Category Archives: Overhaul

Actually Read Books Overhaul Videos

(Over)Haul 1: The Disaster That Is My Life

Published by:

The first video in my (over)haul series was filmed at my friend Sarah’s house! Because I’m a great planner. Watch a montage of the disaster that is my bookshelves, bookpiles and bookbags! Decide for yourself if I’m a (book) hoarder! Marvel at the three solid weeks it took me to post this video! Enjoy yourself!

Featuring music by NHGMusic and all the skills I have as a video editor (very few).

Look out for my next video—a review of Structuring Your Novel by K.M. Weiland—whenever that happens! Or just subscribe to my channel, and let YouTube handle the rest.

Actually Read Books Fiction Misc Non-Fiction Overhaul Poetry Preview Recall Review Stranger Writing Writing Life

Testing, Testing

Published by:

The Martian

It was a great movie…two months ago? And the novel by Andy Weir has been out since 2011. But The Martian is going to be my first novel back on the horse. I finished my last exam for my undergraduate degree this afternoon, and now it’s time start reading (books I choose) again. The Actually Read Books challenge doesn’t start till the new year, but this should be a fun way to warm up.

Summary from Goodreads:

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate the planet while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded on Mars’ surface, completely alone, with no way to signal Earth that he’s alive — and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone years before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first. But Mark’s not ready to quit. Armed with nothing but his ingenuity and his engineering skills — and a gallows sense of humor that proves to be his greatest source of strength – he embarks on a dogged quest to stay alive, using his botany expertise to grow food and even hatching a mad plan to contact NASA back on Earth.

As he overcomes one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next, Mark begins to let himself believe he might make it off the planet alive – but Mars has plenty of surprises in store for him yet.

Grounded in real, present-day science from the first page to the last, yet propelled by a brilliantly ingenious plot that surprises the reader again and again, The Martian is a truly remarkable thriller: an impossible-to-put-down suspense novel that manages to read like a real-life survival tale