Skip to main content

Enter the Dice Book Choices

In case you haven't noticed, I read a rather wild assortment of books. Some of that's because I'm a teacher, and I'm trying to read widely for the sake of my students, and some of that is because I have an insatiable desire to read every book ever published. Just kidding. But really. 

One of my coworkers reads in a rotation format, and late last year, I decided to give it a try and see how it goes. For one, I love reading multiple books at once and seeing how many I can keep straight at a time (turns out it's quite a few). For another, it's helped me get out of some slumps (Fourth Wing, I'm looking at you). By rotating through, I know I have several other books that come in between having to read a book that I'm not as into (but don't want to DNF). This has been a marvelous way to get myself motivated to read, and to get out of my slumps. 

So I did a crazy thing and I took all of my books that I haven't read in my house and put them in a giant spreadsheet by genre. The idea is that I'll roll a die or two to determine my next read. I'm hoping it'll take some of the mood reading picks out of the equation, and I'll actually branch out into books that are on my TBR that I own.

Here are my current reads (and categories):

  • Fantasy: The Courting of Bristol Keats by Mary E. Pearson (63%)
  • Sci-Fi: Nothing - I just finished Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
  • Realistic Fiction: Nothing
  • Young Readers: A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness (I know it's cheating, deal with it... I teach this one every year!) (39%)
  • Brandon Sanderson (yes he needs his own category): The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England (12%)
  • Nonfiction: The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt (12%)
  • Classic: Nothing
  • Mystery/Thriller: The Final Gambit by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (22%)
  • Historical Fiction: The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (23%)
  • Audio: Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake (0%)
So, I have three categories to roll for: Sci-fi, realistic, and classic. I also have a bookstore trip scheduled for tomorrow... Convenient!

Sci-fi roll: d10















5 is A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle. I read this as a kid, and haven't read it since. It's in my classroom library, so I'll have to pick it up on Wednesday when I'm back there. Super excited about this roll!

Note: I have some books where I have part of the series here at home and part of the series in my classroom library... I decided at some point in my career to quit taking all of my books to school. So with A Wrinkle in Time, I have one of the sequels here, but not the first book.

Realistic Fiction: d6












I rolled 4 which means I need to pick something from my classroom library that I haven't read. The first one on my list is Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. I've read this one before, but didn't review it, and I definitely think it merits a re-read. It's so good!

Classic: d10 + d6



A roll of 9 on this one gives me Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. I love this story and the musical, but have never read the original novel. Several of my coworkers swear by it, so I'm super excited to read it. In English. The whole thing. Yes, I know it's long. The copy I have at home is a pretty one, so I'll have to grab my... plain one from school when I'm back on Wednesday.

Dang it, dice! I wanted to buy new books! Oh well, better luck next time haha.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Robert Louis Stevenson: Pavilion on the Links

For anyone who has read Stevenson's short story "Pavilion on the Links" here is a short discussion of the story and a key passage.  For anyone who hasn't, here is a short explication dealing with a passage from the short story.  The prompt is as follows: In "The Pavilion on the Links," Frank Cassilis, the story's narrator, describes his friend Northmour: "My wife and I, a man and a woman, have often agreed to wonder how a person could be, at the same time, so handsome and so repulsive as Northmour.  He had the appearance of a finished gentleman; his face bore every mark of intelligence and courage; but you had only to look at him, even in his most amiable moment, to see that he had the temper of a slaver captain.  I never knew a character that was both explosive and revengeful to the same degree; he combined the vivacity of the south with the sustained and deadly hatreds of the north; and both traits were plainly written on his face, which was...

Dashka Slater: The 57 Bus

 I picked this one up to possibly use in my AP class. It had been recommended to me by one of my coworkers and I was trying to decide if it was worth using in AP. The 57 Bus  recounts the true story of two teens whose happenstance meeting on a public bus in Oakland, California. Sasha identified as nonbinary, liked to wear skirts, and went to a private school in Oakland. Richard was a black student, a good kid, but also tended to get mixed up in trouble. He went to a public school in Oakland's poorer side of town. One day, Sasha was riding the bus as they always did back to their house from school. This time though, Sasha fell asleep on the long ride. Richard and his friends boarded the bus as well, and seeing the skirt hanging off the edge of the seat, decided to see what would happen with a lighter. The material of the skirt burst into flames, and suddenly Sasha was burning. This story is unbelievably sad for both teenagers involved. In working with teenagers, one thing is tr...

Some Forgotten Thoughts--Eragon vs. The Belgariad

I forgot to mention something I noticed about Eragon in my last post.  If any of you have read David Edding's Belgariad series, then you might have realized that many ideas about the workings of magic in Eragon follow along with the Belgariad .  For example, the "Be Not" principle is a very important one in book three of the Belgariad  and has some of the same effects that it does in Inheritance (book four of the cycle).  "Magic" in Eragon can be equated to "sorcery" in The Belgariad .  Magic in both series depends upon your personal strength.  You can't bring people back from the dead (this is a common rule throughout all of the magical fantasy).  Another similarity is that there are different kinds of magic.  Shades are spirits trapped in the mortal world in Eragon .  Eddings actually portrays basically the same idea as an actual demon.  Mispronunciation or breaking of concentration will cause the Shade or demon to destroy the ma...