Reading Roundup: May 2013 Blogging Breakthrough
A literal To Be Read Pile.
Last month I committed to writing a little bit everyday. I didn’t quite make it, but I blogged TWELVE times this month, which is like WHOA compared to my usual two posts. My secret is to let go of perfectionism. Not every post has the most perfect picture, or every book title and twitter account linked. It’s that kind of thing that makes me spend too much time obsessing rather than just writing and interacting, which is kind of the point of blogging, for me.
Any of you bloggers out there have tips to keep a good blogging streak going?
Books Read
- Frances and Bernard by Carlene Bauer. 5 Stars. The night I finished this book, I bawled for an hour. I was doing that thing where you flip ahead to make sure something awful wasn’t about to happen, because if it was, you need to mentally prepare. But I couldn’t prepare for the ending, obviously. Just go read this, please. Review coming once I can emotionally handle it.
Books Obtained
- The Road by Cormac McCarthy. People recommended this book to me a few times after my post about dark and depressing reads. My mom found it at a used book sale for $2. Score!
- The Outlander by Gil Adamson. Another score at the book sale, and I just realized it’s the Canada Reads selection from a few years back – my copy has a different cover. Excited for this one. You had me at “19 year old widow by her own hand.”
- Dance, Gladys, Dance by Cassie Stocks. I was very fortunate to get a signed copy of this Leacock Medal winner courtesy of Matt at NeWest Press. Pickle Me This calls it feminist and smart. Sounds good to me.
Books I Want to Read
- Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels. Cannot for the life of me remember where I read a review, but I know I added it to the list immediately. I also know it won the Orange Prize in 1997 and that’s good enough for me.
- Molotov Hearts by Chris Eng. Read about this punk rock YA book over at Alexis Keinlen’s blog. What can I say, a boy with a mohawk broke my heart once.
- Swimming to Elba by Silvia Avallone. Sounds like a good coming of age book. Will pick it up despite annoying cliche “girl facing away” cover.
- She Rises by Kate Worsley. Read this review at She Reads Novels and added it to the list when I read “reminds me of Sarah Waters.”
On the Blog
I officially posted enough this month to justify a recap.
Reviews
#MobyDick2013 – Moby Dick Read-A-Long
Events, Memes, and Randomness
- NeWest Spring Spectacular
- The Desexification of Anna From Away
- Book and Music Pairings
- Classics Club May Meme
- April Reading Roundup
What’s Next on Reading in Bed
#MobyDick2013 continues, I’ll probably start planning my beach reads for July (I like to plan ahead) and a #yegbooks fall preview. Stay tuned!
Reading in Bed 
Well, I sure enjoyed you posting more often this past month 🙂 You’re right about letting go of the perfectionism – I’m trying to embrace the whole “just write and post” style of blogging, but it’s so hard. And the whole linking up everything *IS* time-consuming, and is it always totally necessary? Probably not.
I’m jealous of your literal TBR pile. It’s so underwhelming and your success rate for actually reading those books is most likely pretty high 😉 (Unlike my ridiculous TBR pile).
We’re going to Nova Scotia now at the end of June for a few weeks, and I’m already excited thinking about which books I will bring to read! I love vacation reading. 🙂
Yep, people don`t click on all those things I link up anyway! No more! Google it yourself! 🙂
Well my actual TBR on Goodreads has 60 books. I just so rarely have my bedside table clean enough for a picture, I had to do it.
Oh excellent! Halifax? We are going to Cape Breton in two months. I can’t wait and am also planning my books already. Probably going to do a summer reading post. What are you thinking so far? I’m debating some YA or I *might* even read Outlander.
To be clear, not The Outlander by Gil Adamson, which appears in my TBR picture, but the romance novel about your husband LOL
LOL! I hear they’re making an Outlander movie – not sure how I feel about that…I’m way over due for a re-read on that one. And to finish the series. I joke (sort of, but not really), that when I finally get pregnant one day, I’ll be put on bed-rest and then I’ll read the entire series in one go! 😉
Is your TBR on goodreads a “wishlist TBR” or a “I actually own these books TBR”? Because the number of physical, unread books I own is scary.
We’ll be in New Glasgow (Pictou Landing)! Although, we always go up to Halifax for a day or two. I haven’t been to Cape Breton yet, although my SIL will be visiting her inlaws there during that time…and we have a wedding in Digby to attend, which I hear is a beautiful part of the province! As for books…all I know for sure is my SIL and I are planning on reading Belinda’s Rings on the trip. In the past, I used to try and read several shorter books on a trip, but then on my last few vacations, I read bigger (longer) books, and I quite enjoyed that – it allows you to read a big book in a shorter period of time and just get fully immersed in it. But I don’t have such a book on my radar right now…
Yeah, my GR list is a wishlist. So I guess my picture is truly my TBR. I have never been one to buy a book that I don’t intend to read in the very near future. I don’t understand why people stockpile books like they’re going out of style. I mean, it’ll still be there when you want to read it. This is something I just don’t relate to, and it seems like every other book blogger does it!
I love reading longer/heavier books on vacation, but I think this one will be kind of hectic so I want to keep it pretty light. Have you read The Crimson Petal and the White? That immediately came to mind when thinking about longer beach reads.
No, I have not read that book, nor have I heard of it…*off to check goodreads*. I definitely don’t stock pile books like I used to when I worked in a book store! But I do acquire books faster than I can read them, it would seem 😉 Can you imagine getting enough books a week that you could have a weekly post about “what’s in your mailbox”? Insane.
Oh my god. You need to read it, for real. I don’t know if you like historical fiction, but even if you don’t, I inhaled this book… it’s 900 pages and feels like 200. Wow I want to reread it 🙂
Haha no I certainly cannot imagine acquiring books that fast. I mostly stopped buying books years ago. It was one of my cost saving measures so I could pay for our wedding 🙂
For the last year or so I’ve been in the habit of scheduling EVERYTHING. I forget that it’s okay to just write a post and post it … I’m sure I’ll get to that point soon since I’m very behind! Blogging 12 times in a month is great — good for you!
And The Road! I loved that one — I hope you do, too!
I looked at The Road and I see it’s about a little kid… I imagine bad things happen? I don’t know if I can take that right now. Eventually, but I have to be in a certain mood for those types of stories.
I’ve scheduled some posts for the first time, for like a day or two ahead 🙂 I feel so accomplished when I do that.
Nice to see you in the comments again 🙂
I enjoyed reading The Great Gatsby! I hope you will like Swimming to Alba, I’ve seen a lot of ‘not so positive’ reviews 😦
Oh really? It sounds so interesting. I’ll try to read it without looking at reviews first.
I hope you will like it though.
If you’re prone to crying at sad things, you may want to start preparing yourself now for Fugitive Pieces. I am not a book-crier, but there’s parts of that one I can’t go back to.
Oh great. I’m a book crier and a music crier. Thanks for the warning.