[Books] September 2021 Reads

 I thought that I had read a lot more books last month, but when I sat down to do my tally, it seems that wasn't quite the case. Don't get me wrong - I'm still way ahead of my end-of-year reading goal. But it seems that August was even more productive than September for some reason. Go figure.

So let's dive into my summary of all the different titles I managed to consume cover over the course of the last month. 

[Books] August 2021 Reads

 

Wow, I thought I had already done an August update for everything I had read, but I guess it had somehow slipped my mind. At had a quick TikTok update at the start of September but that was it. And here we are pretty much at the end of the month and I'm still playing catch-up. 

So here's a very late report on the many things I read during my birthday month. I made a sincere effort to make up for lost ground and slower reading in recent months and I think I managed to make some REALLY good progress for the month.

[Books] June 2021 Reads

 Wow, looking back at the stuff I managed to read during the month of June left me feeling disappointed with myself. While I'm still "ahead" in terms of the pacing of my end-of-year reading goal, I definitely didn't cover as many titles this time around. In fact, I was short of reading at least one book a day, which is a little troubling since it severely ate into my buffer.

But that just speaks to how busy things have been at work, I guess, and all the craziness of trying to get vaccinated (which thankfully I did). So let's see what I did manage to cover this month.

[Books] May 2021 Reads

 I still managed to keep pace with my reading goals during the month of May and I feel like I managed to explore some interesting territory. A focus on more franchise-based fiction like the different Doctor Who and Star Wars books certainly helped in that area.

But that didn't limit me from exploring some interesting pieces that had been sitting in my collection for a while. So on the whole, it felt like a good month for reading. I certainly read a bit faster a the beginning of the month, but things sort of bogged down towards the end and I felt I slowed down. But maybe that's just me.

[Books] March 2021 Reads

March was a bit of a mixed bag for reading, and my decision to invest time in reading a longer Haruki Murakami novel this month means that I had to lean heavily on comic books to make up my numbers. I'm glad that I still managed to keep apace, but I also feel like I cheated a bit since my reading included a few single-issue stories.

But hey, when it comes to competitive reading and a one-book-a-day reading goal, you also have to read smarter at times to balance our more enthusiastic reading, if you get my drift.

[Books] February 2021 Reads

While I haven't quite figured out what else I want to invest in when it comes to updates on this blog, one of the things I still enjoy posting is these sort of reports on what I've read during the previous month. It's not like we should be keeping score, but I guess I sort of am given my annual participation in the Goodreads Reading Challenge.

While February is only shorter by most months by only a few days, it still felt crazy short given everything else. I thought I had read more than a book a day, but come the end of the month that's how things played out. I guess I should be thankful - at least I'm not falling behind the pace I need to maintain to hit my goal before the end of the year.

[Books] January 2021 Reads

I think I started 2021 fairly strong from a reading perspective and managed to make good progress towards my reading goals. A new year means starting from zero again and I'm pretty happy trying to maintain my one book a day target of 365 books covered for the year.

So let's break things down in detail, shall we?

[Books] December 2020 Reads

And now we get to the end of 2020 and the last few titles that made up my reading for the year. I didn't just hit my one-book-day reading goal, but actually managed to cover a total of 388 titles, which is sort of a new record for me. 

I guess the quarantine has had some geeky benefits for me. But let's focus on just December and see how things panned out.

[Books] November 2020 Reads

November 2020 was another good month for reading for me since I had clearly hit my reading goal for the year and was free to enjoy more of the titles I just wanted to read. But the "productivity" of this month was in part because of several comic book efforts along with my continued exploration of the Target Doctor Who books.

So let's dive into my reading for this month.

[Books] October 2020 Reads

 

October was a pretty good reading month for me and I've generally kept up the pace I established in September. If I stay on track, I'm very likely to hit my annual reading goal before November is over, which should free me up to read longer titles once I'm not as stressed over the overall timing.

I like the challenge an annual reading goal provides, but it can influence one's reading decisions to make sure to factor in reading efficiency apart from just reading what you want. It's all good fun though.

On to this month's numbers!

[Books] July 2020 Reads

 

July 2020 will stand out as one of the rare months this year where I actually read more novels than comics. I guess it helps that I got super excited about revisiting the BattleTech universe again, and I was determined to finally finish my internal project to read all of the Classic novels. Thus most of my leisure reading while catching up on Fitbit steps involved a BattleTech title somehow.

It was a pretty good month, but on the whole, I'm still way behind on my 365 book goal for the year. I gotta pick up the pace this August!

[Books] March 2020 Reads

 

Wow, I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but I totally lost track of these monthly reading reports for this blog. I guess the strange nature of our extended quarantine and all the stress that came with it got in the way.

So let's do a month-by-month catch up until we get this house in order.

[Books] December 2019 Reads

In December my reading efforts weren't all that substantial since I was determined NOT to miss my annual reading target of at least 365 titles. That resulted in my blitzing through a total of 38 titles, 27 of which were the equivalent of comic book trade paperbacks versus a measly 3 novels. I also augmented my reading numbers with the help of the fact that many of the older Big Finish Doctor Who audiobooks are available on Spotify.

If anything, the most notable comic that I read during this period was The Immortal Hulk, which added a sense of mysticism to Bruce Banner's story by bringing him back from the dead again and making this a key aspect of what the Hulk is. It could have come out pretty cheesy to claim that all gamma-irradiated heroes and villains were all tied to some mystical green door connected to another dimension, but the way it was carried out worked out quite well. Good job, Al Ewing.

And in case you're wondering, yes, I did hit my annual reading target. You can ready my reviews of the books I read at my Goodreads account.

[Books] Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor Adventures - Volume One Audible Review

Audiobooks are fun experiences on their own and are a great way to experience a book in a different way. Not all books make for great audiobooks and vice versa. But beyond audiobooks are the related entertainment form in terms of radio plays and other such recorded dramas.

Big Finish has made a name for itself as a passionate producer of such original audio content with a lot of work invested in the Doctor Who franchise. And it's nice to see that some of their efforts have made their way to Audible and thus I'm now able to use my credits to get my "hands" on some of these excellent Big Finish productions.

And of course I had to star with the Tenth Doctor's stories because I'm pretty predictable as a Doctor Who fan.

[Books] Torchwood Tales Audible Review

My exploration of fiction audiobooks remains mainly limited to experienced specifically crafted as audio experiences and not so much fiction read aloud. It's not that I'm against titles like those but I still prefer to read such stories for one reason or another.

But then you have titles like Torchwood Tales, which collects short stories written as audio experiences with some sound effects yet not quite full-on radio plays.

This collection has a lot of stories and ends up being a very long listening experience that I had to spread out across many days. It was definitely a mixed bag in terms of how the stories came across but there are some definite gems here.

[Books] Torchwood: The Collected Radio Dramas Audible Review

So I'm continuing to explore Audible's available Torchwood audio experiences after The Lost Files and it's nice to see that there's actually a LOT of material to go through if you get into this sort of thing.

As much as I've theoretically missed Torchwood since the show went off the air, you don't really feel that full until nostalgia really kicks you hard as you listen to members of the original cast reprise their roles. Then you better appreciate what has been missing all this time.

Unfortunately this collection overlaps with the stories covered in The Lost Files and I had realized this too late. Bu hey, I don't mind investing in the franchise to show my appreciation for their efforts to tell more stories in their unique side of the Doctor Who universe.

[Books] Torchwood: The Lost Files Audible Review

Torchwood was one of the quirkier Doctor Who spin-offs that had a very distinct character of its own but could at times feel very alien from a Doctor Who perspective. And that's sort of an ironic statement given they were a group that focused on defending Earth from greater threats from beyond the stars.

But the show ended sooner than we'd like, which was just as well as their death count was pretty significant from season to season. And now the main way you can still explore their stories are through the novels written in the series or audio books like this.

And this is a pretty short one but it features a full cast - or at least a cast that represents what the full team was at the time these stories are set.  But it's the three characters we care about the most, right?

[Books] Doctor Who: The Eleventh Doctor Adventures - 11th Doctor Audio Originals Audible Review

Given my enjoyment with the Tenth Doctor Adventures audio book, I suppose it was only natural that I'd eventually check out the similar title for the Eleventh Doctor. I just wasn't quite as prepared for how much longer this book would be given the significantly higher story count this time around.

But this diverse collection is sort of all over the place in terms of Doctor Who stories, as is the nature of any anthology. There's perhaps a little something for everyone, but at the same time I felt like the Tenth Doctor collection had been a little tighter in terms of how it selected stories versus this one.

It's still quite the amazing collection of original Doctor Who adventures and one that is totally worth an Audible credit at the very least.

[Books] Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor Adventures - 10th Doctor Audio Originals Audible Review

While I've mostly been utilizing Audible to enjoy various autobiographies read by the authors / persons of focus themselves, I've slowly started to venture into trying out various works of fictions. Anthology series seem to work best given how I tend to use Audible during my walks to and from work and thus I got into this particular gem.

Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor Adventures - 10th Doctor Audio Originals is one such collection of short stories as read by various stars of thes show including David Tennant, the Tenth Doctor himself.

Now these are still treated as more traditional audio books and not full-blown audio dramatizations like what you get from Big Finish. But they're still quite compelling for a variety of reasons.

[Videos] Who Is The First Doctor

This year's Doctor Who Christmas Special, Twice Upon A Time, is one that brings the current Doctor, as portrayed by Peter Capaldi, together with his first incarnation, as portrayed by David Bradley as the original actor, William Hartnell, who had passed away in 1975. Bradley had also portrayed Hartnell in the 50th anniversary documentary An Adventure in Space and Time.

For those not so familiar with the First Doctor and his adventures, the Doctor Who team has put together a quick video with highlights of his career and his time with the TARDIS.


A Guide To The First Doctor - Doctor Who