Project Stop Starting New Books: Seven Picks (Aka My Fall TBR)

In my last post (it is in my September Wrap Up that I have not posted yet oopsies) I talked about not starting any new books outside the books I own. I don’t have the time and calmness (I guess) to start new books. It is hard to explain but I can’t get myself to settle enough to start a new book. I need a book that is already good so a book  or series I’m already familiar with.  I thought it would be handy to create a short handy list of the books that I liked but put down because of millions of reasons.  All these are going to be books that I have gotten at least 50 pages into.

Numbered by level of interest

1. A Feast For Crows (currently reading)
2. The Complete Adventures & Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes
3. East of Eden/The Westward Bus
4. Ivanhoe
5. Canterbury Tales
6. Scandalmonger
7. Lolita (umm… I have to think about this one I put this one down because I got antsy about the lack of progression which is kind of creepy actually because it seems like I’m rooting for … yeah.. no.)

Factors To Take Into Account

There are factors to take into account for taking books with me to school.

• Durability

I want to take a book that can handle being carried around all day with other things in my backpack. I’m probably going to lean towards hardcover books or eBooks.

• Compactness

I don’t want something that is too heavy until I am hurting my back carrying it around with all the other junk in my backpack.

• Longevity

It needs to have enough pages for me to read that I will not finish it in one sitting at school. I don’t want to find myself stranded without a book to read. Also, something that the chapters are not so long that I spend 30 minutes reading a chapter.

East of Eden. I have the English bind up version with The Westward Bus but wanted to find a another cover that was not the same one that is shown all the time. Also, I think this cover fits what is going on in the book right now.

This cover is creepy knowing what the book is about.

 

A Feast For Crows fails on almost all counts.  It is a big book to carry around and the chapter are kind of long. I have it in hardcover so that is how it kind of passes on the durability front except it is chaffing at the ends of the book. I had to put a book cover on it. Overall, I can ignore all the things that I put to consider if the book is enjoyable.

The Adventure & Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes is short and since it is a classic can be read as an eBook. So it is compact and durable.  These  are two separate books so I may read one book then comeback later to read the second.

East of Eden/The Westward Bus  is another bindup so I will read East of Eden then comeback to The Westward Bus. It is hardcover but kind of older. Its probably 100 pages less than A Feast For Crows.

Ivanhoe (ebook/physical copy)  is a classic so I can get it in ebook in addition to having it in softcover. I will need it because my copy is old and in softcover.

Canterbury Tales (ebook/physical copy) while being a classic is also a translation from Middle English so reading the ebook is going to be questionable. I still have the option so that is good. My edition of this book is softcover and as most of my classics old. So I think carrying it around would not be a good idea. It definitely has longevity so much so that it made me put the book off to the side. The chapter that I was on felt so long (looking at it now it is not actually that long).

Scandalmonger  is in hardcover. The only thing that worries me about this book is the length of the chapters. It is like Canterbury Tales the size of the chapters for this made me put it to the side  except the chapters for this book are actually really long. The prologue was almost 50 pages long.

Lolita has short chapters which is a major thing working for it versus all the other books.

Books	Durability	Compactness	Longevity
A Feast For Crows	hardcover but is chaffing at ends so had to put a book cover on it.	No, around 700+ pages	Yes
The Adventure & Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes	ebook and hardcover copy	ebook and have hardcover copy (326 pages)	Yes
East of Eden/The Westward Bus	hardcover	500+ pages, it is fat	Yes
Ivanhoe	ebook (good), physical copy is old and softcover (bad)	508 pages but is small	Yes
Canterbury Tales	ebook (questionable because of it being an translation), physical copy is old/ softcover (bad)	383	Yes
Scandalmonger	Hardcover	496
Lolita	No, Old cover/softcover	288	Yes

Library Checkout 9/10/14 (+1 Chapter Test/Mini-rant)

I was supposed to be reading the books I own. I drafted a plan and everything (I’m totally going to post the plan anyway). So while being in my school library to do work I felt myself getting  stressed. The only thing that would help me not to be stressed was walking around looking at books. My original plan was  to just sample the books in-between doing assignments but that did not happen.

The best thing about University so far is the school library. It has all these books I’ve never heard of.

I was supposed to be just sampling these books so they are books I already own. My copy of The Mills On The Floss is old and looks like if I blow on it too hard it will fall apart. So I definitely will read the library copy if I like it. Well, I did not like either of these. Both of them were not engaging. My problem with Wives and Daughters is that it starts off with telling the tale of a girl then goes into info dump territory. The way to succeed at info dump is for the reader to care. This story wants to go straight into info dump territory without laying down the foundation of making me care about any of the characters. Mills On The Floss started with a chapter about nature, something that if you read classics know is not uncommon.  DNF both

In between all these popular classics I want to get some lesser known classics.  I really want to read more lesser known books in my overall reading. It can be difficult to find and get lesser known books especially with the heaviness of the well known works. This book just starts off weird. It has one of those chapters were you don’t know what is going on and you are supposed to be so intrigued that you keep going. The problem is that for one I don’t have the time to read 4 or 5 chapters just to care. And for two I don’t have care. Can books actually start a first chapter off with something that makes the reader care, please, seriously please?  I was rooting for this book so hard *sigh*. Almost,  Every last one of these books has a subpart first chapter. So every book is going back to the library without me finishing them.  DNF

 I might comeback to this one, maybe. I did not get a chance to finish the first chapter.

I got this book on a whim. It is the first book that got my attention at the University library. I saw it in the ya section which is the first section that I could find (The library is in library of congress cauterization, kind of confusing at first. The library has a very good young adult book section by the way. They have older young adult books and newer young adult books together. ).

My experience with school libraries has shown them to be good places to get popular books. I can probably even get books that have 20-30 people on the public library waiting list at my school library.

Reading is probably the only recreational activity I have time to do during the week. Well, I don’t have time but I make time because reading is seriously one of the things that is keeping me sane in college.

317: Misery

 

Synopsis 

Paul Sheldon. He’s a bestselling novelist who has finally met his biggest fan. Her name is Annie Wilkes and she is more than a rabid reader—she is Paul’s nurse, tending his shattered body after an automobile accident. But she is also his captor, keeping him prisoner in her isolated house. Now Annie wants Paul to write his greatest work—just for her. She has a lot of ways to spur him on. One is a needle. Another is an ax. And if they don’t work, she can get really nasty…

The Good

• gory.
• Right away into the action. I did not have to wait 50+ pages to get to the good stuff.
• action packed throughout the book
• The overall writing process. It made me think about how authors view their books vs how readers view their books. I thought about  authors having characters that they can’t stand.
• While I am still trying to read The Stand nope dumped it between finally posting this review, which is not a terrible book no but it is boring and too long, but it is long and is not on the action stuff at the part I am at. In result of that my impression of him was eh. Misery made me remember all the excitement and best of his writing. Then I read some more of his other books and lost it again.
• I was so scared in the real world that some crazy person was coming to get me.

The Bad

Some of the slang  such as cockadoodie got a bit annoying towards the end. Also, the chapters with the excerpts from the novel the author in the book was writing was boring.

The Meh

I don’t know how I feel about the ending though. It was not bad but it did not go out with a bang.

313: Masterpieces of Murder (A Witness For The Prosecution)

Books Part of This Bindup

• The Murder of Roger Ackroyd–  Hercules Poirot #4, I don’t like Poirot.
• And Then There Were None– I read this one last year, it was awesome
• Death on the Nile– Hercules Poirot #17, I don’t like Poirot.
• Witness for the Prosecution- So that left me with this short story.

I realized that all but one book in this bind up  I can/want to read so I read it.

Synopsis

The synopsis on goodreads is spoilery and I think this story works better when you don’t know what is going on.

The Good

It has twists and is a level way above other mystery novels.

The Bad

However, I did not love this book. I’m not sure I really even liked this book. I was in a reading slump so my reading glasses were hazed a bit. Then again, I read some other books that took me out of the slump.

The Meh

In conclusion it was a eh/meh. This is not one of the most in details reviews but this book was less than 30 pages and overall did not leave an impression on me. I hope Agatha Christie can comeback to be being amazing again.

312: Confessions of A Sociopath

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review

Synopsis

The first memoir of its kind, Confessions of a Sociopath is an engrossing, highly captivating narrative of the author’s life as a diagnosed sociopath.

She is a charismatic charmer, an ambitious self-promoter, and a cunning and calculating liar. She can induce you to invest in her financial schemes, vote for her causes, and even join her in bed. Like a real-life Lisbeth Salander, she has her own system of ethics, and like Dexter, she thrives on bending and occasionally breaking the rules. She is a diagnosed, high-functioning, noncriminal sociopath, and this is her world from her point of view.

Drawn from the author’s own experiences; her popular blog, Sociopathworld.com; and scientific literature, Confessions of a Sociopath is part confessional memoir, part primer for the curious. Written from the point of view of a diagnosed sociopath, it unveils for the very first time these people who are hiding in plain sight. The book confirms suspicions and debunks myths about sociopathy, providing a road map for dealing with the sociopath in your life.

The Good

This book had me so conflicted on many things it brought up. It made me think about if a person not having emotions should have heavier sentences in prison than empaths. People commit crimes  repeatedly and still are empaths.

Showing a bit of the evolution of sociopath and psychopath study was a very interesting aspect of this book.

This is a topic that I have never read about before. I don’t really read non-fiction on the regular. I’ve read  a couple of fictional books with sociopaths, she names the majority of the books I’ve read in her reference section. The newness was a factor into what I liked about this book.

Another positive thing is that it  questions how we treat the different people on this earth. Unfortunately, the entire message gets lost in the author showing me personally why people should stay away from sociopaths.

The Bad

I actually think that if the authors plan was to show that sociopaths should not have to hide and are not a danger to society she failed. While, it did bring up some very true things such as having emotions does not make you immediately more likely to not commit a crime. It also brought up the pure destruction that a sociopath can do.  She reviled in manipulating and doing horrible things to people.  I was okay with taking my non-judge glasses off for a bit but they did not stay off for long. It is sort of difficult to not judge as the book gets farther along.

The main issue that I had with this book is the repetitiveness. I would say that at least 50% of this book is her repeating stuff she said earlier in the book the same way. The look at me attitude throughout the book  along side the repetitiveness was not a good mix. Boring is one of the most unfavorable things you can be in a book and this book straddled the fence more than once or twice.

The Meh

The contractiveness was questionable. One moment her family is normal the next they are a highly dysfunctional family.

Conclusion: This could have been such a good book if it was not repetitive. It made me think about how we romanticize  sociopaths in media. Reading this book gave me a sense of what (possibly because she could just be an author version of an internet troll) sociopath is really about.  It does make me want to read more books about sociopaths just to get a second opinion.

[synopsis and image are from goodreads]

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review

August Books Left To Read

 H&NAS = books I do not have the sequel or first in series to

1. I know why the caged bird sings by Maya angelou
2. hard times by Charles dickens
3. prince jack frank spierring
4. Aztec by Gary Jennings
5. Nicholas nickleby by Charles dickens
6. Japanese Americans by harry h.l. kitano
7. Waiting by ha jin
8. samurai by saburo sakai
9. an American in japan, 1945-1948
10. when the elephants dance by Tess uriza holthe
11. Ivanhoe by sir Walter Scott
12. V by a.c. crispin
13. The price of greed & malice
14. A thread of sky by Deanna fei
15. The red tent by Anita diamant
16. A feast for crows by George r.r. martin
17. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
18. Desperation by Stephen king
19. Eli by bill Myers
20. Candles burning by Tabitha king and Michael McDowell
21. The Canterbury tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
22. The complete adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan doyle
23. the book of lies by brad Meltzer
24. the regulars by Richard bachman
25. the girl who loved tom Gordon by Stephen king
26. {east of eden , the wayward bus} by John Steinbeck
27. Martin chuzzlewit by Charles dickens
28. The greatest knight by Elizabeth chadwick
29. False inspector dew by peter lovesey
30. Aladdin and other Arabian Nights
31. Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros
32. Dreamcatcher by Stephen King
33. A Dance with Dragons by George rr. Martin
34. Scandalmonger by William Safire
35. Insomnia by Stephen king
36. Reluctant saint by Donald spoto
37. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
38. O Jerusalem by Dominque Lapierre
39. Cell by Stephen king
40. The Green Mile by Stephen King
41. Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens
42. The Tell-Tale Hart by Edgar Allan Poe
43. The book of negroes by Laurence Hill
44. Bag of Bones by Stephen King
45. His Last Bow by Conan Doyle
46. Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
47. Brazil-Maru by Karen Tei yamashita
48. It by Stephen King
49. Tono-bungay by H.G. Wells
50. Cannery Row by John Steinbeck
51. The Red Pony by John Steinbeck
52. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
53. Gerald’s Game by Stephen King
54. A Christmas Carol and other stories by Charles Dickens
55. Tommy Knockers by Stephen King
56. The Talisman by Peter Straub & Stephen King
57. Watership Down by Richard Adams
58. A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines
59. Complete Miss Marple Novels  by Agatha Christie
60.  My wicked vampire by Nina ~  Wicked Nights [continue]
61. A cast-off coven by Juliet Blackwell ~ Secondhand Spirits  [continue]
62.  The Victoria vanishes by Christopher fowler ~ Full Dark House (lib))
63. Merlin Conspiracy by Diana Wynne Jones
64. Meaniest doll ever by Selznick
65. Professor Challenge by conan doyle
66. The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper
67. The Waste Land by Stephen King
68. Song of Susanna by Stephen King
69. The Dark Tower by Stephen King
70. Hopes and Screams
71. Confessions of a Sociopath by M.E. Thomas
72. After Dark by Manly Wellman
73. Damien Omen II
74. Jennie Gerhardt
75. The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King
76. Night Shift by Stephen King
77. Salem’s Lot by Stephen King
78. Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allen Poe
79. Dark Love by anthology
80. Masterpieces of Fantasy and Wonder by anthology Ruby Jean Jensen
81. Best Friends by Ruby Jean Jensen
82. The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter
83. Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King
84. Different Seasons by Stephen King
85. The Bachman Books by Stephen King  writing as Richard Bachman {Rage, The Long Walk, Roadwork, The Running Man}
86. Nightmares & Dreamscapes by Stephen King
87. On Writing by Stephen King
88. Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King
89. The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King
90. From Buick 8 by Stpehn King
91. The Gunslinger by Stephen King
92. The Shining by sTephen KIng
93. The Dark Half by Stephen King
94. Pet Semetary by STephen King
95. Night Shift and Children of the Corn by Stephen King
96. Three Short Novels by Dostoevsky {The Double, Notes From the Underground, The Eternal Husband}
97. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Fasternak
98. A Treasury of Hans Christian Anderson
99. The Arabian Nights
100. Nobel Prize Library Hemingway Hamsun Hesse

+31 books

-3 books

Earlier in the month: “I want to reach at least 40 or less but that may not happen. As long as I am less than 100 I am okay.”

Later in the month: Well, that was a failure. On a positive note I own almost all of the Dark Tower series books. I’m missing the prequel and 4.5 in the series.