6th Tetrahedral Number

The new year began exactly 20 minutes ago. Hello 2012! We actually stayed up until midnight... that never happens. Of course, we didn't actually watch anything that rang in the new year, instead my husband was watching an online show he likes and I was reading my last book of the year... and happily... I completed it.
My 56th and last book of the year was Crossed by Ally Condie. This is the second book in the Matched series. I loved Matched and could not wait for the second book to come out. Crossed was good but not as good as Matched. I love Condie's ideas and the way she writes them out, she is an excellent story teller. I find it very interesting and almost prophetic how she has created a future world that almost brings us back to how it was in the beginning... people have fallen so far into a tech based world that they no longer know how to write, and those that have decided to rebel and move out of the society have taught themselves how to write, draw and paint... on cave walls. I can't help to wonder if that is where our society is headed. Don't get me wrong... I love technology, I spend tons of time on my computer, my i-pod is a necessity and my nook is my new favorite toy... but there is nothing like holding a real printed book in your hands and there are times that I just feel like writing so badly that I grab a pen and journal and write down whatever I am thinking or lists just so I can feel the pen in my hand and the way it glides across the paper. Words are magical and being able to bring them to life on a piece of paper is even better. It just isn't the same when I type them out on a keyboard. It feels less personal. A handwritten letter holds love and thought, a typed letter is very cold and too professional (which is great if you are writing a letter to a business or congressman).
I'm very excited to start my books for 2012 and have decided to start off with a list of books in alphabetical order, I have already picked out a lot of the books I will be reading. I will also continue with my debut author each month and the remaining books will be free choice. I may not go all the way through the alphabet right away... I may take a break every now and then for a debut author or for a free choice book I just can't wait to read... so if it seems, at times, that I just don't know my ABC's... do not fear... I know them.