In 2008, I began a project to read 100 books that year. At the time, I lived in Grande Prairie, where the library was awful and cost far too much for a membership (I'm told it's better now, but then it was abysmal) so I'd been buying books through discount online booksellers, and had a huge book stash. I wanted to push through it, and by the spring of that year I was well on track to reach my goal, and then some. I was excited, I was reading tons of fantastic books, and I was having a great time doing it.
Of course, at that point, our house burned down and my entire library went with it. Between the two of us, my husband and I, we lost hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of books. Probably around two thousand. We had walls of books in our living room and bedroom, boxes of books hiding under tables and in closets, and stashes of books hidden away in the oddest places, like the breakfront and the bathroom cabinets. It was heartbreaking, and like many things that stopped after the fire, I stopped reading. By the end of 2008, I had read perhaps a half dozen additional books and barely would have hit the halfway mark on my goal.
Over the last couple of years though, I have started reading again voraciously. I devour books. Some only take me a day. I wish I had more time to read, and I'm wary that taking too much time writing will distract me from my reading. Reading keeps your brain growing, and it's not something I ever want to stop, so I've set a goal for myself - 111 books finished in 2011.
The rules of my little quest:
-Every book counts if it's finished, no matter how light or silly or fun.
-If you hate a book in the first chapter, stop reading so you don't waste time on books you aren't loving.
-Re-reading counts too. So do audiobooks, if they're unabridged (the only way I roll with audio). I'm re-reading The Gunslinger series by Stephen King with my husband as he travels for work (and I travel with him). I've read the whole series in book form before the fire, then listened in unabridged audio once since, so this is number three for me, but it'll still count. We're just starting book three.
I'll keep track here, though don't expect reviews. Feel free to ask questions though. I'm not using GoodReads like I did the first time, because then I'd have to look at the books I'd already entered into my library there that I don't have any more. It's like seeing pictures of old friends you've lost, and it makes me too sad.
So, away we go!
Books Finished in 2011
1. Spider bones Reichs, Kathy
2. Blood games Laymon, Richard
3. The next big thing Edwards, Johanna
4. The opposite of me : a novel Pekkanen, Sarah
5. One rainy night Laymon, Richard
In other news, I finished my first IRC shifts at Mahalo this weekend. I'd been putting it off all week because it made me incredibly nervous. I'm not sure why - no, I take that back. I know exactly why! It's the time pressure. When I'm working on a per-piece basis, I can take my time and make sure something is right. The goal during an IRC shift is to update three pages per hour. There was just no way to do that and bring the page up to the correct current standards. I was totally overwhelmed by the process. When I was in my first shift, though, I was reminded that the real goal is to get through them in 20 minutes, not make them perfect, so that was my focus. It was apparently the wrong focus, but I'll get back to that.
Even with working fast, using google news, and fitting as much current information in as I could, I still only managed to average three updates per two-hour shift instead of three per hour. I suppose in time it may get better, but for now this will definitely continue to be the most stressful part of my time at Mahalo. I would show you some pages, but they're all awful. I just couldn't get enough done on any of them to share!
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