A Journey of a Thousand Miles…(December’s Reads)

…begins with a single step. Challenged by a friend in Great Britain, my goal to walk a thousand miles was attained. It took until December 16^th, but this pedometer geek accomplished what I set out to do. I plan to do it again, but in a shorter period of time.

Still, even with this challenge completed, there was a lack of steps in December by this pedometer geek. The results were better than the previous two months with 211,127 steps recorded on my Omron pedometer. Aerobic steps of 73,028 were also recorded and were obtained on all but four days throughout the month. Only three days, however, was the goal of 10,000 steps met.

Despite the busyness of the season, some books were read (or listened to) throughout the month. Eleven books were completed during December. Six of the books were written by authors who were new to this reader. Three of the books were an urban fantasy trilogy. Other genres including suspense, romance, and mainstream were also read. Four of the books were read in an e-book format, and two books were audio-books.

In the two www.bookcrossing.com challenges in which this reader participates, there were mixed results. The first challenge is the SIY (set-it-yourself) challenge, which is a quarterly challenge to read a list of books chosen by the reader. The second challenge is the yearly pages-read challenge, and again it is directed by the reader.

In the former challenge, this reader completed another three books from the list, but still fell short of the goal. This is the third quarter in which the SIY challenge was undertaken with the same result. Only in the first quarter was the challenge successfully met. Despite this, this reader has taken on the challenge once more in the hope that this first quarter of 2018 the results will be better.

The other challenge of reading a self-chosen goal of 40,000 pages over the course of 2017 was completed in December. For the month, 2,841 pages were read bringing the total of pages read for the year to 41,982 pages. Based on these results, another 40,000 page challenge has been undertaken in 2018.

In December, the following books were read:

Sacred Light (Armor of Magic #1) by Simone Pond

 Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak

My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

Dangerous Secrets by Abbie Zander

The Mother’s Promise by Sally Hepworth *

Christmas with the Marine by Candace Havens

Creation in Death by J.D. Robb *

The Sleepwalker by Chris Bohjalian *

Crimes Against a Book Club by Kathy Cooperman

Rising Light (Armor of Magic #2) by Simone Pond **

Edge of Light (Armor of Magic #3) by Simone Pond **

Looking back over the books which were read, there is a bit of diversity among them. From the urban fantasy trio to romance to suspense to mainstream fiction, there is a little bit of everything except nonfiction.

This reader will post a quick rundown of the different books. Several of the books (the Armor of Magic trilogy, The Sleepwalker, and The Mother’s Promise) were reviewed on the review site: www.pedometergeek.wordpress.com.

Francesca Hornak’s Seven Days of Us is the story of a family, forced into a quarantine period of seven days together during the holidays without any outside contact. With each person in the family dealing with his or her own issues, the story is fraught with tension. Just imagine being stuck with all your adult siblings and your parents in a closed environment because of one of them has been exposed to a deadly disease; that’s the story here.

Gabriel Tallent’s debut novel, My Absolute Darling, is the story of a father and daughter, with an unusual relationship. It is a disturbing tale of survivalists, which seems normal to the daughter until she realizes all families don’t live this way. While compelling, there is strong language and situations. On the other hand, any book that refers to playing cribbage as her grandfather and she do is awesome in and of itself.

Zander’s novel, Dangerous Secrets, is a romantic suspense tale. A young woman running for her life meets a man who serves in one of the Special Ops forces. The pair becomes involved, but the romance takes a dangerous turn.

Candace Havens writes a spicy, holiday-themed romance between a Marine and a professional shopper when they accidentally meet at a toy store. A perfect light read during the holidays.

Creation in Death by Robb is the twenty-fifth book in this romantic suspense series that features Eve Dallas and her partner Roarke. The pair and the whole homicide division that Eve heads up are out to solve a series of gruesome murders. Having skipped from the first in the series to this one, this reader can attest to the fact that it can be read without reading the intervening ones; however, there are some references that are obviously spoilers to events that happened in the past novels.

Kathy Cooperman’s novel would be classified as chick-lit. It is the story of two women, two best friends, who create (and sell) a cocaine-laced, youth-enhancing cream to the members and friends of a snooty book group in order to fund their expensive medical therapies. That is, until they get caught. It’s a light read, but there are some delicate, difficult issues that are addressed as well.

That’s it for December’s reading and walking statistics. Is a year-end report next? Maybe…

Books with an asterisk are SIY challenge books; those with double asterisks are audio-books.