Megi53 really will post here in 2014.

I join every year (SqueakyChu's post over at BookCrossing led me here today) but I've always stopped posting as soon as school kicks into high gear.

This time, I feel confident that I really will write some comments for the group about every significant book I start and / or finish.

I see several members whose threads mention poetry; and I've starred all of those!

1st quarter 2014 books read:

January:

1. Blowback: An Anecdotal Look at Pressure Equipment and Other Harmless Devices That Can Kill You! by Paul Brennan

2. Rich in Years: Finding Peace and Purpose in a Long Life by Johann Christoph Arnold

3. The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Stories by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

February:

4. Trinidad Carnival Recipes by Samuel Roystone Neverson

5. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

6. Winter Moon by Jean Craighead George

March:

7. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

8. The Pine Barrens by John McPhee

2nd quarter 2014 books read:

April:

...

3rd quarter 2014 books read:

July:

...

4th quarter 2014 books read:

October:

November:

December:

Scandinavian Cooking by Sonia Maxwell. I've been trying to finish this thing for a good 20 years, and finally did it. Tried one recipe for dill sauce. Book had too many recipes that used raw eggs - probably because it was written before the salmonella scare.

It's Never Too Late by Patrick Lindsay. I picked this up in a Little Free Library next to the local science museum. It was pretty good, although I only found 5 new ideas out of 172. And I learned about the Kokoda Track from the Australian author.

Sounds good! Looking forward to more posting next year.

Hi Margaret! I am making the leap here for the first time, thanks to SqueakyChu's post today, too! I am still trying to figure it all out; your set-up looks logical and manageable. May I borrow it?

Nice to see another familiar name here!

Shelley (aka, jessibud2)

Glad I gave you that extra nudge. :)

Have a wonderful New Year, Margaret!

If it's OK with kgodey (http://www.librarything.com/topic/162711), you can borrow "our" monthly setup, Shelley.

So glad you're here.

@8: Thanks!

It is nice to see that Madeline is as inspiring in the BookCrossing as she is indispensible here with the TIOLIS. Lovely to see you here Margaret.

Paul, I've been an avid Bookcrosser long before I ever discovered LibraryThing. I really love my BookCrossing buddies!

Madeline, it would seem that there is an element of reciprocation as the Bookcrossers seem to be crossing!

Have a lovely new year Madeline.

Paul, Have a terrific New Year!

I really want to follow your amazing thread, but it is so hard to keep up with all of its activity. Know I'll be thinking of you if I'm not there that often.

I saw a wonderful meme on Ape's thread and copied it (if that is not OK, just let me know and I'll take it down).

The book titles are to be chosen from those you read in 2013:

Describe yourself: Paper Plate Gourmet

Describe how you feel: The Old Woman Who Loved to Read

Describe where you currently live: A Step from Heaven

If you could go anywhere, where would you go: Big Stone Gap

Your favorite form of transportation: Viking Ships at Sunrise

Your best friend is: The Confident Woman

You and your friends are: Dolls

What’s the weather like: Save Me

You fear: The Long Steep Path

What is the best advice you have to give: Smarten Up!

Thought for the day: Live Simple

How I would like to die: Earthquake in the Early Morning

My soul’s present condition: O Lost

Thank you, Stephen!

Ha! I love your answers! You actually had good ones for the Advice/Thought ones, so I'm very impressed. :P

That's because I read too many of the free self-help books that show up on the Amazon Kindle bestsellers list every day. No more of that in 2014!

I finally finished Blowback: An Anecdotal Look at Pressure Equipment and Other Harmless Devices That Can Kill You! . Parts of it were really good. Brennan has a droll way of putting things, especially in the columns he wrote for his professional journal and reprinted here.

My 24-year-old scientist son read the book right along with me, and wonders if the author really meant to come off as funny as he ended up sounding.

And -- now I want a ride in a Stanley Steamer!

Great answer to the meme! And Blowback sounds interesting...

I just finished an LT Early Reviewer book: Rich in Years: Finding Peace and Purpose in a Long Life by Johann Christoph Arnold.

It was rather off-putting. From the title and jolly cover image, I thought it would be about taking up new hobbies and staying healthy as a senior citizen. Instead, it was all about relatives and friends of the author becoming sick or injured and dying.

I guess I was chosen for it because I have all those Kindle-freebie R.C. Sproul books in my library. Need to join LT as a paid member and add more of my books! That way my database will be more truly representative of my tastes.

Finally, a very good book: one that's on a version or two of the 1001 list. I started The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Stories by Charlotte Perkins Gilman this past fall, but read four of the seven stories during my recent time off work for snow.

So, by golly, I'm going to include it in my 2014 try at the 75-book challenge. (Especially since I've read 30+ children's picture books this month which I haven't felt free to count!)

Ordinarily I don't include the free Kindle self-help books and cookbooks I read. There will be a few exceptions; the first is Trinidad Carnival Recipes by Samuel Roystone Neverson.

The recipes were so incomplete as to be unuseable, but the guy has a terrific writing style. His vignettes about the music, costumes, parades, and fetes of Trinidad and Tobago during the leadup to Lent were fabulous.

I wish he would write a novel or travel tome with this setting and just describe the food instead of trying to itemize how to make it.

(This seems to be surprisingly difficult to do correctly, judging by 95% of the e-cookbooks I've attempted in the past two years.)

Thanks to Winter Storm Pax, school's been closed and I've had extra time to read. I finished two books I've been working on for weeks: first, The Picture of Dorian Gray. It was very sexy (which is why I quit reading it a few years ago the first time I attempted it: just not in the mood, heh) and scintillating.

Second, Winter Moon by Jean Craighead George, which is a compilation of four books she wrote in the 1960s about a song sparrow, a mole, a great horned owl, and a black bear. Along with travel narratives, natural science like this is the topic about which I like to read most.

The bibliography had a reference to a John McPhee article about bears -- Mt. TBR just grows and grows. (The article can be found in Table of Contents).

I unexpectedly spent Sunday afternoon reading Slaughterhouse-Five from cover to cover.

My Kindle featured an ad for a new story by Hugh Howey which was based on Vonnegut's masterpiece. Since I wanted to buy and read Peace in Amber, I ran to the community college library to pick up the prototype. (My son has loaned out our own copy for what must be the 4th time.)

It was magnificent. As I always say with these mid-century 1001 books, "why did I wait so long?"

>23 Megi53:

Heh! I'm back!

Did you follow along with the group read of The Picture of Dorian Gray here on LT?

>25 SqueakyChu:

Oh, thanks for posting! Yes, I did follow along with The Picture of Dorian Gray and even started a thread about the book's brief hunting scene.

I haven't taken your advice about barging in - er - commenting on - others' threads here yet, though. Maybe soon.

I finished a book I've wanted to read for years: The Pine Barrens by John McPhee. It had a fascinating account of aviator Emilio Carranza's crash in New Jersey, among other previously-little-known bits of history.

I haven't taken your advice about barging in - er - commenting on - others' threads here yet, though. Maybe soon.

*waits patiently*

*invites Margaret to comment on my own thread at any time* :)

Yes, I did follow along with The Picture of Dorian Gray

How did you enjoy the discussion? I had the book, but never joined the discussion because I was trying to read four other books instead. I have no will power when it comes to starting yet another read before finishing a current one. I have to stop doing that (but I know I won't). :/

How did you enjoy the discussion?

It got argumentative quickly -- reminded me of the old days on the BookCrossing forum! I enjoyed a hilarious anti- Dorian poll somebody posted there, although I didn't agree with his sentiments. (will try to come back and link it)

Here we are: https://www.librarything.com/topic/168900 posts 11-14.

OK, let me go see how many threads you have, and how many hundreds of posts are in each :-D

>29 Megi53:

My mom (who died way back in 1970) told me that she liked The Picture of Dorian Gray so this book will yet remain on my ever-lengthening TBR list. *sigh*

I just saw this. Looks like I only lasted one quarter of the year :-(

I read mostly unremarkable kid's books and Kindle freebies since I posted last. Exceptions: Spring Moon, Summer Moon, and Autumn Moon; all by Jean Craighead George.