Reading Tuesday?

I hadn't done a list of what I've been reading for awhile, so here we go!

1. The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart

I have to admit that I was hesitant about reading it. I heard snippets from the audio book when we were driving to the Genesee Country Village and Museum in the early fall and I really didn't follow what was going on. However, my son was really into the book. My husband read it and liked it. Both of them strong-armed encouraged me to read it. I did enjoy the book; I'm not going to lie. Am I going to read the rest in the series? Probably not. Mark says the next two books are better than the first. Zums says the first was the best book. I'm going to stop at the first one for now.

2. Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosch
I believe I posted about how my husband bought this book for me because he read the first chapter on Amazon and it reminded him of my stories. I loved this book because, really, Allie's perspective on stuff is a lot like mine. Something about her simple illustrations really enhance the stories.My only criticism about the book was that the chapters were disjointed: one didn't flow into the other. I prefer an arc in storytelling.

3. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Okay, I haven't read the whole thing yet, but I did pick it up again over break. In fact, on New Year's Eve, I had the house to myself for an hour and a half. At first, I was paralyzed by the possibilities! What do I do? Do I binge on Star Trek or Supernatural or The X-Files? Do I play Rush loudly and freak out? No, dear reader, I did none of those. I streamed a classical music station on Spotify, made a cup of tea and started War and Peace again. Why? Cuz I'm lame. Seriously, I needed a stretch of reading to get into the book.

I really enjoy reading War and Peace. I like the challenge of figuring out who's who. I am impressed by how Tolstoy crafts his characters.

I am about 50 pages into it. This will be my second attempt to read the book. My friend, Amie, told me that my first attempt got her to read it and she felt it was one of the best books she ever read. Based on that recommendation, I'm back at it!

4. MindSet by Carol Dweck. I have to read this for work. I started to read it over break, figuring that I would assign myself a chapter a week or something like that to get through the book. I was wrong: it's very interesting. Dweck's research is about people can be successful by adopting a growth mindset.

I've been listening to my thoughts as I go through the day and try to assess them as a "fixed" or "growth" mindset.

5. The Iron King by Julie Kagawa
I need to keep reading to recommend books to students. Kagawa is coming to the Teen Book Festival in May. Her books are popular in the library. I'm about a quarter of the way through this book.

So, yeah, I'm basically reading three books at once right now. I'm cool with that, though, as all three are different and I'm trying to keep a book on hand at all times, so I don't get into mindlessly scrolling through various social media feeds on my phone.