A to Z Survey

I've been seeing this survey making its rounds around the blogosphere and it looked like fun, so that's what I'm doing this week instead of a Friday Five!

Sponsored by Perpetual Page-Turner

 

Author you’ve read the most books from:

 Oh my goodness...Enid Blyton wins with 58 books hahahah

But if we're looking at most read books with an author that is individual books and not because I read a series by the author, Roald Dahl and Alice Hoffman are tied at 13.

Best Sequel Ever:

I honestly could pick so many, but Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials has been on the mind lately.  The Amber Spyglass is one of the best endings to a series I've ever read.  Actually, it might just be THE best ending.

Currently Reading:

Er..I literally just finished The Crimson Crown which I really enjoyed.  So I guess I'm still in the middle of Mansfield Park?  And I need to review The Magic Warble, so I'll probably start reading that next.

Drink of Choice While Reading:

Usually what I have around? So coffee or tea?  I tend to get too absorbed into the book to remember to eat or drink haha

E-reader or Physical Book?

I'd love to say physical book all the way, but e-readers are pretty nifty too.

Fictional Character You Probably Would Have Actually Dated In High School:

I was sitting here racking my brains out, and then it hit me.  Who have I EVER loved as much as Darcy?  He may have been a bit old for me, but I have had many a daydream about tall, dark, and handsome men like Darcy. 

You are a beautiful, beautiful man Matthew Macfadyen.

Glad You Gave This Book A Chance:

Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey.  I never would have picked this book up just by reading the back cover, and I am SO glad I did (and I am still clueless as to how it came to my possession).

Hidden Gem Book:

I'm going to say books that you've heard me mention a billion times by now.  Some of my favourite books really don't have a big following and they absolutely deserve one, so these are my top choices:

Abarat by Clive Barker
The Nature of Jade by Deb Caletti
Finding Cassie Crazy by Jaclyn Moriarty

I have made a promise to myself to review these books for you guys so I can explain to you WHY you should read them, not just that you should!

Important Moment in your Reading Life:

When I decided reading the Bob books was more exciting than coloring them.  Closely followed by when I read The Trumpeter of Krakow or The Wheel on the School as one of them was my very first chapter book!  (and the other was my second, but I can't remember which one.  I'm leaning towards The Wheel on the School coming first though)

Just Finished:

Oops looks like I already answered this...but I just read the whole Seven Realms series...in two days...I just couldn't put them down!

Kinds of Books You Won't Read:

If I know they are going to be really depressing, it'll will literally take me years to belt up and read it.  I will likely never read Grapes of Wrath.  I also don't handle really scary things...I couldn't sleep at all after I read Misery.  And I thought I could handle scary things...it's just a book, right?  Wrong.  So, so wrong. 

Longest Book You've Read:

Well this is a surprise!  Apparently it's Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Dart which I find unlikely.  It is 1015 pages though.

Just kidding, I looked up Count of MonteCristo which is 1276 pages, so I'm not sure why that isn't showing up at the top of my goodreads page count? 

Major book hangover because of:

 I had to look up what this is....I'd have to say Skip Beat! because I raged for 3 days when I discovered the series wasn't finished UNLIKE WHAT MY FRIEND TOLD ME.  I never would have read it if I'd known that, but then I would never have read Skip Beat, so that would have been upsetting too.

Number of Bookcases You Own:

Before I moved we had bookshelves against ever wall and in every room (even the bathrooms.  My friends thought my family was a bunch of lunatics haha).  I now only have 4 measly bookshelves :(

One Book You Have Read Multiple Times:

Oh there are so many of these!  I can't possibly pick one.  I brought the books I HAD to have to survive with me when I moved, so the Abarat series, His Dark Materials, the Abhorsen trilogy, all of Tamora Pierce's Quartets (except the Circle of Magic ones, I haven't read those yet), Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series, A Wrinkle in Time Quartet, A Ring of Endless Light and Pride and Prejudice, Finding Cassie Crazy, all of which are falling apart I've read them so many times, Harry Potter...I should stop now...

Preferred Place To Read:

These days I like to go out to the square and read on a bench, but really I read anywhere.  Correction, it's more like I read everywhere haha.

Quote that inspires you/gives you all the feels from a book you've read:

"Believe me when I say:  There are two forces that command the soul.  One is God.  The other is the tide." - Clive Barker's  Abarat.  I'm not religious in the normal sense, but the quote really speaks to me, especially the bit about the tide.

"Nature is never static, I understand. Change is ever-constant, clouds zipping across a sky. It is dynamic, complicated, tangled, mostly beautiful. A moving forward, something newly gained, means that something is lost, too." - Deb Caletti's The Nature of Jade.  Writing like this is why you should read Deb Caletti.

Reading Regret:

I'm not entirely sure I have one?  Maybe not really discovering book bloggers until this year (I sort of half-heartedly started this blog in 2010, but I didn't really get into it until this year.)  I don't have a lot of friends who are nearly as into books as I am, or if they are, they don't like the same books (all my friends like nonfiction.  Seriously.  How is that even a thing?) So when I discovered there was a whole world out there of people like me who could talk for DAYS about books with me, I was pretty mind blown.  So it would have been nice if I'd discovered this sooner so I'd feel a little less lonely and geeky about things haha

Series You Started And Need To Finish(all books are out in series):

Bruce Coville's Unicorn Chronicles

Three of your All-Time Favorite Books:

See this picking only 3 is a real problem.  Let's go with books I haven't listed already...The Lords of Discipline (also known as any book ever written by Pat Conroy), Graceling by Kristin Cashore, and Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine.  Completely randomly off my goodreads favs, so there you are.

Unapologetic Fangirl For:

Uhh...off the top of my head, I'd guess the Redwall series.  I LOVED those books (at least the first 10 or so of them) and they're considered relatively geeky I'd guess.  Probably the thing I'm most ashamed/love is manga though.  I got into it my sophomore year of college, and it's not usually something I share with normal people.  Normal people being anyone not reading this blog right now haha. 

Very Excited For This Release More Than All The Others:

Soulbroken by Heather Brewer (it's coming out next week!!), Lair of Dreams by Libba Bray, In the Age of Love and Chocolate by Gabrielle Zevin, and MOST importantly, The Price of Dreams by Clive Barker

Worst Bookish Habit:

Uhhh.....reading a bunch of books and then not reviewing them like I meant to for this blog?

X Marks The Spot: Start at the top left of your shelf and pick the 27th book:

The Cellist of Sarajevo - Steven Galloway
The Masks of God:  Oriental Mythology - Joseph Campbell
The Luncheon of the Boating Party  - Susan Vreeland
Abarat - Clive Barker
....well this is an oddly not very representative list of what I read haha 

Your latest book purchase:

I don't really buy books anymore, I get most of them through bookmooch, friends, or a library.  But my latest mooch on Bookmooch is A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

ZZZ-snatcher book (last book that kept you up WAY late):

Pretty much the entire Seven Realms series

If you'd like to participate, please make sure to let Jamie at Perpetual Page-Turner know, and give her credit for creating the survey. She'd like to see your answers, so be sure to link back to her page.