Pink is All You Need

This past Thursday was the Indigo Spring 2012 media preview; it’s among one of my favourite media events because their items are always so lovely and enviable.

The company, which started out as a big box bookstore is seriously making the shift to being a lifestyle store with books, or as CEO Heather Reisman called it, “a cultural department store” where it’s not as much about “what you buy as much as it’s about the experiences you have with those products.” There was very little mention of books; I couldn’t tell you what new books I can look forward to reading in the months to come, but I can definitely tell you about the pretty notebooks, serveware, tea pots and cups, and baby items you can look forward to at an Indigo near you.

Here are the five—I had a very hard time narrowing it all down—items I covet the most.

Rifle Paper Co. notebooks

Elephant and flower-themed rapping paper for baby

Anchor paper weights

Striped tote bag to further the nautical theme

White ceramic serving bowl

So 2012 begins in much the same way 2011 ended: with books. I am taking the 50 Book Pledge, which is much like my book a week challenge from last year. I know I still won’t be able to read 50 books in the coming year, but I’ll certainly try to exceed the number of books I read last year.

Right now I’m currently reading two books: One Day by David Nicholls and A Touch of Dead by Charlaine Harris. So two books are in the midst as of January 3—a pretty good start me thinks.

Late last year I read about the Book a Week challenge, which, as the title implies, you read a book a week. It was a mandate to watch less TV and stimulate the mind more. Almost every blog I read of people who had taken on the challenge in 2010 said that they started every morning by reading as little as 20 pages to as many as 40 or 50 pages. Realistically, that isn’t possible to me through a work week. Most mornings I’m scrambling out the door with a grumbling tummy, let alone with enough time to crack a book open to read 20 to 50 pages. But with my lengthy commute to and from work, I figured I could easily pull off a book every other week, which is 26 books for the year.

Some books I read a little faster—Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy was consumed in two weeks—while others, like The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, took a bit more time. For Christmas I received the Sookie Stackhouse series (the HBO series True Blood is based on these books), so my year was peppered with tales from the undead.

Here are the books I read this year (though not in this exact order).

1. Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
2. Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris
3. Club Dead by Charlaine Harris
4. Dead to the World by Charlaine Harris
5. Dead as a Doornail by Charlaine Harris
6. Definitely Dead by Charlaine Harris
7. Altogether Dead by Charlaine Harris
8. From Dead to Worse by Charlaine Harris
9. Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris
10. Dead in the Family by Charlaine Harris
    
11. Dead Reckoning by Charlaine Harris
12. Handle with Care by Jodi Picoult
13. Keeping Faith by Jodi Picoult
14. House Rules by Jodi Picoult
15. Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
16. Still Alice by Alice Genova
17. Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
18. The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment by A.J. Jacobs
19. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
20. The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman
21. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
22. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
23. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
24. Juliet Naked by Nick Hornby
25. When God was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman
26. The Help by Kathryn Stockett
27. Room by Emma Donoghue
28. Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close
29. The Kommandant’s Girl by Pam Jenoff
30. Think of a Number by John Verdon
31. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
    
32. The Beauty of Humanity Movement by Camilla Gibb