Cephalopod & Goals - OCTOBER!

Once again it's time for those "end of month" blog hops I like to participate in. I already posted for Write ... Edit ... Publish, and if you want to check that out, click HERE. But I also need to post for the Cephalopod Coffeehouse Book Club, and the monthly Do You Have Goals? hop.

So here goes.

This month I read more than one great book, and while I was tempted to choose If I Stay as my "book of the month", I opted for this one instead:

I can finally say, "I've read this book!" ... and it's about time! I first read an Isobelle Carmody book after my mum bought me book #1 of the Legendsong back in the late '90s. I LOVED it, and I know I'm not here to talk about Legendsong, but the point I'm making is that Legendsong #1 came out in 1998 or so, and yet it's taken until October 2014 for me to finally pick up my first Obernewtyn book. 

Now that we've got that intro out of the way, I will say that the writing in Obernewtyn #1 did strike me as quite 'young', likely because Carmody was in high school when she wrote the book. I'm interested in finding out how her writing did or did not change across later books, as she grew into an adult. I already know they got increasingly fatter, because while book #1 is very slender, some of the later books are literal tomes.

Despite the 'young'ness of this first episode, I greatly enjoyed it. It's an intriguing world I've entered into, a post-apocalyptic world in which magic is feared, and those in charge try their very best to stamp it out. Those figures of authority are fighting a losing battle, though, because more and more people are being born as "mutant" magic users, rather than the population of freaks getting less as they'd hoped would happen. And some of those 'freaks' are getting sick of living under the oppression their kind has endured for centuries. 

I look forward to learning more about the world of Obernewtyn as I read on with this series.

Last month I shared a picture of my beautiful temp foster kitty George, who is still with me. He's still pretty naughty, and very exasperating, but he's just as cute as he was a month ago. So he's lucky about that. ;) Still, he's one of the reasons I'm still a slacker.

So, yeah, goals? Ummm, I've done a tiny bit of revision work since last month, but nothing much to write home about. And guess what? Tomorrow, NaNoWriMo starts!

In sort of related news that isn't really related, I've almost finished reading Stephen King's On Writing, which has made me realise that there's no need to entirely abandon my pantser ways. ;) Being a pantser is no crime, my friends. If it's good enough for Stephen King, it's good enough for me. Ha!

Seriously though, I suck at editing this year.

Better luck next year, perhaps!

(I think On Writing gave me some thoughts there as well about how better to approach my editing tasks in future. But I'll talk about that some other day)

For now, I'm going to sign off on this note:

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! :)

A to Z ~ Keeping Place, the

This year my A to Z theme harks back to 2012's theme, in which I listed an A-to-Z of books from my GoodReads "TBR" shelf. This year I want to revisit that list and report on which ones I've read, and what rating I gave them. Where the book hasn't been read, I'll mention other books starting with that letter I have read since 2012. ;)

"K" ... THE KEEPING PLACE
Status: Not Read

"K" books I have read:

Knee Deep - Jolene Perry. 4 stars.
Knight & Play (Knight, #1) - Kitty French. 3 stars.

Some other "K" books still on my TBR:

Keeping Mum - Alyse Carlson.
Kick - John L. Monk.
Kinetic (Luminaries, #1) - S.K. Anthony.
Kite Runner, the - Khaled Hosseini.

A-Z ... THE KEEPING PLACE

For the A-Z challenge of 2012, I'm posting an A-Z list of books I want to read, inspired by my GoodReads "to read" list (which is rather long). For my K book, I've chosen a book in an epic (and not yet finished) fantasy series by one of my favourite Australian authors:

---

K

The Keeping Place (The Obernewtyn Chronicles #4) - Isobelle Carmody

When a Misfit is kidnapped, Elspeth finds she has little choice but to join the growing rebellion against the Council. Her extraordinary mental powers could tip the scales of the struggle, but Elspeth feels torn between toppling the corrupt authoritarian regime and seeking clues vital to a more personal quest—her ambition to destroy what remains of the Beforetime weaponmachines

Why do I want to read it? In truth, I have to read a few of her other books first (i.e. ALL the books prior to this one in this series), but I've wanted to for years and...I will!

Books read so far in 2011

So far in 2011, I've finished reading the following books:

Currently I'm reading this:

And who knows what I'll read next?! I have an entire shelf on my "to be read before I read anything else" shelf. And then I have most of another bookcase full of books - my "to be read at some point" collection. Just a note before I post this...I've definitely added a few titles to my "favourites" shelf at GoodReads this year. And you can see my reviews of all these titles on GoodReads (some are more extensive than others). As for non-spoiler reviews, I wrote about "Grotesque" and "The Brutal Art" in this blog.

Reading...it's all I do

I guess I can be thankful I'm still well on track with at least one of my 2011 Goals - reading!

2011 Reading Challenge

Trisha has read 20 books toward her goal of 25 books.

20 of 25 (80%)

Just finished reading Cat Dreamer by Isobelle Carmody, and now I'm onto another relatively short book, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. I'm at page 32 and loving it so far. I had to choose short books as when June starts it's time for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. Also June is when BuNoWriMo starts. It has a Facebook group page now - check it out!

I'm thinking that it'll be fun to give over with revisions for a time and indulge in a major writing fest instead. It's been too long since I just wrote and wrote with no care about what was to come later (revisions, argh!). Maybe after I've done BuNoWriMo, I'll be more invigorated and refreshed when thinking about revisions.

I have done a bit more on NAUSICAA revisions, but not much. I'm also wanting to get back to SUNDOWN, but I think I need to give it more of a rest. I have chapters 1-16 up on ElitistCritiques, and if I can get more feedback on those then I'll be able to go from there. I haven't done the print-out yet of course, since I haven't finished that "latest round of revisions" I mention in my Goals list.

How are you guys going with your goals right now??

Another confession (I'm a slacker)

Today is Monday, and for me this particular Monday follows a weekend full of absolutely nothing at all. Well okay, nothing in relation to revisions. Instead, I had a "date" on Friday night, spent most of Saturday adding all my CDs to a "rate your music" website (I have a lot more CDs than I thought, as it turns out!!), then on Sunday I caught up with the girls for snacks, coffee and a movie (we saw Water for Elephants - very cute movie).

So yeah, I'm a slacker. I've really fallen off the revision bandwagon. And oops, I have a Chrysalis story pick to do today. Better get on that... Speaking of Chrysalis, I've slacked off there too. Usually I will get around to every participant's blog and read their stories, but I haven't done that in a couple of weeks. I'm wondering if I burned myself out on all this stuff in general! Hehe.

On another note, my fellow Chrysalis ladies and I are plotting something special for July - relating to JulNoWriMo but not relating to actual novel-writing, more like novel planning. It's going to be open to anyone who wants to participate. The details are not yet entirely figured out, but we'll get there. It'll be nice to have a break from short stories & get onto something different for a month.

I did get one thing done over this weekend though (other than my hair on Saturday) - and that was finishing another book. I read Mother Love, and you can see my (spoiler-riddled) review here. Now I'm onto reading Isobelle Carmody's Cat Dreamer, which is part of The Quentaris Chronicles that various authors write stories for. I'm just past page 50, and so far I like it!



So anyway, that's my current status...and I also haven't read any blogs over the weekend. So I need to get on that. But first thing's first - Chrysalis!

My TBR list

I thought I'd list a few of the books on my to-be-read list, just out of interest's sake. GoodReads will tell you I have 129 books on that list, but those are only the ones I've bothered to add yet. I went through and added all the books on my "to be read before any other books" shelf - yep, I have an entire shelf devoted to this. But there is almost a full bookcase of "books to be read after the first books I am going to read". ;)

So the ones I added to the list last night (as well as some that have been on the list since 2009...) are:

1. Mercy - Picoult, Jodi
2. The Complete Fairy Tales - Grimm, Brothers
3. The Earthsea Quartet (The Earthsea Cycle, Books 1-4) - Guin, Ursula K. Le
4. Farmers and Mercenaries - Drake, Maxwell Alexander *
5. Phantom Waltz (Kendrick/Coulter, #2) - Anderson, Catherine
6. Trace (Kay Scarpetta, #13) - Cornwell, Patricia
7. Of Mice and Men - Steinbeck, John
8. Shakespeare's Sonnets - Shakespeare, William
9. The Picture of Dorian Gray - Wilde, Oscar
10. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Other Stories - Stevenson, Robert Louis
11. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Twain, Mark
12. The Anatomy of Wings - Foxlee, Karen
13. Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You - Gosling, Sam *
14. The Importance of Being Earnest - Wilde, Oscar
15. Bleeding Violet - Reeves, Dia *
16. Colour, the - Tremain, Rose
17. The Pilot's Wife - Shreve, Anita
18. The Crimson Portrait - Shields, Jody
19. Love and the Platypus - Drayson, Nicholas
20. Bear is Now Asleep - Verity, William
21. Spiral (Book 2) - Suzuki, Koji
22. Ring (Book 1) - Suzuki, Koji
23. Hollywood Wives - Collins, Jackie
24. Audrey, Wait! - Benway, Robin
25. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass - Carroll, Lewis
26. On Writing - King, Stephen
27. War and Peace - Tolstoy, Leo
28. The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure - Goldman, William
29. Fortune's Rocks - Shreve, Anita
30. Mutiny on the Bounty - Nordhoff, Charles Bernard
31. Break No Bones (Temperance Brennan, #9) - Reichs, Kathy
32. Second Glance - Picoult, Jodi
33. The Pact - Picoult, Jodi
34. Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha - Doyle, Roddy
35. The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary - Winchester, Simon
36. Blinking with Fists - Corgan, Billy
37. Cat Dreamer - Carmody, Isobelle
38. Lord Minimus: The Extraordinary Life of Britain's Smallest Man - Page, Nick
39. The Distant Land of My Father - Caldwell, Bo

I'm pretty sure all or most of these are on my "TBR immediately" shelf. ;) Of course, the Alice in Wonderland book may well be bumped to the top, if I reach June by the time I get to my next book. That's what we're reading for the A'vron Classic Book Club June session.

I also want to mention that I am finally the proud owner of some of Isobelle Carmody's Obernewtyn books - I found #4 and #5 in K-mart (I think it was K-mart...) for the major bonus price of $3 each!! So now I just have to order the other 3 books (I'm planning on Book Depository, which will be even cheaper what with their current 15% off by the end of May deal), and I'll have the whole set to date. I'm thinking I may have to wait till 2013 to see the third book of the Legendsong come out. Hey, what's another couple of years - already been waiting since 2002!!

So, basically I've got no shortage of books to read - and this isn't counting all the books I have yet to acquire, like the second Hex Hall book, the second Mortal Instruments book (which is actually in the mail headed my way right now), and other books.

And for a Goals update:

2011 Reading Challenge

Trisha has read 18 books toward her goal of 25 books.

18 of 25 (72%)