Kkunker reads 75+ Books in 2015

Hello everyone!

Glad to be back for my fifth year of the 75er challenge. I can't wait to get started. in 2014 I hit the 100 mark, it would be fun to get that many again. I tend use this challenge as a general summary list of all the books for the year. Sometimes I do reviews/reactions sometimes I don't, depends on how busy I get.

I have a C. S. Lewis themed category challenge located here:
https://www.librarything.com/topic/184142

I'm also doing a ROOT challenge found here, for 40 books:
https://www.librarything.com/topic/184746

These other challenges have specifications on what books count towards the totals. The 75er includes anything and everything.

Happy New Year to everyone, and happy reading in 2015.

I decided to keep track of my total pages read for 2015, with a goal of 30,000 for the year.

Welcome back!

Welcome back!

Finished off my first book for 2015.

1. Riese Kingdom Falling by Ryan Copple

Riese Kingdom Falling is a short steampunk book. It provides the background story for a SyFy miniseries of the same name which I watched online a few years ago. When I saw the book a few weeks ago at my library I had to read it.

The book's heroine is Riese, the heir to the throne of Eleysia, who is forced into hiding when her aunt pulls off a coup which results in the death of the rest of Riese's family. I enjoyed the plot of the book, but found the split time frames a bit rough. The book jumps back and forth between Riese on the run and the fatal events which led to her parents death ten years ago. The steam punk elements were rather minor in the book, the religious Sect is composed of humans who weld themselves to clockwork mechanisms but other than their one group technology was quite minimal. A fun read, it was cool to see the background for the miniseries. I'd probably give it 3.5 stars.

2. Star Wars Rebels: the Rebellion Begins
The junior novel about the television shows pilot episode.

3. Celebrating the Jewish Year: the Winter Holidays
A nice overview of the three winter festivals: Hanukkah, Tu b'shevat, and Purim. This series provides a lot of traditions and historical development of certain aspects of the holidays which added to my understanding of the importance of these days.

4. Defending Middle-Earth by Patrick Curry

5. The Hobbit Chronicles: The Battle of the Five Armies: Art & Design

Finished a couple more books this week.

6. Star Wars: Scoundrels
7. Defending the Wilderness
8. Contested Terrain

Finished four more in the past week:
9. The Crown Tower
10. Hebrew Yeshua vs Greek Jesus
11. Anglo-Saxon Community in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
12. The Odyssey

To round out January I finished three more in the past week.
13. Hengest’s Tale
14. Stargate SG-1: The Drift
15. Unshapely Things

Finally, a shared book! I really ended up enjoying Mark del Franco's Connor Gray series. There is a defined story arc from the 1st to the 6th book, and he really knows what he is doing with his Celtic mythology.

Yay for a shared book! I enjoyed the first Connor Gray book, its a style I like. It was a recommendation from Goodreads which I actually thought was a good match for some of my reading habits. The fact that Rob Thurman, author of the Cal Leandros series, endorsed it helped. I've read 8 of the current 9 in that series. My library system has the first 3 or 4 Connor Gray, I just put in a request for the second one. I look forward to continuing the series.

Finished off three more in the past week.
16. Forever Wild: Environmental Aesthetics and the Adirondack Forest Preserve
17. Elantris
18. History in the Mapping: Four Centuries of Adirondack Cartography

19. Band of Giants
an ARC from July 2014

20. The Maze Runner

21. Visitors by Orson Scott Card

22. Two Powers in Heaven

I just returned from an amazing 12 day trip to Israel. I took part in a Christian tour of the Holy Land, and I learned so much. Didn't have much time for reading but I did manage to fit in one book over the course of the four flights.

23. Star Wars Dawn of the Jedi: Into the Void

24. Lake Champlain: key to Liberty
25. Unfallen Dead
26. What every Christian needs to know about Passover

27. Unperfect Souls
28. Cold Copper
29. Roots and Branches

30. Finn and Hengest
31. Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus
32. High King of Montival
33. Trigger Warning

I really enjoyed the Connor Gray series--very tightly plotted into a defined story arc!

I also have enjoyed the Connor Gray books that I've read; they have a similar feel to the Alex Verus series. Unfortunately my library system only has the first four. Not sure if it's worth it to buy only the last two, just so I can finish the series. They are fun quick reads, but not necessarily something I want to own.

34. By Schism Rent Asunder
35. Steelheart
36. The Chapel of the Thorn
37. Roman Britain: A Very Short Introduction
38. The King’s Hand
39. Stargate SG-1: Moebius Squared
40. Songs of the Earth
41. Star Wars Rebels: Rise of the Rebels

I'm happy to be over halfway to my initial goal of 75.

>20 kkunker: I can understand that, but I think the final book is the best of the lot.

>22 ronincats: ronincats: I just purchased the final two books used from better world books. They were $3 a piece, as opposed to $8 new. I figure I can finish the series and then maybe donate them to the library, so they will have a full set.

42. Stargate SG-1: Permafrost
A fun little novella about how the SG-1 team spent one Christmas in Iceland dealing with an unusual archaeological dig.

43. Tears of the Sun
My latest read in the S. M. Stirling post-apocalyptic/sci-fi/fantasy series "Novels of the Change." In this volume the heroes return from their cross country quest and begin to prepare the various realms for all out war against the expansionist Church Universal and Triumphant.

44. The Broken Blade
The conclusion of a new fantasy trilogy. I won the first book in the series in an Early Reviewer giveaway and enjoyed it so much I bought the next two books when they came out. It had some pretty standard motifs but had an interesting magic system which I hadn't seen before.

45. The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
Re-read for my Tolkien poetry class. This time I read the newest edition which has commentary by Hammond and Scull which provided some nice insights into Tolkien's writing process.

46. Tolkien in the Land of Heroes

Here's a list of the rest of the books I've read in June.

47. Trinity Rising
48. Star Wars Rebels: Ezra’s Brush with Danger
49. Where Wilderness Preservation Began
50. William Shakespeare’s Star Wars: The Phantom of Menace
51. The Rose and the Thorn
52. Pathways to the King

So far for July:
53. Mirror Sight by Kristen Britain (760 pages)
54. By Heresies Distressed

I'm not going to get through anything else for the month, so here's what else I read.

55. The Raven's Shadow
56. Star Wars: Dark Disciple
57. Meet the Rabbis
58. A Question of Time
59. Mistborn: The Final Empire

I've finished 6 books since my last post.
60. Tolkien, Race and Cultural History
61. Uncertain Allies
62. A Mighty Fortress
63. Star Wars Rebels: Ezra’s Gamble
64. Undone Deeds
65. Stargate SG-1: Two Roads

I finished off several more books in August.

66. The Change: Tales of Downfall and Rebirth
67. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi: The Desperate Mission
68. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi: Dark Warning
69. Lord of Mountains
70. Veiled

September has been a pretty good month. I've read 8 books so far, which puts me over the 75er minimum that I had for the year! Now I'm curious to see how many books I can fit in for the rest of the year.

71. Blood of Tyrants
72. Star Wars Last of the Jedi: Underworld
73. Brotherband Chronicles: Scorpion Mountain
74. Star Wars Last of the Jedi: Death on Naboo
75. Star Wars Journey to the Force Awakens: Aftermath
76. Star Wars The Weapon of a Jedi: A Luke Skywalker Adventure
77. Star Wars Dark Forces: Soldier for the Empire
78. Smaug: Unleashing the Dragon

Congrats!

September has been a really good reading month, I finished 15 books. The new Star Wars young adult books really helped boost the numbers this month.
79. Star Wars: Journey to the Force Awakens: Smuggler’s Run
80. The Shock of Night
81. Star Wars: Journey to the Force Awakens: Moving Target
82. How Firm a Foundation
83. Star Wars: Last of the Jedi: Tangled Web
84. Star Wars Last of the Jedi: Return of the Dark Side
85. The Fall of Arthur

Congrats on blowing past the 75 book mark!

I have finished off several more books in the past week or so.
86. Star Wars Journey to the Force Awakens: Lost Stars
87. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi: Secret Weapon
88. Ultimate Star Wars
89. Track of the Cat
90. Eighteenth-Century Britain: A Very Short Introduction

Some of my October reads:
91. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi Against the Empire
92. The Given Sacrifice
93. Mouse Guard: Legends of the Guard Volume 2
94. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi Master of Deception
95. Star Wars The Last of the Jedi Reckoning
96. Star Wars and History

Don't think I will be finishing anything else for October, so here are the other books I did finish this month. I've hit the 100 mark for the year! And there are still 2 months left for to go. I'm currently working on 4 books, so maybe I will make 120 before December 31.

97. Back to the Melchizedek Future
98. The Well of Ascension
99. William Shakespeare’s Star Wars The Clone Army Attacketh
100. William Shakespeare’s Star Wars: The Tragedy of the Sith’s Revenge
For fans of Star Wars and Shakespeare I highly recommend Ian Doescher's series. I've read all 6 and really enjoyed them. The way he manages to work in the famous lines into couplets and rhyme is just a blast to read. And the scattering of pictures throughout the books are just fun, seeing the mashup of Star Wars and stage costumes.

I've worked through six books so far for November:
101. Downfall
102. Jackaby
103. Star Wars: A New Hope: The Princess, The Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy
104. Star Wars Vol. 1: Skywalker Strikes
105. The Hero of Ages
106. Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back: So You want to be a Jedi?

I finished off three more books in November and I've read three so far for December.

107. Beastly Bones
108. Star Wars: X-Wing Mercy Kill
109. Star Wars: Shattered Empire
110. Star Wars Battlefront: Twilight Company
111. Stargate SG-1: Ouroboros
112. Star Wars Darth Vader Volume 1

113. Six of Crows
114. Star Wars Princess Leia
115. Foxglove Summer
116. The Alloy of Law
117. A Very Short Introduction: Judaism

Getting ready to start Six of Crows today!



For my Christmas/Hanukkah/Solstice/Holiday image this year (we are so diverse!), I've chosen this photograph by local photographer Mark Lenoce of the pier at Pacific Beach to express my holiday wishes to you: Peace on Earth and Good Will toward All!

>40 ronincats:: Hope you enjoy Six of Crows. I found it to be a fun read. I'm glad the sequel is expected to come out in 2016, so there's not too long of a wait. I'll definitely be requesting it from the library.

118. Game of Thrones and Philosophy
119. The Oxford Inklings
120. The Sea Mark

121. A Grief Observed
122. Living the Beatitudes

And that will round out my year of reading. Quite happy with how many books I finished this year. I even managed to complete both my Category Challenge and my ROOT challenge this year. A very satisfying feeling. Looking forward to seeing folks on the 2016 threads. Good luck next year.