Saturday, January 9, 2010
One down...
I just finished The Enchantress of Florence so I get to cross one off my list! I won't say much yet, but the ending kind of comes out of nowhere. I still haven't decided how I feel about the ending but I really liked the book overall. Rushdie's writing is beautiful.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Some math.
Has anyone realized that this is like a book every 3.6 days? And than I'm still in the middle of Anna Karenina? I'm going to need some short books in there to catch up. Yikes.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
More potentials
I'm going to organize these later when I've decided for sure what my categories are going to be, but for now I need to get them down so I don't forget.
Additions to my reading list based on a conversation I just had with Elise Crane:
Dante's Inferno - it's just inexcusable that I've never read this.
Erasmus, "Praise of Folly," translated by Robert M. Adams.
I'll also finally finish Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and one of my nonfictions (or one of the things that has been on my shelf forever) has to be Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain. Which kind of makes me want to do 10 WWI-related books - Jacob's Room, Goodbye to All That, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom Tender is the Night, All Quiet on the Western Front . . . it has a lot of potential to be awesome.
Animal Farm - I enjoyed my first Orwell, and this one is much shorter.
For nonfiction (which I am really excited about) I want to try something by Bill Bryson - A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bryson's African Diary, I'm a Stranger Here Myself. There's also an Erik Larson I've been meaning to read called Isaac's Storm. (I almost have my nonfiction section filled out already. If I throw in one of the Shakespeare books on my shelf I'll be golden!) There are a few NPR writers I kind of want to check out as well, namely AJ Jacobs and David Sedaris. I'll be looking into some of their books to see what I want to read.
I have Crime and Punishment on Audiobook, so that's probably how I'll finally finish that one. I also have a great audiobook of A Clockwork Orange, which will either go in my "things I don't normally read" or "recommended" category, because I'm probably not going to watch the movie. The clips on AFI freak me out. (Audiobooks aren't cheating, right? Because I think that's how I'm going to make it work with some of the longer ones. I have 1776 and Atlas Shrugged (abridged - there is no way I will ever care enough to get all the way through that book) as well.)
Also for recommended: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner (or whatever Stegner Katherine was just reading) and Seven Gothic Tales by Isak Dinesen. I'll be raiding Ann's shelf for sure.
It occurs to me that I run a book club, so if books don't fit into any of the categories, I may have to form a book club category. Hmm.
I just noticed that Miri has Norman Mailer on her list - I have The Castle in the Forest on my shelf and am excited to read it (I think it's about a Nazi?) so that might go into one of my categories. I also want to read Middlemarch, but we'll see how many big long books I get through after the Tolstoy.
I'll be adding to this post I'm sure, but I had to get down the right translation of Erasmus from Elise before it got lost in my facebook inbox.
Additions to my reading list based on a conversation I just had with Elise Crane:
Dante's Inferno - it's just inexcusable that I've never read this.
Erasmus, "Praise of Folly," translated by Robert M. Adams.
I'll also finally finish Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and one of my nonfictions (or one of the things that has been on my shelf forever) has to be Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain. Which kind of makes me want to do 10 WWI-related books - Jacob's Room, Goodbye to All That, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom Tender is the Night, All Quiet on the Western Front . . . it has a lot of potential to be awesome.
Animal Farm - I enjoyed my first Orwell, and this one is much shorter.
For nonfiction (which I am really excited about) I want to try something by Bill Bryson - A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bryson's African Diary, I'm a Stranger Here Myself. There's also an Erik Larson I've been meaning to read called Isaac's Storm. (I almost have my nonfiction section filled out already. If I throw in one of the Shakespeare books on my shelf I'll be golden!) There are a few NPR writers I kind of want to check out as well, namely AJ Jacobs and David Sedaris. I'll be looking into some of their books to see what I want to read.
I have Crime and Punishment on Audiobook, so that's probably how I'll finally finish that one. I also have a great audiobook of A Clockwork Orange, which will either go in my "things I don't normally read" or "recommended" category, because I'm probably not going to watch the movie. The clips on AFI freak me out. (Audiobooks aren't cheating, right? Because I think that's how I'm going to make it work with some of the longer ones. I have 1776 and Atlas Shrugged (abridged - there is no way I will ever care enough to get all the way through that book) as well.)
Also for recommended: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner (or whatever Stegner Katherine was just reading) and Seven Gothic Tales by Isak Dinesen. I'll be raiding Ann's shelf for sure.
It occurs to me that I run a book club, so if books don't fit into any of the categories, I may have to form a book club category. Hmm.
I just noticed that Miri has Norman Mailer on her list - I have The Castle in the Forest on my shelf and am excited to read it (I think it's about a Nazi?) so that might go into one of my categories. I also want to read Middlemarch, but we'll see how many big long books I get through after the Tolstoy.
I'll be adding to this post I'm sure, but I had to get down the right translation of Erasmus from Elise before it got lost in my facebook inbox.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Lin: Reading List
Here's what I have as possibilities so far:
Books I own but haven't read
Through the Wardrobe (A collection of writings from different authors about the Chronicles of Narnia)
The Wednesday Letters
The Glass Castle
Mansfield Park
Sense and Sensibility
Pride & Prejudice & Zombies
Sense & Sensibility & Sea Monsters
Madame Bovary
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Cranford
The above list is mostly coming from the set of beautiful Penguin classics I got last year for my birthday. I hadn't read most of them (hence the reason for buying them) so now I'm going to do it. This list may change, although it's the most set in stone due to the nature of the category.
Books with movie adaptations
The Road
Stardust
The Black Cauldron
The Outsiders Jane Eyre The Lovely Bones
Derby Girl
The Princess Bride
The Thin Man
The Iron Giant
That's what I've tentatively settled on for the movie/book category. I took most of these from lists found over at the A.V. Club, although the three in bold are on there because I also already own them. The Black Cauldron is the one I'm most excited about because I always thought that movie was so strange and the A.V. Club tells me the source material is much better than the movie. The Princess Bride is on there because I have never read it and I somehow feel like less of a girl for not having done so before this point.
Books I own but haven't read
Through the Wardrobe (A collection of writings from different authors about the Chronicles of Narnia)
The Wednesday Letters
The Glass Castle
Mansfield Park
Sense and Sensibility
Pride & Prejudice & Zombies
Sense & Sensibility & Sea Monsters
Madame Bovary
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Cranford
The above list is mostly coming from the set of beautiful Penguin classics I got last year for my birthday. I hadn't read most of them (hence the reason for buying them) so now I'm going to do it. This list may change, although it's the most set in stone due to the nature of the category.
Books with movie adaptations
The Road
Stardust
The Black Cauldron
The Outsiders Jane Eyre The Lovely Bones
Derby Girl
The Princess Bride
The Thin Man
The Iron Giant
That's what I've tentatively settled on for the movie/book category. I took most of these from lists found over at the A.V. Club, although the three in bold are on there because I also already own them. The Black Cauldron is the one I'm most excited about because I always thought that movie was so strange and the A.V. Club tells me the source material is much better than the movie. The Princess Bride is on there because I have never read it and I somehow feel like less of a girl for not having done so before this point.
10-10-10
Okay, I guess it's my turn to post my category list. I think I'm also going to include a few books that I've already listed in those categories so that I can remember them, and then I'll refer back or add things.
My tentative categories are as follows:
-Books I own but haven't read.
-Books I'm embarrassed that I haven't read or that I started and haven't finished.
This includes a couple of Jane Austens, Crime and Punishment, Les Miserables, Heart of Darkness, Invisible Man, Brave New World and a few others.
-Books written by authors who aren't British or American.
Yes, I'll be counting Anna Karenina.
-Nonfiction (including biographies and memoirs)
Includes the Wilberforce biography I just got, Endurance, possibly a biography of Victoria and Albert, something by David McCullough, and The Year of Magical Thinking.
-genres I don't usually read
This will give me an excuse to read Interview with a Vampire.
-Megan/Lindsey/Miri category
-Recommended books
This will include These is My Words, which at least 3 different people have drooled about to me.
-Books adapted to movies
I want to read The Painted Veil and could always through those Jane Austens in there. Plus I always have the option of throwing in some Agatha Christies if I run out of time at the end.
-Authors I've never read
-Either award winners or something in a category like postmodern or modernist books.
I reserve the right to change these or juggle things into other categories at any time to serve my own nefarious purposes. I also reserve the right to pad things with short stories if I come up short at the end, but I'm hoping Tolstoy won't put me behind enough for that to be an issue.
My tentative categories are as follows:
-Books I own but haven't read.
-Books I'm embarrassed that I haven't read or that I started and haven't finished.
This includes a couple of Jane Austens, Crime and Punishment, Les Miserables, Heart of Darkness, Invisible Man, Brave New World and a few others.
-Books written by authors who aren't British or American.
Yes, I'll be counting Anna Karenina.
-Nonfiction (including biographies and memoirs)
Includes the Wilberforce biography I just got, Endurance, possibly a biography of Victoria and Albert, something by David McCullough, and The Year of Magical Thinking.
-genres I don't usually read
This will give me an excuse to read Interview with a Vampire.
-Megan/Lindsey/Miri category
-Recommended books
This will include These is My Words, which at least 3 different people have drooled about to me.
-Books adapted to movies
I want to read The Painted Veil and could always through those Jane Austens in there. Plus I always have the option of throwing in some Agatha Christies if I run out of time at the end.
-Authors I've never read
-Either award winners or something in a category like postmodern or modernist books.
I reserve the right to change these or juggle things into other categories at any time to serve my own nefarious purposes. I also reserve the right to pad things with short stories if I come up short at the end, but I'm hoping Tolstoy won't put me behind enough for that to be an issue.
Monday, January 4, 2010
10/10/10 Challenge
For my New Year's "resolution" I decided to complete the 10/10/10 challenge--ten books in ten different genres in 2010--and I am really excited to do it. Megan and Lindsey read my post and have expressed an interest in it as well, and we've been discussing possible categories with each other. For right now, here is my tentative list.
--books I own but haven't read yet
--recommended by others
--adult fiction
--nonfiction
--self-improvement
--foreign
--authors I've never read (this is one that I just remembered was on that list online)
--genres I don't usually read
--Megan/Lindsey/Miri category (a predetermined list of ten books that all three of us will read)
--award-winners (?)
or, books adapted to movies?
I am deciding between the last two categories, since one of them will take me over ten. I like the idea of books that have been adapted to movies (which came from Lindsey) because it adds the extra element of watching those movies and comparing them with the books, and I'm sure that would be interesting; however, that also means I have to find the movies, and that isn't always easy.
--books I own but haven't read yet
--recommended by others
--adult fiction
--nonfiction
--self-improvement
--foreign
--authors I've never read (this is one that I just remembered was on that list online)
--genres I don't usually read
--Megan/Lindsey/Miri category (a predetermined list of ten books that all three of us will read)
--award-winners (?)
or, books adapted to movies?
I am deciding between the last two categories, since one of them will take me over ten. I like the idea of books that have been adapted to movies (which came from Lindsey) because it adds the extra element of watching those movies and comparing them with the books, and I'm sure that would be interesting; however, that also means I have to find the movies, and that isn't always easy.
Lindsey's Challenge Categories
When Miri mentioned doing this on her own blog and then later asked Megan for category suggestions, it got me interested. Granted, it doesn't take much to get me interested in anything these days. Also, I hardly read any books in 2009 - in fact, I think the grand total is like 15 or something. I haven't read that little since I was in college. Mostly I was all depressed and retreated into a world of TV and movies, which wasn't bad, but I'm ready for my brain to get some more exercise.
So here we go. 100 books. 10 categories. The categories I have chosen are as follows:
The first book that I will finish will fall under the Megan/Lindsey/Miri category as we have all been reading The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie since this summer. I've got 30 pages left and will be moving on to read Forest Born by Shannon Hale which will either count as a YA book or a book I own but haven't read.
I really hope I can stick to this and get it done. I'm excited about branching out and also getting through the books I already own but haven't had the time or patience to read.
So here we go. 100 books. 10 categories. The categories I have chosen are as follows:
- Books I own but haven't read
- Recommended by others
- Young Adult/Children's Lit
- Adult Fiction
- Biographies
- Authors I have never read
- Megan/Lindsey/Miri (a predetermined list of 10 book we will all read)
- Books with movie adaptations
- Books for the blogject (self-improvement)
- 10 things written by J.D. Salinger
The first book that I will finish will fall under the Megan/Lindsey/Miri category as we have all been reading The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie since this summer. I've got 30 pages left and will be moving on to read Forest Born by Shannon Hale which will either count as a YA book or a book I own but haven't read.
I really hope I can stick to this and get it done. I'm excited about branching out and also getting through the books I already own but haven't had the time or patience to read.
Changes
Changes have quite obviously been made. I am going to use this blog for our 10.10.10 challenge.
Megan and Miri and I are going to be reading 10 books in 10 categories (of our choosing) in 2010. This is mostly for us to keep track of everything.
Megan and Miri and I are going to be reading 10 books in 10 categories (of our choosing) in 2010. This is mostly for us to keep track of everything.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
I forgot the "two"
And it's the most amazing part:
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters: The Classic Regency Romance "Now with Squishy, Slimy, Tentacled Menace!
A thing or two
I just read a post by Meg Cabot called How to Foster a Hatred For Reading that I thought I would share. It brings up an interesting point about something I am sure everyone has an opinion on. It also reminded me of Miri's post on her blog about the change in focus of children's shows and the cancellation of Reading Rainbow. I was never a huge fan of that show, but I realize it's influence and effect. And, like Meg Cabot, I hated The Scarlet Letter and Wuthering Heights (among others) simply because I was forced to read them. It is taking all I have to try to make myself reread Wuthering Heights and that's kind of sad, right?
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