The very last novel finished reading in 2012 was...
Blood and Feathers, which I finished on 12/29/12 and then for some crazed reason, I listed it as my first book read this year. must be trippin! Anyway, I actually finished it the last week of December, 2012. I'll have to fix my list later.....
I cannot say I had a favorite book - I had - HAVE - many favorite authors, ranging from Suzanne McLeod to Terry - errr Sir Terry Pratchett, to Ilona Andrews to J.A. Campbell, to Devon Monk....the list of favorites contains quite a few names. Can't have just one favorites, there are so many different wonderful writers out there. And I will not list my most non-favorite... because then I would start ranting and we need to play nice.
There are plenty of negative bloggers out there, I don't need to add to them, right? :) While I actually do enjoy reading the occasional snarky post, I don't enjoy the posts that are so full of negative comments and lashouts that they're on the verge of .... verbal annihilation. (how's that for dramatic?) I've been guilty of a few negative comments about a certain author or two, but I try to keep these at a minimum and try very hard not to go overboard with them.....it's hard. There are times I want to just let it rip, but...nope. Made a promise to myself a few years ago NOT to go this route, to keep things positive - or at least as positive as possible, so I try to keep it so.
I've said this before, but it needs to be repeated once in a while; Regarding reviews and books I don't enjoy. I mainly started this blog as a way to keep track of what I was reading, which novels I finished or bought. I did have the intention of posting the occasional review. I actually had started two blogs - one at Live Journal, On My Mind, which was going to be my whiny blog. Whiny blog is the place I was going to go ahead and post reviews, but also where I was going to concentrate all my rants, raves, complaints about my health, my blue thoughts, and any thing that was on my mind. This blog - Rabid Reader - was where I was going to concentrate solely on novels.
By the way - when I first started the blogs, I was the only one I could find with the name, On My Mind Today, or the only one with the name Rabid Reader - (at least the only Rabid Reader I found on Blogger, I didn't think about searching other sites for that name, being a low techy type of person - I searched, because I wanted a unique name, something no one else had). In the last few years, I've seen a few variations of Rabid Reader, and I just noticed some other blogs on LJ that had variations of On My Mind..... Such as Feel My Mind, or Rabid Reads, The Rabid Reader, etc. I guess when I really think about it, it's silly to think, with the millions and billions of people on this earth that there wouldn't be something resembling my blog names on other people's minds...of course there are going to be similarities here and there. Only to be expected. (damn it, wanted to be the ONLY one...stamping foot)
Over the years, I've kind of let my Live Journal blog languish. One of the main reasons is that it is too damned hard to format and lay out a post over there. For instance, I absolutely CANNOT post a picture and have any writing that runs alongside it. Nope - the writing starts at the bottom edge, next to the picture and thus a whole lotta space is wasted. I hate that. I recently tried (three times, in fact) to figure out how to even post, and cannot get things to work, links, pictures lined up the way I want them, etc. Once in a while I have that trouble here, but it's rare.
So I now will post just about anything on this blog - feelings and whiny ranty posts about my health/pain (though I try to keep this at a minimum, because no one wants to read too much about whiny stuff.) and I'll post about my grandchildren (I'm pretty sure that EVERYONE in the WHOLE WORLD is very, extremely interested in my grandchildren and if they aren't, there must be something wrong with them - right? lol) and even occasionally about my wonderful, extremely unique dog (no one else ever has a unique dog, right?), named after a book character - SkippyJon Jones. But most of all, it's about books, a couple of bookish blog memes and once in a while there will be links or you tube music videos, because I absolutely LOVE music and I think everyone should love music (the very SAME music) that I do.
Narcissistic? Me? nah.....(maybe)
Regarding reviews - or the lack of negative reviews - or rather, back to that subject...
I started this blog....haha - I did start this blog to keep track of books I read and books I liked. I have a tendency to NOT finish books that I'm not enjoying. Especially ever since the emphysema scare. If I don't finish reading a book, it's not fair to the authors or other review readers for me to write a review based on a book I haven't finished. So I just don't review those books. I mainly finish books I'm enjoying - so what you will find on my blog are books I've enjoyed. Whether I've enjoyed them a little or a lot, I'll eventually write a review, and usually I'll post on Goodreads, Shelfari, The Library Thing and Amazon.
Once in a while I'll list a catch up list of books I haven't finished, and post a bit about why I didn't finish - narration style, dialog that doesn't fit the characters, or words that are too formal for the genre of novel - for instance, a monster hunter who's lived by her wits, off the grid for years, etc but speaks like a university professor. Ugh! way too....stiff and stodgy for me. Or how about a character who is tough as nails, or is very clever and fights to protect herself and others but speaks like she's a 13 year old just learning about life? nah...not for me. And then there are the books where things just don't make sense...scenes don't match up, the characters will start out in one place and end up somewhere else without any mention of them going anywhere...mysterious, but frustrating....
So - just because I rarely post of two or one star review, doesn't mean that my reviews aren't valid. It simply means that I don't waste my time on books I'm not going to enjoy. Simple as that.
I bring this up, because I've seen comments or posts where people don't 'trust' review by reviewers who post only positive reviews. Sure there are people who just give any novel across the board a five or four star review, but there are many who, like me, don't spend time on books they aren't enjoying. And if we only finish reading books we enjoy, then of course all our reviews are going to be good reviews.
For my own needs, and for anyone who is interested, I do keep a page with a list of books that I've finished reading, books I've started (I delete as I finish reading those), and books that I've completely given up on. Though I tend to focus on full length novels, I do list the occasional short story I've read, and any picture book that has captured my fancy or really compels my grandchildren to have it read to them over and over and over and over and over...etc. (such as I Need My Monster, or No Such Thing). This is especially helpful for me, especially when I'm trying to figure out if I've read a particular book right before a trip to a bookstore. Nothing like coming home with a book only to find out that you already have it sitting on a shelf... I think we've all done that. It's kind of fun to keep track this way, and now I've lists from 2009 to this year. It also helps me keep track of which novels I've remembered (or forgot) to review.
Time for bed - I've stayed up long enough, rambling on about books on a post I should have posted waaaayyy back in January of this year.
How I roll.... tha's how I roll!
and by the way - I read the funniest blog entry, at the end of which, the writer was giving out some very good reasons to buy his book. Now the book came out in December (I think), but it's worth it to me to try to get a copy just because of his threats to shoot his kitten. Or possibly cook her....you have to read it to appreciate. ;)
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