Pooched

How much did I pooch this blog? Last entry was in Oct. 2014. It's now the back nine of January 2015.

Sigh.

Part of my apathy was that I read the fewest number of books I have in awhile. I only managed 33, and three of those were re-reads. Meh.

So what did I read after A Queen's Play...

• The World of Ice and Fire - GRRM, Elio Garcia and Linda Antonsson (loved it)

• Celtika - Robert Holdstock (kinda liked it)

• The Best Laid Plans - Terry Fallis (didn't like it)

• The Bat - Jo Nesbo (liked the ending)

• Mistborn - Brandon Sanderson (liked it, but not liking the follow up)

• The Lily and the Lion - Maurice Druon (loved it)

I tried to branch out this year, with the reading of a couple of sci-fi books. It just reminded me why I don't read sci-fi.

I was introduced to the sublime Dorothy Dunnett and her creation Lymond of Crawford.

Lev Grossman finished his Magicians books, and I think that was my favourite of the year. Special mention goes to Serpent of Venice and Boy, Snow, Bird.

Time to up my game again for 2015. I WILL do 50 books this year darnit!

2013: The Year's End

My last high of new books read was 2012, with 36. Well this year, it was 39! 39 all new books! Go me! 

Yes, I did reread some Song of Ice and Fire books again,  but I only read as far as ASoS this year, trying to just read as far as GoT the series got, but I did read quite a few things that GRRM used as source material for his opus. My list includes 3 Canadian authors, one of whom won the Nobel Prize for Literature this year (Go Alice!), and a couple of French authors in translation. There's the usual genres of fantasy (and more fantasy), historical fiction, historical non-fiction, horror and of course, something on Shakespeare. 

So the list is: 

1) A Shadow in Summer by Daniel Abraham

2) A Betrayal in Winter by Daniel Abraham

3) An Autumn War by Daniel Abraham

4) The Camelot Papers by Peter David

5) The Price of Spring by Daniel Abraham

6) The Conquering Family by Thomas B. Costain

7) The Magnifienct Century by Thomas B. Costain

8) River of Stars by Guy Gavriel Kay

9) Open Secrets by Alice Munro

10) The Three Edwards by Thomas B. Costain

11) 1356 by Bernard Cornwell

12) Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill

13) The Last Plantagenets 1377-1485 by Thomas B. Costain

14) Kingdom of the Grail by Judith Tarr

15) The Iron King by Maurice Duron

16) The Tyrant's Law by Daniel Abraham

17) Becoming Shakespeare by Jack Lynch

18) The Wind Through the Keyhole by Stephen King

19) The Kingmaking by Helen Hollick

20) Pendragon's Banner by Helen Hollick

21) The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker 

22) Unfamiliar Fishes by Sarah Vowell

23) In the Shadow of the King by Helen Hollick

24) Among Others by Jo Walton

25) Dance of the Happy Shades by Alice Munro

26) Captive Queen by Alison Weir

27) Darkness of the Light by Peter David

28) The Heights of the Depths by Peter David

29) The Strangled Queen by Maurice Duron

30) Lancaster and York: The Wars of the Roses by Alison Weir

31) Republic of Thieves by Scott Lynch

32) Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey

33) Those Terrible Middle Ages by Regine Pernoud

34) Dear Life by Alice Munro

35) Kushiel's Chosen by Jacqueline Carey

36) Kushiel's Avatar by Jacqueline Carey

37) Kushiel's Scion by Jacqueline Carey

38) Dangerous Women by GRRM and assorted

39) Kushiel's Justice by Jacqueline Carey

My favourites? River of Stars, Among Others and my fav of the year, The Golem and the Jinni

Looking forward to a new year of reading. This year I pledge no more rereads of ASoIaF books, so maybe this year I'll hit 50 :) 

Looking Back at 2012

So all in all, 2012 was a pretty good reading year. While I didn't manage to read 50 books ( a challenge I was trying to do that would allow for re-reads), I did manage to read 36 ALL NEW books, which is three more than my previous best tally. So yay me.

So what are the new reads I read this year? Let's recap:

1) His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik
2) Before They Are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie
3)  How Shakespeare Changed Everything by Stephen Marche
4) Jade Throne by Naomi Novik
5) Bite Me by Christopher Moore
6) The Sleeping Dragon by Joel Rosenberg
7) Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie
8) The Sword and the Chain by Joel Rosenberg
9)  Nine Princes in Amber by Roger Zelazny
10) The Silver Crown by Joel Rosenberg
11) Snuff by Terry Pratchett
12)  Dragonheart by Todd McCaffrey
13) Dragongirl by Todd McCaffrey
14) Sacre Bleu by Christopher Moore
15) The Guns of Avalon (Chronicles of Amber #2) by Roger Zelazny
16)  Black Powder War by Naomi Novik
17)  Friend of My Youth by Alice Munro
18)  A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore
19)  Best Served Cold by Joe Abercrombie
20) The Gunslinger (reread)
21) The Drawing of Three by Stephen King (reread)
22) The Waste Lands by Stephen King
23)  Wizards and Glass by Stephen King
24) The Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King
25)  The Tragedy of Arthur by Arthur Phillips
26) The King's Blood by Daniel Abraham
27) Fevre Dream by George R. R. Martin
28) Song of Susannah by Stephen King
29) A Once Crowded Sky by Tom King
30) The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie
31) The Dark Tower by Stephen King
32) Outlaw by Angus Donald
33) Palo Alto Stories by James Franco
34) Red Country by Joe Abercrombie
35) The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch
36) Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch

Wow, I read a crap load of fantasy this year. I mean, I read a lot of fantasy anyway, but it really was the bulk of material this year. I was very happy to have delved into the world further into the world of Joe Abercrombie; The Last Argument of Kings and the Heroes were defintely two of my standouts this year. My favourite of the year was the Tragedy of Arthur though, because combining King Arthur and Shakespeare is just the best thing ever in my mind, and Phillips' wrote a passable Shakespearean play, which is a pretty major accomplishment and one to be lauded. We won't talk about the Dark Tower because I just don't want to :)

I've already finished the first two books of  Daniel Abraham's The Long Price Quartet, but I'm thinking I might write about them all as one entry at this point.

Now let's see where else 2013 takes me :)

It's January 2nd now, so time for our 2010 Year End post. In a lot of ways, it wasn't a very diverse year as I read quite a few things by the same authors. And of course, there were my usual tomes about Shakespeare in there. So what did I read this year? The list is as follows:

The Book of Negroes - Lawrence Hill
Shakespeare's Wife - Germaine Greer
Dead Until Dark - Charlaine Harris
Fool - Christopher Moore
Under Heaven - Guy Gavriel Kay
Privilege of the Sword - Ellen Kushner
Dead in Dallas - Charlaine Harris
Mythago Wood - Robert Holdstock
The Torontonians - Phyllis Bret Young
A Gentleman's Game - Greg Rucka
The White Queen - Phillipa Gregory
The Children's Book - A.S. Byatt
The Court of the Air - Stephen Hunt
Contested Will - James Shapiro
Atonement - Ian McEwan
Elfland - Freda Warrington
A Cure for All Diseases - Reginald Hill
Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thakeray
The Wordy Shipmates - Sarah Vowell
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Steig Larsson
The Red Queen - Phillipa Gregory
You Suck - Christopher Moore
Of Human Bondage - W. Somerset Maughm
Wizard's First Rule - Terry Goodkind
Let the Right One In - John Alvide Lindqvist
Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffeneger
Dead to the World
Dead As A Doornail
All Together Dead - Charlaine Harris
Definitely Dead
From Dead to Worse
Dead And Gone

Grand total? 32. Damn, one shy of my best record so far. Of course, part of the problem was in November I got completely sidetracked and did a slew of re-reads, but oh well.

Favourite book this year? Of course we have to go with Guy Kay's latest, Under Heaven. A truly gorgeous book that I thoroughly enjoyed. Also right up there was A.S Byatt's The Children's Book. And for best non-fiction, I'm going to go with Contested Will because I like any book that shoots down the 'Shakespeare didn't author his plays' conspiracy as well as this one did.

I read a freaking lot of vampire books this year, 10 all together. The best one being, by far, Let the Right One In. You Suck was rather... toothless (disappointing for a Christopher Moore novel) and the Sookie Stackhouse extravaganza is just light fare that's easy to burn through.

Tried to get into an author two of my cousins adore, but found myself disagreeing with their worship of Terry Goodkind.

Overall, I am pleased with my tally. Library plus starting to take the subway again in the latter part of the year helped bump the totals up.

I've already started my first book of 2011.

Here we are, January 1, 2010, so time to sum up another year's worth of reading. Despite thinking that I wasn't going to be able to read much once the baby arrived in July, it seems the opposite happened and I was able to read more books than I did last year. I'm still nowhere near the elusive 50 books in a year mark, but I did manage 33 all told, and I'm pretty happy with that number. Living very near a library has helped as I've been able to just grab things I've thought looked interesting in the past, but not enough that I'd spend the money on them. I've forgotten how much I like libraries.

So what did I read? The list is as follows:

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
Will in the World by Stephen Greenblatt
Wicked by Gregory Maguire
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maughm
Speaks the Nightbird by Robert McCammon
Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Sound of No Hands Clapping by Toby Young
The Smartest Guys in the Room by Bethany McLean
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel by Susannah Clarke
Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde
Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden
How to Lose Friends and Alienate People by Toby Young
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Mad Kestrel by Misty Massey
Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
The Book of Mordred by Vivian Vende Velde
Firethorn by Sarah Micklen
The Nanny Diaries by Nicola Kraus and Emma McLaughlin
Twilight by Stephanie Meyers
The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold
Sick Puppy by Carl Hiaasen
Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett
Thank You for Smoking by Christopher Buckley
In the Wake of the Plague by Norman F. Cantor
The Uses and Abuses of History by Margaret Macmillian
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
Peter and Max by Bill Willingham
Jesus and Yahweh: The Names Divine by Harold Bloom

Looking back on this, I didn't read anywhere near as much new fantasy as I usually do, with really only a few counting towards that (Thief of Time, Mad Kestrel, Peter and Max, The Book of Mordred and Firethorn). However, one of them, Firethorn, was undoubtedly the worst book I read this year, with a boring plot and thoroughly unlikeable main characters.

I read a lot more 'popular' works than I usually do, such bestsellers as The Time Traveller's Wife, The Lovely Bones and yes, Twilight. Twilight was the worst written book of the year, it is such drivel that I can scarce understand why it is so popular.

Another trend of mine this year seemed to be industry tell all books, reading the likes of Toby Young's two 'memoirs', Anthony Bourdain's chef-tell-all and The Nanny Diaries.

My favourite book this year? I have to go back to the beginning and go with The Thirteenth Tale. An astounding piece of work that feels like a throwback to old Gothic-style ghost stories, as well as being a love letter to reading. I've been resoundingly recommending it.

So there we have it, my 2009 in books. I've already started my first book for 2010 and maybe this will be the year that I finally break 50 books. But as I'm going to be working hard on finally finishing writing a book of my own, well... maybe not.

Due to numerous things at the end/beginning of the year, I've been completely remiss in both my reading and my updating this thing. Holidays and moving make for a busy time, so that's why it's only now that I'm getting around to doing my Year's End.

This wasn't a good year reading-wise as I only managed to read 27 books in total, down from 2007's total. I'm not exactly thrilled with that, but it is what it is. Other achievements, such as getting my husband out of debt and buying a house, were accomplished this year, and that is something to be proud of.

So, what did I manage to read in 2008?

The Amber Spyglass by Phillip Pullman. The last book of the His Dark Materials trilogy.
Around the World in 87 1/2 Gigs by one of my mainstays, Dave Bidini
The Children of Hurin by J.R.R Tolkien
Titan, Wizard and Demon all by John Varley
The Shipping News by another of my mainstays, Annie Prouxl
The Language of Stones by Robert Carter
The Island of the Sequined Love Nun by Christopher Moore
The Year of Living Biblically by A.J Jacobs
Thud! by Terry Pratchett
In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan
Hateship, Friendship, Loveship, Courtship, Marriage by one of my favourite Canadian authors, Alice Munro
Those Who Walk Away by Patricia Highsmith
Banana: The Fate of the Fruit that Changed the Worldby Dan Koeppel
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Dragon Harper by Todd and Anne McCaffery
The Knight by the Pool by Sophie Mason
A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
That Old Ace in the Hole by Annie Prouxl
The Dubious Hills by Pamela Dean
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Just Fine the Way It Is: Wyoming Stories 3 by Annie Proulx
Friends Like Theseby Danny Wallace
America Unchained by Dave Gorman
Shakespeare by Bill Bryson
Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare

Once again, a good cross-section of classics, humour, fantasy, horror and short stories. Annie Proulx distinguished herself as my most read author this year with three books gracing the list. Most depressing book? Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms. Best book I read this year? In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan completely changed how Graig and I shop for food. We even joined a local farm share for the summer due to it's influence.

While it may be Feb. and I'm only just writing the year end for 2008, I have already read a few books in 2009 and those will be coming up soon. Now that we've moved into the new house and are pretty much settled, I feel that there's definitely more time for reading again. This year, we'll push past the paltry 27 books.*

*Just to remind everyone, the totals in this blog are NEW books only. I do not write up or keep track of re-reads. Re-reads usually account for another 20-30 books read over the course of a year, but as some are religiously read every year, I don't find tracking them to be worthwhile.

Here we are, 2008. Another new year, another new bunch of books.

In 2007, I still did not manage to read 50 books. I have excuses though, as to why I only managed to read 30. I volunteer for the board of directors at my son's daycare, which amounts to a (non-paid) part time job on top of my regular job, we travelled to San Diego this year, oh and I got married, and between that and moving my new husband's myriad of belongings into our house, it was a pretty busy year.

So as we look upon 2007, what were those 30 books I read? Let's list 'em shall we?

The Golden Compass and the Subtle Knife by Phillip Pullman
Touch Wood: Confessions of an Accidental Porn Director by Anoymous
Yes Man by Danny Wallace
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier by Alan Moore
Making History by Stephen Fry
Cthulhu Tales by H.P. Lovecraft
Shock Doctrine: The Rise and Fall of Distaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Fluke by Christopher Moore
Late for the Wedding by Amanda Quick
Love of a Good Woman by Alice Munro
Fall of Knight by Peter David
Wilson: A Consideration of Sources by David Mamet
Mordred: Bastard Son by Douglas Clegg
Alice in Sunderland by Bryan Talbot
Curse of the Narrows by Laura M. MacDonald
Give Our Regards to the Atom Smashers: Writers on Comics by Various
Serpents Garden and Oracle Glass by Judith Merkle Riley
Where the Heart Is by Billie Letts
Anasasi Boys by Neil Gaiman
Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay
Bitten by Kelly Armstrong
Inheritance by Devin Grayson
Five Hole Stories by Dave Bidini

It's a nice cross section I think, of things I usually read. A smattering of horror (Bitten, the Night Watch, Cthuhlu Tales), some Arthurian Legends (Mordred:Bastard Son, Fall of Knight), some historical non-fiction (Curse of the Narrows, the Shock Doctrine), stuff written by people who also write comic books (Anasasi Boys, Inheritance), some funny stuff, both fiction and non (Fluke, Yes Man, Touch Wood), some 'serious literature' (For Whom the Bell Tolls, Rebecca) and of course, some fantasy (Ysabel, Harry Potter, The Golden Compass).

Some highlights? Any year where Guy Kay has a new book come out is a spectacular year as far as I'm concerned, and Ysabel did not disappoint. I was both inspired and entertained by Danny Wallace's Yes Man, educated about my own country with Curse of the Narrows, and made increadibly angry (in a good way) by The Shock Doctrine.

The disappointments? The final installment of Harry Potter fell a little flat. The promising Five Hole Stories by Dave Bidini, a collection of short, erotic hockey stories (sex and hockey, two of my favourite things), wasn't as... erotic as I hoped, and Alan Moore's the Black Dossier was nearly impenetrable in parts.

But as I did manage to read more new books than I did last year (and with nearly as many re-reads), I feel 2007 was a winner overall reading-wise and I look forward to 2008, which already sees me half way through the final book in Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, and on my nightstand, presently in queue are Dave Bidini's latest book, J.R.R Tolkien's Children of Hurin and Michael Palin's diary from his Monty Python years. All reads I'm looking forward to.

In the words of Daniel Cook; "Here we are!"

That's right, 2007. So... what did I read in 2006? What was the final count?

Well, 22 new books were read, 20 were re-read, plus one re-read of an epic poem, for a grand total of 43 books read this year...

Wow that seems low. Of course, I chalk this up to numerous things, mainly just having less time to read and my dear G passing on his bad habit of watching television on DVD :)

Of course, this also doesn't keep track of all the comic books I read. With at least 3 or 4 a week, that's a lot of comic books over the year.

I have quite a pile on my bedside table right now, latest Dave Bidini offering; something that could end up being deliciously smutty from Devin Grayson; Gaiman's Anasasi Boys still; and a book on the Cohen brothers, are all things on my reading list for the new year.

Let's start the count again!