven't been on LT since the 20th or so. Nor have I been reading much. Ah well, I made my goal, anyway.

I got a new computer for Christmas, too - I'm busy setting it up, but got distracted by LT. It's so nice - fast and smooth. My old computer, while very good, is...7 years old? Something like that. It could do everything I wanted, but was working flat out to do it - lots of fans running etc. This one is loping along casually with the same level of activity. But, of course, it doesn't have all the data on it yet (let alone programs)...still working on stuff.

Books Read
154. The Meddlers of Moonshine !@ by A.E. Decker. Review - Like the first book – not bad, but not good. Annoying at the beginning, slightly better by the end.

Currently Reading
Too many - Rihannsu by Diane Duane (it's an omnibus, I've read the first two of the four), All Through the Night by Suzanne Brockmann, The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman. Still haven't picked up Once Broken Faith or Sorcerer to the Crown again - next year (so are all of these, I won't have time to do any more reading before midnight tonight). Etc etc. And I need to read a BOMB first for the new year, as I've modified my rereads/new books rule so only BOMBs count.

BOMBs
Nope.

Discards
It's an ebook, so I'll hang on to it.

New/Reread
One new - an ER book - so I end the year with 35 rereads paid for and not used. Yay!

Not doing much reading! As I said above - between volunteer stuff and family and cooking, I'm basically not reading at all. Next year things will settle down and I can read more.

December stats
5 books read
0 rereads
5 new books
35 rereads paid for

1233 pages read, average 246.6

0 BOMBs, 28 total for the year; short of my goal by 22
2 ER books

3 ebooks, 2 paper books

0 discards, 34 total for the year (made my goal!)

1 SF&F
2 children's
1 romances
1 graphic novels

4 F, 1 M authors

Full year stats
154 books read
28 rereads
126 new books
35 rereads paid for and not used

43873 pages read, average per book 284.9, average per month 3656.1

28 BOMBs, short of my goal by 22
16 ER books
8 Netgalley etc books

84 ebooks, 70 paper books

34 discards (yay, past my goal - so boost the goal for next year)

67 SF&F
6 animal stories
8 children's
13 non-fiction
5 general fiction
35 romances
9 graphic novels
11 mysteries

112 F, 52 M authors

Not bad. I do read a lot of female authors... and I always say I read primarily SF&F, here it is showing in the numbers. More than a third, not quite half of my reading.

Success at reading, reading new books (blew that one away!), discards. Failure at reading BOMBs, so next year I'm going to make it that the books I have to read to earn a reread are BOMBs only - new books/library books won't count either way. But old ER/Netgalley books will count as BOMBs (no other ebooks will).

Happy New Year, all, and see you in my new thread!

http://www.librarything.com/topic/244953