Bookalanche 2009

At the start of 2009, I put myself on a book diet. Outside of class reading and knitting pattern books, I'm limiting myself to the books that are currently shelved in a designated "To Be Read" area in my room. For every two books that leave this space - finished, returned to owner, or gifted away - I can pick up one new book or reread an old favorite. At the end of this year, anything from the original list still remaining in this section will be re-homed with someone who'll actually read it.

Why so strict? Well, starting off 2009, I had 40 unopened books shelved in the To Be Read section. More than half of them are from undergrad. Some are even from high school.

So, deepest apologies to anyone who tries to loan me a book and gets brushed off mid-sentence with a "LA LA LA NOT LISTENING." Try again in 2010. Until then, here's what I'm trying to tackle.

Bookalanche 2009 Current Stats:

Borrowed Books (10, down 2):
Sandman vol. VI Fables and Reflections - Neil Gaiman
Sandman vol. VII Brief Lives - Neil Gaiman
Sandman vol. VIII Worlds' End - Neil Gaiman
Sandman vol. IX The Kindly Ones - Neil Gaiman
Sandman vol. X The Wake - Neil Gaiman
Death: The Time of Your Life - Neil Gaiman
Death: The High Cost of Living - Neil Gaiman
Sandman: The Dream Hunters - Neil Gaiman
Sandman: Endless Nights - Neil Gaiman
Magic's Pawn - Mercedes Lackey
The Bone People - Keri Hulme
Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

Books bought upon friends' recommendations (5):
The Zombie Survival Guide - Max Brooks
World War Z - Max Brooks
Reaper Man - Terry Pratchett
Jumper - Steven Gould
Superflirt - Tracy Cox

Books I've been meaning to read since I first heard about them (7):
Fragile Things - Neil Gaiman (partially read)
American Gods - Neil Gaiman
Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman
The Graveyard Book - Neil Gaiman
True Talents - David Lubar (goes with the other Lubar book in the Misc section)
The Psychology of Harry Potter: an Unauthorized Examination of the Boy Who Lived - ed. Neil Mulholland, PhD
Palimpsest - Catherynne M. Valente

Books my dad gave me ages ago (3):
The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
The Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie
Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight - Alexandra Fuller

Total impulse purchases (7):
The Traveler - John Twelve Hawks
Small Eternities - Michael Lawrence
Orbiter - Warren Ellis
The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl - Barry Lyga
Five Seasons of Angel - ed. Glen Yeffeth
The Rising - Brian Keene
Dinosaur Planet Survivors - Anne McCaffrey

Books from my high school English classroom (5):
Beowulf: A New Telling - Robert Nye
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
Tex - S.E. Hinton
That was then, this is now - S.E. Hinton
Rumble Fish - S.E. Hinton

Misc (3):
The Dog Years - Mark Doty (Bought for class, then it got dropped from the syllabus)
Hidden Talents - David Lubar (a reread, to get to the sequel)
You Don't Know Me - David Klass (another reread)

Total: 40, down 2

I seem to be exactly where I started. The two added books are Palimpsest and Superflirt, both of which were...well, they were cheating. But I'll start knocking books off the roster soon enough - my Apocalypses class readings will make sure of that. I need the outside reading right now, for example, to wash the taste of Cormac McCarthy's The Road out of my mind. Goodbye, bleak post-apocalyptic wasteland of death, hello hot pink flirting advice book and SE Hinton teen cowboy angst!

Ah yes, much better.