Bout of Books 10.0 Wrap Up!

Hey guys! So I know this is pretty late, but I figured I'd do my wrap up from the Bout of Books 10.0 Read-a-Thon last week. I had a lot of fun reading! Since this was my first week-long read-a-thon, and second read-a-thon ever, I definitely think I can tweak some things to make the next read-a-thon easier. That being said, I really did enjoy myself and got a lot of reading done, so I'm happy with the overall experience =] Now onto the books! I came into the read-a-thon already reading two books (Cress & Nine Stories), and started more as the week went on. I didn't really stick to my TBR list. I'm going to try and make this as understandable as possible, but I may just even confuse myself! ;P

Books Read:

Cress by Marissa Meyer: 332 (had previously read up to page 218/550, finished on Day 3)

Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger: 131 (had previously read up to page 78/209, finished on Day 2)

The Wonderful Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum (Includes The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Land of Oz, and Ozma of Oz): 637/761 (finished the first two books)

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green: 225/225 (finished on Day 6)

I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark: 37/480

An Expotition to the North Pole by A. A. Milne: 27/27

I hope this makes sense! It doesn't seem like I finished that many books, but I sure did experience a whole bunch. 

Total pages read: 1389

Books Completed: 6

Books Started: 2

Day #5 Update ( aka the slacker update)

Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Slacker. Just call me a slacker. More like an update slacker but still. 

I'm just going to do a quick update because I want to get back to reading, but here is my progress so far. It's just an overall progress because I'm sure I documented my daily progress somewhere but don't really feel like locating it at this time. So yeah. Anyway, here it goes:

Pages read: 996 .. that's slightly disappointing. Just short of 1,000. Comeon.

Books Completed: 1. Started before Bout of Books: 2

2. Started After Bout of Books: 2

Books Experienced:

Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger

Cress by Marissa Meyer

The Wonderful Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum

a. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

b. The Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum

In Progress:

I've Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark (page 46/480)

Books to Start:

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

Ozma of Oz by L. Frankn Baum

Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare

I'm going to try and get through my "In Progress" book by Sunday night as well as the book by the wonderful Mr. John Green. We'll see how that goes. Oh and I also want to finish the last Oz book in this collection because there are three books in one big book if that makes any sense. Yeah.

Happy reading! <3

Day 2 Update- Holy Moley!

I finished Cress. The Lunar Chronicles is now in my top favorite series of all time. I just can't even. So good. So good. That's all the update I have for now because I just finished it less than 5 minutes and am just *insert fangirl (?) screams*. Loved it. So much. I can't wait for Winter. 2015 most anticipated book so far!

Alright. I need to calm down. Now onto my real update. 

I read 232 pages today and finished one book. That bring my total pages read up to something that I can't figure out right now because we're in the middle of a huge thunderstorm and I think my WiFi just went out. Poo. 

I also got about 7 or 8 (I think 8) books out from the library. I believe I need to go on a book borrowing ban for a little bit because I still have Franny & Zooey and just took a collection of the 1st three Oz books off my mom's hands, plus A Tree Grows in Brooklyn which I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to read anytime soon. But I will get to it at some point.

New books from the library:

I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark

Remember Me by Mary Higgins Clark

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare

So excited. So excited. Yes.

Update- I finally got my internet back this morning! Woohoo!

Bookish Battle Royale! (Bout of Books/My Life in Books Challenge)

Alright, so I had to think long and hard about who I thought should battle it out and I think I've come up with some pretty weird characters that I think would make an awesome battle. The characters are:

Haymitch Abernathy (The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins)

Strengths

• Resourceful
• Intelligent
• Survived the Hunger Games for goodness sake!
• Extremely invested in protecting the people he cares about

Weaknesses

• Usually intoxicated
• Haunted by his experiences in the Hunger Games

Argus Filch (Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling)

Strengths

• Loves torturing students (has had practice & the tools to do so)
• Has no problem with corporal/inventive punishment
• Mrs. Norris (helps him find scoundrels)

Weaknesses

• Out of shape
• Squib
• Not the most intelligent person in the world

Gollum (The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien)

Strengths

• Cunning
• Resourceful
• Intelligent/Good riddle teller
• Manipulative 

Weaknesses

• Driven mad by The Ring
• Thinks he's two different people
• Loosing strength since he lost The Ring

And the winner is: Gollum

Gollum would, baring he's not under the impression that he's two different people, be able to distract poor old Filch enough to be able to steal some of his torture devices. Since Mr. Filch can't use magic, he wouldn't be able to stop Gollum. Gollum's so cunning that he probably wouldn't be seen by many people at Hogwarts, minus those who have the Marauder's Map. Haymitch, skilled and knowledgeable as he is, would probably be in too much of a drunken stuper to truly be able to defend himself. So the winner would be Smiegel, all the while whispering to himself "My Precious!". 

Books I'm Looking Forward To (River City Reading/Bought of Books Challenge)

It's that time, the time when I list the 10 books that I'm most looking forward to. I love this challenge, but it was pretty hard for me to complete for the sole reason that I have sooooo many that I want to read and trimming the list down to 10 was almost impossible. But I did. I'm also adding in a little blurb as to why I'm looking forward to reading these books because well, honestly, I forget the reason why, but I'm doing it anyway, so just go with it? Okay? Okay. Yup I just shamelessly threw in a TFiOS reference. That might be on my list. Who knows. I guess you're going to have to wait and see.

Here's my list (in no particular order):

1. Winter by Marissa Meyer

• I'm about 150 pages away from the end of Cress, and I know I'm going to want to read Winter ASAP, but sadly it's not coming out until next year. Sad day. But I just recently read the first reference to Winter in Cress and it made me excited to see what she brings to the storyline and if she's a good character or evil. Muahahahahaha. 

2. Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare 

•  I'm pretty late, it seems, on the Cassandra Clare front. I just recently found out about the Mortal Instruments series so I checked out her website and found the Internal Devices series. It sounds awesome and has been raved about by many a booktuber (I'm most impressed by Katytastic's enthusiasm for the series, putting it in her top series of all time alongside Harry Potter and the Hunger Games), so yeah. There's that.

3. Insurgent & Allegiant by Veronica Roth

• I know, I know, these are two separate books, but I'm counting them as one because they're in the same series. I absolutely loved Divergent and am waiting, somewhat impatiently, for Insurgent to come into the library. Current hold count: hold #34 on 39 circulating copies. That's better than the original #64 holds, or something like that. We're getting there. 

4. I've Got You Under My Skin by Mary Higgins Clark

• I recently finished Moonlight Becomes You by Ms. Clark and absolutely loved it. The story was so suspenseful and kept me on my toes and was intense until the last moment. I can't wait to read all of her books. Not kidding.

5. Rooms: A Novel by Lauren Oliver

• I've heard a lot of great things about Lauren Oliver. I've never actually read anything by her, but I thought this would be a good book to start with since I believe it's about ghosts and what they see while living in the walls of a house. I don't think I've ever heard of, and I know I definitely haven't read, a book from the perspective of a ghost so I'm super excited about it.

6. Panic by Lauren Oliver

• Yup totally just realized that I want to read another Lauren Oliver book. Awkward ineptitude engaged. I think this sounds really interesting and I think I'm going to enjoy this very much. It's going on my "to put on hold" list and will be one of the next ones I get from the library. Ya know, once I finish my insane amount of books that I both currently have checked out and that are currently on hold. I think that number's somewhere between 10 & 15. Yikes.

7. Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman

• I recently started watching the tv show version of this book and am loving it. I've talked a little bit about it in my Mapril Favorites video. My mom read it recently and we've been comparing notes on the two stories and the tv show seems to be a lot different from the book, but nonetheless I don't want any spoilers for the tv show. I know, weird. I usually read books before movies but for some reason this one's opposite. I guess it had to happen sometime.

8. Mansfield Park by Jane Austin

• I ordered this book off of http://bookoutlet.com while they were having their spring cleaning sale, so it cost me no more than $3.00, which was super exciting. The story sounds awesome and I just can't wait to read it. It will be my first Jane Austin novel in a very, very long time and might even be the first one I've ever gotten through. Whoops.

9. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde: A Graphic Novel by Robert Louis Stevenson

• I've been getting into the more creepy side of fiction lately, and this is a classic story that I feel like I should read. Plus I just really want to read it in the first place. I also got this from the BookOutlet spring cleaning sale so it was super cheap. I can't wait to see what it's like!

10. King Lear by William Shakespeare

• Another BookOutlet steal. I'm super excited because, based on the description, King Lear goes nuts, and I love stories like that. Call me crazy, but I do. I just do. This makes me wish I could get a more specific delivery date from the shipping company. Gr. 

So yeah that's my list of top 10 books I'm most looking forward to. I can't wait to get my hands on these books and read, read, read!

Bout of Books Day 1

One day of reading down!

I didn't do as well as I had hoped for today, but I'm still pretty happy with what I got done. I read to page 309 in Cress and got to page 202 of Nine Stories. Stinkin Goodreads had me thinking there was only 198 pages in Nine Stories but a few minutes ago I realized there are 208. Great observation skills I seem to have there! I've still got mad love for Goodreads though. 

Alright so that brings me to a total of 215 pages read on day 1. Sweetness.

I plan on finishing Nine Stories in a few minutes, but I wanted to update to what I officially read on Monday. 

So yeah, I hope to finish Cress tomorrow and then read my Winnie the Pooh Treasury and hopefully get to another book. I'm not sure what I want to get to after those so I guess I'll see when the time comes.

Tomorrow's other goal: DONT GET SUCKED INTO TV SHOWS. I'm pretty behind on The Voice so I watched 2 episodes tonight, which is why I didn't quite get to finish Nine Stories. I also had a doctors appointment that lasted a while, and I don't believe I have anything else planned until Friday night. It was a fun day :)

Day 1 Update #1

Ive reached my first goal for the day! I'm officially on oage 304 of Cress. I'm having a feet time wizzing through this book. 

Pages read so far: 86

Whoop whoop! I didn't start read until almost 4:00 so I'm pretty excited about my progress so far. More later!

Let the reading begin!

So today's Day 1 of the Bout of Books read-a-thon! I have to say, I'm super pumped to get reading. I did wake up kind of late this morning, so I haven't started reading yet. I have a doctor's appointment later and then I'm running some errands, so I'm not going to have a lot of time to read until after those are done. But nonetheless, I figured I'd post a baseline of where I'm at with my reading.

I made sure to document how far I had gotten in books before midnight last night because, you know, I'm a little OCD like that. =P I somehow miraculously got to bed shortly after doing that, so I haven't read anything yet today. Here's where I'm at so far and some of my goals for the day:

Currently Reading: 

1. Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger - page 78/198

2. Cress by Marissas Meyer - 219/550

My goals for the day:

1. Finish Nine Stories

2. Get to page 300 in Cress

3. Write an update blog before midnight tonight

I've also got two books ready to be picked up at the library, but I'm going to try to force myself not to read those until I finish these first two books. I've been reading Cress for a while now (about a week… don't judge, that's a long time considering I got through the first two books in max two days each… o_O)

Books at the library: 

1. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

2. I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark

I've also made a goal for myself to read everything John Green before June 6th when The Fault in Our Stars comes into theaters. I seriously can't wait!!

Happy reading!

<3 Poison

Bout of Books Read-a-Thon Goals!

Ok, so I've been having kind of a blogging slump and don't really feel like posting about nothing, so I think I'm going to make this blog more about books, i.e.- the books I'm reading, books I've bought, books I want to read, and what I think of the books. I think that'll keep me motivated to keep this blog going. That and I can kind of link this with my Youtube channel and get some more motivation from there. 

With that in mind, my first "official book blog" is going to be about the Bout of Books Read-a-Thon! =] I'm super excited for this read-a-thon, especially after the Deweys Read-a-thon I did in April. I have a pretty big TBR (to be read) list for the month of May, partially because of this read-a-thon.. And let's be serious, I went a little nuts at the library a few times recently. 

My goals for this read-a-thon are:

1. Finish the books I'm currently reading
2. Read one book per day (a bunch of the books on my TBR list are shorter)
3. Participate in challenges
4. Get some sleep! 

I have a tendency to stay up ridiculously late, especially when I'm reading, so that last goal is probably going to be the hardest to accomplish =P

Alright, now onto the actual books I want to finish:

• Cress by Marissa Meyer
• Jailbird by Kurt Vonegaut
• A Deodorizer of Dead Dogs by Ambrose Bierce, edited by Carl Japiske

The books I haven't started as of today but that I want to read during the read-a-thon are:

• Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger, Stories include:
• A Perfect Day for Bananafish
• Uncle Wiggly in Connecticut
• Just Before the War with the Eskimos
• The Laughing Man
• Down at the Dinghy
• For Esme- with Love & Squalor
• Pretty Mountain & Green My Eyes
• De Daumier-Smith's Blue Period
• Teddy
• Franny & Zooey by J.D. Salinger
• The Original Winnie the Pooh Treasury by A.A. Milne, Books in this treasury include
• An Expotition to the North Pole
• Piglet Meets a Heffalump
• Pooh goes visiting and Pooh and Piglet Nearly Catch a Woozle
• Eeyore Has a Birthday
• Piglet is Entirely Surrounded by Water
• Winnie-the-Pooh and Some Bees
• Christopher Robin Gives Pooh a Party
• Kanga and Baby Roo Come to the Forest
• The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Bette Smith
• Fight Club by Chuck Palaniuk

A lot of these are short stories (J.D. Salinger & especially the Pooh books) so I hope I can read those pretty quickly. I'm going to count each of those as one book though because I don't think that would really be fair to raise my count with them. 

I hope to be posting updates every day of what I've read, how many pages I've read, and then possibly do some reviews after everything is all said and done.                                                  

On the off chance that I actually finish all of these books, I will start these:

• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
• The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
• Insurgent by Veronica Roth (if it comes into the library!!)

I'm getting tired just thinking about all of these books but I'm really excited!!

Happy reading!

<3 Poison

 Oh! I almost forgot! I will be tweeting throughout the day while I'm reading as well as using Instagram for challenges. I'll also put up a video or two on YouTube throughout the week about my progress. Click the links to get to the various pages! Thanks for stopping by! Come back soon!