Books, the BBC, and Other Things I Have Loved in 2010

You will have to excuse me...I haven't been writing lately. Also, I failed to meet my 100-book goal for 2010. Why, you ask?

No, it isn't because of school. I completed my MBA in September, and up until that point I was on track with 77 pleasure-books read and posting in my blog more-or-less regularly. Work travel? Nope, I have been in my office, working just 8 hour days since the spring.

So, why have I become so neglectful of my commitments? Because I have become distracted by new lovers. There, I said it. It can happen to anyone, and it happened to me...and here I will confess the sordid tale of my 3 new paramours:

1. Purging and Organizing and Generally Retaking Control of My Queendom. My freedom from school and work travel has allowed me to finally notice the MESS my home has become over the last few years. The Villagers in my domain are messy, hoarding souls with no sense of organization. Our nutrition during their rule has consisted mainly of that which can be brought home already prepared in a paper bag. My education and work constraints required me to avert my eyes from the disaster as it formed. Once I refocused, I have needed to repair the chaos, including an 8 hour battle to find the floor of my garage. This war is still a work in process, as the Villagers resist the changes, but I remain convinced I will ultimately prevail.
2. Becoming a Free Believer. I am undergoing a personal transformation. I have spent the last 20 years painfully unlearning and trying to let go of the first 20 years of my life. It left me at a bit of a loss, and I began to fill that place with aggressively trying to convert others to see things my way. However, as I discovered, those actions did not bring me peace. I found myself railing, "Hello, there. I am trying to see things from your point of view. So, tell me...just how did you get your head stuck up there?" This method, most surprisingly, was unbeneficial to me trying to be open, accepting of all beliefs, and loving - as much as it hindered others from opening their eyes to seeing the Truths that I can now see. You see, I was ironically becoming what I had worked so hard to remove myself from. In the midst of my recognizing that I needed change, and with Thanks to a dear life-long friend, I discovered The Free Believers Network. I am now at the beginning of a new life-cycle in discovering the love and peace of God. I still see Truth as proven facts, and eschew dogma, laws, and lies designed to move the masses to assist the elite...but I am finding a new way to live personally within it. I am not a Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, or Jew - and yet I am all these things. I am learning the spirit of Namaste. Therefore, a reason I have not written in a long time is because I am learning a new, gentler voice. And a large reason my for-pure-pleasure-reading has dropped off is due to study of this new way of living and being.
3. NetFlix, Wii, and the BBC. Ohmigod. Obsession times a trillion. I have never been a gamer or a TV watcher. Perhaps because I never learned the habits in my childhood, or perhaps because it all has seemed such drivel compared to the joys of reading. No matter; it has changed with the advent of Wii and NetFlix! Super Mario Brothers has given me thumb-blisters. I exercise until my hair is soaked with perspiration on WiiFit. And NetFlix streaming into my TV via the Wii????! Where I can choose my poison? I am lost....80's movies with my daughter (isn't it grand she loves them as much as I do?); real horror movies with both kids, such as The Shining, It, and The (original) Exorcist; Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra; period movies and subtitled movies like Breakfast at Tiffany's, Dangerous Beauty and Jodhaa Akbar; Michael Moore, History Channel, and National Geographic documentaries....and the pièce de résistance? The BBC. Oh, how I love the BBC mini series! Jane Eyre, Middlemarch, Sissi, A Man for all Seasons, and so many more! Can I count the movies based on classic books as books read? No, I suppose not.

So, you see why I have been lax. But, I have read some wonderful books! Below is the list of the Books I Have Loved in 2010. Check them out - all 96 books are all well worth the read.

1. Anonymous, Primary Colors
2. Tate Halloway, Dead if I Do (Garnet Lacy, #4)
3. Terry Garey, A Match Made in Hell (Nikki Styx, #2)
4. Kathy Reichs, 206 Bones (Tempe Brennan, #12)
5. Anya Seton, Katherine
6. Thomas Perry, Runner (Jane Whitfield, #6)
7. Carola Dunn, The Winter Garden Mystery (Daisy Dalrymple, #2)
8. Deanna Raybourn, Silent in the Sanctuary (Lady Julia Grey, #2)
9. Julie Kramer, Stalking Susan
10. Barbara Seranella, Unfinished Business (Munch Mancini, #4)
11. Robert Everz, Burning Garbo (Nina Zero, #3)
12. Gregory Maguire, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
13. C.J. Sansom, Dissolution: A Novel of Tudor England (Matthew Shardlake, #1)
14. Michael Byrnes, The Sacred Bones
15. Elaine Viets, The Fashion Hound Murders (Josie Marcus, #5)
16. Elaine Viets, Killer Cuts (Dead End Jobs, #8)
17. Josephine Tey, Brat Farrar
18. Michelle Moran, Nefertiti
19. Kimberly Raye, Your Coffin or Mine? (Dead End Dating, #3)
20. Carola Dunn, Requiem for a Mezzo (Daisy Dalrymple, #3)
21. Gregory Maguire, Mirror, Mirror
22. Julie Powell, Julie & Julia
23. Stephanie Bond, Body Movers
24. C.J. Sansom, Dark Fire (Matthew Shardlake, #2)
25. Jane Austin & Seth Graham-Smith, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
26. Don Winslow, California Fire and Life
27. Barak Obama, The Audacity of Hope
28. C.J. Sansom, Sovereign (Matthew Shardlake, #3)
29. Barbara Seranella, No Man Standing (Munch Mancini, #5)
30. Barbara Seranella, Unpaid Dues (Munch Mancini, #6)
31. Yann Martel, The Life of Pi
32. Nancy Martin, Our Lady of Immaculate Deception (Roxy Abruzzo, #1)
33. Carola Dunn, Murder on the Flying Scotsman (Daisy Dalrymple, #4)
34. Laurie Notaro, Spooky Little Girl
35. John Faunce, Lucrezia Borgia
36. Colin Cotterill, Disco for the Departed (Dr. Siri, #3)
37. Alison Weir, Mary, Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley
38. Sandra Gulland, The Many Lives and Secret Sorrows of Josephine B. (Josephine Bonaparte Trilogy, #1)
39. Stephen Evens, The Marriage of True Minds
40. Candace Bushnell, Sex and the City
41. Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine
42. Mary Janice Davidson, Undead and Unwelcome (Queen Betsy, #8)
43. Anthology, My Little Red Book
44. Harley Jane Kozak, A Date You Can’t Refuse (Wollie Shelley, #4)
45. Fatima Mernissi, Islam and Democracy: Fear of the Modern World
46. Sandra Gulland, Tales of Passion, Tales of Woe (Josephine B. Trilogy, #2)
47. Sandra Gulland, The Last Great Dance on Earth (Josephine B. Trilogy, #3)
48. Carola Dunn, Damsel in Distress (Daisy Dalrymple, #5)
49. Michelle Moran, The Heretic Queen
50. Charlaine Harris, Dead in the Family (Sookie Stackhouse, #10)
51. Jeanne Kalogridis, The Borgia Bride
52. Barbara Seranella, Unwilling Accomplice (Munch Mancini, #7)
53. Zoe Ferraris, Finding Nouf
54. Alison Weir, The Children of Henry VIII
55. Gregory Maguire, Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
56. Cara Black, Murder in Monmarte (Aimee Leduc, #6)
57. Carola Dunn, Dead in the Water (Daisy Dalrymple, #6)
58. Michael Byrnes, The Sacred Blood (Charlotte Hennessy, #2)
59. Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father
60. Terri Garey, You’re the One That I Haunt (Nikki Styx, #3)
61. Barbara Seranella, An Unacceptable Death (Munch Mancini, #8)
62. Diana Joseph, I’m Sorry You Feel that Way: The Astonishing but True Story of a Daughter, Sister, Slut, Wife, Mother and Friend to Man and Dog
63. Diane Johnson, Lulu in Marrakech
64. Sophie Littlefield, A Bad Day for Sorry (Stella Hardesty, #1)
65. Kate Jacobs, The Friday Night Knitting Club (Knitting Club, #1)
66. Janet Evanovich, Sizzling Sixteen (Stephanie Plum)
67. Carola Dunn, Styx and Stones (Daisy Dalrymple, #7)
68. Frank Philippi Ryan, Prime Time (Charlotte McNally, #1)
69. Sandra Gulland, Mistress of the Sun
70. Cara Black, Murder on the Ill Saint-Louis (Aimee Leduc, #7)
71. Maureen Johnson, 13 Little Blue Envelopes
72. Justin Halpern, Sh*t My Dad Says
73. Antonia Frasier, Marie Antoinette
74. Carola Dunn, Rattle His Bones (Daisy Dalrymple, #8)
75. Laurie R. King, The God of the Hive (Mary Russell, #10)
76. Frank Philippi Ryan, Face Time (Charlotte McNally, #2)
77. Ruth Downie, Medicus
78. Carolyn Haines, Bone Appetite (Sarah Booth Delaney, #10)
79. Lisa Lutz, The Spellmans Strike Again (Spellman Files, #4)
80. William Gladstone, The Twelve
81. Kathy Reichs, Spider Bones (Temperance Brennan, #13)
82. Deanna Raybourn, Silent in the Moor (Lady Julia Grey, #3)
83. Kyra Davis, Vows,Vendettas, and a Little Black Dress (Sophie Katz, #5)
84. Phillipa Gregory, The Red Queen (Cousin’s War, #2)
85. Alison Weir, The Princes in the Tower
86. P.C Cast and Kristin Cast, Marked (House of Night, #1)
87. P.C Cast and Kristin Cast, Betrayed (House of Night, #2)
88. Nicholas Fraser, et al., Aristotle Onassis
89. Chelsea Handler, Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea
90. Elizabeth Gilbert, eat, pray, love
91. Ken Follett, World Without End
92. P.C Cast and Kristin Cast, Chosen (House of Night, #3)
93. P.C Cast and Kristin Cast, Untamed (House of Night, #4)
94. Candace Bushnell, The Carrie Diaries
95. Carola Dunn, To Davy Jones Below (Daisy Dalrymple, #9)
96. Meg Cabot, Size 12 is Not Fat (Heather Wells, #1)