books!

So a website called Pop Sugar put forth a reading challenge this year:

http://www.popsugar.com/love/Reading-Challenge-2015-36071458?crlt.pid=camp.RTlcdYOWNcmE

Fifty ticky boxes, fifty-two books, one year.  I'm in!  So far, I've read four:

A book with a color in the title: Watson and Holmes: A Study in Black.  Written by Karl Bollers, art by Rick Leonardi (Chapters One through Four) and Larry Stroman (Epilogue). New Paradigm Studios, 2013.  My first graphic novel that I actually finished (one eighth of a zombie comic that made me sick to my stomach doesn't count), and I really liked it.  Give me all the Sherlock Holmeses and John Watsons in the world, thank you very much.

A book with antonyms in the title: Lynn Front to Back. Written by Lynn Kohlman, forward by Donna Karan. Assouline Publishing, 2005.  I chose this because it fit the category, and I was intrigued by the subject matter: a fashion model from the 60s and 70s whose passion was being behind the camera lens, but then her life took a different turn after a cancer diagnosis and went under the knife several times, including a double mastectomy and then brain cancer.  Hard to read because of its weight and size, but worth the read.

A graphic novel: Serenity Volume Three: The Shepherd's Tale. Written by Zack and Joss Whedon; art, colors, and letters by Chris Samnee, Dave Stewart, and Michael Heisler, respectively. Dark Horse Books, 2010.  Don't read it until you've seen all of Firefly and Serenity.  We get hints of Shepherd Book's backstory in this very short graphic novel, but each phase of his life that they chose to give us could have been fleshed out and given its own fifty-page treatment.  Disappointing because of the length, but I liked what little we got.

A book based on or turned into a TV show: Neverwhere. Written by Neil Gaiman. HarperTorch, 1996.  Gaiman has been very good from the get-go at creating intricate fantasy worlds and populating them with interesting characters, and what I wouldn't give for a novel about Door, Hunter, or the Marquis de Carabas.  Instead, we get Richard, [HIGHLIGHT TO SEE SPOILERS] who whines his entire way through the book about wanting to get back home, has his hand held the entire way by more competent characters, lucks out, and then when he does get what he's been whining about, he finds that he didn't want it after all. [END SPOILERS].  Having said that, I really enjoyed the recent radio drama that I got from Audible last week.  Even Richard was not entirely unappealing, thanks to James McAvoy.  Didn't count, though, since it was a dramatization, so I still read the book.

Four down, forty-eight to go.  I've got two audio books and two paper books in progress.  I will read several books that I've read before for the challenge, like The Hobbit and Hamlet, but I'm trying to read as many new-to-me books as I can.  Audio books count if they're unabridged and not dramatized.

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