Reading

Lately I have been doing a lot of scattered reading, attempting to get through a pile of books that just continues to grow with each passing day.  I'm currently in the middle of reading about 4 difference books and just trying to keep my head about water.

Reading List

1. Shiver
2. The Picture of Dorian Gray
3. Nanny Diaries
4. Anita Blake series - Skin Trade/Flirt
5. The Historian

Recently Completed Read:

1. Angels' Blood
2. Archangel's Kiss
3. Antia Blake series - Blood Noir
4. On Writing Horror

Waiting List:

1. Dear John
2. Time Traveler's Wife
3. Dhampir
4. The Darkangel
5. Vampire Kisses series
6. Blood Secret
7. The Den of Shadows Quartet
8. Christ the Lord series (Anne Rice)
9. Linger (release date July 2010)

Unfortunately it doesn't seem like I will be catching up any time soon because each time I visit a bookstore, or go home I always seem to find another book I want to read or I have a friend recommend a book that I should take a look at.   Thankfully I have not had to pay for a lot of the books that I have accumulated as I have been using an awesome site that my mom recommended I check out.  www.paperbookswap.com   I have been swapping books for credits and really racking up a pile of books waiting to be read. 

I know I probably seem to be stuck in a rut of genre reading and YA lit but so far they have been the only thing that can hold my attention.  From the very beginning I hated reading unless it was some sort of fantasy or vampire/monster related thing.  'The BFG' probably being my favorite of the non-vampire stories, and if you were to look at any of my bookshelves you would see that I a very much a kid at heart still dreaming and flying off to magical places.  My shelves are cluttered with books that I will never part with.  My first edition HP and 'Twilight' books, the full collection of 'Princess Diaries', 'Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants', a wide variety of R.L. Stein books, and of course my favorite series that started my vampire/monster obsessed reading style ranging from L.J. Smith's 'Vampire Diaries' series, Christopher Pike's 'The Last Vampire' series, and L.J. Smith's 'The Forbidden Game'.  Scattered somewhere in the middle of all of those books are the racy Laurell K. Hamilton vampire hunter series with Anita Blake, Tanya Huff's Blood series, and a whole pile of books collected that I'm still trying to find the time to read.   Some people say I have a "problem" or that I need to grow up.  But you now what, no matter how many times I'm told that I need to venture out and try new things, and no matter how many times I try, I always come back to my safe haven with wooden stakes, coffins and fangs.  For me, the world of fantasy and monster is my haven.  After a bad day at work I either throw on a movie that will scare me into forgetting the events of the day, or dive right back into a hunters chase after some killer monster.  It don't work for everyone, just like other genres have not seemed to work for me so far.  But the world of fantasy, YA lit and monsters that I can picture turning into only the greatest movie monsters is where I like to live and where I feel most at home.  Even while wrapped up in the paranormal romance books which seems to be the "IT" thing right now, and coming back swinging hard, I cannot seem to turn my eyes away from the "monsters".  Be it hunters, vampires and were-creatures of whatever variety or hunters, angels and vampires, or just straight up weres.  That is where I seek refuge.

So for now, I am working on the last 50 pages of Maggie Stiefvater's 'Shiver', which I started all of yesterday and have not been able to stop turning pages.  And to pass the time during the waiting game for follow-up books in the series, and in so many of the other series I'm working on, I will continue to work my way down the list of books yet to read.