A post from T.S. got me thinking about books, which got me off on another I-should-really-be-writing-but-look-how-shiny Internet trips to sites like GoodReads and BookJetty (by the way, why can’t you all get together and make one really cool book cataloguing site instead of a million little sorta cool sites that do a few random things but never everything I need all in one?).
*Sighs loudly in the general direction of social media sites.*
Anyway, after spending, um, several hours on aforementioned book sites, Amazon.com (order history), Arapahoe County Library (reading history), and my collection of 2007 book receipts, I learned 3 things:
- Nothing is private. With an Internet connection and a little technical know-how (or a presidential mandate-slash-borderline civil rights violation), someone could put together a complete dossier on the life and times of me. Not that anyone wants to, but still.
- I’m over it. That compulsion that for years forced me to read a book all the way to the end even when it sucked so bad that I wanted to pour boiling green tea with honey over my eyes, stupidly hoping that there would be some redeeming revelation on the very last freaking page (because after all, it got published, so it must be good!). Not anymore. 2007 was the year of letting go of crappy books that I would otherwise suffer through out of some perverse loyalty to my “people.”
- A pictorial display of my 2007 completed book reads is so… ooooh, shiny!
2007: Year in Books
Backwards from December to January…
With an average of 3 books per month, 2007 was not a stellar reading year for me (unless I count the several thousand times I read and obsessed and read and read and rewrote and read again my own manuscript…). For 2008, I’m shooting for 50 books. I finished Sarah Dessen’s THIS LULLABY yesterday and have moved on to Libba Bray’s THE SWEET FAR THING and John Steinbeck’s THE GRAPES OF WRATH (my 2007 list was a bit light on the adult books, and books that start with THE, so I’ll compensate with some classics in ’08).
I’ll be guest blogging next week on Mischief Management with some book reviews from the 2007 list. Let me know if you have any requests!
Here’s to a happy, literate 2008!
Sarah Ockler 
I’m so proud of you for crossing over to the dark side and tossing a book that sucks. Personally if I’m not in love with the story by chapter 3, its back to the library. I never understood the whole I must finish concept. I figure the book will suck whether or not I see it to the end.
Last night we watched the worst movie “The Invisible” on demand. It totally sucked. I turned it off and, Dave had a panic attack. “I have to finish it,” he shouted. I just didn’t get. More on book dumping later.