Week #12: 2023.10

2023-03-12

Books I Finished

  • Wash Day Diaries by Jamila Rowser, Robyn Smith: This was a really cute, feel-good comic. It showcases the ups and downs of life of women and how hair grooming ties this sisterhood up together.
  • Heartstopper Volumes 1-4 by Alice Oseman: I was feeling relatively brain fogged this week and decided to read something light. I have seen Heartstopper around and decided it was finally time to try it. I did not know this was a graphic novel and it was a nice surprise! The art style is rather simplistic but very cute and cozy. It’s a sickly sweet kind of plot but one that I badly needed.

Books I’m Currently Reading

  • Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter Version) 6th. Edition by Nina Baym
  • Beloved by Toni Morrison
  • The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
  • Introducing Literary Criticism: A Graphic Guide by Owen Holland & Piero
  • The Lost Years of Merlin by T.A. Barron
  • The Shallows by Nicholas Carr
  • Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
  • Brother in Ice by Alicia Kopf
  • Flamer by Mike Curato
  • Summary of things I learned this week

I’ve been making my way slowly through one of Future Learn’s courses on poetry. It’s a bit slow but so far I have learned about different forms of poems. The main ones that are covered are sonnets (14 line poems that may or may not have a rhyming scheme) and ghazals (poems of at least a handful of couplets, involving much repetition and/or rhyming).

There was a section on metre but I am terrible at trying to figure metre out. I’m trying to slowly scan through one of Shakespeare’s sonnets and failing. Even though it is mostly in iambic pentameter (one of the most common rhythms in poetry: a stressed syllable every other syllable, ten syllables per line), the exceptions are what throws me off. Reading a poem out loud can be drastically different from reading a poem out loud (if you know, you know).

Week #11: 2023.09

2023-03-05

Update on 110 Reading Challenge

Okay… I actually read 110 Hours! It was a rough two days. I basically spent every free second reading in order to make it to the 110 hour mark. But I did it! It was fun and my life feels a little more empty without the challenge, haha.

Books I Finished

  • Devotion by Patti Smith: I was surprised with this one. It is a very slim volume. I didn’t know Patti Smith was an author (I just know her as the singer-songwriter) so I imagined it was going to be less about writing and more about music. Think I will be reading some more of Smith’s work!
  • The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris: I just read this on a whim and I wish I had read the reviews beforehand… For a novel with a ton of editors in them, you’d think the book would be, well, more well edited.
  • Ducks by Kate Beaton: This one had me glued to the screen (I took it out on Libby). Seriously harrowing.
  • She Drives Me Crazy by Kelly Quindlen: Cute and cheesy YA queer romance!! Seriously, I think I have a cavity from reading it.
  • Rockstar and Softboy by Sina Grace: A bit campy but it was a fun read. I don’t know why but a character named Softboy was so fitting, I didn’t even think twice about it.

Books I’m Currently Reading

  • Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter Version) 6th. Edition by Nina Baym
  • Beloved by Toni Morrison
  • The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
  • Introducing Literary Criticism: A Graphic Guide by Owen Holland & Piero
  • The Lost Years of Merlin by T.A. Barron
  • The Shallows by Nicholas Carr

Week #10: 2023.08

2023-02-27

Update on 110 Reading Challenge

I am partaking in a reading challenge that my local library is doing. So far I have read 100 hours. Which means I read 20 hours last week!

It was a loooot of reading but I didn’t quite make it to 110 hours. The challenge is over tomorrow (not sure if it’s over at midnight or like mid-day tomorrow).

Next week I’ll have a proper retrospective on the challenge as a whole.

Books I Finished

The thing about having multiple books on the go is that reading takes a little longer, BUT sometimes I am able to finish multiple books at once (like I did this week).

  • How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas Foster
  • My Pen is the Wing of a Bird by Afghan Women
  • I Used to Have a Plan: But Life Had Other Ideas by Alessandra Olanow
  • The Dispossessed
  • Displacement by Wang Xulin
  • Naturally by Saul Freedman-Lawson
  • Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
  • Oyasumi Punpun (Volume 1) by Inio Asano
  • The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams

Books I’m Currently Reading

  • Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter Version) 6th. Edition by Nina Baym
  • Beloved by Toni Morrison
  • The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
  • Introducing Literary Criticism: A Graphic Guide by Owen Holland & Piero
  • The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris

Week #9: 2023.07

2023-02-19

Update on 110 Reading Challenge

I am partaking in a reading challenge that my local library is doing. So far I have read 80 hours. Which means I read 6 hours this week. This week was very hard for me to sit down and read… Once again, I spent a lot of time just working on my website and not doing much else other than that. I would be lucky to be able to reach 90 hours next week!

Books I Finished

  • After the Rain (Volume 1) by Jun Mayuzuki: I finished reading a volume of manga. I’ve watched the anime probably like four times, it’s just that good. This is my first time reading the manga and I’m pleasantly surprised just how faithful the anime was to the manga (so far) in terms of both plot and the art style!

Books I’m Currently Reading

  • Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter Version) 6th. Edition by Nina Baym: I managed to finish reading a section on speeches made by some Indigenous people in the late 1700’s. The authenticity of such speeches come into question but at the same time, the questionable authenticity also reveals a lot about the times which is interesting.
  • The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin (again): I was behind last week’s reading but I made it to chapter 9. I have to finish the book by Monday which is… Ambitious, hah.
  • The Pen is the Wing of a Bird by Afghan Women: Some of the stories are becoming to be a little too similar but each story is still such a good little experience.
  • Beloved by Toni Morrison: Just yesterday was Toni Morrison’s birthday. I had a copy of this book lying around and I thought it was a good time to start reading it (or maybe not, because I have so many books still in progress, hah).

Week #8: 2023.6

2023-02-12

Update on 110 Reading Challenge

I am partaking in a reading challenge that my local library is doing. So far I have read 74 hours. Which means I read 7 hours this week. For some reason, after Wednesday I just did not do any reading at all. I think it’s because I got super sucked into making my digital garden… Once I get started, it’s hard for me to stop!

As for the actual challenge, I would still need to read about 2 hours every day to meet the 110 goal… Not sure if it is doable but I have a lot of reading I want to get through so it might work out in the end.

Books I Read

No books were finished this week!

Books I’m Currently Reading

There are some books from last week that I’m still reading and some that I have picked up.

  • Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter Version) 6th. Edition by Nina Baym: Made no progress on this one.
  • The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin (again): Finished reading chapter six early last week. It’s building up to something, but I don’t know what (just kidding, I do, but I’m trying to pretend I don’t).
  • The Pen is the Wing of a Bird by Afghan Women: Read some more of this book. It’s really good. The stories vary in their quality but it’s still really good quality.
  • Literary Theory by Terry Eagleton: I brought my e-book reader with me while out and about (because reading from with an actual physical book did not fit the setting) and started reading the introduction to this book. Interesting stuff, so far.

What I Accomplished

Didn’t do much on the reading front. But I did spend a lot of time coding, both at work (crunch time), and for this website (at the time of writing this, it is the.citrus.farm). Like I said in a previous paragraph, it really is hard for me to stop when something is unfinished. I gotta see it through until it’s done! I can’t say I’m 100% pleased with it but it is good enough.