YIPEE-KY-AYE... Mid-Summer Reading Roundup!

As I wrote about about previously, one of my goals for this summer was to "do more reading, and in doing so using my time more wisely...," and while my secondary goal of cutting back on Internet time may not have been so successful, I have found myself reading more and enjoying the process of doing so. Of course, good readers do so with an intention, and my purposes in reading each book have been varied: some I approach as a teacher (Lord of the Flies, The Crucible) looking for terms, themes, and activities which can further the understanding of the novel for those less experienced students, while some I read for my own edification, as a student myself. Now that we are a little over halfway through the Summer (school officially starts on September 4) it feels like a good time to quickly recap where I've been... in a literary sense, anyway!

A few books I have read for a second time (Into the Wild), while others are books I have started and never finished (Motorcycle Diaries), so began again this time following through til completion.

In true obsessive-management form, I have been "tracking" the title read since June in the left margin of the blog, and to date have finished the following books (in order starting with the most recently read):

Into the Wild by John Krakauer, The Motorcycle Diaries: A Latin American Journey by Ernesto Che Guevara, Plenty: One Man, One Woman, and a Raucous Year of Eating Locally by Alisa Smith & J.B.McKinnon, The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Lord of the Flies by William Golding, Farewell, My Subaru by Doug Fine, At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft, and Planetwalker by John Francis.

Nearly each title has something to recommend about it, though some will be added to my list of "read over again periodically," (Farewell, My Subaru) while still others I honestly doubt I will give much of a thought again... though even in the case of these particular novels, I suppose there are pieces and lines I might consciously reference during some conversation or discussion (Planetwalker and Plenty).

Breathe in, breathe out… YOU AND I ARE ALIVE!