#12hppofxmas Wrap Up

I think this was my most successful 12hppofxmas ever, and all it took was a global pandemic to completely eradicate all of the usual ways that I have fun over the holidays and don't read so many books. I feel like I may even have gone a little overboard with my reading, to be honest.

I read all of these pages in the following nine books:

Armed in Her Fashion by Kate Heartfield

Hot Nashville Nights by Sheri WhiteFeather

Dragon Hoops by Gene Luen Yang

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons

Dogsbody by Diana Wynne Jones

Before I Go to Sleep by S. J. Watson

Patient H.M. by Luke Dittrich

Sourcery by Terry Pratchett

Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

Pamela is the least number of pages, at 8. I've started reading it over lunch since I went back to work on Monday.

Dragon Hoops was the longest, at 446 pages. I think it was also the one that I enjoyed the most. I even teared up a few times!

I'm currently working on my end of year summary post, so hopefully it won't be too much longer before that gets posted!

 

Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3: 84

Day 4: 252

Day 5: 221

Day 6: 74

Day 7: 188

Day 8: 214

Day 9: 132

Day 10: 136

Day 11: 32

Day 12: 42

Cumulative: 1763

Cumulative Target: 1200

How Far Off Track Am I?: -563

#12hppofxmas Day 10

Well thanks to the pandemic keeping me at home and inside for the majority of my holidays, I'm well ahead of schedule with my reading. Even excluding the graphic novel I read, I'm ahead of schedule. So today, being my last day before holidays, I'm cutting back on the reading and trying to get a few things prepped for going back to work. (I should mention, I'm currently reading Before I Go to Sleep, an amnesia thriller, and Patient H.M., non-fiction about a somewhat similar topic.)

While I'm happy about how much I've read, I'm still feeling fairly glum about things in general.

In the event that you follow this blog closely enough to have occasion to wonder where my usual end of year book round up is: I'm not done yet. Hopefully it'll be ready within the next week.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3: 84

Day 4: 252

Day 5: 221

Day 6: 74

Day 7: 188

Day 8: 214

Day 9: 132

Day 10 (so far): 47

Cumulative: 1600

Cumulative Target: 1000

How Far Off Track Am I?: -600

Current Distractions, December 2020 Edition

A friend of mine got their first dose of the coronavirus vaccine yesterday, so maybe things are looking up a bit on that front. I'd be lying if I said it hasn't been a really bizarre holiday season, that I'm just not sure how to feel about. I officially haven't seen my sister for over a year, which is the longest we've been apart by far. Mostly I miss the freedom of movement I used to enjoy. It's been so long since I've seen most of the people I care about.

On the other hand, I'm still working and healthy and I know how important those things are this year.

What's really been distracting me a lot over the last few days is preparing my post about the books I read in 2020. I really need to come up with a better way to do this next year (assuming I do it again next year).

I've been trying to go outside more this year, but convincing myself to do so can occasionally be challenging. I'm on holidays right now and will be going back to work shortly, and as usual I don't feel like I made very good use of my time, but even more so this year. We'll see what happens in the new year

Watching

Star Trek: Discovery

Formula One: Drive to Survive

Bridgerton season 1 (I've decided to abandon this one after four episodes, though)

Big Mouth season 4

Grey's Anatomy season 1000 or whichever one was just added to Netflix

The Fellowship of the Ring extended edition, which kind of made me want to read The Lord of the Rings again, to my great surprise

Train to Busan

Reading

So much! I'm currently racing to the end of Dogsbody and Cold Comfort Farm in hopes of including them in my end of year round up.

12hppofxmas Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3: 84

Day 4: 252

Day 5: 221

Day 6: 74

Day 7 (so far): 98

Cumulative: 1117

Cumulative Target: 700

How Far Off Track Am I?: -417

#12hppofxmas Day 6 and RECOMMENDSDAY!

Thanks to Gene Luen Yang's big beautiful Dragon Hoops graphic novel, I'm well ahead of schedule on the 12hppofxmas. Even if it weren't for that graphic novel, I've still read 524 pages in the last five and a bit days. I have two books on the go that I'm hoping I can finish before the clock ticks over to January 1: Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons which I'm quite enjoying although I don't think I've read quite enough of the things she's lampooning to get the full effect, and Dogsbody by Diana Wynne Jones which is a children's novel that may or may not result in tears for me by the end.

Today I'm trying to make progress on (a) getting my end of year reading summary post nearly done, (b) doing some housecleaning prior to my return to work, (c) setting goals and so on for the new year, (d) reading the aforementioned books that I have approximately 36 hours left to finish. Plus I have an online crafting meet up tonight.

It's also recommendsday, which means I should have something to recommend to you and my goodness it's difficult to come up with recommendations in the midst of the holiday season.

So, speaking of the goal setting for the new year, something that I've been doing very successfully for the past seven years or so is tracking my spending and maintaining a personal budget system. This is possibly a somewhat off the wall suggestion, but today I'm going to recommend You Need A Budget, which is a program you may want to try out to do the same thing.

This is actually not what I use for my budget, I do it all in a spreadsheet that mostly works quite well for me. I'm especially committed to my free spreadsheet system ever since the YNAB software became subscription based instead of a one-time payment model. However, the principles that helped me build my personal spreadsheet are very heavily based on the Four Rules from the YNAB model.

I still have a huge amount to learn when it comes to personal finance, but knowing where your money is going is really important.

(By the way, this is not an ad, I genuinely just really like the YNAB principles.)

Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3: 84

Day 4: 252

Day 5: 221

Day 6 (so far): 25

Cumulative: 970

Cumulative Target: 600

How Far Off Track Am I?: -370

#12hppofxmas Day 4 and TBR Bingo Update

I have a couple more things to do on the computer this evening and then I'll be making myself some muffins and going to watch a bit of tv (I need to finish catching up on Star Trek Discovery and also I'd like to watch some more Bridgerton).

Today I'm mainly posting to provide a TBR Bingo update. I got multiple bingos this year for the first time since I started doing these cards a couple of years ago. In fact, I did so well that I'm pretty sure I'll be going down to a 4x4 grid for 2021 instead of a 6x6! Very exciting! Here is my bingo card, which I'm considering complete.

 

Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3: 84

Day 4 (so far): 205

Cumulative: 677

Cumulative Target: 400

How Far Off Track Am I?: -277

#12hppofxmas Day 3

Well, this Christmas season I'm legally banned from meeting up indoors with any friends or family members I don't already live with, meaning that this is probably the quietest one ever for me. In other words, I should have no trouble reading enough to make it to 1200 pages by January 5. Hopefully those don't turn out to be famous last words.

Somewhat awkwardly, I haven't been in as much of a reading mood as I might prefer. Without the structure of The List, I'm relearning how to choose what book(s) to read next, and that's quite an interesting process. Beyond that, I feel like it's very hard right now to sit down and be thoughtful and read books and then write about them.

I'm currently reading three books: Hot Nashville Nights (inspired by looking over my 2010 reads and deciding to give Sheri WhiteFeather another go), Dragon Hoops (a giant graphic novel about basketball, which is at once totally excellent and feels a bit like cheating on the readathon), and Cold Comfort Farm (a satirical classic of sorts).

Pages Read:

Day 1: 106

Day 2: 282

Day 3 (so far): 84

Cumulative: 472

Cumulative Target: 300

How Far Off Track Am I?: -172

The 7th Annual Twelve Hectopages of Xmas Readathon!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve Eve! Once again, I'll be doing my 12hppofxmas readathon whether anyone else participates or not. The description post is recycled below for your enlightenment as to how this works.

Who?

Me! The mysterious M.R.! I am hosting this and will most likely be the sole participant. But you are welcome to participate as well if you want. Keep reading to see how?

What?

This is a readathon. Basically the idea is to just read a whole bunch. In this case, twelve hectopages (1200 pages) over the course of the Christmas season, specifically the twelve days of Christmas. There are no rules besides that. The books don't have to be Christmas books, and I'm not posting any challenges or anything like that.

When?

As always, this readathon will take place over the course of the actual twelve days of Christmas. If you, like Bob and Doug MacKenzie, are somewhat confused as to what the twelve days of Christmas are, then I will tell you the actual dates right now: December 25 to January 5. Let's say midnight to midnight

Where?

Wherever I am and/or you are.

Why?

Instead of quietly doing my usual glut of Christmas reading, I am formalizing it as a readathon (for the seventh year in a row!) so that I can feel even more accomplished. Christmas is a time when I like to hang out with friends and family, eat baked goods until my teeth hurt, and read as much as possible. I won't be doing any of the hanging out with friends or family this year, but you can join me via the magic of the internet!

How?

I have absolutely no mechanism for you to register for this readathon other than leaving a comment on this post. There won't be any prizes other than my appreciation that you're joining me in something I'd be doing anyway. Seriously though, the more the MERRIER. SEE WHAT I DID THERE? Hashtag for this is #12hppofxmas by the way. I basically don't use Twitter at all anymore, however you can find my Litsy posts at @twohectobooks on the app.

#12hppofxmas Day 12

Well, today isn't over and I probably will read more before it's done, but this is going to be my wrap up for this year's 12hppofxmas.

It's been a total bust, in a way that I don't think I've experienced before, and that's actually really made me think about what I'm doing lately and how my life has been going. I've been feeling increasingly swamped with things that I don't have the time and energy to get done. I think in some cases I do have the time, though, and so I'm wondering where all of my energy is gone. Normally, my Christmas holiday reading is one of my favourite parts of the year, but this time around I just... couldn't focus? I dunno, I'm sure I could get into this more if I took the time to really think about it and write a decent post. Unfortunately, I don't have time for that either! Because I'm going back to work tomorrow.

I don't want to jinx anything, but by this time next year I hope to be completely done with reading List books, and maybe I'll have some more positive things to say then.

Hopefully if you were doing some similar holiday reading, yours went better than mine did. I at least am enjoying the two books that I'm reading currently: The Grapes of Wrath and Black Powder War. Hopefully starting the year with two good books means good things for where I'll be ending the year. But let's not think of the end of this year yet!

Pages Read:

Day 1: 6
Day 2: 17
Day 3: 14
Day 4: 17
Day 5: 141
Day 6: 88
Day 7: 118
Day 8: 107
Day 9: 49
Day 10: 73
Day 11: 44
Day 12 (so far): 27
Cumulative: 701
Cumulative Target: 1200
How Far Off Track Am I?: 499

Current Distractions, Slightly Belated December 2019 Edition

Happy New Year!!!

It's always a bit weird doing my Current Distractions update for December in the middle of the 12hppofxmas. I usually schedule the posts a few days in advance, but during this time I'm usually updating the blog a lot more frequently than I typically would. Also, yesterday I went to the pool and I wanted to have my final total cumulative swimming distance for 2019 recorded here for posterity.

Watching
Star Wars Episode IX (Rise of Skywalker
Jojo Rabbit
Peaky Blinders (season 1)
The Crown (season 3)
Grey's Anatomy (season 15)
Big Mouth (season 3)

Playing
Control

Swimming
I finished off the year with a 2300m swim that got me up to a total of 200.6km for 2019. Can I get to 300km in 2020? We'll see!

12hppofxmas Update
It's Day 8 now and I'm still woefully far behind. I did at least manage to finish reading Under the Volcano so now that that's no longer hanging over my head I'm excited about reading other stuff again. Alas, I also now am looking at the last five days of my holiday and I have a ton of non-reading related stuff to do, including for this blog. So we'll see how that all goes.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 6
Day 2: 17
Day 3: 14
Day 4: 17
Day 5: 141
Day 6: 88
Day 7: 118
Day 8 (so far): 40
Cumulative: 441
Cumulative Target: 800
How Far Off Track Am I?: 359

#12hppofxmas Day 6

I've gotten just the tiniest bit caught up since yesterday, although of course I'm still way behind. Now that we're in the final week of my Christmas holidays, I've also got to get a few things done today that don't involve lying on the couch and reading. On the plus side though, I have less than fifty pages of Under the Volcano to go and maybe, just maybe, I'll finish it today if I really push myself.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 6
Day 2: 17
Day 3: 14
Day 4: 17
Day 5: 141
Day 6 (so far): 47
Cumulative: 242
Cumulative Target: 600
How Far Off Track Am I?: 358

#12hppofxmas Day 5

Yikes! I'm pretty sure that this is the furthest I've ever gotten into a 12hppofxmas before posting an update. That's partly because, as you'll see, I've barely had any time to read, much less time to post any updates about my progress. My sister and brother-in-law were visiting for the past several days, and the fact that I only see them a few times a year, PLUS Christmas, means that I just wasn't home quietly reading very much this past week.

Anyway, there are a couple of other reasons why I haven't been reading as much as usual over this holiday:

First, I started playing a game called Control early this month and I really, really love it. I haven't enjoyed a game this much since I last played Minecraft. Considering how rarely I find a game I really love, and how much fun I have when I do, I'm kind of just trying to enjoy the ride with this game and not beat myself up too much about letting it get in the way of my reading.

Second, I really really really don't like Under the Volcano. So yeah, I'm reading way ahead when it comes to The List right now, and I'll get into that more in my upcoming post about the books I read last year. My current List book is Under the Volcano and spoiler alert for when I eventually post my review, but I can't stand it, and I've been doing everything I can to avoid actually sitting down and reading it. I know that I just need to buckle down and get it over with, but I really don't want to!

So yeah, I'm off now to have a snack and read some more of that book I don't like, and then reward myself with some reading of books I do like. I'll get to the end eventually.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 6
Day 2: 17
Day 3: 14
Day 4: 17
Day 5 (so far): 73
Cumulative: 127
Cumulative Target: 500
How Far Off Track Am I?: 373

The 6th Annual Twelve Hectopages of Xmas Readathon!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve! Once again, I'll be doing my 12hppofxmas readathon whether anyone else participates or not. The description post is recycled below for your enlightenment as to how this works.

Who?

Me! The mysterious M.R.! I am hosting this and will most likely be the sole participant. But you are welcome to participate as well if you want. Keep reading to see how?

What?

This is a readathon. Basically the idea is to just read a whole bunch. In this case, twelve hectopages (1200 pages) over the course of the Christmas season, specifically the twelve days of Christmas. There are no rules besides that. The books don't have to be Christmas books, and I'm not posting any challenges or anything like that.

When?

Because I'm perverse and hate my family (not at all, but), this readathon will take place over the course of the actual twelve days of Christmas. If you, like Bob and Doug MacKenzie, are somewhat confused as to what the twelve days of Christmas are, then I will tell you the actual dates right now: December 25 to January 5. Let's say midnight to midnight.

Where?

Wherever I am and/or you are.

Why?

Instead of quietly doing my usual glut of Christmas reading, I am formalizing it as a readathon (for the fifth year in a row!) so that I can feel even more accomplished. Christmas is a time when I like to hang out with friends and family, eat baked goods until my teeth hurt, and read as much as possible. Join me!

How?

I have absolutely no mechanism for you to register for this readathon other than leaving a comment on this post. There won't be any prizes other than my appreciation that you're joining me in something I'd be doing anyway. Seriously though, the more the MERRIER. SEE WHAT I DID THERE?


Hashtag for this is #12hppofxmas by the way. I basically don't use Twitter at all anymore, however you can find my Litsy posts at @twohectobooks on the app.

Current Distractions, January 2019 Edition

Well, folks, if my calculations are correct, this is my 100th all time Current Distractions post. That means 100 months' worth of distractions since the first one I ever posted, back in September 2010. That seems like a lifetime ago.

January has been an extremely full month for me, which is good because that means that one of the coldest and darkest months of the year has flown by (note re: darkness though that December is much darker.. we have as much daylight at the end of January as we do in the first third of November). It's also bad because I'm kind of exhausted as a result. The weather has turned terribly cold over the past week, and I'm trying to really just curl up and stay quiet and comfortable for a little while.

I have a feeling that 2019 is going to absolutely fly by. The first month certainly has.

#12hppofxmas
If you're wondering whatever happened with the #12hppofxmas this year: it was my sister. She was visiting from January 3-10 and I never got around to providing my final update. The last few days shook out as described below. I've learned yet another good lesson about procrastination.
Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3: 80
Day 4: 151
Day 5: 17
Day 6: 122
Day 7: 101
Day 8: 53
Day 9: 146
Day 10: 111
Day 11: 29
Day 12: 4 (lol, I know)
Cumulative: 1062
Cumulative Target: 1200

Swimming
Still swimming, still loving it. I've swum 13,300m so far this year, which is about a 10,000m improvement over last January, so that's certainly something.

Reading
Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott
A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers
The first two novels of U.S.A. by John Dos Passos
The Identities of Marie Rose Delorme Smith by Doris Jeanne MacKinnon

Watching
3% season 2
Aquaman
Glass
The Good Place season 2
Ru Paul's Drag Race season 3
Star Trek Discovery season 2

Cheering
I saw Bob the Drag Queen this month, and she blew my mind.

#12hppofxmas Day 9

Alas, my friends, after procrastinating way too much earlier in the holiday, I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to meet my 1200 page goal this year. Tomorrow evening my sister arrives, and will be visiting for the remainder of the 12hppofxmas, and my reading time will be significantly curtailed. Argh! This isn't a surprise, of course, but I failed to prepare for this eventuality.

This is ok, of course. My success rate for the first four #12hppofxmas is 50%. And I think that this is the first year that I don't have a single graphic novel in the mix, and those are always a huge boost.

So, whatever.

I finished Winesburg, Ohio and started on my next List book, which is The 42nd Parallel (first of the USA trilogy) by John Dos Passos). Fortunately for me, I got the hardcopy from the library and am therefore counting those pages in my total. The book hasn't grabbed me yet.

I'm also reading Jo's Boys, the third in the Little Women trilogy, and for the life of me I can't remember if I've ever read this book before.

We'll see what kind of progress I make today and tomorrow (and Friday, Saturday, Sunday!).

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3: 80
Day 4: 151
Day 5: 17
Day 6: 122
Day 7: 101
Day 8: 53
Day 9 (so far): 93
Cumulative: 865
Cumulative Target: 900

Current Distractions, December 2018 Edition

I almost forgot that I was due to write a Current Distractions post for today, oops!

As is typical for my December Current Distractions, I've had a lot of holiday stuff to do, and also I'm now past the halfway mark of the 12hppofxmas. I'm planning to stay in tonight, do some reading, watch a movie or some tv, and then get started on a fresh new year tomorrow. Last year, January 1 was the last day of Christmas holiday, but this year I took some extra time, and I'm glad I did.

I picked up a couple of books from the library today, and got my final update for the year on how much I've saved using the library rather than purchasing books new, and that number is... $748.56!! I haven't tracked how much I've spent on book purchases over the course of the year, but I'd guess it's around $200, so yay!

Swimming
I met my goal of swimming 100km in 2018 by swimming 102,700m total over the course of the year. I've improved my speed and technique quite a bit over the course of the year, learned how to do flip turns, and am just generally really enjoying being in the water. I'll certainly be continuing to swim in the new year.

Reading
The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
Burial Rites by Hannah Kent
Bear by Marian Engel
Little Men by Louisa May Alcott
Napier's Bones by Derryl Murphy
Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
Jolis deuils by Roch Carrier
Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott
The 42nd Parallel by John Dos Passos

Playing
Ghost Stories, a board game

Watching
Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse
Ru Paul's Drag Race season 3
The Crown
The Haunting of Hill House
Jeopardy! (whichever Tournament of Champions happens to currently be on Netflix)

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3: 80
Day 4: 151
Day 5: 17
Day 6: 122
Day 7 (so far): 88
Cumulative: 706
Cumulative Target: 700

#12hppofxmas Day 6 and TBR Bingo Update Q4

I was right! Yesterday I read a grand total of 17 pages.

I've read more today, although I'm trying to have a somewhat more productive day at the same time, meaning that I'm alternating reading with actually getting a few things done around the house for a change.

While looking at my page counts today, I also took a look at my TBR Bingo sheet, and realized that I won't be crossing off anything else for the rest of the year. So, let's just take a look, shall we?

I only read two additional books in Q4 versus Q3, and those two have been in the last couple of weeks. I had originally planned to read strategically (i.e. Little, Big and Wild Rose in order to make sure I got a bingo, but when the time came to start those books, the stars just weren't aligned in their favour.

The reason I didn't get to more of the TBR Bingo books in the last part of the year is threefold:

1. I read three book club books (not on the card).
   
2. I absolutely had to read three other books, basically just because the spirit moved me (not on the card).
   
3. I got a lot further into The List than I was expecting to. (There were only three List books on the bingo card, and in total I read about ten this year, depending on how you want to count.)

In order to try and actually get a bingo next year, I'm implementing a couple of strategies. The first is that I'm going to leave five spots on the card for book club books. These will be numbered so that I can't fill them up strategically to get a bingo quicker. The second is that I'll be putting all of the List books that I need to finish in 2019 in order to stay on track on the bingo card. To make this work I'm going to have to just number these as well, because there's a trilogy coming up, and I'm not sure if I'll finish it or not. I'll be posting my new bingo card along with my reading plans sometime next month.

(You can find my previous TBR Bingo Update here.)

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3: 80
Day 4: 151
Day 5: 17
Day 6 (so far): 78
Cumulative: 574
Cumulative Target: 600

#12hppofxmas Day 4

I doubt that I'll have time to post anything tomorrow, so I'll give you an update now! (I also have my doubts about being able to read 100 pages tomorrow, it's going to be a busy day.)

This evening I've been writing my review of Bear by the summary took so much out of me that I had to quit. At my current posting rate, I won't be posting the review until early 2020, so I'm still in good shape. This holiday, I'm trying to get a whole bunch of posts scheduled, in hopes of speeding up the frequency of my posts again. Fingers crossed.

I finished Throne of Jade this evening as well. I really enjoyed it. Naomi Novik is really good with her characters, and she excels most in writing the relationship between Temeraire and William Laurence. I'll buy the next book in the series sometime soon, although I'm not going to put it on my To Read list for next year just yet.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3: 80
Day 4 (so far): 146
Cumulative: 474
Cumulative Target: 400

#12hppofxmas Day 3

One thing that I neglected to mention yesterday is that I'm also reading Winesburg, Ohio right now (a List book), however I'm reading it as an ebook, and therefore I'm not able to get an accurate page count out of it. To my dismay, it's a short story collection, and I've been reading a story or two per day and not enjoying it a whole lot. Fortunately I do enjoy the other things I've been reading, and they're going by fast. I'm over halfway through Throne of Jade now.

Yesterday I spent the whole day at home quietly. Today I have a few things to get done outside of the house, so I anticipate a smaller page count.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 202
Day 3 (so far): 70
Cumulative: 318
Cumulative Target: 300

#12hppofxmas Day 2

The greatest challenge of the #12hppofxmas is that the very first day of the readathon is Christmas Day and thus not always conducive to an extended period of quiet reading.

And speaking of which, Merry Christmas!

The stack of books I'm choosing from this year is a lot less ambitious than what I've shown in previous years, mainly because I decided to stick with books I already had on my shelf, instead of going crazy at the library. I also wanted to focus on "fun" rather than anything I might have to write reviews for, so there are a whole bunch of sequels and nothing terribly serious.

From top to bottom:

• Jolis deuils by Roch Carrier - A short short story collection in French that I had originally planned to pick away at throughout the year, but found myself with most of the stories left when I started my Christmas holiday on Friday afternoon. I am determined to finish this by the end of 2018, and I only need to read three very short stories per day to do so. This was a gift from my sister last Christmas.
  
• Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik - The second book in the Temeraire series, which I started reading last night. I'm really enjoying it already at the 25%-ish mark. More on this later, I'm sure.
  
• Elven Star by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman - This is the second book in the Death Gate Cycle series, which I started at my sister's urging a few years ago. This book actually belongs to her, and I'm thinking of trying to read it so that I can send it home with her after her visit early next month. If this book doesn't grab me, I may leave off with the series at this point.
  
• Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott - I just finished my reread of Little Men, picked up for the sake of reading something jolly before the Christmas season. It was a little too sweet in parts, but I still have an appetite for the third and final book in Alcott's Little Women trilogy.
  
• HMS Surprise by Patrick O'Brian - After reading Post Captain earlier this year and really, really loving it, I resolved not to wait so long to read the third book in the Aubrey/Maturin series, and therefore added this physical copy of it onto my shelf.
  
• Protector of the Small by Tamora Pierce - I keep waffling on this. I've never read any Tamora Pierce before and can't decide if this is actually where I want to start. I may also send this back with my sister and start with The Song of the Lioness instead.

Pages Read:

Day 1: 46
Day 2: 126
Cumulative: 172
Day 2 Target: 200

The 5th Annual Twelve Hectopages of Xmas Readathon!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve! Once again, I'll be doing my 12hppofxmas readathon whether anyone else participates or not. The description post is recycled below for your enlightenment as to how this works.

THE
12 hpp
OF
Xmas
***

Who?

Me! The mysterious M.R.! I am hosting this and will most likely be the sole participant. But you are welcome to participate as well if you want. Keep reading to see how?

What?

This is a readathon. Basically the idea is to just read a whole bunch. In this case, twelve hectopages (1200 pages) over the course of the Christmas season, specifically the twelve days of Christmas. There are no rules besides that. The books don't have to be Christmas books, and I'm not posting any challenges or anything like that.

When?

Because I'm perverse and hate my family (not at all, but), this readathon will take place over the course of the actual twelve days of Christmas. If you, like Bob and Doug MacKenzie, are somewhat confused as to what the twelve days of Christmas are, then I will tell you the actual dates right now: December 25 to January 5. Let's say midnight to midnight.

Where?

Wherever I am and/or you are.

Why?

Instead of quietly doing my usual glut of Christmas reading, I am formalizing it as a readathon (for the fifth year in a row!) so that I can feel even more accomplished. Christmas is a time when I like to hang out with friends and family, eat baked goods until my teeth hurt, and read as much as possible. Join me!

How?

I have absolutely no mechanism for you to register for this readathon other than leaving a comment on this post. There won't be any prizes other than my appreciation that you're joining me in something I'd be doing anyway. Seriously though, the more the MERRIER. SEE WHAT I DID THERE?


Hashtag for this is #12hppofxmas by the way. I basically don't use Twitter at all anymore, however you can find my Litsy posts at @twohectobooks on the app.