Friday reads

 

I’ve been really enjoying listening to audiobooks during my commute, and The Vacationers is my currently reading. 

The Posts go on a family vacation to Majorca, ostensibly for their 35th wedding anniversary and their daughter graduating from high school. Between the Posts, their son and his girlfriend, their daughter, and their friend and his husband, there are plenty of family secrets just dying to come out. Or just make everyone really awkward. 

So far, this is a pretty enjoyable read that I would describe as a beach read, though that probably doesn’t do it justice. It’s more literary than a beach read, but more beach-appropriate than your standard literary fare. 

Halfway through 2015! | Goal Check-In

We’re already halfway through 2015! Where does the time go? I checked in on my goals at the end of the first quarter in this post and now I’m back with significantly more progress.

I feel pretty good about my goals so far this year. I’ve made a lot of headway on the Read Harder Challenge compared to where I was in March and my general goals have stayed on track all year.

General Goals

Read 50 books

I have read 24 books so far this year, that I keep track of on my Goodreads page.

Read 20% diversely (includes LGBT, religious minorities, authors of color, and other marginalized identities)

Five books so far this year and I’m currently working on a sixth.  I’m on track, with about 21% diverse. Looking at my current TBR, it’s looking pretty hetersexual white people, so I need to keep pushing toward this goal.

Read six classics

I have read two classics this year (North and South and The Island of Dr. Moreau), which puts me a little bit behind where I’d like to be.

Take time for longer texts

I have read two, having recently finished The Secret History.

Read Harder Challenge

This challenge is put together by the folks at BookRiot, with the aim of reading from a wide variety of genres and author backgrounds. As of last check-in, I had checked off read an author of a different gender, read a book set in Asia, comic/graphic novel, a book in translation, a book by an LGBT author.

A collection of short stories – Almost Famous Women

Author from Africa – We Should All Be Feminists

YA – The Diviners

Audiobook – Beautiful Ruins

Published this year – Almost Famous Women

Sci-Fi – The Island of Dr. Moreau

Written by an author when they were under 25 – Purple Hibiscus (currently reading)

Guilty pleasure – Not That Kind of Girl

 

Summer reading | video

Suggestions for summer reading. Wishing you all beach days and hammock afternoon. 

Summer Reading and the Livin’ is Easy

After a three-month long reading slump, I have finally returned to voracious reading. At the risk of being self-indulgent and talking about myself and my feels instead of the various media this blog is about, I’m going to talk a little about winter and reading slumps.

I live in the midwest, one of the states where February is rarely above 5 degrees and winter stretches from early November to the middle of May. I’ve lived here the vast majority of my life, having moved in here in 1999 and only lived away for one year since, so it’s all I really know. I should be used to it. Winter didn’t used to be so bad, probably because I was a kid or I was always busy in school, but when I went to college winter hit me like a ton of bricks. (I have since found out about SAD and that I probably have it). I find myself hopelessly lethargic. I spend most of my time sitting on the couch, probably watching Netflix. My diet is poor, my class attendance likewise. I am filled with dread at the idea of going outside and feeling the sting on my face, seeing the gray sky and the bare trees and the sidewalks never quite cleared, ice and snow everywhere. Fuck whoever called it a “winter wonderland.”

But what is quite possibly the most upsetting part of winter is my yearly reading slump. I am a reader. Obviously, since I run both a blog and a YouTube channel largely devoted to books. It is a hobby, it is a form of meditation, it is a vital part of my identity. And every winter, it is wrenched from me and buried in the snow.

Now that it’s May, we have been consistently above 50 degrees every day. Last week was probably our last frost. The trees have bloomed and the SPF has come out. In the short break between graduating and starting my job, I have spent many hours at sidewalk cafes, on my apartment balcony, and on various parental decks and porches reading. I feel myself again, as I roast my skin in the sun, pushing my sunglasses up my slippery face to read just one more page.

I know winter will be here sooner rather than later and that my days in the sun are numbered. But for now, this feeling is enough.