It feels like it’s been a while since I’ve written up a wrap up, between blog tours and other happenings going on! I am so glad that it’s Friday. In theory, it’s been a shorter week since we had a holiday on Monday, but I’ve often found that shorter weeks like this make you even more tired because you’re trying to squeeze five days worth of stuff into only four. It’s almost not worth the day off!

School update: as I mentioned, my daughter just started high school. This is the end of her second week and it’s actually going really well! I’m so happy and relieved! She has really fallen in love with the place and even wants to go to a football game tonight! I never thought those words would come out of my kid’s mouth! Her teachers so far have been really empathetic and supportive which I am so grateful for. She’s also starting a bunch of new art projects which, if she gives me permission, I might share with you guys here on the blog. She is an amazing artist and so creative.

I’ve been having some ups and downs with my own depression lately, as well as some minor (thankfully) fibromyalgia flare ups. I’ve started a new fitness program to try and work out some of these issues. The medication helps, but I probably would be better off if I could drop some weight. I even splurged and bought myself a Fitbit to help motivate me to be more active, as much as I can on my good days. And, because my goal is to be a crazy cat lady when I grow up, I picked this watch display.

Yes, of course, it’s also purple.

I already love it.

Oh, another thing, because I obviously have so much free time these days: I’ve started a new writing project. Gah! It’s only in the planning stages so far, but I’m still excited about it. I really want this one to be good and not just my usual word vomit onto a page. Depending on how things go, I may post updates here. I’m using John Truby’s The Anatomy of Story to help me flesh out some details. I highly recommend that book for anyone interested in storytelling, whether books or screenplays or what have you. I’m only a few chapters in and my ideas have already gotten more rich and developed. A writing group I used to belong to back in the day used it a lot.

This past week (heck, this past MONTH) has been a heavy reading week (MONTH) for me, so let’s check out some of those stats, shall we?

Reading progress August 30-September 5:

• I read chapters 37 through 59 of A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer, finishing that book and finishing the Disney Readathon. That was so much fun. If they do it again, I’m definitely joining in. Or maybe finding some other readathons to participate in if I find out about them earlier – coming up with a TBR the day before and hopping onboard at the last minute was a bit insane.
• I read chapters 12 through 36 of Helix by Mary Ting. This is the second book in the International Sensory Assassin Network series. I’m on the blog tour for that, so look for that post next week.
• I read chapters 3 through 8 of Eve 2.0 by Winter Lawrence. This is for another blog tour in two weeks, so be on the lookout for that as well.
• I finished Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins, although I don’t have the chapter breakdown. I read this while I was out sick for a few days and finished it on Labor Day.
• After Hex Hall, I picked up Demonglass by Rachel Hawkins, book #2 in the Hex Hall series and finished it. Read the whole book over three days.
• Since my library holds all came in at the same time, I started reading book #3 in the Hex Hall series – Spell Bound by Rachel Hawkins. I only started it yesterday and have read chapters 1 through 5.
• A surprise read for me this week was The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. I wasn’t planning on reading it, but I have also decided to participate in the Seasonal Reading Challenge group over at GoodReads for Fall. This nice thing about their challenge is that you can easily fold all of your current reading into it. There is a long list of tasks and each one is worth a certain number of points. You can complete the tasks however you want to in what ever order you please. I needed a book that was short (less than 200 words) but had a long title (more than 5 words) to complete a task, and this was the first one that came to mind. It was really good and I could have easily finished it in one sitting if I hadn’t had to attend to other things. Why does real life have to interrupt my reading time!
• Finally, I read chapters 2 through 5 of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling for my Chapter-A-Long project. I know I still have a while (a long while, given my pace) before I finish the Harry Potter books, but I need to start deciding A). whether I will continue with the Chapter-A-Long project once I finish Deathly Hallows and, B). what I will do next if I do continue. People seem to like them and I have enjoyed writing them, although they do take up some time. I have a few ideas, so that will be a discussion to be had when the time comes.

Oh, and in other news, I met my GoodReads Read Challenge! Demonglass was my 50th book for the year! I’m also well on my way to completing my Complete the Series challenge. The only reading challenge this year that is not going so well is Beat the Backlist. 20 books from my TBR to try and read this year and I’ve only read two so far. With the other books and reviews I have, it’s not likely to get much better than that. Oh well. I’m still really happy with the other two!

Have a wonderful weekend, beautiful people!

Categories: Weekly Wrap-Up