Thursday, January 15, 2015

2015 Reading Challenge: "It's about time."

On Goodreads, I set my goal for the year at 50 books, which is more or less my standard.  But I also wanted to pick out some specific books.  I took a three-tiered approach.


First, I went through my shelves and pulled out ones that I have had for a long time, or have been looking for for a long time.  I am finally going to read these, because it's about time.

Second, while I was completing my 2014 Challenge, I learned about quite a few interesting books that I was unfamiliar with, and I managed to track some of them down, too.

And third, I have the two books left over from 2014.  So if I can get to those as well, so much the better.

With that, I have quite the stack of suggested reading.  I'm not going to be overly regimented with it.  If I get to them all, that's fine; and if I don't, that's fine, too.

Here's the 'official' not-very-official list:

  • Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood   (from 2014)
  • Saturday by Ian McEwan  (from 2014)
  • Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett (this one is not in the picture because I'm reading it)
  • The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson
  • Diamond Age by Neil Stephenson
  • A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons
  • A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters by Julian Barnes
  • Drood by Dan Simmons
  • The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obrecht
  • Illywhacker by Peter Carey
  • The Kingdom of Ohio by Matthew Fleming
  • Ship Fever by Andrea Barrett
  • Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson
  • Let the Great World Spit by Colum McCann
  • The Passage by Justin Cronin
  • Confederates by Thomas Keneally
  • The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
  • Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
  • The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
  • The Bone People by Keri Hulme
  • Anil's Ghost by Michael Ondaatje
  • The Sound of Waves by Yukio Mishima
  • The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
  • Waiting by Ha Jin
  • The Gathering by Anne Enright
  • The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
  • The Magician's Assistant by Ann Patchett
  • Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
  • Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
  • The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
  • Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
  • The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos
  • Servants of the Map by Andrea Barrett
  • Close Range by Annie Proulx
  • Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin
  • White Teeth by Zadie Smith
  • Troubles by J.G. Farrell
  • Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
So that's 38 books.  And I have a few more coming in the mail that may distract me from this list.  Plus, I have some authors on there twice, so that I have options to choose from.  So I don't know if all 38 will happen or not, but I think it's a pretty good line up!

.....

Aaaaaaaand I thought I had it all set up.  Then I just had to look at my ebook collection.  Here's some more options for 2015:

  • Katherine by Anya Seton
  • Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
  • Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman
  • A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozecki
  • The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon
  • The Shadow Lines by Amitov Ghosh
  • Hounded by Kevin Hearne
  • The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga
  • The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud
  • The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal
  • Justine by Lawrence Durrell
  • Flowers from the Storm by Laura Kinsale
  • The Maid's Version by Daniel Woodrell
  • If I Stay by Gayle Forman
  • Attachments by Rainbow Rowell
  • Vampires in the Lemon Grove by Karen Russell
  • Harvest by Jim Crace
  • Brooklyn Bones by Triss Stein
So there's 18 more for a grand total of 56.  I know I won't get to them all.  There are some heavy hitters on the list, and to get over 50 there usually has to be quite a few that I can read in a day or two.  I don't like to go in predicting failure, but I'm pretty sure that's what is going to happen :)



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