Friday, January 16, 2009

What should I read next AND a giveaway

First of all, thank you to my FIVE voters even though there were MORE THAN FIVE commenters (Come on, are you AFRAID I will be mad if I don't like the book you pick? Are you too CHICKEN to have an opinion and vote?)** last time. You unanimously selected The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst as my next read. So I am reading it. As a result of feeling too crappy to do anything other than read, blog and watch TV, I am about 15 minutes away from being done with The Dogs of Babel. So it's time to pick my next book. My random grab from my book piles resulted in the following choices:

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes,

The Blue Zone by Andrew Gross,

Step on a Crack by James Patterson [Wait a minute, this was a choice last time. I have ANOTHER copy of this book? It seems I have once again double-purchased a book. I have a paperback AND a hardcover. Hmmm... What should I do with the extra copy? Let me ponder that a moment...]

Paint It Black by Janet Fitch AND

Simple Genius by David Baldacci [Um, I seem to be holding a paperback copy of this book while looking at the spine of a hardcover copy in my book pile... Another troublesome problem.]

OK, so go vote in the poll to the right to determine what I will read next and leave a comment telling me why you chose the book you did. I will then randomly choose two commenters. The first one chosen will win my brand-spanking-new paperback copy of Step on a Crack, and the second one chosen will win my brand-spanking-new copy of Simple Genius. So come on, people... VOTE. You have incentive this time - WIN A FREE BOOK.***

** This is trash talk. I'm not very good at it. It is SUPPOSED to provoke you into doing what I want you to do. We'll see if it works...

*** This compromises the validity of the trash-talk experiment.

10 comments:

Tess said...

I voted for Flowers For Algernon. I have always wondered how that book is.

Pickles and Dimes said...

I also vote for Flowers for Algernon. That is a great book. I should read it again too [adds to library book list].

I gotta tell you, I am LOVING these book posts. I like to hear what others think about books I've already read (like The Road, which I still think is awesome, I don't care if I'm the only person in the universe to think so) and to get ideas for new books to read. My library book list is growing every day - I love it!

Alice said...

oh man... i read flowers for algernon YEARS ago and.. well.. it's great, but once was enough because it is SAD. i'm going "paint it black" just to be different!

Chantal said...

having never read any of these books (again yes i do read) I chose the one with the cool title. :)

Flibberty said...

I will vote, but I cannot divulge what I'm voting for for fear of judgment.

Becky said...

Flowers for Algernon! I read that book in high school, and it made me cry. But it is SO GOOD. I bought another copy of it a few years ago (my old one was totally worn out), and I should pick it up again sometime here. But here's my issue: with so many books in the world, it is hard for me to justify re-reading something, even if I liked it. Because that is one less book that I will get to read in my life. How do you deal with this issue??

Fiona Picklebottom said...

flibberty - I would NEVER judge, after all, these are all books in MY to be read piles that I purchased and two of them I purchased TWICE

becky - I also rarely intentionally re-read a book. As a matter of fact, I have only re-read the following books (on purpose):

Beach Music by Pat Conroy - EVERYONE should read this book, it is the best book EVER, I would even consider re-reading yet again,

This Much I Know is True by Wally Lamb

and Lord of the Flies by William Golding - not sure WHY I re-read that one, except that I went through a phase at some point of thinking I should re-read some of the classics we were assigned in high school, and so that one got re-read. Come to think of it, I may also have re-read Candide by Voltaire during this period, but I'm not sure.

I have ACCIDENTALLY re-read books, thinking, "This sure seems familiar," until I finally realized I had read it before but couldn't remember what happened, so I went ahead and finished it. Hopefully, my reviews of books here will help me stop that practice. Now if only something could stop me from buying a book I already own...

Anonymous said...

Hey, no fair closing the polls before I got to vote. But no matter, I would have chosen Flowers for Algernon. I loved that book.

Jess said...

OK, the poll is closed so I vote here for Flowers for Algernon. It's the only book in the list that I've read. And I liked it.

Shelly said...

I've read Paint it Black. It was good, but not great. I think I wrote a post about it early last year. It was the first book I read in 2008, so that should tell you how long it's been. The poll is closed, but I would have voted for Flowers also. I've always been curious about that book.