Growing Bookworms Newsletter: New Year, New Focus Edition

Today, I will be sending out a new issue of the Growing Bookworms email newsletter. (If you would like to subscribe, you can find a sign-up form here.) The Growing Bookworms newsletter generally contains content from my blog focused on children's and young adult books and raising readers. I normally send the newsletter out every two weeks. However, it's been four weeks this time due to the Christmas and New Year's holidays, and due to some soul-searching on my part related to changes to the blog (more below).

Newsletter Update: In this issue I have a post about my blog's 10 year anniversary, the New Year's Eve / Cybils Shortlist edition of my Twitter links roundup posts, a new literacy milestone post, and a post about my daughter and the importance of creative play. I also have a post in which I explain my plans for a new direction for the blog, and one launching a new feature about #JoyOfLearning articles. 

Three other Twitter links posts are not included in this issue. You can find them here, here, and here if you are interested.  

You'll notice that there are no book reviews in this issue. As you'll read below, I will be publishing fewer book reviews going forward, but I do expect them to resume once I get things settled again. I thank you for your patience. I hope that you will stay with me as I expand my journey from promoting the joy of reading to promoting a love of learning in general. I know that I'm excited about it!

Reading Update: In the past four weeks I read/listened to one middle grade, one young adult, and 10 adult titles. I read:

• Neal Shusterman and Eric Elfman: Tesla's Attic (Accelerati Trilogy, Book One). Disney-Hyperion. Middle Grade Fiction. Completed December 23, 2015, on MP3. This is a launch to an over-the-top new middle grade series with a nice science focus. A boy's family moves into an inherited house, and discovers that the attic is filled with odd inventions, one of which threatens the future of the world. I don't know why the second book is not available on audio, but I do look forward to reading more in the series. 
• Scott Sigler: Alive (Generations Trilogy, Book 1). Del Rey. Young Adult Fiction. Completed December 17, 2015, on MP3. I had heard good things about this book, but I actually did not care for it very much. It reminded me a lot of James Dashner's The Maze Runner (kids awaken to find themselves in weird, contrived, dangerous situation). 
• Brett Battles: Exit 9: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 2. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 9, 2015, on Kindle. I became completely hooked on this apocalyptic series. The books are fairly short, and the whole series was really more like one long book. I liked the way the story took place during, rather than after, the apocalypse, and the way the apocalypse was intentional. I would like to read more about this world, should the author decide to write it. 
• C. J. Box: Savage Run (Joe Pickett, Book 2). Berkley. Adult Mystery. Completed December 12, 2015, on MP3. I also became addicted to the Joe Pickett series, on audio. The books are a bit bleak sometimes (Box has surprised me with things he's willing to do), but they do keep me exercising. 
• Brett Battles: Pale Horse: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 3. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 13, 2015, on Kindle.
• Brett Battles: Ashes: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 4. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 15, 2015, on Kindle.
• Brett Battles: Eden Rising: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 5. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 20, 2015, on Kindle.
• Brett Battles: Dream Sky: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 6. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 25, 2015, on Kindle.
• Brett Battles: Down: Project Eden Thrillers, Book 7. Amazon Digital Services. Adult Science Fiction. Completed December 28, 2015, on Kindle.
• C. J. Box: Winterkill (Joe Pickett, Book 3). Berkley. Adult Mystery. Completed December 30, 2015, on MP3.
• Vicki Abeles: Beyond Measure: Rescuing an Overscheduled, Overtested, Underestimated Generation. Simon & Schuster. Adult Nonfiction. Completed January 3, 2015, on Kindle. I will definitely be talking more about this book. It gave me considerable food for thought. 
• C. J. Box: Trophy Hunt (Joe Pickett, Book 4). Berkley. Adult Mystery. Completed January 6, 2016, on MP3.

Now that I've given myself permission to read more books without reviewing them, I do expect to get back to reading more children's and young adult titles. For 2015 as a whole I read 47 children's books, 35 young adult books, and 59 adult books, for a grand total of 141 titles (not including countless picture books). My informal goal was 150, but I only came close because I listened to a LOT of audiobooks. Right now I'm listening to The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone and reading The Element by Ken Robinson. 

The books my husband and I read (and our babysitter) to our daughter in 2015 can be found here. The grand total was 1446, down a bit from last year, but including significantly more chapter books. She ended the year still on a Magic Tree House book tear. I've started a new list of her reads for 2016 in my sidebar, but it doesn't have a separate archive page yet.

We didn't read as much as I would have liked over the holidays, because we were out of our routine. Now that she's back in school, what I'm doing is selecting a different stack of picture books each morning and putting them on the breakfast table. I read 2 or 3 during breakfast, and then her babysitter reads others throughout the day. It's working so far, and we're starting the New Year reading more books. 

What are you and your family reading these days? Wishing you a joyful 2016! Thanks for reading the newsletter, and for growing bookworms. 

© 2015 by Jennifer Robinson of Jen Robinson's Book Page. All rights reserved. You can also follow me @JensBookPage or at my Growing Bookworms page on Facebook.