The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, May 12th and runs through Sunday, May 18th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 10 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team
Sunday Update:
- time spent reading: 2.5 hours (total so far: 19.5 hours)
- pages read: 228 (total so far: 1,781 pages)
- finished Sight Reading
- completed Retitle Your Current Read challenge at Oh Magic Hour
Previous Updates:
Challenges:
Wrap Up
My final count for the week is five books. By books, pages, and time spent reading, this is my most successful Bout of Books yet. On top of that, I did a lot more commenting than I thought I would… amazing how easily it comes when I’m not forcing myself, like I did a year ago in my very first Bout of Books.
Best book of the week for me was Heart-Shaped Box, by Joe Hill.
There are some horrific things in these pages, and the worst of them are, predictably, the real things rather than the supernatural. If you don’t like reading things that make you uncomfortable, this is probably not the book for you. Because it is uncomfortable, in many different ways. But it’s compulsively readable. My second Joe Hill book, and certainly not my last.
4 stars
My least favorite was the one I finished today, Sight Reading, by Daphne Kalotay. I would have liked to end the week on a high note, but… they can’t all be winners.
I loved the musical descriptions, but unfortunately this just isn’t the type of story that interests me. The author basically takes snapshots, years apart from each other, to tell the story of these people, and it just didn’t work for me. First of all, I never really believed that Nicholas had fallen in love with Remy, this event that affects the rest of the lives of all characters involved… and it just snowballed from there. I need to stop picking up books solely because they involve music.
2 stars
Looking ahead, Bout of Books 11 starts exactly three months from today.
Unfortunately (well, no, that’s not the right word…) my brother is getting married three months and four days from today. And since I’m in the wedding and we’ll be traveling and probably turning it into an extended weekend… my reading and blogging time will be obviously limited. Probably just Monday and Tuesday, maybe a little on Sunday. Maybe more than that; aside from the rehearsal dinner Thursday night and the wedding on Friday, I’m really not sure what that week is going to look like for me.
I’ll still be signing up, because really, how could I not? It will just be a very low-key event for me.
So, how was everyone’s Bout of Books? First-timers, do you think it’s something you’ll do again? Anyone watching from the sidelines feel like jumping in next time?
Cheap Thrills 