Category: updates

#ABookishHoliday Day 9: Book & Candy

~ EMM

 

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For the ninth day of #ABookishHoliday, I’m going a little retro. This is a book that my mom had when I was growing up. I remember paging through it and picking out ideas for my birthday parties as a kid. It’s a classic, as is the retro linoleum floor in our apartment’s kitchen. Even though they end result is an incredibly “busy” composition, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to showcase both of these, together. The “candy” here are actually cough drops. We don’t usually have any candy around the house, so I had to improvise.

#ABookishHoliday Day 8: #shelfie

~ EMM ~ 1 Comment

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It’s day eight of #ABookishHoliday and that means it’s time to let me take a shelfie.

These are my “favorites” shelves on my bookcase. The stack in the middle of the lower shelf are TBR books. But the rest represent some of my all time favorite books.

Other things you can see in this photo: the corner of my mini Star Wars poster, a geode bookend that my sister’s ex-boyfriend gave me for Christmas one year, my Queen of Shadows pre-order swag buttons, and my Funko Cheetara.

#ABookishHoliday Day 7: Books & Socks

~ EMM

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The theme for day seven of #ABookishHoliday is “books & socks.” I’m not really a “socks” person, so I struggled a bit with this assignment until I realized that stockings are basically socks. So, tonight’s picture is of our Christmas stockings, and the books I picked out to give my niece and nephew as part of their Christmas present this year. (They’re too young to read this blog, so I’m pretty sure I won’t be giving away any secrets by sharing this with you.)

#ABookishHoliday Day 6: Blue & White

~ EMM

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On the sixth day of #ABookishHoliday, for the “blue & white” theme, I give you a book of short stories that I have been slowly working my way through for over a year, and a Kindle book that my cousin just finished and LOVED. I purchased The Selection back in March, but haven’t had a chance to read it yet (because I gave myself too many reading projects this year). But, based on my cousin’s Goodread’s review, it’s moving to the top of my TBR.

#ABookishHoliday Day 5: Holiday Read

~ EMM

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On day five of #ABookishHoliday, to celebrate the “holiday read” theme, I bring you a sweet holiday romance that I just finished this week and the first Christmas present to arrive for me this year. In case you can’t tell from the photo, it’s a snitch locket that has a little clock inside. It’s a little bigger then I thought it would be, but it’s so pretty. Thanks, Santa Mom!

#ABookishHoliday Day 3: True Love

~ EMM

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It’s Day 3 of #ABookishHoliday and the theme is “true love.” As far as I’m concerned, in the world of books, no one writes about love as well as Rainbow Rowell. So, today’s photo is of my hardback copies of my two favorite books by her… along with a little coloring I’m doing with my fancy new markers.

#NaNoWriMo Wrap-up (TGIO!)

~ EMM ~ 3 Comments

NaNoWriMo 2015 is over. Phew. This one was a doozy. But I did it. I’m a “winner.”

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I finished the challenge. I “won” by the skin of my teeth in nearly the final hour, and only by including all my notes on backstory and future chapters, all of which I wrote in November, but aren’t actually part of the book. So, yeah… I resorted to a tiny bit of “cheating.”

The problem this year was that I fell behind almost immediately after I posted that mid-point check-in update where I was so excited because for once I wasn’t behind. Life got in the way and I was stuck at almost 31k for almost a week.

I did a frantic amount of writing over the Thanksgiving weekend, but we made a last minute decision to travel and visit family. So, I was distracted and stressed out. But I wrote anyway. I am too stubborn to fail.

The problem is that, just like the past two years, NaNoWriMo is over and my novel isn’t finished. The difference this year is that I’m not stopping until I write “the end” at the end of the last chapter. I’m all in and I’m going to finish it. I actually REALLY like my story this year, even though I think it’s going to need some serious tinkering to get it exactly right.

I’m on track for this story to be about 61k words, total. So, my current plan is to take some of the writing pressure off and commit to about 1k words per day until I finish it. At that rate I should be done by mid-December. Then I’ll be looking for some beta readers. So, if you’re interested, let me know.

On reading lists and book projects

~ EMM ~ 3 Comments

This year I gave myself way too many book projects, and now it’s December and I have a “guilt list” of books I need to finish before the end of this year. Not fun.

My list has eight books on it. Six of these are books I need to read to finish the Book Riot “Read Harder” challenge. The other two are books I need to read so that I can meet my “diverse books” goal of reading at least twelve books by non-American and/or non-white authors this year.

The thing is, I actually want to read (almost) all of those books. So, it’s not like I’m making myself read things that I don’t want to read. It’s just that there are so many books that I want to read MORE than those books.

When I was voting for the Goodreads Choice Award nominees, I realized that I’d only read a handful of the books nominated. Many of them were on my TBR, some of them I even owned, but I didn’t get to read them this year because I was so busy trying to check all the boxes on my various reading projects. This made me sad.

I was all set to do another reading challenge next year. I had this great idea planned and I’d already made a list. I wanted to read all the Hugo and Nebula best novel award winners from this century. But now I’m reconsidering. This “required reading” thing is making me grumpy. I don’t want to be grumpy. I don’t want reading to feel like work when I read (mostly) for fun.

So that’s it. I’m calling it. No reading projects in 2016. I’m not going to push it. I’m just going to read what I want, when I want to, and not worry about it.