My 2017 Book List

2016 Book List
2015 Book List
2014 Book List
2013 Book List
2012 Book List
2011 Book List

* readaloud with Bug
+ audiobook

Click on each month's name to see more info on my thoughts!

January
1:   The Nix by Nathan Hill (628 pages)
2:   The Wizard of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (189 pages)
3:   A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness (205 pages)
4:   Feverborn (Fever series) by Karen Marie Moning (433 pages)
5:   Study Hall of Justice (Super Hero Society series) by Derek Fridolfs* (175 pages)
6:   Feversong (Fever series) by Karen Marie Moning (501 pages)
7:   The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier+ (267 pages)
8:   The Little Book of Hygge:  The Danish Way to Live Well by Meik Wiking (240 pages)
9:   Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi (320 pages)
10: Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris+ (272 pages)
3,230 pages

February
11: Dr. Maniac Will See You Now (Goosebumps series) by R.L. Stine* (138 pages)
12: Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison+ (337 pages)
13: The First Four Years (Little House on the Prairie series) by Laura Ingalls Wilder (135 pages)
14: The Burning Page (The Invisible Library series) by Genevieve Cogman (356 pages)
15: Shelter by Jung Yun (336 pages)
16: Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok (307 pages)
17: The Marvelous Land of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (319 pages)
18: Boneshaker by Cherie Priest+ (416 pages)
19: Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson* (128 pages)
20: The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma+ (304 pages)
21: The Shack by William Paul Young (248 pages)
22: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty by James Thurber (32 pages)
23: The Book of Unknown Americans by Christina Henriquez+ (286 pages)
24: The Natural World of Winnie-the-Pooh by Kathryn Aalto (286 pages)
25: The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo* (268 pages)
26: Attack on Titan Volume 1 by Hajime Isayama (193 pages)
3,989 pages

March
27: Attack on Titan Volume 2 by Hajime Isayama (184 pages)
28: Attack on Titan Volume 3 by Hajime Isayama (208 pages)
29: Attack on Titan Volume 4 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
30: Attack on Titan Volume 5 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
31: On the Way Home by Laura Ingalls Wilder (101 pages)
32: Fort Solitude (Super Hero Society Series) by Derek Fridolfs* (176 pages)
33: Attack on Titan Volume 6 by Hajime Isayama (208 pages)
34: Attack on Titan Volume 7 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
35: Attack on Titan Volume 8 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
36: Attack on Titan Volume 9 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
37: Attack on Titan Volume 10 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
38: Trigg's Ozark Tour at Shawnee National Forest by Todd Carr (128 pages)
3,269 pages

April
39: Attack on Titan Volume 11 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
40: Henry and Ribsy by Beverly Cleary* (208 pages)
41: The 13-Story Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton* (256 pages)
42: Attack on Titan Volume 12 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
43: Attack on Titan Volume 13 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
44: Attack on Titan Volume 14 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
45: Attack on Titan Volume 15 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
46: Attack on Titan Volume 16 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
47: Attack on Titan Volume 17 by Hajime Isayama (192 pages)
48: The 26-Story Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton* (352 pages)
2,160 pages

May
49: Outlander by Diana Gabaldon (850 pages)
50: The 39-Story Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton* (352 pages)
51: The Host by Stephanie Meyer (620 pages)
52: Alex (Cold Fury Hockey series) by Sawyer Bennet (224 pages)
53: Ozma of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (182 pages)
54: Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (940 pages)
55: Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman (299 pages)
56: Gwendy's Button Box by Stephen King and Richard (175 pages)
57: Through the Woods by Emily Carroll (208 pages)
3,850 pages

June
58: Stuart Little by E.B. White* (131 pages)
59: Dave Ramsey's Complete Guide to Money by Dave Ramsey (330 pages)
60: The Line (Witching Savannah series) by J.D. Horn (296 pages)
61: The Shining by Stephen King (447 pages)+
62: Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen (251 pages)+
63: The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden (322 pages)
64: Beartown by Fredrik Backman (432 pages)
65: Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys (393 pages) 
66: Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente (352 pages)
67: The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton (224 pages)+
3,178 pages

July
68: Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie (256 pages)*
69: The 52-Story Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton (336 pages)*
70: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (1,273 pages)
71: Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (180 pages)
72: The 65-Story Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton (240 pages)*
73: The Beauty and the Beast by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve (208 pages)
2,493 pages

August
74: Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne (161 pages)
75: Fierce Kingdom by Gin Phillips (288 pages)
76: The Fifth Wave (The Fifth Wave series) by Rick Yancy (457 pages)
77: Hoot by Carl Hiaasen (292 pages)
78: The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford (145 pages)
79: Addison Cooke and the Treasure of the Incas by Jonathan W. Stokes (336 pages)
1,679 pages

September
80: Child Star: An Autobiography by Shirley Temple Black (546 pages)
81: The Infinite Sea (The Fifth Wave series) by Rick Yancy (300 pages)
82: Peony in Love by Lisa See (287 pages)
83: Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King (384 pages)
84: The Road to Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (181 pages)
85: The Last Star (The Fifth Wave series) by Rick Yancy (338 pages)
86: The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events) by Lemony Snickett (176 pages)+
87: Number the Stars by Lois Lawry (137 pages) +
88: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (449 pages)
2,798 pages

October
89: A Secret History of Witches by Louisa Morgan (496 pages)
90: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone: Illustrated Edition by JK Rowling (248 pages)*
91: The Emerald City of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (209 pages)
92: Crenshaw by Katherine Applegate (256 pages) +
93: Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Cleary (134 pages)*
94: All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater (320 pages)
95: The Tommyknockers by Stephen King (558 pages)
96: Stranger the Dreamer by Laini Taylor (538 pages) 
97: Miss Hickory by Carolyn Sherwin Bailey (120 pages)
98: Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Chronicles by Kate DiCamillo (233 pages)
99: The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (525 pages)
100: Ghostbusters Movie Novelization by Stacia Deutsch (144 pages)*
101: The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls (288 pages)
102: Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (352 pages)
103: Strider by Beverly Cleary (176 pages)*
4,741 pages

November
104: The Shadow Land by Elizabeth Kostova (478 pages)
105: Doctor Sleep by Stephen King (531 pages)
106: The Matchlock Gun by Walter D. Edmonds (80 pages)
107: The Princess Bride by William Goldman (450 pages)
108: Push by Sapphire (192 pages)
109: The Patchwork Girl of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (160 pages)
110: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain (225 pages)
111: A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (337 pages) +
112: Gerald's Game by Stephen King (332 pages)
113: Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco (326 pages)
114: The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman (369 pages)
115: The Dreadful Tale of Prosper Reading by Alexandra Bracken (362 pages)
116: Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan (448 pages)
117: The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (277 pages)
118: The Leavers by Lisa Ko (352 pages)
119: The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic by Leigh Bardugo (281 pages)
5,200 pages

December
120: Future Home of the Living God by Louise Erdrich (267 pages)
121: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee (513 pages)
122: Tik-Tok of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (182 pages)
123: The Scarecrow of Oz (Oz series) by L. Frank Baum (208 pages)
124: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng (304 pages)
125: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets: Illustrated Edition by JK Rowling (259 pages)*
126: The Disney Book by Jim Fanning (195 pages)
127: Strange Weather by Joe Hill (432 pages)

September 2017 Books

I made up for the lack of books in August and finished September with a grand total of nine books. I finished off the 5th Wave series, a couple of chunky books, and got back into listening to audiobooks in the car.

My favorite this month was surprisingly Little Women.  I started this book years ago and barely read a chapter because I just wasn't feeling it but this time around I could not stop reading it every spare chance I had. 

August 2017 Books

We went to Disney World in August and the older I get the harder it is for me to read in the car so my completed number really isn't all that great.  They were almost all kids books, too.  Oh well.  At least I read!

My favorite books this month were Fierce Kingdom by Gin Phillips and The 5th Wave by Rick Yancy.  The Yancy was a reread and I loved it even more the second time around.  The rest of the series isn't that great but this first one I just love. 

July 2017 Books

I only finished six books in the month of July which was one of my smaller months, BUT I did finally finish the monstrosity that is War and Peace.  FINALLY.  

I'd been working on this since the first of the year and it was a chore, not going to lie.  I finally just forced myself to read at least ten pages a day.  I figured ten pages isn't much but every little bit counts and I normally managed to do around 15 pages instead of 10.  Once I started that the book finally started to seem manageable.  It was a big day when I finished.

Those MinaLima classic editions of Peter Pan and The Beauty and the Beast are beautiful and they're interactive.  I love them. The books themselves are a little boring but everything is more fun with a pull-out or pop-up!

Random Things I've Loved Lately

It's been ages since I made a random post of things I'm loving so here's just a hodgepodge of pretty pictures and stuff I'm obsessed with lately.

I was introduced to Larabars back in January when I did my first 28 Day Reset round.  They're these snack bars that only have a few ingredients in them and they. are. amazing.  I buy them in bulk every time I go to the store.  Peanut Butter Cookie is just the best thing ever.  I savor them like a candy bar.  So, so good!

I worked my butt off during this last year.  Most days I was gone between 10 and 6 and there were quite a few days where I worked 7-6.  So I rewarded myself with a handful of Barnes and Noble orders.  There's nothing I like better than beautiful books.  Usually I buy for my girls or when it's for me I only order books I've read through the library and loved.  There's nothing I hate worse than spending $15-$20 on a book and hating it.  The MinaLima editions of classics are an exception.  I buy every one that comes out because it's not just the story I want to enjoy, it's the whole experience.  They are worth the money.  I already have the entire Harry Potter collection but I want to start reading them with Bug and I thought she would enjoy the illustrated versions so I'm going to slowly start to collect them, too.

If you have a Krispy Kreme near you then run, don't walk, and get there before the Cake Batter donuts are gone.  They are the best donut I've ever eaten and Goose can literally eat five in one sitting.  She's unstoppable when it comes to the Cake Batter flavor.  I love sitting at the table with a yummy donut and a hot cup of coffee and not moving for a while because there's a book in my lap. 

*sidenote- this book was horrible

I know this post is heavy on the books, but it's honestly because books are a huge part of my life.  I rarely leave the house without one because you never know when you need something to read.  Growing up my parents spoiled me with books.  They were so cheap and I read so much that pretty much every time we went to town I got a new one.  Wal-Mart came out with the Wizard of Oz paperbacks around the time I was in sixth grade and I eagerly started collecting them.  I never got them all but I had a decent amount that I absolutely loved.  Oz became my favorite fantasy world and over the years I've gone a little crazy in my collection.  I'm rereading the series now and trying to go slow with no more than one book a month but it's so hard!

June 2017 Books

There was a grand total of ten books I finished in June and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I managed to do.  My kitchen redo project was in full swing so I was listening to audiobooks almost every day this month and that helped out my count a lot.

My favorite book this month was Beartown.  Honestly the only reason I picked this one up was because the cover was so pretty and I went into it not really knowing anything about the plot.  It turned out to be so good that I read almost half of it in one morning. 

This wasn't the most exciting reading month but I'm glad I was able to knock out a lot of random books and that I was able to stick with the audiobooks for so long.  Usually I lose interest and stop downloading them after a couple of weeks.

May 2017 Books

May was a GREAT reading month for me.  Even though I didn't read very many books I managed to finish off several large books this month.  I go through spurts of "Eh, why read when I can watch TV?" and "WHO CARES ABOUT TELEVISION LET'S GO TO THE LIBRARY!" and this was a definite library month.  Six of these books were from there and I just appreciate the heck out of our library for taking such good care of us.

I enjoyed so many of these books!  My favorite was The Host by Stephanie Meyer.  It's my second time reading this book and I loved it even more than the first.  Say what you will about Meyer's Twilight series, this one is nothing at all like it. 

I FINALLY finished Anna Karenina after I downloaded the audiobook and listened to it while I worked on painting my kitchen.  I didn't love it but I did enjoy it a lot more than I had expected.

Stephen King has a new short story out and Gwendy's Button Box was a quick but enjoyable read.  He should stick with short stories because for the most part they are better than his doorstop novels.  Not as much rambling and just enough to creep you out and then leave you.

Outlander was a spur of the moment book decision for me and I'm glad I made it.  I've had it for a couple years now but never picked it up.  It definitely could have used an editor to shorten it by a couple hundred pages but the action started to pick up about halfway through and was a little easier to take.  It almost read like a Scottish fanfic.  I started the second book in the series but I think I'm one and done with the Outlander universe. 

I hope the rest of the summer is as good of a reading month as this one!

April 2017 Books

For some reason I didn't do a lot of reading in April.  School was starting to wind down but stress at my second job kept me too jittery to do much besides worry and get angry at everything near me.  I did do myself a favor and decide enough was enough with the Titan books though.  After 17 volumes I just couldn't deal with it anymore and I gave up.  I know this series is a lot of people's favorites but to me it was just a rehash of the same scenes over and over and I could read one book in about 30 minutes because there was so little dialogue. 

Bug and I finished a grand total of THREE books together this month!  She of course loved her Beverly Cleary (always a favorite in our home) and I discovered the 13-Story Treehouse books at our local library and picked the first one up for her.  She thought it was the greatest thing ever and begged me to get the next one as soon as we had finished it.  I think they're a little cheesy but they're not aimed at my age group so my opinion doesn't matter as much as hers.  Bug just thought they were hilarious. 

March 2017 Books

March was my month of Titan books.  I read nine of them and not much else.

This series is not one I would honestly recommend to anyone wishing to start in this genre.  Death Note was so much better and easier to follow.  Attack on Titan is heavy on the pictures but not on the plot and it really started to drag for me by the end of this month.

Bug and I read the second book in the Secret Hero Society series and she absolutely loved it.  She's a huge DC universe fan and she was so excited when she recognized random characters that you don't see very often.

A woman at work loaned me a book about the Shawnee National Forest and I will say that be default it was my favorite this month.  I loved seeing old views of some of the places I enjoy going to and how they've changed over the years.  It was an interesting read.

February 2017 Books

My reading slump was OVER this month and I am incredibly thankful.  I read quite a few great books and it was so nice because I was really worried I was going to repeat 2016 and just go through the motions with reading bleh books.  I read SIXTEEN books in February and ended with a total of almost 4,000 pages of books!

I listened to several audiobooks in February and read a few smaller books which is why my count is so high.  My number one pick this month was Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok.  I love books centered around Asian characters and this one was so moving and sad that I could not put it down.
There were a few meh picks this month.  I really didn't care about the children's books I picked up.  Attack on Titan was a new manga series I started during this month which was another not very good choice for me.

2017 Reading Goals

Well I didn't do very well for my 2016 goals even though I read a lot of books.  I always start out with such high hopes on what and how I am going to read and just never follow through because I"m such a mood reader.  I can made TBR piles for days and still pick up something that I just think looks pretty. 

For 2017 my number one most important book goal is to read War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (finally).  I have this beautiful edition and I like that even though it's a large sized book there are a lot of words for each page so it seems like I'm flying through it.  My goal was to read it in two months but it's so dense that I think I am just going to aim to do at least 100 pages a month and if it takes me a year, it takes me a year.

I'm going to be trying for two reading challenges this year to branch out and try new books.  The first is the challenge from Popsugar which gives you a weekly theme and a few extras just for fun.  I already know of a few books that I want to read that fit the theme so I'm excited to get started.

One thing I noticed while looking over my 2016 book list was that I am slowly moving away from YA, something I'm happy about.  I always gravitate to it as a fallback when I have nothing else to read because they're usually short and have the prettiest cover, but I'm proud that I read a lot of 'adult' novels last year.

January 2017 Books

I started War and Peace at the beginning of January and was doing great with it, zooming along past my weekly goal and then BOOM. Reading slump. I didn't pick up another book for over a week and War and Peace has sat on my table this whole time being lonely.

Once I finally started reading again I plowed through a grand total of TEN books which blew my mind since I took so much time off.  I finished four books in less than 24 hours one weekend (I told you, I like to have something to do while I clean).

I didn't really have a stand-out favorite this month but The Nix by Nathan Hill was the book that brought me out of my reading slump so I'm going to give the honors to it.  It's a huge book but I was enjoying it so much that I finished it in just a few days. 

The best part about this month was that I discovered I enjoy audiobooks again after growing sick of them last year.  I finished two during January just by listening to them on my drive to and from work and when I cleaned.  Listening to them on fast speed  also helped.

My Favorite Books of 2016

I finished strong this year with 114 books and even though it wasn't my highest book count year it is still a good amount considering I started working 8 hour days in September.

Even though I think I read more clunkers than keepers this year there were still a good amount of books I loved and want to reread sometime down the road.

Joe Hill was my breakout star author of the year and I loved both of the books by him that I read.  NOS4A2 and The Fireman blew me away and I recommend them to everyone.  I enjoyed The Fireman slightly more than NOS4A2 but only because I liked that it wasn't as horror-like as I would have expected from Stephen King's son.

Speaking of Stephen King, if you haven't read 11/22/63 then you are doing yourself a disservice.  King is so hit or miss with me.  I either love him or am so over him, but this book was fantastic.  Again, I think maybe because it wasn't a standard King horror novel.  I read 90% of my books through the library and I loved this one so much I went out and bought it.

I made my way through almost all of the Little House on the Prairie books this year and even though a few were boring, overall I think it's such a sweet, wholesome series.  Yeah, Ma is a racist and Pa is a loser, but if you try to overlook the strides we have taken and just read it as a testament of its time then it's a great series for young children to enjoy.  I love Almanzo the most and always enjoyed his scenes in the books.

And if you are looking for another wholesome set of books to read to your kids then please go out and buy all of Beverly Cleary's books.  Bug and I read them like crazy this year and we only have a few left, a fact she is so sad about.  She has loved every single one of them and always begged for "one more chapter" each night.

I can't wait to see what 2017 has in store for me book-wise!

My Least Favorite Books of 2016

I read A LOT of books I disliked this year.  I don't know if the older I get the more cantankerous I become but books take a lot to get more than three stars from me nowadays. 

The first book I disliked this year was Watership Down.  I'm sorry, I know that's a lot of people's favorite.  It was a long, hard read for me and one I was happy to unhaul when I finished it.

A series that Bug and I read together this year was the entirety of The Chronicles of Narnia series and we both hated every page of it.  She slightly enjoyed The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, but only because she loves the movie so she was able to understand what was happening pretty easy.  It was so preachy and cringe-worthy and I ended up finished the last couple of chapters of the last book by myself because she was just so over it.

The Prince by Machiavelli was one of the shortest books I read this year and also one of the most boring.  I honestly didn't understand any of it.  Not one sentence. 

Bug was really looking forward to The BFG movie and I wanted to read the book before I saw it so I checked it out of our library and man, am I glad I didn't pay for that book.  Bug normally likes Roald Dahl books and even she hated this one.  It almost felt like it talked down to us, like we were too stupid to understand it was a nonsensical book.  Big letdown.

Let's talk about my number one most hated book of 2016.  I'm sure it will come as a surprise to a lot of big book lovers because most people raved about this book this year.  A Little Life by Hanye Yanagihara.  I.  Hated.  This.  Book.  I literally threw it down when I finished and ranted to my husband for about thirty minutes about how revolting it was.  If ever there was a Mary Sue character to have existed it is Jude.  God, I could wax poetically all the ways this book pissed me off for at least an hour.

Just goes to show that just because a book wins awards doesn't mean it's any good.

My 2016 Book List

2015 Book List
2014 Book List
2013 Book List
2012 Book List
2011 Book List

To see my individual month reviews just click on the month titles.

*denotes a readaloud with my daughter


January
1:  The Wanderer by Sharon Creech
2:  Watership Down by Richard Adams
3:  Socks by Beverly Cleary*
4:  The Magician's Nephew (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
5:  A Feast for Crows (A Song of Ice and Fire series) by George R.R. Martin
6:  The Reader by Bernard
7:  11/22/63 by Stephen King
8:  Feverborn (Fever series) by Karen Marie Moning
9:  The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

February
10:  The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
11:  My Friend Flicka by Mary O'Hara
12:  Iqbal by Francesco D'Adamo
13:  The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
14:  Tricky Twenty-Two (Stephanie Plum series) by Janet Evanovich
15:  Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling
16:  The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
17:  Six of Crows (Six of Crows series) by Leigh Bardugo


March
18:  Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley and Me, Elizabeth by E.L. Konisburg
19:  Texts from Jane Eyre by Mallory Ortberg
20:  The Horse and His Boy (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
21:  Red Winter by Dan Smith
22:  Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder
23:  Prince Caspian (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis
24:  Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte 

April
25:  The Bronte Sisters:  The Brief Lives of Charlotte, Emily, and Anne by Catherine Reef
26:  Enchanted Air:  Two Cultures, Two Wings:  A Memoir by Margarita Engle
27:  Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera
28:  Hatchet by Gary Paulson
29:  Ribsy by Beverly Cleary*
30:  Witches!  The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem by Rosalyn Schanzer
31:  Twenty Years After (The D'Artagnan Romances) by Alexandre Dumas
32:  Mr. Mercedes (The Bill Hodges Trilogy) by Stephen King

May
33:  The Raven King (The Raven Cycle series) by Maggie Stiefvater
34:  The Field Guide (The Spiderwick Chronicles series) by Holly Black
35:  The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
36:  The BFG by Roald Dahl
37:  Broadchurch by Erin Kelly
38:  The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary*

June
39:  The Seeing Stone (The Spiderwick Chronicles series) by Holly Black*
40:  The Fireman by Joe Hill
41:  Emily's Runaway Imagination by Beverly Cleary*
42:  Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library by Chris Grabenstein
43:  Dear Hank Williams by Kimberly Willis Holt
44:  Lucinda's Secret (The Spiderwick Chronicles series) by Holly Black*
45:  El Deafo by Cece Bell
46:  The Invisible Library (The Invisible Library series) by Genevieve Cogman
47:  A Dance With Dragons (A Song of Ice and Fire series) by George R.R. Martin
48:  Honor Girl by Maggie Thrash
49:  The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen
50:  Ironwood Tree (The Spiderwick Chronicles series) by Holly Black*

July
51:  The Wrath of Mulgarath (The Spiderwick Chronicles series) by Holly Black*
52:  Paper and Fire (The Great Library series) by Rachel Caine
53:  The Journey (The Guardians of Ga'Hoole series) by Kathryn Laskey*
54:  Rome (Marked Men series) by Jay
55:  A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab
56:  On the Banks of Plum Creek by Laura Ingalls Wilder
57:  Sarah, Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan
58:  A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
59:  A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
60:  The Silver Chair (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
61:  The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne
62:  Jacob Have I loved by Catherine Paterson
63:  The Bad Seed by William March
64:  Pretty Ugly by Kirker Butler
65:  Prisoner of Night and Fog by Anne Blankman
66:  Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow


August
67:  The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary*
68:  A Gathering of Shadows by V.E. Schwab
69:  Star Wars:  Maul:  Lockdown by Joe Schrieber
70:  NOS4A2 by Joe Hill
71:  How the Post Office Created America:  A History by Winifred Gallagher
72:  Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
73:  The Bourbon Kings by J.R. Ward
74:  Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by Anonymous
75:  The Last Battle (Chronicles of Narnia series) by C.S. Lewis*
76:  Ollie's Odyssey by William Joyce
77:  Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
78:  Suicide Squad Movie Novelization by Marv Wolfman
 

September
79:  By the Shores of Silver Lake (Little House on the Prairie series) by Laura Ingalls Wilder
80:  The Secret Tree by Natalie Strandiford*
81:  Cousin Phillis by Elizabeth Gaskell
82:  O Pioneers! by Willa Cather
83:  A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
84:  The Masked City (The Invisible Library series) by Genevieve Cogman
85:  Macbeth by William Shakespeare
86:  The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling*
87:  The Wonder by Emma Donaghue
88:  After Dark by Haruki Murakami

October
89:  Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruku Murakami
90:  Secrets of a Charmed Life by Susan Meissner
91:  Ellen Tebbits by Beverly Cleary*
92:  This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper
93:  Runaway Ralph by Beverly Cleary*
94:  Six of Crows (Six of Crows series) by Leigh Bardugo
95:  The Vegetarian by Han Kang
96:  The Long Winter (Little House on the Prairie series) by Laura Ingalls Wilder
97:  Henry and Beezus by Beverly Cleary*

November
98:    Crooked Kingdom (Six of Crows series) by Leigh Bardugo
99:    Little Town on the Prairie (Little House on the Prairie series) by Laura Ingalls Wilder
100:  Lafayette in the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell
101:  Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood
102:  Curious Minds (Knight and Moon series) by Janet Evanovich
103:  From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg*
104:  Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
105:  Twilight by Stephenie Meyer
106:  A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (The Tales of Dunk and Egg) by George R.R. Martin
107:  The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman
108:  The Big Wave by Pearl S. Buck
109: Henry Huggins by Beverly Cleary*

December
110:  These Happy Golden Years (Little House on the Prairie series) by Laura Ingalls Wilder
111:  Matilda by Roald Dahl*
112:  Turbo Twenty-Three (Stephanie Plum series) by Janet Evanovich
113:  Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
114:  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
115:  The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson*

My December Book Pile

Even though I had a week and a half off for Christmas break this month I wasn't able to get much reading done.  I'm not sure what happened but I just wasn't feeling books for the first few weeks of December.  I still managed to finish six and it pushed me to a grand total of 115 books for 2016!  Nothing to sniff about!

This month I did four books on my own and two readalouds with Bug.  Matilda took us foreverrr to get through and I don't know why because she actually really liked it.  We just had tough like finding reading time together to do it.  After we finished she immediately started the movie and has already watched it twice.  The Great Gilly Hopkins on the other hand took us just a few days to read.  She made me read 50 pages of it in one sitting because she loved it so much.

I really wanted to have all of my in-progress books finished by the new year so I took the last few days of the month to buckle down and finish everything up.  Wuthering Heights and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn were my final books of the year and they weren't anything special which is upsetting.  I was hoping to end on a high note.  On the bright side, that's two big classics I can cross off my list of books I wanted to read.

My favorite book this month I guess is the Little House book by default.  Just because nothing else really blew me away. :/

My November Book Pile

This was a GREAT reading month for me.  I don't know what it was but I just felt like reading every spare second I had.  I even did one big readathon weekend and got through a few books off my pile.

I cleaned out my bookcase and donated several bags of unwanted books and I found a couple of teeny tiny books that I thought I could knock out really quickly so that helped my total, too.

My favorite this month was Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo.  I wasn't a huge fan of Six of Crows but I absolutely LOVED Crooked Kingdom.  I could not put it down.

There were several least favorites this month but by far the worst was Lafayette in the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell.  I listened to an audiobook of this one and finally had to end it a few chapters from the end because the author narrated it and her voice was about to make me go insane.

December is already proving to be a busy busy month for us so I doubt I will have this good of a pile going.  Oh well, here's to 2017!

My Weekend Readathon

I had a three day weekend and decided to spend it doing as much reading as I possibly could.  It was my own little three day readathon.

I went the library and got myself a giant stack of books to pick through.

By the end of my three day break I had finished four books (three of mine and one chapter book with Bug) and started the two on the right.

Yes, yes Twilight is trash.  I still love it.  Sue me.

I love weekends where you have absolutely nothing planned and all you need are a good book and a hot cup of coffee to be happy.

My October Book Pile

I once again worked eight hour days all week so I was only able to read during my breakfast time or at night if I forced myself to stay up late.  Work hours stink for my reading but are great for our grocery budget!

I read six books on my own this month and three chaptered books with my Bug.  We normally average one and a half books per month but she just LOVES Beverly Cleary and wanted me to read more and more each day.  I ended up reading one book to her for an entire hour at the kitchen table one night.  She's going to be so disappointed when we finish all of the Cleary collection (and we are getting pretty close to it!)


My favorite this month was This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper. I watched the movie a while back and liked it so much that I immediately put the book on my TBR list so I could read and rewatch it again. 

My least favorite was probably The Vegetarian by Han King because the translation was so jumpy and I hated every single character in it.  I am so glad it was a short book.

I reread Six of Crows because the last time I read it I was just eh about it and wanted to give it another chance before reading Crooked Kingdom.  Happily, it went a lot quicker the second time around.

My September Book Pile

My work schedule went from three hours a day to eight hours a day in the beginning of September so I was very lucky to have been almost finished with several books.  That helped boost up my book count a bit this month.

My favorite this month was probably After Dark by Haruki Murakami and A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay. They were both spur of the moment picks that I had zero desire to read until I saw them but I'm really glad I did.
I actually had a pretty good reading month quality-wise.  I loved The Wonder by Emma Donoghue, The Masked City by Genevieve Cogman and the Little House book.
My version of The Jungle Book was the beautiful MinaLima version with tons of amazing pull-outs and fun things to explore.  Bug and I loved it.