2008 is over. I managed to read 44 books this past year. Which doesn’t seem like that many. I’ve been reading blogs where people have read up to 75 books this year. I’m willing to bet that they are not full-time college students. Not that I am bother or jealous of people with more free time than me.

I did read some books I really enjoyed this year. Douglas Coupland is on his way to becoming one of my favorite authors, but I need to read a few more of his books to be sure. Some other new authors I discovered this past year were Jonathan Sellwood (The Pinball Theory of Apocalypse), Paul A. Toth (Fishnet), Scott Heim (We Disappear), and Joey Comeau (Lockpick Pornography). I would like to read more of all of their works.

In terms of authors that I have read previously, Marc Acito (Attack of the Theater People) and the Dave Barry-Ridley Pearson combo (Peter and the Shadow Thieves) wrote follow ups to their older books. Both books were better than the first ones in my opinion.

In 2009 I am attempting two reading challenges. The first is the 20 Books in 2009 challenge which now that I think about it, it shouldn’t be that hard. The other other challenge is one I made myself where I plan on reading 10 books that contain pirates. I call it, The Book Pirate Challenge. There might be other challenges that pop up later on this year, but I will worry about those when the time comes.

To wrap things up, Happy 2009.

The Olive Reader posted two more interviews by authors I enjoy. Larry Smith, editor of Not Quite What I Was Planning, and Scott Heim of Mysterious Skin and We Disappear fame.

Merry Happy Christmas Eve and whatnot.

To celebrate, why not curl up with a good book and wait out the snow. If you are lacking in the good book department, why not check these two interviews from two of my favorite authors, Lance Reynald and Josh Kilmer-Purcell, over at The Olive Reader.

Enjoy the holidays. Remember to keep warm.

Finals are finally over. Now I return to my books already in progress:

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers

It has come to my attention that this web site doesn’t function when you view it with Internet Explorer.

Also, it has come to my attention that some people still use Internet Explorer.

I’ll work on fixing this but I probably wont get around to it till next month.

I’m taking a month off from reading any new books. Somehow I found myself in a spot where I was not in the middle of reading any books. Normally I am in the middle of reading one or two books at a time. For November, however, i’m going to be participating in NaNoWriMo (Nation Noval Writing Month). The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days which works out to 1,667 words a day. How hard could that be right?

Anyway, I don’t plan on having much time for leisure reading. But I do plan on updating TBP with my various musings on the NaNoWriMo process and the progress of my novel. I also might bug random strangers about the progress of their novel just to keep things interesting. If anybody reading this is participating in NaNoWriMo, I sure would like to hear from you.

Just curious, is there anybody participating in NaNoWriMo next month?

Here are the books I hope to read this fall. A few of them are left over from my Summer Reading Pile that I never got around to reading. Of my Summer Reading Pile, I managed to finish nine of my original nineteen books I had planned. I did get sidetracked and read a couple books that weren’t originally in my pile. You know how that goes..

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
Polly and the Pirates by Ted Naifeh
Therein Lies The Problem by Steve Dupont
The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
Jane-Emily by Patricia Clapp
Edin Burgh by Alexander Chee
Sparks by Lawrence Marvit
Have You Seen The Horizon Lately? By Jamie S. Rich
Un Lun Dun by China Mieville
The Half-Mammals of Dixie by George Singleton
Yes, Yes, Cherries by Mary Otis
Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
The Sound of No Hands Clapping by Toby Young
Hero by Perry Moore
Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire