My Last 2017 Read.

This would probably be my last post for 2017. And you guess it right. It is about books.

Last January, I joined Goodreads’ 2017 Reading Challenge and I committed to read 150 books till the end of this year which is today. I finished the challenge though sometime last October and went on to continue reading. It was an eclectic mix of reading genre – from YA books to fiction, memoirs, classics, Psychology and a couple of self-help books.  Goodreads has this to say:

Congrats!

You have read 207 books of your goal of 150!  207/150 (138%) 

I found lots of new authors  too.  Discovering their works  is such a thrill and reading them are so inspiring.  A few days ago, I  found a new author  named Julie Cantrell.  Julie Cantrell is an award-winning New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, teacher, and speaker. She is into fiction, contemporary and spirituality. Her first book which I was lucky to find was Into The Free. It was set  in  depression-era Mississippi in the middle of the 1930’s.  It is a beautiful story of survival, family relationships and redemption. The book was full of  inspiring Biblical quotes.  There is book number two entitled When Mountains Move.  It is just as good if not better than the first book. I am still in the middle of it. Maybe it would be a continuation  to my reading list come 2018. I intend to join the 2018 challenge in a few days. Maybe I would lessen my goal and concentrate more on classic books that I haven’t  read yet if I can find them at a lower price in bookstores.

I can’t give up reading. There will always be a room in my life for it.

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Way To Go

I’ve blogged about books twice this week  and  maybe you would think I do nothing but read, right? Wrong. I only read before I go to sleep or before I take that much-needed nap in the afternoon. We call it siesta.

I can’t pass this up. Goodreads just released something new, a list of books you’ve read throughout the year  arranged as to when you have finished reading them.  It’s called My Year 2017 in Books. They said I had a total of 66,115 pages across 201 books. The shortest is Luanne Rice’s The Night Before with 24 pages and the longest is  Light A Penny Candle by  Maeve Binchy with 832 pages.  The most popular one I read this year was The Lord Of  The Flies by William Golding with almost two million readers who read it too. My average rating for 2017 was 3.5. The highest rated on Goodreads was September Blue by Cat Whitney.  I remember that short review I had of that book. I actually gave it five  stars.

Wow, this is just so good. One of the best books I encountered this year. A compelling read, bravery amidst trials and tribulations. Just breathtaking!

They  listed all the books I read with the highest ratings in big prints. So glad of  Goodreads to do this. Now I can come back and  use it as reference when I want to reread all those books with five stars. Goodreads  serves as my online library since that is where I get those lovely recommendations on what books to read, new releases and award winners.

Thanks Goodreads.

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My 202nd Read

Last January I committed to read 150 books on Goodreads 2017 Reading  Challenge. The joy of reading, I just finished my 201st read last night, a story set in a Tuscan farmhouse.  It’s nice to go back reading  about the provincial life in Tuscany. This book though was more descriptive than conversational.  It was a light read so I finished it in one day.

Last February, I included A Man Called Ove in my bucket list for the year. Fredrik Backman  is definitely a gifted writer.  He was born in Stockholm, Sweden and he had his book translated into  English by another author. I got hold of his other books, Britt-Marie Was Here  and  another one entitled And Every Morning The Way Home Gets Longer And Longer. Lately though I found his other book called Beartown.

I haven’t actually started it yet but I noticed that it has mostly five-stars on  Goodreads.  Readers say it is different from his other books.  Looking forward to reading it  today. I hope it is as good as his A Man Called Ove.   Per my Goodreads’ virtual  library, this will be my 202nd  one this year.

I have more in store – Richard North Patterson, James Patterson, Ken Follett,  Stephen King,  Lang Leav (love her poems), Mary Oliver (of course) , Santa Montifiore and  Lisa Wingate to name a few.  There are more authors that I came across but I have yet to read their books.  Hopefully I’ll find time to read all these lovely  books. It is always nice to visit other places and learn about other cultures through books.  Hooray 🙂  ❤

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Monday, Monday

A blessed Monday morning to all.

Cloudy skies. And there are two low pressure areas which are still outside the Phil. Area of Responsibility (PAR) but this early it looks like it will rain again. It’s a good thing we are finally done trimming  our plants and cutting the carabao grass yesterday. Gardening is  a lot of work but one is happy when you see the immaculate lawn smelling of the earth and newly cut grass.  We harvested calamansi too and got a bout a kilo. The two calamansi trees we have in the garden are presently bearing so many fruits. Heaven.

I was done with my Goodreads 2017 Reading challenge last August 20 finishing the 150 books I set myself to read. I’ve added about five more books since then. I am presently reading The House on Honeysuckle Lane by Mary McDonough, my first book of hers. Gosh, it’s full of Rumi quotes and one character was even named Rumi.  I remember those  earlier days  when I used to write on my little notebooks several quotations from that  writer.  His works are still widely  read until today. Reading is such a leisure that is so fulfilling. Give me a book anytime.

Last September 7 and 8, I got a total of more than 2,400 views alone on my post about Mama Mary.   I guess since 2013 thereabouts, my stats always jump during Mama Mary’s birthday. Busy Google.

 

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Finally…..Bow

Last night, I received this precious badge from Goodreads together with this lovely message:

“Congrats!
You have read 150 books of your goal of 150!”

Almost nine months and I am done. It was nice to discover new authors whose  books were just as lovely as those I have read before. It was nice to discover new places.  It was just lovely to add more books on my shelves and on my tab.  I was even on a quandary what book to read last but I finally settled on Palladian.  I was reminded of the book Jane Eyre at the outset.  Palladian was first published in 1946, more than ten years before I was born.  Much as there are negative reviews on the book, the positive ones far outweigh them. Such poetic prose,  a string of words that warms the heart.  Summaries and various reviews are posted on Goodreads,  that is, if you have time to visit the site.

Hoping I could find more lovely books to read, reread those books that inspired me over the years, discover more memoirs, poems and fiction in the process.

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The Shadow Of The Wind

Books and more books.

Just borrowed the title of Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s  book. An almost five hundred pages of engaging read. One of the best books I’ve read so far in this year’s challenge. It’s actually my first book of Carlos Ruiz Zafón.

I’ve heard of this Spanish novelist in one of our book club’s discussions but didn’t try to find a copy since I had so many TBR books at hand. Finally, I found time to make it as one of the priorities in my reading. It’ my 105th book  read this year. Forty five  more books to go until December and I’ll be able to complete Goodreads’ 2017 Reading Challenge.

I didn’t know what to expect of this book but it was all about antiquated books and libraries which are subjects dear to my heart. Like my other book reviews, I won’t even attempt to summarize the story here, it’s  for other readers to find out. Suffice to say, I enjoyed every page although it took me almost three days of on and off reading to finish it.  It’s worth every minute.  There are three books actually in this series and  this is the first one. I wonder if  I could find the other two.

As usual, I set aside gardening and blogging for two days while I tried to finish the book. Often, in most lovely books,  a book review would not be complete without Good quotes.

“So long as we are being remembered, we remain alive.”

“Fools talk, cowards are silent, wise men listen.”

“People tend to complicate their own lives, as if living weren’t already complicated enough.”

“Once, in my father’s bookshop, I heard a regular customer say that few things leave a deeper mark on a reader than the first book that finds its way into his heart. Those first images, the echo of words we think we have left behind, accompany us throughout our lives and sculpt a palace in our memory to which, sooner or later—no matter how many books we read, how many worlds we discover, or how much we learn or forget—we will return.”

I just started with a book called The Memory Child by Steena Holmes, another first on my list. What are you reading?

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Today’s Quote

We go on, not because we are strong, but because we carry those who are gone with us. We are the guardians of their memory and the propagators of their legacy. So we must live fully, but we will never forget them . they will be part of every moment of joy and we will hear them in every cry of new life. We will carve something new out of this blood-soaked rock and we will stand, unafraid. We will strive to be better, to be kinder, and to give full measure of compassion, and even though the price of love may be loss, we will pay. No matter the cost, we will love blindly, boldly and without bounds.

– September Blue, Whitney Cat

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The Mistletoe Secret

Whether we admit it or not, most of us live our lives on autopilot. We wake at the same hour, go to the same place of work or worship, talk to the same people, eat at the same restaurants, even watch the same TV show….

But sometimes the evolving terrain of life requires us to evolve with it. When those times come, we usually find ourselves quivering on the

The Mistletoe Secret

precipice of change as long as we can, because no one wants to dive into the ravine of uncertainty. No one. Only when the pain of being becomes too much do we close our eyes and leap.

Thus begins the first chapter of Richard Paul Evans’ The Mistletoe Secret. Another book to cherish. It’s my 75th book on Goodreads’ 2017 Reading Challenge.  I can relate to this book because the story is about a blogger who feels so alone and lonely and she writes what she feels through a blog.  She thought no one cares but there was someone out there who continued to read her blog.  This is the premise of the book until the guy decided to look for that blogger and you guess it right…there is a happy ever after, but of course.  The story line is simple but it has depth of emotions and feelings. It’s been a long time since I read a book by Richard Paul Evans.  His writing style is not that complicated but I love how he delves into  life in general and relationships in particular.  It’s what I like about RPE’s writing.

I am halfway through my committed books to read for this year, 150 in all. One thing with a new book is that you can’t help but  smell the pages and no dog-ears please. Use a book marker.  I started reading a few excerpts of Mary Oliver’s Upstream when it was published  late last year but now that I have my copy, I will enjoy reading her essays.

What have you read lately?

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Something Lost, Something Gained

I don’t know what really happened. My supposed to be blog post published itself without any write-up. Funny, I just have to delete and put it to trash.

I just remember, today is the 12th death anniversary of St. Pope John Paul 11. He died last April 02, 2005. I have blogged about him in the past more than I care to admit.  He is my favorite figure in the Catholic church.

My goodness, I lost most of my uploaded e-books on my tab. My device storage is almost full. My tab won’t take additional photos although I deleted most on my Viber app. There are so many pre-loaded apps on the phone  that you cannot erase including Facebook.  The SD card loaded here hasn’t been loaded yet so my son transferred all my e-books to it but along the way, some of them won’t copy and import.  I lost my down loaded classic books of all things. Those that remained were mostly historical fiction and some short stories and poems. Even my memoir books were lost in the process. I have to go online again and buy or maybe get to those free books online.  Maybe when I am not that busy, I would find those books again. I really wonder what happened, now I have lots of free space on my tab, both on the device and SD card. Aldiko e-reader is not that nice on the SD card.  It shows the title but I cannot arrange the books in alphabetical order, both author and book titles.  I wonder why.

Books are that important to me. I cannot live without them. Although I have so many volumes accumulated on our shelves since typhoon Ondoy back in 2009, I still crave for more. My son tells me I am a book addict. When you find it a joy to hoard, (yes the word is HOARD) books that maybe a book addiction. I haven’t read all of them yet. There are still too many on my TBR list. There are authors that I like. Richard Paul Evans is one. I even have an album on the quotes lifted from his books that I copied and pasted  from Facebook. Rosamunde Pilcher and Diana Gabaldon are nice historical reads. Robert Fulghum is a favorite too. I love his practical approach on life depicted in his writings.  Tuesdays with Morrie and The Little Prince are on my shelves so with Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I find them inspiring and the messages they evoke are timeless.

April is just beginning and I just finished 43% of my reading challenge on Goodreads.  Hopefully, I’ll finish earlier than December 31st.

Are you a reader?  What are your favorite books?

 

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Sepsis

I’m done reading my third book of  Amanda Prowse, my 61st read on the Goodreads challenge this year. She writes prose but her subjects are varied and worth-reading.  All the three books that I’ve read so far are superbly written. I don’t usually go about reviewing books or writing about book summaries. It’s really more on how it made me interested to read it.  Three -and-a-half Heartbeats is a work of fiction that deals on sepsis awareness.

Most of us are not probably aware of what sepsis is. I heard  of it the first time when Nate was born more than four years ago. Nissa labored for so many hours before her OB gynecologist decided to operate on her by Caesarian section. She was induced earlier but the baby wouldn’t come. Nate was confined at the NICU for two weeks before we were able to bring him home because of sepsis. We were so worried seeing him  incubated that long and Nissa had to extract her milk at home  for Nate. We were so blessed that he is now growing up to be a smart boy.

According to research, sepsis is   “a life-threatening condition that arises when the body’s response to infection injures its own tissues and organs. Sepsis develops when the chemicals the immune system releases into the bloodstream to fight an infection cause inflammation throughout the entire body instead. Common signs and symptoms include fever, increased heart rate, increased breathing and confusion”.  The most common cause of sepsis is bacterial infection.  Sepsis can also result from other infections.  it may affect someone at any age but babies are the most susceptible to the disease. Most of us are not aware that sepsis exists until it is too late.

According to sepsistrust.org:  Every year in the UK, there are 150,000 cases of sepsis, resulting in a staggering 44,000 deaths – more than bowel, breast and prostate cancer combined.

Going back to the book, I hope you will find time to read it too

 

 

 

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