Only One Act

My reading goal for 2011 was to read 40 books. I only managed 30. SIGH. At least there were some pretty huge tomes in that 30.

I enjoyed most of what I read although I didn't find much of it outstanding, just pleasant and/or interesting. But that's still a pretty good achievement for a book! There was only one that ended up being completely forgettable. (It was Plus Blood in Their Veins, which I should have expected considering it was a pulp fiction novel that cost me about a quarter.)

For those interested nobody?, my ( 2011 Book List )

You can ask me questions about how ~awesome (or not ~awesome) these books are and I will probably answer them!

ALSO. This week I am going to go on my New Year's book buying binge on Amazon, but I don't have many books picked out yet, so! SUGGESTIONS FOR EXCELLENT READING would be appreciated.

My book collection has outgrown my shelf space, so I may do a book giveaway in the near future. Just in case anyone is interested.

Apropos of nothing: I enjoyed this pithy dig at Twilight.

On the subject of books, I set this year's goal at 40 books. So far I've finished sixteen. /FAIL If I count graphic novels the number is probably in the mid twenties but that feels like cheating. My book pile is still pretty huge, but I can't seem to concentrate on fiction these days, and I don't have much nonfiction in my list. Time to go browsing at the library! Suggestions are always welcome, of course - I'm most interested in Asian and Middle Eastern history at the moment, but any subject that's presented well is fine.

To round things out, it's meme revival time!

30 Days Fanfiction Meme

Day 4: Do you have a "muse" character, that speaks to you more than others, or that tries to push their way in, even when the fic isn't about them? Who are they, and why did that character became your muse?

Not really? I have favorite characters who I write about, but that's not the same as being inspired in the way people who say they have 'muses' are. For me, there is a lot of conscious thought that goes into the development of fic ideas - I'm not really the sort of person who gets random plot bunnies - though I wish I could. :c

boring answer is boring

( the rest of the meme )

As of 5:20 AM Eastern Standard Time, I have read 6 books:

2666 Roberto Bolano
The Cage Kenzo Kitakata
Confessions Kang Zhengguo
Parasite Rex Carl Zimmer
The Tale of Peter Rabbit Beatrix Potter
The German Shepherd Dog Howell Book House

Although technically I only read the last 100~ pages of 2666, so that would be...uh... 5 and 1/4 books? Hahaha

After all this is done (I don't want to spend TOO MUCH time posting) I'm thinking of posting all of the lines and passages that I found particularly striking or memorable or bizarre. This assuming I can remember anything after what will probably be a very long nap ;)

Two teaser lines, to give you a taste of what I've been reading:

I could barely pronounce his English name, so I adopted the Xi'an custom of calling him Stinky Egg.

Finally, one day, the ant meets its awful end: the parasite dissolves the connection between the head and the rest of the body.

Almost there!

so, every time i make a personal commitment to do something, uh, internetty, for lack of a better term, like this blog once a day thing or finish some mediocre fanfiction or doodle shit or whatever, my life - which until said decision had been content to be a gaping hole of boredom and suck - decides it would be a really great time to become ~eventful~ once again. And it's never, you know, one or two ~events~, it's like the universe is making up for lost time and crunching three or four months' worth of THE HAPS into a week. And I am like: "Why, Fate? Why?"

Then I stop because talking to nonexistent entities, like multiple exclamation points, is a sure sign of a diseased mind, and also counterproductive to my current task of filling out a sea of paperwork in which i must give detailed answers to the question Why do you fail so hard at life?

If you are wondering what i am going on about, don't. because i'm not quite sure i know, either, only that i have been doing it for the past uhhhh three days i believe.

***
in other news, i think i have a book problem.

( book stack )

Out of that to-read pile, i've only finished The River Ki, The Stranger, and What is the What; I've started Dracula: Prince of Many Faces, Dracula's Guest, Kraken, 2666, and P.S. Your Cat Is Dead. Which sounds ridiculous, i know, but my reading sessions go something like this:

"Hey, self! You know what sounds like a smashing good read? Victorian vampire fiction!"

*30 pages in*

"You know what, I am just not feeling up for fictional vampires today. I'm going to read about the real Dracula!"

*30 pages in*

"Okay, let's be honest, even Dracula can't salvage dry history texts. Time for some giant squid cult action!"

*30 pages in*

"Fuck, could this narrator be any more of a hipster douchebag? Gawd. I'm going to read some real literature."

*30 pages in*

"Oh. I forgot a hundred pages describing nothing but the passage of time as expressed through the changing of seasons is the calling card of Japanese writers. Fuck this, I'm going to watch some douchebags fail at life on tv."

And thus, five books started, no books finished. MISERY AND WOE!

***
CLUMSY SEGUE!

Anyway, I was planning to dick around on XBL like I usually do last night, BUT i had completely forgotten that there was a SUPER IMPORTANT BASKETBALL GAME between MAH TEAM the Celtics and the Miami Superfriends that i had to watch w/ assorted RL semi-friends. I do like to pretend i have some actual, flesh-and-blood people i can tolerate for the approximate length of a basketball game, and also i genuinely enjoy b-ball, so i resisted my first inclination to ditch everyone for the joys of the interwebs.

And man, i was NOT disappointed.

Since I'm pretty sure 0% of my flist is interested in basketball, i'll try to keep the summary to the juicy drama: the Miami Heat Superfriends currently has the NBA's most self-indulgent player, Lebron James, on its roster. How self-indulgent, you may ask? Well, he had an hour-long ESPN special broadcast that was basically about how fabulous he was as a human being, and so that he could destroy the city of Cleveland with this really awkward announcement of his move to Miami:

( the show was called 'The Decision.' With capital letters and everything, for added gravitas and/or asshattery )

Seriously. "Taking my talents to South Beach." Who talks like that? Assholes, that's who.

Anyway, the Miami Superfriends are were supposed to be *the* team to beat this year, with people predicting 72+ wins (in an 82-game season) and all sorts of jackassery. Currently, though, they are 5-4, and they lost last night in the *best* way possible: a massive, embarrassing meltdown in the face of a monstrously good Celtics performance. Basically, I got both the childish glee of watching my favorite team perform high-flying dunks and ridiculous ally-oops and ninja passes and all sorts of cool things while also indulging in the sweet, sweet taste of schaudenfreude that comes from watching the 'best player in the league' brick a three-pointer by hurling the ball off the backboard. A+++++ game, Miami!

AND THEN! After the game my favorite player ever, Paul Pierce (seriously i have his jersey and wore it last night and everything it is kind of embarrassing because it hurts my geek cred) used the Amazing Technology of Twitter to start some awesome trash talking:

( tweet tweet ;D )

AWWWWWW YEAAAAAAAH

Also after the game he was wearing some pretty rockin' glasses that made me :)

( glasses )

4 minutes before i miss the day! PHEW.

here are all the books i read in 2009. IT IS A THRILLING LIST LET ME TELL YOU (actually no :p )

no rhyme or reason. just all the books i can remember reading. :)

( books: fiction )

( books: nonfiction )

24 in total. there are probably a few - possibly more than a few - that I'm missing, especially in the nonfiction section, but still: FAIL :(

(my aim was to read at least 30 books)

will add 2010 planned reading list soon, maybe~

so in a fit of boredom i was checking out ff.net's absurdly informative statistics page, and discovered a hit from a country i did not know existed before today. :0

Oh yes. the Ignorant American stereotype is being fulfilled RIGHT HERE.

(other stupid american moment: "Holy crap, i didn't know [insert country here] had internet access!" i am ashamed to admit this happened multiple times.)

i guess it's a good thing i ended up not majoring in International Politics, duuuuuuuur.
***
speaking of countries i don't know anything much about, i finished The Dark Side of Love Friday. it's easily the best book i've read this year and is quite possibly the best book i've read since Murakami's Kafka on the Shore.

...i've sat here in front of my computer screen for eighteen minutes, trying to organize my thoughts about the book, and i just can't do it. it's one of those cases when you have so much you want to say you, but end up saying nothing, because your mind just can't process all that you're thinking into something intelligible. D:

also it's like 2am and i've been up since 7am. i uh, will probably try to compose a genuine review at some point and leave it on Shelfari as there does not seem to be one for this book! this makes me a sad panda. :(

oh! maybe more than anything, The Dark Side of Love makes me want to read lots and lots of Arabian literature now, if only so i can better understand/spot all of the allusions in the book. i've only read a few selections from The Thousand and One Nights and the Fitzgerald translation of the Rubaiyat. it also makes me want to dive into French literature again, because out of the many references to French authors and novels i had only read two of them.

and now i am going to crawl under a huge pile of blankets and try not to freeze in this 30~40 F weather.

taken from hamimifk:

( 27 book questions )

it's a little late to be starting this, but anyway: this summer, i have decided to read as much zombie-related fiction as possible.

i haven't been reading nearly as much as i used to. part of this is due to time constraints, but i've also lost a lot of enthusiasm for reading in general. in the past few months, i've picked up five new books - all recommended by various, quality book reviewers/organizations - and i haven't finished any of them; i just can't get into them. i don't know why. objectively, they aren't bad, and the themes they deal with are not exactly pedestrian in nature. but for some reason, i can't seem to concentrate enough to read them for any decent length of time.

anyway, i figured that one way to get back into my old reading habits would be to read as many books as possible about a subject i always find fascinating. i had a few other 'summer reading project' ideas - like reading all those classics i avoided in college, or trying to tackle The Tale of Genji for a third time - but these all felt too weighty for where i'm at mentally right now.

so i decided to read about ZOMBIES!

here is a preliminary list of books:

Forest of Hands and Teeth, Carrie Ryan
The Down-Home Zombie Blues, Linnea Sinclair
Breathers: A zombie's lament, S.G. Browne
Patient Zero, Jonathan Maberry
The Living Dead (Anthology)
Berserk, Tim Lebbon
World War Z, Max Brooks
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Jane Austen, Seth Grahame-Smith

it's still quite small at the moment, and won't last for the whole summer (assuming i don't lose interest). i will continue to look up books, of course, and suggestions are always welcome.

i'm not sure if i'll do anything more than simply read these books. i'd like to at least come up with a decent recommendation list after i'm done, for anyone else who loves zombies or books or zombie books, like me. i might try my hand at reviewing, too - one thing that's bothered me about a lot of book reviews i've read is that they aren't very good at describing why a book ought to be read. i'm not sure i could do a better job, but i'd like to try, at least. :p