ANNUAL READING GOAL CHALLENGE for 2015!

[threeboysmom]

I'm not sure how I stumbled upon this thread, but sounds like fun! I'd love to participate. I will set a goal for 40 books this year!

Welcome!! So glad you found us here!

I've added you to the first post.

 

[K and K's Mommy]

Just a comment for today -- as I read some comments about 'want to read' lists.

I am 43 and I think I could retire tomorrow, live to be 100, and still not get through all of the books I want to read!

Happy Reading all!

Have a magical day!

Hee-hee! I agree! (even the same age)

 

[Swimnoid]

I was glad to come across this review of James Patterson. Just a few days ago I was on his website looking through all of his book series.

The Alex Cross series looks good, but I was thinking about the Women's Murder Club series. I might grab a sample of the 1st book and try it out.

Michelle

I've read all of the Alex Cross books and am on the 9th one of the Women's Murder Club series. I like both series but I like the Alex Cross series better. I love the characters in the Women's Murder Club but the stories are weaker. Still, they have interesting plot lines. They are pretty predictable. Another James Patterson series is the Michael Bennett series. I love those too!

 

[Tasha228]

I was glad to come across this review of James Patterson. Just a few days ago I was on his website looking through all of his book series.

The Alex Cross series looks good, but I was thinking about the Women's Murder Club series. I might grab a sample of the 1st book and try it out.

Michelle

I have been hooked on the Alex Cross series for the past 15 years or so. I wait eagerly every December or so for the latest book to come out. It is a fantastic series.

 

[Tasha228]

I've read all of the Alex Cross books and am on the 9th one of the Women's Murder Club series. I like both series but I like the Alex Cross series better. I love the characters in the Women's Murder Club but the stories are weaker. Still, they have interesting plot lines. They are pretty predictable. Another James Patterson series is the Michael Bennett series. I love those too!

I have only read 1 book in the Michael Bennett series so far but I liked it. I still prefer Alex Cross, but that may be because we go way back lol.

 

[dizluvah]

Book #4
The Husbands Secret by Liane Moriarity

3.5 stars
I think this is a solid 3.5 stars (i keep fluctuating between 3.5-4) I like this author and enjoy the moral dilemma's the characters face. I especially loved the epilogue, the what-if section if you will. Lots of topics for discussion for a book club - so many characters to love and hate. Good solid book

 

[BonnieF]

Book 3/40 - Dark Places, by Gillian Flynn. "Dark" really sums it up. There isn't a single bright moment in this book. While it's well written and plotted, I felt awful when I was reading it. At least Gone Girl had its absurdity to keep it from being oppressive.
Next up, Revival, by Stephen King. Ironic, in light of what I thought of Dark Places! But, at least I know what I'm in for!

 

[willowsnn3]

Goal 72

#3 Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McCreight

Finally got around to reading this one and really liked it.

 

[queenofthehive]

3/25 - Good Graces by Lesley Kagen

Great book!

 

[lovegrumpy]

Still on my first book but decide to pull out some old books I have had for years. Can't wait to start reading those again.

 

[kmb584]

I finished book #3, 77 Shadow Street by Dean Koontz, last night. It was good, but not great. I guess I expected it to be more of a haunting than sci-fi. Summary provided by Goodreads:

I am the One, the all and the only. I live in the Pendleton as surely as I live everywhere. I am the Pendleton’s history and its destiny. The building is my place of conception, my monument, my killing ground. . . .

The Pendleton stands on the summit of Shadow Hill at the highest point of an old heartland city, a Gilded Age palace built in the late 1800s as a tycoon’s dream home. Almost from the beginning, its grandeur has been scarred by episodes of madness, suicide, mass murder, and whispers of things far worse. But since its rechristening in the 1970s as a luxury apartment building, the Pendleton has been at peace. For its fortunate residents—among them a successful songwriter and her young son, a disgraced ex-senator, a widowed attorney, and a driven money manager—the Pendleton’s magnificent quarters are a sanctuary, its dark past all but forgotten.

But now inexplicable shadows caper across walls, security cameras relay impossible images, phantom voices mutter in strange tongues, not-quite-human figures lurk in the basement, elevators plunge into unknown depths. With each passing hour, a terrifying certainty grows: Whatever drove the Pendleton’s past occupants to their unspeakable fates is at work again. Soon, all those within its boundaries will be engulfed by a dark tide from which few have escaped.

Dean Koontz transcends all expectations as he takes readers on a gripping journey to a place where nightmare visions become real—and where a group of singular individuals hold the key to humanity’s destiny. Welcome to 77 Shadow Street.

 

[kt_mom]

Book 3/40 - Dark Places, by Gillian Flynn. "Dark" really sums it up. There isn't a single bright moment in this book. While it's well written and plotted, I felt awful when I was reading it. At least Gone Girl had its absurdity to keep it from being oppressive.
Next up, Revival, by Stephen King. Ironic, in light of what I thought of Dark Places! But, at least I know what I'm in for!

I've got this on my list to read but haven't gotten to it yet. I really enjoyed Gone Girl, and then I read Sharp Objects and it was just okay, I barely even remember what it was about. I guess I won't rush to read this one.

 

[WDWMom]

Book #5 Above the Bridge by Deborah Gardner

It was just Ok. Slow starting, too much fluff and not enough story.

 

[PigletsPal2]

Goal: 30 books this year.

#3 (1/10th of the way there!) - Yes Please by Amy Poehler. I think she is one of the funniest people on earth, and her autobiography didn't disappoint. It's refreshing to read about someone who succeeded is spite of coming from a normal, two-parent, middle-class functional loving family!

As she describes the journey from her "too safe" childhood in Boston to her award-winning turns on Saturday Night Live, Parks and Recreation, and hosting the Golden Globes award presentations, she introduces us to many interesting people who have helped to make her who she is. And it's worth noting that she doesn't bad-mouth any of them (that I can remember).

Her love for her family and friends and her gratitude to those who influenced her personal life and career are evident in every chapter, and they make the reader wish she was a personal friend. Definitely worth the time to read.

Queen Colleen

 

[timsprincess]

Book #2/75

The Miniaturist
by Jessie Burton

4/5 stars


The Miniaturist
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My rating:
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The Miniaturist
by Jessie Burton
3.56 of 5 stars 3.56 · rating details · 13,263 ratings · 1,674 reviews
Set in seventeenth century Amsterdam-a city ruled by glittering wealth and oppressive religion-a masterful debut steeped in atmosphere and shimmering with mystery, in the tradition of Emma Donoghue, Sarah Waters, and Sarah Dunant.

"There is nothing hidden that will not be revealed…"

On a brisk autumn day in 1686, eighteen-year-old Nella Oortman arrives in Amsterdam to begin a new life as the wife of illustrious merchant trader Johannes Brandt. But her new home, while splendorous, is not welcoming. Johannes is kind yet distant, always locked in his study or at his warehouse office-leaving Nella alone with his sister, the sharp-tongued and forbidding Marin.

But Nella's world changes when Johannes presents her with an extraordinary wedding gift: a cabinet-sized replica of their home. To furnish her gift, Nella engages the services of a miniaturist-an elusive and enigmatic artist whose tiny creations mirror their real-life counterparts in eerie and unexpected ways . . .

Johannes' gift helps Nella to pierce the closed world of the Brandt household. But as she uncovers its unusual secrets, she begins to understand-and fear-the escalating dangers that await them all. In this repressively pious society where gold is worshipped second only to God, to be different is a threat to the moral fabric of society, and not even a man as rich as Johannes is safe. Only one person seems to see the fate that awaits them. Is the miniaturist the key to their salvation . . . or the architect of their destruction

I liked this book and there were times I wanted to keep going, when I had to do other things. It kept my attention. It was interesting to remember how some things were handled/perceived then that are very normal life to us now. Interesting characters...story did not go where I thought it would.

 

[KiKi Mouse]

I'm super late to this party too but would love to join.

Goal=25 books

1/25=Leaving Time-Jodi Picoult.
LOVED it. Thought of the elephants in AK.

2/25=If I stay-Gayle Foreman
Liked it. So then I read...

3/25=Where She Went-Gayle Foreman
Didn't care for it. Seemed like a sequel for the sake of writing a sequel.

4/25=Still Alice-Lisa Genova
Currently reading. Like it. Scares the crap out of me. Looking forward to the movie.

 

[wvjules]

I'm super late to this party too but would love to join.

Goal=25 books

1/25=Leaving Time-Jodi Picoult.
LOVED it. Thought of the elephants in AK.

2/25=If I stay-Gayle Foreman
Liked it. So then I read...

3/25=Where She Went-Gayle Foreman
Didn't care for it. Seemed like a sequel for the sake of writing a sequel.

4/25=Still Alice-Lisa Genova
Currently reading. Like it. Scares the crap out of me. Looking forward to the movie.

One of my favorites from last year!

 

[threeboysmom]

I'm super late to this party too but would love to join.

Goal=25 books

Welcome! I've added you to our list! Happy Reading!

Have I missed anyone up through this point? It's getting harder to notice the new members amongst the people sharing book reviews...

 

[zippitydoo]

Book #4 of 50: Wayward by Blake Crouch

 

[SallySkelington]

#2: Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Excerpt from Goodreads:

Under the streets of London there's a place most people could never even dream of. A city of monsters and saints, murderers and angels, knights in armour and pale girls in black velvet. This is the city of the people who have fallen between the cracks.

Richard Mayhew, a young businessman, is going to find out more than enough about this other London. A single act of kindness catapults him out of his workday existence and into a world that is at once eerily familiar and utterly bizarre. And a strange destiny awaits him down here, beneath his native city: Neverwhere.

I personally enjoyed this book, but it took me a little while to really get into it. I suppose because it wasn't what I expected it to be. But it's definitely worth the read. It's more of what I call a dry fantasy, where the words are very simple and minimal, but Gaiman is a master painter with words.

As for my next book... I have no idea.

Perhaps I will start A Storm of Swords by George R. R. Martin but the last book took me forever to get through, and I usually breeze through books.