2012 Books

So, in case you don't know, I read a LOT! A couple of years ago I started keeping a list of all the books I read so I could keep track of what I was reading.  Last year I began also keeping track of my books and reviews on Goodreads.com (look me up under LadyDamonayde!)

This year my goal was 60 books.  Tecnically I made it, there are 78 books on this list.  But in reality I consider this a failure because 19 of those books are audio.  It was a tough year, but there was a lot of good reading.  Hope you find something fun and Happy 2013 to everyone!

 

1.)    Heist Society (Ally Carter)

2.)    Possession (Elaine Johnson)

3.)    Masquerade (Melissa de la Cruz)

4.)    Heads You Lose (Lisa Lutz and David Hayward)

5.)    Soulbound (Heather Brewer)

6.)    Revelations (Melissa de la Cruz)

7.)    A Million Suns (Beth Revis)

8.)    1Q84 (Haruki Murakami)

9.)    Ready Player One (Earnest Cline)

10.)  The Van Alen Legacy (Melissa de la Cruz)

11.)  Matched (Ally Condie)

12.)  When She Woke (Hillary Jordan)

13.)  Crossed (Ally Condie)

14.)  Night Shift (Lilith Saintcrow)

15.)  Clockwork Prince (Cassandra Clare)

16.)  11/22/63 (Stephen King)

17.) The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson)

18.)  Red-Headed Stepchild (Jaye Wells)

19.)  The Windup Girl (Paolo Bacigalupi)

20.)  Fallen (Lauren Kate)

21.)  Torment (Lauren Kate)

22.)  Replication (Jill Williamson)

23.)  Deadlocked (Charlaine Harris)

24.)  Storm Front (Jim Butcher)

25.)  Leviathan (Scott Westerfeld)

26.)  The Maze Runner (James Dashner)

27.)  Fool’s Bargain (Timothy Zahn)

28.) Behemoth (Scott Westerfeld)

29.)  Bumped (Megan McCafferty)

30.) Passion (Lauren Kate)

31.) Cinder (Marissa Meyer)

32.) Goliath (Scott Westerfeld)

33.)  Fool Moon (Jim Butcher)

34.)  Coveted (Shawntelle Madison)

35.)  The Hunter (Theresa Meyers)

36.)  Grave Peril (Jim Butcher)

37.)  Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (Seth Grahame-Smith)

38.)  Bewitching (Alex Finn)

39.)  Neverwhere (Neil Gaiman)

40.)  The Forest of Hands and Teeth (Carrie Ryan)

41.)  Robopocalypse (Daniel H. Wilson)

42.)  Bitterblue (Kristin Cashore)

43.)  Divergent (Veronica Roth)

44.)  Summer Knight (Jim Butcher)

45.)  Rapture (Lauren Kate)

46.)  Shadow of Night (Deborah Harkness)

47.)  Serpent’s Kiss (Melissa de la Cruz)

48.)  Zoo (James Patterson)

49.)  Beautiful Creatures (Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl)

50.)  Born at Midnight (C. C. Hunter)

51.)  The Strange Case of Finley Jayne (Kady Cross)

52.)  The Girl in the Steel Corset (Kady Cross)

53.)  Wrecked (Anna Davies)

54.)  Son (Lois Lowry)

55.)  Reached (Ally Condie)

56.)  The Hobbit (J. R. R. Tolkien)

57.)  Tempted (P. C. Cast/Kristin Cast)

58.)  Fated (Rebecca Zanetti)

59.)  Confessions of a Murder Suspect (James Patterson)

 

Audio Books

1.)    House Rules (Jodi Piccolt)

2.)    The Litigators (John Grisham)

3.)    Explosive Eighteen (Janet Evanovich)

4.)    Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (J K Rowling)(re-read)

5.)    Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (J K Rowling) (re-read)

6.)    Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (J K Rowling) (re-read)

7.)    Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (J K Rowling) (re-read)

8.)    Theodore Boone: The Abduction (John Grisham)

9.)    Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (J K Rowling) (re-read)

10.)  Wicked Business (Janet Evanovich)

11.)  Sea of Monsters (Rick Riordan)

12.)  Going Bovine (Libba Bray)

13.)  19 Minutes (Jody Piccolt)

14.)  The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Douglas Adams)

15.)  Magic Kingdom for Sale-SOLD (Terry Brooks)

16.)  Feed (Mira Grant)

17.)  Life, the Universe, and Everything (Douglas Adams)

18.)  So Long and Thanks for All the Fish (Douglas Adams)

19.)  Titan’s Curse (Rick Riordan)

 

To learn more about what I'm reading, and see my reviews follow me on twitter or goodreads @LadyDamonayde

Why I love YA

Why do I love YA? You mean besides the fact that it’s emotional, groundbreaking intense, and so well written it cannot be ignored? Okay, let me explain.

Loving YA for me starts with being deeply personal. I was always a reader. I can’t remember a time when books were NOT a part of my life.  My parents took me to libraries and bookstores, bought me book orders, gave them as gifts…. 

I remember my father bringing home Garfield comics and teaching me to read, and my mother buying me a subscription to the Babysitter’s Club book club which sent me three books a month for a year. (I still have every one of them).  But around sixth or seventh grade I kind of hit a standstill.  I was beyond the juvenile level reading that the school library carried and dad’s Tom Clancy books were a little over my head.  So what was I to do in a world where J. K. Rowling, Beth Revis, and Ally Condie didn’t yet exist? 

I started with looking for books based on what I liked to watch.  I read a lot of movie adaptation novels or novels that had popular movies made out of them.  This was how I discovered John Grisham and Terry McMillan. But the pentacle moment came in 7^th grade when a man named George Lucas created a special edition version of three movies that were extremely popular. 

I often refer to this moment as the beginning of my geekdom.  Even though I had some interest in sci-fi already, thanks to Power Rangers and Quantum Leap, I didn’t not truly emerge as a diehard fan until I saw, and then began reading, Star Wars. 

But anyway, back to YA.  So I was in high school when the Harry Potter craze hit, and I’m now a soon to be 30-something librarian who is obsessed with young adult literature.  Why? Because it’s well written, fun, and it’s what I would have wanted to read twenty years ago. 

People make fun of adult interest in YA but it’s really quite simple.  Being a teen is hard.  We all went through it, or are going through it (some of us well beyond our thirties but that’s a different post).  For me it’s the plain and simple emotion of it.  The characters in these books are going through something very emotional and intense AND they’re often doing it in a world where things are already in chaos.  It’s awesome to read Orson Scott Card, or Kevin J. Anderson or Timothy Zhan and be amazed, but to see someone so young, who in any situation is going to be highly emotional be put in that situation, ups the stakes to a whole new level. 

I often tell people that YA goes farther than adult fiction and I believe it’s true.  The emotional depth that the authors put into their characters is amazing.  You fall in love with them so much more than with any adult fiction because they are FEELING it so much deeper.  Even the ones that don’t involve fantasy and sci-fi (yes, I occasionally read those. One cannot live by vampires and rocket ships alone) are awesome because the emotional journey is even more central to the plot. 

Bottom line, no matter your age, there is something in YA that everyone can connect to.  They are not dumbed down adult books, or fantasy escapism with pretty covers.  They are hard core dramas about a people who overcome not only the world around them, but themselves. 

This post was inspired by Beth Revis’s Celebrate Bookscontest where you can win a library’s worth of amazing YA books.