27. No Future For You (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 2), written by Brian K. Vaughn and Joss Whedon, and illustrated by Georges Jeanty (graphic novel).

28. The Forgotten Garden, Kate Morton.

29. A Monstrous Regiment of Women (A Novel of Suspense Featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, Laurie R. King.

30. Absolutely Maybe, Lisa Yee.

31. March, Geraldine Brooks. The premise is so promising, and it had some truly wonderful moments, but there were huge chunks that just didn't ring true. I'm still not sure how I feel about it.

32. Book of a Thousand Days, Shannon Hale. My favorite for the month (other than Stardust) - I'm a sucker for retold fairy tales.

33. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance - Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!, Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith. Meh.

34. Favorite Father Brown Stories (Dover Thrift), G.K. Chesterton.

35. Stardust, Neil Gaiman (reread).

36. Wolves at the Gate (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 3), written by Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon, and illustrated by Georges Jeanty (graphic novel).

37. Ink Exchange, Melissa Marr. I read this one without realizing it was a sequel to Wicked Lovely, but it wasn't actually confusing, just a little boring and predictable. I was pretty underwhelmed with it overall and wonder if it would have been more interesting had I read the first. Maybe I'm just bored with "edgy" YA urban fantasy. It tries too hard without bothering to be much good. Or something.



That was a lot of books this month! But with two graphic novels and a bunch of YA - plus a subway accident last week that has given rise to extra-long commutes ever since - it's not a surprisingly large number.

• 18:19 Been trying to get on a train for almost half an hour and wish I'd stayed at work and gotten stuff done. #

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• 08:37 Got to the metro almost 15 minutes ago and the train just showed up. I even got here early to account for delays. #

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• 11:59 Am definitely not receiving mobile updates from twitter. FAIL. #

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• 11:28 Heading to Ohio for a wedding! #
• 14:32 Keep seeing signs for Kennywood. Is that like Dollywood for Kenny Rogers? #

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• 23:25 Cooking tip: You can't substitute the yogurt from fruit-at-the-bottom yogurt for plain. At least we had plenty of other food. #
• 14:50 Was eating a bitterish peach then noticed the pit was split open so threw it out. Now a bit dizzy and short of breath. Cyanide poisoning? #

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I can't believe they beat me to it! Mine was totally going to star Christopher Walken or Crispin Glover as Waldo and be weird as hell. Oh, well. I guess I can't complain since I'm not actually in the movie industry, nor do I have any plans to be. It could work (?)... as long as it has no real relationship to the book.

20. Noisy Outlaws, Unfriendly Blobs, and Some Other Things... That Aren't as Scary, Maybe, Depending on How You Feel About Lost Lands, Stray Cellphones, Creatures from the Sky, Parents Who Disappear in Peru, a Man Named Lars Farf, and One Other Story We Couldn't Quite Finish, So Maybe You Could Help Us Out, Editors of McSweeney's. Although some of the stories in the collection just didn't hold my interest, some were quite good, and others rather excellent. Since this was the first book I read last month, I'm afraid I don't remember which were my favorites. Alas.

21. The Beekeeper's Apprentice: Or On the Segregation of the Queen (A Novel of Suspense Featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes), Laurie R. King. I know a few of you have already read these, and I'm glad you have, or I'd have never heard of them. A teen-aged super-sleuth-in-training solving mysteries with Sherlock Holmes! So fun! And aside from the gimmick which creates the initial premise, I didn't find this as gimmicky as I'd expected.

22. The Long Way Home (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 1), written by Joss Whedon and illustrated by Georges Jeanty (graphic novel). I finally got around to starting Buffy Season 8! It was excellent if you're a Buffy fan, and if you're not you probably don't care anyway.

23. The Lady Elizabeth: A Novel, Alison Weir. It was totally time to get my historical fiction on. This follows Queen Elizabeth I from the time she's declared a bastard at a teeny tiny age and the title of Princess is stripped from her to her ascension to the throne upon the death of Mary. I found it engaging, and Weir (who is a Tudor historian) brings real life to the characters and situations. Even secondary and tertiary characters seem fully-fleshed out when we encounter them. I was particularly taken with the deft way in which Weir handles the relationships between the three siblings (Mary, Elizabeth, and Edward).

24. A Little Princess, Frances Hodgson Burnett (reread). Of the books that I loved growing up, Burnett's are among those that still hold a great deal of magic for me. I love the film adaptations (even the Shirley Temple one), but rereading the book reminded me how emotionally complicated and messy and heartwrenching the source material is compared to the shiny shiny Hollywood versions. I admire Burnett for being able to create a book for children that is all of this, and charming and magical besides.

25. I Capture the Castle, Dodie Smith. I'd meant for years to read this. I'd actually pretty much forgotten that I hadn't by the time I checked it out from the library because I'd grown to love the movie version so much. The book is even better. Cassandra is a wonderful narrator, her adolescent angst lives side-by-side with a sense of clarity regarding her observations of herself and others (and yet these clear observations are toppled and rebuilt in new ways as the story progresses). A stunning example of YA lit done right.

26. Main Street, Sinclair Lewis. About a young woman fairly fresh from University who married a man and moves to the small middle-American town where he's a general practitioner. She goes into the town with big dreams and wide-eyed ideals and philosophical theories, and the book follows the heck-of-a-time she has trying to live up to herself and not lose herself to the town. It's classic individualism vs. the institution, but without the black-and-white preachiness that can entail. Lewis shows us flawed people, situations, and institutions, and grudgingly draws out the subtleties of character in all of them and how they relate to one another.

• 16:54 Leaving San Antonio for Austin. Vacation is nearly over. #
• 17:35 Driving around Will's old neighborhood before we hit the highway. #
• 22:00 Saw the bats! Gonna eat some ice cream at Amy17. #
• 22:01 Erm, Amy's. #
• 07:51 About to drive back to Houston to catch our flight. I've enjoyed this mini-tour of Texas. #

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• 23:34 Will's grandmother just handed me a stack of handwritten cookie recipes! #
• 23:36 I have to give them back after I copy them out, but still... pretty darn cool. #

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• 16:06 Will's brother called to offer us one of their kitties as baby Ethan just tested positive for allergies. Also dogs, peanuts and eggs. #
• 16:29 Sonic, muthafuckas! #
• 21:57 We totally remembered the Alamo, and then we ate some barbecue! #
• 12:00 Going to the zoo, zoo, zoo! How about you? #

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• 11:59 Driving from Houston to San Antonio to visit Will's grandfolks. #
• 16:06 Will's brother called to offer us one of their kitties as baby Ethan just tested positive for allergies. Also dogs, peanuts and eggs. #

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• 06:10 Waiting at the gate to board a plane to Houston. Why is there no Cinnabon after security at this airport? #

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• 11:39 Really looking for a weeklong trip to Texas (Houston and San Antonio) that starts Saturday. #
• 11:42 Erm, that last post should have read that I'm looking *forward to* a weeklong trip. Oh, well. #

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• 18:03 I want some Lucky Charms! #

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• 08:33 Leonard Cohen tonight! #

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• 15:17 My hands are cold, and I feel very lethargic. #

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I know this isn't a book icon, but right now, I love it the most because it has a piano and snowglobes and post-its and Jenny Lewis.


14. The Devil Wears Prada, Lauren Weisberger
15. Little, Big, John Crowley
16. Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before, Tony Horwitz
17. Watchmen, Alan Moore and David Gibbons (graphic novel)
18. Coraline, Neil Gaiman (reread)
19. The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Vol. 2, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Note: the collection includes The Return of Sherlock Holmes, The Valley of Fear, His Last Bow, The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes, and a pair of parodies and a pair of essays by Conan Doyle)

Only six books in two months! Little, Big and the Sherlock Holmes collection were both pretty long reads, so I think I did pretty well (plus, the Holmes was four books in one!).

And I feel like I should say that I shouldn't have waited so long to read Watchmen or Little, Big. I loved them both so much!

And Devil Wears Prada was awful. I do enjoy good chick lit from time to time, but this did not do anything for me.

• 12:02 Hungry. But if I eat now, will be hungry before the end of the work day. What to do? #

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• 08:36 Have eaten five almonds. Hope I have an oatmeal at the office. If not, I have had a poor breakfast. #

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