My 2014 Wrap Up

What a crazy year this has been. Have I mentioned that I am tired of crazy? My one ULTIMATE resolution for 2015 is to find a job teaching at another school - but the resolution post will come tomorrow (when I have thought of more things besides 'get another job'). This post is about what I read this year.

2014 Reading Challenge

Pan has completed her goal of reading 50 books in 2014!

76 of 50 (100%)
view books


OK. So according to Goodreads, I got through 76 books or 28668 pages! Shew! With my work schedule, I don't know how I did that!

There were two reading challenges that I had. The first was to read 30 books for the year (I was thinking one a week not including November (Nano), or the majority of the second and forth terms at school as I have ALL the English exams to set (16 in total) and sleeping is the only thing I plan to do when I am not working my 20 hours a day (no exaggeration there - see why I want another job?)). This challenge was met, raised to 50 and met again then surpassed. Yay!

My second challenge was less of an official challenge for me, but an incentive to try new things. It was the book alphabet challenge. It got me to read The Virgin Suicides by Jeffery Eugenides (would you believe that my thoughts are still out on that one) and The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. I came close to actually finishing the challenge, but my TBR pile is short of books starting with J, Q, X and Z. But I think four short is not bad, considering the letters that were left (if I had another week, I would have got Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton).

This is the 3rd book in the Night
 Angel series and the one with
super stalking powers.

I had some great experiences reading this year. I discovered Brent Weeks and decided to give him a go. (Actually, his books were stalking me for months, and I decided to give them a go as a result.) I really enjoyed his Night Angel trilogy. It is high adult fantasy with plot twists and turns, but without the grim, gory details of GRR Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series. Talking about GRR Martin, I suppose I should mention the low point in the reading year: Book 5 - A Dance with Dragons was such a disappointment. You can check out my review of it here.

Other great reading experiences happened too. I read a load of Neil Gaiman, and that can only ever please. I think he is fast becoming my favourite author. I discovered Cinda Williams Chima's Seven Realms series and breezed through those with delight (my first ever blog post was a review of this! You can read it here if you are curious.). Patrick Ness's Chaos Walking trilogy was also a HUGE hit for me. I read this during the BookTube-a-thon. It was brilliant. I read some classics and thoroughly loved them. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (Oops! Just discovered that I wrote the review of this and never posted it!) and Brave New World by Albert Huxley come to mind here. I love it when books make you think about them months or weeks after the fact.

My TBR pile is still at a reasonable number. It did go through a moment  where it threatened to grow out of proportion when I got over stressed and needed to feel better (which means I spend a lot of time in book shops) but I got both it and myself under control in time. I have not totalled it recently - in fact I reorganised my book cases again and just put them where they are supposed to be so that I don't look at a pile of books that was starting to sway and threatening to fall. I am not worried about it though. I read from my TBR pile all the time. Since I can remember, I have always had a fairly healthy TBR pile and have liked it that way. Then, when I am in the mood for "insert genre here", I have something to read. I am looking forward to 2015's reading. My TBR pile is awesome and should keep me happy for months. It has a combination of classics, award winning books, light fluffy reading, more light fluffy reading, adult contemporary, middle grade and crime - to name a few.

Well, that was the 2014 brief wrap up. I apologise to all the books I loved that I didn't mention. (I didn't want my post to look like a novel.)

The Diviners by Libba Bray

I really enjoyed this one. Libba Bray can build suspense and maintain it! If you happen to be in the mood for a well-written piece of light reading with a scary atmosphere, then this is the book for you.

Something evil has been released in a post World War 1 New York. Mysterious murders are happening. Evie O' Neill, a girl with a strange gift and a penchant for getting into trouble, has been sent to stay with her Uncle in New York, who also happens to be the curator of The Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult. Noticing a connection yet? Interested? You should be.

I think that what I enjoyed the most about this was how it was written. Unlike many books these days where things are spelt out for the reader in such tiny little details that, as the reader, one feels a bit insulted, Libba Bray left much of that up to the reader. It was a pleasant change. I also felt that although this book is classified as YA, it was written in a maturer style. 

I also appreciated her characters. First, I have to talk about the individual voices. Memphis was a young black man. I could hear it in his diction and accent. I did not have to be told it (and if memory serves me right, I wasn't told it - well, not bluntly at least). Second, the characters were different. While Evie and I would probably never agree over much (I am more of a Mabel), I could still appreciate her and enjoy her. And Sam! I really liked Sam. I can't wait to see what happens with him in the next book. The mysteries surrounding these characters were awesome, and kept me busy trying to guess what had happened in their pasts. If there is one thing I could fault, it would be that Evie was not a very realistic 17 year old. She would have been better off being in her early 20s, which would have matched her behavior a lot better. But is that necessarily a fault? I think it is what made me enjoy this more. I am tired of YA reads where the heroine's main concern is finding true love. Evie was not that girl and I loved her even more for it.

And now I am going to be left guessing what is going to happen until the next book comes out! In the mean time, I think I am going to see if I can get my hands on Beauty Queens  by her. It sounds like fun (and she seems hilarious too).

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

So apparently social media and I just don't agree with one another. Or more accurately, my job's time requirements and social media just don't work together. I just never seem to get the chance to write up my thoughts on books. Hell, I barely get to read books at certain times in the year. But that is a whinge for the second and fourth terms of the school year. For now, finally, the long awaited summer holidays are here.

I will be posting (hopefully) reviews on all the books I have read over the past few months. But to start, I figured the most recent book I have finished would be easiest.

OK, quick synopsis. The story starts with Christopher Boone finding his neighbour's dog murdered and declaring that he will discover who did it. And that is all I am going to say on it. That was all I knew when I started this story, and I am really glad about that. It led to a few unexpected surprises.

Now for my thoughts: This book and I took a while to get to grips with one another, not because it was bad, but because the narrator was so realistically done. I could see one particular kid I teach in Christopher Boone and it took me a while to get immersed in the story as a result. The story line, however, went in a completely different direction to that which I was expecting which I enjoyed. 

I enjoyed the character growth in the story. I really enjoyed how Christopher pushed himself in areas that he found horribly uncomfortable to reach objectives. The characters that I appreciated, not in a humanitarian sense, but in a 'they were well crafted' sense were the adults in Christopher's life. Asperger is not something that is even remotely easy to deal with, and I appreciated the honesty with which the were shown.

One thing that pee'd me off: it spoilt The Hound of the Baskervilles for me. Ahhhh. I generally don't expect to get spoilers in other books.

I gave this book 4.5 stars, although, as it has given quite a bit to think about as far as Asperger Syndrome goes, maybe it should be upped to a 5.