Here’s our September round up:

George’s Marvelous Medicine – Roald Dahl

When George’s parents leave him alone to care for his crochety grandmother he decides to concoct a medicine that will make her easier to be around.

Sir O really enjoyed the lists of ingredients in George’s medicine and thought the result of Grandma’s having tried the medicine was hilarious. I enjoyed reading it with him but had forgotten how often Dahl used words like “hate”, “stupid” and “hag”. Thankfully I’m pretty sure O is wise enough to not try this stuff out on his grandmothers.

Sideways Stories from Wayside School – Louis Sachar

A collection of 30 short stories about each of the wacky students and teachers on the 13th floor of Wayside School.

With teachers being turned into apples and accidentally eaten, students trying to sell their toes and the threat of riding home on the kindergarten bus it’s no wonder Sir O liked this one. There were a few times when I wasn’t sure if he was understanding the joke but he giggled through all of them and it was his favourite book of the month.

What have you been/did you read to your kids? Any suggestions for October? 

Been there, done that:

Fifty Shades of Grey – 3/5

An attractive, young billionaire meets an even younger college graduate and proceeds to spank her – a lot.

I caved. I feel slightly stupid for having done it but, stupid as it may be, while the writing is atrocious (it’s called a vagina… not “her sex”), it wasn’t horrible. It’s a bit like the Twilight train wreck: I know it’s not good for me but I can’t stop reading.

Remarkable Creatures – 2.94/5

A spinster moves to Lyme Regis, meets Mary Anning, and discovers a love of fossil hunting.

This was for a book club and got pretty blah reviews from everyone. Mary Anning’s life is super interesting (I hit up Google a lot) but Chevalier’s story was boring and her writing was a bit too flowery. I’d check out one of the many other Anning books.

The Giver – 4.13/5

In a society where everything is highly controlled Jonas is given the chance to experience what no one else can.

I’m sad I waited so long to read this but I wondered if I’d have appreciated its brilliance when I was 10 or 12 so I gave it to a 10 year old I know who loved it. Lowry’s writing is spot on and there’s just enough foreshadowing to keep you interested without feeling heavy handed.

The Fault of Our Stars – 4.31/5

Two teens with cancer in a support group and fall in love.

I haven’t laughed and cried so much since The Book Thief. Green gave his characters insightful but believable outlooks, took a fresh approach to childhood illness (allowing for some smart ass-ish morbidity), and turned out an amazing novel.

Snowflower and the Secret Fan – 3.63/5

When Snowflower and Lily are 7 they promise to support each other for the rest of their lives but are torn apart by a lifelong secret.

I’m officially glad I was born into the time and place I was. Life in China was TOUGH for young women and See does a great job of illustrating the various obstacles to the girls’ happiness although it does get a bit Dickens-ish by the end.

The Graveyard Book – 3.94/5

When his family is murdered a two year old wanders into a cemetery where he is protected and raised by ghosts.

People like Gaiman make me feel like an unimaginative boob – my mind just doesn’t work the way his does and I’m SO jealous. His villian is exceedingly wicked, the ghosts are bumbling but good natured, and Nobody Owens is the brave, inquisitive boy I’m hoping to raise.

Macbeth – 4.19/5

After hearing an unlikely prophecy Macbeth kills King Duncan for his throne and the entire court begins to unravel.

This is one of my favourites of Shakespeare plays, it’s just so creepy and dark! Maybe I sound morbid but realistically who doesn’t love a play that includes regicide, witches and revenge?

Up next:

Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe

A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

What have you been reading?

Some of the craziness:

1. We are not moving to Toronto!

Earlier this Spring Steveo’s work told us to be ready for a big move to the Centre of the Canadian Universe. It stressed us out and pretty much made us keep our lives on hold while we waited. But then, just a month or so ago, we found out he had been promoted within the office here and we wouldn’t have to move! Now that we know we’re staying in the Lower Mainland I’m psyched to get on with our lives, unfortunately all this excitement and planning has left me pretty drained.

2. I know what I want to be when I grow up

I’ve figured out what I want to go back to school for and I’m beyond excited to get started. Plus, I can finally cross something off my 30 before 30 list. Woot, woot! I’ve been accepted in a local university’s bachelor of arts program and will be working my way to becoming involved with literacy and rehabilitative skills in prisons. I’ve always been passionate about social justice, literacy and developing a love of learning so when I heard an estimated 1 in 4 Canadian inmates has a grade 10 or lower education I felt compelled to learn more. Without skills, help and support how can we expect these people to leave the correctional system and become healthy, law abiding members of society? Alright… enough with the heavy stuff and onto the debauchery!

3. We actually have a social life

We’re not lepers, we’ve always had friends, we just rarely did anything with them. Over the last little bit our dance cards have become strangely full and that took priority. It was a bit hectic and fairly exhausting but we are so glad we threw ourselves into developing relationships and building a community within our community. The late nights of chatting, drinking rum and coke and the subsequent recovery days were well worth it but now that things have calmed down I’m excited to get back to my online chums.

What have you been up to lately?

Books Read

We Have Always Lived in the Castle – Shirley Jackson
(review to come)

I read this at the very beginning of April and I’m only a third of the way through the review. Hopefully it will be ready for next Monday’s review post. Here’s a hint though… I liked it! I can’t believe how far behind I am review wise, it’s actually feeling a bit oppressive at the moment.

Bonus Books

I will likely do full reviews of these when I finally catch up but here are some first thoughts:

An Abundance of Katherines – John Green

My first John Green novel and April’s book club selection! I was so excited to read this during the readathon that I may have inflated my expectations. It was definitely well written and the kids were just as witty as I was led to believe but it dragged a bit in the middle. I will likely check out more of his books as I’ve heard The Fault in Our Stars is phenomenal.

Damned – Chuck Palahniuk

Another first! I was a bit apprehensive because of Palahniuk’s reputation as a chaotic writer and was expecting barely understandable ranting. Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised  when instead I got an interesting concept with wonderful (if horrifying) imagery. I will probably read another of his books so if anyone has a suggestion that’d be great.

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? – Mindy Kaling

If this book tells the truth Mindy is one of the funniest, most relatable actors out there. I feel like in so many regards we are the same person (we’d definitely be best friends if we had the chance to hang out). She actually made me laugh out loud which is no easy feat. It’ll definitely be super hard to choose just one feature quote for my upcoming review.

Best Book of the Month

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me – Mindy Kaling

Next Up

In May I’ll be trying to get a bit a head of the game and will be reading 6 books:

The Giver – Lois Lowry

Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams (already 50% done)

Insurgent – Veronica Roth

A Monster Calls – Patrick Ness

The Watch That Ends the Night – Allan Wolf

Corrag – Susan Fletcher

What did you read this month?

And on that super awesome note we begin my coverage of my attempt to read for 24 hours:

4:45am

Where my head’s at: It’s cloudy and confused but psyched. You know you have a good husband when he agrees to leave your house for the weekend (with your child) so you can read for 24 hours but you know you  have a great husband when he gets up at 4:30am to go get you a coffee. For some reason I’m having a hard time figuring out what book to read first and feel like a dork for not deciding last night.

Book I’m starting with: An Abundance of Katherines – John Green

8am

Where my head’s at: I’m still kind of groggy although the coffee is starting to kick in and I might actually be hungry enough to eat now. I’ve realized that lying on the couch and reading is a major mistake and have found myself a comfortable sitting position instead. I’m about halfway through An Abundance of Katherines so I expect to finish that before the next update. I might switch it up after that and read a bit of Age of Persuasion, sometimes you just need some nonfiction right? I’ll probably spend the next fifteen minutes checking out blog updates and seeing if there are any mini challenges I want to participate in.

What I’ve read: An Abundance of Katherines

Pages Read: 110 (a bit slower of a pace than I’d like but it’s still early so I blame morning brain!)

# of Post it notes written: 8

11am

Where my head’s at: I’m actually feeling really good. I took a half hour break at 8 to update my blog, tweet, make breakfast and say goodbye to my family which seemed to help me wake up a bit. My reading speed has improved and I’m starting my second book, Age of Persuasion, which I will read between bouts of fiction to clear out my brain a bit. Pretty much I’m kicking this readathon’s ass.

What I’ve read (since last update): Finished Abundance of Katherines and started Age of Persuasion by Terry O’Reilly

Pages Read (since last update): 124 (slowly getting faster)

Total pages read: 234

# of Post it notes written: 6 (for a total of 14 so far)

Books Finished: One (Abundance of Katherines)

2pm

Where my head’s at: I am feeling like a bit of a failure as I accidentally took a 20 minute nap after my last update break. This means I did not read for an entire hour! I know there isn’t anyone policing me but I really didn’t want to nap until later in the day. It’s okay, I’m not mad at myself… just disappointed. I’m finding that nonfiction is a much slower read than fiction and will likely only be sprinkling a chapter in here or there from now on. I really enjoyed the first chapter of Damned and am happy I chose it as my first Palahniuk book. I feel like I might need to eat again so will go pop in my frozen pizza and see you in three hours!

What I’ve read (since last update): Age of Persuasion and started Damned by Chuck Palahniuk

Pages Read (since last update): 60 (54 in Age of Persuasion and 6 in Damned)

Total pages read: 294

# of Post it notes written: 8 (for a total of 22)

Books Finished: One

5pm

Where my head’s at: Half way through! I haven’t read nearly what I’d hoped and have taken two half hours naps but overall I’m not doing to shabby. During this stretch I learned that reading while taking notes on Post its in the bathtub is not as easy as it sounds. My reading pace seems to have slowed back down so I’m going to make a push to finish Damned before my check in at 8pm. I’m starting to feel lonely as my family is gone and even my cat isn’t cuddling me. Thankfully I have a friend willing to come over and knit in silence while I read. That’s real friendship!

What I’ve read (since last update): Damned

Pages Read (since last update): 78 (Yikes! But I did take a one hour break again… )

Total pages read: 372

# of Post it notes written: 4 (for a total of 26)

Books Finished: One

8pm

Where my head’s at: I’m super tired and super looking forward to having some company (and some coffee) at 11pm. Damned is wrapping up and getting a bit philosophical for someone who has been reading for 15 hours. I’m honestly pretty disappointed in my progress thus far. I mean 472 pages in 15 hours? That’s only an average of 31.47 pages an hour. At this rate I’ll feel lucky if I finish Damned and Hitchhiker’s Guide by 5am tomorrow.

What I’ve read (since last update): Damned

Pages Read (since last update): 100 (getting back up there!) 

Total pages read: 472

# of Post it notes written: 3 (for a total of 29)

Books Finished: One

11pm

Where my head’s at: I feel like I’m getting my second wind and am not really tired at this point. My friend should be here to sit in silence soon and the cat is finally sitting by me. I finished Damned about an hour before I planned to and have started my third book which is light and funny and should take me to at least the next update. All in all it’s been a pretty good three hours.

What I’ve read (since last update): Damned (finished) and Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (started)

Pages Read (since last update): 113

Total pages read: 585

# of Post it notes written: 2 (for a total of 31)

Books Finished: Two (An Abundance of Katherines and Damned)

2am

Where my head’s at: Confession time: my friend did indeed come over and it was anything but silent. I ended up taking a three hour break to chat and gossip… oops! Nevertheless it was exactly what my lonely little heart needed so I’m ready to see if I can push through for another three hours. To be honest I’m pretty impressed I’ve only taken three half hour naps in the last 22 hours. I pretty much deserve a medal.

What I’ve read (since last update): Nothing!

Pages Read (since last update): 0

Total pages read: 585

# of Post it notes written: 0 (for a total of 31)

Books Finished: Two (An Abundance of Katherines and Damned)

5am

Where my head’s at: Ummmm couldn’t tell you, I fell asleep at some point and woke up at 8am. I know for sure I made it 22 hours which I think is a victory and I read 22 more pages after my last update so I’m thinking I fell asleep some where around 2:30am.  I think I will definitely do the readathon again in October but will likely arrange for some company throughout as I got pretty desperate for human conversation. As a special treat, here’s what I look like when I’m reading at 2am:

What I’ve read (since last update): Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Pages Read (since last update): 22

Total pages read: 607

# of Post it notes written: 0 (for a total of 31)

Books Finished: Two and a quarter (An Abundance of Katherines and Damned)

#8 Break Up with Diet Coke

That bitch seduced me once again. It started with a drink at a movie theatre or at a restaurant out with friends and it’s ended with me having a stock of the devil juice in my fridge again. I’m super disappointed because I was so proud of myself for kicking it to the curb.  I suspect I’ll need it through the readathon on Saturday but on Sunday I will throw its stuff back out on the lawn and live my life without it.

#12 Loose 50lbs and Keep Them Lost

I found I couldn’t maintain the previous routine of a daily walk and work out video. Not only did I not enjoy it (the video part at least), my knees would not allow it. Apparently I’m 100 years old and doing squats can kill me. Now I’m looking for an alternate form of exercise that I might actually enjoy and so far biking and swimmer are the winners.

#19 Take Up and Master a Handicraft

I’m not sure what happened but I pretty much stopped cross stitching all together. It’s weird because I was definitely enjoying it and really want to finish my project. I think part of the reason might be that as soon as the embroidery floss came out so did my cat. No Lola, not all string is for you!

My commitments to you, my readers

This month I will act to remedy the total failure this project has become and vow to:

1. Get some form of exercise 6 days a week

2. Loose 5 pounds

3. Finish that bloody cross stitch project

4. Go cold turkey from Diet Coke after the readathon

5. Start at least one additional goal from my 3o before 3o list

I will report back around this time next month and let you know how it’s going. If I haven’t achieved my goals you have my permission to mock me relentlessly!

What goals are you working toward this month?

What’s in the queue

1. Damned

Pages: 256

One Sentence Synopsis: When 13 year old Madison dies and finds herself destined to spend eternity in hell she tries to find out why and is determined to make the best of it.

Why now? I’ve been meaning to read a Palahniuk novel forever and I think it’ll be a good one as it’s short and sounds less complicated than Fight Club and Invisible Monsters.

2. A Monster Calls

Pages: 205

One Sentence Synopsis: Conor is awoken by an ancient monster who tells him three tales and expects one in return.

Why  now?I’ve been trying to fit this one in forever but I know I won’t want to put it down once I start so I’ve been waiting for the perfect time. Readathon it is!

3. The Age of Persuasion

Pages: 352

One Sentence Synopsis: History of the marketing industry and how its campaigns have shaped our culture.

Why now? I really enjoy Terry O’Reilly’s CBC podcast on marketing and have been interested in this book for a while. I suspect I’ll read a chapter or two of this to clear my head between long bouts of fiction.

4. The Watch That Ends the Night

Pages: 480

One Sentence Synopsis: Twenty four short stories told by voices from the Titanic including: Molly Brown, John Jacob Astor, a young child, a con man and the iceberg itself.

Why now? Much like A Monster calls I know once I get started on this one I won’t want to stop. I can already hear myself saying, “Just one more chapter.”

5. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Pages: 216

One Sentence Synopsis: Just before the Earth is demolished to make way for an intergalactic freeway, Arthur is saved by his best friend, Ford, and taken on a space adventure guided by the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Why now? This has been on my TBR list forever and will be a great short book to finish and boost my confidence during the readathon.

6.An Abundance of Katherines

Pages: 227

One Sentence Synopsis: After being dumped by the 19th straight Katherine, Colin goes on a quest to create a theorem that will predict the future of his love life.

Why now? Finally, my first John Green novel! This was supposed to be Paper Towns but when I found out my book club was reading this for April I switched it out.

Feel free to bring me coffee at any time!

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Each week they post a new Top Ten list for participating bloggers to create answers and blog posts for. Everyone is welcome to join and you can find more information on upcoming topics at their site.

This week we’re giving tips to new book bloggers. I’m a bit nervous as I’m still pretty new and am not sure I am in a position to be giving advice. Some of my tips will be repeated from my first ever blog post as they bear repeating but others are what I’ve gleaned as I went along.

Top Nine Tips for New Book Bloggers:

1. Just get started.

Before I began writing my crazily popular (if a couple hundred daily views equals a crazy popular) blog posts I used to worry that no one would read what I wrote. Crazy right? Clearly my enormous blog following (79, what?! what?!) has proven me wrong. But seriously, just get started. Don’t worry, if you write it they will come.

2. Be easy on the eyes.

Don’t strain your readers’ eyes, it’s not polite and it won’t make people like you. It’s been proven that a white background with black writing is easier to read than a dark background with light writing and you want your blog to be easy to read. Now that I’ve been reading blogs for almost a year I must say I agree, reading your blog shouldn’t make me want to go lie down in a dark room.

3. Keep it clean.

Nothing’s worse than going to a blog and seeing too many graphics, a bunch of different fonts and a messy, distracting side bar. In the world of blogging less is more and your writing is really what you want to stand out. Choose your images carefully, limit your widgets and for heaven’s sake choose one font and stick with it.

4. Brevity is better.

Alright, guilty as charged! I’m a rambler, you should hear me leave a voice mail, but while blogging I do my best to edit myself and be less wordy. I can’t always achieve my desired level of conciseness but blogs are much more attractive to the reader if it doesn’t appear they’ll age a year as they read.

5. Treat others the way you want to be treated.

Read other blogs and leave insightful comments. It will drive traffic to  your blog and it’s nice to let people know you enjoyed their post. One of the best things about blogging is interacting with readers and other bloggers but do NOT comment simply to promote your own post, it’s cheesy and people aren’t stupid, they can see it coming from a mile away.

6. Rubric, rubric, rubric.

Am I a chart and graph geek? Totally, and I can’t believe I didn’t know more about rubrics until Mandy shared her book review rubric on her blog. Now I can’t emphasize the importance of having one enough. If you’re focusing mainly on book reviews your readers are going to want to know you are being consistent in your ratings. You want to make sure all your 4 star books are really worth 4 stars and a rubric gives you an unbiased way of getting there.

7. Proofread.

Make sure you review, edit and proofread!  Mistakes in spelling, grammar and formatting can turn people off from reading and make you seem less professional. People are also less likely to accept advice from bloggers who consistently make mistakes so, if you really want to make sure people take your reviews seriously, make sure this isn’t you.

8. Be consistent.

Write consistently. I’m still working on this but aim to post Monday through Friday. Readers like to know what to expect and when to expect it. If you’re really lucky you’ll end up being part of someone’s morning ritual or, if you’re more like me, people will know when to avoid the internets.

9. Find your voice.

Find your voice and figure out your hook. What makes your blog different from the gazillion other book bloggers? My voice is self deprecating sarcasm and I have pretty structured reviews. All my favourite blogs have their own thing that makes them unique. Some use humour, others take themselves more seriously. Some mix personal anecdotes with bookish knowledge while others stick to just the facts. Whatever you decide stick with it and let your readers get comfortable with your voice.

10. Join Goodreads.

You’re about to be bombarded with some really great book suggestions now that you’re in the world of book blogging and you’re going to need somewhere to keep those suggestions.Goodreads will allow you to rate books you’ve read, suggest books for others, enter contests to win books and compile lists of books you’d like to read. It has been a lifesaver for me and I always have it open in a separate tab when I’m reading blogs.

What tips do you have for bloggers just starting out?

Best Commenter Award

Originally awarded by SJ at Snobbery this award goes out to the five readers who comment the most on this blog:

Molly at The Waffler

Heather at Gippsland Granny

Kate at Subtle Kate

Miss Anderson at The Librarian Who Doesn’t Say Shhh

Danielle at Enchanted By Books

In addition to showing the comment love (and using the awesome graphic) each recipient (who wants to accept the award) must answer the following 9 questions:

1. What is your third favourite colour? Red
2. Would you rather be:  a Jedi, a Pokemon Master or a Wizard/Witch?  Choose ONE I would be a Jedi. There aren’t really any female Jedis so I’d be super rare which is rad. 
3. Who is your favourite Doctor? I’m ashamed to admit I’ve only seen Tennant as the Doctor so… I choose Tennant. 
4. Can you whistle? Intermittently and never when it would make me look cool.
5. Would you name your child Sirius Albus? Nope. I named him Oliver Wellock. If he had been a girl her name would have been Ella Louise.
6. What is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything? Naps.
7. Do you own a lawnmower? No, but we don’t own a lawn either.
8. Do you think Legolas is a (very pretty) pansy? No, but he may be too pretty.
9. What’s the trashiest thing you’ve read in the last year?  Should we [Snobbery] cover it for Trashy Tuesday? Outlander but I don’t know how trashy it really is. There’s a lot of sexy times though. Cover it!

So, ladies feel free to pass the award on if you’d like, we can all agree the best part of blogging is when someone takes the time to write a comment and I’m super grateful you 5 have been so active in the Shhh Mommy’s Blogging community!

Beautiful Blogger Award

The requirements for winning this award are highly vague so I’m picking my 5 most visually pleasing blogs of the moment:

1. Lucy’s Football – We have the same theme and she always chooses cute/funny pictures to illustrate her posts. Plus, I’ve heard that in real life she’s easy on the eyes.

2. Why This Book? – It’s cool to call a dude beautiful right? Cause he is, for realsies… or at least his blog is. I love the simplicity of his theme, his type writer header and his well chosen images.

3. Broken Penguins – Farah’s purpose behind starting a blog was to talk books and share beautiful pictures and she’s definitely succeeding. Her header is gorgeous (someone’s a graphic artist!) and she always finds stunning photos to illustrate her posts.

4. Librarian Who Doesn’t Say Shhh (that two awards for her so far!) – Miss Anderson appears to be a Photoshop whiz and it makes her blog really attractive. Plus, she does a really pretty Quotastic Friday feature .

5. Between the Covers – I just started reading this one but I love the look of her theme! The colouring is super bookish and I love the little snippets of posts, it just makes everything so clean and modern.

You may have noticed I thanked Mandy for nominating me, linked to her blog, included the award’s image on my blog, nominated seven (or fewer) blogs and linked to their sites. That’s all those nominated have to do if they want to pass the award along.

The Versatile Blogger Award

I have already received and passed this one along but Mandy demands I at least do the 7 Random Things requirement and I can never say no to her:

1. Before I started this blog I had only read Harry Potter and Twilight but now I’m highly addicted to young adult fiction. I have a YA TBR pile that is almost as tall as I am.

2. I can’t stop buying water bottles, I have 5 at home and still get excited when I see new ones in the stores. This also applies to journals.

3. I think Deadwood was the best show on television and I’m highly disappointed with HBO for cancelling it. I was upset enough to not watch their shows but then True Blood and Game of Thrones crumbled my resolve.

4. I’m horribly, horribly addicted to home renovation shows. My poor family has been forced to watch Leave it to Bryan marathons and Property Brothers through dinner. Of course if I ever actually had to pick up a hammer it’d be a disaster.

5. The first movie I saw in the movie theatre was The Little Mermaid. The first movie I saw without my parents was the Lion King, pretty rebellious huh? I still remember all the words to all the songs in both of the movies because I’m awesome!

6. I have 6 tattoos and am constantly coveting more. I have big plans of mermaids, pirate ships and an octopus but we’ll see.

7. I’m a perfectionist and obsessively preview and reread my blog for grammatical and formatting mistakes but still feel panicky when I hit the publish button. Can you imagine what I’d be like if I was actually getting paid for this?

So there you have it, I’m a weirdo but at least some people like me.

Synopsis: When Isabella Swan moves to Forks, WA to live with her dad she immediately wonders if she’s made a mistake: the town is rainy, small and the other kids seem way too cheery. Things start to look up when she meets the gorgeous but aloof and mysterious Edward Cullen. They quickly find they only have eyes for each other but Edward is hiding a big secret that when revealed will put both him and Bella in danger.

I had heard a lot about Twilight prior to reading it and had convinced myself it was not up my alley. I hadn’t really read any young adult fiction up to that point (except Harry Potter of course) and didn’t think a book about sparkly vampire romance would tempt me. Then, one day with nothing to read and a huge wait ahead of me, I picked up a copy and started reading. Is it great literature? Nope, the writing is actually a bit atrocious but it’s addictive! The 16 year old girl in me loved the idea of a strong and mysterious love interest saving me from all kinds of trouble and the adult was sucked into the sexual tension and the drama of the two worlds (human and vampire) colliding. I ended up flying through the series and have seen all the movies to date. It’s my guilty pleasure and I’m not afraid to admit it.

What book did you expect to hate but ended up liking?