Sunday, September 30, 2012

September 2012 Wrap-Up

Here's a summary of my book-related activity for September. It's gonna be a big one! The Children's Hospital Book Sale happened, which means lots of very cheap books for a good cause. I can't resist!

Books I read (linked to the reviews)


Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut (borrowed)
Claws by Will Weaver (TBR pile)
The Message (Animorphs #4) by K.A. Applegate (TBR pile)
Carrie by Stephen King (TBR pile)
Change the World Before Bedtime by Mark Kimball Moulton (NetGalley)
Confessions of a Teenage Hermaphrodite by Lianne Simon (review copy)
The Hermitage House Miracle by Malcolm Ater (NetGalley)
The Predator (Animorphs #5) by K.A. Applegate (reread)
Killer Virus (Choose Your Own Adventure #177) by R.A. Montgomery (TBR pile)
Zombie Surf Commandos from Mars by Tony Abbott (reread)
The Witching Hour by Anne Rice (TBR pile) (still in progress)

Books I bought


The Beauty of Humanity
Movement by Camilla Gibb
The Forest House by
Marion Zimmer Bradley
Ozma of Oz by
L. Frank Baum

The Joy Luck Club
by Amy Tan
The Time Raider by
R.L. Stine
Silent Night 3 by
R.L. Stine


The Ruby in the Smoke
by Philip Pullman
Eat Cheese and Barf! by
R.U. Slime (Goosebumps
parody)
Are You There God? It's Me,
Margaret by Judy Blume


Bloodletting & Miraculous
Cures by Vincent Lam
Misery by Stephen King
Hatchet by Gary Paulsen


The Dead Zone by
Stephen King
I Am Hutterite by
Mary Ann Kirkby
Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funke


In Too Deep (Fear Street
Senior #2) by R.L. Stine
Curtains by R.L. Stine
Into the Dark by
R.L. Stine
Escape From Camp Run-For-
Your-Life by R.L. Stine
Shop Till You Drop... Dead!
by R.L. Stine
All-Day Nightmare
by R.L. Stine
Caution: Aliens at Work
by R.L. Stine
Creep From the Deep
by R.L. Stine
Horror Hotel part II
by R.L. Stine


Monster Blood for Breakfast!
by R.L. Stine
Who's Your Mummy?
by R.L. Stine
Dr. Maniac vs. Robby Schwartz
by R.L. Stine


Say Cheese - And Die Screaming!
by R.L. Stine
'Salem's Lot by
Stephen King
Welcome to Camp Slither
by R.L. Stine


Red Dragon by Thomas Harris
Guards! Guards!
by Terry Pratchett
The Silence of the Lambs
by Thomas Harris

The Last Summer (of You & Me)
by Ann Brashares


Priestess of Avalon
by Marion Zimmer Bradley

Books I've been approved for on NetGalley


The Hermitage House Miracle
by Malcolm Ater
Change the World Before Bedtime
by Mark Kimball Moulton
Andy Squared by Jennifer Lavoie



Fog by Caroline B. Cooney
The Slumbering Masses
by Matthew J. Wolf-Meyer

Other e-books I received for review


Shifted Perspective by J. Bridger
The Mine by John A. Heldt
Rick & Wylie's Fantastical,
Magical Adventures by
Andi Katsina

Books that magically appeared in my mailbox!


We're All Different but We're
All Kitty Cats: First Day of School
by Peter J. Goodman
Confessions of a Teenage
Hermaphrodite by Lianne Simon
The Secret Book of Frida
Kahlo by F.G. Haghenbeck

Books my honey lovingly bought me, because he knows me so well


11/22/63 by Stephen King
The Casual Vacancy
by J.K. Rowling

Progress on challenges


The Witching Hour was my September book for the Read Your OWN Library! Challenge.

Claws was my September Random Read.

I completed the following letters for the 2012 A-Z Book Challenge: K, P, and Z

I read 5 books for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge.

I read 1 book for the 2012 Anne Rice Challenge. You can still sign up!

Operation: TBR Reduction: I added 48 (!) books to my to read list and removed 13 (the number of books I read, plus the 5 I got rid of [go me!]), so my pile increased by 35 this month. Well, that's what happens when the Children's Hospital Book Sale comes to town! C'est la vie! But I think I'll try not to buy any books in October.

Carrie Read-a-Long: Part 3: Wreckage

This post is the last of three updates for the Carrie Read-a-Long. It covers part 3 of the book, called Wreckage. Part 1 is here, and part 2 is here. This post will contain spoilers. You have been warned!

Part 3 of Carrie is very short, only 9 pages in my edition, and is basically an epilogue. It's quite different from the rest of the book. While part 1 was filled with foreshadowing, and part 2 is pure action, part 3 is the quiet aftermath. It consists entirely of excerpts from the books about the Carrie White incident that have been quoted throughout the book. It's essentially a description of how the town has failed to bounce back from the tragedy.

I like that this part was included. It makes perfect sense that a small town would not easily recover from the death of so many people, including so many children. Think how much of the population must have lost someone in their own families. There would just be too much grief all concentrated in one place.

As for final thoughts, I loved this book, just as I loved The Shining. I have officially become a Stephen King fan.

5 stars.

Oh, and I happened to pick up both 'Salem's Lot and Misery at the Children's Hospital Book Sale, so I'll definitely be taking part in the read-a-longs for those in October and November!

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Bloggiesta - To Do List


My first Bloggiesta starts tomorrow! Once I started thinking of things to improve on my blog, I couldn't stop, so I now have a rather huge to do list. I hope that by the end of this weekend, this blog will have seen some nice improvements!

  • Add Goodreads links to all reviews, and to my review template.
  • Add Book Depository links to all reviews, and to my review template.
  • Go through all posts and add links between them wherever necessary.
  • Go through all posts and make sure they have all the right categories.
  • Catch up on my reviews.
  • Catch up on copying my reviews over to Goodreads. DONE!
  • Change my bold headers on my monthly wrap-ups to actual HTML headers. DONE!
  • Add Random Reads line to my monthly wrap-ups. DONE!
  • Move at least 3 blogs in my pending category in Google Reader either to my Books category (book bloggers that I lurve) or out of my Google Reader (book bloggers who are probably cool but we have nothing in common).
  • Check out a few other blogs that are participating in Bloggiesta and comment/add them to pending on Google Reader.
  • Update my little blog roll thingy on my sidebar that I always forget is there.