Wrapping Up 2009

Both personally, and in terms of my reading, this has been a great year for me. As far as writing, it could have been better, as I made very little progress on my book and kind of fizzled out on the blogs mid-way through. Maybe 2010 will be the year I figure out how to focus on my writing without letting the rest of life go all blurry.

I've been afraid to look at the reading challenges I joined for 2009, but now that I've peeked, I see that I didn't do so horribly. Okay, I tanked on the Dream King challenge, for which all I had to do was read one Neil Gaiman book (The Graveyard Book, done) and watch one movie based on a Neil Gaiman book (failed). And I completely stalled out on the Blog Improvement Challenge, which I read regularly but never acted on.

Let's see how I did on the others.

Diversity Rocks Challenge I said I'd include books by authors of color for every challenge I participated in, and I definitely succeeded in that. I also said I'd review at least two authors of color per month, but then I didn't label my reviews well enough to easily see if I lived up to that. I'll have to do some digging to figure that out. I do know that I read and reviewed more books by authors of color than I would have without the challenge, and that's a permanent change for me, not a one-year thing. The increased diversity in my reading has become a rewarding habit at this point, one that I fully intend to keep.

Graphic Novels Challenge, 2009
I committed to reading 6 graphic novels, and I read 7 plus two that remain unfinished, but only reviewed 5 of them.

1) Embroideries

2) Bone

3) Incognegro (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/01/incognegro-mat-johnson-book-review.html)

4) American Born Chinese (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/02/american-born-chinese-gene-luen-yang.html)

5)Emiko Superstar (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/03/emiko-superstar-book-review.html)

6) Aya (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/06/aya-marguerite-abouet-book-review.html)

7) Kampung Boy (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/07/kampung-boy-lat-mini-book-review.html)

Young Adult Challenge

I committed to reading 12 books. This was no problem. Challenge complete!

1) Night of the Howling Dogs (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/01/night-of-howling-dogs-graham-salisbury.html)

2) Cracked up to Be (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/01/cracked-up-to-be-courtney-summers-book.html)

3) Cricket Man (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/01/cricket-man-phyllis-reynolds-naylor-kid.html)

4) American-born Chinese (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/02/american-born-chinese-gene-luen-yang.html)

5) Flygirl (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/04/flygirl-book-review.html)

6) The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/04/boy-in-striped-pajamas.html)

7) Alive and Well in Prague New York (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/06/nerds-heart-ya-bracket-4.html)

8) Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/06/nerds-heart-ya-bracket-4.html)

9) Boy Toy (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/06/boy-toy-barry-lyga-book-review.html)

10) Down to the Bone (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/07/down-to-bone-mayra-lazara-dole-book.html)

11) Back Creek (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/07/back-creek-leslie-goetsch-book-review.html)

12) ADHD and Me (http://worducopia.blogspot.com/2009/08/adhd-me-blake-taylor-book-review.html)


Dewey's Books Challenge
I'm pretty sure I failed this one, but I can't tell because Dewey's blog is down and if there's another list of her books, I can't find it. I did read at least 2 out of the 5 I said I'd read:

1) Looking for Alaska

2) How I Live Now

I didn't read the others I'd planned on reading, but I may have read others? I'm just not sure. I also wish I'd found the time to participate in more of the mini-challenges. I did finish knitting my felted bag for the knit-along challenge (I still have to felt it, though), and I've knit hats for each of my sons since then and am now working on a pair of fingerless gloves for me, so clearly the knitting challenge was what I needed to get me going! All the more reason why I should have participated in more of them. Ah, well.



World Citizen Challenge

I completed the World Citizenship 101 level, which was one book (Kampung Boy). I had a few memoirs that would have worked for the challenge, but I'm disappointed that I didn't read any of the recommended books in the other categories.