Reading Challenge 2016

Yep! That's 40 books for this year (last year I challenged myself with 24 books and managed 43..

I have several books started (but not quite abandoned.. and some I didn't manage to finish before the new year rang in..).. Rather than stacking up all my TBR (to-be-read) books, we'll just take a look at this week's plan:

1."A Strange Wilderness" by Amir D. Aczel **FINISHED**
2."In the Garden of Beasts" by Erik Larson **FINISHED** (8 January)

Hopefully starting Today (most are TBRs for my Stats Class later this month):
4. "TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator for Dummies"
5. "Statistics Demystified"
6. "Understandable Statistics: 8th Edition" (we'll be using the 11th edition I think)

Pleasure Reading:
7. "Latinos at the Golden Gate" by Tomas F. Summers Sandoval Jr. (FINALLY! This I had to get a copy from the SF Public Library)

I managed to get a lot read during the semester as I read a lot of classwork related titles to round out what I'm learning in school. In the case of maths, I ended up reading some probability books and math histories, which I found helps me 'get' the why if not the how of maths. People need tools, for me reading about something is a complement to showing me how to solve something. Reading "A Strange Wilderness" was a bit of a muddle in many places, but learning about the lives of people and what drove them to find the answers to questions they had (even if it's things that I don't puzzle over) was enjoyable time spent, and totally relatable! I loved Aczel's book "Chance" also.. that one was fun. yes. I said that, (aloud, even!)

For pleasure I like reading history, quasi-history, the occasional mystery or sci-fi/fantasy book, or random things related to things that interest me.. whaling, true-life adventures (think Mallory or Shackleton), a bit of true crime (like "Devil in the White City" or "Empire of Sin") but pleasure reading seems to be harder to come by when school is in session. We'll see how this year goes!