VioletBramble's 2018 Category Challenge

Hi! I'm Kelly. This will be my 8th year participating in the Category Challenge. This year my categories are based on films that were originally books/stories/essays. I plan no set number of books per category. While I have listed possible books to read for each category I'm going to attempt to be less rigid with my reading and planning. The only books that are semi-set are those I'm thinking about for the CATs. I plan to participate in the ColorCAT, The SFF/SFFFKit and the RandomCAT.
Happy New Year and Happy Reading in 2018!

Books About Books

1) So You Think You're a Bookworm?
2)

Possible Reads:
The Invisible Library
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry
Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

Fantasy

1) How to Stop Time- Matt Haig
2) All the Birds in the Sky
3) Undead Girl Gang
4) Summer of Salt
5) The City of Brass
6) Practical Magic

Possible Reads:
The Fifth Season
The Obelisk Gate
The Stone Sky
A Court of Thorns and Roses
All the Birds in the Sky ✔
To Hold the Bridge
The Alchemist's Council
A Darker Shade of Magic
Wonder Woman: Warbringer
The Language of Thorns
Strange the Dreamer
Akata Witch

Science Fiction

1) Binti
2) Redshirts
3) Every Anxious Wave
4) Ready Player One

Possible Reads:
Redshirts ✔
Binti ✔
The Three-Body Problem
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Warcross

North American Fiction

1) Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk
2) Station Eleven
3) The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
4) The Hate U Give
5) Rabbit Cake
6) One Hundred Days of Rain
7) I'll Take You There
8) The Virgin Suicides
9) The Lovely Bones
10) I'll Take You There
11) Dandelion Wine
12) Ready Player One

Possible Reads:
Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk ✔
The Animators
The Underground Railroad
Rabbit Cake ✔
One Hundred Days of Rain ✔
The Bean Trees
Station Eleven ✔
Every Anxious Wave ✔
The Voyage of the Narwhal
All The Little Live Things
The Winter of Our Discontent
Ready Player One✔
Stephen Florida
The Virgin Suicides ✔
Caramelo
The Lost Garden: A Novel
The Lovely Bones ✔

Fiction from Outside North America

1) A Man Called Ove
2) Candide
3) Fever Dream

Possible Reads:
Memoirs of a Polar Bear
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine
A Man Called Ove ✔
The Essex Serpent
Love in Lowercase
The Solitude of Prime Numbers
The Prime of Miss Jean Brody
Candide
The Farming of Bones
Confusion
Potiki

Poetry

1) Night Sky With Exit Wounds
2) Diving Into the Wreck
3) There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce
4) The Undressing - Li-Young Lee
5) Americus
6) Vivas to Those Who Have Failed
7) Mouthful of Forevers
8) Cold Pastoral
9) The Sun and Her Flowers
10) Dog Songs: Poems
11) The Princess Saves Herself in This One
12) Love is a Dog From Hell
13) Scribbled in the Dark
13) Ariel: Restored Edition

Possible reads:
Mouthful of Forevers ✔
Cold Pastoral ✔
There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce ✔
Vivas to Those Who Have Failed ✔
Night Sky With Exit Wounds ✔
Ariel
Love is a Dog From Hell ✔
Dog Songs: Poems ✔
Americus ✔
The Conference of the Birds
Diving Into the Wreck ✔
The Sun and Her Flowers ✔

Memoirs

1) Devotion: Why I Write
2) An African in Greenland
3) Lab Girl
4) The Best We could Do: An Illustrated Memoir

Possible Reads:
When Breathe Becomes Air
Lab Girl ✔
An African in Greenland ✔
Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Devotion: Why I Write ✔

Essays

1) Devotion: Why I Write
2) No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters

Possible Reads:
Bad Feminist
Am I Here Alone?
The Givenness of Things
Notes From No Man's Land
Devotion: Why I Write ✔

NonFiction

1)
2)

Possible Reads:
The Witches, Salem, 1692
The Hot Zone
No Is Not Enough
The Film Book
Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In
A Farewell to Ice: A Report From the Arctic
On Tyranny
Braving the Wilderness
The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have

Large Books

1)
2)

Possible reads:
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Swann's Way

Unplanned Reading / Books that don't fit into any of my categories.

1) Going Into Town
2) A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo
3) Goodnight Lab
4) Ocean Meets Sky

Planned Reading for the ColorCat and SFF/SFFF KIT

January:
Black - Station Eleven
Random/Book Bullets-Station Eleven
SFF/SFFKit- Should have read earlier- The Fifth Season

February:
Brown: Diving Into the Wreck
SFF/SFFFKit - Urban Fantasy- A Darker Shade of Magic
MysteryCAT- Female sleuth/cop/detective- The Grave's a Fine and Private Place

March:
Green- An African in Greenland
SFF/SFFFKit -Off World- Binti, Redshirts

April:
Yellow: The Animators, Rabbit Cake
SFF/SFFFKit- Time Travel- Every Anxious Wave, How to Stop Time

May:
Blue: The Voyage of the Narwhal, The Invisible Library
SFF/SFFFKIt: Rise Up: ??The Three-Body Problem

June:
Purple: The Obelisk Gate
SFF/SFFFKit - Series: The Obelisk Gate
RandomCAT-Memoirs of a Polar Bear

July:
Pink: The Virgin Suicides
SFF/SFFFKit: Cyber/Tech - All the Birds in the Sky, Ready Player One

August:
Grey: Candide

September:
Metallic: The Film Book, City of Brass, Warcross, Wonder Woman
SFF/SFFFKit: Myth/Legend/Fairy tale: A Court of Thorns and Roses

October:
Orange: The Underground Railroad

November:
Red: Love in Lowercase

December:
White: The Solitude of Prime Numbers
SFF/SFFFKit: How it Ends: -The Stone Sky

Books bought in 2018:
1) The City of Brass
2) Hot Drinks: Over 25 Warming Recipes for Cold Days
3) Potions and Pastries
4) Brownies and Broomsticks
5) So Much Blue
6) Her Body and Other Parties
7) A Secret History of Witches
8) The Idiot
F9) No Time to Spare
10) The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
11) Feeling Good
12) Starfish
13) How to Stop Time
14) Why We Sleep
M15) The Little Paris Bookshop
16) The Radium Girls
17) The Undressing
18) Doctor Who: The Day She Saved the Doctor
19) Doctor Who: The Missy Chronicles
20) Dear Evan Hansen
21) A Lot Like Christmas
22) The Astonishing Color of After
23) Crime and Punishment
24) The Word for World is Forest
25) Fever Dream
26) Binti: Home
27) Binti: The Night Masquerade
28) The Heart's Invisible Furies
29) Doctor Who: Twelve Doctors of Christmas
30) Doctor Who: The Legends of River Song
31) Red Clocks
32) Norse Mythology
A33) Circe
34) The Female Persuasion
35) The Wicked Deep
36) Killers of the Flower Moon
M37) A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo
38) Glass Houses
39) The Changeling
40) Sing, Unburied, Sing
41) Exit West
42) The Poet X
J43) The Romantic Poets
44) Crime and Punishment (Word Cloud Classics)
45) Anne of Green Gables
46) The Scarlet Letter (Word Cloud Classics)
47) Shakespeare's Sonnets and Other Poems (Word Cloud Classics)
48) So You Think You're a Bookworm?
49) Stuff Every Vegetarian Should Know
50) The Green Wiccan Year
51) Symphony for the City of the Dead
52) Every Body Yoga
53) The Language of Spells
54) Squint
55) Young Jane Young
56) Easy Vegan
57) Doctor Who Heroes and Monsters Collection
58) Anansi Boys
JL59) Spinning Silver
60) Hocus Pocus and the All-New Sequel
61) Murder on the Flying Scotsman
62) Ghost
63) The Moonstone
64) Scribbled in the Dark
65) There There
66) Undead Girl Gang
67) Bee Journal
A68) Summer of Salt
69) Hope Never Dies
70) Seed to Harvest
71) How to Change Your Mind
72) Catwoman: Soulstealer
73) Goodnight Lab
74) Rain Reign
75) Bob
76) The Poppy War
77) Monstress: Volume One: Awakening
78) Monstress: Volume Two: The Blood
S79) Slouching Towards Bethlehem
80) The Long Ships
81) Witches, Midwives & Nurses
82) Innocence
83) To The Edge of the Bright World
84) Dictionary Stories
85) A Wilder Time
86) The Tattooist of Auschwitz
87) Tales of the City
88) A Thousand Dances
90) Rin, Tongue, and Dorner
91) Summer Bird Blue
O92) Ocean Meets Sky
93) Space Opera
94) Vicious
95) Vengeful
96) The Spellbook of Katrina Van Tassel
97) Monstress Volume Three
98) Spell on Wheels
99) Bridge of Clay
100) Harry Potter A History of Magic
101) Bless Me Ultima
102) The Rules of Magic
N103) The Library Book
104) Where the Crawdads Sing
105) Fascism: A Warning
106) They Both Die at the End
107) Snow & Rose
108) The Illustrated Herbiary
109) Mabon: Rituals
110) Yule: Rituals
111) Midsummer: Rituals
112) Grimoire for the Green Witch
113) Morning Altars
114) The White Darkness
115) Stranger Things: Worlds Turned Upside Down
116) Shame is an Ocean I Swim Across
117) The Color of Magic
118) The Bone Witch
119) Winter
120) Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
121) Before the Devil Breaks You
122) Keto-tarian
123) Oh She Glows Every Day
124) Gmorning, Gnight!: Little Pep Talks for Me & You
125) Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
126) Taste of Home Christmas
127) harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets: Illustrated Edition

Planned reads for January -- so far:
Station Eleven
The Fifth Season
Night Sky With Exit Wounds- for Poetry Challenge at Litsy

I have also started reading a daily meditation book, The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want By Being Present to the Life You Have. I wake up 15 minutes earlier than my usual time, read the daily passage and do the exercise for that day. 2017 was incredibly stressful for me -- at work and just the general political climate in the US - and I'm trying to get a handle on that stress. This book will last the whole year -- unless I bail.

Now I have to go prepare my bag for work tomorrow in anticipation of walking to work for 40 minutes in whatever may be happening at 0600. I know it will be very cold. Will have to wait for morning to know the snow situation. Unsure if I should pack clothes in case I get stuck at work. In case I actually make it to work. If the subway has not been shut down may take my chances and take that to work. I'm actually not dreading tomorrow as much as I am dreading going to work Saturday when it is supposed to be 3F. Ugh.

Welcome back! Good luck with tomorrow's commute. Hope you aren't stuck at work. If you pack clothes, hopefully you won't need them.

I like your theme and categories.

Hope you made it to work with little trouble.

I've never done the CATs/Kits but you've made me curious about the SFF/SFFFKit.

Good luck with your reading & with the weather! I've always been curious about living somewhere that gets snow. It seems like a beautiful nightmare.

I hope your 2018 is filled with great reads!

Hi Kelly, I am placing my star and look forward to following along.

Hope you survived going back to work. Happy reading!

A film theme! Fabulous! The movie adaptation of 84, Charing Cross Road is one of my favorites. I hope all is well with you and the winter weather.

Kelly, I love your theme and your categories! Looking forward to following your reading adventures.

This is a great theme, and some wonderful movies. Happy reading!

Glad to see you back for another year! Hope you are faring well with that nasty, nasty cold weather!

Hello everyone. So sorry for not responding and having not been around for over a month. I'm having a hard time motivating myself to do anything beyond the basics - eat, sleep. hygiene, work. I started out the year hating everything I was trying to read -- and maybe just being in a general funk. The mood seems to be passing. I switched books and even completed some. I actually went out Friday evening and was social.
I'm just gonna do a quick catch up.

1) Going Into Town: A Love Letter to New York - Roz Chast
Graphic, New York City
Pages: 169
Rating:

An illustrated guide to New York City that Chast made for her daughter as she headed to college in the city. Covers getting around the city by walking, subway, stuff to do, things to eat, apartment hunting, nature and, for some reason, standpipes.
Cute and fun.

2) Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk- Kathleen Rooney
Fiction, Advertising, New York City
Pages: 284
Rating:

Lillian Boxfish was once the most famous and highest paid woman in advertising. She was also a famous poet. The now 84 year old Lillian is a flâneur. Flâneuse? She likes to take long walks around New York City. The story takes place on New Year's Eve, 1984. As Lillian walks, making stops for drinks, dinner, shopping, a party and getting mugged, she thinks about her years in advertising, her wild single days, her marriage, her divorce, her son and grandchildren, and her suicide attempt.
I thought the story was charming in parts. 1984 New York City was accurately portrayed. I didn't like Lillian. Lillian is a catty bitch who judges other women on their appearance and clothing but likes to pretend that those things don't matter. I think part of the reason I liked the book was because Lillian lives in a neighborhood that I had visited for the first time ever -- and I moved to NYC in 1971- just the day before I started reading the book.
Recommended.

There in the bathroom, certainly, I felt well past tears, and made a point of not meeting my own eyes in the mirror. The minute you see yourself you're forced out of your head and into your body, forced to reckon with yourself as a thing that takes up space in the world, that others can see and react to, that has a story with a beginning, middle, and end that intersects with other people's stories. A mirror gives you perspective.

I am old and all I have left is time. I don't mean time to live; I mean free time. Time to fill. Time to kill until time kills me. I walk and walk and think and think.

3) Night Sky With Exit Wounds- Ocean Vuong
Poetry, LGBTQ
Pages: 89
Rating:

Poems about identity that touch on family, nationality, sexuality, love and violence. My favorite poem in the collection was about serial killer Jeffery Dahmer. Vuong never met his father. The poems where he imagines how his parents met and he was conceived; before his mother fled Vietnam during the war, are lovely.

4) Station Eleven- Emily St. John Mandel
Fiction, pandemic, Canada
Pages: 333
Rating:

Recap for January

Books read in 2018: 4
Books off the shelf 2018: 4
Fiction: 2
NonFiction: 0
Poetry: 1
Graphic, etc: 1
Female author: 3
Male author: 1
Pages read in 2018: 875
Books bought in 2018:8

Planned reading for February:

ColorCAT and Poetry Challenge- Diving Into the Wreck

SFF/SFFFKit - A Darker Shade of Magic

Mystery CAT- The Grave's a Fine and Private Place

Other reading:
A Man Called Ove
The Fifth Season- on hold from January

5) Diving Into the Wreck- Adrienne Rich
Poetry, Feminism
Pages:62
Rating:

A collection of poetry from the early 1970s. These beautiful and angry poems are about female identity, female sexuality and changing female roles at the beginning of the Women's Movement in the USA. I've read the collection through twice and found deeper - and different- meaning on the second read. I may change my rating.

6) A Man Called Ove- Fredrik Blackman
Fiction, Grief
Pages: 337
Rating:

Ove is a curmudgeon who has specific ways of doing things and dealing with people. His wife died 6 months ago. One Monday he went to work and they told him he was done, just to go home and rest. Ove is 59 years old. Frequently throughout the book people treat him as if he is 79 years old. On Tuesday Ove starts putting his affairs in order because he plans to kill himself and doesn't want the aftermath to be a bother to anyone. His plans are interrupted by his new neighbors. Every day Ove wakes up, does his morning routine, checks that everything in the neighborhood is safe and gets ready to commit suicide. Everyday he is interrupted and his help is needed by one neighbor or another. By the middle of the book it's obvious where the story is going. I loved it anyway. It made me laugh, often, and it made me cry. It was exactly the book I needed to be reading when I read it.
Recommended.

Happy to hear you are getting over your "funk" - and happy to see that you enjoyed Station Eleven!

>34 DeltaQueen50: Thanks Judy. I did enjoy Station Eleven. I stopped reading it for a while, part way through, because I was expecting things to get violent. I'm glad I finished the book.

My niece got everyone in the family a ticket to see the Pierpont Morgan 1906 Library and Museum. It was her Christmas/Solstice gift to everyone.
The photos are:
1)The Library - three levels of books. The young lady in the lower left corner is my niece.
2) the other side of The Library
3)The Vault in the West Room-- the only books not behind glass
4) The West Room office
5) The ceiling in the Atrium
6) A letter from Alexander Hamilton to his wife. There was an exhibit of Hamilton family correspondence in the Atrium.

Gorgeous library! It looks like it smells divine. Mmmm old book smell :)

>37 rabbitprincess: I remember when my Mom and I visited Jack London's house in California and she caught me sniffing up the "old book" smells in the library. I love that smell!!

>36 VioletBramble: beautiful photos. What a lovely gift.

What a thoughtful and fun gift! Those books are gorgeous.

>33 VioletBramble:
I thought that one was quite a lovely book - lots of opportunities for laughter and tears.

>36 VioletBramble:
So beautiful!

7) The Grave's a Fine and Private Place -Alan Bradley
Mystery, Series, Chemistry, MysteryCAT
Pages: 363
Rating:

This is the ninth installment in the Flavia DeLuce mystery series.
Six months after the death of their father, Flavia and her sisters, Feely and Daffy, are on a boating holiday with Dogger. As they are gliding past St Mildred in the Marsh - the scene of a triple homicide just two years earlier - Flavia is trailing her hand in the water. In true Flavia style she manages to "hook" the mouth of a corpse with her fingers. After being questioned by the police the DeLuce party is detained in the town of Volesthorpe pending further investigation. This delay gives Flavia a chance to investigate not only the death of this young man but also the three parishioners poisoned two years ago. And, there's lots of chemistry involved.
After the depressing gloominess of the last two installments of the series I was so relieved to read the lighter tone of this one. I had been considering giving up on this series. I also enjoyed the extent to which Dogger, Daffy -- and even Feely-- were involved in the investigation. I like these new developments and Flavia's plans for the future.

8) Devotion (Why I Write) - Patti Smith
Essay, Short story
Pages: 93
Rating:

This small book has three sections. The first section is an essay/memoir about a trip to Paris where Smith meets with her French publishers and re-visits favorite places in France. She mentions various things that are inspiring her- movies, documentaries, poems, photos, objects, foods/drinks, and conversations. She uses these inspirations in the writing of the short story that comprises the second section. The third section is another essay/memoir in which she recalls a time when she was allowed to spend the night at the home of Albert Camus. While there she contemplates why she writes.
I love Smith's two published memoirs; Just Kids and M Train. The two essay sections of the book are similar to those books. The fiction was interesting but not great. I give this book 4 stars for the first and third sections.

What is the task? To compose a work that communicates on several levels, as in a parable, devoid of the strain of cleverness.
What is the dream? To write something fine, that would be better than I am, and that would justify my trials and indiscretions. To offer proof, through a scramble of words, that God exists.
Why do I write? My finger, a stylus, traces the question in the blank air. A familiar riddle posed since youth, withdrawing from play, comrades and the valley of love, girded with words, a beat outside.
Why do we write? A chorus erupts.
Because we cannot simply live.

Recap for February:

Books read in 2018: 8
Books off the Shelf 2018: 7
Fiction: 4
NonFiction: 1
Poetry: 2
Graphic novels, etc: 1
Female author: 5
Male author: 3
Pages read in 2018: 1730 (855 in Feb)
Books bought in 2018: 14

Planned reading for March:

ColorCAT: Green
An African in Greenland- Tété-Michel Kpomassie

SFF/SFFF Kit - Off World
Binti - Nnedi Okorafor
Redshirts- John Scalzi

RandomCAT - Ripped from the Headlines
The Hate U Give- Angie Thomas
On Tyranny - Leo Strausse

Poetry:
There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce - Morgan Parker
The Undressing - Li-Young Lee

9) The Hate U Give- Angie Thomas
Fiction, Rascism, Protests, RandomCAT
Pages: 444
Rating:

Star Carter attends a party in her home town of Garden Heights. She is certain she knows no one at this party except her older brother's sister. She has not attended school in Garden Heights for years. After witnessing the murder by drive-by shooting of her friend, Natasha, Star's parents have sent her to a mainly white prep school 45 minutes away. But then she sees her childhood bestie, Khalil, who she has not seen in at least a year. When Khalili gives her a ride home they are pulled over by a white cop. When Khalil leans into the car to see if Star is okay he is shot multiple times and dies right in front of Star. Star is traumatized and wishes to remain anonymous. When the media depicts Khalil as a gang banger and a drug dealer she knows she has to speak up in defense of her friend.
This is a powerful book that looks at the Black Lives Matter movement, the need for justice and accountability when people of color are murdered by police, the tendency of the media to portray people of color involved in incidents as criminals, discrepancies in the social safety net and educational and job opportunities in lower income neighborhoods that cause people to make poor, often illegal, choices, just to survive.
A powerful book, well written and a quick read. Highly recommended.

10) There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce- Morgan Parker
Poetry
Pages: 81
Rating:

I liked this poetry collection enough but wasn't wowed. This book got a lot of buzz so maybe I just expected too much. Also, I think it would have helped to know more about Beyonce than I went into this read knowing. Maybe if I understood why her fans love her or what she means to them in a larger cultural context I would have enjoyed these poems more. Many of the Non-Beyonce poems were my favorites.

My Vinyl Weighs a Ton

Sit down shut up slip me out of my sleeve.
I have come from the grasses of California.

Twenty years of the dark I carry.
The sun bends it's back over Struggle City.

It hits me first thing: I've never been cool.
I am driving with glass eyes and lead feet.

I jetpack into the heaviness alone.
My bare face hanging out all over the kitchen counter.

What's largest is the ego, half animal growing near mint.
I'm a rare EP strutting into the brown morning.

T-shirts are a theme. The neighborhood watches.
Lawn chairs tumble into liquor stores alone.

The good old urban sprawl at half volume.
It is literally just another day.

All my friends are changing religions and getting laid.
I have been too patient.

It's just one long slumber party in here. It seems impossible
that Mom will ever arrive, car running, to take me home.

11) Binti - Nnedi Okorafor
Fiction, SciFi, Math, SFF/SFFF Kit
Pages: 90
Rating:

Binti is a young woman from the Himba tribe in Northern Namibia. Her father makes astrolabes. Binti is a Master Harmonizer and her skills are essential for her family's business. Binti is the first person in her tribe to be accepted at Oomza University, the best university in the galaxy. Her family does not want her to go to Oomza Uni and would be required to disown her if she, an unmarried female, goes out on her own.
Binti decides to leave without telling anyone. Most of her fellow travelers on the space ship to Uni are Khoush. Most of the Khoush have never seen a Himba. After a few days her fellow students accept her and she makes friends. One day the ship is attacked by The Meduse - a jellyfish like people who are enemies of the Khoush.
Binti, the Master Harmonizer, must act as a mediator to prevent further war between the two peoples. This role will change Binti in ways she never expected.
I LOVED this book. I gave it only 4 stars because it's too short. I'm eagerly looking forward to reading the rest of this series.
Highly recommended.

>42 VioletBramble: I totally agree with your review of this one! I too was thinking of quitting the Flavia series, but The Grave's a Fine and Private Place seems like a return to form.

Seconding Christina in >48 christina_reads:! (I wasn't sure if I was going to quit the series, but I do agree about the latest one being a return to form.)

12) Redshirts- John Scalzi
SciFi, Satire, SFF/SFFFKit
Pages: 317
Rating:

I enjoyed this Star Trek inspired satire. I'd describe this book as Star Trek meets Stranger Than Fiction (the movie). The new crew members on The Intrepid quickly figure out that the red shirt wearing crew members are the ones that always die on away missions. An encounter with a crew member who hides in an unused loading dock clues them into the theory that they are characters in a poorly written Science Fiction television show. They travel to the past to confront the show's writer in hopes of changing their fates. Funny and entertaining.

13) An African in Greenand- Tété- Michel Kpomassie
NonFiction, Memoir, Greenland, Togo
Pages: 298
Rating:


When Kpomassie was a teenager in Togo he would climb to the tops of coconut trees to get fresh coconuts. One day he chanced upon a python and her nest in the top of a tree. The python chased him out of the tree, causing him to fall a great distance to the ground. His family, who had witnessed the end of the altercation thought he had been bitten. They could not understand why the remedies weren't healing him. In desperation his family took him to the Sacred Forest to be healed by a priestess of the snake cult. When the priestess had finished the ceremony she sent him home to heal. Before he left the priestess told him that he should come back after he was finished healing to study with the snake cult. In gratitude his father agreed.
Kpomassie hated snakes and started thinking of ways to avoid becoming part of the snake cult. One day he saw a book about Greenland. He immediately fell in love with the idea of Greenland - the low temperatures, no snakes, and no trees. He came up with a plan to runaway to Greenland. He spent the next decade traveling north to Greenland. Once in Greenland he worked his way north so he could have the true Greenland experience -- dogsledding, seal and whale hunting, eating raw fish, surviving the long night of winter, etc.
Full of interesting facts about the social aspects of life in Greenland. One section near the end contained way too much information on the preparation of raw seal and fish. I skimmed that section, looking for important information between the carving up bits.
Kpomassie is a charming and open minded memoirist. Recommended.

14) The Undressing- Li-Young Lee
Poetry
Pages: 95
Rating:

Li-Young Lee is my favorite modern poet. I had no idea that this poetry collection had been published. I luckily found it while browsing the poetry section at B&N. The poems in this collection are about the things that Lee has written about in the past -- love, violence, his dead brother, his father, war, refugees and the immigrant experience.

Recap for March:

Books read in 2018: 14
Books read in March: 6
Books off the shelves 2018: 12
Fiction: 7
NonFiction: 2
Poetry: 4
Graphic novels, etc: 1
Female author: 8
Male author: 6
Pages read in 2018: 3055 (1325 in March)
Books bought in 2018: 32

Planned reading for April

ColorCat:
The Animators
Rabbit Cake ✔

SFF/SFFFKit - Time travel:
How to Stop Time ✔
Every Anxious Wave

Poetry Challenge:
Americus ✔

other reading:
The Fifth Season

15) Rabbit Cake- Annie Hartnett
Fiction, Grief, ColorCAT, RandomCAT
Pages: 344
Rating:



16) Americus, Book1- Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Poetry, ColorCAT
Pages: 90
Rating:

17) How to Stop Time- Matt Haig
Fiction, Time travel, SF/SFFKit
Pages: 325
Rating:



18) Every Anxious Wave-Mo Daviau
Fiction, Time travel, SF/SFFKit
Pages: 288
Rating:

19) Lab Girl- Hope Jahren
Science, Memoir, Botany
Pages: 290
Rating:

Recap for April:
Books read in 2018: 19
Books read in April: 5
Books off the shelfs 2018: 16
Fiction: 10
NonFiction: 3
Poetry: 5
Graphic novels, etc: 1
Female author: 11
Male author: 8
Pages read in 2018: 4,392 ( 1,337 in April)
Books bought in 2018: 36

Planned reading for May:

ColorCAT - Blue

So Much Blue- Percival Everett
One Hundred Days of Rain- Carellin Brooks
Cold Pastoral- Rebecca Dunham --- also for Poetry Challenge

RandomCAT - Spring

The Sun and Her Flowers- Rupi Kaur---also for Poetry Challenge
A Court of Thorns and Roses- Sarah J Maas

Barnes & Nobel Book Club:

The Female Persuasion- Meg Wolitzer

20) One Hundred Days of Rain- Carellin Brooks
Fiction, Vancouver, Rain
Pages: 203
Rating: :

A woman catalogs 100 days of rain in a year in Vancouver while dealing with the break up of a relationship, her ex-husband, their son, her new lover, and commuting by bus and bicycle.

21) Last Week Tonight with John Oliver Presents A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo- Jill Twiss
Illustrated, LGBTQ, Parody
Ages: 40
Rating:

A parody book based on the book written about the bunny who belongs to the family of Vice President Pence. This story features two male bunnies who fall in love and get married.
Proceeds go the The Trevor Project.

22) Cold Pastoral: Poems- Rebecca Dunham
Poetry
Pages: 66
Rating:

Poems about the Deepwater Horizon tragedy and other environmental disasters.

23) Dog Songs: Poems- Mary Oliver
Poetry, Dogs
Pages: 121
Rating:

Beautiful poems about living with dogs, loving dogs and grieving their loss.

24) Mouthful of Forevers - Clementine Von Radics
Poetry
Pages: 112
Rating:

Poems about relationships, trauma and surviving your twenties.

25) the sun and her flowers- rupi kaur
Poetry
Pages:256
Rating:



26) the princess saves herself in this one- amanda lovelace
Poetry
Pages: 195
Rating: :

I don't get all the love for these two poetry collections. Reading these is more like reading diary entries. Many of these "poems" are just one sentence long. That's not a poem, it's a sentence.

Recap for May:

Books read in 2018: 26
Books read in May: 7
Books off the shelf 2018: 22
Fiction: 11
NonFiction: 3
Poetry: 10
Graphic Novels, etc: 2
Female authors: 18
Male authors: 8
Pages read in 2018: 5385 (993 in May)
Books bought in 2018: 42

Planned reading for June:

RandomCAT:

The Lovely Bones
Memoirs of a Polar Bear

Group Read:
No Time to Spare- Ursula K Le Guin

Other reading:

A Court of Thorns and Roses
Vivas to Those Who Have Failed

Hi Kelly, I also just read Dog Songs by Mary Oliver and just loved it!

27) The Lovely Bones-Alice Sebold
Fiction, Murder, Grief, RandomCAT: Unusual Narrator
Pages: 328
Rating:

I avoided reading this book for years because of it's subject matter. A 14 year old girl is raped and murdered in an underground bunker in a cornfield near her home. She is the narrator of the story. A little over a year ago I watched the film based on the book. It's a beautiful, imaginative film about love and grief. I decided then that I would read the book. I didn't like the book as much as the movie, but, it was still pretty good, except the ending.
This is the story of a murdered girl who watches her family and friends process losing her. It is the story of how her family, particularly her father and sister, deal with their grief and move on, or not.

28) Vivas to Those Who Have Failed: Poems - Martin Espada
Poetry
Pages: 94
Rating:

A collection of poems about activism, labor strikes, baseball, family and unknown heroes.

just quickly updating:



29) So You Think You're a Bookworm? - Jo Hoare
Illustrated, Books about books
Pages: 64
Rating:



30) The Best We Could Do: An Illustrated Memoir- Thi Bui
Graphic novel, Vietnam
Pages: 336
Rating:

31) No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters - Ursula K LeGuin
Essays
Pages: 240
Rating:

June Recap:

Books read in 2018: 31
Books read in June: 5
Books off the Shelf 2018: 24
Fiction: 12
NonFiction: 6
Poetry: 11
Graphic novels, etc: 3
Female authors: 22
Male authors: 9
Pages read in 2018: 6447 (1062 in June)
Books bought in 2018: 58

Planned Reading for July:

Color Cat - pink
The Virgin Suicides

SFF/SFFFKit;
Ready Player One
All the Birds in the Sky
Warcross

RandomCAT:
The Winter of Our Discontent

Poetry:
Bee Journal

32) The Virgin Suicides- Jeffrey Eugenides
Fiction, Family, Suicide, ColorCAT- Pink
Pages: 384
Rating:

33) I'll Take You There - Wally Lamb
Fiction
Pages: 272
Rating:

34) All the Birds in the Sky- Charlie Jane Anders
Fiction, Magic, Technology
Pages:316
Rating:

35) Undead Girl Gang - Lily Anderson
Fiction, Wicca, Latinx, Young adult
Pages: 305
Rating:

36) Bee Journal- Sean Borodale
Poetry, Bees
Pages: 91
Rating:

A bee keeping journal in the form of poems.

20th April

Frost, and frost yesterday
and last night.

Strong little moon picked at your bones.

The pear on the brink
of unpacking it's blossom.

One-bee marquees,
nectar festivities, tents.

One-day-only stalls of druggy sugars,
the beers of flowers.

Everything is dragged awake;
puts on it's music clothes.

Recap for July:

Book read in 2018: 36
Books read in July: 5
Books off the Shelf 2018: 26
Fiction: 16
NonFiction: 6
Poetry: 12
Graphic novels, etc: 3
Female author: 24
Male author: 12
Pages read in 2018: 7815 (1368 in July)
Books bought in 2018: 67

Planned reading for August:

ColorCat:
Candide- Voltaire

Poetry Challenge:
Love is a Dog From Hell- Charles Bukowski

Books I started earlier in the year and will try to finish this month:
Ready Player One
Court of Thorns and Roses
Warcross

37) Summer of Salt - Katrino Leno
Fiction,, Young adult, magic, witches, sexual assault, LGBTQ
Pages: 256
Rating:

38) Love is a Dog From Hell- Charles Bukowski
Poetry
Pages: 307
Rating:

dog

a single dog
walking alone on a hot sidewalk of
summer
appears to have the power
of ten thousand gods.

why is this?

39) Candide- Voltaire
French classics
Pages: 137
Rating:

I have been meaning to read this book since I did a presentation on French Literature for 9th grade French class. (sometime in 1976-77 school year) I didn't find the humorous parts funny, mainly because nearly 260 years later our political and religious leaders are still corrupt and people still tend to be horrible to each other.

If this is the best of all possible worlds, what are the others like?

40) Ready Player One- Ernest Cline
Fiction, Gaming, Dystopian
Pages: 374
Rating:

This was a July SFF/SFFFKIT book. It took me a while to get into this one. At one point I noticed that the movie was available on pay per view. I thought it might help me read the book faster if I watch the movie. The movie was so different from the parts of the book that I'd read already that it made me mad. But it also made me want to finish the book which is so much better than the movie.
Set in a dystopian future where everyone spends most of their time with their heads in a Virtual world, mainly playing games. When the inventor of this virtual world - The Oasis- dies, he leaves his billions to the person who can find an egg that he has hidden. Wade, aka Parzival, a poor high school student, finds himself among the top 5 contenders in the race for Halliday's Egg.

41) Fever Dream- Samanta Schweblin
Latin American fiction, Environmentalism, Poison, Speculative fiction
Pages: 183
Rating:

My favorite book of the year, so far:
I grabbed this book off the shelf on my way out the door because it was the smallest book available and would be the least heavy to carry around on a day that I would be carrying a lot of bags. I started reading it while waiting for my train. The train was a half hour late so I managed to get a good bit of reading done.
This book grabs you on the first page and fills you with a sense of urgency -- something terrible is happening; what is it? who are these people? After returning home from my errands I sat down and finished the book.
This is a strange and creepy book. The writing is brilliant. I wish I knew someone who reads this type of fiction because I really want to push this book on others.

Recap for August:

Books read in 2018: 41
Books off the Shelf 2018: 29
Fiction: 20
NonFiction: 6
Poetry: 13
Graphic novels, etc: 3
Female author: 26
Male author: 15
Pages read in 2018: 9072 (1257 in Aug)
Books bought in 2018: 78

Planned reading for September:

Random Cat:

Dandelion Wine- Ray Bradbury (a re-read)

ColorCAT- Metallic:

Spinning Silver
City of Brass
Wonder Woman: Warbringer
Circe

Poetry Challenge:

Scribbled in the Dark

still reading:
Warcross
A Court of Thorns and Roses

42) Goodnight Lab: A Scientific Parody- Chris Ferrie
Children's book, Science, Parody
Pages: 32
Rating:

I'm taking a bb for Fever Dream :) I know just how it feels to read something and want desperately to throw it at others, but not know who to throw it at, so I'm intrigued!

You've also re-inspired me to get around to Ready Player One. I was all excited to read it at one point, and then the movie previews (playing constantly) put me off of it, to the point where I never actually got around to it.

43) Dandelion Wine - Ray Bradbury
Fiction, RandomCAT, Reread
Pages: 288
Rating:

A re-read of one of my favorite books.This book always makes me feel nostalgic for my childhood.

44) Scribbled in the Dark: Poems- Charles Simic
Poetry
Pages: 98
Rating:

45) The City of Brass- S.A. Chakraborty
Fantasy, Series, ColorCat- Metallic
Pages: 530
Rating:

Nahri is a young woman living in Cairo in the late 18th century. She is an orphan, a thief, a con artist, and a healer. She is unaware that she's not human despite the fact that she heals extremely quickly. One night after accidentally alerting an Ifrit to her existence she is attacked. As she prays for help she, once again accidentally, calls forth a Daeva, a fire elemental, that rescues her. This Davea, named Dara, recognizes her as the last of the Nahids, a family of healers. He takes her to Daevabad, their ancestral homeland, now ruled by the Geziri tribe who destroyed their families. Once in Daevabad Nahri must learn the ways of the healers while trying to find her way at court among her enemies.
This is the first book in a new adult fantasy series. The second book is out in Jan. or Feb. I loved the world building, the characters and the story. I've already pre-ordered the second book.

In the afterword to her book Nikki Marmary writes that "women deserve a better origin story than a fable that vilifies and slanders us, which ordains our inferiority. A myth that was wielded as a misogynist's charter to justify women's oppression, erasure, and abuse for two and a half thousand years- and which still has power over our lives" In Lilith she has given us a better origin story.
It starts in the Garden of Eden, with Asherah, the Mother Goddess, Yahweh, the Father God, Adam, and his first wife, Lilith. In this story Lilith eats from the Tree of Knowledge and becomes immortal. Lilith is present to see the power struggle between Asherah and Yahweh. Asherah mysteriously disappears and Yahweh proclaims that males are dominant over females. The reader is shown the start of patriarchal religion and societies. When Lilith is banished from the garden she travels the world, seeking out matriarchal societies, a number of whom still worship Asherah. She seeks to bring balance back to the world,, to give women equality, and bring back respect for women's wisdom.
I received a free e-book from the publisher through the Early Reviewers program. I loved this book so much - and the cover art - that I bought a physical copy of the book when it was released. Highly recommended.

>84 whitewavedarling: I hope you like Fever Dream. I actually got a few of my co-workers interested in the book. I gave my book to one co-worker who read it that night. She felt the same way about the book.

Recap for September

Books read in 2018: 45
Books read in September: 4
Books off the shelves 2018: 30
Fiction: 22
NonFiction: 6
Poetry: 13
Graphic novels, etc: 4
Female author: 27
Male author: 18
Pages read in 2018: 10,022 (988 in Sept)
Books bought in 2018: 91

My reading has slowed down so much this year. Mainly because I'm no longer reading at bedtime. For many reasons sleep has become way more important to me than reading. As of today I have bought more than twice as many books this year than I have read this year.

Planned reading for October:

ColorCAT: Orange:

The Underground Railroad- Colson Whitehead
There There- Tommy Orange -- double Orange for cover color and author name.

Poetry challenge:

Ariel- Sylvia Plath

Other October reading:

Hocus Pocus and the All-New Sequel
Practical Magic- Alice Hoffman

46) Ocean Meets Sky- The Fan Brothers
Children's picture book
Pages: 48
Rating:

I bought this beautiful picture book at NY ComicCon because the illustrations reminded me of one of my favorite children's books; Flotsam by David Weisner.

47) Practical Magic
48) Hocus Pocus and the All-New Sequel
49) Ariel
50) Love in Lowercase
51) The Poet X
52) Hope Never Dies
53) My Sister the Serial Killer
54) A New Selected Poems
55) Calypso
56) Gmorning Gnight!: Little Pep Talks for Me & You