Sunday's With Erica

Sunday's With Erica - Week 32

Well, this has been a crazy week. My reading has been all over the place. Nothing seems to keep my attention for longer than 10 minutes. If I shared the list of what I have been reading, it would be ridiculously long! Could it be that I accepted ARCs based on the covers again!!? YEP!

Normally, I go through a strict process of reading and analyzing the synopsis. But...NOT THIS TIME! So, now I have to either (1) make myself read (uggh) and hope to find something that pulls me in or (2) be honest and inform the 'powers that be' that the book did not capture me in the first 50 pages.

With respect to choosing an option, I am leaning toward # 2. Honesty is key! But, that would be 10 books from NetGalley and 12 from Edelweiss!!

(NOTE: My NetGalley Feedback Ratio is still at goal - my goal range is 90% - 93%. I will not allow it to go beneath 90%.)

Now, to be fair, each of the books (yes...all 22) have awesome covers and are possibly good reads for the right reader. Sadly, that right reader is not me.

Remember last week when I said I would keep pushing through The Confessions of Frannie Langton? Well, I could not! I even snagged the audiobook copy from the library. No help...the narrator was...well...'not expressive' is probably the most polite way to say it. It just seemed to drag.

So, I been book hopping. Dipping in and out various books.

What I've Been Reading (sprinkled with some thoughts)

How Long 'Til Black Future Month - This book has inspired me to read more science fiction by black authors. See, Nora (N.K. Jemisin) has a few stories with an urban fiction flair. This was amazing. But, even better, she inspired me to share my short stories.
Geek Wisdom - This reminded me of Geek and Ye Shall Find, but without the Christian component
Preacher Finds a Corpse
The Fast800 Diet
Soul Murmurs
Lifestyle Blogging Basics - I started reading this because I want to modify my blog - a literary-infused lifestyle blog. (Still working this out.)
Swipe Right For Murder

Books I've Read (and enjoyed enough to share)

Favorite Posts and Articles from Around the WWW

The Essential Toni Morrison Reader
The Nobel laureate, who has died at 88, left a rich, powerful literary legacy. These are some of her best - and most essential - books.

I Tested 6 Popular Note-Taking Apps To Find My Favourite. The Best Part? They're Free.
There are a ton of note-taking apps out there in the market, but I take a look at 6 apps that are free and support cross-platform.

The Amazon Publishing Juggernaut
Read: What Amazon thinks you're worth And Amazon Publishing is a culture-making juggernaut, even if the literati don't much think about it. According to Peter Hildick-Smith, the CEO of the book-industry analysis firm the Codex Group, roughly 25.5 million U.S.

In the age of ear buds and audiobooks, they want to be the voices in your head
August 9 at 6:00 AM David McKeel pauses. The romance genre is unfamiliar territory for him. He's reading a selection from Cheris Hodges's steamy novel, "Recipe for Desire." Where McKeel picks up, the protagonist, Marie, has sprained her ankle, and a millionaire hunk named Devon is driving her to Presbyterian Hospital in his red Ford Mustang.

12 New Books We Recommend This Week
Editors' Choice The anthropologist Franz Boas - he's the central figure in Charles King's new book, "Gods of the Upper Air," below - was more interested in similarities than in differences, ever alert to the things that united human cultures. So maybe he would find a common theme among the 12 titles we recommend this week.

The Racial Roots Behind The Term 'Nappy'
subscribe to Code Switch podcast A black man walks into my barber shop on Manhattan's Lower East Side and removes his hat, revealing hair that is thick and tightly coiled. There's usually a hum of hair clippers buzzing through the loud bachata music in the shop, but the moment the man walks through the heavy glass door, a silence seems to befall the place.