15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Wrap up

I really enjoyed participating in the 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  Some of the topics were really hard!  Alot harder than I thought they'd be!  But that's ok, we made it!  I really hope you enjoyed reading my posts everyday and learned a little something more about me.

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 15

Day 15:  Who are your book blogging mentors?

That's pretty easy :)

1.  Danielle from There's A Book

2.  Pam from Bookalicious

3.  Jen from Teach Mentor Texts

and I'd totally make 4. Michelle from GalleySmith, but she's on hiatus.  Oh heck!  Let's make her #4 anyway!

5.  Various bloggers/educators from NerdyBookClub

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 14

Day 14:  Tell us your deal breakers

*I hate it when girls fall madly in love with a boy after meeting him like once.

*Anything that is remotely close to Twilight.

*If I can guess how it's going to end within the first few chapters.

*Too much blood and guts (with the exception of historical fiction and Game of Thrones.  Those are pretty essential.)

*If the teens don't act or talk like normal teens.

*If I feel dumber after reading. 

*I'm done with werewolves, vampires, angels, demons.  I'm ok with fairies, though.

*Stuff that should have been caught in the proofread (misspellings, repetition, run ons, etc). 

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 13

Day 13:  Describe one underappreciated book that everyone should read

When I was growing up, before the new library was built, the first floor was for grown up books and the 4th was for children's books (the second and third floors, only accessible from the inside of the 1st floor were adult nonfiction).  Anway, one of my first forays into the world of "the grown up book section" was reading THE WILD HUNT by Elizabeth Chadwick.  I had just seen FIRST KNIGHT starring Richard Gere and Sean Connery (don't hate, but I loved it and still do), read the tie-in book and saw that Ms. Chadwick had written it.  I wanted to read more by her and found THE WILD HUNT.  

THE WILD HUNT is set in 1100's England on the border of England and Wales (called the Marches) and is the reason I love historical fiction, romance books and medieval history.  It wasn't bodice ripping romance, which I appreciated (and still do).  And now thinking about it, the main character, Judith, is 16.  So it's a YA, too.

After reading this one just back to back to back (I'd totally check it out, return it and then check it out again), the library finally picked up the sequel and the kind of prequel (or at least another book by the same author).  But, this one was always my go to book.

Can I just say, this is the cover I remember.  The one featured on Amazon is pretty bodice ripping if I say so myself. 

From Publishers Weekly (via Amazon):  Winner of the 1990 Betty Trask Award, this engaging historical romance takes place on the feudal domains of Norman lords occupying Wales during the reign of king William Rufus. A marriage of political expediency unites 15-year-old Lady Judith of Ravenstow and Guy FitzMiles, lord of Ledworth. Judith has been traumatized by a brutal father and is terrified of men. Guyon, a decade older, is a handsome and powerful Norman nobleman, well versed in the arts of love and of war. A compassionate man, he is so moved by the terror of his child bride that he refrains from sex on their wedding night. The novel follows parallel lines: the personal history of Judith and Guyon, and the history of 12th-century feudal England. Along with Guyon's tender wooing of Judith, her coming-of-age and the final consummation of their marriage, there are border skirmishes, Welsh raids, full-scale battles, murderous schemes and dreams of power. The daily life of the occupied Welsh and the occupying Normans is described in extensive detail. Chadwick's first novel is typical of the genre, with many dark deeds afoot and many dark secrets to be unveiled before Judith and Guyon, now passionate lovers, triumph over their evil enemies. 

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!   

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 12

Day 12:  How do you fight blogger fatigue?

Easy, I take some time off.  I like blogging because I can do it on my own schedule.  Once it starts feeling like a job, then I take a break.  This is my "for fun" thing to do.  If it isn't fun, then I don't do it.

That being said, after my break, then I generally start with fun stuff like this challenge, or posts about my pinterest boards / movie castings / playlists.  Something fun.  Fun for me to do and fun for you to read!  

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 11

Day 11:  Show off!  Share your 5 best blog posts!

I don't know about 5 best, but these are my 5 most popular / ones I'm most proud of/ ones I like the most:

*  The Wonder of WONDER

*How I could cast a movie of THE GIRL IN THE STEEL CORSET

*My sister talks about WONDER, and her experiences with being disabled 

*Using Pinterest in School:  Stuff I'm Printing Board

*WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 10

Day 10:  How do you choose what book to read next?

It really depends.  

If I just picked up a  lot of books from the library, I'll read those first because I only have a short amount of time to finish them.   

If it's for Virginia Reader's Choice, I'll generally read those before anything else (because I really want to try to read all that I can before our meeting in October). 

If it's a VRC from the library, then that goes straight to the top!  

If it's a book in a series, then I try to read them in order before I start anything else.  I don't want to forget anything from one book to the next (so I'm soooooooooooo screwed when the next Game of Thrones comes out!  I'm gonna have to read all of them all over again.  Ok, that's not too much of a hardship!)

If it is none of those, then I put them on a shelf in the general order that I'd like to read them and going from right to left, I'll just take the next one off the shelf.  

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 9

Day 9:  Why do you blog about books?

I started blogging because I wanted to learn more titles that I could share with my students.  I was frustrated with the lack of books that some teachers had in their classrooms and the lack of time some were allowed to go to the library.  And, this is before we got our awesome librarian Gwen, I was frustrated with the lack of good (new) books in our school library and the then librarian's lack of knowledge.  

I wanted to be able to recommend great books to my students and find that one book that made them "a reader".

From that, I've met so many great people, and read a lot of great books. 

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 8

Day 8:  Quick!  Write 15 bullet points of things that appeal to you on blogs!

YIPES!

• Light colors
• Lack of floaty stuff behind the mouse
• No CAPTCHAs
• Funky type, but not so funky that I can't read it
• Contact / follow me buttons
• Personality
• Professional yet fun (ie, not sounding like a stereotypical sorority chick when talking about why you like something)
• Reasons why you like something, not just a summary or a "It was so great, you should totes read it, too!"
• Not having to do a ton of stupid stuff to enter a contest.  Just let me fill out a google form for Pete's sake!  I don't want to have to follow you, your mom, and your dog on twitter, facebook, pinterest, tumblr, etc just for an entry.
• Variety of books read and recommended
• On cooking blogs:  easy recipes.  Ain't nobody got time for grating lemons to have to create an infused olive oil that you really don't need that much of and doesn't add that much flavor to your finished meal in the first place
• On crafty blogs:  if you're going to blog about the awesome thing you made, give me the steps in that post.  Don't just say, "It's like this post over here".  Again, ain't nobody got time to go find your old tutorials.  
• On organizational blog/blogs with printables:  Just add the adobe file to the main page.  Don't make me click to another post (see crafty blog).
• Links to where I can buy the book, gadget, whatever
•  Clear photos!

 The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 7

Day 7:  Talk about your blogging quirks

Geesh, that's a tough one.  I think one of my quirks is that I smell my books before I read them!  Not because I love the smell of books, but because I get most of my books off Amazon or the public library, and sometimes they smell.  If it smells smoky or perfumey, I get a headache and can't read the book.  So, I always check before I read. 

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 6

Day 6:  Describe how you shop for books

If it's a book for my classroom, I go by recommendations from my NerdyBookClub friends on twitter.  And then I'll scoot over to amazon and price shop.

If it's a book for Virginia Reader's Choice, I'll first hit up the Green Valley Book Fair to see if they have it, otherwise, again price shop on amazon.

I'm more likely to buy my books off of amazon than at Barnes and Noble (no independent bookstores around here that I know of besides GVBF mentioned above) as it's just cheaper and I get overwhelmed and want to BUY ALL THE BOOKS!

yeah, I totally made that and now it's on pinterest.  I rule.

Unless it's a book that I CANNOT wait for (looking at you BITTERBLUE) and then I'll go straight to the bookstore as soon as it opens.  

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogging Challenge: Day 5

Day 5:  Recommend a tear jerker

In no particular order:

 

*THE BOOK THIEF by Markus Zusak

*WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS by Wilson Rawls

*WONDER by RJ Palacio

*STONE FOX by John Reynolds Gardiner

*HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS by JK Rowling (I'm currently listening to it on audio and sob in my car quite frequently because I'm at the end)

(images from goodreads.  Click the image to go to the goodreads page)

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogging Challenge: Day 4

Day 4:  What is the last book you flung across the room?

I can't say it was the last one, but the one that sticks in my head (and probably always will) is THE BOOK THIEF by Markus Zusak.  It was a good book, but the ending just KILLED ME!  I don't want to ruin it for anyone who hasn't read it, but I was SO UPSET at the ending that I honestly threw it to the other end of the couch and sobbed for about 10 minutes.  

Others that I probably flung but don't remember include: 

A STORM OF SWORDS (Game of Thrones 3)---you guys probably know the reason, and

MOCKINGJAY, again, you probably can figure out the reason.

One book that I would NEVER fling across the room is HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS.  Even though it gives me the proverbial "feels", it must be placed gently back on the shelf and loved forevermore. 

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Book Blogger Challenge: Day 3

Day 3:  Who are your book blogging BFF's?

I'd have to say the 3 book bloggers that I'm closest to / talk to the most are Mandi from The Story Spirit, Kristina from Ladybug Storytime and Andi from Andi's ABC's. Though I would like to give a shout out to Danielle from There's A Book b/c I think she's awesome.

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Blogging Challenge: Day 2

Day 2:  What is your bedtime reading ritual?

I don't usually read in bed anymore!  I'll read downstairs on the couch and then go watch tv for a little in bed.  Ok....since it's a true confession, I have to be 100% honest---most nights it goes: read on the couch, fall asleep on couch, drag self upstairs, watch tv, fall asleep.  

Though, when we're traveling, I'll read in bed in the hotel room.  But that's usually just because I'm afraid to sit on the couch in most hotel rooms (you don't know what kind of cooties are embedded in there, and I'd like to think the sheets are cleaner).  

Rarely, like when it's a book that I just CANNOT PUT DOWN BECAUSE I LOVE IT SO MUCH, I'll read it in bed when I wake up, before I have to start my day.  Or like on snowdays, when I wake up to get ready, get the news that we don't have school and then can't go back to sleep.  

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 Day Blogging Challenge: Day 1

Day 1:  Make 15 Book Related Confessions

1.  I have never finished reading Pride and Prejudice.

 

  Much like Tom Hanks, I've tried and quit a bunch of times.  I also get lost in the words, but not in the good way like Meg Ryan.  They overwhelm me.

2.  I feel like I'm cheating when I don't finish a book.

3.  I don't know how to delete DNF books off Goodreads so I just leave them on my "currently reading shelf", realizing it makes me look like I'm reading like 5 books at a time.  I don't want to click "done" because I'm not "done", I just don't want to finish it!  I just want it to go away... 

4.  On Pottermore, I was originally sorted into Slytherin House.  I didn't agree with those results (as I had a bad day that day and was in a pretty bad mood), so I later created another account and was sorted into Hufflepuff.  Twice (ok, I created ANOTHER account to verify).  And I can totally see that.    

5.  I'd rather give books (or bookish things) as gifts rather than anything else.

6.  I don't think I've ever read the entire assigned text for a class.  Masters level included.  

7.  I'm a skimmer.  Which is why I often read things more than once.

8.  Please don't hate for this one:  While I enjoy John Green's humor (especially on his youtube videos), I'm not a fan of his books.  

9.  I hate realistic fiction in which the characters don't act or talk like normal teenagers.

10.  I always try to read the book before I see the movie.  Except in the case of World War Z (I tried, but see #3).  But then, I haven't actually SEEN World War Z yet, so this point may in fact be moot (or moo...

11.  Because I'm a skimmer (#7), I often only see the superficial.  I don't see the "hidden meaning" behind things.   I also don't remember quotes.

12.  Besides "teacher books", I've read less than 10 adult books in the past year.  

13.  Growing up, I used to have an "upstairs book" and a "downstairs book".  And sometimes a "bathroom book".  I'd take books to restaurants.  I'd have a book in the car.  Just so I'd always have a book.

14.  I'm slightly upset over the fact that my husband doesn't take my book recommendations.  I was right about Harry Potter and Hunger Games!  I can be right about Game of Thrones and the Chaos Walking series, too!  (Actually, those are the only 4 series I've ever recommended to him.)

15.  If we have a girl, we plan on naming her "Molly" after Molly Weasley.  If we have twin boys, Fred and George.  Our next dog shall be named "Tonks" if it's a girl, or "Muggle" if I can convince Aaron into letting me get a puggle.     

The 15 Day Book Blogger Challenge is hosted by April of Good Books and Good Wine.  And don't forget to head over to Andi's ABC's to find out Andi's book related confessions!  

15 day book blogging challenge: Intro

You may have noticed that I've been a little absent.  It's not that I'm too busy.  It's not that I'm not reading.  I just don't feel like blogging!  Blogging is hard work sometimes; thinking of legit reasons why you did or did not like a book (more than just IT"S SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Side note, I hate when blogs do that, so I don't want to be like that!)

But let's get back on track.  I've been absent from the blog.  So when I saw April from Good Books and Good Wine's tweet about a 15 day book blogger challenge, I was intrigued.  But then Andi from Andi's ABC's and I talked and decided to do it together!

We picked these next 15 days to post because it's before Andi goes on a cruise (jealous) and before I start back to school!  I'm so not ready for school yet, it seems like I just started my summer break!

(You guys know I love my kiddos, but come on Target and Walmart!  Enough already!  Before you know it, they'll be putting out supplies / having the mega sales before school is even over in June!)

Tomorrow starts our foray into the 15 Day Book Blogging Challenge hosted by Good Books and Good Wine.  I hope you join us!

Below is a list of daily topics...