Quaisior's 2018 ROOTs

My TBR pile grows faster than I can read, especially now that I have a toddler who doesn't like to sleep at night. My goal is to read and/or DNF and get rid of 50 of my own books this year. I'm also skimming some books that are from sub-genres I don't like much, so I'll count those separately.

ROOTs 2018:
1) The Revenants- Sheri S. Tepper
2) The Gate to Futures Past- Julie E. Czerneda
3) Trading in Danger- Elizabeth Moon
4) The Cupcake Queen- Heather Hepler
5) Unf*ck Your Habitat- Rachel Hoffman
6) Guardian of Honor- Robin D. Owens
7) King's Blood Four- Sheri S. Tepper
8) Marque and Reprisal- Elizabeth Moon
9) Necromancer Nine- Sheri S. Tepper
10) Sorceress of Faith- Robin D. Owens
11) The Mammoth Book of Futuristic Romance
12) Engaging the Enemy- Elizabeth Moon
13) Wizard's Eleven- Sheri S. Tepper
14) Command Decision- Elizabeth Moon
15) The Song of Mavin Manyshaped- Sheri S. Tepper
16) Dragongirl- Todd McCaffrey
17) Victory Conditions- Elizabeth Moon
18) The Flight of Mavin Manyshaped- Sheri S. Tepper
19) Dragon's Time- Anne and Todd McCaffrey
20) Cold Welcome- Elizabeth Moon
21) The Search of Mavin Manyshaped- Sheri S. Tepper
22) The Nursing Mother's Companion- Kathleen Huggins (I read the relevant-to-me parts anyway)

DNFs:
1) Peeps- Scott Westefeld
2) Incarceron- Catherine Fisher
3) Uglies- Scott Westefeld
4) Pretties- Scott Westefeld
5) Liverpool Taffy- Katie Flynn
6) Snobs- Julian Fellowes
7) In the Midnight Hour- Patti O'Shea
8) Bitten- Kelley Armstrong
9) Stolen- Kelley Armstrong
10) Dime Store Magic- Kelley Armstrong
11) Industrial Magic- Kelley Armstrong
12) Haunted- Kelley Armstrong
13) No Humans Involved- Kelley Armstrong
14) How Not to Spend Your Senior Year- Cameron Dokey
15) What I Wore to Save the World- Maryrose Wood
16) Recursion- Tony Ballantyne
17) A Study in Ashes- Emma Jane Holloway
18) Blood's Pride- Evie Manieri
19) Natural Nutrition for Dogs and Cats- Kymythy Schultze
20) Violin- Anne Rice
21) Servant of the Bones- Anne Rice
22) Star Trek: The Next Generation: Vendetta- Peter David
23) Star Trek The Next Generation: A Time to Be Born- John Vornholt
24) Protector of the Flight- Robin D. Owens
25) Keepers of the Flame- Robin D. Owens
26) Echoes in the Dark- Robin D. Owens
27) Strands of Starlight- Gael Baudino
28) Dragon Sword- Gael Baudino
29) Daughter of Prophecy- Anne Kelleher Bush
30) Silver's Lure- Anne Kelleher
31) Sorcery Rising- Jude Fisher
32) Baker's Boy- J. V. Jones
33) Black Trillium- Marion Zimmer Bradley, Julian May, and Andre Norton
34) How to Cheat at Cleaning- Jeff Bredenberg
35) Speed Cleaning- Jeff Campbell
36) Spring Cleaning- Jeff Campbell
37) No-Cry Sleep Solution- Elizabeth Pantley
38) No-Cry Sleep Solution For Toddlers and Preschoolers- Elizabeth Pantley
39) The Baby Sleep Book- William Sears
40) The Sword- Deborah Chester
41) Resenting the Hero- Moira J. Moore
42) Exile- Anne Logston
43) Magic's Silken Snare- Elizabeth Gilligan
44) The High Queen- Nancy McKenzie
45) The Baby Owner's Manual- Louis and Joe Borgenicht
46) The Baby Owner's Games and Activities Book- Lynn Rosen & Joe Borgenicht
47) Deadline- Sandra Brown
48) The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm- Nancy Farmer
49) The Hollow Kingdom- Clare B. Dunkle
50) A Sorcerer's Treason- Sarah Zettel
51) The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit- Storm Constantine
52) Jane-Emily and Witches Children- Patricia Clapp
53) The Telling Pool- David Clement-Davies
54) Being Dead- Vivian Vande Velde
55) The House of Shattered Wings- Aliette de Bodard
56) What to Expect: The Toddler Years

Currently reading: Sky Dragons- Anne and Todd McCaffrey

Good to see you back!

Good to see you, Quaisior

Welcome back!

Thank you, everyone. It's good to finally have a little time to myself to read and keep my post updated. ;)

Oh, I guess I will give a bit of an intro for those who don't know me. I'm in my mid-40's and have Crohn's, so I haven't worked outside the home in a long time. I love to read and collect books. I'm a crafter, mostly knitting and crochet, but I dabble in other crafts as well. I collect vintage toys and should probably start selling my duplicates. My spouse works in IT and he races mountain bikes on weekends. We have a daughter who is almost three and she loves books. We recently lost our two old cats (21 and 17 years old), plus a disabled stray kitty passed away that we had rescued when our neighbors moved and tossed him outside. He was part of a 12 cat colony and 8 of those cats are still outside, so we and some neighbors feed them and we have put shelters, a heated water bowl, and a heated bed in our shed for them. BTW, 2 of those kitties are now in homes, one was super sweet and we wanted to keep her, but she wasn't a good match with a small child. When our indoor kitties died, we immediately started looking for a new cat at all of the local rescues and we found the sweetest cat named Kit Kat. She's great with our daughter and she loves to cuddle with everyone, plus she's playful, and it's just nice to have a young and healthy cat again.

Kit Kat is an excellent cat name! :)

Hi Q - don't think we've met as I only started ROOTing last year. Sounds like life is busy - happy reading when you can fit it in! :)

>7 rabbitprincess: Yes, she already had that name and we don't change rescue cats' names. The only problem with the name at first was that my daughter kept thinking we were talking about the Kit Kat candy bar. ;)

8> Welcome. Oh yes, very busy, but I've gotten to read a lot more in the past year or so than I did when my daughter was first born. I also read a lot of books to her.

>9 Quaisior: My daughter (now 4) loves us reading to her (although it's sometimes a bit trying when she wants to be read to Right Now and expects us to drop everything Right Now to read a book for the gazillionth time!). I'm happy that she loves books and is really engaged with them (currently more engaged with the pictures, but I'm really hoping that when she learns to read she'll get even more into it).

Hi Q. What a sweet introduction. I would love to have a cat ( or two) but my husband does not care for them. So I like hearing cat stories like yours.

>10 Jackie_K: Aww, I love hearing about young children loving books. My daughter is the same way and sometimes she will entertain herself just looking at her books and making up stories to go along with the pictures. She has also already picked out the first grown-up book she wants to read: Tailchaser's Song by Tad Williams. :-D She saw my copy, grabbed it, and said "let's read this kitty book, Mommy."

>11 connie53: I'm sorry you don't have a cat. With me being home all day for the past 20 years, I really needed someone to keep me company. The outdoor cats keep welcoming more cats from the neighborhood, so there are at least four more that come around now. We also had at least one opossum, but it died in our shed. There are probably more and the cats don't seem to mind them. They do, however, have a problem with the skunks. ;-)

It's been warm here, finally, so I've been going for walks every day, plus I started clearing out my yard. We also did a few minor repairs on our front porch and we have so many other projects planned.

My reading plans for this year are to read the whole True Game Sequence by Sheri S. Tepper, read all of Elizabeth Moon's Vatta books, and finish reading the last few of Anne McCaffrey's Pern series. I just heard that McCaffrey's daughter has a new Pern book called Dragon's Code coming out in October, so I hope to get that from the library. I haven't enjoyed her son's books nearly as much as Anne's, but I'll give Gigi's book a chance.

In addition to reading, I love British TV shows and I seem to be drawn to British mysteries, although I don't read a whole lot of them. I requested the first season of Luther DVDs from my library and will be picking them up today. I missed the show when it was on TV, but my library system has all four seasons. Now that my daughter is old enough to watch children's movies, I'll probably be getting a lot more DVDs from the library again. My spouse and I used to borrow movies all the time.

Over the last few years, I've also found three Canadian series that I adore: Orphan Black, Murdoch Mysteries, and my latest obsession, X Company.

>13 Quaisior: I love the library's DVD collections! I tend to borrow a lot of documentaries, especially ones narrated by David Attenborough.

>14 rabbitprincess:, I've been watching a lot of Attenborough's Planet Earth shows this year on PBS and BBC America. My daughter loves them too and will drop everything to watch penguins or dolphins. :-D

>15 Quaisior: She has great taste! Penguins are hilarious, and dolphins are so smart!
We're watching Blue Planet II, and I just about died of cute at the episode featuring the otters. :)

>13 Quaisior: I love watching mysteries too. The English ones and recently I've discovered the Scandinavian and Icelandic series. Luckily they come with subtitles. ;-)

>16 rabbitprincess:, Blue Planet II was what got me started watching all of the Planet Earth shows. Otters are the cutest!

>17 connie53:, I haven't watched any Scandinavian or Icelandic mysteries yet, but I've heard great things about The Bridge. I've watched the British adaptation of it called The Tunnel and I've watched the first season of Marcella, which the creator of The Bridge wrote.

I wasn't watching any TV at all last week because our TV screen went black. Last Friday, our friend gave us one of her old TVs that was sitting in her basement and we got a previously owned entertainment center since our old one was too small for the TV. We have mounted the new TV on the wall, so our daughter can't touch it. ;-) All of the stereo components, DVD player, video game systems, etc. are all locked inside the glass doors too, so she can't get into anything.

I've been attempting to clean and organize my house, which is very difficult with a toddler running around, but at least I've gotten rid of 100 books. I have a stack of vinyl records to listen to and if they play well, then I'm going to try to trade them in at a record store.

My husband took some time off earlier this month for our daughter's birthday and while he was home, we put in new kitchen flooring. The old vinyl floor was in horrible shape from our old portable dishwasher and a kitchen sink leak, so about half of it was torn out and the other half was peeling and breaking off. We put in luxury vinyl plank which clicks together like laminate and it's supposed to be waterproof. It looks and feels like wood and it's so easy to clean.

Ahh, a toddler in the house! That is one good reason for not getting organized for a while.

>19 connie53:, Yes, it's a challenge. ;)

I haven't done much besides reading, watching TV, and listening to the records I mentioned (I got rid of 33!) because I have Shingles. It was very painful for the first few days, but I'm taking an antiviral medication, which has helped a lot. I still can't overdo things because the sores will start to hurt, but at least I don't have nerve pain anymore. I feel bad that my daughter hasn't gotten to go outside to play as much as usual because I can't run around after her right now, but it has been raining quite a bit anyway.

Aikes, painful! I hope you feel better soon.

>21 connie53:, Thank you. It only took about a week for the nerve pain to go away because of the antiviral, but the worst of the sores are still healing.

Not only did I pass my goal of getting rid of 50 books this year, I doubled it! (Actually, including a children's books I got rid of, it's actually 112 books I've gotten out of my house this year). I've been ruthless with my SFF collection, but I still have a long way to go with that. I still had a bunch of books about various aspects of raising babies, so I got rid of almost all of those since I won't be having more children. And I reorganized my craft and cookbooks, so I weeded out a few of those that I didn't have room for.

I'm reading the last of the Pern books Anne McCaffrey contributed to and I'll be picking up the new Pern book by her daughter from the library today.

Congrats on exceeding your goal!

Good job, Congrats!