LucindaLibri—Getting to the ROOT of the Problem!

I was certain I had already started this thread, but apparently not . . . I only posted my goal in one of the general threads—finish 50 TBR books (books on the bookshelf before Jan 1, 2013). I'm also going to track "bonus" points—5 extra points for any book that was on the shelf before I joined LT in 2007 (thus no Date Acquired listed).

One thing I'm giving up is tracking my TBR books . . . I tried that last year and the number fluctuated so much (due to old books getting cataloged and new books acquired) that it never really made any sense.

So, now off to figure out how many ROOTs I've finished this year and to set up my new ticker.

What I've finished so far in 2013:

1. Original Fire by Louise Erdrich (1/4/13)
2. A Wedding in Haiti by Julia Alvarez (1/11/13)
3. Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius by Ignatius (1/12/13)—the touchstones on this are a mess, so not including them.
4. Moby Dick by Herman Melville (1/26/13)
5. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (1/28/13)
6. Swamplandia! by Karen Russell (2/2/13)
7. The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather (3/24/13)
8. Take Your Time : The Wisdom of Slowing Down (4/18/13)
9. The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie (5/3/13)
10. On the origin of species . . . by Charles Darwin (5/6/13)
11. Whose Names are Unknown by Sanora Babb (6/18/13)
12. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (7/19/13)
13. The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood (7/27/13)
14. Calico Joe by John Grisham (8/4/13)
15. Windy City Queer edited by Kathie Bergquist (8/11/13)
16. Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich (8/13/13)
17. The Constitution of the United States First Official Printing plus Amendments. by United States Constitutional Convention (1787/2012) (finished 8/28/13)
18. The book; on the taboo against knowing who you are by Alan Watts (9/6/13)
19. An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire by Arundhati Roy (9/11/13)
20. Stretch Out Your Hand : Exploring Healing Prayer by Tilda Norberg and Robert D. Webber (finished 9/29/13)

Here's a space for my biggest weakness . . . acquiring new books:




How I wish that the "done" message might be true :) Clearly, this is only the beginning . . .

I've been tracking my incoming books for the past few years and having a list of them helped me see not only what they were but where they came from so that this year, one of my goals is to reduce the number of free books that I take. I saw that I was picking up just about any book rather than being a bit more discriminating. Now I have to really want to read a book (even if it's free) before I put it on my shelves.

Well I can say that most of my new additions are things that have been on my "really want to read" list for a while (or new books that "I really want to read") . . . Of course, there are many old things on the bookshelf that I really want to read :)

Five more acquired yesterday. Three are cookbooks for allergen-free cooking/baking, so necessary. The other two are need/want to read and/or book group picks.




Also finished another ROOT a few days ago (see list above):



Will be away from LT for a bit recovering from whiplash sustained in a car accident a few days ago.
Sitting at the computer is aggrevating the neck/head pain, so I've been instructed to reduce my computer time.

Will try to keep track of my ROOTS and then post again near the end of January.

Oh Lucinda! It's sounds awful. I keep my fingers crossed for you and wish you all the best. Take care and

Ohh, that does sound awful. I hope you wil get better soon.

Feel better soon! Perhaps audiobooks will help pass the time?

Hope you feel better soon - buying cookbooks sounds like good therapy.

Thanks for all the well wishes. Lucky for me, reading while recovering from whiplash hasn't been as much a problem as the computer.
I updated my ROOTS list above . . . though no extra points as these two were acquired in 2012.

Finished Swamplandia! today, so updating my ticker to 6/50.




Also updating the books acquired ticker to 13 . . . bought The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz for one of my book groups.

Bought 7 more books this morning at the Women's Prison Book Project Pancake Breakfast . . . 20 books acquired in 2013 and we're only at the beginning of February! Bad Bad Bad!

Only one more ROOT since February. I finished The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather on March 23, 2013. This was a "restarted" book . . . originally started September 2011.




Also acquired a few more since February:

Douglass' Women by Jewell Parker Rhodes
and
Body Geographic by Barrie Jean Borich

Acquired 6 more this week, so that's 28 already this year:
The New New Testament (from Early Reviewers) The touchstone wants to pick Grimm's Fairy Tales for this . . . interesting!
Rilke's Book of Hours (because after I read the library's copy, I had to own my own . . . a beautiful book of inspiring poems)
Toxic Charity (for another book group)
The Marriage Plot (for another book group)
The Allergy-Free Cook Bakes Bread
and
Learning to Bake Allergen-FREE

I have no will power :)

Finished 2 more ROOTS (though one just barely counts, acquired Dec 2012 from Early Reviewers).
Take Your Time : The Wisdom of Slowing Down
The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
So that's 9/50 ROOTS so far . . .




I also finished an audio/ebook, but I've decided not to count those in ROOTS because they aren't physical books taking up space in my house :)

I also acquired 3 more:
Business from Bed
The legend of Sigurd and Gudrún by J. R. R. Tolkien
Little Bird of Heaven by Joyce Carol Oates

So that's 31 acquired in 2013 . . .

Add 5 more to the Acquired 2013 pile . . . Couldn't resist the boxed 5-volume autobiography of Leonard Woolf for $3.

Add 3 more ROOTS today (see full list above)

10. On the origin of species . . . by Charles Darwin (5/6/13)
11. Whose Names are Unknown by Sanora Babb (6/18/13)
12. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (7/19/13)

Also have 5 more to add to the Acquired list which brings it up to 41:
The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
Small Wonder by Barbara Kingsolver
The Cruel Ever After by Ellen Hart
Antipodes by Maria-Antonia Oliver
Take Back the Word by Robert Goss

Off to update tickers:

Finished two more ROOTS in the past couple of weeks:

13. The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood
14. Calico Joe by John Grisham

Off to update tickers and check on any new acquisitions I've forgotten to list . . .




One new acquisition (from Early Reviewers):
Baseball's Creation Myth by Brian Martin

Added one more ROOT (bringing me up to 15) and 3 more acquired (bringing me up to 45) . . . Yes, I know that my ratio of ROOTS to ACQUIRED is rather backwards!! :)

ROOT #15: Windy City Queer : LGBTQ Dispatches from the Third Coast edited by Kathie Bergquist




Acquired:
Snow-Storm in August by Jefferson Morley (for the Saint James Book Group meeting in September)
I Await the Devil's Coming by Mary MacLane
Are You My Mother? by Alison Bechdel

Added a few more ROOTs from August & September, so now up to 19 . . .

16. Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich (8/13/13)
17. The Constitution of the United States First Official Printing plus Amendments. by United States Constitutional Convention (1787/2012) (finished 8/28/13)
18. The book; on the taboo against knowing who you are by Alan Watts (9/6/13)
19. An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire by Arundhati Roy (9/11/13)




Also added acquired a couple more, so up to 47 acquired.
Unabashedly Episcopalian by Andrew Doyle
People of the Way : Renewing Episcopal Identity by Dwight J. Zscheile




The good news is that I finished cataloging most of my book collection (nearly 2000 books owned) and have already designated nearly 200 books as "Give-Sell-Toss" so will be clearing some space on the shelves! Wuu Hoo!!

Hurray for more shelf space! :)

Finished Stretch Out Your Hand : Exploring Healing Prayer which I had started in 2008, but didn't finish (for reasons I don't really remember). Brings me up to 20 ROOTS for 2013!

Edited a few posts above on 9/29/13, originally from August or September 2013, to fix touchstones . . .