Well, it was a sort of failure in tackling my TBR since, as mentioned in my Noirwich post, I got eight more books that weren’t on my list already at the Norwich Crime Writing Festival last weekend, and then I picked up a Storybundle of 16 new ebooks for $20. So, five down, but 24 added!
This week my reading plans were pretty well scuppered by the terminal illness of my gorgeous guinea pig, Colman. Well, he wasn’t so much ill as old (seven years is very old for guinea pigs, although their life expectancy is on the up, due to better sharing of care information via the internet, I suspect), but three days nursing him interspersed with a couple of uncancellable events meant the reading pretty much got dumped.
Colman is in my books, of course. He is one of the antagonists in the Princelings stories, appearing for the first time in the Talent Seekers, then all the later books. I cast him as a villain when I first rehomed him, and he resented my existence. He loved to bite me, with his ears back; he wasn’t playing. A year later I was wondering how to rehabilitate him in the books, since he had accepted me completely and was utterly adorable.
But I soldiered on with my fifth book on the last day of the Challenge, and just about finished it, thanks to staying up for the lunar eclipse – and then started the next in the series immediately, since there was still an hour to go to totality! I was glad it was One Man, No Plan, since it was a series I enjoyed reading, and could drag my mind back onto the plot despite its many twists and turns. So I met my goals…
- one book from my Storybundle books (The King’s Sword)
- a book that was on my kindle before Jan 2014 (Jungle Land, which was there in Oct 2013)
- two books from series (four; The House at Sea’s End; One Man, No Plan; Montalbano and The King’s Sword, which I didn’t realise was a series when I started it)
- one that qualifies for my Local Hero Challenge (House at Sea’s End, and I haven’t made any progress on The Rings of Saturn since starting the TBR readathon)
… but I didn’t get around to as many other participants as I had intended. I apologise, but hope to get to you in the weeks ahead.
I did thoroughly enjoy meeting everyone who commented on my Challenge. I’m emailing the winners just after I post this, so congratulations to the Rafflecopter winner, Agnieszka, who gets the main prize of a signed copy of one of my paperbacks, (your choice from nine, unless you want to wait for the scifi one in January), and to the winner of what you might call the author’s pick… it was a tie between five people, and I couldn’t see any reasonable way of splitting them, so you can each have an ebook copy of one of my books!
Thank you so much to Tressa and everyone who took the time to visit and comment on my blog, I hope your reading was more successful than mine in tackling your TBR – keep up the good work, and see you next year, if not before!
The Viridian System Sampler launches today – eight short stories in the world of the Viridian System Series, the first of which, The Perihelix, will be out in January,
The Goodreads Giveaway for the Princelings of the East ends Wednesday – click the cover on the sidebar to go to the entry page (needs Goodreads sign-up)
A new Goodreads Giveaway for book 2, the Princelings and the Pirates starts on Thursday – check Goodreads for details.
From the moment I read your words about Colman, I knew you would win him over with love. How are the rest of the furballs doing? Are they still in the garden or have they moved inside?
Mine are inside but go out when the weather’s nice. That meant they had weeks of August and early September when they couldn’t go out, but they’re making up for it now, even though I have to go out with a towel and dry the grass for them :O
I think that’s the way a TBR works. Maybe even how it should work. Who wants to run out of books?
I was so sorry to hear about Colman. That’s the worst of the little guys–they have short lives. At least yours have happy lives and great love and care!
Thanks, Rebecca 🙂
Colman is way too adorable!! So sorry Colman past away a few days ago… My condolences. Pets wonderfu creaturesl. My oldest Pomeranian passed away unexpectedly last November and I still miss her so much.
I did have fun participating in the Tackle Your TBR Read-A-Thon this year and look forward to participating in next year’s read-a-thon as well. Here’s a link to my wrap up post: http://captivatedreader.blogspot.com/2015/09/tackle-your-tbr-read-thon-2015-wrap-up.html
Thanks, Lisa, and sorry to hear about your Pomeranian. They just grab our hearts and take them away with them, don’t they?
It’s been a fun TBR… I’ll get across to you in a few minutes!
Good job!! Isn’t it funny? I read one and add 5 all the time and that’s why I’ll never completely ever tackle my list. 🙂
Glad I’m not the only one! Thanks for popping by.
Finishing a few and adding a few more? Ha ha. Good times! I did much the same.
It’s probably just proof that we’re addicted to reading 🙂
I’m sorry about Colman, our pets are member of teh family so when they need us they takes priority over anything even reading ( they do gives us so much)
all things considering you did well don’t beat yourself either about adding more books we all do and a TBR pile must be growing to stay a TBR pile after all^^ every true reader has one no matter how strongly he wants to read everything more boosk comes up without waiting for us to catch up
thank you also for hosting a giveaway, it was very generous of you
It doesn’t matter what other people have read – as long as you were able to enjoy yourself which it seems like you have largely been able to do! That’s what matters in my opinion, and you did get quite a few books read. And getting new books is also nice too 😀