It’s quite the dreary, rainy day in Maryland . . . and I have a few cheery soundtracks on repeat to help me cut through the darkness! And, of course, lists always make me feel better. 🙂 Like lots of other bloggers, I’ve seen this meme making its rounds — and it looks fun. Here we go!
Hardback, trade paperback or mass market paperback? Definitely trade paperback! I’m fine with mass markets, too, but definitely don’t like hardcovers. Not only do they cost more, thereby limiting my desire to get them when they’re first out, but they’re just . . . clunky. And awkward. Not easily transported.
Barnes & Noble or Borders? Definitely Borders! Okay, as a contingent employee, I’m biased . . . but I genuinely prefer the laid-back vibe of Borders stores over B&N.
Bookmark or dog-ear? Bookmark — I can’t stand to dog-ear books. Unless I’m out, need to highlight a passage for myself and don’t want to write in the book! I usually just go ahead and run a pen beneath the words anyway, but I try to behave and keep the pages clean.
Amazon or brick-and-mortar? Brick-and-mortar. I love doing online research for books but, if I figure the cost with shipping will be the same as just going over to get the book at Borders, I’ll drive over. I’m there all the time, anyway.
Alphabetize by author, or alphabetize by title, or random? My own shelves are organized by subject matter, more or less, but I would love to have everything alphabetical by author and subject, like we did at the store! Just not enough space for me to be that controlling.
Keep, throw away, or sell? I keep the books I love, and then pass on the books I’m finished with and don’t have any strong feelings about. They go on BookMooch or are donated to friends or the library!
Keep dust jacket or toss it? I keep it, but I always take it off when I’m reading the book. Though the only hardcovers I’ve read in years were probably the Harry Potter series and the Twilight series!
Read with dust jacket or remove it? Remove!
Short story or novel? Definitely novels! I do love Jhumpa Lahiri’s short stories, though. But that’s a big exception to the rule.
Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket? Oh, Harry! I haven’t read any of the Lemony Snicket books.
Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks? If I’m reading during the day, I wait to finish a chapter. But if I’m reading before bed, I literally read until my eyes shut and the book falls! It’s way more effective than a sleeping drug! 🙂
“It was a dark and stormy night” or “Once upon a time”? “Once upon a time.” Can’t pass up a good fairytale-like story!
Buy or borrow? Both. I buy a ton of my books, but the rest are loans from friends or review copies sent to me.
Buying choice: book reviews, recommendations, or browse? All three! I always listen for recommendations from my bookish friends and customers at the store. I read book blogs faithfully for new titles I may not have seen on my own, and I browse through the store looking for something new to catch my eye! Though I probably buy books through my own random browsing the least often.
Tidy ending or cliffhanger? I hate cliffhangers — unless the book is part of a series, and the series is complete! Even then, they irk me. I like closure.
Morning reading, afternoon reading, or nighttime reading? Nighttime reading. That’s the only part of the day I can actually settle down with a book, save the occasional lunch break.
Stand-alone or series? Stand-alone, though there are definitely some series I adore!
Favorite series? Oh, I’ll give you the obvious answers first! J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series; Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series. But I also love Meg Cabot’s Princess Diaries books, and the Wallflowers series by Lisa Kleypas!
Favorite children’s book? The Berenstein Bears books! I can’t wait to share them with my kids someday.
Favorite YA book? Just Listen by Sarah Dessen. I need to re-read that one!
Favorite book of which nobody else has heard? I don’t know that my tastes are terribly obscure, but maybe Kathleen Tessaro’s Innocence or Pam Houston’s Sight Hound.
Favorite books read last year? Oh my! I just drag over everything from this post, but I’ll try to go from memory: John Grogan’s Marley & Me; Stephenie Meyer’s Eclipse; Marisa de los Santos’ Belong To Me; Nicole Sexton’s Party Favors; Sarah Addison Allen’s Garden Spells; Courtney Summers’ Cracked Up To Be.
Favorite books of all time? Tough. I’ll say Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake; F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby; Sarah Dessen’s Just Listen; Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything Is Illuminated. But that was hard!
What are you reading right now? Finishing up both Kate Jacobs’ The Friday Night Knitting Club and Rosy Thornton’s Crossed Wires. The former is for the first book club I’m hosting at my local Borders in three weeks — I’m excited and nervous!
What are you reading next? I have Gigi Amateau’s A Certain Strain of Peculiar up for review, and I’m really looking forward to that! I’ve also promised my boyfriend I would read Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, which is definitely outside of my normal genre . . . and I’ve got to keep that deal soon. I’m also dying to start Robin Benway’s Audrey, Wait! and Maureen Johnson’s 13 Little Blue Envelopes. And I need to have Envelopes read before I leave for London next month! Oh, who am I kidding . . . I’m dying to get all of these books read!
Favorite book to recommend to an 11-year-old? Sharon Creech’s Walk Two Moons, one of my favorite books ever from middle school.
Favorite book to re-read? The only book I can immediately recall re-reading is The Great Gatsby — I read it three times in high school and college. So I guess that’s my favorite!
Do you ever smell books? I will admit to smelling the books I know are from England . . . and getting a sniff of the package in which they arrived! Just to see if there’s a difference. There isn’t — none that my nose can detect, anyway!
Do you ever read primary source documents like letters or diaries? Constantly, in college, but I haven’t read much lately. I have read a significant amount of diaries from World War II and Holocaust victims, and those are some of the only “documents” I can really read on my own.
write meg! 
Walk Two Moons is awesome. I was interested to find out that we have a lot of the same interests in books! Borders all the way! Hardcovers are definitely really really expensive and clunky. Gah. What is “Just Listen” about?
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Glad we agree! 🙂
Here’s the back cover of Just Listen:
“Last year, Annabel was ‘the girl who has everything’ — at least that’s the part she played in the television commercial for Kopf’s Department Store. This year, she’s the girl who has nothing: no best friend because mean-but-exciting Sophie dropped her, no peace at home since her older sister became anorexic, and no one to sit with at lunch. Until she meets Owen Armstrong. Tall, dark, and music-obsessed, Owen is a reformed bad boy with a commitment to truth-telling. With Owen’s help, maybe Annabel can face what happened the night she and Sophie stopped being friends.
In this multi-layered, impossible-to-put-down book, Sarah Dessen tells the story of a year in the life of a family coming to terms with the imperfections beneath its perfect facade.”
Just Listen is one of the best YA novels I’ve ever read — or just one of the best novels, period. Annabel is such a rich character, and her relationship with Owen is so… perfect. It develops naturally and is so redemptive for both of them! It really moved. Definitely check it out if it sounds like something that would appeal to you! 🙂
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This was lot of fun, so thank you for sharing. I usually go the Amazon route if I can because it usually turns out to be less expensive. I dropped a mint of money on Barnes and Noble the other day. I have to save this meme for a rainy day, so that I can post my answers.
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