Monthly Archives: April 2014

So when I passed out at 11pm last night, I figured I would do my norm and wake up in a few hours and read…normally, I’m a fairly disjointed sleeper…but would you know…I didn’t move all night…when I finally cracked the eyelids (no thanks in part to my German Shepherd bouncing on the bed because he had to go out)…it wasn’t 4am, or 5am, but 6:30…that is by far the longest i’ve slept in, I don’t know how long. But I decided to try and maybe squeeze in a little bit more reading before the 8am cut-off…tried being the operative word…within about 20 minutes the head was nodding again and I decided that obviously, I still hadn’t gotten enough sleep, rolled over and dozed off…oh wells!

Now to the End of Event Meme:

Which hour was most daunting for you?
I think i made it to about hour 15 before I started dozing off, so somewhere in there 😉
Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a Reader engaged for next year?
Unfortunately, I didn’t really have any blow my mind kind of reads this time – mostly because I was trying to finish up some books that had been languishing on the currently reading pile…and they were languishing because for some reason or another, they were just not catching my attention
Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year?
Nope – not off the top of my head
What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon?
I liked what I saw of the mini-challenges although I didn’t actually particiate and that I did have a couple of cheerleader’s check in, even though I signed up right before it started
How many books did you read?
I finished 4 books, 3 of which were in progress when I started
What were the names of the books you read?
Helsinki Blood – James Thompson – mystery set in Finland
Moonlight On My Mind – Jennifer McQuistion – historical romance
Strange Bird – Anna Jansson – Mystery set in Sweden
Love Irresistibly – Julie James – contemporary romance
nearly finished (within about 15%) – Ink – Amanda Sun – YA set in Japan
Which book did you enjoy most?
Strange Bird – the whole idea of an artificial bird flu were intriguing
Which did you enjoy least?
I struggled with Ink – I liked it, but because it was a pdf converted ebook, the formatting was a bit funky that made it hard to read
How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? What role would you be likely to take next time?
sign me up – i’ll be there with bells on, and hopefully less conflicts 😉 I might consider doing a mini-challenging, or signing up to be a cheerleader – not sure though

Posting a few minutes early because my eyes are starting to droops…which means, I’m going to cave and take a nap 😉 Not sure how much I actually read this last set of three hours (time wise) – between finishing up my mid-point post, feeding and referring the dogs dinner (it always sounds like an epic battle) and realizing that I needed to run the dishwasher…

Anyways, I did read Love Irresistibly – Julie James. I know that it wasn’t one of the books I was reading during my last update, but I grabbed it while I was waiting for my cheese sticks to cook and got sucked in. Julie James is a comfort read for me – I like her snarky humor and the way the stories just flow. I’m guessing that it probably took me about an hour and a half to read or so.

Update Time Read: 1 hr 30 min
Update Time Listened: 00:00 (its raining out)
Update Pages Read: 274

Total Time Reading to Date: 5hr 26min 02secs
Total Time Listening to Date: 1 hr 5 min 48 secs
Total Pages Read So Far: 1026

Food Consumed: 1/2 a bag of Trolli Peach Rings (those things are like crack!) and cheese sticks.

Next update, will probably be around 5am, but who knows – if i wake up before that, I may read 😉 Nite. Good luck to those still reading.

Halfway there! Whoo-Hoo! Although, i will admit that my reading has been a bit spotty for the most part – I did finally get a semi-decent reading set in this update – my longest in a 3 hour period to date. I finished up Strange Bird – Anna Jansson which I mentioned in my last update. For the most part, the ending lived up to the rest of the book, I’ll be interested to see where the series goes in the future – but since this is the only book in the series out of the 14 that have been published that is available in English, me thinks I’ll be waiting a while…

And with the completion of Strange Bird, I met my goal of finishing at least 3 books that I had in progress at the start of the Read-A-Thon, which meant that I got to pick a new book (or two) to read. Doing a quick scrounge, below is a picture of some of the books on my upcoming TBR pile…

And by using my magic trick of random selection – I grabbed Orphanage of Miracles – Amy Neftzger which is a Children’s/YA Fantasy about kids in a orphange that are tasked with creating miracles and another young girl on a quest to find one – I have a feeling there is going to be a huge moral to the story, but we’ll see. I also grabbed For the Love of Pete – Julia Harper (who also writes under the name Elizabeth Hoyt) – which is a contemporary romance with an FBI agent…mostly cheesy, but we’ll see…

Update Time Read: 1 hr 38 min 59 sec
Update Time Listened: 00:00 (its raining out)
Update Pages Read: 332

Total Time Reading to Date: 3hr 56min 02secs
Total Time Listening to Date: 1 hr 5 min 48 secs
Total Pages Read So Far: 752

Food Consumed: Nothing! Apparently i need to rectify that!

Now onto the Mid-Event Survey:
1. What are you reading right now?
Orphanage of Miracles; For the Love of Pete and Ink
2. How many books have you read so far?
Finished 3 I had in progress prior to the read-a-thon and 5 more currently in progress (including 2 new ones)
3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon?
Ellen Hopkin’s Impulse came in for me at the library the other day (free verse poetry) so that is going to be up next and also The Steady Running of the Hour which i saw as a featured book on Goodreads and reserved at the library
4. Did you have to make any special arrangements to free up your whole day?
I had all kinds of plans to get up early and workout and avoid running errands…unfortunately life happened…I tried…in October when I’m not training for any triathlons, I’ll hopefully have more time/less interruptions
5. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those?
Most interruptions have had to do with errands that needed to be run. But I listened to my audiobook while driving around, and made sure to have my kindle in my purse, in case I had a few minutes here and there.
6. What surprises you most about the Read-a-thon, so far?
I seem to be reading slower here than i do normally…more conscious of time maybe?
7. Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year?
This is my first one, so not right now
8. What would you do differently, as a Reader or a Cheerleader, if you were to do this again next year?
Sign-up more than 24 hours in advance 😉
9. Are you getting tired yet?
yep – I may take a cat nap in this next section, i’m not sure though.
10. Do you have any tips for other Readers or Cheerleaders, something you think is working well for you that others may not have discovered?
I alternate books – so i’ll read 3 chapters of one, and then 2 of another – but they typically have to be completely different genres – right now contemp romance, children’s fantasy, YA coming of age

So i’m getting more productive on my reading each block of 3 hours, but i haven’t yet quite got it flowing how I want. And of course, it doesn’t help that I decided to go and get a pedicure – but I did take my kindle with me and while I read most of the time, I did start to doze off a bit – so while my reading times were ok, my page count, probably not as much. lol.

For the last 3 hours, I focused on 2 more books on my in progress pile. The good thing is, once I finish these, I have met my goal of finishing 3-4 of them, and can start something new – yay!

In the last three hours, I read 74 pages of Ink – Amanda Sun. This has been loitering on the TBR pile for a while, but i’m really enjoying it – its a YA set in Japan with mythological elements (the Kami – who can bring drawings to life). I also read 90 pages of Strange Bird – Anna Jansson (translated by Paul Norlan) which is about a bird flu pandemic hitting a small island is Sweden. This author is the featured author in one of my Goodreads groups for the month and I’m enjoying it and will be looking for more by her in the future.

Update Time Read: 1 hr 7 min 29 sec
Update Time Listened: 25:30
Update Pages Read: 164

Total Time Reading to Date: 2 hr 17 min 03 secs
Total Time Listening to Date: 1 hr 5 min 48 secs
Total Pages Read So Far: 420

Food Consumed:
Starbucks Venti Soy Vanilla Latte; Charley’s Grilled Subs Ultimate Fries (cheese sauce, bacon and ranch dressing); 1 ring a pineapple (for some fruit) and a chocolate chip cookie

My last three hours has been much more productive (at least on the reading front) than my first three. Whee! Although, I still had some errands to run, including a trip to the post office (blech!)

I managed to finish up two of the books that I had in progress – Moonlight On My Mind – Jennifer McQuiston – which I started at 62% on my kindle – which was equivalent to about pg 238 and finished it up – Pages Read: 146. I also finished up Helsinki Blood – James Thompson – which I started at pg 196 to the end – Pages Read: 110. My total time for reading of those two books was 1:09:34 and I managed to listen to another 23:18 of my audiobook.

Total Time Reading to Date: 1 hr 9 min 34 secs
Total Time Listening to Date: 40 min 18 secs
Total Pages Read So Far: 256

Food Consumed: 3 chocolate chip cookies and a cheese danish from Starbucks (when I ran out to go to the post office quickly).

You know what they say about best laid plans right…they are going to never actually work out. So my plan for the morning had been get up at 4am and knock out my workout (2.5 bike ride and then a 3 mile run for the triathlon i’m training for). That would get me done around 7 am and give me time to relax a little before kicking off Dewey at 0800. Of course, when my alarm went off at 4am, I realized that the trail I was going to ride, isn’t open until sunrise (6:20), so what did I do…I rolled over and went back to sleep. So I didn’t start my ride until 7:20…

Fast forward to 11:00 for my first update and I’ve listened to….wait for it….a sum total of 15 minutes of the audiobook that I have in progress on my drive home.

Hopefully, this isn’t how the rest of the day is shaping up to be…but on that note, I’m going to throw some toaster pastries in the toaster, grab a quick shower to de-stink slightly and hit my next 3 hour block running (hopefully).