Monday, March 2, 2015

March Madness 2015 Sign-Up

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A reading March Madness is much more my style than your traditional basketball March Madness! I'm a little late with this sign-up, but when I read Alysia's post yesterday, I knew it was the perfect read-a-thon to join for my last month before baby. Who knows if our little guy will be early, late, or right on time, but with a due date of April 23rd, March is definitely the last month I would consider joining any sort of blogging event like this. And I've been on a reading roll lately, so it'd be nice to keep it going a little longer. My reading choices often change depending on my mood, but here's what I have queued up at the moment:

Isn't Henry the cutest? A baby gift from my brother's
girlfriend, he's been on my nightstand since Christmas

Now that I actually look at them in a giant pile, this number of books looks slightly insane for one month, but I actually think I have a decent shot of reading them all. The bottom six are the remaining installments of the comic collection Y: The Last Man that I started last month. I flew through the first four, so I don't think the final six will be all that time-consuming either -- they are so addictingly good though, I might not want them to end!

Above those are the last two mysteries by Sara Blaedel that have been translated into English so far. I'm no mystery aficionado, but I was in the mood and decided to read The Forgotten Girls last month. It had been so long since I read a mystery, but I really liked it and promptly went back and read her first English translation Call Me Princess and borrowed Only One Life and Farewell to Freedom from the library. So far, Blaedel's books have also been fast, addicting reads for me.

Then we have Fiercombe Manor by Kate Riordan, a new release I've had my eye on and requested from the library (published as The Girl in the Photograph in the UK). I will likely read this one first because it has a shorter loan period.

Unremembered, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, and Paper Towns are for the next few months of book club. (And I grabbed Unremembered's sequel Unforgotten in case I want to continue with the series.) If I manage to read these three, I will have no reading schedules or deadlines to think about until the summer. YA books also tend to be faster reads, so I am hopeful I will be able to get ahead of the game.

Than I have two more short books from the library I couldn't resist borrowing. Forgotten Bookmarks just looks like a lot of fun. And Fables for Our Time and Famous Poems Illustrated by James Thurber is one I picked up after loving a short story of his I listened to as part of an audio collection.

Lastly, we have the doorstop that is Diana Gabaldon's Voyager, but that one I am already over 800 pages in, I just want to finish it! I'm still ahead of the game for Kay's Outlander Reading Challenge, but am anticipating a lull once the baby arrives, so I'll take as much of a headstart as I can get! It's also likely I will read something on audio while doing chores and things around the house, but I don't have anything picked out yet -- it will depend on what is available from my library when I get the opportunity to listen.

So, is 16+ books over-ambitious? Maybe. But considering that I read a total of 41 in January and February thanks to the types of books I've been in the mood for lately (comics, audio, & shorter books in general), I don't think it's terribly unrealistic. Whatever I manage to read, I'm planning to enjoy my last few weeks of quiet reading before the chaos of adjusting to life with a newborn begins!

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Are you joining any challenges or read-a-thons this month? What books do you have queued up to read next?

9 comments:

  1. Good luck with your read a thon! I loved The Coldest Girl in Coldtown and Paper Towns. Happy reading!

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    1. Thanks! Those two are for book club & I'm definitely looking forward to them -- haven't gotten to them this month yet, but definitely soon :)

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  2. Good luck and have fun with the readathon! Great stack there!!

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  3. Messed up my comment there - oops!

    The giant stack of books really intimidates me. Haha! Henry makes it a little more appealing though.

    Good luck with the readathon - it looks like you have a bunch of fun titles lined up.
    :-)
    Life’s Open Pages

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    1. Yea....I think I was a little overambitious with everything going on this month -- I've made decent headway though -- and looking back at the stack I seem to be working from the top and the bottom -- the middle got a little neglected -- though the month isn't over yet! And I do love little Henry -- I don't care if I'm a grownup -- I'm still a sucker for stuffed animals :)

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  4. So glad you are joining in the Madness too! Man that is a stack of books. WOW! Good luck and keep the pages turning.

    Have you picked a name yet?

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    1. I couldn't resist! Even though I lost my momentum a bit, this has still been a fun event. And that seems to be the question of the month LOL no name yet -- we're still working on it...I'm starting to think we're not going to be able to really decide until we meet our little guy :)

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  5. You got this!

    April 23 is just around the corner! Very exciting! My birthday is April 5. So obviously all amazing babies are born in April. ;)

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    1. There are so many April birthdays! We have a lot of friends and family also with April birthdays who are rooting for their date to be shared with the little guy, so definitely good month :)

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I'd love to hear what you think :)