Summer Reading Challenge 2018

I realize I've basically not posted anything since December two years ago.

Oops.

But as I roll around towards my MA thesis, I realize that I need a place to record some of the reading that I do outside of the required stuff. The stuff I read (or reread) for fun. The random books in my book haul when I go out to local bookstores. Books that I recommend, books that I don't, and books that have been recommended to me.

So my goal this summer is to keep track of what I'm reading, both here and on Goodreads. I'm also creating a small tracker in my bullet journal to make sure I follow my reading goals.

I'm going to plan out 20 books that I know I want to read this summer: five fiction, five non-fiction, five plays/poems, five rereads. I'm also going to list (separately) books that I want to reread in order to teach them in the spring.

With each book, I will post a blog review when I finish it. The rating system will be 1-10 (and some books can go to 11). I'll include a brief blurb about the book, what made me want to read it, and what my thoughts are. And then on to the next book.

So here's my 20 Summer Reads for 2018:

1. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky
2. A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
3. We, the Drowned - Carston Jensen
4. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon
5. Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace
6. Battle Cry of Freedom - James McPherson
7. American Brutus - Michael W. Kauffman
8. The Romanovs - Simon Sebag Montefiore
9. Grant - Ron Chernow
10. The Invention of Murder - Judith Flanders
11. The Winter's Tale - William Shakespeare
12. Five Revenge Tragedies: Kyd, Shakespeare, Marston, Chettle, Middleton
13. The Duchess of Malfi - John Webster
14. Pericles - William Shakespeare
15. Five Plays - Christopher Marlowe
16. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
17. Wolf Hall - Hilary Mantel
18. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
19. Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov
20. The Beautiful and Damned - F. Scott Fitzgerald

And other assorted books that I'll be rereading this summer may include:

• Henry V - William Shakespeare
• Confederates in the Attic - Tony Horowitz
• The Killer Angels - Michael Shaara
• The Things They Carried - Tim O'Brien
• Code Name Verity - Elizabeth Wein
• The Scarlet Pimpernel - Baroness Orczy

Feel free to join along! There's not any set timetable for this, other than to be done by the end of the summer. Fingers crossed that I make it there!

What's Next?

It's almost 2016 - this coming August, it will make two years of blogging here.

So my plan is to continue to blog.

For 2016, one of my resolutions is to complete a reading challenge - something that I attempted to do last year, but failed miserably at, because there were strict guidelines as to what I could and could not read.

This year, my reading challenge is to finish the books that I've already bought. And, for the most part, those are books that are sitting firmly in the nonfiction portion of my bookshelves.

So, in the next few months, expect a resurgence of my Van Gogh biography read through (which I had to put aside while I was in Europe because the book was too large to carry with me); a look at the biography that inspired the hit musical Hamilton; books on the French Revolution and the Glorious Revolution, on witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts and in France, on poets and authors. And also keep an eye out for stories of me reading classic novels, fantasy fiction (this will finally be the year I tackle Game of Thrones), and even some YA classics.

And all of it will be tied up with what I'm doing on campus and what I'm studying in classes.

Fingers crossed that I can keep this up.

Wish me luck!

Happy New Year, readers.

Coming to Terms

It's been a while since I've posted, but I've been slightly avoiding making my final post. Not just because it's the last post of this school year, but also because that means that this internship is actually over. And I really don't feel like accepting that.

I learned a lot from working in my school archives - not just about my school, but about the craft. I've learned valuable skills about preserving the past that I can take on with me into the future. And I've also learned more about my school's past, which makes me even more proud of my institution.

And this doesn't even begin to touch on all of the things I learned about Greek life this semester. Not only did I immerse myself in Spring Hill's traditions, but I learned more about the fraternities that were on campus as I found them, and about how they organized themselves. It was fascinating to see how things changed as years passed, and how many people stayed in their organizations as time went on. It was also really neat for me to see that some things never change - Greek students in the past were just as involved with campus life as Greek students are now, something that was heartwarming to see.

I'm sad to be leaving the Archives, and to no longer be working alongside such wonderful people, but I'm excited to move on to my summer job - working at another internship, doing similar work, but at a museum.

Which leaves me to wonder what to do with this blog in the interim.

I think that I might continue to blog here, but instead of posting what I'm doing - after all, there are only so many times I can post that I scanned a photograph - I might blog book reviews of what I'm reading this summer. It's a mix of history and fiction - I'm quite excited. So if you're interested in that, feel free to keep reading.

To the road ahead.