Coffeespoons

October is ending, and around this time of the year, I like taking a good long look at where I am in my life. I think it has something to do with December creeping up, signalling the following things: Christmas, the end of another year, and the celebration of another birthday. Yup, I love December and its significance that, months before it, I like getting psychologically prepared. So, with two months left in the year, I thought I'd take a look at my reading progress. When I started this blog, I set out my general reading plan . Basically, I had pretty fluid goals--read a lot of books from my awards lists (Booker and Pulitzer) and other distinguished lists (1001 Books to Read before you die, BBC Big Read, Time 100 Novels). No time limit on the reading, and I do not intend to compel myself to read every book on these lists. Just the ones I am interested or vaguely interested in. I'll summarize my progress on these lists by this year's close, but now, I'm checking my stat...

I finished! Albeit a few minutes after zero hour, but I finished, in between all the interruptions of life.:) 1. Which hour was most daunting for you? I'd say the last. Only because I was rushing reading my third book. Granted, my third book is very thin.:) 2. Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a Reader engaged for next year? Among the three I read, I'd suggest Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh. But in general, I'd strongly suggest the following: the Sookie Stackhouse series the Hunger Games series the Hitchhiker's Guide series the Mortal Instruments Trilogy series 3. Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year? Televise it? Just kidding.:) Then again... 4. What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon? Well, as usual, I loved the Cheerleaders. Oh, and this time, I was keeping track of all the #readathon tweets. It was highly encouraging to read them. 5. How many books did you read? Three!...

My apologies for doing the Hour 13 survey at Hour 16. My only excuse is I was reading!:) 1. What are you reading right now? Still Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh. After posting my review of Vampire Knight last night, I curled up in bed with my book and promptly fell asleep! Oh well, sleep is a good thing to have. 2. How many books have you read so far? One and a half. I think I'll make my goal of reading more than two and a half books this time, though.:D 3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon? Death of a Salesman. Because it's short and because I've been waiting for an excuse to read it for a while now. 4. Did you have to make any special arrangements to free up your whole day? Ah, I wish. But Sundays are partly workdays for me since I do some tutoring on the side. Plus, it's when I usually have play time with my kids. So, I grab reading time whenever I can. 5. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those...

Read: 25 Oct 2009 My first book for the Readathon ! Vampire Knight is about the only manga I read and buy. I just bought this third volume not three hours ago, and now I've read it. Pretty quick, eh. But then again, it's manga. I wrote about the first and second volumes of Vampire Knight previously. My fascination for the series has even led me to buying the DVDs. I've seen the whole first season, which was why, when I read volume 3, I had a feeling that I'd read it before. Turns out I haven't; I'd only seen it on DVD. In this volume, more is revealed about the backstory of Yuki, Kaname, and Zero. It's not surprising that Yuki's fascination for the pure-blood vampire Kaname stems back from her childhood. What is surprising is that Kaname seems to have been equally entranced by her, even when she was a child. And Zero--well, it's also predictable that Zero's aggression towards Kaname existed from the moment Zero starts living in Yuki's hous...

It's Readathon day! And guess what? I'm only starting now and it's already Hour 4. Darn it. I was actually out with book club friends, including Blooey , who's also participating in the readathon. The difference is, while we were at the restaurant and later, in a coffeeshop, Blooey just kept on reading and making headway with her books, while I was just chatting with our other friends. So, no reading done yet, but here I am, raring to get into the thick of things. Oh, here's my first hour meme: Where are you reading from today? From Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines. So, right now, hour 4 actually translates to 1AM.:) 3 facts about me … I have two beautiful children, a five-year-old boy and a four-year-old girl who has Down syndrome. I adore both of them that it breaks my heart.:) I am about to undergo a career change. I do not peek at the endings of books I read. How many books do you have in your TBR pile for the next 24 hours? I had 7 books, but I just bough...

Read: 12 Sept. 2009 5/5 stars What can I say about The Hunger Game s that hasn't already been said? Not much, I think. But since I'm blogging to enter into the greater discourse that blogging allows me, here are my two cents... The Hunger Games storyline might already be familiar to readers of Koushun Takami's Battle Royale . In The Hunger Games , as in Battle Royale , teenagers fight to the death in an arena. The lone person left alive is the victor. However, whereas in Battle Royale , the purpose for the brutal game is to discipline the lax youth, in The Hunger Games , it is to commemorate the defeat of 12 states against the autocratic Capitol. This commemoration takes the form of a sacrifice of 24 youths--one boy and one girl from each district. Except for the lone victor, of course. If this, too, sounds a bit like the story of Theseus and the fourteen youths sacrificed each year to the Minotaur, that's because Ms. Collins does acknowledge that she takes inspiration...

So, I signed up again for Dewey's Read-a-thon , to be held this October 24. And I find my inner critic saying "No, you'll barely have enough time to read one book." My inner critic is probably saying this because I only finished 2 and a half books last Read-a-thon, one of them a really short middle-reader. Nevertheless, I am choosing to ignore my pesky inner critic and am determined to join this Read-a-thon. I think my thoughts after last April's read-a-thon aptly explain why. More than the reading of several books, I loved the sense of community the read-a-thon creates--imagine, book bloggers everywhere reading and cheering each other on. There's nothing more enjoyable than having a bunch of like-minded people engaging in the thing they love at the same time AND being supportive with each other about it. :) And so, in preparation for October 24, I'm coming up with my reading list. From experience, I think I will just stick to the shorter reads. That way,...

The Kindle has gone worldwide ! So, they'll finally ship to my neck of the woods, and I can get my own Kindle! Of course, soon as I work up the budget for one and figure out the other tech stuff which I barely understand. My take on whether the popularity of the Kindle will signal the demise of books: No. I myself really prefer ink and woodpulp. I can never give up on owning my books or adding to their already unmanageable number. And given the convenience and beauty of books that even a reader like the Kindle cannot match (books don't need power, books can have fantastic layouts and designs), I don't think that the book is one technology that will go away easily. So, personally, I don't mind purchasing another type of reading repository. I figure it's just another aspect of book collecting.:) The Man Booker Prize winner has been announced . This year, it's Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall , a historical fiction novel featuring Thomas Cromwell. Let's add that...

A few days ago, I was desperately looking for something to read that would distract me from worrying about another storm threatening to hit Manila. So, I went on Facebook to ask people for book recommendations. As I posted the same thing on Twitter, I noticed that Neil Gaiman (whom I follow) started a hashtag called #comfortbooks . The whole thing started when Gaiman tweeted that he was feeling awful because he was sick, prompting the following reply from one SOCMusic: "I always re-read 'Good Omens' when I'm sick. It always makes me feel better. Good chance that won't work for you, though." And so, the #comfortbooks hashtag took off. People started listing their comfort books--books one reads "when one feels down or stressed out." Of course, I browsed through the tweets right away, and I got some wonderful recommendations. Gaiman himself says: "At different times of my life, my 'Comfort Book' has been Narnia, LOTR, Glory Road, ...

Having around 19 books to review, I have decided to clump some of them together--most logically, books from the same series. So, here's the real review for the Mortal Instruments. (In case you were thrown off by my previous post not being about the Mortal Instruments.) I have tried not to spoil any of the books, so that leaves me with the broadest strokes for the summary. However, I might not be able to help but reveal a few things in the collective review at the end. For this, I apologize. But, if you're anything like me, knowing what happens in a book won't spoil your enjoyment of it. I hope. Book 1: The City of Bones Read: 22 A ug 2009 4/5 stars Clary, a fifteen-year-old girl living in New York, goes to a club one night with her best friend Simon and witnesses a murder perpetrated by three teenagers. Thing is, the boy murdered appears to be a demon, and no one else sees the three teenagers aside from her. These three teenagers turn out to be Shadowhunters, warriors who...

(picture via @kongkong622, via blitzmacalma ) When we had to leave our home last Saturday because of the epic flood that hit Metro Manila, I packed the most important of my belongings into a plastic bag which I placed inside my already loaded backpack. I wasn't about to risk them getting wet. These most important things were the following: my wallet, my cellphone and charger, and my hardback copy of the third book in Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments Trilogy, The City of Glass . Not that The City of Glass has become my favorite book in the world and the one book I'd take with me to the hypothetical deserted island. It was just that I hadn't finished it. And I knew I would need a distraction from the things happening that day. I thought it was pretty apt that I was reading a series entitled The Mortal Instruments . This thought had nothing to do with the books themselves. It had more to do with the fact of my family and I watching a lot of our life washed away in the...