Nyotaimori

Ok. One more! But only because there’s not much good to say about June. What was I doing in June? Obviously not reading anything good. Oh yeah, Kris and Gene wedding. Also dating a 22 year old. Riiiiiiiight. Ugh. You know what June gave me? The phrase “~~Mow Mow HUGGLES!~~” Yes. With the little wavy symbols too. I should have kept that text message for all time. Maybe it was an email. I might have kept that.

Stats:

Books Read: 13 (+4 unfinished)

Books Bought: 20

Books from Library: 12

Books Loaned/Given: 4

Money spent: $18 plus a $25 GC to Amazon. Ah, library book sale where one can buy 18 really awful books, most of which I didn’t even read, for a dollar each.

Favorite Book: Honestly? They all kind of sucked this month. Possibly His at Night by Sherry Thomas was the best. I did like the main guy.

Least Favorite Books: Ok. Seriously, this was ridiculous. I’m just going to list some of the truly amazing titles so you can get a sense of what my month was like. None of them honestly top “~~Mow Mow HUGGLES!~~”, I think. But you be the judge.

Fanged and Fabulous

The Naked Duke

Nobody’s Baby But Mine (this was an ACTUAL baby, not just a term of endearment. The woman stole sperm.)

Must Love Dragons

Sleepless in Scotland

After a completely delightful break of dinner, fro-yo, swings, and movie (Cartman voice, “Super sweet.”) I am back. I can do maybe one more catch-up month. You people are too much with the whipping! Task masters! Argh!

Stats:

Books Read: 13 (+2 unfinished)

Books Bought: 0

Books from Library: 16

Books Loaned/Given: 6

Money spent: $0 Can I hear it again, Cartman? SUPER SWEET. I must celebrate all these little victories, people. Do you not remember that entry only a couple months back where I spent $50 on one book and then didn’t even attend the online discussion of it? I am a slacker!

Favorite Book: Huh. Well… I’m gonna go with The Demon’s Lexicon by Sarah Rees Brennan, Flora Segunda by Ysabeau Wilce, and (though it pains me because I equally hated it) Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel.

Let’s briefly discuss these.

Demon one–clever pseudo-twist. Awesome narrator.

Flora Segunda–damn fine! The sequel was also good. And I liked it for how I randomly picked it out at the library primarily because of the cover and title. I like when that kind of leap of faith works out for me. So often it goes very, very bad.

B&V. Dammit. Spoiler.

**********Spoiler**********

My problem with this was, yes, I do not deny it, the thing with the narrator’s cat and dog. YEAH. OK. FUCK THAT SHIT. The cat DIES. HORRIBLY. THIS IS UPSETTING TO ME. I can’t believe I kept reading it. I also don’t want no lip from you people about how this is what was most upsetting to me and not the whole Nazi war criminal psychopath thing. Because that was also upsetting, all right. But the cat gets MAULED. HATED it. But the whole play thing and the conceit of trying to write indirectly about the Holocaust and making art? That was good. And the writing was amazing. EXCEPT FOR THE CAT THING, YOU TOTAL ASS-FUCK.

*******************END SPOILER******************

You know what? I think I want to take back my recommendation for that book. It’s got me all upset again just thinking about it. But that’s what good lit should do! So annoying!

Least Favorite Books: I read several bad romance novels this month. The worst (which I didn’t even finish; it was so bad) was Her Scandalous Ways by Loretta Chase. You know what she wasn’t? Yeah. Scandalous. Misdirection! OK, honestly I don’t even remember what the plot was, let alone if she was saucy. But I’m guessing not. Also bad was The Princess Plot by Kirsten Boie. Never trust a Kirsten. I always forget that rule. Also anyone who spells Boy that way. Just wrong.

This is killing me. Why are there so many months I missed? UUUUUUGGGGHHHHHH. I’m taking a break after this one.

Stats:

Books Read: 19 (+ 1 unfinished)

Books Bought: 2

Books from Library: 12

Books Loaned/Given: 5

Money spent (approximately): $20

Favorite Books: Scott Pilgrim volumes 1-4 by Bryan Lee O’Malley, Archangel by Sharon Shinn, and Pinky Pye by Eleanor Estes

Let’s discuss HOW AWESOME Scott Pilgrim is: So awesome. If you got excited by the movie which came out recently, you should really read the graphic novels. It’s not like they take long and they are hilarious. There are actually 6 of them, but 5 and 6 came out over the summer so I hadn’t read them back in April. The fifth one was not as good as the others, but what can you do.

Archangel (even though I pronounce it wrong all the time) is excellent. I keep meaning to read more in that series. I’m getting around to it, seriously. But this first one, totally worth reading if you like huge epic world and alternate reality angels.

Pinky Pye…cute cute cute. Pinky Pye is a kitten the Pye’s pick up on vacation. I love this family. Possibly more than the Moffett’s. After all, the Pye’s have more animals. =)

Other Worthies: the 39 Clues series, books 4-8, Succubus Shadows by Richelle Mead, Bite Marks by Jennifer Rardin, I Am Not A Serial Killer by Dan Wells, and Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan. There was a lot of good books this month!

Least Favorite Books: A Foxy Old Woman’s Guide to Traveling Alone by Jay Ben-Lester. Snort. I read weird things sometimes.

Quote: “…they both smelled the air and then they continued with their conversation. Is there anything more pleasant than to sit in the evening time on a little porch under a large and rustling tree and talk with your brother?, Rachel wondered. And no one calling anyone nuts.” From Pinky Pye by Eleanor Estes.

Stats:

Books Read: 11 (+1 unfinished)

Books Bought: 6

Books from Library: 13

Books Loaned/Given: 1

Money spent (approximately): $36

Favorite Book: Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books by Aaron Lansky. I cried so many times while reading this. And, sure, I am a sucker for a good cry about rescuing books from garbage cans, but this really was amazing. I’ve love to go to the museum/library they built for the books on the East Coast someday.

Other Worthies: Found and Sent by Margaret Peterson Haddix. And Heist Society by Ally Carter.

Least Favorite Books: The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson by Jerome Charyn. Though it’s possibly I just wasn’t in the right mood for it.

Quote: “Haven’t you heard that thing about how, at any given moment, at least one atom of the air in your lungs was probably once in Cleopatra’s lungs? Or George Washington’s or Albert Einstein’s or Martin Luther King’s, or whoever you want to pick from history?” From Sent by Margaret Peterson Haddix. I’m pretty sure scientifically this isn’t true. …But if it is, how awesome is that?!

Birthday month! How well I remember it. Soon it will be birthday month again. Well…in several months.

Stats:

Books Read: 8

Books Bought: 1 (a copy of my book which I sold to Kristen)

Books from Library: 4

Books Loaned/Given: 5

Money spent (approximately): Well, $10, but then Kris paid me back.

Favorite Book: Lips Touch: Three Times by Laini Taylor. So good! It’s 3 novellas by Taylor and the writing is excellent. Really great story-telling. Mostly kind of fairy-tales retold. I wrote down several quotes from this one in my book.

Other Worthies: Pleasure of a Dark Prince by Kresley Cole. Ha ha ha. I love her books. Not so much the last one which I just bought from B&N and then returned to them to get my money back. It just wasn’t worth owning.

Least Favorite Books: Eh. Probably Steampunk by Katie McAllister or Fool Moon by Jim Butcher. But neither was awful, just not great.

Quote: “Kizzy wanted to be a woman who would dive off the prow of a sailboat in to the sea, who would fall back in a tangle of sheets, laughing, and could dance a tango, lazily stroke a leopard with her bare foot, freeze an enemy’s blood with her eyes, make promises she couldn’t possible keep, and then shift the world to keep them. She wanted to make love on a balcony, ruin someone, trade in esoteric knowledge, watch strangers as coolly as a cat. She wanted to be inscrutable, have a drink named after her, a love song written for her, and a handsome adventurer’s small airplane, champagne-christened Kizzy, which would vanish one day in a windstorm in Arabia so that she would have to mount a rescue operation involving camels, and wear an indigo veil against the stinging sand, just like the nomads.” From Goblin Fruit in Lips Touch: Three Times by Laini Taylor

Stats:

Books Read: 11 (+5 unfinished)

Books Bought: 0

Books from Library: 11

Books Loaned/Given: 1

Money spent (approximately): 0. Good job me!

Favorite Book: I don’t remember any of these being really very good. I guess maybe H.I.V.E: The Overlord Protocol by Mark Walden. I at least really remember liking the first one and this sequel one. My mom got these for her 4th graders though so it’s not like they’re particularly advanced literature or anything.

Least Favorite Books: I’m going to go ahead and guess the ones I didn’t finish reading: Me and My Shadow by Katie McAllister, Tempted by P.C. and Kristin Cast, and Black and White by Jackie Kessler. Katie McAllister has just gone downhill. And dammit but those stupid vampire ones by the Cast mother and daughters: UGH. So sick of them. Kessler’s looked like it was going to be fabulous but it disappointed.

Now that I’ve started up the whole blogging thing again, I’m going to catch up on the book stats. But since it’s been a really long time that it was December, this will be speed reviewing until I reach more recent months.

Stats:

Books Read: 7 (+1 unfinished)

Books Bought: 14

Books from Library: 7

Books Loaned/Given: 9

Money spent (approximately): $88 (one book was $50. Yeah. That was stupid.)

Favorite Book: Suite Scarlett by Maureen Johnson. Plus, I just read the sequel to this! Like last month. It was pretty good too. These aren’t like amazing or anything, they’re just enjoyable. Great secondary characters, particularly her brother.

Other Worthies: ….well, none really. But Rampant by DIana Peterfreund wasn’t completely awful. It was mostly bad. But the whole unicorn hunter conceit was intriguing. I’ll read the second one when it comes out in December is all I’m saying.

Least Favorite Books: Going Bovine by Libba Bray. Didn’t even finish it. Sad.