Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

Published in 2007. 288 pages.


I had heard good things about Jay Asher's first novel, and I was thrilled when it became available at BookMooch earlier this year. When it arrived, Jelly Bean read it, but I put it off because reading a book I own doesn't have the same urgency that reading a book I have to return to the library does. Last weekend's read-a-thon, however, seemed a good time to give it a try. It was the perfect read-a-thon book, and I absolutely loved it - that is, despite the sadness.

First sentences: "Sir?" she repeats. "How soon do you want it to get there?"

Last sentences: Two steps behind her, I say her name. "Skye."

Basic concept (from the book jacket): Clay Jensen returns home from school to find a strange package with his name of it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers several cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker - his classmate and crush - who committed suicide two weeks earlier. Hannah's voice explains that there are thirteen reasons she decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he'll find out why.

For more information: Visit the novel's official website!

Other book bloggers' reviews of Thirteen Reasons Why: If you have read and reviewed this book, I would love to link your review here. Please leave me a comment or email me your link!

• Alessandra (July 8, 2008)


• Debi (May 22, 2008)


• C.B. James (March 22, 2008)


• Joy (January 15, 2008)


• Dewey (January 3, 2008)


• Becky (October 7, 2007)

By the way: This book is my twelfth of twelve for the Young Adult Challenge. That's one challenge I had no problem completing! (It runs until December 31.)

2008.38

The Off Season by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

Published in 2007. 277 pages.


First sentence: Every Labor Day, the Jorgensens - they own Jorgensens' Ice Cream - set up a little ice cream stand right in their yard, which means you can spend the entire Labor Day picnic making yourself ice cream sundaes if that's what you want to do, and for years when I wasn't playing softball or chasing the Jorgensen kids or trying to keep up with my brothers, I'd sit myself at that little booth making one sundae after another until it was time to head home for evening milking, and then a couple miles into the drive I'd bring that whole sundae experience back up, right there on the side of whatever road we happened to make it to.

Last sentence: Someone else who's strong enough to take on a whole herd of trouble when it comes their way.

Plot summary (from the Library of Congress): High school junior D.J. staggers under the weight of caring for her badly injured brother, her responsibilities on the dairy farm, a changing relationship with her friend Brian, and her own athletic aspirations.

Blurb from the book jacket: This hilarious, heartbreaking, and ultimately triumphant sequel to the acclaimed novel Dairy Queen takes D.J. and all the Schwenks from Labor Day to a Thanksgiving football game that you will never forget.

How I felt about this book: I loved it! I loved Dairy Queen and picked up The Off Season immediately after I finished Dairy Queen. This one deals with some more serious situations - resulting in my reading through my sobs at times - but it's still as funny and as real as Dairy Queen. I truly hope that this isn't the last we've heard from D.J. Schwenk.

Other book bloggers' reviews of The Off Season:
If you have read and reviewed this book, I would love to link your review here. Please leave me a comment or email me your link!

• tinylittlelibarian at tiny little reading room (November 7, 2007)


• Jen Robinson's Book Page (June 24, 2007)

2008.34

Dairy Queen by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

Published in 2006. 274 pages.

Paperback Cover
Hardback Cover

First line: This whole enormous deal wouldn't have happened, none of it, if Dad hadn't messed up his hip moving the manure spreader.

Last line: Maybe Curtis should try flunking English.

Why I read this book: I chose Dairy Queen for the Triple 8 Challenge in my "Bee Bonanza" category - picks from the nominees for the 2008 Beehive Awards. I also chose it to celebrate Dairy Month, which is June, for the Every Month is a Holiday Challenge.

Basic concept: A coming-of-age story of a sixteen-year-old dairy farmer and her relationship with her family, all of whom love football, and with the quarterback of a rival football team.

Why I loved this book: One of the blurbs on the back cover of the sequel The Off Season says it well:

"D.J. Schwenk is a real, true-to-life heroine ... full of self-doubt, yet incredibly determined and brave. Plus, she's funny. Her voice just dragged me in and didn't let go. I loved this book."
- E. Lockhart, author of The Boyfriend List and Fly on the Wall

I found it impossible not to like D.J.! Additionally, the secondary characters are well-developed, and the whole story just rings true. The chapters have fun titles too, such as "People Who Are Crazy and Need to Have Their Heads Examined" and "Who Ever Said Love Was Fun?"

What else you might want to know: The sequel to Dairy Queen is The Off Season - which I started reading immediately after finishing Dairy Queen. (My review of The Off Season is here.) Catherine Gilbert Murdock's website is here. I'm whole-heartedly recommending this book to my seventeen-year-old daughter.

Other book bloggers' reviews of Dairy Queen:
If you have read and reviewed this book, I would love to link your review here. Please leave me a comment or email me your link!

• Melissa at Book Nut (April 8, 2008)


• Jen Robinson's Book Page (June 3, 2007)

2008.33

Someone Like Summer by M. E. Kerr

Published in 2007. 263 pages.



Several months ago, not knowing anything about either the book or the author except what I read on the jacket flaps, I picked up Someone Like Summer from the Young Adult section of my local library. My 17-year-old daughter read it and told me she thought I'd like it too. Following my read of Speak, I wanted another good YA novel, so I decided to give this one a try. Unfortunately, despite my desire to love it, I just didn't.

First sentence: The first time I saw Esteban, he was kicking a soccer ball down a field behind the Accabonac School.

Last sentence: He said, "Yes. Family."

Basic plot summary: An upper-middle-class white girl from Long Island and an immigrant worker from Colombia fall in love despite objections from both their families and their community.

Why I just didn't love this book: Among the reasons I just couldn't fall in love with this book - despite what I thought was a premise with great potential - are the following:

• Except for several references to President Bush and the Iraq War, and also a reference to Hurricane Katrina, I felt like I was more in the 1950s (à la West Side Story) than in 2005. What could have been a highly topical current political issue fell flat for me.


• The storyline was mostly bland. While there were a few interesting secondary characters, I wasn't drawn into their lives, and Annabel and Esteban didn't really have the chemistry that I'd like to feel in a good "Romeo and Juliet" story. Their story wasn't particularly compelling.


• Annabel's voice didn't seem nearly as "real" to me as, say, Melinda's in Speak. It just didn't resonate the same way.

2008.26

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Published in 1999. 198 pages.
2000 Printz Honor Book.


First sentence: It is my first morning of high school.

Last sentence: "Let me tell you about it."

Basic storyline: A traumatic event near the end of the summer has a devastating effect on Melinda's freshman year in high school.

Why I read this book: I put this book on my to-read list last year when I found out about Laurie Halse Anderson's work at The Hidden Side of a Leaf. (Here is Dewey's 2006 review of Speak.) I even picked the book up at the library, but other things took priority and I didn't get to it before I had to return it. As I was compiling 2008 challenge lists, I put Speak on my lists for the Cardathon, the Printz Award Challenge, Every Month is a Holiday, and the Young Adult Challenge. I was determined to read Speak at some point this year! Luckily for me, the host of my IRL book club choose Speak for our April group meeting - and the rest is history.

Why I loved this book: There are several reasons why I really loved this book. First, Melinda's voice is the perfect mix of sarcastic wit and honest pain. She is just so "real." Second, the subtle symbolism and literary references were so great. My favorite was a poster of Maya Angelou on the door of Melinda's secret hide-away; like Melinda, Angelou suffered a trauma as a child and stopped speaking for a time. Third, Anderson's writing is just so powerful. Here is a passage that my IRL book group host particularly liked:

Our frog lies on her back. Waiting for a prince to come and princessify her with a smooch? I stand over her with my knife. Ms. Keen's voice fades to a mosquito whine. My throat closes off. It is hard to breather. I put out my hand to steady myself against the table. David pins her froggy hands to the dissection tray. He spreads her froggy legs and pins her froggy feet. I have to slice open her belly. She doesn't say a word. She is already dead. A scream starts in my gut - I can feel the cut, smell the dirt, leaves in my hair.

Finally, I loved this book because it deals with a serious, important issue with such humor.

A note about censorship: Because of its controversial subject matter, Speak has been challenged in a number of schools. The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) reports that "according to Anderson, in almost all the challenges she has heard about, the book remained in the curriculum." Read more about the challenges Speak faces and about Anderson's efforts to fight censorship at The Banned Books Project. (One of the posts there about Speak is mine.)

2008.23

A Dance for Three by Louise Plummer

Published in 2000. 230 pages.


First sentence: Milo wasn't the first boy to kiss me but he was the first one to bite me.

Basic premise of the book: When fifteen-year-old Hannah Ziebarth discovers she's pregnant by her boyfriend Milo, she believes that everything will be all right. But her pregnancy isn't the only difficulty in her life: she and her mother are still trying to come to terms with her father's unexpected death, and Mrs. Ziebarth's response has been to withdraw into her bonsai plants, never leaving their home, not even capable of making her own sandwich for lunch. From the back cover: "Louise Plummer tells Hannah's powerful story from three perspectives in this tale of loss, recovery, and self-discovery." In addition to Hannah's perspective, we hear from Hannah's best friend Trilby and from Milo's younger brother Roman.

What I thought of the book: I wanted to absolutely love this book! I've read all of Plummer's previous young adult novels and enjoyed them all, especially The Unlikely Romance of Kate Bjorkman. This one had great potential - but while I did like it and do recommend it, I finished the book feeling somewhat disappointed that it didn't live up to my expectations. One disappointment relates to the "three perspectives" of the story. Roman's perspective in particular was too limited to fulfill its promise.

The meaning of the title: When I first picked up this book, I expected that the "dance for three" related to the main character, her baby, and the baby's father. There is that, of course, but the symbolism goes beyond that. There are the three perspectives of the novel - not just Hannah's voice, but the voices of two other people peripherally affected by Hannah's pregnancy. There is also the "dance for three" of Hannah and her parents, a dance that affects everything that happens after Mr. Ziebarth's death. Finally, the actual words of the title come into the story as Hannah watches a baby and its parents at an outdoor concert she attends during her pregnancy; this "dance for three" helps Hannah decide what she wants for her life and for her baby.

Personal connection to the book: In some sense this book is about "my people." The book is set in Salt Lake City, near where I live. Hannah and her mother belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons), as I do, and although there is no discussion of their religious beliefs and little about their involvement in their congregation, their concerned bishop plays a pivotal role in the outcome of the story.

Recognition given to the book: A Dance for Three was an American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults in 2001; the entire list is here. It also received the 2001 Association for Mormon Letters (AML) Award for Young Adult Literature; there is a nice review on the AML website (here).

2008.18

Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli

Published in 2007. 274 pages.


Love, Stargirl, the sequel to Stargirl, was released last summer. I was eagerly anticipating the opportunity to read it, but when the chance first came, I hesitated. I think that because I love Stargirl so much - it's an all-time favorite of mine, one of the few books I've read more than once - I was afraid I'd be disappointed with this sequel. So I put it off.

Just before Christmas, my mom took my kids and me to the bookstore to pick out a few gifts - she has given books as Christmas presents for as long as I can remember - and I saw Love, Stargirl on the shelf. Mom bought it for me. I was excited to have it - but still put off reading it for a while.

The birthday of author Jerry Spinelli is February 1. I'd included Spinelli on my possibles list for the Celebrate the Author Challenge, so I decided that to "celebrate" Spinelli I would read Love, Stargirl during February. And I did.

The entire novel is basically a letter from Stargirl to Leo, whom she left back in Arizona at the end of Stargirl.

Dear Leo,
I love beginnings. If I were in charge of calendars, every day would be January 1.
And what better way to celebrate this New Year's Day than to begin writing a letter to my once (and future?) boyfriend.

Not quite as powerful as the original, Love, Stargirl nevertheless reminds us of the importance of being oneself and of the difference one person can make in the world. As the book jacket states, "Over the course of a year, Stargirl comes to find hope in new places: mockingbirds, donut angels, moon flowers, and the Winter Solstice - that turning-point day when dark tips to light." I find hope in those things too!

You can find out how to start a "Stargirl Society" here! I wanna join!

2008.16

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

Published in 2006. 233 pages.
2007 Printz Award Winner.


With its themes of race, identity, and self-acceptance, this graphic novel (only the second I've ever read) was a great follow-up read to Nothing but the Truth (and a Few White Lies). Three separate stories that come together in the end, this is a quick read. I started it on Tuesday while sitting in the high school parking lot waiting for my daughter and finished it last night while eating an egg roll and a fortune cookie. The more I think about the book, the more I like it. Author Gene Luen Yang's discussion of the origins of the book (here) brought me nearly to tears. I think this is a book that everyone ought to read!

2008.12

Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

Published in 2005. 314 pages.
2006 Newbery Honor Book.


First sentence: Miri woke to the sleepy bleating of a goat.

Last sentence: From the cracks in the rocks all around, the miri flowers were already blooming.

Why I read this book: I've been meaning to read a Shannon Hale book for quite some time. My daughters are both fans, and because Shannon is a Utahn, I feel a sense of connection to her as well. When my church women's group book club discussed Princess Academy as a possibility for February's meeting, I highly encouraged that idea. We often choose books that I have already read - which is okay with me - but it's more fun when I get to read along, and having a deadline always helps my motivation in getting to something on my to-read list.

A brief description of this book (adapted from the ALA's description on the 2006 Newbery Medal and Honor Books page): Miri and the other young women of her rocky highland village are forced to leave their close-knit community to attend the "Princess Academy" when the palace priests divine that the prince must choose a bride from the territory where the girls live. Like the miri flower, which sprouts from the cracks in the linder rock, Miri proves herself to be strong, resilient, and courageous. The book is a fresh approach to the traditional princess story with unexpected plot twists and great emotional resonance.

My thoughts about this book: I love princess stories! Or maybe I ought to say that I love princess stories that are other than the "happily ever after" drivel I detest, ones that celebrate the strength, uniqueness, and often contrariness of the girls involved. Princess Academy met all my expectations. Miri is my hero!

A couple of favorite passages:

Britta, one of the girls attending the academy:

"The only thing I wish is that whoever does become the princess is happy, I mean really, really happy. Otherwise, what would it matter, right?" [pages 108-109]


From a discussion between Miri and Britta:

Miri slumped onto a boulder. "What should I say? That I like him so much it hurts?"
"Maybe you should tell him."
"But what if I do and he looks at me like I'm salt fish rotten in the barrel, and then I can never be his friend again?" [pages 169-170]

How this book helps me with my challenge goals for the year: This is my ninth book of 2008 and my fourth for the Young Adult Challenge. This one also qualifies for 888 (in my "Oh, To Be Young Again" category), the TBR Challenge (because it's been on my to-read list for more than six months), Celebrate the Author (more on that below), the Cardathon (my thoughts in that regard are here), and the Unread Author Challenge (since this was my first Shannon Hale book) - as well as the Winter Reading Challenge and the A~Z Reading Challenge. Don't you love cross-listing?!

Celebrating the author:

Author Shannon Hale, who has published five novels for young adults and one adult fiction book to date, was born on January 26, 1974, in Salt Lake City, Utah. She and her husband Dean Hale and their two young children currently reside in South Jordan, Utah. You can find out more about her - including bios as written by her husband and by her son - here. Her website also includes the following princess tips - which I think give some insight into who Shannon Hale is.

I received a call from the UK branch of my book publisher, asking me to come to the UK to promote Princess Academy. Very cool. Part of the conversation went something like this:


UK publicist: "We thought we might do a princess party and send out the invitations as though inviting the guests to attend the princess academy. But would you feel comfortable wearing a tiara to the party?"

Me: "Would I feel comfortable wearing a tiara to the party? When wouldn't I feel comfortable wearing a tiara?"

She also wondered if I could write some tips on becoming a princess, based on the story in the book. They made postcards with these tips on them, which some of you may have seen:

How to Be a Princess

Learn to walk with a boot on your head
Put on your favorite dress
Read books after everyone else has gone to bed
Memorize all the rules
Break the rules
Save your friends from uncertain danger
And, most importantly, just be a girl

Happy Belated Birthday, Shannon!

2008.9

Nothing but the Truth (and a Few White Lies)by Justina Chen Headley

Published in 2006. 241 pages.


First sentence: While every other freshman is at the Spring Fling tonight, I have a date with an old lady whose thumb is feeling up my belly button.

Last sentence: And that is the whole yin-yang truth about me, the one and only Patricia Yi-Phen Ho.

Brief summary of the plot (from Headley's website): Hapa (Half Asian and half white) Patty Ho has never felt completely at home in her skin. Life at House Ho is tough enough between her ultra-strict Taiwanese mom (epic-length lectures and all) and her Harvard-bound big brother. But things get worse when a Chinese fortune teller channels Patty's future via her bellybutton ... and divines a white guy on her horizon. Her mom then freaks out and ships her off to math camp at Stanford. Yes, math camp. Just as Patty writes off her summer of woe, life starts glimmering with all kinds of probabilities.

Why I read this book: I was looking for Asian or Asian-American authors for the Expanding Horizons Challenge when I stumbled upon Justina Chen Headley. Nothing but the Truth, which won the 2007 Asian Pacific American Award for Literature, was her debut novel. It appealed to me greatly, and I decided that it would be a perfect for both Expanding Horizons and the Young Adult Challenge.

Connecting with this book: One of the reasons this book first appealed to me is that I am the (white) mother of two Hapa daughters (and a Hapa son) whom I want to feel comfortable with - even celebratory about - their "halfness." I think I fell in love with Patty Ho when I read this on Headley's website:

Why did you write Nothing but the Truth (and a Few White Lies)?
A couple of years ago, I took my kids to the Children’s Museum. A group of teens hung-twung-wung’ed us (you know, mocked us with pseudo-Chinese). That night, my character, Patty Ho, started giving a soliloquy about what it feels like not to fit in either at home with her ultra-strict Taiwanese mom or at her high school. Her observations were so wry, I started to laugh, which probably accounts for why the other runners on my path veered out of my way (or not).

I also felt connected with this book because of the math camp aspect - since I am a bit of a math geek myself, as well as the daughter of a (female) math geek, the sister of a (female) math geek, and the mother of a (female) math geek. Finally, despite my "wholeness" as a Caucasian, I can relate well (as I suspect many people can) to feelings of not quite fitting in, of being "other." This is a great read for anyone who relates to that!

For more information: Justine Chen Headley's fun website is here. There is information there about her second young adult novel Girl Overboard, which is definitely on my to-read list. You might also want to check out the great review of Nothing but the Truth that Jen Robinson, who chose it as one of her favorite books of 2007, wrote (it's here).

2008.8

The Giver by Lois Lowry

Published in 1993.
Awarded the Newbery Medal in 1994.
Audio book performed by Ron Rifkin.


This was actually a re-read for me - of a book that immediately became an all-time favorite when I read it several years ago on the recommendation of a friend. I planned to re-read The Giver this month for the Yahoo! Book Awards Group, as well as to refresh my memory of it before reading Gathering Blue, the second book in what Lowry's website calls simply "The Trilogy." (I have also heard the set of three books, which also includes Messenger, referred to as "companion books.")

Because I was looking for a book to listen to during my commute and because I have several times in the past gotten a new perspective and enhanced enjoyment from hearing a book after my initial read, I picked up the Book on CD version of The Giver when I was at the library last week. I found the book to be just as tremendous the second time through - and Ron Rifkin's performance was delightful.

The Giver is the kind of book that makes you think - and which continues to stimulate thought on a re-read. The themes of choice, freedom, and diversity are powerfully explored in the novel. I think my emotional reaction was even more profound on hearing the story of Jonas, the young protagonist of the book, than when I read it. The Giver will continue to be an all-time favorite of mine!

Sadly, The Giver is on the ALA's list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Challenged Books of 1990-2000. Read more about the challenges faced by the book here.

2008.5

Specials by Scott Westerfeld

Published in 2006. 372 pages.


Specials is the third book in the young adult science fiction Uglies trilogy. The storyline nicely completed the saga of Tally Youngblood, but I found the telling to be a bit uneven. Some of it was fast-moving and exciting, and, like with the other books, I thought the social commentary - which included not only society's obsession with appearance but also the concept of choice and the idiocy of war - was superb. But other parts seemed too much of the "same old thing," and I thought maybe the series was continuing on too long. The ending was great, however, and I've heard good things about the fourth book - Extras - so I'm eager to read more.

Before I read Uglies, Pretties, and Specials, Scott Westerfeld was an "unread author" for me. With Extras, that'll be four of the six books required for the Unread Authors Challenge. I am going to also count Specials for the Winter Reading Challenge, the Young Adult Challenge and my "Oh, To Be Young Again!" category of the 888.

2008.3

It's All Joy's Fault

About a month ago Joy stopped by and mentioned that she is hosting a Young Adult Challenge in 2008. How can I pass that up?!

The rules are "sweet and simple." I just have to choose twelve young adult novels and read them at my own pace during 2008. These are my tentative choices (listed alphabetically by author) - including six alternates:

• Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson


• Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson


• Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher


• The Rhyming Season by Edward Averett


• Pieces of Georgia by Jen Bryant


• Total Constant Order by Crissa-Jean Chappell


• The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier


• Double Identity by Margaret Peterson Haddix


• Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes


• Princess Academy by Shannon Hale


• Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer


• John Lennon: All I Want Is the Truth by Elizabeth Partridge


• A Dance for Three by Louise Plummer


• Finding Daddy by Louise Plummer


• A Crooked Kind of Perfect by Linda Urban


• Peeps by Scott Westerfeld


• Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac by Gabrielle Zevin


• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

Note: I will be cross-listing some of the books for this challenge with other challenges.

The Quintessential Challenge for 2008

Michelle (or 3M) is hosting the quintessential challenge for 2008! In the Triple 8 Challenge (or 888), participants "read eight books in each of eight different categories in 2008." (Further details are available on the challenge blog.)


These are my eight categories:

1. Oh, To Be Young Again! (some cross-listing with the Young Adult Challenge)
   Eight young adult or older children's novels.


2. Escapism Reads (some cross-listing with the Series Challenge, the First in a Series Challenge, and the Cardathon)
   Eight books from the genres of mystery, suspense thriller, science fiction, fantasy, chick lit, or maybe even romance.


3. In Their Shoes (cross-listing with the "In Their Shoes" Challenge)
   Eight memoirs, biographies, or autobiographies. The "long list" of my picks is here.


4. Bee Bonanza
   Eight books from the 2008 Beehive Book Nominees. (The Beehive Awards are sponsored by the Children's Literature Association of Utah (CLAU). Awards are given in five categories: Children's Picture Book, Children's Fiction Book, Children's Informational Book, Young Adults' Book, and Children's Poetry Book. Winners are chosen from the nominated books by the children of Utah, who vote for their favorite books. A list of the 2008 nominees can be found here.) These are my preliminary picks (in alphabetical order):
   
   
   • Bella at Midnight by Diane Stanley*
   
   
   • Dairy Queen: A Novel by Catherine Gilbert Murdock*
   
   
   • Fairest by Gail Carson Levine*
   
   
   • Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen and illustrated by Kevin Hawkes*
   
   
   • Pieces of Georgia by Jennifer Bryant*
   
   
   • The Rhyming Season by Edward Averett*
   
   
   • She's All That: Poems about Girls by Belinda Hollyer
   
   
   • Team Moon: How 400,000 People Landed Apollo 11 on the Moon by Catherine Thimmesh
   
   
5. Salt Lake County Library Reader's Choice
   Eight books from either the 2008 nominees or past winners. (Twice a year the Salt Lake County Library staff selects a group of recently published books that they enjoyed reading and that they think library patrons will like reading too. Patrons vote for their favorites. A list of past winners is here.)


6. Banned Books (in conjunction with the Banned Books Project)
   Eight books from the many that have ever been challenged or banned.


7. IRL Book Club Picks
   Eight picks from those chosen for my main in-real-life book club. (We meet eleven times during the year, so hopefully there will be at least eight picks that I haven't previously read. If there aren't enough, then this category will be expanded to include some picks of the book club of my church women's group.)


8. Books About Books (cross-listing with the Themed Reading Challenge)
   Eight books (fiction or non-fiction) about books or reading. Among the possibilities I'm considering are the following:
   
   
   • 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff (This would be a re-read from my college days.)
   
   
   • Book Crush: For Kids and Teens - Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment, and Reason by Nancy Pearl
   
   
   • Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment, and Reason by Nancy Pearl
   
   
   • The Book That Changed My Life: 71 Remarkable Writers Celebrate the Books That Matter Most to Them edited by Roxanne J. Coady and Joy Johannessen
   
   
   • The Book Thief by Markus Zusak*
   
   
   • Booked to Die (the first in the Cliff Janeway series) by John Dunning
   
   
   • Ex Libris : Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman
   
   
   • Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (This would be a re-read from my high school days.)*
   
   
   • Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her by Melanie Rehak
   
   
   • How Reading Changed My Life by Anna Quindlen
   
   
   • Inkheart by Cornelia Funke*
   
   
   • Inkspell by Cornelia Funke*
   
   
   • Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen*
   
   
   • Out of the Flames: The Remarkable Story of a Fearless Scholar, a Fatal Heresy, and One of the Rarest Books in the World by Lawrence Goldstone
   
   
   • The Readers' Choice: 200 Book Club Favorites by Victoria Golden McMains

Note: Potentially overlapping picks (eight of which are allowed by the challenge) are marked with an asterisk.

I've done the math, and if I'm going to be successful with this challenge, I'm going to need to read at least five of these books each month (or a little more than one book a week) throughout the year. As of today I've read almost sixty-seven books this year - which is at a pace for a total of about seventy-nine for the whole year, or about one-and-a-half books a week. Even with the addition of a handful of additional books - for other challenges (either already in progress or yet to join), for other purposes (such as the Book Buddies picks and the selections of two Yahoo book groups I've recently joined - Book Awards and Classic Lit), or justforthehelluvit - it seems do-able. (I think.)