I always feel so great at the end of the semester, whether it's the Fall or Spring one. But of course I'm going to be more excited about the Spring semester coming to an end because the break is WAY longer--which means more TIME.
Time is something I never ever have when I'm at school, so I'm super stoked to just have extra time not devoted to homework. Instead, I'm doing the usual: editing the story, then querying the story, then writing other things. BUT. This Summer, i have a new thing I want to try out: reading!
Yeah, I know. Soooooo exciting. And it's not like I don't read as of now. But like I said, the time thing...I don't have it. Usually, when I manage to have spare time, I'm only doing what I have listed above, which I love love love doing, don't get me wrong. It's just that...I would really love love love to take a break from being kind of stressed out (mainly about the querying part) and escape from things the way I used to: plain old sitting somewhere comfy and reading.
Seriously, if you know me, you know I love to read, (what writer doesn't?) and I always seem to have a different book. My friends always comment on how many bookshelves I have, I must of read all of those books, and therefore, I must be a better, more enriched, human being because of it. People must think I'm a super-awesome-speed reader. Nah. Nope. None of it. I just have a hard time concentrating on one book at a time while school is in the mix for some reason.
And those book shelves? Illusions, Micheal! (You're my insta-friend if you know what that is in reference to!)
So to motivate myself in this new-kind-of-not-really-new idea, I'm making a list of books to read...or just finish, because there are a lot of those lying around. But there are rules.If there are no rules, I feel like I'll just end up buying tons of books to add to the almost finished book shelf, which would be kind of counter productive.
Rule 1: I can only read the book if I have it in my possession. This means (with few exceptions, meaning the book hasn't come out yet and is due out this summer) that I have to read and finish the books I have, unless they're awful, before buying the books on my wishlist.
Rule 2: Read all borrowed books first. I have a really hard time giving back books in a timely manner to my friends, so I'm going to en-state this rule for those poor souls still waiting for their books to come home to them.
Rule 3: In between reading books that are borrowed, I have to finish at least one book that I own that I've started but never finished. That way, i will feel like I am reading more, even though I'm pretty much not, because I literally have like, a few chapters left of most of the books I have yet to finish.
Rule 4: As strict as I am with writing, I am not as strict with reading. so I am going to follow the same rule I have when it comes to writing for myself: Read a little every day. Even if I'm busy, or don't feel like it. Do it. I will thank myself later. Trust me.
So, here we go, a not-even-close-to-being-finished-list of books I want to read/buy/finish this summer.
Book number 1: Looking for Alaska by John Green
Yes, I know, most people have already read this book and know of John Green's super amazing-ness. But dude, I read The Fault in Our Stars first. That book was so sad, and funny, and beautiful, that it hooked me into buying this book the day I finished it. ...And then it sat on my bookshelf, where it was neglected for months and months and months. I haven't decided which order I'm going to read the books I've bought, but this is definitely up there.
You want a synopsis? eh, here's one from Amazon:
Sixteen-year-old Miles Halter's adolescence has been one long nonevent - no challenge, no girls, no mischief, and no real friends. Seeking what Rabelais called the "Great Perhaps," he leaves Florida for a boarding school in Birmingham, AL. His roommate, Chip, is a dirt-poor genius scholarship student with a Napoleon complex who lives to one-up the school's rich preppies. Chip's best friend is Alaska Young, with whom Miles and every other male in her orbit falls instantly in love. She is literate, articulate, and beautiful, and she exhibits a reckless combination of adventurous and self-destructive behavior. She and Chip teach Miles to drink, smoke, and plot elaborate pranks. Alaska's story unfolds in all-night bull sessions, and the depth of her unhappiness becomes obvious. Green's dialogue is crisp, especially between Miles and Chip. His descriptions and Miles's inner monologues can be philosophically dense, but are well within the comprehension of sensitive teen readers. The chapters of the novel are headed by a number of days "before" and "after" what readers surmise is Alaska's suicide.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Book number 2: Half Black Soul by H.D. Gordon
Now, don't go calling me biased because one of my friends wrote this. Fuck you, she's and amazing writer, and if you haven't read her first book, Blood Warrior, you should go to Amazon right now and read that. So I started this, and got a good chunk of it read before midterms smacked me in the face. I've read pieces of it here and there, but I haven't had time to dive right into it for a while. This is probably going to be the first book on my "finish" list. Just because it is amazing, and I love all of her characters. If you like vampires, and blood, and not the typical "oh you're a vampire, well, I automatically love you because of that fact" vampire fiction, read the first book and then read this. I mean it.
Oh, here's a synopsis from Amazon: In the past few weeks Alexa Montgomery has had her entire world flipped upside down. She's gone from living a semi-normal teenage life to a life full of vampires and werewovles who all expect her to deliver them from the control of an evil dictator because she is the last of her kind. She is a Sun Warrior. Alexa has left the safety of Two Rivers and gone in search of her mother. WIth her is Kayden, a vampire who is the other half of her, and who will do anything to protect her. But, by going on her quest, she has left behind her sister, the one person she was always told to protect. Secrets will come out, relationships will break and danger lies just ahead. WIll Alexa be able to face it all and come out alive? And, will she be able to protect her sister from danger when she is so far away?
Book number 3: Hairstyles of The Damned by Joe Meno
My best friend, Sara, was down a week ago and gave me this book to borrow. She said something to the effect of "You'll like this one. It's got punk stuff in it." God, does she know me. Okay, I'm reading this one right now, and I'm about **this** close to finishing it, so I won't copy the synopsis and I'll just sum it up really quick:
Brian Oswald is a kid whose parents are fighting, is trying to fit in at his catholic school, while trying to find love and be a teenager, and figuring out where he belongs and who he is. Seriously, this book captures to a T what it is like trying to be a punk, and not just that, but a teen in any respect, and just trying to figure it out. I'm not going to say anymore, because I'm pretty sure I'm going to post a book review on it. But you should read it. I'm loving it.
Book number 4: Fat Vampire by Adam Rex
My boyfriend, Al, got me this book for, I think...my birthday last year? I don't know. I do know that I love this book! I honsestly do not know why I haven;t gotten around to finishing it. There are Neil Gaiman and vampire movie/book references. This is funny as hell too. Also, it takes the popular vampire conventions and bends--or just plain laughs at them. And then--THEN--in the middle of this fat kid being truned into a vampire, and the hilarity, there is heart. There is love; there is horror. This will probably be the next book I finish.
Book number 5: Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
I know I had to have read this book back in middle school at some time, but I cannot remember reading it, or anything about it, so therefore it is as if I haven't read it. And I really really want to read it. We all know the story by now, I hope, so I'm not going to post a synopsis. I also want to read "Choke," but I think I'll start with this one. Oh, and I don't own this book or anything, so hopefully I will be able to stick to my rules so I finish books that I have and not spend money on this until I actually have it. So. that's that.
Book number 6: Shatter me by Tahereh Mafi
With very few exceptions(The Hunger Games and things), I'm not too big into the new-wave dystopian novels. However, there are a few that I have my eye on, and this book is one of them. I read the first few pages in Target one day, and I really like how it's set up. It starts off quick, but without losing important character building, which I feel like is so crucial in the first few chapters a book sometimes, yet is often ignored in YA. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just what I personally like most of the time. AND there is this cool experimental stuff going on with it. A lot of the lines are crossed out to where you can still read them, and then something contradictory is written instead. And I remember I felt like I was reading poetry rather than a YA book, which was really nice and not something I always like, but it was done really nicely in this. Of course this is on the do-not-buy-until-you-are-absolutely-done-with-the-rest-of-them books...so alas. Until that day.
Book number 7: The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larson
This is one of those books that I'm sad to finish, so that's probably
why I have been stuck on that last ten chapters or so for about three months. It's not that it's slow, or that I don't like it. It's just that I've been reading the series since winter break, and I love love love all of the books. I'm sad to be done. This always happens to me when I read series books. I plow through the first few books, then I get stuck on the last one to the point of craziness where I vow never-again-will-I-read-a-series-ever-I-mean-it-this-time. BUt Lisbeth is just such an amazing character, as well as all of the characters in the Millenium series. I'm going to miss her.
No synopsis for you. If you don't know what these books are about, that is completely your loss.
Book number 8: A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
Because I love the show, and I love the characters, and if I don't, Al will absolutely slaughter me, I'm putting this on the list. My boyfriend has always told me, from the moment I met him, that he doesn't like to read. Well, I saw it as my job from that moment on to make him LOVE reading for-the-love-of-god-even-if-it-kills-me. So I bought him this book for like, six dollars for Christmas and he read it in a few weeks. He's now on the newest one;I've created a monster. There are a few drawbacks that are holding me back from reading this. Okay, I already saw season one, which really means nothing, but Al tells me it's pretty much the same as the book--and then pointed out what wasn't (a monster, I'm telling you!). So I kind of know what's going to happen. Also, it's not the typical thing I like to read. It's very fantasy, which I barely read any of anymore, but used to love when I was younger. However, I really like the Dyer wolves, and John Snow, and the dragons and things like that, so I think I'll eventually get around to reading it. I may just have to break it up with other not finished books and things. Or maybe my estimation is completely wrong and I'll just completely spend my entire summer reading the rest of the series.
Book number 9: A Touch Morbid by Leah Clifford
This is another sequel. I read her first book during the "hurricane" last summer when the power went out at Al's house for like, 12 hours straight. It's about angels, and dark angels, and new-super-natural-creatures that I love love loved. There is also romance, and gore, and darkness. Real, not, "my boyfriend is such a douche bag but I love him so I guess I'm stuck with him. I'm gonna be depressed now," darkness. I could never get into the books about angels and fallen angels, mainly because I always feel like with a lot of them you have to have a biblical background to get any of it, but with this it wasn't the case. So. I may be breaking the no-buying-books-rule for this one, just because I meant to get it when it came out but Stockton made me concentrate on things like earning a degree so I don't have to work at Petsmart the rest of my life.
Book number 10:
...Then the book sat on my to be read shelf for over a year. Yep. Anyway, This book is kind of like the Hairstyles of The Damned book in that it's mostly about being different and trying to fit in while sticking out, finding yourself while growing up, and all the while trying to deal with school junk, family shit, and dumb boys. The character has a really strong and sarcastic voice, one that reminded me a teensy bit of a certain character of mine So. I think I'll like this, I just haven't gotten around to reading it yet. PLUS! Roller derby! How could I forget about roller derby!
...Okay, there you have it. If you've read this far, good for you. This is only a fraction of a fraction of the books I have on my ever-growing list, so stay tuned for new lists and reviews of the books I read! : )
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