The College Freshman Book Tag

Created by Little Blind Book Finds. View the original post here.

It’s been ten entire years since I was a freshman in college. Wow. It doesn’t feel like it. I’m not very good at this adulting thing… Anyway, but because I am a teacher and my husband works at a university, I don’t feel all that removed from the college experience, so this book tag really caught my attention. This should be fun!

Rules:

1. Give credit to the creator. (That’s Little Blind Book Finds, y’all.)
2. Answer the questions to the best of your ability! You don’t have to be in college or have gone to college to answer these!
3. Tag three people to complete the tag.

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The Roommate

Roommates can be a hit or miss experience freshman year, especially when you don’t get the opportunity to pick who you room with. Name a character you’d love to be roommates with and one you’d hate to be roommates with.

There are two book characters that I would have loved being roommates with in college. The first is Cath from Fangirl. Cath would be a great roommate because she is low-key, preferring to stay in rather than going out all hours of the night (just like me!), and low maintenance. She would be there to hang out with on a Friday night when everyone else was out partying, but if I needed some space she wouldn’t be desperate for my company. Plus, if we can just pretend Simon Snow is Harry Potter, than we could have been the biggest fangirls of all time together. I don’t know anyone else who loves Harry Potter like I do! The other character who would be a great roommate is Sam Gamgee from The Lord of the Rings. If he took care of me the way he took care of Frodo, I would call myself one lucky hobbit.

I would absolutely never ever want to be roommates with Draco Malfoy. He’s a jerk, he’s a racist, and I would get tired of hearing him talk about himself all the time. And even though his mom was always sending him sweets, I bet he never shared.

Orientation

Before your freshman year officially begins, you typically go to an orientation to familiarize yourself with the campus. Orientation can be both exciting and scary as you’re experiencing something new. Name a book that you read to experience a new genre, or to familiarize yourself with a topic you knew nothing about. Did you like the book? What did you learn from it?

I am REALLY interested in the mystery genre, but haven’t read much of it. About a year ago I read The Complete Sherlock Holmes because I figured it would be a good starting place. Having done that, I think I probably should have started with Agatha Christie or something, because most of Sherlock Holmes is short stories, which is probably not too representative of the genre.

Homesick

It is normal to experience homesickness at some point after moving away from home for the first time. Name a book from your childhood that you love so much that you sometimes miss, and may even find yourself rereading it often.

When I was a middle grade reader one of my favorite books was Absolutely Normal Chaos by Sharon Creech. Most people have read Walk Two Moons, and this book was a spin-off about a minor character. It’s the journal she kept over summer vacation that the teacher in Walk Two Moons disastrously reads aloud to the class. I was just in love with this book. I probably read it ten or twelve times, and always at least once every summer. I haven’t read it in a long time, and lately (especially since it’s summer!) I find myself wishing I could make time for it.

Choosing a Major

Choosing a major is something every college student has to do at some point, but many students choose their freshman year. Hopefully your major is something you are passionate about. Name a book that you have read about a topic you are passionate about, or a character from a book that shares a similar passion as you.

I’m going off the beaten path with this one a little bit…

I am a band nerd. Probably the world’s biggest band nerd. I am such a huge band nerd that I went to college to study music education so I could teach band for the rest of my life.

One of my great disappointments as a reader is how few authors of young adult novels have written about high school band or choir. (Although, there’s a whole section on fanfiction dedicated to marching band, if you want to read it!) These programs are such a huge part of so many students’ lives, and there is nothing written about it! However, John Green got close. In Paper Towns Quentin is friends with all the band kids, but isn’t in band himself. He hangs out by the band hall before and after school, even waits for his friends after school while they have rehearsal. I suspect John didn’t actually put Q in band because he wasn’t in band, and he didn’t want to misrepresent. But this particular detail of the book was wildly accurate, and definitely made me chuckle.

Join the Club

Joining different clubs and groups can often be an exciting thing to jump into as a freshman for some, and nerve-wracking for others. Name a popular book or book series that you didn’t think you’d enjoy, but ended up loving.

Don’t judge me.

I read the Twilight series on accident. I couldn’t fall asleep on night and my mom had a copy sitting on the coffee table. I figured it would put me right to sleep. Instead I stayed up all night reading.

Really and honestly, they are TERRIBLE books. I hate them. But I was so intrigued despite myself. At this point I have read them more than once *cringe*, AND it has got me on a thing where every summer I read a YA series that looks not so amazing, but entertaining.

The All-Nighter

As a college freshman and a college student in general, all-nighters are pretty common. Name one book that was so good, you stayed up all night reading it.

I have never pulled an all-nighter. I swear, I am not lying. Once my boss made me do a lock-in with my students, but that’s it. But the night Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix came out I stayed up until about 2 AM before I went to bed. I finished it the next day about 9 PM. I remember my mom dragging me to the mall and reading it while she shopped. Amazingly, I did not run in to anyone!

The Night Before It’s Due

Speaking of those all-nighters, they usually have something to do with that assignment you put off until the last minute. Name a popular book or book series that you put off reading for way too long.

I didn’t have to read To Kill a Mockingbird in high school, and so I just never really got around to it. In college everyone would always site it as a book they liked. A friend of mine has since named her daughter Harper Lee. And I would always just kind of nod along. Then after we got married it turned out it’s my sister-in-law’s favorite book. So I got around to it so we would have something to talk about! And boy, were they all right. Wow.

The Hangover

You may or may not have experienced a hangover… or 10 during your freshman year in college. Name a book that left you with a book hangover after you finished it.

I have also never experienced a hangover. For real. I don’t really get book hangovers either. To me getting a book hangover would be like going to a Mexican restaurant and slowly savoring your chips and salsa instead of eating as many as you can. What’s the point in that? BRING ME MORE CHIPS!!!!

But Eleanor & Park got me pretty close. I rarely wish for sequels, they almost always ruin things. And a sequel would DEFINITELY ruin Eleanor & Park. But when it was over I just wanted … more. I’ve talked before on my blog about how Rainbow Rowell is like magic. Her characters are more real to me than I am sometimes, and her books tug on my heart like nothing I’ve ever read before. I didn’t want Eleanor & Park to be over, I just wanted it to go on forever.

On a Budget

Freshman year, you usually learn what it means to be a broke college student. Name a book that you remember buying even though you were tight on cash, because you just had to have it.

So, this would be every book I own, haha.

The year after I graduated college was the year Mockingjay came out, and I was working in a bookstore. I actually learned about the Hunger Games series because we literally could not keep it in stock, and people were always upset we didn’t have it. So I had my husband check The Hunger Games out for me from the library. When I finished it I was actually at school, and I called him and said “You have to go back to the library and get Catching Fire and Mockingjay right NOW because if I don’t get to start them tonight I am literally going to spontaneously combust.” But it turns out they didn’t have either book at the library. So even though I was making barely enough money to cover rent and we were living off of my savings from my high school job, I went to Barnes & Noble that afternoon and bought the entire series. My only regret? They didn’t have The Hunger Games in hardback, so my set doesn’t match.

English 101

General ed courses are typically all you take freshman year, and English is usually one of them. (Depending on the prof that could be a good thing 😉 ) Name a required reading book that you loved. (it can be middle/high school or college)

Oooo, this is so hard to pick just one! I read so many amazing books in school! So I’m going to pick two that I think are probably now what you expect.

First, Watership Down. Oh. My. Goodness. I love love LOVE that book! So I read Watership Down in 7th or 8th grade, and we had a test at the end of each “part.” By the time the rest of the class was done with Part 1 I had already finished the book. And I enjoyed it so much that the night before the test I went back and read all of Part 1 AGAIN. I read it so many times that by college my copy got so beat up that eventually all of the pages fell out and the cover got ripped off. Sadly I don’t have that copy anymore. I wish I did.

Second, also from 8th grade, The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara. In case you’ve never heard of it (you probably haven’t!), it’s a historical fiction about the battle of Gettysburg. Shaara’s son, Jeff Shaara, went on the write God’s and Generals which you probably HAVE heard of. Anyway, it’s a fantastic book and even if you think you don’t like historical fiction or war novels you should go read it. I’ve read it probably half a dozen times and each time I fall in love with it all over again.

The Textbook

Part of being a broke college student is trying to find the cheapest way to buy a textbook. To make it worse, some freshman gen ed courses end up having no use for the book at all. Name a book that you spent money on and ended up not liking.

Another hard one for me to pick just one. I tend to buy books, not borrow them, and I often end up buying ones I didn’t end up liking. Krista at Little Blind Book Finds mentioned a big one for me, The Time Traveler’s Wife. Hated it. At the exact same visit to the book store I picked up One Day by David Nicholls, and I didn’t like that book at all either. Not too often you get two 1-star reviews in a single trip.

Office Hours

All professors have office hours, and often times students don’t take advantage of them. Advice for freshman: go to office hours! It is a good idea to get to know your professors. Making connections with them can lead to great tips on assignments, internship opportunities, and job connections. Name a book (autobiography or biography) that you read to get to know more about someone you are interested in.

Steve & Me was written by Steve Irwin’s wife, Terri, after he died. Steve is probably my favorite person of all time, and this book just made that more true. Still missing him every day, and I am so proud of his kids and the people they are becoming.

The Mean Professor

There’s always that one professor that no one likes, especially in freshman gen ed courses. Name a villain or any character you disliked, that you would hate to have as a professor.

Two words: Dolores Umbridge. Do I need to say more?

Drop the Class

Sometimes It gets to the midpoint of the semester and you can’t take any more of a particular class, and decide to drop it. Name a book or author you thought you’d enjoy reading but ended up not liking.

I LOVE the classics, especially romances, so I figured Anna Karenina was right up my ally. Guys, I didn’t even make it 50 pages. Note to self, Russian literature is not my thing.

Life Lessons

I learned so many life lessons my freshman year of college. The experience made me learn so much about myself that I didn’t realize. Name a book that has made you reflect on life.

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult, for sure. I’m not normally a fan of those kinds of books, to be completely honest, but Nineteen Minutes is about a school shooting, and I read it in college after … isn’t it sad that at this point there have been so many  I can’t remember which one it was? But as I said, it’s a really hard book to read. It’s written from several POVs, including the shooter, his now estranged childhood friend, his mother, and his lawyer. Anyway, it really got me thinking about unconditional love and what that means, and the nature of good and evil. No, that’s not read. Not good and evil. But maybe what it means to be a good person or a bad person, and that maybe it isn’t always as black and white as we like to think it is.

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Hey, this was fun! Thanks Krista and Dawlyn for a prompt that really got me thinking! Sorry my answers are all so long, I don’t really do succinct, haha.

Tags:

Vrinda at A Bookish Human
Emma at Emma’s Bookish Corner
Ysabel at Shelf of a Bookworm

(I will not be offended if none of y’all do this. I am new here and don’t really KNOW you yet. 😉)