Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Professional development.

After three months of bloglessness, I reappeared here last night. It heralded what was, in my mind, the beginning of a series called Bound and Determined, in which I try to read one of my purchased-but-as-of-yet-unread books weekly and then blog about it. So I introduced the concept, prattled on about Birdwing (which I read during the ice storm), and then went to bed. After sleeping on it, I made a decision.

Actually, my first decision upon waking (which, interestingly, turns out to be after getting out of the shower and eating breakfast) was not to go to work. My stomach did (and does) not feel right at all, and well, it didn't take much arm-twisting to get me to log onto the help-I-need-a-substitute! website and unplug the curling iron.

Then, after making a nest in the living room, I made this other decision. Instead of just a series, I turned Bound and Determined into its own blog. I've done this before. And by this, I mean both starting up a new project blog on a whim and starting up a reading blog. I do not have a good track record here, but you never know when I just might stick with something.

Plus, and this is where I'm really honest, I am way too impressed with myself for coming up with the multi-faceted title. I mean, bound? Like books. And determined? Because I am and the whole point of writing the blog is to keep myself motivated. Okay, I'll stop patting myself on the back, but you gotta admit… But of course, I did some research, and I'm not totally original here. Bound and Determined is also the name of a few other blogs and a work of erotica. It's a cliché, unique only in its redundancy. Whatever.

I have to admit that I'm jumping the gun a little. I've already acknowledged my paper-thin willpower. Ha, I haven't even written about a second book yet. And I have over thirty – thirty! – other books on my list. The sheer magnitude of the list alone is enough to defeat me. Some accountability can't hurt.

I'm not going to pretend that I'm not doing this because I want to be a librarian. Obviously, I am. Books and reading are what I love, but I have a lot of work to do if I honestly want to consider myself "knowledgeable about current children's and young adult literature". It's professional development.

Follow me as I develop professionally at http://determinedtoread.blogspot.com/. And join in the discussion. Ask questions. Make reading recommendations. Let me know if you have read / want to read / don't want to read the book I'm reading.

I've recently decided that books are only important because they connect us with other people. If I can't share the experience or knowledge or insight that I gain from a book, what's the point in reading it?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

good question. pumped!