2015 Goals and the Best of 2014

My Goals and my picks for the best of 2014!!!

Every New Year people make resolutions. Usuall something to make them a better person or to loose a few pounds, or just be happier. I am no stranger to these, I've put on a few pounds that I would like to try and get rid of this year. This blog is about my bookshelf and the things I want to review so I do have a goal or two about reading I would like to accomplish.

Goals:
This year I got some great books for Christmas and the one I didn't get I plan on buying as soon as I can. With that being said my to-read pile is growing like crazy so I am going to set some time aside to read at home more. My daughter is now 1 and a half and when my son was little my wife and I read him some grown up books. My wife read the Chronicles of Narnia to him, and I read him the Hobbit, the first Lord of the Rings book, and a few of Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes books. Of course he didn't get these stories which is great because we will read them again when he is older. I want to do this for my daughter because my son has the most diverse vocabulary I have seen on some adults. At the age of 3 he was using words like irritated correctly in a sentence. I want that for my daughter also. I have a Sherlock Holmes book or two left to read so these may become bedtime stories again for both kids.

Best Books of 2014!!!

Now on to the Best books I have read in 2014. Let me start with my favorite of the year. I have actually read a lot of good books this year but this one was my favorite.

It is no secret that Jeffery Deaver is my favorite author. Still with all of the mixed reviews I read on this book I really loved it. The idea for this book was amazing. The Killer is tattooing his victims but instead of using ink he used poison. There are some changes in the way this book was written which I can see people being upset with. One of the biggest changes is the fact that we spend a good bit of time with the villain. We get to see his point of view and how he is planning and carrying out the murders. This causes the story to bounce between perspectives and that can be off putting if not done well. A bunch of reviews also said this book lacked the suspense and thrills of a traditional Deaver book, but I think the twist and turns are impressive and hard to figure out until all is revealed.






When I first started getting into reading back in high school Connelly was the second author I really got into. I loved his detective Harry Bosch and still do. Things have changed over the years and many books for Harry but now he is on the verge of being forced to retire and works part time in cold cases. In this book we get two cases for Bosh to solve. The main case involving Former Cheif Irvin Irving's son's death isn't as good as the cold case Harry works in this book. I loved this book for many reasons but most for the fact that I couldn't stop thinking about this book. The longer it went after I finished this the more I thought of every little aspect of this book. This book is going to be a little confusing if you haven't read the other ones but only in the character relationship aspect. The rest of this could easily be read as a one shot novel and enjoyed by all.






What is a children's book doing on my best of 2014 list you might be asking? My son loves to go to the library and now that he is older we have been getting bigger books. We read the Invention of Hugo Cabret as our first family read. My wife and I would take turns every night reading a section of that book to the kids and we all had a great time doing it. I happened to stumble across this at our library this past year and jumped at the chance to read this as a family again. The book is huge but mostly pictures. The illustrations are done by Selznick himself and they are really great. They really help move the story forward even without dialog or narrative at time. This book follows two different characters through the whole thing. The illustrations tell one story and the actual writing tells the other. I loved how this whole plot was done and how much fun it was to read this. Of course my son had a good time reading it but I think the biggest surprise for me and my wife was just how much we enjoyed the book.




These are just the few I really wanted to mention but there were actually a lot of great books that I have read this year. I could honestly go on for days about the books I loved and felt worthy of 5 stars. Instead I picked my top 3 of this year. As some of you know I will review movies from time to time and this year brought some good ones. I didn't get to see a lot in the theater but wanted to mention the movie I liked best out of the reviews I posted. Big Hero 6 was and amazing movie. We took my son to see it opening day for his 5th birthday and he loved it. All of us are anxiously waiting for this to come to Blu-Ray and Digital so we can watch this again. If you haven't seen it yet you really should this is enjoyable for kids and adults. This is where I leave you, ready to kick off a great year ahead and if you are interested in reading any of my full reviews for these they are here on my blog.

I hope you have set some goals for yourself this year and that you have given some thoughts as to just what your favorites were. Happy New year everyone.