Things have been hectic around my house, but I think that we are finally getting back to normal. I am hoping to get more reading done in the near future. I can’t even imagine how I used to be able to read at least one book a week!

When I first joined my online mystery reading groups, I had a lot of books that I "had to read." I remember that when I started participating in the reading groups, I would always buy the books and then proceed to highlight passages and mark them with my comments. I did that for about a year, but then got tired of not being able to pass the book on. At the time, my mother in law enjoyed reading mysteries, so I wanted to send my books on to her. I knew that she would then pass them on to my sister in law, and so on and so on.

So, I stopped writing in/highlighting my books and I started taking detailed notes about my reading groups’ books…….. If I was lucky, I was able to get the audible book so that I could listen to it in the car. But that meant that I would have to find a place to park in order to write down the things I wanted to remember for our group discussions.

I am no longer an active member of any mystery reading groups, which might be why I have become so relaxed about my reading. As much as I love to read a good mystery (preferably cozy, but not limited to that genre) I find that I am going through a phase where I just am not reading as much as I would like. I wonder if this "computer-thing" has anything to do with this lull in my reading. Let’s see, it’s after 10:00 pm, and I am still sitting in front of this "computer-thing"……. Hmmm….. I will have to think about this…………………

If you’re anything like me, you probably like to see that a favorite author has merited a special award…….. especially an award for writing the very type of book that you enjoy reading. And, if you’re anything like me, you probably don’t know why that particular award was received. Was it given by other mystery book authors?  Was it given by mystery book readers? (Or, was it given by the author’s family and friends?)

Most of us are probably familiar with the more popular awards. I am going to do some research on the different mystery awards that are given each year and then I plan to write some blogs about what exactly the different awards mean to us…… the mystery readers. I have already started doing the research and I must say that I have been surprised to find that there are more awards than I knew about.  And, that’s a good thing….

Sometimes, when we aren’t quite sure if we want to "try" an author, just the fact that he/she has won "an Agatha," or "an Edgar" might help us in making the decision. I know that when my children were growing up, the fact that an author won a Newbery, Carnegie,  Caldecott (in this case, an illustrator), ETC, was a good starting point for our book choices.

So, on with the research, and on with the awards!