Weekly Review #16 & Giveaway

What a week this has been.  It’s almost hard to believe another is week is over already.  I got quite a bit of reading finished this week but my health has been on the decline.  And I’m attempting to find out what books have made you laugh.  So, there is so much that I could talk about today.

First, we had the 24 hour read-a-thon this past weekend.  I didn’t get through the full 24 hours and a lot of that has to do with my decline in health.  I really enjoyed the time that I could sit and read and actually got several things read.  You can see a good summary of how things went here.  There you’ll find out what I read and my general thoughts about how my time reading went.  Now I’m really looking forward to the next one, I hope to find others in Stratford that are interested in participating and getting together to read.

I’m hosting a giveaway of sorts.  I’m wanting to know what books you think are funny.  So until the end of April I want you to tell me what books you have found funny.  From that list I want to compile a list and then survey to find the top 10 funny books.  This isn’t exactly an original idea but the one being done on CBC will be dealing with a smaller group of people.  This one, I hope to have a list from the book blogging community.  Once all is said and done I will be giving away a book to one of the people that tell me what books have made them laugh.  You can go to the original post to tell me what makes you laugh.  Now for some added encouragement if you blog about this event, and send me the link to the post, I’ll give you five more entries.  The prize will also change, instead of getting the number one book you’ll get the books that place 1, 2 and 3.  

I hope this week brings you many great books and some wonderful time to read.

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What Makes You Laugh?

It’s hard to believe that it hasn’t even been a week yet.  Not quite a week ago I got the email asking if I would like a copy of Fool by Christopher Moore, and low and behold the book gods have brightened my pupils!  Fool has arrived!

I am really looking forward to reading this one.  Thank you so very much Harper Collins Canada!  I’m almost finished Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (probably finish it this evening) and then I’ll be starting Fool right away.  

In anticipation of this book, and due to the ongoing discussion over at the CBC Book Club, I’d like to know what books have you read that made you laugh?  I have a number of books that I find funny but I really want to hear what you have to say.  Feel free to elaborate on why you think the book(s) you’ve selected are humorous.  Then on April 27th I’ll compile the list that have been collected here to do a survey to see what you think is the funniest book!  

I hope you’ll participate!  Anyone that participates will have their name entered into a draw you’ll win the winning novel!!!

And the Winner is…

So, I took a little trip to random.org to select the winner of My First Giveaway and it turns out the winner is Alyce from At Home With Books.  I hope you enjoy The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill.  It was a great book that I’ve yet to review but look for that yet to come.

Thank you to everyone that entered.  I had a lot of fun so I’m sure to do this again sometime soon.

Now that Canada Reads 2009 is over I’m really excited to see that CBC has decided to start a book club!  I’m really excited to see what happens with this book club because it looks like it’ll be very interesting with lots of supplementary materials for the books they’ll be reading.  The first book is obviously The Book of Negroes it should be interesting to see what others have to say about the book.

Canada Reads – Day 5

Today is another sad day with the end of Canada Reads 2009.  And, as all previous episodes, we started with the revelation of the previous days vote.  It ended up, and I must say I was kind of surprised, that The Outlander by Gil Adamson left.  Which left Lawrence Hill’s The Book of Negroes against Fruit by Brian Francis.

Once the discussion started for the day it became vary obvious which book was going to come out victorious.  The question about scope, I think, resulted in the real down fall of Fruit.  It’s important for the book of Canada Reads to have a rather large scope because it does seem to make more appealing for the largest audience.  I did enjoy The Book of Negroes but I really didn’t want to have that one win because it’s already extremely popular.  Perhaps that’s not the best reason for wanting a book eliminated but I think there are so many wonderful Canadian books out there that aren’t recognized for the greatness contained between the covers.

So, it’s true The Book of Negroes is the winner of Canada Reads 2009.  Congratulations to Avi Lewis for advocating for this book and Lawrence Hill for writing this wonderful novel for all of Canada and the world to enjoy.

Now you know what book you’ll win if you enter my first giveaway.  The contest closes tonight at midnight.  A comment will be selected at random and it’s open to everyone.  The winner will get a new copy of The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill.  The best of luck to all that enter.

Weekly Review #8

Well I guess this past week made up for the previous week.  I got three books finished and got a giveaway started.  I guess I have several reviews I should get working on and posting on here but I keep finding other things that I want to talk about on here so the reviews get left behind sometimes.  Another bookish type thing that I got do yesterday was a trip to Toronto to see The Color Purple: The Musical.

If you’ve been reading this post for a while you’ll know that I spent some time talking about Canada Reads last year and I’ve started to keep tabs on what’s going on in the world of Canada Reads 2009. So to celebrate great Canadian literature I’ve decided to host a giveaway.  I’m going to give the drawn name the winning novel in this years Canada Reads.  I’m really excited to see what others have to say their best Canadian novel is.  Since some people have asked already the giveaway is open to everyone!  Enter and good luck!

This week I finished reading Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow then I got several other started and finished.  This week I also had the joy of reading Fruit by Brian Francis (this is the first book I read for Canada Reads 2009), Murder at the Prom by Peter DePietro (this was actually some required reading for the community theatre group I’m helping get off the ground), and the 3rd installment of the Fables graphic novels (Fables: Storybook Love by Bill Willingham, with illustrations by Mark Buckingham and Steve Leialoha).  Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for some reviews to come.

Well it’s been a busy week and it was nice to end it off yesterday with The Color Purple and then the Oscars.  A great way to end a week.  Until next time happy reading!

My First Giveaway!

This is part of the book giveaway carnival being hosted over at bookroom reviews.

So I thought I would give this a shot. I’ve been the recipient of a few prizes when others have done giveaways and thought it’s been more than time for me to host one of my own. I’ve been trying to think of the best thing I could giveaway. After giving it significant thought I’ve decided to giveaway a copy of the winning novel in this years Canada Reads 2009, or if you already have the novel you may select one of the other contenders.

To celebrate great Canadian writing you need to tell me what your favorite Canadian novel is and if you really want you can tell me why it’s your favorite.

The novels up for Canada Reads this year are:
The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill
The Fat Woman Next Door is Pregnant by Michel Tremblay
Fruit by Brian Francis
Mercy Among the Children by David Adams
The Outlander by Gil Adamson

Canada Reads runs on CBC from March 2-6 so the winner will be selected the following day. All the best to everyone who enters. I must also say I hope to hear about some great Canadian novels that I haven’t read yet.