Of course we all grow up learning to read and needing to read, but somewhere along the line maybe there was something or someone that influenced your reading and it spurred you on.  Or maybe I’m just in the minority on this one. There’s a couple of things that I can look back on that gave me my love of reading.

• Book It – Yeah the Pizza Hut reading program.  Loved that contest and for at least 2 years, maybe more, I was blasting through the books. I was lucky in the fact that there were no restrictions on what I could read, it just needed to be a certain number of pages.  And since I was clearing Tom Clancy books at 5th or 6th grade level it was awesome!
• The Librarian – Growing up my parents owned a restaurant that was about a block away from the city library.  So in the summer when I was stuck at the store, I’d head over to the library and read a lot. But also there was a children’s librarian that was a great influence on my reading style.  Looking back some of the books he suggested me reading, and I did, probably weren’t the greatest, but nothing kept a young boys attention like these books.

So what or who influenced your reading?  Writers your welcome to chime in as well since to me reading and writing fall hand in hand.

It looks like during the week of Christmas not many books are published (if any at all) so we are going to be hitting two weeks worth of information here.

Witch and Wizard – James Patterson – I’ve read quite a few of Patterson’s books and they are pretty good.  Nice quick reads most of the time.

Alter of Eden – James Rollins – Rollins is another other that I’ve read before and like Patterson’s his books are good.  A bit of history rolled into these which I always enjoy.  Rollins has been tweeting quite a bit lately and you can follow him here: @jamesrollins

The Honor of Spies – W.E.B Griffin

I, Sniper – Stephen Hunter – I’ve read quite a few of Hunters books, a couple of them based on Bob Lee Swagger, but somewhere along the line he went back to Bob’s dad and I didn’t read those.  However this does appear to be a Bob Lee Swagger book (Shooter, with Mark Walhberg, was based off of Hunters Point of Impact)

Back when my wife and I got married, we had a 1600 mile drive to make from Montana to Iowa. Knowing we had this long drive ahead of us we decided that we’d pick up an audio book to help us get down the road. Although a bit expensive it was well worth it.

Later on in college I was taking a elementary education literature class and we were talking about different ways to read. Reading could be done in a variety of ways and one of those was listening to audio books. At the time I had a one way commute of 20 minutes that was perfect for knocking out a few chapters of an audio book each day. I quickly zoomed through a variety of audio books but mostly Harry Potter. If you’ve looked at prices for audio books you know they can be expensive, so how did I get around that?

Your best bet for audio books, if you don’t want to purchase them, is to hit up your local library. It may take some time to find what you are looking for, but I’m confident that you’ll find something you can listen to while on the road or working out (if your on the treadmill for an extended period of time these will really help you along!). Other avenues of getting an audio book: iTunes, Amazon MP3 and RSS feeds. I’ll go into the RSS feeds a bit more early next week and talk about some other things on audio books.

So do you listen to audio books? What are some of your favorites?

I’m a creature of habit and my habits usually include reading the same authors when they release new books.  However on occasion a book cover or an except on the back will catch my eye.  Black Widow was one of those books.  Actually I believe it was another book of White’s that caught my eye, but this was the one I brought home.

Black Widow stars Doc Ford, a former CIA agent I believe, who is now a biologist/detective in Florida.  In Black Widow he’s asked by his goddaughter to deliver some money to someone whose blackmailing her and some of her friends.  With as little details as possible Ford is told that they had a bachlorette party on an island (yup a bunch of rich girls!) and things got out of hand with some of the island boys and apparently they were taped and are now being blackmailed with that tape.  Doc steps in and begins working his way to the bottom of the case.  Along the way he meets a few new people that help him discover who is really behind the blackmail.

On the main scale I give this a 3 out of 5.  It’s got some action.  There’s no outright sex scenes in it, but it’s hints at it here and there at just the right time which keeps the male mind going!  Overall a good read, but not one that really sucks you in.  It took me awhile to read this one.

Here’s a short list of books being released in the upcoming week that might be of interest!

Alone (#2 in Valentino Mystery Series) – Loren D. Estleman

The Disciple – Stephen Coonts

Faces of the Gone – Brad Parks

The Good Son – Russel Mclean

Luck of The Draw – Anthony J. Cardieri

Star Wars Darth Bane #3 – Dynasty of Evil – Drew Karpyshyn

I do have another book review coming out. Something I finished earlier this week.  With any luck I’ll have that posted up on Friday.  As always any comments and suggestions are appreciated.