Project BOTS! January and February Edition...

Soooooooooo sorry.  This isn't going to become a habit.  I promise!

I read some new books in January.  Goldfinger, you know how the story goes.  Clockwork Lives was magical beyond all reckoning.

Except.... in the entire month of February.... I didn't read a single new book. Wow.  This year is not starting off well.

I can explain!  I promise!  Ok, so school has been hitting me with a shovel, and I don't have time to even go for a walk in the afternoons.  I am about
to fall off the wagon and get run over by a horse.  So, all eight of my teachers have started throwing projects, essays and tests on top of the hell we've been dealing with, and I'm so bogged down with everything that I have time for nothing.

Well, that's not entirely true.

So, I have had a few really, totally great things happen.  First, I went to Disneyworld!  *cue confetti*  It was pretty ok and I got a stuffed Sorcerer Mickey.  Did you know that they're planning a Chernabog movie based off of Fantasia's Night on Bald Mountain?  They are!  It's exciting!

Second, I learned how to make bread.  Yep.  That doesn't sound as great as it is, but lemme tell you.  My bread is amazing.  It's an Azerbaijani recipe, but the bread is standard European style.  Super crusty outside, baked on a pizza stone, ect.  It is tough to make and tough to eat, but it's delicious.  I'll put up a recipe eventually.

Last, but CERTAINLY not least, I got an opportunity to spend a month in Spain this summer!  Salamanca.  The paperwork is exhausting, and I don't know how my Spanish is after a year of dedicated Danish, but it will get better or I will suffer.  Muchly.

I'll fill you in with more details when I get them on that.

On a more relevant note to the title, this month (the glorious month of March, which I despise.  I hate March) I have a handful of books.  Four, to be precise.  I intend to read them over spring break... which is the last week of the month.  Here they are:

Crime and Punishment
Passenger
Starflight
I, Lucifer

See you later... I'll do better, I promise :)

2015 Book haul part FINALE

This is the 2015 book haul.  From top left to bottom right:

An Ember in the Ashes

The Golem and the Jinni

Stand Still, Stay Silent

The Slow Regard of Silent Things

Shadowmarch

The Lies of Lock Lamora

Clockwork Angels

Clockwork Lives

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

The Name of the Wind

The Wise Man's Fear

The Night Circus

Player Piano

Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti

Titus Groan

The Last Lecture

The Sirens of Titan

Soulless

Dark Eden

Mother of Eden

The Keeper of Lost Causes

The Absent One

The Marco Effect

All of the books on my kindle

The House of Dark Shadows

The Child Thief.

There were a couple of others, but all of those I bought with my own pennies so they are special to me.  :)

Also, this is the 50th post!  REJOICE!!

Project BOTS! November and December Edtition.

Aaahhhh
This is the first time in the last year that I failed to write a post for BOTS.  Even July, I wrote something.  I'm genuinely sorry.  I've been a little bit busy with NaNo, school, life...  But I have read books.  Not many, but I promise that I did read something.

For November, I read The Golem and The JinniI by Helene Wecker.  I truly loved it, since it is a historical-fantasy thing and that is my all-time favorite genre (not really) but it takes place in my favorite time period (the late 1800's immigration boom) and with two supernatural creatures that very rarely get any press-time.  I recommend it, sure.

For December, I got about nine or ten new books for christmas, and I finished one in... two days?  I got a kindle! :) and my book was Jar City by Arnaldur Indriðason.  If you remember The Keeper of Lost Causes from... June? you know how much I ADORE Nordic crime stories.  This one is Icelandic, hence the "Ð", which is a letter only used in Icelandic.  I know nothing about Icelandic geography, and though the book provided a map, it was tiny.  It did have some cultural quips, though, like all of the random sheep heads lying around ;).

As for what I actually thought of it, it was very different from the Department Q books by Jussi Adler-Olsen.  The style of it followed the detective Erlendur ONLY, as opposed to occasionally shifting views to the killers.  I felt the crime was tamer, but that's probably because Iceland is tamer in that regard, as is alluded to with some frequency.  I actually got the second one, and I'll be reading it after Under the Glacier by Halldór Laxness.  Which is also an Icelandic novel, but probably not a murder mystery.

On that note, I also have the SEQUEL to Clockwork Angels by Kevin J. Anderson, which I cannot express how much I am looking forward to reading it.  Along with that, I received the print version of Stand Still, Stay Silent. by Minna Sundberg.  (If you want to buy it, too, tough beans.  Sold out.  But you can read the webcomic of the same name for free.)  Also on my list, I have Smilla's Sense of Snow, The Neverending Story, The Complete Cosmicomics, and Little Women.  Two of these I have to read, but not really.  Little Women, because I have an audition for it coming up, and The Neverending story for my creative writing class.

And that *should* be all, so happy reading to everyone!

Project BOTS! October Edition!

There is shame in the air today.  I have read very little this month.  I did a lot of rereads this month, though, and I suppose my FIVE books from last month make up for this.  Anyways, the only book that was new that I read this month wass...

"If on a Winter's Night a Traveler" by Italo Calvino.  This book was acquired for prelim NANO work, since I am doing Nano this November.  I'll have excerpts and synopses for you in a little while.

 Anyways, I absolutely love IoaWNaT.  It's in the second person, which is the perspective my NaNo will be in.  It also is about books, and unlike Shadow of the Wind, it's reeeeally good.  I like how it incorporates the start of ten different books, as Reader and Other Reader go around trying to finish them, but they just keep getting hooked on different books.  It's very interesting, a lot more better than I thought it was going to be.  I was just going to use it as reference for how to write in the second person present POV, and I ended up seriously enjoying it.

I also bought a number of other books, which I will list NOW.
"Player Piano" by Vonnegut, "The Golem and the Jinni" by Helene Wecker, "House of Dark Shadows" by Robert Liparulo, "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch, and "Geek Love" by Katherine Dunn.  Of those five extra books, I've only started Player Piano (for school) so... yea.....

I also read MacBeth, but I don't really think that counts since I didn't read it by choice, nor was it random.

Project BOTS! September Edition

IknowIknow I'm late.  But I was kinda really busy with school and play rehearsals every afternoon for four hours, so I just plain DIDN'T HAVE TIME.  So sue me.

Since I'm already late, I don't want to waste any more time.  I'm proud to introduce... September BOTS.

First up is Dark Eden, by Chris Beckett.  I read this one, not exactly sure what to expect, and oooooh I enjoyed it.  I don't list this book in my top ten books of all time, but it certainly got my attention.  It was a truly unique book, talking about what would happen if a man and a woman got stranded on a planet and told to have kids.  Yes.  There is gonna be inbreeding issues, but such is life if there are only two people.  It's a take on early man that I don't think has ever been done before, and I enjoyed it so much that I got the second book...

Mother of Eden, which is also by Chris Beckett.  I didn't like this one as much as the first one, since the main character had no impact on the planet, which is kinda the point of the book.  It was a tad bit anticlimactic, but if there is a third book, I WILL GET IT.

Next on the list is Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut.  I kinda fell in love with this.  By the way.  Just a little.
I've been wanting to read 2001 a Space Odyssey for a while, but this book actually predated it, and it was just as prophetic (perhaps moreso) than 2001.  I also had never heard of Vonnegut before, and now... lets just say, I'm probably gonna read Cat's Cradle or Slaughterhouse 5 for October BOTS.

Lastly, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.  I had heard about this book by just about everyone.  I heard it was amazing, and I DON'T AGREE.  I got about halfway before declaring it boring and shelving it.  Well, I actually read about 2/3 of it.  I admit that it is GORGEOUS writing, and the magic used is very, er, magical.  The circus featured is a truly hypnotic place that I truly wish was real, and the way it's described put me into a sort of trance as the beautiful writing and bewitching setting just made my artsy inner self go "wow.  I have never read a book this pretty."  I admit that.  I do.  Even Mervyn Peake's Titus Groan isn't this pretty.
EDIT: Now that I've let it simmer, I desperately want to reread it.  With all of my heart and soul.  Sheesh.  I'm worried about my health now.

I have a couple of books in mind for this month- Ok, that's a lie.  I have no idea what I'm gonna read.  Great.  Just smashing.