February Wrap-Up

I'm linking up with the Wrap-Up Round-Up @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction

February Snapshots

Houses at night.

My little bed hog.

1. Please give a warm welcome to our robot overlords. If you’re very observant, you may have noticed that ads appeared on this blog in February. I was always hesitant to let robots with mysterious algorithms put ads on my blog, but I’m going to give it a try. I guess there are bloggers in this world who actually make money from ads? WHAT ARE THEIR SECRETS? This site doesn’t get tons of traffic, so it’ll probably take the rest of my life to meet the AdSense payment threshold. I’m pretty sure I’ll die from old age on the day I get my first paycheck from blogging. My future children better be grateful for this.

Anyway, if you notice an ad that is offensive, obnoxious, or idiotic, let me know so I can murder it with fire.

2. It’s nothing personal. My blog just hates you. Speaking of the blog, I checked my comment spam filter for the first time in months. Most of the comments in there were not spam. They were just regular comments. Oops. I guess this is your periodic reminder to check your spam filters.

3. I’m too squirrely for coloring books, but I’m excellent at taking credit for other people’s work. Recently, my mom has gotten into the adult coloring book thing. (Is it just me, or does the phrase “adult coloring book” sound naughty?) Here’s one of my mom’s designs. I bought her the books for Christmas, so I feel like I should get some credit when things turn out well.

4. You may have noticed that I have a book-hoarding situation. I’ve acquired a lot of books in the past few months. That’s why I’m participating in the Take Control of Your TBR Pile Challenge in March. I’m going to try really hard to get ahead on my Goodreads goal and get caught up on writing reviews. So, if you see me posting stupid dog videos on Twitter, tell me to stop screwing around and write a review.

5. Do you wish that you had a book-hoarding situation of your very own? Well, you’re in luck! I’m currently hosting a giveaway. Enter to win a book of your choice from Book Depository. (Open internationally.)

Wayward Googlers

Cait @ Paper Fury sometimes posts the amusing Google searches that led people to her blog. Today, I’m stealing her idea. Here are a few unfortunate souls who ended up on Read All The Things! instead of finding what they were Googling for.

“Blogspot exercise bike with tv.” Um, no, this is a book blog. Thanks for trying, though. 

 “Who are Kell’s parents in A Conjuring of Light.” Do you know the best way to find the answer to this question? Read A Conjuring of Light. 

 “How do Troy and Curt see themselves so far in the novel? How does the way the characters see themselves, differ from how others see them? How do you see the various characters? fat kid rules the world.” This is the longest Google search that has ever brought somebody here, so congrats. Also, these are clearly homework questions. I’m not going to do your homework for you. Not having homework is one of the perks of being a grownup. I earned my homework-free status. 

Books I Read In February

In February, I read 9 books and gave up on 1.

Bird Box – Josh Malerman

Still Points North – Leigh Newman

Dinosaurs on Other Planets: Stories – Danielle McLaughlin

Criss Cross – Lynn Rae Perkins

The Butcher’s Hook – Janet Ellis

The Shell Collector: Stories – Anthony Doerr

Crispin: The Cross of Lead – Avi

Missing May – Cynthia Rylant

What is Not Yours is Not Yours: Stories – Helen Oyeyemi (DNF)

Scythe – Neal Shusterman

I also made progress on my reading challenges. Click here to see how I'm doing.

Best Books Of February

1. Scythe – Neal Shusterman

2. The Butcher’s Hook – Janet Ellis

3. Dinosaurs on Other Planets: Stories – Danielle McLaughlin

Most-Viewed February Reviews

1. This Monstrous Thing – Mackenzie Lee

2. The Dumb House – John Burnside

3. The Last One – Alexandra Oliva

Most-Viewed February Non-Reviews

1. Discussion: A Brief List Of Oddities Discovered Inside Used Books

2. Top Ten Tuesday: Long-Term Reading Failures

3. The “Vaguely Dystopian” Book Haul

All The Things!

Distance I’ve sloppily jogged so far in 2018 = 47 miles (75.6k)

Number of unread books on my TBR shelf = 58 books

I’m currently reading = The Complete Stories of Truman Capote by Truman Capote

What did you do in February?