Hows my little reader in 2011?

2011 has been off to a slow start for reading because of two things, less time spent reading, and the first book I read.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Fantastic book. I've had different people from all sorts of different parts of my life telling me to read this book since the springtime and I'm so glad they did. The hunger games is an exciting story about a girl attempting to survive a battle to the death with many other contestants. It is a page burner no doubt. There were no boring parts and the author's vast imagination was running wild with excitement and creativity. If you like exciting fiction and a fast read, I recommend getting started on this trilogy. I can hardly wait to dive into the second part.

From Vines to Wines by Jeff Cox
From Vines to wines was an extremely informative book on starting your own vineyard to making wine from scratch. The author threw in a little humor to keep things light and also made everything very understandable. On the other hand its also a how to book with some very long boring parts. Hence my very large gap between book updates. He also makes some very bold statements on winemaking techniques which, like everything else in the world should be taken with a grain of salt. Different strokes for different folks as they say. I would only recommend this book to someone who is either looking into planting some grape vines as it is quite descriptive on how to approach that, or someone who has a little bit of winemaking experience as many of the things mentioned seem to rely on a bit of prior knowledge. This book should not be used as someone's only reference guide but paired with several more sources of information.

The Passage by Michael Cronin
I really enjoyed this book. Even though its the first I've completed this year it might already be the favorite of 2011. Its a hard one to describe but I'll try, It is a story of adventure. It begins with several unrelated stories that eventually converge and then all abruptly end. Which was unexpected. The middle of the book pretty much starts a brand new story 90ish years into the future. The world has changed drastically and the population of the USA is severely depleted, the survivors live under lights which keep the infected away. Until one day someone (from the first half) makes their way into the colony and everything changes and a new adventure begins. I'm purposefully being vague, the book is fantastic, and I highly recommend it to anyone who likes a good adventure novel. Don't let the size scare you (800+ pages), Cronin manages to keep the story moving rapidly along through each page. Oh yeah, if it weren't for the last 10 or so pages this would have still been a great book but he threw in a gigantic cliffhanger at the very end. I can't wait to read more of the series as it comes out.