2012 reading plan finalized

Here it is 8 weeks into the new year & I finally have my reading plan finalized. In the last couple of years I have tried giving myself mini challenges to complete, but that isn't quite my style. My word to live by this year is "caregiver," so I wanted to focus more on my word.

The theme for Let's Talk About It this year was "Growing Older, Growing Wiser." It is almost over for the year, one more book to go. I haven't been to the last 2 discussions because of headaches.

I have read 7 books this year & have started 2 that are kind of high centered. I can't seem to get to the end. They are both library books so I either have to finish reading them or return them unread.

Book 2 for 2012

A Return to Christmas
by Chris Heimerdinger

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I was telling an aunt about Donna VanLiere's Christmas Shoes series & how I loved those books. So my aunt told me about this book & that I would love it. It had been a gift to her & she read it in one sitting. She brought it over this evening. Yes, I did enjoy it. Yes, it was unputdownable, just as she had said. I had started another book this afternoon & was right in the middle of it. I did not plan to read A Return to Christmas tonight. However, I started reading the cover blurb & the beginning of the book. I IMMEDIATELY knew how it was going to end. I started for the end of the book, as I invariably do, & she made me promise, pinky-swear, that I would not read the end of the book. I had the hardest time keeping that promise. When I finished the book, just as my son & his girlfriend came home & wanted the only couch in the house, my mom immediately asked me if I had read the end. I had to tell her a couple of times, "I DID NOT READ THE END OF THE BOOK!!!"

Because it took place in Salt Lake City, & I lived there for almost 20 years, it was easy to picture the city, Temple Square all lit up, the Christus, the freeways ...

2011 Recap

I read 50 books in 2011 - barely. A list of the books I read is here.

For 2012, I plan to read 62 books, one for every year of my age. One book a week. The last couple of years I have had mini challenges. This year I'm thinking of doing it a little bit different. I'm still thinking.

Books read since June

So, here are the books I've read since June:

1. Invisible, Lorena McCourtney (2004), read 6/30, 5 stars, free Kindle
2. In Plain Sight, McCourtney (2005), 7/13, 5 stars, interlibrary loan
3. On the Run, McCourtney (2006), 7/16, 5 stars, interlibrary loan
4. Stranded, McCourtney (2006), 8/4, 5 stars, interlibrary loan
5. The Birth Mother, Tara Taylor Quinn, (1996), 8/27, 3 stars, Harlequin Romance, found
6. A Turn in the Road, Debbie Macomber, (2011) 10/21, 5 stars (hold from the library)
7. Between Friends, Macomber, (2003), 5 stars, 9/30, own
8. Voices of Bipolar Disorder: The Healing Companion: Stories for Courage, Comfort and Strength by Richard Day Gore,(2009), 5 stars, 7/25, library
9. Sisterchicks say ooh la la, Robin Jones Gunn, (2009) 5 stars, 10/29, Talking Books/interlibrary loan
10. Sisterchicks on the Loose, Gunn, 5, (2003), 7/25, interlibrary loan
11. After the Fire, Kathryn Shay, 7/6, 2, 2010, free Kindle

Cumulative reads

For some reason my ticker wasn't working, which ticked me off.  But I had it up & running again.

I wanted to update it. I've finally started reading again. I'll never make the goal of 61 books I set for 2011, but 2012 is another year.

Library fines

Mother is listening to a digital book from Talking Books & I heard this prhase before I turned my hearing aid off:

People will believe what they want to believe.

So true, but I don't even know what the book is about. I think it's an Amish romance. She enjoys sitting here listening to books.

I saw the July 4th entry & thought, "I owed $2.25 in fines? I could have taken that money & bought a book for my Kindle4PC. By owning it, I could have kept it as long as I needed to finish it." Maybe I'd better rethink this.

Then again, I went down to the chicken coop the other day because I was positive there was a wooden chair with arms down there. Mother has a hard time getting up & down from the kitchen table & I thought a chair with arms would help her get up & down. I slid the door to the chicken coop & there was a cardboard box with a water-soaked, warped lid. It was one of those nice white legal boxes you can fold, full of books. The first layer of books were also water soaked. These books are OLD. A lot of Harlequin Romances before the Harlequin Romances started getting sleazy.

I pulled the box out & set it on the trampoline. I was stacking the books on the tramp & looking at them. Don came down & I told him I'd found a lot of romances. I said it like I had found a guilty secret. I don't read a lot of romances. He looked at the books I had pulled out & said, "Does Dorothy Gilman write romances?" It wasn't an incredulous question, it wasn't a sarcastic question either. It was just matter of fact.

I stopped, thought for a minute, & said, "No. I don't think so."

"You found a lot of books then, didn't you?" he said.

But, I felt badly that the books had sat there in a leaky shed for so many years. Now, the box isn't even sitting in a shed. It is out to the side of the couch in the car port.

Shelved

Detection Unlimited had to be returned to the library unread. It was an interlibrary loan & was due. Several other books were returned to the library unread also. I now have a fine of $2.25.

The Goodreads quote for Sunday, July 3,

A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us.

~ Franz Kafka

Happy birthday to Franz Kafka! The author of The Metamorphosis was born on July 3, 1883.