Lay On For Reading!

This week I rested my eyeballs a bit after the fun of the reading challenge last weekend. My nephew came in from out of town and we held our annual Boffer Party, which involves running around and whacking each other with padded swords. I got to use the bow and arrow and even managed to hit some people, which is unusual and fun.

I finished a few books, but clearly nothing like last week:

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• Something To Hold, Katherine Schlick Noe. I picked it up because the setting was Oregon, but I'm glad I read it even though I finished a different Oregon book a few weeks ago.
• The Ultimates 2 (Vol 2), Mark Miller. To honor the Avengers.
• An Accidental Goddess, Linnea Sinclair. Because I didn't like her other book.
• Icefall, Matthew J. Kirby. My favorite book this week.

I also went through two apology poem books, Joyce Sidman's This Is Just to Say and Gail Levine's Forgive Me, I Meant to Do It, both based on William Carlos William's plum apology poem. I much preferred Levine's take on this, which was frankly non-apologetic and a lot of fun, while I found Sidman's fake children rather treacly. Also, I find that poetry gets weak if the author cuts a lot of corners (a sonnet with eight lines, or a limerick that doesn't rhyme, for example), and Sidman in her persona as a bunch of kids lets them slack off.

What am I still reading? At least I have actually been reading most of them, even if not productively. TBR books are from my To Be Read list, and RML books are Reading My Library picks. Fourteen books aren't as bad as it seems; five of them are in my reading bag, two on my NOOK, two audio books for the car, and the rest I just dabble at.

• Willie Mays, The Life, The Legend, James S. Hirsch. TBR He's up in the major leagues now.
• Infamous Scribblers, Eric Burns. TBR Wow, I hadn't known about the Hamilton sex scandals.
• The Clockwork Three, Matthew Kirby. RML. I'm glad the fiddler got a square meal.
• The Otherworldies, Jennifer Kogler. RML. The girl on the cover is about five years older than the girl in the story, which I guess balances last week's Galactarian Legacy, which reversed the problem.
• The Dark Knight Returns, Frank Miller. Must steal this back from seventh grader.
• Paper Covers Rock, Jenny Hubbard. NOOK. I'm a bit tired of boarding school boys after 100 pages.
• Phoenix In Flight, Sherwood Smith & Dave Trowbridge. NOOK I won the sequel (I'm so lucky!) so I bought the first.
• Smart But Scattered, Peg Dawson & Richard Guare.  I lost this, ironically enough, but now it's found again.
• Honored Enemy, Raymond Feist & William R Forstchen.  Ignored this week.
• Knight of a Trillion Stars, Dara Joy. Also ignored.
• The Catholic Church in the Modern World, E.E.Y. Hales. Untouched.
• Close Range: Wyoming Stories, Annie Proulx. If I keep putting this down after each break, it will take me years to read this.
• The Penderwicks at Point Mouette, Jeanne Birdsall. Audio. Marshmallow roasting.
• The Ring of Solomon, Jonathan Stroud. Audio. With 7th grader. CD 2. We do love the narrator.

I'll go sign in on the update posts that Book Journey does, where everyone notes what they read, are reading, and intent to read. Teach Mentor Texts echos this with a concentration on children's books, and I mentioned the two poetry books just for them.

What will I read next? I need to clear out my library shelf so I can attempt to read a book off my to-read bookcase every day this summer vacation, which starts on Friday. I plan to concentrate on the kidlit shelf to make this feasible. This means some ancient books as well as the leftover Best of the Best books.

Challenges:

1. Cybils: 61/73. I loved Icefall.
2. Global Reading Challenge: 13/21. No change.
3. Where Am I Reading?:  23/50. Need to review Vermont, Montana, Mississippi, Massachusetts, and Louisiana. I also read a Washington D.C. book.
4. Science Book Challenge: 1.141/3.14159. No change, but a qualified book is out from the library. I haven't read it yet, though I did read a few nonfiction books.
5. Reading My Library:  I'm reading two right now. On Ks, with an M in waiting.
6. Eclectic Challenge: 10/12. Need to review 3, though.
7. Best of the Best: 25/25. I'm almost done with #26. I think I'll just keep going, only in a less rushed way.