(Y-9) 44 days….making plans

Usually, at this time of the year, I begin planning the reading for next year.

Like I said in past posts the next year of reading is back to the one genre that got me hooked on reading, Epic Fantasy.

So, from now on (Y-10) will be known as “Total Epicness”.

To start the year with a bang I will read the illustrated edition of The Hobbit and the 50th-anniversary edition of Lord of Rings.

From there I planned to tackle three series: The Malazan Book of the Fallen (starting with book 2) by Steven Erikson, The Black Company by Glen Cook and the Dragonlance: The War of Souls. I know a huge task but I’m up for it.

And to top it off, and if completed, the crown jewel of the year, I will tackle almost the entire Legend of Drizzt series by R.A. Salvatore. I’ll start with book 4, the first three I have already read, and work myself up to number 23, which is the last they have published.

In all the list for (Y-10) is 49 books.

So these coming months I’ll focus on buying the missing books and find a comfortable spot to read because I’m in for a long ass task.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

 

(Y-9) 47 days…focus..shifted

The end of this reading year is fast approaching and with that, my anxiety grows.

I start making plans for next year which include the shifting of books and with the next year being the 10th anniversary of my project this take on a whole different meaning.

I have in store for (Y-10) a sort of back to my origins.

The thing that really got me into readings was fantasy books and Lord of the Rings had the most impact of all the books I read.

With that in mind, I started analyzing this year remaining list and decided to migrate some books for my full of epicness.

Here are the remaining books

READING LIST (Y-9)
The Lord of the Rings	J.R.R. Tolkien
The Hobbit (Illustrated Edition)	J.R.R. Tolkien
Tarantula	Bob Dylan
Jerusalem	Alan Moore
Dragonlance: Dragons of a Fallen Sun	Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
Dragonlance: Dragons of a Lost Star	Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
Dragonlance: Dragons of a Vanished Moon	Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
Dragonlance: The Legend of Huma	Richard A. Knaak
The Tyranny of the Night	Glen Cook
México Mutilado	Francisco Martin Moreno
Star Wars: Aftermath	Chuck Wendig
Star Wars: The Black Fleet crisis Tyrant’s Test	Michael P. Kube-McDowell
Star Wars: The Corellian Trilogy-Ambush at Corellia	Roger MacBride Allen
Star Wars: The Corellian Trilogy-Assault at Selonia	Roger MacBride Allen
Star Wars: The Corellian Trilogy-Showdown at Centerpoint	Roger MacBride Allen

The ones in bold red are migrating to next year, the ones in blue are the main focus for the remaining 47 days and the ones in normal text are probably going back to the shelf to be read in another year.

For now, I’ll focus on México Mutilado, Jerusalem, and Tarantula, in that particular order and one by one.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

(Y-9) 49 days… and 200,000 pages

Finally, after 8 years 10 months and 17 days I reached the second milestone of this my crazy life project of reading my way to 1,000,000 pages.

The book that put me over the top was the Graphic Novel “Boba Fett: Man with a Mission” who happens to be my favorite character in all of the Star Wars universe.

So, officially I have read until this point 200,086 pages and have about 13 years to read 799,914.

I’m up for the challenge.

This idea first came to me, to read that ridiculous amount of pages,  in October of 2008, and I decided to keep a record of everything I read.

A couple of years later I started a very similar blog to this one, only on a different platform, which the main idea was to keep a sort of journal of my day to day life and how it revolves around my love for coffee, food, wine, and books.

For some years I stop writing on my blog/journal.

Until about 4 years ago I decided to pick it up again as a therapeutic outlet.

Many things have happened in this last 8 years, I have read some awesome books, welcome to this world, my son, and daughter,  share this crazy journey with my best friend which consequently, being the lucky bastard that I am, happens to be also my wife, suffer the sudden loss of my beloved father and many things big and small that have shaped this part of my journey.

The only thing that I have to say is Thank You, for listening to me ramble on, and hopefully, you’ll stick around for the next 800,000 pages.

Happy Reading!!!

azr.

 

(Y-9) 50 days…

So I’m determined to reach 200,000 by tomorrow.

How I’m going to do it?

By finishing this two graphic novels.

At 104 pages each is more than enough to get me over the top.

I’ll check back tomorrow to tell you how it went.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

 

(Y-9) 51 days…

The last couple of weeks have been a bit hard and honestly, I can seem to find my train of thought.

But finally, to the soothing sound of rain, last night I finished my first piece of reading material in over a month.

It was a graphic novel, Crimson Vol.1,  it follows the misadventures of a teenager turned vampire by the name Alex Elder. My favorite character is definitely Joe, a Mexican Indian vampire that becomes Alex’s mentor.

Illustrated by Humberto Ramos, it’s a must have.

 

With this, I’m inching closer to one of the important milestone of this crazy project, 200,000 pages.

I’m only 122 pages off.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

 

 

(Y-9) 53 days… tick…tock

Well, it has been a couple of shitty weeks, in general, and particularly on my reading.

In the past 7 days, I have managed to read the pathetic sum of 109 pages.

Haven’t finish any books or Graphic Novels.

You get the idea.

But on Saturday and Sunday, I received a couple of precious little moments that lifted me up.

Let’s start with Saturday or new goodies day.

One of my friends needed more shelf space, I gain some really cool stuff for my ever growing list of reading material.

The graphic adaptation of Stephen King’s The Stand and the single issues are a series of comic books based on paintings by Legendary fantasy artist Frank Frazetta.

Also, I dove into my books/comic books stash at my parent’s house and found some Star Wars single issues and graphic novels and a book by Charles Vess, an extraordinary artist who worked on Stardust by Neil Gaiman.

All in all, it was fun watching my stash grow, believe I’m going to need it next year in order to achieve the monumental task that (Y-10) is going to be.

And on Sunday, especially in the early morning, my beautiful desert was covered by gray clouds and light rain. This kind of days just fills me with a deep feeling of peace.

So, coming back to the rough numbers, I have 53 days left on (Y-9) and 11, 358 pages to tackle.

Let’s get this show on the road and go after those pages.

Happy Readings!!!

azr

 

(Y-9) Tick, Tock the clock goes (aka the 60 day march)

Well, here I am, staring down the last 60 days of this year of reading.

And a long ass road to get where this project must be.

So, here is the current reading situation.

I have read 21 of the 36 proposed books. Not that bad.

In the page count, I have 15,942 of the 27,300 minimal progress to deem this year a productive one.

That gives me 11, 358 pages to tackle.

One of the positive things of my final count is that I’m only 282 pages short to reach 200,000. This means that I have some celebratory wine and pizza on the horizon, this is a tradition with my wife, it all started when I read the first 100,000.

In the meantime, I have about 190 pages to read per day and a whole lot of caffeine in my future.

As my bullet journal can tell it’s has been a bloody awful time (pun intended).

 

I’ll start with the three currently in my reading pile, Jerusalem by Alan Moore, México Mutilado by Francisco Martin Moreno and Star Wars: Tyrant’s Test by Michael P. Kube-McDowell.

 

And one final thing.

I have never been so motivated to take this journey.

Thanks for listening.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

(Y-9) and the desert gentle weeps

Sometimes your world just gets rattled by an event so heart breaking that it can only mean that it’s the end of an era.

Sadly this past Tuesday my beloved father passed away.

He struggled, thankfully for a short time, with that dreadful disease known as cancer.

Part of me will forever mourn his absence, and my other part will remember always the time I spent with him.

I inherited quite a few things, besides the eerie physical similarity.

My love for the desert and nature in general, come directly from him; also my sense of humor and love for red wine and sotol.

My curiosity and love for reading comes indirectly from him, through his mother, she always had a house full of books and an extreme passion for poetry.

Needless to say this last few days haven’t been really productive on reading.

I missed him terribly.

And now I raise a toast in his honor, with the most appropriate of drinks, sotol, as one time he said to me, it’s like some one bottled a rainy desert afternoon.

Cheers!! and good night.

azr