Author you've read the most books from: I had to count, but Julia Quinn is the winner by a few. She's a romance author, BTW, and my very favorite romance author. She always has those moments in her book that make me laugh out loud, which is a trait I much value in my reading. In case you're interested, second place goes to JR Ward, my guilty pleasure of the reading world.
Best Sequel Ever: And thus starts the Harry Potter devotion. No book or series, in my opinion, has come close to how amazing and consistently awesome those books are. No one else can touch that.
Currently Reading: Speaking of Julia Quinn, I just started reading her again. I'm on her first book, Splendid. I finally finished the Harry Potter series while I was camping a couple weeks ago.
Drink of Choice While Reading: Water is my drink of choice 90% of the time, so that's usually what is on hand.
E-reader or Physical Book: I am a die-hard physical book girl. I don't have a Kindle or Nook, but I do have the Kindle app on my phone and the program on my computer, so it's not like I haven't used e-readers at all. I find them handy, to be sure. But there is a magic to a real book, the feel of the pages and the smell of the paper and the way you can take a moment to close the book and cry or laugh if you need to. Also, it's hard to read ahead on an e-reader. (Oh yeah, I'm THAT person.)
Fictional Character You Probably Would Have Actually Dated In High School: *Takes a moment to consider this* Okay, this is a hard one. First of all, I have many friends who are writers, I myself am a writer, and I am emotionally attached to a whole lot of characters that don't even exist in a published forum. I actually fictionally dated a version of Orlando Bloom for quite a while in junior high and high school, courtesy of a dear writer friend that indulged my Lord of the Rings inspired fantasies (I've mentioned this before, there were vampires and Michael Jackson involved). So, if we are only counting characters that have been published, and we're not limiting this to books I had only read by high school, I would say that the character I would have dated in high school would be . . . one of the Weasley twins from Harry Potter. They were hilarious, unruly, had a family as bonkers as mine, I think I would have done very well with one of them. If we're counting unpublished literature as well, I do have a few characters of my own and a few creations of other friend writers that I would have dated without a second thought.
Glad you Gave This Book a Chance: Julia Quinn pops up again. I had never read a romance novel until my honeymoon (don't worry, the irony is not lost on me), and it had not occurred to me to take anything to entertain myself on said honeymoon. I figured we'd be busy watching movies and lounging around when we weren't, erm, pursuing other activities. Well, by the end of day 2, we were starting to get bored. So I bought a movie magazine that featured a lot of Pirates of the Caribbean material, and a book I picked at random from that aisle of the grocery store. I figured if I picked a pretty safe-looking cover and didn't stumble across anything scandalous during my brief skim through it, I'd be fine (I was leery about romance novels, since I'd never read one). Well, everything checked out, so I unknowingly bought my first romance novel. And I LOVED it! Opened up a whole new genre of books that I absolutely adore! Regency romance (Regency era of England, about 1815 and the years surrounding) is my favorite, and I've written quite a bit in this era as well, but all romance novels have appealed to me thus far. I love the characters, the plots, and I'm such a sucker for romance anyway. Throw me a hero that is professing his love to the heroine using the most flowery or simple words, it doesn't matter which, I love it.
Hidden Gem Book: Greek mythology. Not any specific book, not really, because there are probably dozens if not hundreds of books about Greek mythology, but there is just something about reading those stories, from whatever book I find them in, that I love. Gods and goddesses and heroes, beasts and monsters, tricksters and mortals, this convoluted web of interconnected characters and stories that are so very epic in every kind of way! With no end of tragedy, to be sure, but still, I love them. I love reading these myths, they are my favorite in all of mythology.
Important Moment in Your Reading Life: I don't remember it, but it was probably the moment I really discovered a library. I mean, come on. A voracious reader like me, just a kid, going from the bookshelves at home to a LIBRARY? Shut up! Libraries became frequent visitations for me after that, and still are. I take my daughter to story time at the library I worked at for two years, and she loves it there. We always go home with a huge bag of books, and even some movies, and she always has a favorite. Libraries are such a big thing for me, I discovered some of my greatest reading loves from the library, and I still do. If you don't have a library card, go get one immediately, and use it weekly. I promise it will be worth your while.
Kinds of Books You Won't Read: Stephen King. Don't get me wrong, I think the guy is amazing, and no way he has as many books and movies as he does without being an amazing writer. But horror, thriller, disturbing, all that is just not my thing. Which also cancels out Mary Higgins Clark and other writers in that genre. I'm also not all that fond of mysteries either. I live for fantasy, love, and comedy.
Longest Book You've Read: Probably the fifth Harry Potter book, Order of the Phoenix. That's 870 pages.
Major Book Hangover Because Of: Yes, this is going to keep cropping up. Harry Potter, definitely. Although, I'll definitely give second place to the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by JR Ward. I finish those books (several hundred pages) as fast as possible, and have to wait a whole YEAR for the next one. Thankfully, I only had to wait for the last few of Potter since I was later to the game on that one. But I do fantasize about JK Rowling doing another Hogwarts series, featuring either the Four Founders, or the Marauders, or the Progeny of the Harry/Ron/Hermione generation.
Number of Book Cases You Own: Actual cases? I have three 6-shelf bookcases with doors, and three 3-shelf open cases. One of them doesn't actually contain books because I moved them to shelves on the wall in my room, but there you go. Six book cases of varying sizes.
One Book You Have Read Multiple Times: Homeless Bird by Gloria Whelan. I don't know why, but I adore this book. I have read it over and over, and it's the book I never get sick of. It's the story of a teenage girl in India dealing with an arranged marriage, being widowed, and starting over her life from nothing, and I love it so much. Probably because it has a happy ending.
Preferred Place to Read: Someplace quiet. I'm a peace and quiet nut, and I can't write or read when there's lots of noise and activity going on. I don't even listen to music when I read and write, I like silence.
Quote That Inspires You: Oh, there are so many. No, really, I'm a quote collector. I have journals, Pinterest boards, and Word documents full of them, and I love them all. But this one pertains to all of life, and it brings reading into it in a special way. "Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten." - G.K. Chesterton. This is on my closet door, which is kind of my shrine to, well, happiness and beauty and things that inspire me.
Reading Regret: That I do not have or do not make enough time to read as voraciously as I have before in my life. I have a daughter, and another baby on the way, so being mommy takes up a lot of time, and just being an adult takes up even more. And I have my computer and internet, where I waste far more time than I should, and there's also my own writing. So reading time, just reading, is precious and rare, which I hate. But I will never, never cease this fierce, abiding love for books and reading. I just have to treasure those moments I have for it.
Series You Started and Need To Finish: I have a few, actually. The Tennis Shoes series by Chris Heimerdinger (intensely interesting, historical, exciting, and fascinating look into biblical times mixed with the modern world). the 13th Reality series by James Dashner (it reminded me a little of the feel of Harry Potter and I already know I love this author from reading his Jimmy Fincher series). I know I have more, but I'd have to go peek at the rest of my books to find out which ones I'm still working on.
Three of Your All Time Favorite Books: Uh oh. This is so problematic. Alright, first off, I am going to give my three favorite authors, because I literally CANNOT choose favorites from them. They are JK Rowling, JR Ward, and Julia Quinn. If we are looking outside those three authors, my three favorite books after those (that I am listing off the top of my head to save time) would be Homeless Bird by Gloria Whelan, Falling Up by Shel Silverstein, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Yes, they are all young adult or children's books. I'm a kid at heart.
Unapologetic Fangirl For: Harry Potter. There, I said it. Potterhead to the end, I will go down with this fandom. Always. I beg you, Ms. Rowling, give us more!
Very Excited For This Release Over All The Others: Since this is the series I've been hooked into most recently and it is the most emotionally wracking, laughter-inducing, tension-cranking series I've ever read (not even exaggerating), the most anticipated book I am looking forward to is JR Ward's new Black Dagger book, The King. It comes out in March. Over half a year away. I go through this every year with her.
Worst Bookish Habit: How long it takes me to finish them. Soooo not kidding. Last year at a camping family reunion, I took the 5th and 6th Harry Potter books with me, both to color the pictures (yes, I do that) and to finish 5 and start on 6. This year at the reunion, just a couple weeks ago, I finally finished 7 and read Tales of Beedle the Bard. I know. I know. Don't even go there. Also, I dog-ear pages if I don't have a bookmark right there. So guilty.
X Marks the Spot: One of my earlier memories of my childhood involves my mom and dad reading to me and my little brother and sister when I was probably no more than five or six years old. We were reading Little House in the Big Woods, the first book of the enormously popular series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. I have a very clear memory of being together in the bedroom us kids shared, sprawling around while my mom and dad took turns reading chapters to us. That boxed set of books was the first book series I ever owned, as a gift from my mom. I've read them over and over, all of them, all nine books. We were bookworms as kids, and we certainly had plenty of books to choose from. Shelves and shelves of Disney books and Little Golden Books and The Tales of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter and Berenstain Bears, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Little Critter, I could go on and on. Our house always had books, all kinds of books, everything from Baby Mickey board books to little chapter books to the Shannara series by Terry Brooks for my dad and scores of LDS authors for my mom. I grew up on all of them, all kinds and genres and lengths of books, and I still have that widely varied base guiding my reading today. I will be as happy reading picture books as I would reading adult nonfiction, because from a very early age, I was encouraged to read. I was the kid that read James and the Giant Peach during recess at a new school before I had friends, and I was okay with that. It has been a lifelong treasure and gift, that was started from the time when I couldn't even read yet. I will always appreciate that.
Your Latest Book Purchase: Ah, book fairs. At my daughter's school, I went on the sale day of the book fair and got three books. A Clifford the Big Red Dog 6-book collection (for her), a book about the life of Darth Maul from Star Wars (my husband and I), and a book about 100 Most Amazing Animals (mostly for me, but it's COOL!), I think is what the title was. I love books, I love buying them, I love having them. I also loves sales and the clearance section of Barnes and Noble.
Zzz-Snatcher Book (Last Book that Kept You Up Late): It was while we were camping, I was up late separate times reading the three books I read while up there, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, The Tales of Beedle the Bard, and Splendid by Julia Quinn.
That was actually a ball to write! I told you I love these surveys! I love thinking about books I've read and loved, revisiting memories that they hold. It's the same feelings I get when I write. And I didn't even touch of most of the books I've read that I adore, and believe me, that list is long and ridiculous. So, anyway, please do this survey if it interests you, I loved it! Also, feel free to comment about anything and everything that comes to mind, I also love comments.
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