Thursday, January 8, 2009

100th Post and End of Year Review

According to Blogger, this is my 100th post. If I hadn't slacked off so much in the last few months I would have hit 100 a long time ago so I don't really feel like celebrating. I do want to celebrate an awesome year of books, though. This has been an incredible year of reading for me, probably one of my best. That has everything to do with my blog and the book blogging community. I'm not especially active in the book blogging community but I've "met" some really great people and learned about a lot of great books. Here are a couple lists of favorites:

Favorite Books Read in 2008:
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt
My Antonia by Willa Cather
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Giver by Lois Lowry
And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

There are several other books that I really liked and that I gave 4-5 stars but these are the ones that make me say, "Oh yeah, that was a good one," when I read the title.

Favorite New Authors (to me) in 2008:
Agatha Christie
Gary D. Schmidt
Shannon Hale
Lois Lowry
Georgette Heyer

These are authors that I read for the first time and have read at least 2 of their books. I plan on reading many more by each of these authors.

In 2008, I received about a dozen review copies of books. While it is fun to get new books for free, I've decided in general not to ask for them anymore. There are just too many books that I want to read and even though I've enjoyed most of the books I've reviewed, having them and knowing that I have to read and review them has stressed me out at times. So, I've decided to be much choosier about review books in the future.

Thanks so much for reading my blog and I look forward to 2009 being an even better year than last.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have read a lot of the same books this year. Loved Thousand Splendid Suns and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Shannon Hale, Gary Schmidt and Lois Lowry were all new authors for me this year as well.

Here's looking forward to 2009!

Julie J. said...

I would love to read anAgatha Christie... Is And Then There Were None a good place to start?

Laura at Library of Clean Reads said...

100 posts is something to celebrate! It means dedication, perseverance and giving others great things to read about books. Congratulations!

I like this summary list you've posted and I now look forward to reading new authors.

Kim said...

I think that "And Then There Were None" is considered one of her best. I think we talked about reading that one for our Halloween Book Club.

Jeanette said...

I rarely accept review copies for the same reason you mentioned. There are too many books I already want to read without having to worry about review copies.
Congrats on your 100th post.

Book Lover Lisa said...

My Antonia, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, and The Giver are on my all time favorites list.