2011 Book Challenge

So.... I set myself a book challenge for 2011 on the Goodreads website... but I have to admit that I HATE that website. It seems so convoluted for no apparent reason. I figure, why don't I just keep my tabs on my new literature blog? No reason I shouldn't.

So here it is. I set my goal fairly low at 30 books for the year. It's been so long since I've gotten to really read just for pleasure (thanks to my time at university...) so I started this past Christmas by getting a Kindle before moving to Hong Kong. It's really helped, I must say. There are lots of free books and I've been reading much more frequently. Not that I don't believe in buying paper copies (I love a real book in my hands), but it's more environmentally sound and easier to carry when traveling halfway across the world. No really. When we went to Bangkok for the honeymoon, we loaded maps from the internet as PDFs and used them as we walked around Bangkok. So worth it.

So I'm going to start posting the books that I read on the blog. I'll post them after I read them. I don't know that I'll be reviewing, but I'll try to make it some kind of comment and keep a count. Here's my list for the year thus far:

1) The Fellowship of the Ring (J.R.R. Tolkien)
2) The Two Towers (J.R.R. Tolkien)
3) The Return of the King (J.R.R. Tolkien)

What can I say. It had been a while (since middle school) since I'd read them and I'm writing my own fantasy fiction right now, so I figured reading genre would help.

4) My Antonia (Willa Cather)

It'd never read of any Cather's work before, but I found all of it (or at least most of it) for free for the Kindle, so why not? There is a lot more Cather on my list for this year's reading.

5) A Breath of Snow and Ashes (Diana Gabaldon)

I've been reading this author since I was in high school and fell in love with the Outlander series then. I bought a copy of the book a few years ago, but didn't get to finish it with all of my school work. I've finally finished it and was happy to do so. I've got to say that Gabaldon has started relying on some stock descriptions a bit for her work, but I'm already invested in the characters and the plot, so I've found I can turn a blind eye for that. I'm reading her next book in the series (An Echo in the Bone) right now. I'll post when I finish it.

5 out of 30 down. 25 more to go.

I encourage everyone else to set a reading goal as well. It's helped me to feel less guilty about the time I spend reading and get back into the swing of setting aside time to read.

Happy Reading!