#bookyear

First week of 2026. First book of 2026. 1/52.

Because this has become some sort of a tradition.

January

Inferno by Dan Brown

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie.

Barely 3 months into my new job I quit. I dunno what got into me. It was a cool job, still a call center job but my account was Xbox - we get to play during our free time yay! I guess I didn't like the fact that agents can't bring books (or any kind of paper - even tissue) to the floor. Also things with my "fling" that time were getting complicated. So perhaps I was trying during the better part of January to save whatever could be saved from that baffling relationship instead of focusing on reading books and yeah, keeping my job.

February

Finished only one book: Eating Fire and Drinking Water by Arlene Chai. I met someone I found seriously interesting that I spent more time getting to know her instead of reading books.

March 

Was a pretty good month. I read 5 books:

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry

Imperial Bedrooms by Bret Easton Ellis

Girl With a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier

Playing for Pizza by John Grisham

Win Like Lin by Sean Deveney

The girl I met also liked reading books. Which motivated me to read more that month on top of our conversations. And yes, I still didn't have a job.

April

Read only The Last Juror by John Grisham. We started dating so I was definitely distracted.

May

She lent me the book What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami. This is the only book I ever finished in May. Not that I'm complaining, because May was a good month for me. Achievements unlocked: Traveled to Cagbalete Island with the girl I liked. Got myself a girlfriend. Got myself a new job.

June

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie

Invisible by Paul Auster

The first two books were lent to me by my girlfriend, the last one I purchased during one of our Maginhawa - UPD dates. My job was boring at best, if a little demanding at times.

July

Paper Towns by John Green 

Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

I was falling into the routines of a job I was starting to regret. I turned down the chance to work for a really big and well known company in favor of this job because I thought that even that the salary was way smaller, I'd be happier in a new environment but my work was killing me.

August

Didn't read any book the whole month. I was busy deliberating whether I should resign. Good thing my girlfriend's always there to put things into perspective and I finally made up my mind to return to the call center industry. I was wondering how I will tell my boss that I wanted to resign when we got called in a meeting and were informed that they had to pull out the business because it wasn't making any money.

September

Matilda by Roald Dahl

Three Bags Full by Leonie Swann

I started working for my new company Telus. My account was tech sales, so we were a bit busy during training learning all about computers and how to sell them. Not much time to read here.

October

Hollow City by Ransom Riggs

The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Same story as in September. Plus we were moved to night shift so I was always too tired to read. Plus it's me and my girlfriend's birthday month so we were busy celebrating. Lol.

November

After more than a month of training, we finally hit the floor. With the Thanksgiving sale coming up it was like a madhouse at work.

December

After the Thanksgiving madness we were called in by management and were informed that Dell was downsizing. Apparently Dell only hired people as buffer for Black Friday - Cyber Monday but now that it was over they were letting people go. We were given the choice as to which account we would like to go to, so I chose the account I am working for now, which is a company selling fitness tracker. I am quite happy thank you very much. Since I started training again I got some time to catch up on my reading.

Superstitious by RL Stine

Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

The Lover's Dictionary by David Levithan

This is How You Lose Her by Junot Diaz

Sadly though, I didn't make it to my goal 24 books. :(