Having realized I don't need to finish all those other books until Monday I started re-reading Outlaws of Sherwood anyway.

ROBIN I LOVE YOU. Sooo cranky. Don't you know, Robin, that being cranky won't keep the rain out?

So list of swag. Actually really just list of free books because the rest of it doesn't compare very well to loads of free books. All of these are Advanced Reading Copies or galleys except where otherwise specified. The majority are YA/children's.

1. Heroes of the Valley - Jonathan Stroud
2. A Sweet Disorder - Jacqueline Kolosov (doesn't come out until June!)
3. Time of the Witches - Anna Myers (September)
4. The Strain - Guillermo del Toro & Chuck Hogan (June)
5. Kiss of Life - Daniel Waters (May)
6. Cracked Up to Be - Courtney Summers (not a proof! A REAL BOOK!)
7. The Chosen One - Carol Lynch Williams (May)
8. Isadora Duncan - Sabrina Jones (REAL BOOK!)
9. The Ghost's Child - Sonya Hartnett (October)
10. Hidden Voices - Pat Lowery Collins (May)
11. Sophomore Switch - Abby McDonald
12. Closed for the Season - Mary Downing Hahn (July)
13. Captain Nobody - Dean Pitchford (July)
14. Deeper - Roderick Gordon & Brian Williams
15. Skeleton Creek - Patrick Carman
16. Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls: Best Friends and Drama Queens - Meg Cabot
17. Psych Major Syndrome - Alicia Thompson (August)
18. The Lost Summer - Kathryn Williams (July)
19. Girlfriend Material - Melissa Kantor (May)
20. Sir John Hargrave's Mischief Maker's Manual (June)
21. The Extra-Ordinary Princess - Carolyn Q. Ebbitt (August)
22. Sprout - Dale Peck (June)
23. Alive in the Killing Fields - Nawuth Keat with Martha E. Kendall
24. Lost Childhood - Annelex Hofstra Layson with Herman J. Viola
25. Latter-Day Cipher - Latayne C. Scott (REAL BOOK!)
26. Chasing Lincoln's Killer - James Swanson
27. Tumtum & Nutmeg: Adventures Beyond Nutmouse Hall - Emily Bearn (April)
28. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya - Nagaru Tanigawa
29. The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya - Nagaru Tanigawa (October)
30. Tiny Tyrant - Lewis Trondheim & Fabrice Parme (REAL BOOK!)
31. Adventures in Cartooning - James Sturm, Andrew Arnold, and Alexis Frederick-Frost (REAL BOOK!)

Those last two are both from :01, aka my favorite non-manga graphic novel publisher (you may remember my previous rant about them). The lady at their booth was really nice and interesting to talk to, and I must order a pile of their books as soon as I have the opportunity.

I also bought myself a second copy of The Graveyard Book with a shiny Newbery Medal on it, so I can keep my first copy safe because it is SPECIAL. Except upon actually opening the new copy like five minutes ago I noticed it is signed. So I guess I have two copies that I am not lending, hohoho. e_e

( And here is a photo of me on my red scooter swimming in a sea of red )

Foot update: It doesn't hurt at all really even after walking around on it all day.

Books:
Over Sea, Under Stone by Susan Cooper
Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
Westmark by Lloyd Alexander

Once I've diminished my enormous book pile somewhat I'll be reading the rest of the Dark is Rising series from Cooper and the Westmark books (though I've read both before, it's been a very long time).

Manga:
Petshop of Horrors: Tokyo 1 by Matsuri Akino
Toto! 1 by Yuko Osada
Yumekui Kenbun 1 by Shin Mashiba
Hellsing 1-9 by Kohta Hirano (Didn't this series finish already? I guess vol 10 must be the last one, but it hasn't been released yet. I also hope Dark Horse publishes The Dawn afterwards because Alucard as a cute little girl is kind of special).
+Anima 4-5 by Natsumi Mukai

Currently I'm in the middle of reading three books (From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, Strawberry Panic 1, and Eon: Dragoneye Reborn... actually technically I'm still reading The Westing Game very slowly but it's up in my bed and thus out of reach for now), and I got the new Twelve Kingdoms book on Friday but I'm thinking I might wait until my foot's better to read that because my current strategy is to leave books all over the house so I don't have to carry any anywhere. Twelve Kingdoms is too good, so I know I'll want to tote it around until it's done... XD

I'm also trying to get caught up on manga I've bought but haven't read. I have at least twenty-one volumes I just haven't read yet. Actually work on Thursday I had to do something horrifying... we got vol 22 of Fruits Basket in, and I'm a couple volumes behind on that, but I had to flip through it for the page count. I was like "I AM NOT LOOKING NOOO" XDD I can't even remember if I read vol 20, but I know for sure I haven't read 21, and I picked up 22 on Friday as well. I put off reading it because it always makes me cry.

The rest of the stuff I still have to read, because no one cares: Spiral 1, Shinshoku Kiss 1, ION, Gentleman's Alliance ?-9 (I am so lost on this series that I think I'm just going to start again from the beginning... Tanemura's manga gets more and more complex with every series she does. Sakura Hime Kaden terrifies me already!), Love Com 3-4, Castle of Dreams (by Masami Tsuda!), Chicago 1-2 (which I read when it was in Animerica Extra so long ago XD), and Full Metal Panic! 2-9.

I think after Twelve Kingdoms I am going to finally tackle Twilight. Wish me luck, guys. XDD

Plus tons of homework this week. Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday I have to write on three journal topics, do my Literature Circle posting, work on my Info Hunts (though I just remembered I've already done the print sources on Handbooks and Manuals as well, although I didn't evaluate them, so that really means I'll only have to look for three things that aren't online!), and do my article critique and discussion board posting for 5000. I think that's it. Argh. Also I still haven't figured out what classes to take this fall and the deadline for early registration is fast approaching. Oh, yeah, and I think I'm still on for booktalking some graphic novels on Saturday morning, so I guess I should plan that... provided my professor ever tells me it's okay, goddammit. And sometime I'm meeting with Patti about the storytime I'll be doing on the 3rd that I am still utterly terrified of. T_T

Shit, they changed the course list for SLIS and now I can't even figure out what the hell I'm looking at. It was super easy to read before!

EDIT: Finally picked which classes... Learning Resources Organization & Media and Adult Materials & Reading Interests, aka 5208 and 5410... The latter seems to be like 5420 only for adults and the former I am pretty sure is the cataloging class my advisor recommended.
Also have more or less figured out what to take next Spring, May, and Summer, though I still need to double-check to graduate after summer...

I just ordered 56 volumes of manga/light novels from https://www.bookcloseouts.com/! Ohohoho! $0.99 sale on, as far as I can tell, every Tokyopop book they have in stock.

Where am I going to put them all?

Actually I think next time I rearrange shelves I'm going to give in and double-layer my manga shelves... Because getting a new bookshelf is all well and good, but getting two is not so much, and I think I already have enough books lying around right now to fill most of one without even counting the manga. It's sad, but I was looking at past Shelf Life columns on ANN and the "Shelf Obsessed" bit on this one... I kind of felt it was a challenge. XDDD I'm so pathetic sometimes. Not that I have any intention to get my collection up to 2000, because I have I think more discerning tastes than these people (also I don't ever buy Korean books... It's not like I have a personal grudge against Koreans, but I've been disappointed by them more times than not so I've just decided not to spend the money).

I'm happiest that they had all five vols Tokyopop's released of Tactics so far. I've been wanting it for a while, but the completist freak in me can't stand the idea of having different editions of the first two (because I have ADV's editions) than the rest, and the very small part of me that hates spending money on unnecessary things (it's very, very small) couldn't stand the thought of buying two volumes I already had. But for $.99 each who cares.

If only they'd had Viz shit on sale, too. I could feel much better about buying their garbage if it were only $.99 a book...

Now I need to take a fast shower (as fast as I can with this rotten foot) and go out and about for a bit (loudly cursing all non-automatic doors while I'm at it).

I got Prince of Persia yesterday because I figured I needed some sort of reward for not doing my homework being awesome. Game is crazy addictive. I have to keep my door closed, though, while playing it because I end up constantly yelling "I SAID WALLRUN NOT JUMP TO YOUR DEATH YOU DUMB SHIT" at the Prince all the damn time. It's a good thing you can't actually die.

My only problem with the game is that the Prince never shuts up. The conversations between him and Elika do amuse me but only until all they're saying to each other is "LET'S GO LET'S GO" and I'm like "I WOULD BE GOING IF YOU DIDN'T KEEP TELLING ME TO HIT R2!" Pff.

But it is engrossing to the point that I was staring at the screen so intently that my contacts dried out and when I blinked one fell out. True story. Of course I was precariously hanging off a wall at the time so I had to half-blindedly carry on until I found some place to stand. Really I guess I could've left him hanging off a wall but that felt mean.

Also, bakemonokun - After playing Prince of Persia until three o'clock last night I was expecting to dream about climbing walls and jumping on things, but instead I had a dream where I was a vampire being falsely accused of killing four people. Possibly related: I finished the first part of Last Watch.

So now it's after six and I've just been slacking all day. I went out grocery shopping with Mom and Dad and got a gigantic kite shaped like the Millennium Falcon at Sam's Club, except it was missing a part so my tale of slacking isn't a tale of kite flying. Perhaps tomorrow. After we got back I ate lunch and read Dragon Slayer's Academy which I would have loved if I were an ten year old boy but alas, I am not. So I didn't. But that's all I've done for school all day. Since then I've been on my ass watching Toradora.

I haven't mentioned Toradora because I know I'm prone to fangirlish rants and no one really cares that much, but... I really love this show. I dismissed it initially as just some dumb show for fanboys, but it really isn't. Actually, as far as I'm concerned it's more on a level with something like Fruits Basket... I find it hard to believe it's not a shoujo series, in fact, but since it's based on a light novel I don't even know if those sorts of genres apply to light novels (do they? Does anyone know?).

Really the appeal for me is that... well, for one it's hilarious. The comedic aspects of it remind me of a less family-oriented Minami-ke, in that they can be pretty random but at the same time I can totally see them happening to people I know. But beyond just being funny, it's actually very, I dunno. It's real, I guess is what I want to say. The plot is something more interesting than "boy and girl fall in love" as it's instead "boy and girl team up to help each other fall in love" (that's not really it since they're both already in love, but it sounds better to put it that way XD). Over the course of this, Ryuuji has become Taiga's mother (if we want to be nice we can say "older brother" but what kind of older brother sews dresses, cooks, and makes fake boobs for their younger sisters? No, he's a mom. A manly mom but a mom regardless) and everyone thinks they're actually dating because they're so close now. Meanwhile, Ryuuji is in love with Minori, who is pretty weird but awesome, and Taiga is in love with Kitamura, who is... questionable, to say the least. And then there's Ami, third wheel to everyone (secretly I support Ami and Ryuuji as a couple... I love Minori and all but I agree with Ami's assessment of Minori and Ryuuji as a couple. It just wouldn't work. Really I wish they'd go into some explanation of why Ryuuji likes Minori in the first place because I totally want to know).

But beyond the comedy and the plot the main reason I love the show so much is the characters. They're all very well-rounded, I think, and I like to think they go beyond the typical stereotypes that are usually in high-school romantic comedy anime. Though Taiga is a pretty extreme tsundere at first glance, she's also codependent, clumsy, and freaks the hell out when Kitamura so much as looks at her. Ryuuji is the dependable guy, but he's insecure about his scary-looking face and he really, really loves doing housework. Ami is the two-faced pretty girl but she's really a lot more sincere and observant than anyone notices. Minori is goofy, but is actually a top athlete, dependable, and entirely dedicated to being Taiga's friend. And Kitamura... well, I dunno WTF. Kitamura kind of creeps me out sometimes. He's just strange (I don't give him enough credit here... he's strange in an awesome way, and I think he'd be a lot of fun to know in real life... but he is really wacky sometimes, and even when I think I'm getting used to him he keeps surprising me).

Okay, I'm done here, drooling over Toradora. I'm hoping the show ends as well as it's gone on so far (I'm thirteen eps in now), but for now out of everything I've fangirled over in recent memory this show is pretty much topping the list. While I don't expect it will become one of my favorite anime ever, I do think that I will actually buy the show if it gets licensed, and how often do I say that about anything? I hope someone licenses the novels as well. Really why aren't more Dengeki novels with (or without) anime adaptations being licensed? I wonder if the licenses are too expensive or something. I'd love to see stuff like this, Spice and Wolf, Baccano!, Sigsawa's other series, and even things like Shigofumi, which doesn't appeal to me as an anime but sounds more interesting as a novel. It's not like nothing has gotten translated... Seven Seas seems to be doing fine on that front, with Boogiepop (note to self: you still need to buy this), Ballad of a Shinigami, and Strawberry Panic... Shakugan no Shana of course was licensed by Viz who did a terrible job with it, though, and then Kino no Tabi was screwed up by Tokyopop and is now in a limbo I don't know if it's ever going to escape, so. :/ Who knows. I wish that the interest in light novels had started when the manga boom was on, because I think more of this stuff would've been snapped up before the market got so glutted with manga and publishers scaled back their operations so much.

That kind of reminds me, since I don't think I mentioned it here. Besides stuff like the Caldecotts and Newberys, the ALA also gives an award for translated novels (which for some reason goes to the publisher... shouldn't it go to the translator? But I think the point is to encourage more publishers to translate things or something, so I dunno), called the Batchelder Award. This year's winner was Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, which I wholly recommend if you like a good YA fantasy. It's not a light novel in any way, mind you. More like Twelve Kingdoms sort of fare.
Last year's winner was Brave Story, btw... you know I totally didn't realize that was published by Viz? If only Alexander O. Smith translated all their stuff.

Haha, this post's topic changed pretty abruptly there, didn't it? Secretly the reason I want to get a Japanese degree is so I can read light novels on my own... Hohohoho e_e

If I keep making posts this long everyone's going to defriend me, so I'll shut up now.

So a certain author just won the Newbery. His post there is amusing enough to read, but the supplementary post on his Twitter makes it even better.

So, if you haven't already, go and read The Graveyard Book. It is very good. It won a Newbery.

Today was the big day... while technically I won't get my money until tomorrow as I have direct deposit and tomorrow is actually payday, they always hand out checks/pay stubs on the day before payday. So I was eagerly awaiting mine to see how much it was going to be!

And... they paid me at my old pay rate. When I was a page I was making $8 an hour, now I'm making $12.40, but they paid me $8 an hour. Ugh. And of course it's too late to do anything about it now, so I won't get the rest of my money until next paycheck. Oh well... It doesn't really change any of my plans, anyway. But it is really annoying.

In other news, I finished the Death Note novel. LOL plot twist at the end there. I can't really say much about it without spoiling it, though. But I did crack up at the very end, over the sexual harassment thing. Oh, Misora. Too bad you die later. We've actually got the entire series of Death Note at work now (well... it's sitting in tech because no one wants to deal with the graphic novels, or rather I wouldn't mind dealing with them but Bruce doesn't want to deal with them so he won't show me how... once I know how to catalogue the things, they'll get catalogued a lot faster, I promise). I think I'm probably going to re-read it. I hardly even remember the beginning anymore.

Somewhat related, but is anyone else besides Ali reading Ohba and Obata's new series, Bakuman? It's about a pair of guys who are trying to create a hit manga. Of course they're trying to get their manga in Shonen Jump (because of course it's a SJ manga)... It's pretty awesome, though. Hilarious, and fun to read... also very interesting from a learning how manga gets made standpoint, I guess. The actual premise is way more ridiculous than I just said. XD Anyway, it's on OneManga, so whether you liked Death Note or not you should check it out. I think.

Only Ali will care, but I keep playing .hack while I eat dinner... except I don't feel like actually going off and doing the next story thing (because the trend is to make me go to dungeons and those take too long). So I've just been running around working on getting everyone's affection to max, which means I'm just dragging random people out to areas. Mostly areas way too high level. As a result, I (I being Haseo and Atoli, really, who are almost level 140 while mostly everyone else is still below 130) am probably like fifteen levels higher than the game expects me to be right now... whoops.

And only Zoë will care, but... just how is Anton supposed to live there with no toilets? Is there a toilet in the apartment with no door that he can use? XD

Now I am going to bed super early.

Well, I finished reading the xxxHoLiC (or whatever random capitalization) novel. I think I'm in love with Nisioisin, who wrote it. I read the first book of his Zaregoto series, The Kubikiri Cycle last month and loved that, too. I think I've said this already. Have I? I don't know. I've told plenty of people about it, anyway (on that note, read The Kubikiri Cycle if you are the reading type... it's really a fascinating read).

So today I finished the Holic novel and was still hungry for more. Out of curiosity, I looked at who the translator was on that... Andrew Cunningham. I thought the name looked familiar; as it turns out he also translated the Kino no Tabi novel (or is translating the novels... maybe, since Tokyopop hasn't bothered to make a statement regarding what the heck happened there as far as I can tell). And then I was like "Well, he does good work, I wonder what else he's worked on?"

So it turns out he's the one who translated the Death Note novel as well! It's also by Nisioisin, so I wanted to read it, but I avoid novels published by Viz like the plague... However, since I know Mr. Cunningham can be relied on, at least, I got it anyway. And now I have another Nisioisin novel to read! Hooray!

Not really related, but... I kind of wonder about the practice of not putting the translator's name anywhere except the copyright page on these light novels? Typically when a book is translated the translator's name will be on the title page at least (on the cover if it's a well-known translator). It seems a little unfair to me. I dunno. I guess what Haruka said in the AI Buster novel really got to me. XD As she said, if a translated book does well, it's clearly because the author is good, but if it does terribly it must be the translator's fault. But in this case how can we even blame the translators if we can't even find their names to blame them? I actually blame the publishers more than anything else, though. Viz poops out shoddy translation jobs all the time, but whether it is actually the fault of their translators or the fault of their editorial department I sure don't know. All I know is that if we look at things by company, the only company I always rely on to do a good job from presentation through to translation is Del Rey... And the one I rely on most to fail is Viz.

Actually, somewhat related, Ali, can you check and see who translated the AI Buster novels and tell me who translated Shakugan no Shana? I think I'm going to start keeping a list of these things, so when I look at light novels in the stores I can decide whether to buy them based on whether or not I like the translator rather than just not buying anything Viz and hoping for the best in every other case.

But I do hope Del Rey publishes more novels, and I hope that Little, Brown does a good job on Suzumiya Haruhi whenever they release that (I forget when it comes out and am too lazy to look it up right now).

(Though segueing back to the subject of presentation, at least Viz didn't fail in that sense on this Death Note novel... it's really nice to look at. Even if I hate dust jackets that don't cover the entire book on principle (do they realize how hard those are on libraries??), it's still an attractive book, overflowing with, um, skulls and eyeballs as it is... I also kind of like the art in it. I mean, it's Obata, so of course it's well drawn, but what I really mean is I like that he didn't just keep drawing the characters. There's a color frontispiece of L and Misora (I assume it's Misora, anyway) but the rest is all black and white drawings of... skulls and eyeballs, yeah.) (Also it should be noted that Viz did in fact slap Andrew Cunningham's name on the title page in this case, so I don't know. Did they put the translator's names on the title page for Shana?)

This was really an excessively wordy post in order to say nothing more than "Yay more Nisioisin for me to read!" XD I'm not even that big of a Death Note fan, but, hell, I'd read a Naruto novel if it were written by Nisioisin.

I am finally posting photos from the trip to Archer a couple weeks ago.
There'll be three posts because I love posting photos that are unnecessarily high quality and the whole of the photos I'm going to post is like 9MB hur hurr.

( First is Booked Up )

I'll probably post the rest of the photos over the course of the day.

Only twenty to go!

-The Magician's Boy - Susan Cooper
-.hack//AI Buster 2 - Tatsuya Hamazaki
-Wild Robert - DWJ
-Day Watch - Sergei Lukyanenko
-The Storyteller's Daughter - Cameron Dokey
-Beauty Sleep - Cameron Dokey
-Scarlet Moon - Debbie Viguié
-Sunlight and Shadow - Cameron Dokey

I'm currently rereading Tanith Lee's unicorn trilogy, and I can't decide which Once Upon a Time book to read next. I refuse to read Debbie Viguié's other one because Scarlet Moon was so ridiculously terrible. I've got Golden (Rapunzel) and Before Midnight (Cinderella) by Dokey and Spirited by Nancy Holder (Beauty and the Beast, set during the French and Indian War). I'll probably end up reading the other Dokey ones first, though, because they're shorter.

Also I've now read 136 manga volumes/comic books this year! Hooray! I predict I will easily hit 150 by the end of the year on that front. I went to the book store Tuesday and spent too much money there. But they had Scott Pilgrim! Unfortunately they did not have volume 3 of that, so I only got the first two and now I am sad. Oh well!

D:

Thanks to everyone who wished me congrats~! I still haven't applied for financial aid! Kill me now!


Tomorrow Dad and Mom and I are driving way the hell out to Archer, Texas, for the sole purpose of going to a used bookshop. I don't think I've mentioned it here yet? It's the bookshop owned by Larry McMurtry, aka the guy who wrote Lonesome Dove and like fifty other things. I haven't ever read any of his stuff! Nor do I really care about him very much at all! But books! Books! Books!

Be back sometime Saturday, dunno when. Full report then.

Some work-related complaints now... We were closed Tuesday for, uh, whatever holiday that was (Veteran's Day?), and typically the day after a holiday is craaaazy. But this was one day, right? ONE DAY. And apparently on that one day (it was also raining) everyone decided to turn in all their books/DVDs/whatever. So I got released from my exile in Tech Services to go help check-in, though as soon as the afternoon crew arrived Bruce stole me away again, which annoyed Gayle considerably I think.

Today was just another day in tech, except I finished everything I had to do a half hour before it was time to leave and Bruce told me I could go shelve. Yippee! Shelving! For half an hour! I ended up staying fifteen minutes late helping Ali with the colossal amount of CDs that came in Tuesday and didn't get shelved. I dunno if she actually finished or not as she was still at it when I finally cleared out.

As for the rest of my week:
-Finally learned how to put plastic covers on books on Monday, meaning I could finally get the two coverless books I had on hold processed meaning I could finally check them out! Also am terrible at putting the covers on. Really bad. Though I've gotten better.
-Tuesday Mom and I went grocery shopping and then finally went to see High School Musical 3. Loved it, though Sharpay's role was kind of lame? I thought they had set her up to be somewhat reformed in the second movie, but it looks like the only part of that which actually carried over is she was no longer after Troy... Ryan had a pretty nice role in this one, though, so at least there was that. ♥ (oh god why am I even talking about this HI I'M A LOSER I LIKE HSM)
-Played more .hack//G.U.; haven't translated any more 4komas. So sad. If doing it in the car wouldn't make me carsick I'd occupy my eight or whatever hours in the car tomorrow working on that...

Also I am reading the Once Upon a Time series because sailormgm mentioned it. Thus far I've only finished The Storyteller's Daughter, a retelling of Arabian Nights, but I quite enjoyed it. I'm about halfway through Beauty Sleep, so I'll probably finish that in the car tomorrow. I can't decide which to read after that... (Also, sailormgm, it turns out we had more of them at work than I thought... I failed to realize they were by more than one author dur hur. We have all but two, though those two I really want to read so I'll probably try to badger someone into buying them.)

Okay, now I must pack my overnight bag and make some lists. Then to bed, since we're leaving at 5:30-ish tomorrow morning and I'll need a shower...

-Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
-The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
-Chalice by Robin McKinley
-Deerskin by Robin McKinley
-Ballad of a Shinigami volume 1 by K-ske Hasegawa
-.hack//AI Buster by Tatsuya Hamagaki
-The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson
-The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
-Full Metal Panic!: Fighting Boy Meets Girl by Shouji Gatou

All of these books save Inkheart were truly excellent! Well, Ballad of a Shinigami could've been better, but that was more of the slightly awkward translation's fault than anything else. The story was good.

Next up is Day Watch, by that Dude, Sergei L. Though I will probably simultaneously be reading the second AI Buster novel (since that is a light novel that will take no time at all to finish).

After that, I'll probably be reading the newest Bloody Jack book and by then I should have another pile of fairy tale retellings that sailormgm told me about.

Sooo many books to read!

I should go update my GoodReads bookshelf...

( Book meme. )

Now I'm going to go finish Chalice and then go to bed.

Up to 63 now. Only 37 left to go!

-The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
-The Swan Kingdom by Zoë Marriott
-Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George
-East by Edith Pattou
-Fairest by Gail Carson Levine
-The Twelve Kingdoms: Sea of Wind by Fuyumi Ono
-Wildwood Dancing by Juliet Marillier
-Sisters of the Sword by Maya Snow
-Matilda by Roald Dahl
-The Earthborn by Paul Collins (this book was awful, ugh)

I think next up is Inkdeath, though I'm still afraid to read it.

I'm up to 107 manga/comic books now, though, disregarding all I've read online.

I own 1088 books. That number actually seems small to me. I need more books, clearly.

Today I bought seven (five manga, since Border's had a buy four get one free, then I finally got Ali a replacement for her book I spilled juice on and I bought Inkdeath but am afraid to start reading it). And we're going to a Japanese book sale on Saturday morning. Also Tuesday I bought the first two books in Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy since book three comes out in October and I wanted to have all three hardback. He was offering the first two on his website, and also he'd sign them. Sweet deal, as far as I'm concerned. So that's two more books on the way...

It's going to really suck when I move out. XD

I almost counted how many library books I have out, too, but then I decided not to think about that.

Also of my 1088 books only 481 are manga or comic books. Most of that's manga... 48 or so is American comic books (non-manga-style, that is... I'm counting the manga-styled stuff as manga).

Ah, I should've counted how much is fiction and how much is reference books. I didn't think of that.

Really it's probably sad that I even own as many as I do considering I work in a library. But I can't help it, I love me my books.


Even though I haven't read a single book this week. For shame... I guess I'm going to have to read one tomorrow and one Saturday, but I'm going to be busy most of Saturday and Sarah's coming over tomorrow. Whoops. Don't worry, I'll still meet my goal for the year... even if it kills me!

Though I still feel bad that Jenny's beating me and she isn't even trying. :/

Just finished the Gay Dragon Book, aka Havemercy. While I was afraid it would not live up to the hype, it exceeded my expectations on every front. Heartily recommended.

Seems like an appropriate time for a booklog update, anyway. I haven't quite given up on my hundred book goal for the year, but I am woefully behind. Ridiculously behind. I'm going to have to read a whole lot in the next few months. As if that's difficult.

-The Twelve Kingdoms: Sea of Shadow by Fuyumi Ono
-Not Quite What I Was Planning edited by Smith Magazine (this probably shouldn't count but I'm behind so it does)
-Biting the Sun by Tanith Lee (still probably my favorite book ever)
-Horseradish: Bittersweet Truths You Can't Avoid by Lemony Snicket (again, probably shouldn't count but does)
-Inkheart by Cornelia Funke (reread)
-Inkspell by Cornelia Funke (reread)
-Superior Saturday by Garth Nix (how can he end a book like that!!)
-Havemercy by Jaida Jones & Danielle Bennett

That puts me at 53. If only I counted comic books. Then I'd be at 123 (well more than that if I counted things I read online).

Next up is to finally finish The Grand Tour and read the second Twelve Kingdoms! I need to read three books a week or so if I want to meet my goal... Good thing I work at a library.

Sir is now dropped off at the Apple Store. Should be 3-5 days until I see him again, and since Karai is just too obnoxious to use anymore hopefully that will be a productive 3-5 days.

sailormgm, I got the letter! It made me laugh lots. XD Also I forgot to ever respond to you, but feel free to let anyone you want read them. I don't mind a bit!

While on a quest for sewing machine feet today, I was going by Half-Price Books so I thought I'd stop in. I haven't been there since they moved (which was in February... x_x). Totally scored, though, because I found some Tanith Lee! Gold Unicorn in hardback and Red Unicorn in paperback (now I have that whole trilogy!), plus one other old paperback I can't remember the name of. ALso I got The Merlin Conspiracy in hardback... a little beat up, but that's okay. I've actually been wanting to reread that one. I also got one manga, because I am weak-willed. But I only spent $15!

Also while I was there I saw Jessica! I haven't seen her since she left the library (in January sometime), so it was nice. Of course she was working so I couldn't hang out with her for real long, so she's going to come over Saturday. Ali, you should come over too (we do still need to watch Stardust), and I guess we might as well make a party of it so anyone else feel like coming over? XD

My foot quest was semi-fruitful. Sew Contempo has a great selection of feet, but they didn't have the stretch foot I wanted. I did get a hemmer and a seam binding foot, though. The seam binder is so goofy. I can't wait to try it out~

Damn this keyboard is dusty. Also hurting my wrists. I have to press so hard on the keys!

And when I moved it I found more mouse poop behind it. I'm sure it is old, but UUUUUURRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH. Gotta go vacuum that up.

Somehow or other I forgot that House of Many Ways, the newest "sequel" to Howl's Moving Castle, came out while I was in Philadelphia. I got it finally on Friday, but didn't really start it until Saturday and I finished it today.

I can't really say most of what I loved about it without spoiling things for people, though! So I will just have to say I loved it!

I can say that Charmain, the main character, is completely adorable. If useless. Actually that's part of her charm, I think... My only complaint about the book at all is that it went much too quickly.

And for the curious, it takes place after Castle in the Air (so we still don't know anything about that other apprentice mentioned in that book! :/)

I'll make this a general book log update as well... I haven't actually been reading much besides manga and some other comic books, but the few books I did finish between the last time I made a post and now are the following:
-Aunt Maria by Diana Wynne Jones (I could have sworn I'd read this already but apparently I never did?)
-Howl's Moving Castle by DWJ
-Castle in the Air by DWJ
-Deep Secret by DWJ (all three of these are rereads)
-Elantris by Brandon Sanderson (very good book that I meant to make a post about and somehow never did)

Incidentally this puts me at 38 books read so far this year, disregarding all manga, comic books, and graphic novels (counting those always feels like cheating to me, though I sometimes make exceptions). I want to see if I can make 100 this year after seeing a lot of people saying they're going to read fifty (I typically read at least fifty without going out of my way because I read all the damn time, but it looked like it would be fun to set a goal so I'm going all-out), but that means I've really got to step up the pace. Unlike last year's list, I am including books I've re-read in this year's because I still took the time to read them, and it's my book list so I can do whatever I want.
I've actually got one book I'm about halfway through and one I'm nearly finished so I'll be at 40 in no time... plus I've got the last Dragonback book by Timothy Zahn, which I anticipate will be a quick read.
Wish me luck!