Goal 1

More Awesome: Goal 1.10 Complete

RaeBelle

A little late in posting this.  October was a busy month and I didn’t really read a ‘normal’ book.  I read like 3 magazines cover to cover and I read quite a lot of technical documentation and articles, none of which I’m counting here.

What I am counting is the very long User Guide for one of the systems I work with that I read this month for work.  I had to do some research and the index was rubbish, so I read the guide.  It was not fun at all.  November I really need to read something fun again!

More Awesome: Goal 1.09 Complete

RaeBelle

I’ve had hockey on the brain which makes me a bad blogger here sometimes.  But I do do quite a lot of reading during September.  I don’t feel I’m any good at book reviews, and I read 3 books so I’ll spare everyone who read this from my poor attempts at reviewing the books.

I started with The Balkan Escape by Steve Berry.  It was a short story to prepare you for the next book in the Cotton Malone series, The Emperor’s Tomb.  It was such a quick read, I almost felt bad about listing it.  Though it did kick off my little reading binge, so it made the list.  It’s only available in eBook format, which was fun.  I love reading eBooks, so it was no problem at all for me.  I can’t wait for November and the release of Emperor’s Tomb!

Next up was The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova.  It was a good book but felt a bit plodding at times and took me much longer to read than I thought it would.  I just couldn’t dive in for extended reading sessions.  I had to take some breaks.  I think I preferred Kostova’s first book, The Historian.  If she releases a new book, I’ll give it a try, but my expectations are lowered a bit.

I ended the month with 206 Bones by Kathy Reichs.  I’ve read every book in the Temperance Brennan series and I always enjoy them!  As always with Kathy Reichs, this was a great book.  I’ve never been disappointed by one of the Temperance Brennan books.  I have another on my iPad waiting to be read. 🙂

More Awesome 1.08

RaeBelle

In August I made up for my slacking in July 🙂

To start the month, I read A Vintage Affair by Isabel Wolff.  It was an interesting story about loss, grief and forgiveness.  Though the actual plot felt like that was almost secondary to the descriptions of vintage clothing.  I enjoyed the descriptions of the vintage clothing, as it is a fondness of mine.

In the middle of August, I read the Paris Vendetta by Steve Berry.  It’s the 5th book in the Cotton Malone series.  I really enjoy Steve Berry’s books and I’ve read them all to date.  I really enjoyed the book and there were actually some events I didn’t anticipate, which was a nice change for me.  Normally when I read action or mystery books I figure it out early in the story.  I didn’t have it all figured out, which I loved.

To wrap up the month, I read Rework by Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson of 37signals.  I’d heard a lot of good things about the book.  It was pretty good, but nothing in the book really felt revolutionary to me.  Of course I didn’t read it for a revolutionary experience, so it met my expectations.

I’ve also been listening to Crush It! by Gary Vaynerchuk.  I’m really enjoying it, but it doesn’t count towards my goal :)  I’ll probably do a separate post on that!

More Awesome: Goal 1.07 Complete

RaeBelle

Such a slacker in my blogging recently, I must work on that.  I bought an iPad and playing with that has occupied my time to an alarming level.  It’s also made it easier to read some of the PDFs I’ve had sitting around and I’ve not read.  And one of those was What Matters Now a really great eBook available free!  It was great to read so many pieces by some very intelligent, well respected people.  It was inspirational and I’d highly recommend it!

More Awesome: Goal 1.06 Complete

RaeBelle

It’s almost the end of June and I almost forgot to pick a book to read.  I have so many books I want to read, sometimes it’s super hard to actually pick one and read.  Which actually corresponds with the book I did select for June, The Dip by Seth Godin.  I love Seth Godin’s blog and was inspired to pick one of his books to read.

The subtitle for The Dip is “A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick)” and that’s exactly what it does. It reminds you that quitting isn’t a bad thing. It’s not the same as failing. In fact, quitting at the right time is one of the best things you can do.  Successfully quitting is a strategic decision, not something you talk yourself into.  The Dip also nicely reinforced the idea of ignoring sunk costs, with a small story about Michael Crichton.

The Dip is a short book, but a very interesting read.  I can see myself rereading it when I need a reminder about quitting and it’s value!

If you’re interested in learning more about The Dip, there’s a great squidoo page on it

More Awesome: Goal 1.05 Complete

RaeBelle

I decided to mix it up for May and read Steps in Time: An Autobiography by Fred Astaire.  I love Fred Astaire.  I have Fred Astaire movies on DVD, recordings on CD and even pictures of him.  He was stylish, an amazing dancer, a great singer and actor.  I found the book fascinating.  Astaire is a very good writer.  I knew a lot about Fred Astaire, and yet I learned so much more.  His early career with his sister Adele on Vaudeville and Broadway were particularly interesting.  I didn’t know that much about his pre-movie career and personally find Vaudeville and Broadway fascinating.  Astaire’s writing took me to the those periods he was describing.  There were almost 50 photos included with the book, which was wonderful.  How could I not love more pictures of Fred Astaire?  I might have to break out some of my DVD collection and enjoy them all over again.

More Awesome: Goal 1.02 Complete

RaeBelle

For my February book, I selected Managing Transitions by William Bridges.  I received the book for free from work almost 2 years ago.  We were supposed to have meetings about change.  Of course priorities changed, and we never did have those meetings.  I put the book on my bookshelf and basically forgot about it.  I was looking at my bookshelf to and the name just jumped out to me.  Since I’d never read it and it’s very applicable right now, I thought it would make a perfect book for my goal of Being More Awesome.

The book feels like it’s geared more towards managers than individual contributors.  It’s not really a problem.  I’ve read other books for managers and taken lessons from them to apply to my individual contributor role.

I did find the quotes on the side interesting.  I enjoyed reading them, yet at the same time they sometimes became distracting.  I’m glad they didn’t appear on every page.

I’m really glad I read the book.  I felt it’s helped empower me with questions to ask my management and things to look for while experiencing a very significant change and transition at work.

More Awesome: Goal 1.01 Complete

RaeBelle

From my first book, I selected The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, wiki article. It won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize, which is one of the reasons I selected it.  I’ve heard so many good things, I thought I should read it.

The writing style is very descriptive but I had no problems reading it.  Unfortunately I found I really did not like Newland Archer, the male protagonist.  Not liking one of the main characters does make a book a little difficult to read.

I am quite glad I’ve read the book, though I don’t think I’ll be reading it again anytime soon.

More Awesome: Goal 1 — Reading

RaeBelle

I love reading, it’s absolutely one of my favorite pastimes.  Fiction and Non-Fiction, I love them both.  While I love reading I just haven’t read as many books as I’ve liked recently.  Which has inspired Goal #1 of being More Awesome.

Goal #1 – Read at least 1 book a month (12 books for the year)

Of course, there are only 9 days left in the month of January, but I’m still going to read a book before the end of the month.  I’ve created a Page to track my goals.