It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (June 5, 2017)

It's Monday, What Are You Reading? is now hosted by Kathryn at The Book Date.

It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading is where we gather to share what we have read this past week and what we plan to read this week.  It is a great way to network with other bloggers, see some wonderful blogs, and put new titles on your reading list.

I will be combining my YA and adult reading and purchases on this one weekly roundup. YA and middle grade reviews will still be posted on  Ms. Martin Teaches Media - my other blog.

Other Than Reading... 

Well, my teaching career is over except for the final workday which is mostly a breakfast, awards ceremony and final faculty meeting. I have all my grades done, my personal stuff taken home, and my files as purged as I want them to be. I also have to turn in my district-issued laptop which should take less than 5 minutes and complete check-out forms at both buildings (another 5 minutes). I have to stay until 2 PM on Monday so I'm bringing a book for some concentrated reading time.

At home, I have final packing and purging to do. One more trip with things for the Salvation Army and for the food bank is on my to-do list. I'm hoping to have substantial reading time early in the week because I know Thursday and Friday will be too busy for reading. The moving van comes Thursday, then I drive to Duluth, and Friday the moving van arrives at my new house to unload. I really want it to be next Saturday even though I know I'll be surrounded by boxes that need to be unpacked.

Read Last Week

We Come Apart by Sarah Crossan and Brian Conaghan is a novel in verse. It tells the story of two young people, both with difficult home situations, who find each other for support. I enjoyed the story. My review will be posted on June 10.

The Last Place You Look by Kristen Lepionka was a mystery the was nicely twisty. I enjoyed the main character who has a drinking problem and a complex romantic life. My review will be posted on June 14.

Want by Cindy Pon is a near-future science fiction story about haves and have-nots in a very polluted Taipei. I liked the way the main character grew and changed through the story. I also liked the all-too-plausible world building. My review will be posted on June 7.

Come and Find Me by Hallie Ephron was a thriller from my TBR mountain. This story also had a very twisty plot and an engaging main character. My review will be posted on June 10.

Currently

I have two from my review stack:

• More of Me by Kathryn Evans - YA, June 13
• Indigo by Charlaine Harris et al. - Adult, June 20

Next Week

Two from TBR mountain:

• Battle Magic by Tamora Pierce
• Delia's Shadow by Jaime Lee Moyer

Three from the review stack:

• City of Angels by Kristy Belcamino - YA, May 18
• The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Makenzi Lee - YA, June 27
• UNSUB by Meg Gardiner - Adult, June 27)

Reviews Posted

A Merciful Truth by Kendra Elliot

Run to Ground by Katie Ruggle

The Sandcastle Empire by Kayla Olson

What I Lost by Alexandra Ballard

Want to See What I Added to My Stack Last Week?

White Hot by Ilona Andrews

Come Sundown by Nora Roberts

Stillhouse Lake by Rachel Caine - review from Kindle First

What was your week like?

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (Jan. 5, 2015)

It's Monday, What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading, is where we gather to share what we have read this past week and what we plan to read this week.  It is a great way to network with other bloggers, see some wonderful blogs, and put new titles on your reading list.

I had a quiet and relaxing week. I spent a lot of time reading and working on my blogs. I finished my last January review book at 11:32 PM on Dec. 31 but didn't write the review until New Year's day. For GoodReads it was my first book of 2015 as I started my new challenge with a goal of 250 books for 2015. On my spreadsheet, it was the last book of 2014.

Speaking of 2014, I read 296 books containing 99,731 pages. 203 of them were review books. I added 621 books to my LibraryThing account and 343 of them are still marked To Read. I actually added 236 review books among the 621 and have 48 that will be read this year. I've started reading the books that will be released in February. More review books are coming, too. I asked for about a dozen from Macmillan but none of them have arrived yet. These will be print ARCs.

I took some time setting up all the Teaser Tuesday, Friday Memes, WoW posts and the Review posts for February on both this blog and Ms. Martin Teaches Media. I have a couple of empty spots on this blog that I hope to fill with books from my TBR mountain (unless I'm tempted by another review book.)

It's back to school on Monday for the final three weeks of the first semester of our school year. I change all my classes at the semester and will be seeing a whole new bunch of students. Next semester I'll be seeing Kindergartners, First and Second Graders, Fourth Graders and Sixth Graders. I really should begin doing some planning for my upcoming classes - but there is so much to finish with the classes I already have.

Read Last Week

I read a recent addition to my TBR mountain this week. I chose Dirty Magic by Jaye Wells. This is an urban fantasy with an interesting magical system and engaging characters. I liked it enough to order the second book in the series. My review will be posted on January 31.

I also read Dream of Danger by Maggie Shayne. This is a novella in the Brown and DeLuca series and was an entertaining, quick read that whet my appetite for the rest of the series. My review will be posted on January 28.

I decided to set my review books aside for a bit and catch up on the Brown and DeLuca series. I read both Innocent Prey and Deadly Obsession. My review for Innocent Prey will be posted on January 29 and my review for Deadly Obsession will be posted on February 5. I really enjoyed both stories and loved watching the relationship between Mason and Rachel develop.

 

Beastkeeper by Cat Hellisen was a convoluted and complicated fantasy about a family curse. I didn't like it every much because most of the characters were completely unlikable. I also found the motivations for the curse to be weak. My review will be posted on Jan. 28.

On the other hand, I found Cut Me Free by J. R. Johansson to be an amazing book. This was a story about a young woman who had escaped a lifetime of abuse and was trying to start a new life for herself. It was complicated when she rescued another young girl who was in the same situation and then was being stalked by someone. My review will be posted on Jan. 29.

 

The Stolen Moon by Rachel Searles was an entertaining middle grade science fiction story. It is the second book in a series and I thought it was better than the first with more adventure and intrigue. My review will be posted on January 31.

I also read Since You've Been Gone by Mary Jennifer Payne which tells the story of Edie who, along with her mother, is on the run from her abusive father. They get to London, England, where Edie's mother disappears and Edie decides to try to find her without police involvement. She and a new school friend try to trace her mother's path. My review will be posted on February 5.

 

I pulled Rule Breaker by Lora Leigh off my TBR mountain. This was a typical Leigh - intensely erotic. I liked the story because the main character - Gypsy Rum McQuade - was such an interesting, strong but broken, person. My review will be posted on February 7.

I'll also be posting my review of I'll Meet You There by Heather Demetrios on February 7. This YA contemporary was an excellent story about a girl who can't wait to leave her dead-end town and an injured young Marine who has come back to it to get his life in order. Great characters and intense emotion made this book a gripping read. 

Currently

I'm reading Bite Me by Shelly Laurenston. I love her funny paranormals and am enjoying this one which features a honey badger shifter.

Next Week

I pulled Closer to Home by Mercedes Lackey from my TBR mountain. I just finished the first series about Mags and am eager to start the second.

Dreaming Spies by Laurie R. King is from my review stack. I love the Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series and can't wait to dig into this one.

My YA books are from my February review stack. I have Mars Evacuees by Sophia McDougall which will be released on Feb. 17 and Better Than Perfect by Melissa Kantor which will be released on Feb. 26 next up on my stack.

Reviews Posted

• Save Me by Jenny Elliott
• Hungry Like the Wolf by Paige Tyler
• Gifted: A Holiday Anthology by Kelley Armstrong
• The Unicorn Hunter by Che Golden
• Private Affair by Rebecca York

Want to See What I Added to My Stack Last Week?

• Inside of a Dog  No new adult books this week.
• Ms. Martin Teaches Media

I'm not listing it because I don't yet have it, but I will be reading Trust No One by Jayne Ann Krentz as soon as it downloads to my Kindle on Tuesday.

What are your plans for the week? Leave me a link and I'll be sure to come visit.

Monday Musings: Keeping Books

Today’s MUSING MONDAYS post is about a keeping books.

Do you keep all the books you ever buy? Just the ones you love? Just collectibles? What do you do with the ones you don’t want to keep?

To comment or link to your post on this topic, go here to Just One More Page.

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I could not possibly keep all the books I buy. I buy, on average, 10 books a week. I live alone in a three bedroom house that has bookshelves in most rooms. But, even so, I don't have the shelf space to keep everything. Here is a look at my bookshelves as of Jan. 9, 2010.

I only keep books that I think I will read again someday or books that are parts of a series or by favorite authors. When my shelves get too full I go through the shelves and remove those books that no longer qualify as something I might want to read again.

I read a lot of middle grade and young adult books. When I finish them I almost always donate them to the school media centers where I work. Since I am the librarian in charge, I can add them to my collections. I know that others have reported that books donated to their public libraries end up in the Friends of the Library annual sales rather than on the shelves of the library. I do keep some of the MG and YA books if they are by authors I already collect like Tamora Pierce or Sherwood Smith. I have probably already purchased those books for my media center with my school budget. If I buy the book, I will get to read it sooner than if I add it to a school book order and I gain the tax deduction for donating the book too.
The adult books are more of a problem. If I don't want to keep an adult book after I have read it, I don't know what to do with it. Turning it in to a used bookstore for credit doesn't really help me out. My local used books stores are genre specific. The one that does romance doesn't accept books more than a few months old and the other one only does science fiction. Also, I have a hard time using up the credit I receive because I probably already own anything that they offer that I might want to read. I have over $1500 credit at one used bookstore and no way to use it.

I would like to give the books away to people who might enjoy them but most of my friends are not readers. I know that there are internet sources to do that but haven't investigated them yet. I don't really want to swap books. I want to get rid of books that I don't want. I will admit that I have been throwing books that I don't want to keep in grocery bags and then throwing them in the trash when I'm tired of looking at the bags.

Now that I have a couple of blogs, I could hold contests. The problem is that the blogs focus on YA and kidlit and I already have a way to recycle those. I need to find and follow some blogs that cater to readers of adult books (by which I mean books not designed for children and adolescents rather than erotic books).

Any suggestions on ways to recycle the books that I don't want to keep on my shelves would be gratefully accepted. I hate throwing them in the trash but haven't found another way to get rid of them.