Day 112: a general update

I'm having some trouble keeping up with my reading at the moment.  I have a part-time temporary job that is very labor intensive.  So I come home and I conk out for about 2 hours, and then I call my fiance and tell him to go do something with his life.  Needless to say, I'm exhausted pretty frequently.  No worries though, I'll do my best to keep up with the posting.  And if you, dear readers, would like to help me out, send guest posts!   Whatever you're reading right now, send me a post about it along with a short bio, picture, and link to a blog, profile, whatever (picture and link are optional).  I'll email you when I've scheduled them to post so you can tell family and friends to check it out.

I've started looking at other blogs for the Book Bloggers Appreciation Week.  There are some excellent blogs out there.  One of the more excellent blogs (which I've started watching) mentioned gaps in her reading.  Not genre-wise, etc. but alphabet and it made me curious to see where my gaps are.  Here's what I'm missing:

Titles:
Q and X
Authors:
I, U, X, and Y

I'm somewhat surprised by the I, actually.  Anyone who has suggestions about what I should read to fix this feel free to comment.  I'd prefer something good, but my ranty posts also tend to be pretty good.  Anyway, here's what I plan to read next, just remember, I don't always stick with the plan.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
This is one of the few classics that I know absolutely nothing about.  I feel bad about that.  And I really should make my way through the classics at some point. 

The Education of Bet by Lauren Baratz-Logsted
Excuse me while I chew on that mouthful of a name.  I picked this up as an Advanced Reader Copy from the American Library Association Conference in DC.  Some of you may be wondering why I'm not just reading straight through everything.  Well, that could potentially be boring for the both of us.  Publishers tend to publish on a theme, so after awhile all the books would start to look the same to me.  Mixing it up with my regular reading list is beneficial for everyone.  Bet is going to go to school as Will, because she can't go otherwise.  It's a period piece, which are very hit and miss with me.  This looks pretty good though, let's hope it is. 

Brave Girl Eating: A Family's Struggle with Anorexia by Harriet Brown
Wooo, more eating disorder books.  I'm not sure what our fascination with eating disorders is these days, but there's something so basic about it that the idea of giving up gained calories is completely counter-intuitive.  The cover of this is reminiscent of Twilight, which I find somewhat hilarious in it's inappropriateness.

My Empire of Dirt: How One Man Turned His Big City Backyard into a Farm by Manny Howard
Ah Colbert Report, you add books to my list based solely on the personalities and how they interact with you.  I read books featured on your show in the hopes that that personality will show through in their books.  There have been a lot of these "I've turned into a farmer" books.  Publishing trend, see, here it is.  I feel like I should read at least one, and this guy seems to have a freakin' sense of humor at least.

Great House by Nicole Krauss
Another ALA ARC.  The description of this is actually somewhat confusing, so I will boil it down: there is a special desk which seems to hold some kind of power to make life grand.  The desk gets taken away from a writer who has been using it for a long time and now the writer's life is thrown into turmoil.  Yeah, that's the gist I got from it.  We'll see what it's actually about when I read it.

 The Ask by Sam Lipsyte
Oh look, it's one of those talked about books.  That means I have to read it.  Poop.  I've heard both good and bad things about this, so we'll see how that turns out. 

The Wake of Forgiveness by Bruce Machart
Picked up as an ARC at ALA.  Seems kind of Zoro-esque, actually.  Might be passing it on to my mother-in-law when I'm finished. 

Evermore by Alyson Noel
Holy Butts, this has over 13,000 ratings on Goodreads.  Someone must like it.  It's also a series...so...potential following up with additional novels if I like it.  And another publishing trend shows up: paranormal.  She can see auras, learn a past by touch, and a number of other things.  See, this is why I read a mix of old and new.

Noah's Compass by Anne Tyler
It's a retirement story about a guy trying to get his life back.

Firmin by Sam Savage
Another request/recommendation by Dayna Ingram.  I love it that people are giving me recommendations.  Keep 'em coming.  This one looks interesting, it's about a rat that eats books, but he really "tastes" them and apparently describes their different flavors.  Sounds good to me.  

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula LeGuin
I was actually ashamed to discover that I have not read any Ursula LeGuin.  I love sci-fi and I admire the women who got into the genre before that was the thing to do.  These are amazing people who tended to focus more on the human element, by emphasizing the importance of the human-to-alien dynamic and how awesome that really is (I mean awesome in the original sense of the word, not as in "cool").  I forced my fiance to read some Andre Norton instead of this at one point by forcibly shoving Elvenbane* into his hands, so it's only fair that I'm reading this with him now.

*I am still pissed that Lackey hasn't finished it, along with many other fans.
**Also, Hi new followers!  I see you lurking there with your lurk-y ways.  Welcome to my strange ideas and what not.