JANUARY ROOT - Progress Thread

FLOWER OF THE MONTH = CARNATION







Password is ROOTS

Carnation is the birth flower for those born in the month of January.

For the most part, carnations express love, fascination, and distinction, though there are many variations dependent on color.
Along with the red rose, the red carnation can be used as a symbol of socialism and the labour movement, and historically has often been used in demonstrations on International Workers' Day (May Day). In Portugal, bright red carnations were used when in 1974 the authoritarian Estado Novo regime was overthrown; therefore, this transition (brought about by a combination of a coup d'état with civil resistance) is known as the Carnation Revolution.
Light red carnations represent admiration, while dark red denote deep love and affection.
White carnations represent pure love and good luck, while striped (variegated) carnations symbolise regret that a love cannot be shared. White carnations, in the Netherlands are associated with Prince Bernhard. He wore one during World War II and in a gesture of defiance some of the Dutch population took up this gesture. After the war the white carnation became a sign of the Prince, veterans and remembrance of the resistance. Purple carnations indicate capriciousness. In France, it is a traditional funeral flower, given in condolence for the death of a loved one.

According to a Christian legend, carnations first appeared on Earth as Jesus carried the Cross. The Virgin Mary shed tears at Jesus' plight, and carnations sprang up from where her tears fell. Thus the pink carnation became the symbol of a mother's undying love.

Since Ottoman times, red carnations and tulips are used in the interior wall paintings of mosques in Turkey. It is often said that while tulips represent Allah, carnations is the symbol for the Prophet. However these flower designs are not unique to mosques but also used in many other Ottoman traditional art forms.

The carnation is the national flower of Spain, Monaco, and Slovenia, and the provincial flower of the autonomous community of the Balearic Islands. The state flower of Ohio is a scarlet carnation, which was introduced to the state by Levi L. Lamborn. The choice was made to honor William McKinley, Ohio Governor and U.S. President, who was assassinated in 1901, and regularly wore a scarlet carnation on his lapel.

Colors
Carnations do not naturally produce the pigment delphinidin, thus a blue carnation cannot occur by natural selection or be created by traditional plant breeding. It shares this characteristic with other widely sold flowers like roses, lilies, tulips, chrysanthemums and gerberas.

Around 1996 a company, Florigene, used genetic engineering to extract certain genes from petunia and snapdragon flowers to produce a blue-mauve carnation, which was commercialized as Moondust. In 1998 a violet carnation called Moonshadow was commercialized. As of 2004 three additional blue-violet/purple varieties have been commercialized.

The formal name for carnation, dianthus, comes from Greek for "heavenly flower".

The goal for January is still being determined as people join the group.
So far, January's goal is 244

The percentages will be calculated and a star awarded for those on target to reach their goals. More stars for farther toward their goal. If anyone's number is incorrect, please let me know and I will make the necessary adjustments. So go out there and dig those ROOTs.

I will be updating the goals as they are added.

Goals so far:

ahef1963 100
Ameise1 12
arubabookwoman 36
benitastrnad 60
bg853 25
bookworm148 20
bragan 50
brakketh 30
clue 50
connie53 42
crazy4reading 38
curioussquared 50
CurrerBell 40
cyderry 84
detailmuse 40
DissamblyOfReason 100
enemyanniemae 50
Erratic_Charmer 40
Familyhistorian 65
FAMeulstee 24
floremolla 50
fuzzi 100
HelenBaker 40
Henrik_Madsen 50
Jackie_K 60
Jacksonian 75
kac522 45
karenmarie 30
klarusu 36
Kristelh 45
Kwharton 12
LadyBookworth 30
lindapanzo 48
lilisin 50
LoraShouse 15
leslie.98 75
lilisin 50
madhatter22 50
majkia 60
mandymarie20 25
martencat 30
Miss_Moneypenny 50
MissSos 25
MissWatson 50
nebula21 48
Nickelini 15
rabbitprincess 60
rainpebble 36
readergirliz 32
readingtangent 24
Rebeki 24
Robertgreaves 90
rocketjk 27
rosalita 36
Sace 18
sallylou61 30
si 20
sibylline 30
This-n-That 20
torontoc 30
tuna.moriarty 200
Val_Reads 100
vestafan 60
wandaly 18

Goals submitted

Thanks so much Chèli for everything you're doing for this group. I love the flower theme.

So good to see many known faces in the new group. Makes me think it's normal to have roughly as many books waiting on the shelves as when I started in this book-hoarder support group!

Thanks for setting it all up again Chèli. It is a pleasure to be part of the group, talking about books and getting motivated to revisit why those old tomes on the shelves appealed to us in the first place.

Happy new year and happy ROOTing everyone.

Flowers! How wonderful! I'm off to create my ticker with 45 as my goal.

Carnations remind me of my father who was born in January. He was known to give me some upon occasion. Thanks for that and for all you do for the ROOTing group, Cheli.

Beautiful picture! And what a nice theme.

Thanks for all you do for the group Cheli.

Thanks Chèli for all your work setting up the group and threads! I love the flower theme - it is nice to start the year with such beautiful colors.

Thanks Chèli! As usual, lovely set up. And so good to see everyone back again. Good luck to us all. And Happy New Year!

Please check the opening post to make sure that your goal has been recorded properly. If your name is not in the list, please be sure that you have joined the group.

Mine is 42 ROOTS Chèli. I had used the wrong ticker. Going to check if they are right now.

I love the chosen theme, Chèli. When I saw this it put a smile on my face. Flowers are so 'happy'.
Thank you. :-)

I have joined the group but I am not on the list. My goal is 75 ROOTs (and I have added my ticker to the ticker thread but will go check it after I post this).

Happy New Year, Chèli. Thanks for hosting the group again and starting the year off with some cheerful flowers. I just joined, created my topic and added my ticker. My ROOTs goal is 20 books.

I've set up my thread and ticker. Happy new year, everyone.

Finished ROOT # 1 for the year, # 1 for January

De wereld vergaat niet by Kate Atkinson

All tickers updated.

Hooray for a new year and a lovely new theme! Thanks for running this Cheli, I can only imagine how much work you put into hosting us here.

I've set my goal at 50 ROOTs again this year and can't wait to get started. Happy New Year everyone!

Decided to start the year with a graphic novel. At least I can say I completed 1 ROOT this month.

The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam

Tickers updated.

Happy New Year, everyone. So nice to be back and with a 33% higher ROOT goal for me.

Wishing you all lots of wonderful ROOTs reading of in 2020.

I've finished my first ROOT The Northern Cross and have updated my ticker.

I've updated my personal ticker with my first ROOT of the year: The Bellamy Trial, by Frances Noyes Hart. I'll update the group ticker for my ROOTs at the end of January, once the group goal has stabilized a bit :)

Remember if your name is not in the list of the opening post you may need to JOIN the group.

I can't count your numbers if you aren't officially in the group!

I will update the OP again tonight.

>22 cyderry: I don’t see my name in the opening post. I am a member of the group and I set my goal at 36. Thx.

>23 arubabookwoman: added!

>22 cyderry: Please add me to the opening post, I joined the group and my goal is 24.

I didn't realise I had to join the group as well as add a ticker to the ticker chat, but I have now done so. My target for this year is 90 books. A Happy New Year to all ROOTers.

>26 Robertgreaves: The way my spreadsheet works it needs to identify the members of the group so that then I can match the name with the ticker message. So if you aren't a member then there's no match. Do I need to explain more for everyone?

>27 cyderry: I don't think anything else is necessary. That'll teach me to read the introductions more carefully.

Coffee, a book, and carnations:

Glad to be back ROOTING again and hoping to be more sociable this year. Thanks cyderry for all your hard work running this group and keeping us organised. I'm going for a goal of 24 ROOTs in 2020.

It's great to be backand see so many familiar names. Thanks for the wonderful introduction, Chèli! I'll be setting my goal at 50 and add my ticker as soon as I have finished visiting all the threads!

Finished my first for the year! Yay me! Of course, I'd started it last year, so I'm getting a break!

First ROOT finished last night: Ophav by Danish novelist Eva Tind. And it was a pretty good one, too!

Glad to be back for another year of ROOTing and grateful for your excellent hosting of the group, Chèli.

Good luck one and all with your goals!

I have finished my first ROOT of the year :) My thread and all tickers have been updated.

I think I have to ask this every time I attempt ROOTing...I have updated the ticker on my thread, which automatically updated the ticker on the 2020 thread, but I am supposed to update the January thread with my January books here, correct?

The updating the January (group) ticker is optional. Some people prefer to avoid it. I just note whenever I post on that thread whether or not I've updated the group ticker or just my own (I usually do all of them).

I just want to welcome everyone to 2020's ROOT challenge. I hope to visit everyone's thread at some time but getting everyone into the matrix to do the calculation takes a bit of time so please pardon me if I don't get there officially. Please know that you are all important to the group goal and that I appreciate your notes of acknowledgement of my efforts.

Happy New Year to all!

Thanks >36 Jackie_K:! I think I will stick to updating just my personal tickers and leave the rest alone! :-)

Off to finish the final accounting for 2019!

Just checking in, no ROOTs in January so far.

Added my second ROOT of 2020 to my personal ticker: The Mystery of the Chinese Junk, by Franklin W. Dixon.

I've finished my second ROOT Oh, No, Octavius! and have updated my personal ticker.

I have finished my second ROOT, The Wings of the Dove. I own the Kindle editions The Wings of the Dove Volume 1 of 2 and The Wings of the Dove Volume II as well as the audiobook edition to which I actually listened so in a way it was 3 ROOTs in one! And that is the most positive thing I can think to say about it... My thread and all tickers updated.

In the mood for more short reading. Decided to make a Doctor Who comic book my third ROOT of 2020: Terrorformer, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Dave Taylor with Mariano Laclaustra. My personal ticker is up to date.

I’ve read my first book for January but still need to create a thread and ticker. Today is my first day back at work after the holidays so depending on how busy it is maybe I can create all of that today during some free time.

>44 rabbitprincess: LOL! I did something similar with my 3rd ROOT - I read a Kindle novella which was only about 70 pages long. My thread and all tickers have been updated.

I have added my first ROOT to my personal ticker, a nice historical mystery about Hamburg: Tod in der Speicherstadt.

Finished ROOT # 2 for the year, # 2 for January

Het spel van de engel by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

All tickers updated.

2nd ROOT of the year done: The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood. I'll be heading straight into the third book of the MaddAddam trilogy as this is a trilogy that I feel is best read back to back to keep track of all the characters and plot.

ETA: I have finally created my thread and have added my ticker to the ticker thread as well. Goal of 50!

>22 cyderry:. Hi Cheli, my root goal should read 48. I have completed my first tome, The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert.

>50 HelenBaker: sorry, must have done it the day I was having trouble with my eyes. All fixed.

Finished ROOT # 3 for the year, # 3 for January

Vlucht uit New York by Guillaume Musso

All tickers updated.

Finished another short ROOT. My thread and all tickers have been updated.

I'm finally out of the starting blocks and added my first ROOT to all tickers, mine and the group's.

There are still some people who have not joined the group. I won't name any names but...

Remember if your name is not in the list of the opening post you need to JOIN the group.

I can't count your numbers if you aren't officially in the group!

Reporting my first ROOT of 2020. :-) I updated my personal ticker and the two group tickers.

I've joined the group but don't see my name in the opening list :)

>57 curioussquared: I did add you to my own list a few days ago, Natalie. So Chèli might have missed your name.

>57 curioussquared: Sorry, Natalie, I missed a whole section for the updated Opening post. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Also, there are several members who have not set a goal or have not set up a thread.
If you want to be counted you have to have a measurable goal and either a ticker or a thread that is going to show me where you stand on that goal. I prefer the tickers in the ticker thread because it is faster for gathering the data but if you don't want a ticker, I won't force you. But then, you are responsible for reporting your status somewhere at the end of the month - either your own thread or the progress thread.

>59 cyderry: No worries, thanks, Chèli!

Finished ROOT #1: Gingerbread by Helen Oyeyemi. Thread and ticker updated.

Another ROOT done & dusted! My thread and all tickers will be updated soon.

Finished ROOT # 4 for the year, # 4 for January

De gevangene van de hemel by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

All tickers updated.

Finished ROOT #4, Gracelin O'Malley by Ann Moore.

2nd root completed, There was Still Love by Favel Parrett, back to the shelves I go.

With another ROOT done, I have finally matched my 2020 ROOTs with the number of new books amassed! Fingers crossed that I pull ahead and stay that way *grin*

I've just added my second ROOT for the month and year to all tickers.

I finished the Maddaddam trilogy by Atwood last night and have started a short little Chinese book this morning.

Four ROOTs so far. I love January, when practically every book is a ROOT.

The book I started this morning I just finished as it only has 90 pages. 4th root for January done: Un chant celeste (Marrow) by Yan Lianke.

Another ROOT completed :)

My thread and all tickers have been updated.

Root #3, The Actresses by Barbara Ewing, this is very relevant to the court case just commencing against Harvey Weinstein. It was first published in 1997 and looks at the lives and experiences in the acting field of a group of English actors and actresses now in their late fifties. It was republished a couple of years ago due to the rise of the #MeToo movement. A very good insight especially into the treatment of actresses compared to their male counterparts.
Back to the bookshelves I go but which of the 344 remaining to choose...

I'm currently reading a 1000 page book. And that's just the first tome. I'll see you guys again on the other side.

I've added #3 for the month/year to all tickers.

Another couple of ROOTS finished. My thread and all tickers updated. January is always a good month for ROOTing for me :)

Since I last posted in >44 rabbitprincess:, I've read 3 more ROOTS:

Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor, Vol. 2: Fractures, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Brian Williamson and Mariano Laclaustra
Gold from Crete, by C. S. Forester
Verdict of Twelve, by Raymond Postgate

My personal ticker is up to date. I will update the group ticker at the end of the month.

Reporting Root #2 The Ten Thousand Doors of January. All tickers updated.

Read two ROOTs so far in January, but have removed an additional 15 books from my shelves, for a total of 17. Personal ticker has been updated.

This is my first year in the group, and I don't have a thread yet, but I did put my ticker in the ticker thread and have updated it. Please let me know if there's anything else I need to do to make your stats-gathering easier!

The two ROOTs so far are Sad Cypress and Five Little Pigs, as I continue my chronological read of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot series. It will be back to the library for the next one, sadly.

>79 rosalita: You did great! Ticker in the ticker thread is all I need. Thanks.

Added my seventh ROOT of 2020 to my personal ticker: The Mystery of Orcival, by Emile Gaboriau, which I read in a public-domain ebook.

Another very short ROOT completed. My thread and all tickers updated.

Roots #4 & #5 completed, Back When We Were Grownups by Anne Tyler and The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri. The latter I particularly recommend. This is an excellent novel based on the experiences of Syrian refugees seeking asylum.

Finished ROOT # 5 for the year, # 5 for January

Het labyrint der geesten by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

All tickers updated.

ROOT #2 completed- Pachinko by Min Jin Lee. Incredible. Thread and ticker updated.

Chalked up ROOT #8, which I added to just my personal ticker: Gold for Prince Charlie, by Nigel Tranter.

I have managed to finish several more ROOTS since I last posted here (and to obtain a few more books as well). My thread and all tickers have been updated.

Finished ROOT # 6 for the year, # 6 for January

Wit - Ted Dekker

All tickers updated.

First ROOT for the year- Review is on my thread and no tickers updated. ( I will try to set up a ticker next week)

I've read 6 ROOTs that I have posted about so far but I am behind in writing about my reads. Once I have updated my thread with the other books I will update my ticker but by then there might be another ROOT added.

Read 2. Updated tickers.

Roots read this month - 2
Towards goal - 2/25

First ROOT read, 1/24

All tickers updated.

I've done 7 ROOTs so far this month but Katherine of Aragon: The True Queen has me hostage. At 600 pages it's taking a while.

Finished my first root this month! I kept putting it off (go figure) but finally pulled through.

All tickers updated.

I have finished another ROOT & may be able to squeeze one more in before the end of the month. My thread and all tickers have been updated.

What a January! I was able to finish 15 ROOTs. I'm stockpiling as February and March are shaping up to be extraordinarily busy and I don't think I'll get much reading done. My personal ticker is updated but not the group one. Happy reading, everyone!

Edited because I haven't had enough caffeine to properly count my ROOTs! The number is fixed now.

I finished 7 ROOT's this month. No tickers updated. I only have 53 more to read this year! WOOT! WOOT!

Here is the list of the books I read and listened to this month.

Books listened to
The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner
Nevernight by Jay Kristoff

Books read
Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski
Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers-Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing by Merve Emre
The Girl: Marilyn Monroe, The Seven Year Itch, and the Birth of an Unlikely Feminist by Michelle Morgan
Blood From A Stone by Donna Leon
Black in Selma: The Uncommon Life of J. L. Chestnut, Jr. by J. L. Chestnut, Jr. and Julia Cass

I finished my second book this month for the Nonfiction challenge. Black in Selma: The Uncommon Life of J. L. Chestnut, Jr. by J. L. Chestnut, Jr. and Julia Cass won the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award back in 1991. It is a riveting read and should be required reading for anybody who moves into, or lives in Alabama. The book is told in the first person from interviews that Chestnut gave to Cass when Cass was assigned to write a story about the impact of the Civil Rights Movement on Selma, Alabama. The book covers the years 1945 up to 1989. Chestnut was the first black attorney to practice law in Selma and he remained a civil rights activist all of his life. He was one of the members of the community voting committee and was on the committees that planned the marches and other civil rights activities in Selma throughout his life. He was very politically astute and understood many of the strategies that the white community took to keep power in their hands even though the white population of the county in which Selma is located is only about 40% white. Chestnut died in 2008 and it is sad to see that he did not live to see Obama elected president. I am sure that he would have had a rollicking good time with that ultimate expression of Black Power.

Throughout the book Chestnut's vivacious personality and flamboyance comes through and writing it in the first person allows that individuality to shine. The historical events are momentous and changed this country forever and as important as those are, it is the story of this one man who spent his life defending his people from injustice that captures the reader. It is clear that Chestnut did not seek monetary gain and fun loving as he was, his passionate defense of his people and his fancy lawyering (as we say at home) is another window into the impact of the Civil Rights Movement on the ordinary people of the South.

This was a wonderful book and deserves any and all accolades it got.

This book is still in print in paperback, and even though it is 423 pages, it reads fast.

I also finished reading Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers-Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing by Merve Emre which I had started for the November 2019 nonfiction challenge on creators. Instead I read it for the January 2020 Nonfiction challenge and the category was Award Winners. This was a good book, even though it doesn't seem to have been because it took me almost three months to read it. (I read it only during lunch hour at work)

This was a biography of the two women who designed the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator - MBTI. Katherine Briggs and Isabel Myers were a mother daughter team. It was the brainchild of Katherine Briggs and the earliest versions of it were created in the 1920's. Briggs thought it was based on Jungian theory and she carried on a correspondence with Jung for years until he finally told his secretaries to stop replying to her letters. In the 1940's Isabel Myers, Katherine's daughter started carrying the torch for the MBTI and it was she who created the test in its final forms, marketed it aggressively, and didn't live to see its success. Today the MBTI is a 2 Billion dollar a year business.

The book is a scholarly work that is hampered in its thorough coverage of the subject because the author was denied access to the private papers of Briggs and Myers. Even though the papers are in the possession of the University of Florida, the Center For Assessment of Personality Type controls access to them and they deny almost all requests for access. The author essentially debunks the validity of the test and lays bare the fact that this test is just another feel-good test that doesn't really test for anything. It was interesting reading and makes you wonder how so many people could fall for this test and think that it really does tell you who you are. I do have to admire the determination of Isabel Myers and Katherine Briggs in designing and marketing this test and in persuading millions that it works.

This title was listed as a New York Times Critics Best Book of 2018 and an Economist Best Book of 2018.

It was a month of Nonfiction and the third work of nonfiction I read was The Girl: Marilyn Monroe, The Seven Year Itch, and the Birth of an Unlikely Feminist by Michelle Morgan has an intriguing title, but no substance. The author never really delivers on the promise of the title. The author does go into detail about why Marilyn Monroe broke with Twentieth Century Fox and formed her own production company, but it does not detail why that production company broke apart or how it really worked. Instead it became more of an apologetic for Marilyn Monroe's life, but it never dug down into the why's of her behavior. It has presentations of being a scholarly work with end-notes and a bibliography, but it never backs up its arguments in a definitive way. It is what I would call it a lightweight work of narrative nonfiction.

I read three works of SciFi/Fantasy this month and all three of them were the first in a trilogy. Without a doubt the best of the three was The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner. The other two Last Wish, the new hit series for Netflix, and Nevernight were fun, but not of the quality of "The Thief." That one had plot twists that I didn't see coming and that made me look forward to reading the next one in this series. I listened to this book and the narrator was great, so I will try to finish this series by listening to it.

The one outlier in my reading this month was book 14 in the Guido Brunetti series by Donna Leon. Blood From a Stone was a bit different than the formula for mystery novels in that this one was very open ended. Just like real life it was very ambiguous. My journey with Guido will continue next month.

I am doing my best to get us to the 150 posts.

>103 benitastrnad: said "I am doing my best to get us to the 150 posts."

lol - I was beginning to wonder if you had mistaken which thread you were posting in!

I guess that I won't be getting any more ROOTs done in January as I have a couple of library books to read at the moment.

I managed to complete 18 ROOTs this month which gives me a comfortable margin against the 13 new books I got *grin*. In my convoluted mind, that translates to 5 "real" ROOTs which sounds much less impressive.

>103 benitastrnad:
I usually just do two posts at the end of the month. The one with my total number and the one with the titles. This time, since we were so close to 100 I thought I would push it and hope that we get to the 150. I doubt we make it, but it might be nice for our host.

Added all of my January ROOTs to the group ticker in one go. I read 8 ROOTs this month.

>100 benitastrnad:

Very good review. Although I won’t read the book it was obviously a very interesting topic so I’ll keep it in mind as something to recommend to my more nonfiction reading friends. I never believe in any of those tests. They are fun to take but human personalities are too complex to fit I categories. I know I get a different result every time I take those quizzes. I can’t even get sorted into the same Harry Potter house. I think I’ve been everything but Slytherin so far!

I was hoping to finish my current tome by the end of the month but alas it’ll turn into a weekend project so I only have four ROOTS for January instead of the aimed for five that would have made for one book a week.

>100 benitastrnad: I remember when I was working that I took the Myers Briggs test and came up with one result which I felt at the time very accurate. Then I had a traumatic event in my life and when I took the test again I got a very different result. To a certain extent, I thought that it read my personality right and the change was understandable. The testee really needs to be honest with their answers when filling out the test and when reading the results, a bit of introspection and honest thoughts may be what is needed.

I don't think I'll fit in any more ROOTS in this month so here is my report for January 2020:

UpROOTED books: 12
ROOTless books: 7
Added to the TBR shelves: 0

The ROOTs were:

Eyrie by Tim Winton
Agatha's First Case by M. C. Beaton
Numero Zero by Umberto Eco
Kant: A Very Short Introduction by Roger Scruton
Life in Ancient Rome by Lionel Casson
The Man From the Sea by Michael Innes
Buddha: A Very Short Introduction by Michael Carrithers
Illegally Dead by David Wishart
The City and The Stars by Arthur C. Clarke
The Great Dinosaur Robbery by David Forrest
Down and Across by Arvin Ahmadi
Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein

ROOTs in YTD: 12

Tickers have been updated but hopefully not harmed in the making of this report.

Off to a really good start to 2020 with 5 ROOTS to report, only 2 of which I had started last year.

I just posted my last ROOT for the month which brings me to 10 ROOTs for January. At this rate I will get to my goal of 65 pretty soon but February is a shorter month, so there is that.

Four tomes completed for January, ie 4/50.

I started out the year with 4 off-the-shelfers. Goal for the year is 27.

I completed 5 ROOTS, on track to goal of 50.

Will be running numbers this weekend. I may be a little slow, my oven died and I have to go shopping for a new one, UGH! NOt what I had planned for the weekend!

Sorry to hear about your oven, Cheli. I hope you find a good one that doesn't cost the earth.

>117 cyderry: Ahh, that's a pity. I like a good working oven. Good luck with your search for a new one.

I was able to complete 5 ROOTs for the month of January. Today I began a 6th. My personal ticker has been updated but I did not touch the group one.
Happy Rooting in February everyone!

I've been in a real reading funk, so my final total is 3 ROOTs for the month. I need to read 5 a month to reach my goal, so hopefully I will catch up. I've got several on the go, so hopefully February will be better.

I finished my eighth ROOT just before midnight on January 31st, which is much better than I hoped to achieve. Personal ticker is up-to-date, didn't touch the group one.

FEBRUARY Thread is up!

https://www.librarything.com/topic/316284#

7 for January! Personal ticker has been updated.

ROOT #3: Alexander Hamilton. That was a commitment, but well worth it. Thread and ticker soon to be updated.