February Reads Take Me All Over Europe!

 February Reads – Books 12 to 9…..

So far this month I have finished four books. Those books have taken me to a variety of counties where I met a lot of interesting characters. I am writing about the books in the reverse order of when I read them…

Book Number 12 The Hermit by Thomas Rydahl took me to the Canary Islands.There I met a 65-year-old taxi driver from Denmark, Erhard Jorgenson. Erhard lives alone in a shack near the resort of Fuerteventura. Erhard’s life is changed forever,after a car is found washed up on the beach. A dead 3 month old baby is found in a cardboard box on the back seat. The police try to quickly and quietly close the case by having a prostitute  claim she was the mother. Erhard knows that is wrong and for the sake of the baby he wants to prove what really happened! read more

2017 Reading Challenges Mini-Update (Feb 6, 2017)

An Amazing Start on My 2017 Reading Challenges

Ok so I do believe that I would be hard pressed to find two months in the last 15 years where I have read more books than January and February of 2017. In January I read  books and so far in February I have read three more! Bringing 2017’s total of books read to 11! In order to achieve my 2017 Reading Challenge goal of 60 books, I need to average 5 books per month.  I am already above that average in the first week of February!! Goodreads says that right now I am 5 books ahead of schedule! Woo Hoo! read more

2017 Reading Challenges…

This Man Reads 2017 Reading Challenges…..

Two  years ago I signed up for several Reading Challenges on various websites. The result was that the challenges helped me remain more focused with my reading. So last year I created my own Reading Challenges. They were meant to keep me focused and reading a variety of books. So here is my 2017 version.

I probably should have created these reading challenges back  in December, but I was too busy trying to get past 51 books to do it!   But you know that they always say,”Better Late than Never”. So here are my 2017 Reading Challenges. My overall reading challenge is to read 60 books. I didn’t reach that goal in 2016, but I did read more books in 2016 that 2015 so maybe I can reach the goal this year!! read more

October Reads and Reading Challenges Update!

Where DID October Go!

Ok I give up where did October go? Seems like the NFL season just began and now we’re at Week 8. The World Series is at Game 5 and both the NBA and NHL have begun their seasons. And yesterday the two colleges that I attended. As the Universities of Florida and Georgia renewed their heated rivalry.  I really don’t care which team wins most of the time. But it’s always nice when the team that needs it more gets the victory. Since the Gators stayed atop the SEC East with the victory, I was glad they won. read more

September Reading Challenges Update!

A Quick Update of Where I Stand on My 2016 Reading Challenges

So far this month I have finished three books. They are; Life with Pi, The Winter Fortress and most recently Dark Run. This brings my total number of books read in 2016 to 35 books. My lofty goal is 60 books. So right now I am way behind the pace I need (five books per month) to read to reach that goal. However, I am not that far off the pace needed to match last years total of 51 books.

Where I Stand  on My 2016 Reading Challenges

Yesterday I sat down and reviewed where I stood on my various Reading Challenges. Here’s a tabulation of where I stand right now! read more

March 2016 Reading Challenge Update

March 2016 Reading Challenge Reads and My Proposed April Reads…..

March Reads

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To meet my 2016 Reading Challenge of 60 books, I need to average five books per month. I fell one book short of that this month reading only four books. Overall though, I am two off the pace needed to reach my 60 book goal. Three of the four books that I read were either mysteries or thrillers,and were written by a favorite author. The fourth book was a mini-memoir. The three books written by favorites  were: Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter,The Forgotten Room from Lincoln Child and Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger. read more

Reading Challenges for 2016

Renaissance Granddad’s 2016 Reading Challenges!

Well last year was the first time that I set a goals for both the overall number of books that I was going to read in the year and the types of books. I signed up for three reading challenges: Cloak and Dagger, Historical Fiction, and Nonfiction and created one of my own Science Fiction. While I kept track of the number of books I had read for each challenges I never posted at the websites where I had signed up for the challenges. I guess I should have but I was one of the few men who signed up for the challenges, so I felt kinda alone and funny posting! Also I’m lazy and a loner so it was easier just to post about the books I was reading here! read more

Reading Challenge Update – Late December 2015

With 51 Books Read RGranddad Reaches His Overall Goal!

With the end of 2015 two days away, last night I finished the 51st book I’ve read for the year The Politics of Deception JFK’s Secret Decisions on Vietnam, Civil Rights and Cuba, thereby reaching the lofty goal of 5I books I set at the beginning of the year! Overall, it is the most books that I have read in a year since 2009!

Now while I did meet the overall goal for books read, I did fall short on two reading challenges. I only read nine of eleven nonfiction books and nine of twelve books for the science fiction reading challenge!! But considering last year I only read seven nonfiction books, and only one science fiction book. So I did read more books from those two genres!! read more

Reading Challenge Update: October 2015!

Reading Challenge October Update

So now I’ve caught up on my running,(well, actually if you consider today’s run I’m not caught up with runs right now!), it’s time to catch up on my reading. Over the last couple of weeks I have finished two books! The first is the Pen/Faulkner winning Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson, and then I finished Gracie: A Love Story written by her partner and husband George Burns!

They were the 43rd and 44th books that I have finished this year!! That leaves only 7 more to reach what I thought was a lofty goal of 51 books for the year!! read more

Reading Challenge Update for Mid-October!

2015 Reading Challenge 41 books down 10 more to go!!

So as I have said many times October has been a busy month especially the last two weeks. But in those two weeks I have finished two books first Broken Promise from Linwood Barclay and most recently Silent Creed from Alex Kava. So where does that put me on my various reading challenges. Well, the addition of these two books have brought the total number of books I’ve read to 41 which is 80% of my goal total of 51 books. Since the goal of 51 books was very lofty, I’m really happy with where I am right now!! So right now I can achieve my goal with 2 more books this month and 4 in each of the following months. But with so much competing with my time over the next few month i.e Eagles football, Sixers basketball and Flyers hockey plus the World Series I don’t know if I’ll reach my goal!! Anyway, here’s a tabulation of my reads!! read more