A Long Overdue Book Post

With a goal of 104 books to read this year, I'm sure the whole world is wondering why I haven't been updating about books like crazy.  *listens to crickets* Ok, so maybe the fact that it's mid-February and I haven't been posting about books is just making ME feel a little guilty, but I have been reading, I promise!

Unfortunately, I have mostly been REreading.  One of the very reasons I set this goal for myself was because of my proclivity towards re-reading.  I love cuddling up with a comfortable book and losing myself in the familiar story.  However, I also find that my reading stagnates, I don't push myself, and, although I am reading constantly, the number of books I move through dwindles.

In addition, publicly posting the books I read makes me want them all to be "good" books, not guilty pleasure reads.  But, books are books, and if guilty pleasures are what it takes to get this party started, then so be it.

Without further ado, the book to date list:

1) Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
I read this to fulfill January's Victorian Challenge, since I had read everything written by Charlotte and Emily and nothing written by Anne.  I have a feeling that my free Kindle version might have been the warned-about version edited by Charlotte, rather than Anne's presumably more radical version, but I still enjoyed this in a predictable governess-meets-a-nice-man way.

2) Outlander by Diana Gaboldon (627 pages)
This qualifies for my chunkster challenge and also makes me happy to have a long-stored book off my "to read" shelf.  Although the Outlander series comes highly recommended - and I will probably finish several more books since I own them (thanks, Borders going out of business sales) - all historical fiction set in Scotland pales in comparison to the Grand Dame, Dorothy Dunnett.

3) On the Edge by Ilona Andrews
4) Bayou Moon by Ilona Andrews
Written by a recently discovered author, I found myself turning to these quick reads on recent plane rides (yay, Kindle!).  In the questionable "urban fantasy" genre, they were predictable but enjoyable reads.  They certainly did nothing to add to my intellectual development, but my 5 hour plane ride passed quickly!

5) The Magicians by Lev Grossman
I'm a completionist, so I will most likely read the sequel to this one, but overall, my impression was "eh".  Other than the discovery of the existence of magic (hello, Harry Potter), I found the narrator to be a badly-written Emma Bovary.  Obsessed with a fantasy world similar to Narnia (and who didn't want to go to Narnia when they were 10), this college-age young man moves through the book longing to go to the happier world of his childhood stories.  He's never happy.  Never.  And he knows he's not happy, but he seems to be incapable of doing anything about it, except comment on the fact that he acknowledges his unhappiness and wishes it otherwise.  Potentially interesting fantasy elements were overwhelmed by my desire to point the author in the direction of C. S. Lewis and Flaubert and say "They did it better."

E-Readers: My Thoughts

I have long resisted the siren song of the e-reader.  I had the first version of such a thing a million years ago, (Honestly, I might not even have been in high school yet.  That's like the paleolithic age in tech years.) but since that time I have been uninterested.  I like books, especially new books.  I have shelves upon shelves of (mostly read) books, and I love flipping back through them, seeing old notes or coffee stains or particularly well-loved spines and dog-eared pages.

But I am now in possession of a Kindle Touch, which I received as a Christmas gift.  I figured it was only fair to give it a trial run, as it were, so here are my thoughts six weeks later.

Pros:

• I LOVE how small/lightweight the Kindle is.  I can tuck it in my handbag and haul it around everywhere.  For someone who routinely packs 3-4 books on every trip she takes, this frees up a lot of space in my luggage.
• I appreciate the ability to download books on the spot.  I have extreme book anxiety when I travel - what on earth would I do if I ran out of things to read? - so this is helping to alleviate this fear.  (Mind you, I still brought a paperback on my most recent trip "just in case," but you can't expect miracles overnight.)

Cons: 

• It drives me batty that, due to several factors including the ability to change font sizes, text does not stay in the same place.  I'm a compulsive re-reader and can always count on remembering not only where in the book a passage is located but also where on the page.  My e-reader keeps moving text, and it's hard to skim.  Plus it really does make me bonkers that a passage I KNOW was on the bottom of the "page" the first time I read it is now in the middle.  Aargh.  Others may not have this particular issue.
• The screen is super responsive to any touch, not just fingers, so occasionally it will jump around, making it difficult to locate where I left off.  This usually only occurs when I have to shove the Kindle under my legs to hide it from flight attendants during take off.  I'm a rebel, what can I say.

Basically, I like my Kindle.  It goes on airplanes with me.  It goes to Starbucks.  But it won't ever replace my actual books.  In fact, I have basically been buying books twice - one for my Kindle and one for my bookshelf.  Just don't tell my husband!

February Health and Fitness Goals

Ooops... where did yesterday go?  Better late than never, I guess, or pick your platitude of choice.  Here goes:

1) Complete a 45 min cardio workout a minimum of three days per week.


So, since I didn't manage to make this one last month, I figured there was no reason to build on no foundation.  So we're sticking with the basics.

2) Eat at least two servings of fruit a day.


I like fruits and vegetables.  I eat a lot of fruits and vegetables.  At least, I think I do.  The more I start paying attention, the more I realize that, even though I like and sometimes prefer vegetables and fruits, it's easy to go through a whole day eating basically none, especially in winter.  In summer, I hardly think about fruit consumption; the weekly farmer's market provides too much temptation!  But in the winter, I get bored of apples and clementines.  So we're starting with fruit.   Oh, and don't forget the water drinking; that isn't going to stop now that we've moved on to month two.