# the 2010 reading challenge



## Pickman's model (Dec 24, 2009)

how many books will you read in 2010? and by read i mean cover to cover without skipping. make your estimate now and then in the new year post up your read books with the number it is, so *eg* if you think you'll read 100 books, for the first book you read in 2010, if it's 'asterix and the secret agent', post up 'asterix and the secret agent (1/100)', then if the next book is 'pride, prejudice and zombies' post up 'pride, prejudice and zombies (2/100)'


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## zenie (Dec 24, 2009)

I average one or two a week


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## Santino (Dec 24, 2009)

Probably a trillion.


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## marty21 (Dec 24, 2009)

i reckon about 30-40, tend to get through one a week on the journey in, plus a few more on holiday, might get over the 50 mark


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## Pickman's model (Dec 24, 2009)

i'll put myself down for 100.


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## tar1984 (Dec 24, 2009)

zenie said:


> I average one or two a week



I'm about the same.  

I'l say 70 for next year.

Good idea this thread.


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## Bakunin (Dec 24, 2009)

51-100 for me.


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## el-ahrairah (Dec 24, 2009)

This will be interesting.  I immediately reckoned about 50, so i'm going for that.  let's see how close i am.


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## cliche guevara (Dec 24, 2009)

I'm not reading much at the minute, so I've gone for the 11-20 bracket. I'll probably average one a month with a peak of one every few days in summer.


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## Buddy Bradley (Dec 24, 2009)

21-50. I read a lot, but recently I've been going for big thick fantasy trilogy type books, which take quite a while to get through.


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## cybertect (Dec 24, 2009)

> the 2010 reading challenge



I read it when it came out in 1982


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## soulman (Dec 24, 2009)

Pickman's model said:


> how many books will you read in 2010? and by read i mean cover to cover without skipping. make your estimate now and then in the new year post up your read books with the number it is, so *eg* if you think you'll read 100 books, for the first book you read in 2010, if it's 'asterix and the secret agent', post up 'asterix and the secret agent (1/100)', then if the next book is 'pride, prejudice and zombies' post up 'pride, prejudice and zombies (2/100)'




Oh look it's the literacy police.


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## scifisam (Dec 24, 2009)

I ticked 101-200 but it's more likely to be above that, thinking of it. I read for work and spend at least four hours a week sitting waiting for daughter while she's at stuff like Guides, then read all evening at least once a week, and am a very fast reader; in the past week or so I've read ten books, I reckon, from the pile next to the sofa. No way am I posting up the title and number - too many to keep up with. Most of the books are light, not exactly hard going, so reading that many is not exactly a feat.


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## Dirty Martini (Dec 24, 2009)

I've sped up a lot in recent years, not necessarily a good thing, and I spend most evenings reading, every bus journey, down the pub and at lunch. It's almost completrely taken over watching films for me. I reckon close to 100.


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## heinous seamus (Dec 24, 2009)

Hopefully I will beat the 2 I managed this year (so far).


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## Dillinger4 (Dec 24, 2009)

I am going to read one entire real life book.


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## Fictionist (Dec 25, 2009)

I expect to read around 51-100. Circumstances permitting.


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## gentlegreen (Dec 25, 2009)

Dillinger4 said:


> I am going to read one entire real life book.



That'll be one more than me.


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## QueenOfGoths (Dec 25, 2009)

I was reckoning on one a month but now I think it is more like two a month (I'm a slow reader with a tendency to fall asleep on trains, where i do most of my reading).

However i like the idea of keeping track of what and how much I read so I will aim for one a month and see what happens!!

Great thread


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## 5t3IIa (Dec 25, 2009)

Shit thread. It's not the quantity is it


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## QueenOfGoths (Dec 25, 2009)

5t3IIa said:


> Shit thread. It's not the quantity is it



Yeah but my quality is also pretty naff so I am looking forward to posting a small amount of shit titles


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## fractionMan (Dec 25, 2009)

If I count lil fractions books then it's in the 100s


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## Stigmata (Dec 25, 2009)

5t3IIa said:


> Shit thread. It's not the quantity is it



Kind of what I was thinking innit


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## tar1984 (Dec 25, 2009)

Good thread - it'll be fun.


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## Diamond (Dec 25, 2009)

11-20.

I read more than that in 2009 but I'm quitting student life in 2010.


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## tar1984 (Dec 25, 2009)

I might've overstimated by saying 70.  We'll see though.  Maybe 50.


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## Dirty Martini (Dec 25, 2009)

5t3IIa said:


> Shit thread. It's not the quantity is it



OP never said it was.


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## mitochondria (Dec 25, 2009)

I am sure I will read 21 but I hope to get to 50


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## Lea (Dec 25, 2009)

zenie said:


> I average one or two a week



^^ This. I also read about one or two books a week although my reading has slowed in the last couple of months. Will try to get back into reading next year.


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## colbhoy (Dec 26, 2009)

I've said 21-50 but I'm probably being quite optimistic so will aim for 21.


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## Infidel Castro (Dec 26, 2009)

21-50.  Warming up now with a few flashcards.  Come on 2010!


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## FridgeMagnet (Dec 26, 2009)

I'm not going to Reading in 2010 and I don't care how much you challenge me to.


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## Pickman's model (Jan 2, 2010)

fantomas (1/100)
insider: gerry bradley's life in the ira (2/100)


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## izz (Jan 2, 2010)

I've put myself down for 51-100 but think I'll have to revise that up.


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## pennimania (Jan 2, 2010)

101-200 but some of them will be very silly 

Right now 

Walden -Thoreau
and

Hometown Doctor - Seifert (I love doctor novels)

always have at least 2 books on the go.


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## idioteque (Jan 2, 2010)

21-50 I reckon, I've not been reading as much as usual recently but am hoping to rectify that in the near future, in which case closer to the upper end of 21-50, maybe above.


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## marty21 (Jan 3, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell

I am reading this atm btw, but will finish it, it's part of a series of novels I have been sucked into


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## DotCommunist (Jan 3, 2010)

Ken Follet has been given up on. Worse than Jeffry Archer. So thats 0/24


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## butchersapron (Jan 4, 2010)

1. Government, Party and People in Nazi germnay - edited by Jeremy Noakes
2. Marxism in the UNited States - Paul Buhle
3. Western Marxism and the Soviet Union Marcel van der Linden
I have a fourth but about 1/2 of the reading was done over xmas before finishing it in 2010. So i prob shouldn't count it.


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 4, 2010)

(1/52) Carry On, Jeeves


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 4, 2010)

butchersapron said:


> So i prob shouldn't count it.



Bung it in, it counts.


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## butchersapron (Jan 4, 2010)

Okey dokey

4. Journey to a Legend and Back: The British Realistic film - Eva Orbanz.


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## sojourner (Jan 4, 2010)

Couldn't really say.  My spare time might be all used up doing new stuff, or it might not.

I'm shit at estimating how much I'll read anyway, and I'm a fairly slow reader, as I like to go back over certain bits of writing to savour them, and then I often drift off while I mull over the ideas it has provoked in me


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## colbhoy (Jan 4, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> Bung it in, it counts.



Oh well, if overlapping 2009-10 counts, then:

Hark! by Ed McBain (1/21)


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## Onket (Jan 4, 2010)

I've gone for 21-50 which is a pretty safe bracket, imo.

Currently reading The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists- Robert Tressell.


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## Balbi (Jan 4, 2010)

A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole (1/101)


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## strung out (Jan 4, 2010)

21-50 for me. i might go for one a week, though ideally i'd like to do more than that. this could be a good project to stop me spending so much time on the internet.


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## tar1984 (Jan 4, 2010)

Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 4, 2010)

Piers Paul Read - The Templars (1/50)


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## Greebo (Jan 4, 2010)

Schokolade zum Fruehstueck, 
Love me, 
French Revolutions,
Corduroy Mansions  (4/30)


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## tar1984 (Jan 4, 2010)

Greebo said:


> Schokolade zum Fruehstueck,
> Love me,
> French Revolutions,
> Corduroy Mansions  (4/30)



In 4 days?


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## 8den (Jan 4, 2010)

Right so far due to some weird shift I've covered

The men who stare at goats (infinitely superior to the stupid film)

I'm wading through the 2008/2009 collection of  Charlie Brooker's columns. 

And the 1995/96 Diaries of Alec Guinness, which is just as you can imagine, sweet, charming, self depreciating, and incredibly polite...


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## Johnny Canuck3 (Jan 4, 2010)

I do a shitload of reading for work, so I don't have all day for free reading. I'm lucky to get through a book about every two weeks or so.


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## Lakina (Jan 4, 2010)

The Leper of Saint Giles (1/30)

warming up with some forgetable tosh


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## Lakina (Jan 4, 2010)

DotCommunist said:


> Ken Follet has been given up on. Worse than Jeffry Archer. So thats 0/24



ah, Follet.  The bad writer's bad writer.  I understand Dan Brown has a picture of Follet on the wall of his study.

Were you reading The Pillars of the Earth, by chance?

I gave up on that after about 60 pages.  Probably the worst book I've ever discovered.  He is a really bad writer.


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## tar1984 (Jan 7, 2010)

Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70)


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## zenie (Jan 7, 2010)

Does it matter that mine are nearly all going to be non-fiction?


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## Thraex (Jan 7, 2010)

^ 'course not, Zenie, they're still books aren't they? 

Me? I've put myself down for 100 but hope to read more, almost finished the second of this year. 

Good poll, Pickmans.


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## ericjarvis (Jan 7, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70)



I LOVE that book. One of my all time favourites.


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## Knotted (Jan 7, 2010)

Probably 5 or 6 - maybe a textbook or two, probably a book of short stories, possibly a short novel (although that is likely to take me more than a year to finish) and maybe one or two non-fiction books. All in all, if somebody has got something to say and they couldn't say it in a short story/article/paper/blog post, then it better be fucking amazing.


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## tar1984 (Jan 8, 2010)

Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)


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## marty21 (Jan 8, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell

moving on to no.2


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## tar1984 (Jan 8, 2010)

I might have another read of the communist manifesto to get my numbers up.


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## butchersapron (Jan 8, 2010)

5. A New Guide to Italian Cinema - Carlo Celli, Marga Cottino-Jones


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## Balbi (Jan 8, 2010)

Bryan Talbot - Alice in Sunderland (2/101)


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 12, 2010)

Oliver James - They Fuck You Up (2/50)


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## QueenOfGoths (Jan 12, 2010)

Iain M. Banks - Look To Windward - 1/10 (though I am aiming for more, honest!)


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## butchersapron (Jan 12, 2010)

6. The International Communist Movement: From Comintern to Cominform - Fernando Claudin


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Jan 13, 2010)

The Behaviour of Moths (1/61)

I'll need to get a shuffle on


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## tar1984 (Jan 15, 2010)

Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).

I'm now juggling Michael Moore's 'Dude...where's my country' and Naom Chomsky's 'For reasons of state'.


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## butchersapron (Jan 16, 2010)

7. The Stalin Revolution - edited by Robert V Daniels


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 17, 2010)

(2/52) Crime and Punishment


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## ivebeenhigh (Jan 17, 2010)

1 Superfreakonomics
2 Generation A
3 Risk - The Science and Politics of Fear

3/50 - starting on 4 this evening


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## tar1984 (Jan 17, 2010)

Michael Moore - Dude where's my country. (5/70)
Noam Chomsky - For reasons of state. (6/70)


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## strung out (Jan 18, 2010)

slow start for me 

1/50 1984 - George Orwell


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## Signal 11 (Jan 18, 2010)

An Introduction to the Sun and Stars - eds Simon Green & Mark Jones (1/11)


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 18, 2010)

Haven't updated in a week.

Kasuo Ishigora (sp?) - The Remains Of The Day (3/50)
Ursula Le Guin - The Left Hand Of Darkness (4/50)

Got 60 pages into William Golding's The Inheritors then decided this morning that it wasn't worth it.


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## sojourner (Jan 18, 2010)

Oh - are we keeping count now, on this thread?

No one told me


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## Voley (Jan 18, 2010)

I doubt I'll do well on this as I've been reading 'Homicide' for approximately eight years now. In my defence, it's a very big book.


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## sojourner (Jan 18, 2010)

Okay then

1 was the new Tom Waits biog

2 was And the Ass Saw the Angel (Nick Cave)

3 was/is the bible

4 is The American West (Dee Brown)

5 is The Gunfighters - one of the Timelife series

6 is The Loggers - another one of the Timelife series


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## sojourner (Jan 18, 2010)

NVP said:


> I doubt I'll do well on this as I've been reading 'Homicide' for approximately eight years now. In my defence, it's a very big book.



  it took me AAAAAGES to finish that, and when I had, I was upset cos I didn't wanna


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## Voley (Jan 18, 2010)

That's part of it, tbh. I'm enjoying it so much I don't want it to end. I've read a good couple of hours of it most nights for fucking ages but I'm still only two thirds through.


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## Voley (Jan 18, 2010)

And I'll have to read The Corner afterwards.


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## sojourner (Jan 18, 2010)

NVP said:


> And I'll have to read The Corner afterwards.



Even more bleak though - have you seen the tv series?


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## crustychick (Jan 18, 2010)

I'm going to aim for 20 this year. I reckon I might average 1 a month max at the mo, but allowing for the fact that I'll have finished my thesis by the end of this month, and for a few extra (I managed 3 in 09) for the summer hols. 

Started first one at Christmas and am just over half way through


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## Hulot (Jan 18, 2010)

I set myself a target of a book a week as a new year's resolution a few years ago. I found myself deliberately choosing thin books to keep myself on target, so I deliberately stymied myself by picking up a couple of dense, heavyweight tomes from the eighteenth century - Smollett, that sort of thing, which took several weeks each. Still managed something in the high forties.

I'm only counting books read entirely for recreation.


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## butchersapron (Jan 18, 2010)

8. The American Labor Movement - edited by Daniel Brody.


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## madamv (Jan 18, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> (2/52) Crime and Punishment



Best. Book. Ever.

4/100  Harlen Coben.  One False Move.   (I have a thing for trashy cop novels this month it seems)


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## Lakina (Jan 18, 2010)

2/30 the spoilt city by Olivia manning.  Romania gets invaded.  British people bitch at each other.


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## Lakina (Jan 18, 2010)

NVP said:


> I doubt I'll do well on this as I've been reading 'Homicide' for approximately eight years now. In my defence, it's a very big book.



 I love that book. Everthing is so real you can just reach out and touch it.


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## sojourner (Jan 19, 2010)

7 - Women, by Charles Bukowski


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 19, 2010)

madamv said:


> Best. Book. Ever.



Mmm, not for me. I think it's great and all, it'd be churlish not to think so, but, fuck, it dragged in the middle. Certain passages did burn me up, but on the whole I think The Idiot is better (not read Karamazov yet).


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## Biddlybee (Jan 19, 2010)

Where does everyone find the time to read a book a week? 

I need more time dammit!


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## Voley (Jan 19, 2010)

sojourner said:


> Even more bleak though - have you seen the tv series?


The Wire? Yeah. Or is there something else I've not heard about?


Lakina said:


> I love that book. Everthing is so real you can just reach out and touch it.


Yeah, it's brilliant. The way he describes the dynamics of the office, the pisstaking and the despair at having open cases is rivetting.


sojourner said:


> 7 - Women, by Charles Bukowski


Long while since I read that but remember enjoying it. I think Ham On Rye is my favourite of his although Post Office impressed due to his unerring ability to avoid doing anything and get blind pissed instead.


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## sojourner (Jan 20, 2010)

NVP said:


> The Wire? Yeah. Or is there something else I've not heard about?
> 
> Long while since I read that but remember enjoying it. I think Ham On Rye is my favourite of his although Post Office impressed due to his unerring ability to avoid doing anything and get blind pissed instead.



No, the Corner, the one I quoted, you berk 

Well, Women is okay, but am more looking forward to the short story collection.  Love short stories, and wanna see what he does with them.


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 20, 2010)

Spike Milligan - Adolf Hitler, My Part In His Downfall (5/50)
CS Lewis - The Magician's Nephew (6/50)

Although given that neither of those are exactly challenges I feel a little guilty about counting them towards my total.  

Started reading The Second Virago Book of Fairy Tales, but the tone is utterly insipid.  Angela Carter's lovely style is completely absent from her editing.  Not sure I'll continue beyond my commute home.


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Jan 20, 2010)

99% Ape (2/62) which I feel is slightly cheating, given that it is a textbook. Decent starter on evolution though.


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## Lincoln Rhyme (Jan 20, 2010)

Probably 27 would be my guess. I usually read almost 30, every year.


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## sojourner (Jan 21, 2010)

8 - Tales of Ordinary Madness, Charles Bukowski


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 21, 2010)

(3/52) Fear & Loathing in Fitzrovia


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## Voley (Jan 21, 2010)

sojourner said:


> No, the Corner, the one I quoted, you berk



Never heard of that before.


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## toggle (Jan 21, 2010)

BiddlyBee said:


> Where does everyone find the time to read a book a week?
> 
> I need more time dammit!



i'm pissed off with myself if i don't read 4 a week, i aim for 5. but i'm a history student atm, so reading books is what i supposed to be doing.


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## sojourner (Jan 22, 2010)

NVP said:


> And I'll have to read The Corner afterwards.





sojourner said:


> Even more bleak though - have you seen the tv series?





NVP said:


> The Wire? Yeah. Or is there something else I've not heard about?





sojourner said:


> No, the Corner, the one I quoted, you berk





NVP said:


> Never heard of that before.




you taking the piss?


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 22, 2010)

Duncan Campbell - The Paradise Trail (7/50)

Good read that, thanks to zora for recommending it to me.


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## Cheesypoof (Jan 23, 2010)

sojourner said:


> 7 - Women, by Charles Bukowski



women is a fantastic book.


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## butchersapron (Jan 23, 2010)

9. Stalinism In France - Tom Kemp


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## Cheesypoof (Jan 23, 2010)

Balbi said:


> A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole (1/101)




i finished that book today! Incredible. Absolutely outstanding.


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## pennimania (Jan 23, 2010)

I finished Walden 

Counting that as 1

2 Day of the Triffid
3 The Kraken Wakes - very scary climate change scenario which really got me going as it was in the cold spell
4 The Chrysalids - all these by John Wyndham- prompted by the TV adaptation of Triffids, my husband had them all from his teenage scifi days
5 Jewel in the Crown
6 Division of the Spoils - books 1 &4 of the Raj quartet, (Paul Scott) again prompted by Sky rerunning it on TV. Have dipped into the 2 middle books as well. Need to reread it properly.
7 Because Cowards get Cancer Too - John Diamond - very moving yet funny. Kept me awake last night cos I had to finish it.

I am not counting the JillY Cooper, Fanny Cradock, Elizabeth Seifert that I use as mental chewing gum.


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## Cheesypoof (Jan 23, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 7 Because Cowards get Cancer Too - John Diamond - very moving yet funny. Kept me awake last night cos I had to finish it.



would love to read that, will order it


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## pennimania (Jan 23, 2010)

Cheesypoof said:


> would love to read that, will order it



I got it for 1p plus postage from Amazon.

I am an Amazon Junkie   and as i live in the back of beyond I read a LOT and those sexy brown cardboard packages make my fucking day!


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## Cheesypoof (Jan 23, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I got it for 1p plus postage from Amazon.
> 
> I am an Amazon Junkie   and as i live in the back of beyond I read a LOT and those sexy brown cardboard packages make my fucking day!



me too!!!! 

*high five*


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## pennimania (Jan 23, 2010)

Cheesypoof said:


> me too!!!!
> 
> *high five*




never dreamt I would have a high five with cheesy 

I am not worthy


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## toggle (Jan 23, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I got it for 1p plus postage from Amazon.
> 
> I am an Amazon Junkie   and as i live in the back of beyond I read a LOT and those sexy brown cardboard packages make my fucking day!




i don't do amazon much.

but i do abe books a lot.

and bookmooch.

i have a serious bookmooch habit


http://bookmooch.com/m/inventory/toggle


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## sojourner (Jan 25, 2010)

9 - Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - Dee Brown


Heartbreaking


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## QueenOfGoths (Jan 25, 2010)

The Grave Tattoo - a bit dull  (2/10)


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## el-ahrairah (Jan 25, 2010)

Spike Milligan - Rommel? Gunner Who? (8/50)


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Jan 26, 2010)

Penelope Mortimer - The Pumpkin Eater (3/62)

S'alright but a bit muddled


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## starfish (Jan 26, 2010)

Between 21-50. Am on my 3rd one.


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## imposs1904 (Jan 27, 2010)

Nice thread. 

If I read 30 books this year I'll be happy. 

It'll mostly be fiction and there'll be a few rereads. I don't consider that cheating. I've got the memory of a goldfish and I can reread a book as if I've never read it before.

Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now: My Difficult 80s by Andrew Collins *(1/30)*
Darkness, Take My Hand by Dennis Lehane *(2/30)*
Candide by Voltaire *(3/30)*


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## Mrs Magpie (Jan 27, 2010)

Only just seen this thread...it's a good one...trying to remember what I've read since Jan 1st...going to pootle off and make a list as best I can.....


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## Mrs Magpie (Jan 27, 2010)

1/100 In The Woods - Tana French
2/100 Forgotten Fruits - Christopher Stocks
3/100 The Brother Gardeners - Andrea Wulf
4/100 Heshel's Kingdom - Dan Jacobson
5/100 The Children's Book - AS Byatt
6/100 Dazzled and Deceived - Peter Forbes
7/100 I Never Knew That About England - Christopher Winn
8/100 Islam; A Short History - Karen Armstrong
9/100 Private Eyes - Jonathan Kellerman
10/100 When The Bough Breaks - Jonathan Kellerman
11/100 Macbeth - William Shakespeare*
12/100 Cat - Katharine M Rogers
13/100 Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare*
14/100 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck*
15/100 How To Lie With Statistics - Darrell Huff*

The ones that are asterisked are ones I've read for and in work. Presumably they still count.
I've got two books on the go right now but I won't mention them in case I don't finish 'em....I had estimated I'd read about 10 or 11 so I'm quite surprised. I may have forgotten a couple and I haven't included ones that I can't quite remember whether I read them in December or January....


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## Mrs Magpie (Jan 27, 2010)

I forgot one!
16/100
52 Ways of Looking at a Poem: How Reading Modern Poetry Can Change Your Life  - Ruth Padel

I have bought quite a lot of poetry this year but I haven't included them because I can't say I've read every single poem in them. I've also read a lot of short stories and quite large chunks of reference and text books too but I've not included any of them either


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## Voley (Jan 28, 2010)

1/25 Homicide: A Year On The Killing Streets - David Simon.

Finally finished it. I've read one book and it's nearly February. My target of 25 looks unlikely.


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## Voley (Jan 28, 2010)

sojourner said:


> you taking the piss?



No, I never knew it was a telly series. I was out of the country for a few years.


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## sojourner (Jan 28, 2010)

NVP said:


> No, I never knew it was a telly series. I was out of the country for a few years.



Let you off then


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## marty21 (Jan 28, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor


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## Thraex (Jan 28, 2010)

Book 9 (The Good Fairies of New York) will be done and dusted today; Book 10 will be "F**k It".


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## Voley (Jan 28, 2010)

(2/25) Conspicuous Compassion - Patrick West. A *very short book* to get my average back on track.


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## Mrs Magpie (Jan 28, 2010)

Forgot another one
17/100 Genesis -Robert Crumb (if this doesn't count there is no justice).


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## Mrs Magpie (Jan 28, 2010)

D'oh! Got the numbering wrong because I didn't read the first post properly 
I blame a very tough day at work and also that I have developed cataracts.


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## pennimania (Jan 28, 2010)

Do cookery garden books count?

Just finished Tender by Nigel Slater.  I love his stuff but this book is literally physically too large to read comfortably.

As is Stanley Spencer, the Entire Catalogue which I have been dipping in and out of for several weeks.

need a hydraulic lift to hold it up 

Not sure what number I'm on now.


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## Voley (Jan 28, 2010)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Forgot another one
> 17/10 Genesis -Robert Crumb (if this doesn't count there is no justice).



Never heard of that before, ta for the heads up. Sounds interesting. I've always had a soft spot for Crumb's deeply warped take on things.

Sorry to hear about the cataracts btw.


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 30, 2010)

(4/52) Bright Young People: The Rise & Fall of a Generation 1918-1940


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## pennimania (Jan 30, 2010)

8 The Rack A E Ellis
9  The Painted Veil W Somerset Maugham -re read, still brilliant, much better than The Rack.
10 Tender (as mentioned but not counted before)
11 Stanley Spencer - ditto


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## Dirty Martini (Jan 30, 2010)

NVP said:


> (2/25) A *very short book* to get my average back on track.





pennimania said:


> (as mentioned but not counted before)



ALL sorts of shady business going on in this thread  Love it.


----------



## ericjarvis (Jan 30, 2010)

Up to the end of the first month...12.

The Book Thief - Markus Zuzak
Be Cool - Elmore Leonard
Saturn's Children - Charlie Stross
Shame - Jasvinder Sanghera
Where Angels Fear To Tread - E.M. Forster
Memory - Linda Nagata
Berlin Game - Len Deighton
Mexico Set - Len Deighton
Master And Commander - Patrick O'Brian
Downbelow Station - CJ Cherryh
London Match - Len Deighton
The Fall - Albert Camus


----------



## tar1984 (Jan 30, 2010)

Comrades, I regret to inform I haven't read a book for almost two weeks.  I have now acquired one out of the library and will be back on track shortly.


----------



## Signal 11 (Jan 31, 2010)

Green Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson (2/11)


----------



## girasol (Jan 31, 2010)

6


----------



## Infidel Castro (Jan 31, 2010)

Infidel Castro said:


> 21-50.  Warming up now with a few flashcards.  Come on 2010!



You know what?  I'm still on my first book.  I've been playing Final Fantasy on the PSP and lost 50hrs to gameplay.  Shocking stuff really.  I've gone right off the boil and my target is looking VERY shaky now.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jan 31, 2010)

4/62. A short history of tractors in Ukranian. As i feared, the title was the best thing about it.


----------



## madamv (Jan 31, 2010)

I picked that up in the library and put it straight back down...   Glad to see I havent missed anything 

5/100 The Clothes on Their Backs - Linda Grant
6/100  What Was Lost  - Catherine O'Flynn


----------



## pennimania (Jan 31, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 4/62. A short history of tractors in Ukranian. As i feared, the title was the best thing about it.




it's dreadful isn't it?


----------



## pennimania (Jan 31, 2010)

madamv said:


> 6/100  What Was Lost  - Catherine O'Flynn



that's my mate's little sister!!!


----------



## Mrs Magpie (Jan 31, 2010)

NVP said:


> Never heard of that before, ta for the heads up. Sounds interesting. I've always had a soft spot for Crumb's deeply warped take on things.
> 
> Sorry to hear about the cataracts btw.


It's brilliant. He's basically illustrated the book of Genesis. It's really good....and the cataracts are OK at the moment...as soon as I can't read any more I'm having the op and it can be done in an afternoon and will be very simple. I'm well used to eye ops so I'm not even nervous. The only bad bit was when I didn't know what was happening to my sight (which wasn't A1 to begin with although what I had was good) so finding out what it was (and that it was nothing more sinister) was a great relief.


----------



## madamv (Jan 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> that's my mate's little sister!!!



Tres


----------



## sojourner (Feb 1, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 4/62. A short history of tractors in Ukranian. As i feared, the title was the best thing about it.





pennimania said:


> it's dreadful isn't it?



Oh I quite liked that!

I expect OU will be along shortly to say that the writer is his mum's best mate (she is )


----------



## 5t3IIa (Feb 1, 2010)

I've read a book and started another.


----------



## temper_tantrum (Feb 1, 2010)

pennimania said:


> that's my mate's little sister!!!



Really?  I fuckin' love that book. I've attempted to force-feed it to just about everyone I know. *hero-worship*

(Would love to join this thread but unfortunately all my spare reading time is going to be spent on oceanography textbooks and papers on volcanology this year I'm afraid).


----------



## colbhoy (Feb 1, 2010)

Just finished No Safe Place by Richard North Patterson (2/21).

Started Papillon today.


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 1, 2010)

PJ O'Rourke - All The Trouble In The World (9/50)
Spike Milligan - Monty: My part In His Victory (10/50)
Ryu Murakami - Pierced (11/50)


----------



## girasol (Feb 1, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> Just finished No Safe Place by Richard North Patterson (2/21).
> 
> Started Papillon today.



I read it when I was very young and remember loving it so much!  

A hora da estrela - Clarice Lispector(1/6)
How to be Free -Tom Hodgkinson (2/6)

I abandoned quite a few books last year, so I'm setting myself an achievable target.


----------



## marty21 (Feb 2, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
> 2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor



3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell


----------



## Infidel Castro (Feb 2, 2010)

_1/21 - Unseen Acamedicals, Terry Pratchett._

It took me about 36 days to finish off this one, sadly because it was a little bit shit.  I had to finish it and I remain a staunch Pratchett fan, but this was just a step too far for me.

Fortunately I'm on _Other People_ now, by Martin Amis.  A breath of fresh air.  I'll be flying soon.


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 2, 2010)

Infidel Castro said:


> _1/21 - Unseen Acamedicals, Terry Pratchett._
> 
> It took me about 36 days to finish off this one, sadly because it was a little bit shit.  I had to finish it and I remain a staunch Pratchett fan, but this was just a step too far for me.



I'm dissapointed to hear that.  I was planning to read that at some point.  

I've just started reading 'Darwins Watch', having enjoyed the other sciencey roundworld tales.  I'm also going to read 'hogfather' because it's one of the few pratchett books i've not read for some reason.


----------



## DotCommunist (Feb 2, 2010)

Don't bother with the TV adapt for hogfather it is shite


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 2, 2010)

Yeah, it looks shit.  David jason ffs.


----------



## ericjarvis (Feb 2, 2010)

DotCommunist said:


> Don't bother with the TV adapt for hogfather it is shite



I thought it was superb. Far better than I expected. Michelle Dockery and Marc Warren were utterly brilliant. Nicely done script too. I don't see how it can be faulted.


----------



## Infidel Castro (Feb 3, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> I'm dissapointed to hear that.  I was planning to read that at some point.
> 
> I've just started reading 'Darwins Watch', having enjoyed the other sciencey roundworld tales.  I'm also going to read 'hogfather' because it's one of the few pratchett books i've not read for some reason.



It's solid enough in the main, but the attempt at dealing with a 'foot the ball' match is dire.  A big let down.  Still, 36 days is a long time to be reading one book.  I'll shoulder the lion's share of the blame on that score (and the PSP can have the rest shared equally with the book not being up to much).


----------



## 5t3IIa (Feb 3, 2010)

Just bought a paperback about Rose West and an unauthorised biography of Guns n Roses from the work Haiti fundraising table. Knicker each. 

I may or may not read them.


----------



## pennimania (Feb 3, 2010)

12 (I think) Catalina W Somerset Muagham - started well. Got a bit fed up with it.

I am currently exploring a shelf of very old Penguins that have been recently exhumed from our container.

It's Antic Hay by Aldous Huxley now. Loving it.


----------



## Cerberus (Feb 3, 2010)

1) Scarlett Thomas - The End of Mr Y
2) Hannah Arendt - On Violence
3) Chinua Achebe - Things Fall Apart
4) John Le Carre - Single & Single

On target for somewhere near 40 to 50...


----------



## girasol (Feb 4, 2010)

For the people who read so many books, do you actually remember any of it? 

Even when i was a young'un and had more reading time available, I liked to have a little rest between books to absorb them and think about them.


----------



## ericjarvis (Feb 4, 2010)

Iemanja said:


> For the people who read so many books, do you actually remember any of it?
> 
> Even when i was a young'un and had more reading time available, I liked to have a little rest between books to absorb them and think about them.



Yes. I remember a fair amount if the book is good, and with a really good book I remember most of it.

We all work in different ways. I generally have faith that my memory will pick up anything that matters, and then I process it all unconsciously. So very often I'll suddenly have an insight into something from a book I read weeks ago. Useful in terms of simply soaking up loads of information and then integrating it into a world view, not a lot of use when it came to academic study of a subject.


----------



## pennimania (Feb 4, 2010)

Iemanja said:


> For the people who read so many books, do you actually remember any of it?
> 
> Even when i was a young'un and had more reading time available, I liked to have a little rest between books to absorb them and think about them.



TBH I think often not.

BUT I do a huge amount of rereading.  I read so fast that I gulp down books I'm enjoying, often staying awake to finish them. Just done this with 'The Bell Jar', can't believe I never read it before.

so anyway

12 Antic Hay
13 The Bell Jar


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 5, 2010)

(5/52) Jane Eyre


----------



## sojourner (Feb 5, 2010)

10 

Andrew Collins - Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Feb 5, 2010)

Best Served Cold - Joe Abercrombie (3/10). Good fantasy style novel commenting on loyalty and revenge


----------



## pennimania (Feb 6, 2010)

14- The Diana Chronicles - Tina Brown - ashamed to say I thoroughly enjoyed this.  It made me hate both sides even more than I already did.


----------



## marty21 (Feb 7, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell



4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cormwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 9, 2010)

Terry Pratchett - Darwins Watch. (7/70)


----------



## pennimania (Feb 9, 2010)

15 Three Women Marge Piercy
16 Sleeping With Cats ditto


----------



## Signal 11 (Feb 9, 2010)

Climate Cover Up: The Crusade To Deny Global Warming - James Hoggan & Richard Littlemore (3/11)


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 9, 2010)

Spike Milligan - Mussolini: His Part In My Downfall (12/50)

Then I read the first 80 or pages of Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse before concluding that I really didn't give a toss about the lighthouse or any of the people who may or may not be visiting it in the near future.


----------



## Voley (Feb 10, 2010)

(3/25) Keith Richards - Victor Bockris



Dirty Martini said:


> ALL sorts of shady business going on in this thread  Love it.



Starting 'Anarchism: A *Very Short* Introduction' now. The title appealed to me for some reason.


----------



## imposs1904 (Feb 10, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Nice thread.
> 
> If I read 30 books this year I'll be happy.
> 
> ...



Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby *(4/30)*


----------



## marty21 (Feb 10, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell[/QUOTE]
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean (half way through, but it's my second time reading it)


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 10, 2010)

Bet Bernard Cornwell was a bit peeved when a 'Bernard Cormwell' turned up on the scene


----------



## marty21 (Feb 10, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> Bet Bernard Cornwell was a bit peeved when a 'Bernard Cormwell' turned up on the scene





edited now


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 10, 2010)

marty21 said:


> edited now





Be a good marketing strategy though

*wanders off to see if Dan Browm is taken*


----------



## sojourner (Feb 11, 2010)

11 

Willa Cather - O Pioneers!


----------



## fractionMan (Feb 11, 2010)

I've just read two books weighing in at 1200 pages each.  

I think this should be done on weight not number.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 12, 2010)

(6/52) _We Danced All Night: A Social History of Britain Between The Wars_


----------



## zenie (Feb 12, 2010)

Iemanja said:


> For the people who read so many books, do you actually remember any of it?
> 
> Even when i was a young'un and had more reading time available, I liked to have a little rest between books to absorb them and think about them.


 

Yes I have to write essays on the subject after 

Will tally mine up later, I think I'm up to about 8 now.


----------



## Onket (Feb 12, 2010)

I'm on my second.


----------



## zenie (Feb 12, 2010)

Well the one I'm currently reading is fiction and seems to be a bit of a 'self help' book.  (I got given it )


----------



## Onket (Feb 12, 2010)

I'v still got one of your books, actually.


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 12, 2010)

I'm reading two books simultaneously - a 'Hogfather' by Terry Pratchett and 'microserfs' by Douglas Coupland.


----------



## Onket (Feb 12, 2010)

One with each eye?


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 12, 2010)

Ha.  'Simultaneously' was the wrong word.  I am alternating between two books.


----------



## Voley (Feb 12, 2010)

zenie said:


> Well the one I'm currently reading is fiction and seems to be a bit of a 'self help' book.  (I got given it )



Giving someone a self-help book? Asking for a slap, imo.


----------



## Signal 11 (Feb 13, 2010)

Riding Rockets - Mike Mullane (4/11)


----------



## pennimania (Feb 14, 2010)

17 A Life of Contrasts - Diana Mitford
18 The Pursuit of Laughter ditto (includes bits lifted from the above)

shocking woman but hilarious none the less. Worth reading for her description of Lady Evelyn Guiness her MIL alone - a true mentalist


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 14, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 17 A Life of Contrasts - Diana Mitford
> 18 The Pursuit of Laughter ditto (includes bits lifted from the above)
> 
> shocking woman but hilarious none the less. Worth reading for her description of Lady Evelyn Guiness her MIL alone - a true mentalist



I think you'd enjoy _Bright Young People_ by DJ Taylor -- a close look at that set in the 1920s and 30s.


----------



## pennimania (Feb 14, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> I think you'd enjoy _Bright Young People_ by DJ Taylor -- a close look at that set in the 1920s and 30s.



Thanks for that - I'm really interested in that era at the moment


----------



## tastebud (Feb 14, 2010)

there are a few posters that clearly spend their entire lives reading either urban or a book!
my average is probably one a week. i would like it to be more but i never seem to manage it - unless i am travelling.


----------



## pennimania (Feb 14, 2010)

tastebud said:


> there are a few posters that clearly spend their entire lives reading either urban or a book!
> my average is probably one a week. i would like it to be more but i never seem to manage it - unless i am travelling.



I sleep very badly, so often read late at night.

however, I also read while having a bath, cooking and such like.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 15, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Thanks for that - I'm really interested in that era at the moment



Me too, plus the 40s


----------



## pennimania (Feb 15, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> Me too, plus the 40s




And me 

I suppose you've read all those books based on the Mass Observation stuff?

Our Hidden Lives, Austerity Britain and the wonderful Nella Last Diaries?


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 15, 2010)

Terry Pratchett - Hogfather (8/70).
Douglas Coupland - Microserfs (9/70).

I think I'll look out more coupland stuff, he's pretty good.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 15, 2010)

pennimania said:


> And me
> 
> I suppose you've read all those books based on the Mass Observation stuff?
> 
> Our Hidden Lives, Austerity Britain and the wonderful Nella Last Diaries?



Not yet -- I'll have to relieve my dad of his copy of Our Hidden Lives next time I'm over there, and Austerity Britain's on the list. It's a fairly recent enthusiasm for me, although I've been reading the fiction of the period for years.

Get yourself some Julian Maclaren-Ross for the 40s, if you haven't already, particularly the memoirs


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Feb 15, 2010)

5/62 The Colour Purple - Alice Walker
6/62 Starter for Ten - David Nicholls


----------



## pennimania (Feb 15, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> Not yet -- I'll have to relieve my dad of his copy of Our Hidden Lives next time I'm over there, and Austerity Britain's on the list. It's a fairly recent enthusiasm for me, although I've been reading the fiction of the period for years.
> 
> Get yourself some Julian Maclaren-Ross for the 40s, if you haven't already, particularly the memoirs




Ordered the memoirs! thanks  I've always had a thing for the 40's, I even knit snoods 

And I love wartime films - just watched Millions Like Us again.

Oh yes

17- The Road Cormac McCarthy


----------



## imposs1904 (Feb 16, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby *(4/30)*



Aberystwyth Mon Amour by Malcolm Pryce *(5/30)*


----------



## Cerberus (Feb 16, 2010)

5) Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
6) Arthur Koestler - Darkness at Noon
7) Jean Teule - The Suicide Shop


----------



## Voley (Feb 16, 2010)

(4/25) 'Anarchism: A Very Short Introduction' - Colin Ward


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 17, 2010)

(7/52) _Selected Stories_, Julian Maclaren-Ross


----------



## xes (Feb 17, 2010)

So far I've managed about 20 pages of 1 book


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 17, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Spike Milligan - Mussolini: His Part In My Downfall (12/50)
> 
> Then I read the first 80 or pages of Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse before concluding that I really didn't give a toss about the lighthouse or any of the people who may or may not be visiting it in the near future.



Since then I have read:

Iain M Banks - Excession (13/50)
Cory Doctorow - Little Brother (14/50)
Iain M Banks - Look To Windward (15/50)

Now I'm reading and loving Ian McEwan's Atonement


----------



## Infidel Castro (Feb 17, 2010)

Infidel Castro said:


> _1/21 - Unseen Academicals, Terry Pratchett._
> 
> It took me about 36 days to finish off this one, sadly because it was a little bit shit.  I had to finish it and I remain a staunch Pratchett fan, but this was just a step too far for me.
> 
> Fortunately I'm on _Other People_ now, by Martin Amis.  A breath of fresh air.  I'll be flying soon.



2/21 - _Other People_, Martin Amis
3/21 - _The Road_, Cormac McCarthy

Two good books, though I'm probably going to have to have a long hard think about the Amis one.  There's a lot to be uncovered in a re-read.


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Feb 17, 2010)

"Let The Right One In" - excellent (4/10)


----------



## fractionMan (Feb 17, 2010)

Now reading Diaspora - greg egan & another one by the same author.


----------



## fractionMan (Feb 17, 2010)

Can I count half of a book?

I read half of some academic text about the use of fairytale intertexts in modern fiction.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 17, 2010)

You'll have to read half of another book. Halves get rounded down at the end of the year. At least, this is what I'll be recommending to the commission.


----------



## Signal 11 (Feb 18, 2010)

The Day We Found The Universe - Marcia Bartusiak (5/11)


----------



## sojourner (Feb 18, 2010)

12 - Ham on Rye - Charles Bukowski


----------



## Thraex (Feb 18, 2010)

15: Vicious: Too Fast To Live; Alan Parker
16: (current) Lonely Werewolf Girl; Martin Millar.


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 19, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Since then I have read:
> 
> Iain M Banks - Excession (13/50)
> Cory Doctorow - Little Brother (14/50)
> ...



Realised I forgot one as well as just finished Atonement (which, incidentally, made me weep like a small child  )

Stuart Maconie - Pies and Prejudice (16/50)
Ian McEwan - Atonement (17/50)


----------



## sojourner (Feb 19, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Stuart Maconie - Pies and Prejudice (16/50)



Great book that.  I loved all the namechecking of places I've lived in


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 19, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> Michael Moore - Dude where's my country. (5/70)
> ...



Douglas Coupland - J-pod (10/70).


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 19, 2010)

That's 10 books in 50 days.  Which means at this rate I should reach 70 in 350 days.


----------



## pennimania (Feb 19, 2010)

18 - Shadows Over castle Rising - Fanny Cradock 

but I HAD to have an antidote to 'The Road' - I mean I was retching and thinking about gnawed bones ALL the time.

And it sure worked 

But now I'm reading Thunder Over Castle Rising and there's really no excuse


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 19, 2010)

sojourner said:


> Great book that.  I loved all the namechecking of places I've lived in



It was great.  Made me realise how fucking south-centric my knowledge of england is.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Feb 19, 2010)

7/62 Watchmen


----------



## Red Horse (Feb 20, 2010)

Cerberus said:


> 5) Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
> 6) Arthur Koestler - Darkness at Noon
> 7) Jean Teule - The Suicide Shop



Mmmm, that's a nice fat depression-fest you've got there.

A day in the life of Ivan Denisovich= got up in minus 40 weather, worked 18 hours, had a bowl of cabbage soup, made a shiv from mouse bones, went to bed in minus 50 weather.


----------



## imposs1904 (Feb 20, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Aberystwyth Mon Amour by Malcolm Pryce *(5/30)*



Let It Bleed by Ian Rankin *(6/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Feb 20, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 18 - Shadows Over castle Rising - Fanny Cradock
> 
> but I HAD to have an antidote to 'The Road' - I mean I was retching and thinking about gnawed bones ALL the time.
> 
> ...




I'm now rereading the Road and wishing I wasn't - everyone in the house is fighting over it 

19 Thunder Over Castle Rising as above 

20 Medieval People - Eileen Power


----------



## girasol (Feb 21, 2010)

Iemanja said:


> A hora da estrela - Clarice Lispector(1/6)
> How to be Free -Tom Hodgkinson (2/6)



1984 - a lot darker than I remember, but couldn't put it down until I finished it
The one straw revolution - Masonobu Fukuoka


----------



## Cid (Feb 21, 2010)

I'm doing so badly at the moment, not one book read this year... Working too much, don't often come home before 10pm.


----------



## sojourner (Feb 22, 2010)

13

Swag, by Elmore Leonard


----------



## fractionMan (Feb 22, 2010)

Now on number 4 (I think) - axiomatic by greg egan.


----------



## DotCommunist (Feb 22, 2010)

^^^ top book that. The Infinite Assassin is the best piece in it IMHO


----------



## fractionMan (Feb 22, 2010)

DotCommunist said:


> ^^^ top book that. The Infinite Assassin is the best piece in it IMHO



Only just started reading his stuff and I'm really enjoying it.  Found 5 or so of his books in a charity shop   You read diaspora?


----------



## DotCommunist (Feb 22, 2010)

yeah, found it hard work. Bit too cerebral and I couldn't like the charachters. His short work is proper good hard SF though. Lucky find man, what tool gives away 5 Egan books?


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 22, 2010)

sojourner said:


> 13
> 
> Swag, by Elmore Leonard


----------



## Tacita (Feb 22, 2010)

1/50	Belching Out The Devil – Mark Thomas
2/50	The Remains Of The Day - Kazuo Ishiguro 
3/50	Pies And Prejudice - Stuart Maconie 
4/50	Cotters And Squatters Colin Ward
5/50	Permaculture In A Nutshell – Patrick Whitefield
6/50	Red Herrings And White Elephants – Albert Jack
7/50	The Good Women Of China – Xinran
8/50	Trotsky’s Writings On Britain 
9/50	Sepulchre – Kate Mosse 
10/50	Of Mice And Men - John Steinbeck
11/50	Planet Of Slums – Mike Davies
12/50	Ten Days That Shook The World – John Reed
13/50	Allicin: The Heart Of Garlic – Peter Joslin
14/50	Ground Control – Hannah Minton

so far, so lacking in humour. In my defence, I devoured the Alison Bechdel, 'Dykes' series (again) over christmas.


----------



## Biddlybee (Feb 22, 2010)

I'm ¾ of the way through my first book of the year


----------



## Voley (Feb 22, 2010)

(5/25) The Decline Of The English Murder and other essays - George Orwell


----------



## sojourner (Feb 22, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


>



It's already had me snorting with laughter a few times 

I fucking LOVE Elmore Leonard


----------



## sojourner (Feb 22, 2010)

Tacita said:


> 7/50	The Good Women Of China – Xinran



I'm trying to get my daughter to read that at the moment.  She often asks for recommendations from my bookshelves, so this is next up.

Heartbreaking and eye-opening.  I intend to re-read it at some point.


----------



## Cid (Feb 22, 2010)

It probably doesn't help that my current reading list is as follows:

Modern Architecture: A critical history (Kenneth Frampton)

Studies in Tectonic Culture: The Poetics of Construction in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Architecture (Kenneth Frampton) 

Capital (Marx)



Should probably put some fiction in there somewhere.


----------



## sojourner (Feb 22, 2010)

^ christ yeh - you do need some fiction


----------



## tar1984 (Feb 22, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> Michael Moore - Dude where's my country. (5/70)
> ...



Douglas Coupland - Miss Wyoming (11/70).


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 23, 2010)

sojourner said:


> It's already had me snorting with laughter a few times
> 
> I fucking LOVE Elmore Leonard



His _10 Rules of Writing_ is out next month 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for-writing-fiction-part-one


----------



## sojourner (Feb 23, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> His _10 Rules of Writing_ is out next month
> 
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for-writing-fiction-part-one



Am gonna get that!

I remember this one:  Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.


----------



## girasol (Feb 23, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Douglas Coupland - Miss Wyoming (11/70).



I really don't get Douglas Coupland, I read a few of his books and none of them worked for me...  Maybe I'm too old.

Worse still, I'm sure I posted this very same thing somewhere on urban, but hopefully not on this thread 

I downloaded one of those apps that have 101 classics to the ipod and today I started reading The Picture of Dorian Gray (again, I read it many years ago).  So many books so little time!


----------



## Mrs Magpie (Feb 23, 2010)

18/100 Shakespeare's Wife - Germaine Greer
19/100 In Beginning Was The Worm - Andrew Brown


----------



## Dirty Martini (Feb 24, 2010)

(8/52) Tess of the D'Urbervilles


----------



## Thraex (Feb 24, 2010)

19/80 Junky - William Burroughs


----------



## el-ahrairah (Feb 24, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Realised I forgot one as well as just finished Atonement (which, incidentally, made me weep like a small child  )
> 
> Stuart Maconie - Pies and Prejudice (16/50)
> Ian McEwan - Atonement (17/50)



Matthew Collin & John Godfrey - Altered State: The Story of Ecstacy Culture and Acid House (18/50)

I've had this almost since it came out meaning to read it.  It wasn't worth the wait.


----------



## marty21 (Feb 24, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell[/QUOTE]
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean
7/50 Man Walks into Pub - A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown - fascinating book, makes me want to go to pubs more


----------



## pennimania (Feb 24, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I'm now rereading the Road and wishing I wasn't - everyone in the house is fighting over it
> 
> 19 Thunder Over Castle Rising as above
> 
> 20 Medieval People - Eileen Power




21 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold - daughter's recommendation - not too impressed.

22 The Secret Life of France -Lucy Wadham


----------



## imposs1904 (Feb 26, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Let It Bleed by Ian Rankin *(6/30)*



No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July *(7/30)*


----------



## sojourner (Feb 26, 2010)

14

Peter Carey - True History of the Kelly Gang


----------



## Voley (Feb 28, 2010)

(6/25) Moab Is My Washpot - Stephen Fry


----------



## Pickman's model (Feb 28, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> fantomas (1/100)
> insider: gerry bradley's life in the ira (2/100)


the spy who came in from the cold (3/100)
the kingdom of this world (4/100)
devices and desires (5/100)
evil for evil (6/100)
the escapement (7/100)


----------



## Pickman's model (Feb 28, 2010)

our lady of darkness (8/100)


----------



## marty21 (Feb 28, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell[/QUOTE]
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean
7/50 Man Walks into Pub - A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown 
8/50 The Sharp End: The Fighting Man in World War II - John Ellis


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Feb 28, 2010)

8/62 Chuck Palahniuk "Invisible Monsters"


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 1, 2010)

(9/52) Through A Glass Darkly: The Life of Patrick Hamilton


----------



## pennimania (Mar 1, 2010)

23 The Letters of Evelyn Waugh -  gosh what a beastly man!  but absolutely unput downable


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 1, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 23 The Letters of Evelyn Waugh -  gosh what a beastly man!  but absolutely unput downable



A hideously unpleasant individual indeed, but a great prose writer 

I love the fact that his first wife was also called Evelyn.


----------



## pennimania (Mar 1, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> A hideously unpleasant individual indeed, but a great prose writer
> 
> I love the fact that his first wife was also called Evelyn.



she didn't put up with him for long!!

No doubt at all - he was vile but I do love his books and his letters were hilarious and illuminating.

My interest in the Mitfords led me to them.

I've got that Julian MacLaren Ross book btw - looking forward to it.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 1, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I've got that Julian MacLaren Ross book btw - looking forward to it.





It's nice and long. Should slow you down a bit


----------



## ericjarvis (Mar 1, 2010)

12 again for February.

Patrick O'Brian - Post Captain
Ian Rankin - The Naming Of The Dead
CJ Cherryh - Merchanter's Luck
Iain M Banks - Matter
Ian Fleming - Dr No
Patrick O'Brian - HMS Surprise
Len Deighton - Spy Hook
Joseph Wambaugh - The Onion Field
William Tenn - The Square Root Of Man
Yevgeni Zamyatin - We
Len Deighton - Spy Line
Ian Fleming - Live And Let Die


----------



## pennimania (Mar 1, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> It's nice and long. Should slow you down a bit




I thought mr Waugh had done that! took me three nights


----------



## tar1984 (Mar 2, 2010)

> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)
> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> ...



George Orwell - 1984 (12/70).

I read this when I was younger but was able to grasp the politics better this time round, so could appreciate it more.  Amazing book.


----------



## tar1984 (Mar 2, 2010)

Iemanja said:


> I really don't get Douglas Coupland, I read a few of his books and none of them worked for me...  Maybe I'm too old.
> 
> Worse still, I'm sure I posted this very same thing somewhere on urban, but hopefully not on this thread



I thought microserfs and j-pod were great.  He's a really sharp writer.  Miss wyoming didn't really hold my attention though.


----------



## tar1984 (Mar 2, 2010)

Oh, I'm reading 'the double' by Dostoevsky now.  Not sure if I'm going to like it.


----------



## Thraex (Mar 2, 2010)

20/80 "Hey Ho Let's Go - The Story Of The Ramones"  Everett True.


----------



## marty21 (Mar 2, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean
7/50 Man Walks into Pub - A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown 
8/50 The Sharp End: The Fighting Man in World War II - John Ellis
9/50 Rapture - Carol Ann Duffy


----------



## ericjarvis (Mar 2, 2010)

dragonwolf said:


> 20/80 "Hey Ho Let's Go - The Story Of The Ramones"  Everett True.



My old songwriting partner. Must get around to getting a copy of that.


----------



## fractionMan (Mar 3, 2010)

5) Luminous - greg egan 

I think.  I'm kinda reading axiomatic at the same time.


----------



## crustychick (Mar 3, 2010)

oh dear - I'm really not doing very well with this. Haven't finished one book  am determined to finish my bookclub book which we discussed last night  and the next one by May... but I'm really not doing very well. must try harder!


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 3, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> our lady of darkness (8/100)



first blitz (9/100)


----------



## starfish (Mar 3, 2010)

Finished number 6 last night. Start 7 of 21/50 tonight. Back to the 87th Precinct.


----------



## fractionMan (Mar 4, 2010)

6) titus groan

Liking it so far.


----------



## el-ahrairah (Mar 4, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Matthew Collin & John Godfrey - Altered State: The Story of Ecstacy Culture and Acid House (18/50)
> 
> I've had this almost since it came out meaning to read it.  It wasn't worth the wait.



John Haskell - American Purgatorio (19/50) 
Richard Adams - Watership Down (20/50)  because it is necessary to return to the rabbits every so often


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 8, 2010)

(10/52) The Orchid Trilogy by Jocelyn Brooke
(11/52) How Not To Write A Novel by S Newman & H Mittelmark


----------



## sojourner (Mar 8, 2010)

15

No Country for Old Men - Cormac McCarthy


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Mar 8, 2010)

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (5/10)


----------



## el-ahrairah (Mar 8, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> John Haskell - American Purgatorio (19/50)
> Richard Adams - Watership Down (20/50)  because it is necessary to return to the rabbits every so often



Julian Barnes - Arthur & George (21/50) very odd.


----------



## marty21 (Mar 8, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (5/10)



I loved that, what did you think of it ?


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Mar 8, 2010)

marty21 said:


> I loved that, what did you think of it ?



Really enjoyed it and am now reading the second of the trilogy  I thought the characters, story and themes were very strong but I did feel his writing went from succinct and interesting to a bit sloppy and lazy towards the last part of the book when the story took over more. Still well worth a read though.


----------



## pennimania (Mar 8, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 23 The Letters of Evelyn Waugh -  gosh what a beastly man!  but absolutely unput downable




24 Secret Diary of a Grumpy Old Woman - I thought this would be great seeing as I love diaries and also am a GOW.

Not at all - I found it fatuous, formulaic, mawkishly sentimental and ultimately emotionally dishonest. Worst book I've read in tears - Mrs Cradock rates as a genius in comparison.

25 -First Childhood - Gerald Berners - excellent 

I've also been reading some Chalet School books but won't count them


----------



## marty21 (Mar 9, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean
7/50 Man Walks into Pub - A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown 
8/50 The Sharp End: The Fighting Man in World War II - John Ellis
9/50 Rapture - Carol Ann Duffy 
10/50 The Last Bachelor - Jay McInerney


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 9, 2010)

(12/52) Journey into the Past by Stefan Zweig


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 11, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> first blitz (9/100)



major farran's hat (10/100)


----------



## colbhoy (Mar 13, 2010)

Just finished Papillon by Henri Charriere (3/21).

Excellent and harrowing read.


----------



## pennimania (Mar 13, 2010)

26 - Journeying Boy -diaries of Benjamin Brtten - Schoenberg good-Vaughan Williams bad


----------



## marty21 (Mar 13, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
> 2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
> 3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell
> 4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
> ...



11/50 The Way Home - George Pelecanos


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 14, 2010)

(13/52) Far From the Madding Crowd
(14/52) Life with a Star by Jiri Weil


----------



## pennimania (Mar 15, 2010)

27 HMS Ulysses Alastair MacClean - I was hoping this would be as good as The Cruel Sea - it isn't.


----------



## el-ahrairah (Mar 15, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Julian Barnes - Arthur & George (21/50) very odd.



Iain M Banks - Matter (22/50)


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 17, 2010)

(15/52) Beware of Pity by Stefan Zwieg


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Mar 17, 2010)

"The Girl Who Played With Fire" (6/10) - okay, good story but ended up skimming through it a bit as I wanted to find out what happened but couldn't be arsed to really read it 

Now trying to learn lines for "City of Angels" so train commuting time is being used for that rather than reading.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Angels_(musical)


----------



## starfish (Mar 17, 2010)

8-21/50. At this rate should make 21 easily.


----------



## marty21 (Mar 18, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 11/50 The Way Home - George Pelecanos



12/50 The White Bird - Lauran Paine


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 19, 2010)

(16/52) Erewhon by Samuel Butler


----------



## Voley (Mar 20, 2010)

(7/25) Killer On The Road - James Ellroy


----------



## fernhill heath (Mar 20, 2010)

(3/20) britains forgotten wars ( colonial campaigns of the 19th century) - ian heron. 

bit of a slog at 733 pages long but a excellent read


----------



## Voley (Mar 22, 2010)

(8/25) The Hacienda - How Not To Run A Club - Peter Hook. Rattled through this in three days.


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 23, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> major farran's hat (10/100)



eastern approaches (11/100)
the trouble with guns (12/100)


----------



## Infidel Castro (Mar 23, 2010)

1/21 - Unseen Academicals, Terry Pratchett.
2/21 - Other People, Martin Amis
3/21 - The Road, Cormac McCarthy
_4/21 - The Bones, S Tepper
5/21 - Gulliver's Travels, Swift_

Not sure why I read an S Tepper book, but it's serviceable stuff to be fair to her.  Read Gulliver for the umpteenth time just because it's such a good book.  I'm off to read a book by that feller Anthony Burgess now...


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 23, 2010)

(17/52) Beyond a Boundary


----------



## sojourner (Mar 23, 2010)

16 - The Complete Western Stories - Elmore Leonard.  Am reading this at lunchtimes in work.  Interestingly, it is a chronological collection of all his westerns, so you can see his style start to develop.  It wasn't that great at the beginning   Wayyyyy too much geographical description, which is something he ends up disregarding, and in fact, puts it down as one of his rules for writing 

17 - Of Love and Hunger - Julian Maclaren Ross.  Started it last night, is an evening/weekend read, promising start


----------



## pennimania (Mar 23, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> (17/52) Beyond a Boundary



oooooh! I've always wanted to read that! 


28 ( I think) The Jewel Garden -Monty Don
29- Turnip Tops -E.M. Boileau
30 - The Legacy - Sybille Bedford
31 - (reread) The Well Tempered Garden Christopher Lloyd - one of my favourite books and just the right time of year for it.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 24, 2010)

pennimania said:


> oooooh! I've always wanted to read that!



Ah, it's great. Some purblind sentimentality in it, but mostly hard analysis grounded in a fascinating and full life. I love the style, which at every point aims to avoid dogma -- it kind of reminded me of Raymond Williams.


----------



## el-ahrairah (Mar 29, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Iain M Banks - Matter (22/50)



Not updated in ages, let's see if i can remember them all.

Frances Hill- A Delusion Of Satan (23/50)
Max Brooks - World War Z (24/50)
Graham McNeill - A Thousand Sons (25/50)
Ian M Banks - The State of The Art (26/50)

A Delusion Of Satan is a history of the Salem witch trials and is utterly fantastic.  

Reading Down And Out In Paris And London at the moment, as the last week has been a bit lightweight!


----------



## Voley (Mar 29, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> A Delusion Of Satan is a history of the Salem witch trials and is utterly fantastic.



That sounds interesting. Never heard of that before.  Just ordered it off amazon, ta.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Mar 31, 2010)

(18/52) Among The Bohemians by Virginia Nicholson


----------



## fractionMan (Mar 31, 2010)

I managed to lose titus groan (90% finished) on the bus.  

So now I'm reading 7) Anathem


----------



## imposs1904 (Apr 2, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July *(7/30)*



The Woman Who Walked Into Doors by Roddy Doyle *(8/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Apr 2, 2010)

pennimania said:


> oooooh! I've always wanted to read that!
> 
> 
> 28 ( I think) The Jewel Garden -Monty Don
> ...




32 - Diaries - Edwina Currie 
33- The Blunkett Tapes - David Blunkett - (boring twat) Edwina is much more interesting.
34- The Philadelphian - Richard Powell
35 - House Music - Oona King


----------



## machine cat (Apr 2, 2010)

Might as well join in...

1/30 - A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
2/30 - Wild Swans - Jung Chang
3/30 - Five Essays on Philosophy - Mao Zedong
4/30 - Filth - Irvine Welsh
5/30 - A Song of Stone - Iain Banks


----------



## ericjarvis (Apr 3, 2010)

Vernor Vinge - Across Realtime
Len Deighton - Spy Sinker
Charlotte Bronte - Jane Eyre
Elmore Leonard - The Hunted
Len Deighton - Winter: A Berlin Family 1899-1945
PD James - Innocent Blood
Len Deighton - Faith
Len Deighton - Hope
Charlie Stross - The Revolution Business
Len Deighton - Charity
CJ Cherryh - Hellburner
Elmore Leonard - Freaky Deaky
Vernor Vinge - Rainbows End

37 by the end of March. That's a little more than I expected, liable to be closer to 150 than 100 by the end of the year. I shall have to start reading some longer books.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Apr 4, 2010)

(19/52) _Alone in Berlin_ by Hans Fallada


----------



## imposs1904 (Apr 6, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Woman Who Walked Into Doors by Roddy Doyle *(8/30)*



Hide and Seek by Ian Rankin *(9/30)*


----------



## marty21 (Apr 7, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 12/50 The White Bird - Lauran Paine



13/50 The Death of Bunny Monro - Nick Cave


----------



## Captain Hurrah (Apr 7, 2010)

Dirty Martini said:


> (9/52) Through A Glass Darkly: The Life of Patrick Hamilton



Wouldn't mind reading that.


----------



## Dirty Martini (Apr 7, 2010)

Captain Hurrah said:


> Wouldn't mind reading that.



It's worth reading if you like Patrick Hamilton. He doesn't come out of it too well -- in fact, he was an utter mess. The biographer's psychologising got on my wick a bit, but give it a go


----------



## Dirty Martini (Apr 7, 2010)

(20/52) _Weimar Germany: Promise & Tragedy_ by Eric D Weitz


----------



## Captain Hurrah (Apr 7, 2010)

I like The Slaves of Solitude.

So far ...

Policies of Chaos: The Organizational Causes of Violence in China's Cultural Revolution - Lynn T. White 

Red Guard Factionalism and the Cultural Revolution in Guangzhou (Canton) - Stanley Rosen

Mao's Last Revolution - Roderick MacFarquhar and Michael Schoenhals

Brother Enemy: The War After the War: A History of Indochina Since the Fall of Saigon - Nayan Chanda

I tend to re-read books shortly after the first time, if I really like them or importantly want stuff to sink in.


----------



## Mrs Magpie (Apr 7, 2010)

Oh bloody hell, I'd forgotten about this thread  I shall try and remember what I've read since I last posted.


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Apr 7, 2010)

"The Private Patient" PD James  (7/10)
"The Lovers" - John Connolly (8/10)


----------



## Mrs Magpie (Apr 7, 2010)

20/100  Chloroform: The Quest for Oblivion - Linda Stratmann

The next three books are in the same series (Animal) from Reaktion Books that my twelfth book, Cat, is in. They are a great little series of books. A lovely way to leave work behind for the day and just read, sitting on a bus on the way home.

21/100 Pigeon - Barbara Allen
22/100 Crow - Boria Sax
23/100 Snail - Peter Williams

24/100 A Book of Bees: --and How to Keep Them - Sue Hubbell
25/100 A World Without Bees - Alison Benjamin, Brian McCallum
26/100 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
27/100 The Fight and Other Writings - William Hazlitt
28/100 Our Betty - Liz Smith
29/100 Jottings: Flights of Fancy from Our Betty - Liz Smith


----------



## marty21 (Apr 7, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 13/50 The Death of Bunny Monro - Nick Cave



14/50 ' London's Strangest Tales '- Tom Quinn


----------



## Riklet (Apr 8, 2010)

I've read lots of bits of pieces, essays, chapters, extracts, but I don't think i've actually finished a full book so far this year... 

Aiming for 15, I can read very fast when in the mood n gripped, but seem to have slightly fallen out of love with reading, I just don't get round to it as much (well, whole novels anyway).  Which is a real shame.  Hopefully things will improve... Currently read/reading

1/15 - "Sold Out: How I Survived A Year of Not Shopping" by Robert Llewellyn, interesting n funny read this 'un.
2/15 - "Art Theory, a Very Short Introduction" by Cynthia Freeland
3/15 - "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder

Definitely gona finish these.  Read a fair load of stuff on race, Habermas, environment and aesthetics, but no chance of finishing most of those books if i'm honest!


----------



## Voley (Apr 8, 2010)

The Dark Heart Of Italy - Tobias Jones (8/25) Took ages to get through this. It just about held my interest till the end but I nearly abandoned it about 5 times. Odd. Started out interesting enough.


----------



## imposs1904 (Apr 9, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Woman Who Walked Into Doors by Roddy Doyle *(8/30)*



Rude Kids: The Unfeasible Story of Viz by Chris Donald *(9/30)*


----------



## Dirty Martini (Apr 10, 2010)

(21/52) Rebellion
(22/52) The Spider's Web, both by Joseph Roth


----------



## pennimania (Apr 11, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 32 - Diaries - Edwina Currie
> 33- The Blunkett Tapes - David Blunkett - (boring twat) Edwina is much more interesting.
> 34- The Philadelphian - Richard Powell
> 35 - House Music - Oona King




36 Raven Seek Thy Brother - Gavin Maxwell
37 reread Diaries - Alan Clark - I just lerrrve political diaries and this is one of the best! 

38 The Tories and The Nation State - Alan Clark - very waspish and entertaining.


just in case people think I am a great big Tory may I just say I am NOT!!!!!

but one book leads to another......

I am now dipping into William Pitt the Younger by William Hague - I am reading this because I recently saw a film about William Wilberforce and I was intrigued by the Pitt's character, possibly one of the greatest reforming politicians we have ever had.


----------



## Pickman's model (Apr 13, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> eastern approaches (11/100)
> the trouble with guns (12/100)


girl with dragon tattoo (13/100)
girl who played with fire (14/100)
girl who kicked hornets' nest (15/100)
a terrible glory: custer and the little bighorn - the last great battle of the american west (16/100)
blank spots on the map: the dark geography of the pentagon's secret world (17/100)


----------



## Voley (Apr 14, 2010)

My Shit Life So Far - Frankie Boyle (9/25)


----------



## marty21 (Apr 19, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 14/50 ' London's Strangest Tales '- Tom Quinn



15/50 'Fifty Degrees Below' Kim Stanley Robinson


----------



## starfish (Apr 19, 2010)

Im on my 10th but its a struggle. Whoulda thought 19th century philosophy & political theory would be a hard read.


----------



## machine cat (Apr 20, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> Might as well join in...
> 
> 1/30 - A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
> 2/30 - Wild Swans - Jung Chang
> ...




6/30 - Matter - Iain M Banks
7/30 - The Road - Cormac McCarthy (Best novel I've read in a long time. Started and finished it yesterday )


----------



## Pickman's model (Apr 20, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> girl with dragon tattoo (13/100)
> girl who played with fire (14/100)
> girl who kicked hornets' nest (15/100)
> a terrible glory: custer and the little bighorn - the last great battle of the american west (16/100)
> blank spots on the map: the dark geography of the pentagon's secret world (17/100)


almuric - 18/100


----------



## pennimania (Apr 20, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 36 Raven Seek Thy Brother - Gavin Maxwell
> 37 reread Diaries - Alan Clark - I just lerrrve political diaries and this is one of the best!
> 
> 38 The Tories and The Nation State - Alan Clark - very waspish and entertaining.
> ...



39 Cuttings Christopher Lloyd
40 The Plumed Serpent DH Lawrence

also lately I have been reading a lot of twaddle (dr books and stuff)   which I will not bother counting....


----------



## el-ahrairah (Apr 20, 2010)

el-ahrairah said:


> Not updated in ages, let's see if i can remember them all.
> 
> Frances Hill- A Delusion Of Satan (23/50)
> Max Brooks - World War Z (24/50)
> ...



Shit, I'm well behind in my recording.  Have another eight or nine books that i've read in the last couple of weeks...


----------



## sojourner (Apr 21, 2010)

18 - Philip Pullman - The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Apr 21, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The Private Patient" PD James  (7/10)
> "The Lovers" - John Connolly (8/10)



"The Angels Game" - Carlos Ruiz Thingy o) - 9/10


----------



## marty21 (Apr 23, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 15/50 'Fifty Degrees Below' Kim Stanley Robinson



16/50 Thatcher's Britain - Richard Vinen


----------



## Cerberus (Apr 23, 2010)

Cerberus said:


> 5) Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
> 6) Arthur Koestler - Darkness at Noon
> 7) Jean Teule - The Suicide Shop



8) Stella Rimmington - Dead Line
9) Philip Roth - Sabbaths Theatre
10) W.B Yeats - Collected Poems
11) Julian Barnes - Cross Channel (re-read)
12) Albert Camus - The Fastidious Assassins


----------



## imposs1904 (Apr 25, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Rude Kids: The Unfeasible Story of Viz by Chris Donald *(9/30)*



Right As Rain by George Pelecanos *(10/30)*


----------



## machine cat (Apr 28, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 6/30 - Matter - Iain M Banks
> 7/30 - The Road - Cormac McCarthy



8/30 - Dune - Frank Herbert


----------



## fractionMan (Apr 28, 2010)

Finished anathem and started some stephen fry book, gave up and started reading some greg egan book instead - 8) shilds ladder.


----------



## strung out (Apr 28, 2010)

strung_out said:


> slow start for me
> 
> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell



still been going way too slow...

2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
5/50 Rendezvous With Rama - Arthur C Clarke

hopefully, i'll speed up once i've moved house


----------



## Voley (Apr 29, 2010)

No Country For Old Men - Cormac McCarthy (10/25)


----------



## Dirty Martini (May 1, 2010)

(23/52) _A Majestic Innings_ CLR James


----------



## sojourner (May 4, 2010)

19 - The Family Frying Pan by Bryce Courtenay

20 - 10 Rules of Writing, by Elmore Leonard (bit of a cheat as it only took 5 minutes - but it is VERY funny, had me laughing out loud in places, some excellent illustrations in there )


----------



## strung out (May 4, 2010)

strung_out said:


> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell
> 2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
> 3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
> 4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
> 5/50 Rendezvous With Rama - Arthur C Clarke



6/50 The City and the Stars - Arthur C Clarke


----------



## ericjarvis (May 4, 2010)

PD James - A Certain Justice
Neil Gaiman - Coraline
Carl Hiaasen - Hoot
CJ Cherryh - Cyteen
Elmore Leonard - Valdez Is Coming
PD James - The Lighthouse

43 to the end of April. Definitely needed to read some longer books. Cyteen and the two PD James novels slowed me down quite effectively.


----------



## sojourner (May 4, 2010)

^^  I took delivery of Valdez is Coming over the weekend - can't wait to start it!!   What an immensely fucking cool cover as well!


----------



## machine cat (May 4, 2010)

9/30 The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins


----------



## imposs1904 (May 5, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Right As Rain by George Pelecanos *(10/30)*



Ragtime by E.L Doctorow *(11/30)*


----------



## machine cat (May 6, 2010)

10/30 No Country for Old Men - Cormack McCarthy


----------



## tar1984 (May 6, 2010)

> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)
> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> ...



J.D. salinger - Catcher in the rye (13/70)

(Clearly I'm not going to reach 70 though)


----------



## marty21 (May 12, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 16/50 Thatcher's Britain - Richard Vinen



17/50 American Rust - Philipp Meyer


----------



## machine cat (May 13, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 10/30 No Country for Old Men - Cormack McCarthy



11/30 The Book Thief - Markus Zusak


----------



## pennimania (May 14, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 39 Cuttings Christopher Lloyd
> 40 The Plumed Serpent DH Lawrence
> 
> also lately I have been reading a lot of twaddle (dr books and stuff)   which I will not bother counting....



Well i have been a bit lax about updating this thread. I have been reading a lot of books about upholstery - my new passion- and gardening. Will not count them just now as I can't remember the authors and they all have the word 'upholstery' in the title! 

41 - Exotics - Christopher Lloyd
42 Into Politics - Diaries 70's- 82 Alan Clark
43 William Pitt the Younger - William Hague


----------



## Onket (May 14, 2010)

I really need to update this thread.


----------



## pennimania (May 16, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Well i have been a bit lax about updating this thread. I have been reading a lot of books about upholstery - my new passion- and gardening. Will not count them just now as I can't remember the authors and they all have the word 'upholstery' in the title!
> 
> 41 - Exotics - Christopher Lloyd
> 42 Into Politics - Diaries 70's- 82 Alan Clark
> 43 William Pitt the Younger - William Hague




44 Holy Terrors Arthur Machen - love the way he wrote 

plus upholstery and Elizabeth Seifert drivel


----------



## marty21 (May 19, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 17/50 American Rust - Philipp Meyer



18/50 The Waking - T M Jenkins - enviro disaster, thriller, sci fi nonsense - quite pacy, seem to end all of the sudden, enjoyed it


----------



## pennimania (May 19, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 44 Holy Terrors Arthur Machen - love the way he wrote
> 
> plus upholstery and Elizabeth Seifert drivel



45 The Snow Goose paul Gallico
46 A Canticle for Leibowitz -Walter Miller jr(reckon Cormac McCarthy has read this )


AND

47 Diaries 1942-54 James Lees Milne - words cannot express how entertained i have been by this man's wit and the way he rogered indiscriminately through posh society in the 40's and  50's. Yet very poignant at the same time. Try it


----------



## starfish (May 19, 2010)

Finished book 12 last night. Will start 13 tonight.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (May 19, 2010)

9/62 Dave Haslam - Young Hearts Run Free
10/62 John Steinbeck - Of Mice and Men
11/62 Chinua Achebe - Things Fall Apart

Way behind my target, but plenty more time come my summer hols in a month or so.


----------



## strung out (May 20, 2010)

strung_out said:


> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell
> 2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
> 3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
> 4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
> ...



7/50 Out of the Silent Planet - C S Lewis

my target of reading 50 (broadly) sci-fi books this years is looking increasingly unachievable, however i do have about 15 unread books lined up on my shelf, so you never know...


----------



## pennimania (May 20, 2010)

strung_out said:


> 7/50 Out of the Silent Planet - C S Lewis
> QUOTE]
> 
> Love that book
> ...


----------



## strung out (May 20, 2010)

at some point later this year, i'll read the two sequels to it. just started on star maker by olaf stapledon though which should take me a while...


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (May 20, 2010)

12/62 Joseph Conrad - Heart Of Darkness


----------



## pennimania (May 25, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 45 The Snow Goose paul Gallico
> 46 A Canticle for Leibowitz -Walter Miller jr(reckon Cormac McCarthy has read this )
> 
> 
> ...



I am currently on an apocalyptic jag! 

48 The Death of Grass - John Christopher  - absolutely tore through this.
49 Down to a Sunless Sea - David Graham


----------



## pennimania (May 27, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I am currently on an apocalyptic jag!
> 
> 48 The Death of Grass - John Christopher  - absolutely tore through this.
> 49 Down to a Sunless Sea - David Graham



50 Last Light Alex Scarrow - interesting idea but hated the way it was written. In fact worst book I've read this year - and it could have been so good


----------



## marty21 (May 28, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 18/50 The Waking - T M Jenkins - enviro disaster, thriller, sci fi nonsense - quite pacy, seem to end all of the sudden, enjoyed it



19/50 White Bikini Panties - Kelly James Enger
20/50 - My Helmet for a Pillow - Robert Leckie
21/50 - The Ghost - Robert Harris


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (May 28, 2010)

13/62 - The Conformist - Alberto Moravia


----------



## colbhoy (May 29, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> Just finished Papillon by Henri Charriere (3/21).
> 
> Excellent and harrowing read.



The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins (4/21)
The Odessa File - Frederick Forsyth (5/21)
Hold Tight - Harlan Coben (6/21)


----------



## QueenOfGoths (May 30, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The Angels Game" - Carlos Ruiz Thingy o) - 9/10



"The Glass Book if the Dream Eaters! - GW Dahlquist (10) 


I think thisn thread has encouraged me to read more


----------



## marty21 (May 31, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 19/50 White Bikini Panties - Kelly James Enger
> 20/50 - My Helmet for a Pillow - Robert Leckie
> 21/50 - The Ghost - Robert Harris



22/50 Diaries, 1971- 1983 - James Lees-Milne


----------



## pennimania (May 31, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 22/50 Diaries, 1971- 1983 - James Lees-Milne



Ooh I'll be interested to know how you like that!

I just lerrrrrrrrrrrrrved his 1940's diaries - he was a terrific snob tho.


----------



## marty21 (May 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Ooh I'll be interested to know how you like that!
> 
> I just lerrrrrrrrrrrrrved his 1940's diaries - he was a terrific snob tho.



I'd never heard of him before tbh, mrs21 bought it, we were on holiday last week and saw it, had a browse and got hooked. He was an enormous snob, and seemed to dine with someone vaguely famous every weekend  I really enjoyed it, gonna find some more JLM now


----------



## pennimania (May 31, 2010)

marty21 said:


> I'd never heard of him before tbh, mrs21 bought it, we were on holiday last week and saw it, had a browse and got hooked. He was an enormous snob, and seemed to dine with someone vaguely famous every weekend  I really enjoyed it, gonna find some more JLM now



Only at the weekend?

he must have been slipping


----------



## marty21 (May 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Only at the weekend?
> 
> he must have been slipping



he was getting on, there were quite a few lunches in the week as well. I was in Bath at the weekend, my mum lives near where he lived (Lansdown Crescent) so we took a walk up there and found his flat


----------



## pennimania (May 31, 2010)

You must read his first diaries - he was shagging and dining his way through the upperclasses (both sexes) 

he seemed to know literally everyone.


----------



## marty21 (May 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> You must read his first diaries - he was shagging and dining his way through the upperclasses (both sexes)
> 
> he seemed to know literally everyone.



I will read them as well, the 71-83 diaries seems to be a lot about chaste love, he gets obsessed with pretty boys, but doesn't indulge in sex anymore.


----------



## pennimania (Jun 4, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 50 Last Light Alex Scarrow - interesting idea but hated the way it was written. In fact worst book I've read this year - and it could have been so good



51 The Last Diaries - Alan Clark
52 Nella Last's Peace -post war diaries Nella Last

both these excellent - Clark's very poignant and sad.


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 6, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Ragtime by E.L Doctorow *(11/30)*




A Drink Before The War by Dennis Lehane *(12/30)*


----------



## ericjarvis (Jun 6, 2010)

Elmore Leonard - Get Shorty
Patrick O'Brian - Mauritius Command
Mary Gentle - Golden Witchbreed
Mary Gentle - Ancient Light
Joseph Wambaugh - The Choirboys
Terry Pratchett - Wyrd Sisters
Terry Pratchett - Guards Guards
Terry Pratchett, Jack Cohen and Ian Stewart - Science of Discworld 3, Darwin's Radio
Terry Pratchett - Going Postal
Terry Pratchett - Making Money
Michael Moore - Stupid White Men

Takes me to 54 for the start of June. I'm still reading too quick. Must try watching some telly or something.


----------



## pennimania (Jun 9, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 51 The Last Diaries - Alan Clark
> 52 Nella Last's Peace -post war diaries Nella Last
> 
> both these excellent - Clark's very poignant and sad.




53 Harold and Vita - letters edited by Nigel Nicolson
54 Diaries- Harold Nicolson
55- Children of the Dust - Louise Lawrence (more apocalyptic crip-crap)


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 10, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> A Drink Before The War by Dennis Lehane *(12/30)*



The Shoe by Gordon Legge *(13/30)*

A re-read. One of my favourite books of all time.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jun 10, 2010)

14/62 - The Kraken Wakes - John Wyndham


----------



## pennimania (Jun 15, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 14/62 - The Kraken Wakes - John Wyndham



Did you enjoy it?

I had  a real pash of reading his stuff in January


----------



## marty21 (Jun 16, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 22/50 Diaries, 1971- 1983 - James Lees-Milne



23/50 The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland - fucking excellent - loved every page, can't believe I haven't read it before.

I seem to be on schedule for the 50 this year


----------



## pennimania (Jun 16, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 53 Harold and Vita - letters edited by Nigel Nicolson
> 54 Diaries- Harold Nicolson
> 55- Children of the Dust - Louise Lawrence (more apocalyptic crip-crap)



56 Alas Babylon Pat Franks
57 Patriots - James Wesley, Rawles


i have got to stop reading these post apocalyptic novels.

 At this rate I am going to be crawling around from bush to bush with a M1A dressed in camo gear just to take the rubbish out


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 17, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Shoe by Gordon Legge *(13/30)*
> 
> A re-read. One of my favourite books of all time.



The Distant Echo by Val McDermid *(14/30)*


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Jun 17, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The Glass Book if the Dream Eaters! - GW Dahlquist (10)
> 
> 
> I think thisn thread has encouraged me to read more



"Perdido Street Station" (11) - excellent book


----------



## Pickman's model (Jun 19, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> almuric - 18/100



the glass books and the sequel to it: 20/100
revolutionary suicide: 21/100


----------



## Pickman's model (Jun 19, 2010)

some trilogy i can't remember the name of: 23/100


----------



## Pickman's model (Jun 19, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> some trilogy i can't remember the name of: 23/100


and a wallander book 24/100


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Jun 19, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> *the glass books and the sequel to it*: 20/100
> revolutionary suicide: 21/100



Did you enjoy it? - I have read "The Glass Books" and do intend to read the sequel but though I did like to bool it didn't inspire me iyswim. I liked the characters and the story but it just didn't seem to pull together


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 20, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Distant Echo by Val McDermid *(14/30)*



Blow Your House Down by Pat Barker *(15/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Jun 20, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 56 Alas Babylon Pat Franks
> 57 Patriots - James Wesley, Rawles
> 
> 
> ...



58 Swansong - Robert McCammell - absolute tosh


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 22, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Blow Your House Down by Pat Barker *(15/30)*



Lush Life by Richard Price *(16/30)*

Brilliant novel. Best book I've read for a few years.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jun 22, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Did you enjoy it?
> 
> I had  a real pash of reading his stuff in January



Sorry, I missed this earlier. Yeah, interesting structure and decent mystery. 

15/62 The Wayward Wife and Other Stories - Alberto Moravia
16/62 The L-Shaped Room - Lynne Reid Banks


----------



## pennimania (Jun 26, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 58 Swansong - Robert McCammell - absolute tosh



59 - The Ghost Road - Pat Barker
60- Mrs Miniver - Jan Struther


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jun 27, 2010)

17/62 SuperFreakonomics - Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner


----------



## marty21 (Jun 27, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 23/50 The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland - fucking excellent - loved every page, can't believe I haven't read it before.
> 
> I seem to be on schedule for the 50 this year



24/50 Eleanor Rigby -  Douglas Coupland - another winner


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 28, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Lush Life by Richard Price *(16/30)*
> 
> Brilliant novel. Best book I've read for a few years.



Division Street: America by Studs Terkel *(17/30)*

Originally published in '67, Division Street is an oral history of contemporary Chicago. An eye-opener.


----------



## imposs1904 (Jun 28, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 59 - The Ghost Road - Pat Barker
> 60- Mrs Miniver - Jan Struther



Eye of the Door was my favourite in the Regeneration Trilogy.


----------



## fractionMan (Jun 29, 2010)

fractionMan said:


> Finished anathem and started some stephen fry book, gave up and started reading some greg egan book instead - 8) shilds ladder.



Fuck, I've read loads since and I can't remember what


----------



## fractionMan (Jun 29, 2010)

9) Some science fiction book that was crap but very long
10) Teranesia - Greg egan
11) Tao of Pooh
12) Valiant - Helen something

Now reading:
13) Babylon - Victor Pelevin

I think I've missed a couple.  Oh yeah, 
14) Broken Angels - Richard Morgan
15) Coraline - Neil Gaiman.

+ a couple more


----------



## marty21 (Jun 30, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 24/50 Eleanor Rigby -  Douglas Coupland - another winner



25/50 The Strain - Guillermo Del Toro/ Chuck Hogan - vampires/epidemic sort of thing - slow start but I got into it.


----------



## pennimania (Jun 30, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 59 - The Ghost Road - Pat Barker
> 60- Mrs Miniver - Jan Struther



61 -One second After -William R Forstchen


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 3, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Division Street: America by Studs Terkel *(17/30)*
> 
> Originally published in '67, Division Street is an oral history of contemporary Chicago. An eye-opener.




Sacred by Dennis Lehane (18/30)


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 4, 2010)

18/62 The Life of Senna - Tom Rubython

Utter crap, repetitive and contradictory at times


----------



## Pickman's model (Jul 4, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> Did you enjoy it? - I have read "The Glass Books" and do intend to read the sequel but though I did like to bool it didn't inspire me iyswim. I liked the characters and the story but it just didn't seem to pull together



second book good but ultimately disappointing.


----------



## Pickman's model (Jul 4, 2010)

cocktail time - 26/100


----------



## ericjarvis (Jul 4, 2010)

Vernor Vinge - A Deepness In The Sky
Elmore Leonard - Tishomingo Blues
John Pilger - Hidden Agendas
Jeff Noon - Vurt
Terry Pratchett - Unseen Academicals
Elmore Leonard - Out Of Sight
Greg Egan - Incandescence
PD James - Devices And Desires

Takes me up to 62 for half way through the year.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 5, 2010)

19/62 Maus - Art Spiegelman


----------



## ericjarvis (Jul 5, 2010)

Oops. Missed one.

Pratchett, Cohen and Stewart - Darwin's Watch.

So 63 not 62. Not that it makes a lot of difference.


----------



## pennimania (Jul 6, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 61 -One second After -William R Forstchen



62 The Plague Albert Camus
63 Flood Stephen Baxter


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 8, 2010)

20/62 If it is your life - James Kelman


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 9, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Sacred by Dennis Lehane (18/30)



I Love Me (Who Do You Love?) by Gordon Legge *(19/30)*


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Jul 10, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "Perdido Street Station" (11) - excellent book



"The Scar" (12) - another Mieville. Very very good

Oh and a play "Dangerous Corner" by JB Priestley, I think I can count that can't I (which makes 13)


----------



## DotCommunist (Jul 10, 2010)

(lost count) Ulster Crises: Resistance to Home Rule 192-1914

It has some excellent stuf on how ill-equipped wrt rifles and uniform ammuntion the UVF were at that time. Serious lack of even rifles to drill with, and what they had was mismatched stuff. Some good gunrunning went on though. Asquith while being a dick was like the clegg of his age. So a dick then. The UVF fronted hard but had not much to back it. Troops, plenty willing. But arms, sadly lacking.

Cunt left me all agog to see what his take on post 1914 Irish activites were.


----------



## DotCommunist (Jul 10, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> *"The Scar" (12) - another Mieville. Very very good*
> 
> Oh and a play "Dangerous Corner" by JB Priestley, I think I can count that can't I (which makes 13)



What I like about this, other than my usual loves of his bestiaries and weird science of another world stuff, is how he made an entirely unlovable pair come alive. Doul and Coldwine are basically a pair of cunts. For differing reasons. Bellis is a m/c refugee from a society where she was able to carefully ignore injustice. Doul, a refugee from a society where he had some attempt at a good life. Both were thinking themselves great manipulators but only one knew how to do it properly.

Only Tanner comes out well. 'I'm learning my salt. I'm a scarswater man'


The polity stuff is good.


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Jul 10, 2010)

DotCommunist said:


> What I like about this, other than my usual loves of his bestiaries and weird science of another world stuff, is how he made *an entirely unlovable pair come alive*. Doul and Coldwine are basically a pair of cunts. For differing reasons. Bellis is a m/c refugee from a society where she was able to carefully ignore injustice. Doul, a refugee from a society where he had some attempt at a good life. Both were thinking themselves great manipulators but only one knew how to do it properly.
> 
> Only Tanner comes out well. 'I'm learning my salt. I'm a scarswater man'
> 
> ...



Same here - Doul especially, like Inquisitor Glokta in Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy, just seems to have a life off the page, outside the book iyswim.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 12, 2010)

21/62 Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger


----------



## colbhoy (Jul 12, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins (4/21)
> The Odessa File - Frederick Forsyth (5/21)
> Hold Tight - Harlan Coben (6/21)



The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson (7/21)

Much enjoyed, will definitely read the next two in the series.


----------



## fractionMan (Jul 13, 2010)

16 or so) The last of the hippies - c.j. stone

now reading:
17) awakenings - oliver sacks.


----------



## fractionMan (Jul 15, 2010)

Just bought in no particular order:

18) cloud atlas - david mitchell
19) and another thing... eoin colfer
20) the fuller memorandum - charles stross


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 17, 2010)

22/62 Why does E=mc^2 (and why should we care?) - Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw
23/62 Pearls are a Nuisance - Raymond Chandler


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 18, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> I Love Me (Who Do You Love?) by Gordon Legge *(19/30)*



Quite Ugly One Morning by Christopher Brookmyre *(20/30)*


----------



## fractionMan (Jul 20, 2010)

ooh, got the new phillip pulman book on my shelf waiting to be read.


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 21, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Quite Ugly One Morning by Christopher Brookmyre *(20/30)*



The Ballad of Peckham Rye by Muriel Spark *(21/30)*


----------



## fractionMan (Jul 22, 2010)

21) that jesus book - philip pulman
22) woken furies - richard morgan

ok, so some of these are on the to do list...


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Jul 22, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 22/62 Why does E=mc^2 (and why should we care?) - Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw
> 23/62 Pearls are a Nuisance - Raymond Chandler


 
24/62 Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War - Che Guevara
25/62 Old Men In Love - Alasdair Gray


----------



## pennimania (Jul 22, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 62 The Plague Albert Camus
> 63 Flood Stephen Baxter


 
I have been on holiday!  have many to list -including some dreadful things that I found in gite.

64 My Favourite Wife Tony Parsons -rubbish
65 The Girl in a Swing Richard Adams - rubbish but compulsive
66 The Commitments Roddy Doyle (re read)
67 something by Georgette Heyer (gite book - can't remember its name)
68 The wasp Factory - Iain Banks


----------



## colbhoy (Jul 22, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson (7/21)
> 
> Much enjoyed, will definitely read the next two in the series.



Five Fall into Adventure - Enid Blyton (8/21) 

I know, but my 9 year old daughter is reading them constantly at the moment (my old ones!) and they are lying about and I just picked it up and started reading it. I can still see what the attraction is for children, they are well thought out stories.


----------



## Cheesypoof (Jul 23, 2010)

stupid thread. people that enjoy reading arent in competition.....


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 23, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Ballad of Peckham Rye by Muriel Spark *(21/30)*



The Football Man: People and Passions in Soccer by Arthur Hopcraft *(22/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Jul 23, 2010)

Cheesypoof said:


> stupid thread. people that enjoy reading arent in competition.....


 
who said it was a competition?

I don't list half the books I read because they are silly but you have provoked me....

69 The Twins at St Clares Enid Blyton

&&&&&&& about 12 books by Elinor Brent Dyer


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 25, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Football Man: People and Passions in Soccer by Arthur Hopcraft *(23/30)*



Two Way Split by Allan Guthrie *(24/30)*

Excellent crime novel set in Edinburgh. I'm definitely looking out for other novels by Guthrie.


----------



## marty21 (Jul 26, 2010)

1/50 - The Lords of the North - Bernard Cornwell
2/50 - D-Day -Antony Beevor
3/50 Sword Song -Bernard Cornwell
4/50 The Burning land - Bernard Cornwell
5/50 Brooklyn - Colm Toibin
6/50 Eastern Approaches - Fitzroy Maclean
7/50 Man Walks into Pub - A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown 
8/50 The Sharp End: The Fighting Man in World War II - John Ellis
9/50 Rapture - Carol Ann Duffy 
10/50 The Last Bachelor - Jay McInerney
11/50 The Way Home - George Pelecanos
12/50 The White Bird - Lauran Paine
13/50 The Death of Bunny Monro - Nick Cave
14/50 ' London's Strangest Tales '- Tom Quinn
15/50 'Fifty Degrees Below' Kim Stanley Robinson
16/50 Thatcher's Britain - Richard Vinen
17/50 American Rust - Philipp Meyer
18/50 The Waking - T M Jenkins
19/50 White Bikini Panties - Kelly James Enger
20/50 - My Helmet for a Pillow - Robert Lechie
21/50 - The Ghost - Robert Harris
22/50 Diaries, 1971- 1983 - James Lees-Milne
23/50 The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland 
24/50 Eleanor Rigby -  Douglas Coupland 
25/50 The Strain - Guillermo Del Toro/ Chuck Hogan

updated list - I love a list, a few more about to join it, reading a couple at the moment


----------



## pennimania (Jul 26, 2010)

marty21 said:


> I love a list


 
Good. So it's not just me then!

actually I was looking back atwhat I've been reading and it's really interesting and brings back how I was feeling on particular days IYKWIM.

I have more to add but not right now!


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 26, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Two Way Split by Allan Guthrie *(24/30)*
> 
> Excellent crime novel set in Edinburgh. I'm definitely looking out for other novels by Guthrie.



Hillbilly Women by Kathy Kahn *(25/30)*


----------



## october_lost (Jul 26, 2010)

My 50 is looking a little tough of a target right now, just finished 
15. Ian Johnson - Wild Grass


----------



## colbhoy (Jul 27, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> Five Fall into Adventure - Enid Blyton (8/21)
> 
> I know, but my 9 year old daughter is reading them constantly at the moment (my old ones!) and they are lying about and I just picked it up and started reading it. I can still see what the attraction is for children, they are well thought out stories.



Stalingrad - Anthony Beevor (9/21) 

Fascinating and unsettling read.


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 28, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Hillbilly Women by Kathy Kahn *(25/30)*


 
Being Emily by Anne Donovan *(26/30)*


----------



## marty21 (Jul 29, 2010)

26/50 - Freakonomics - Steven D Levitt & Stephen J Dubner


----------



## machine cat (Jul 30, 2010)

12/30 - The Bridge - Iain Banks
13/30 - Blood Meridian - Cormack McCarthy


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Jul 30, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The Scar" (12) - another Mieville. Very very good
> 
> Oh and a play "Dangerous Corner" by JB Priestley, I think I can count that can't I (which makes 13)



"Dreamcatacher" Stephen King - good, I enjoyed it though found my concentration laspsed a bit at times (14)


----------



## marty21 (Jul 30, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The Scar" (12) - another Mieville. Very very good
> 
> Oh and a play "Dangerous Corner" by JB Priestley, I think I can count that can't I (which makes 13)


 
I enjoyed The Scar - very much.


----------



## imposs1904 (Jul 31, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Being Emily by Anne Donovan *(26/30)*


 
The Damned Utd by David Peace *(27/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 1, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Damned Utd by David Peace *(27/30)*



Smoking In Bed - Conversations With Bruce Robinson  edited by Alistair Owen *(28/30)*


----------



## marty21 (Aug 2, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 26/50 - Freakonomics - Steven D Levitt & Stephen J Dubner


 
27/50 'With the Old Breed' - E B Sledge (WW2 Marine memoir)


----------



## ericjarvis (Aug 2, 2010)

Guy Gavriel Kay - Ysabel
Joseph Wambaugh - Hollywood Station
Junot Diaz - Drown
Irvine Welsh - Trainspotting
PD James - The Black Tower
Irvine Welsh - The Acid House
Terry Pratchett - Thud
Greg Bear - Vitals
Paul Davies - Other Worlds
Ian Rankin - Doors Open
Elmore Leonard - Bandits
Distress - Greg Egan

So, at the end of July that's 74. Just over ten books a month. A little more than I expected.


----------



## pennimania (Aug 3, 2010)

pennimania said:


> I have been on holiday!  have many to list -including some dreadful things that I found in gite.
> 
> 64 My Favourite Wife Tony Parsons -rubbish
> 65 The Girl in a Swing Richard Adams - rubbish but compulsive
> ...


 
69 Justine Lawrence Durrell
70 Balthazar
71 jean de Florette Marcel Pagnol
72 Le chateau de ma Mere - Marcel Pagnol
73 (if we're counting Kids' books) ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeild
74 Curtain Up - Noel Streatfeild


----------



## pennimania (Aug 3, 2010)

OooooH!

just noticed eric and I are neck and neck!!!


----------



## machine cat (Aug 4, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 12/30 - The Bridge - Iain Banks
> 13/30 - Blood Meridian - Cormack McCarthy


 
14/30 - Metropole - Ferenc Karinthy 

Picked it at random in the library. Very good book


----------



## Dirty Martini (Aug 4, 2010)

(24/52) Afternoon Men by Anthony Powell
(25/52) Black Mischief by Evelyn Waugh
(26/52) The Great War and Modern Memory by Paul Fussell


----------



## ericjarvis (Aug 4, 2010)

pennimania said:


> OooooH!
> 
> just noticed eric and I are neck and neck!!!


 
I'm trying very hard not to see it as a competition. I think we probably just read at approximately the same rate. Though very different books so far as I can see. 

Have you stopped to work out how many books you have probably read in your life, and how much space they would take up? It's pretty scary.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 4, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 24/62 Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War - Che Guevara
> 25/62 Old Men In Love - Alasdair Gray



26/62 Yellow Dog - Martin Amis
27/62 House of Meetings - Martin Amis

Thought I would have read more when I was on holiday, my target is looking a little overly ambitious now


----------



## marty21 (Aug 4, 2010)

pennimania said:


> OooooH!
> 
> just noticed eric and I are neck and neck!!!


 
we need a league table!


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 4, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Smoking In Bed - Conversations With Bruce Robinson  edited by Alistair Owen *(28/30)*


 
Now's The Time by John Harvey *(29/30)*


----------



## ericjarvis (Aug 4, 2010)

marty21 said:


> we need a league table!


 
Only if there are prizes.


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 7, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Now's The Time by John Harvey *(29/30)*


 
Hieroglyphics and other stories by Anne Donovan *(30/30)*


----------



## machine cat (Aug 10, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 14/30 - Metropole - Ferenc Karinthy


 
15/30 - The Player of Games - Iain M Banks


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 10, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 26/62 Yellow Dog - Martin Amis
> 27/62 House of Meetings - Martin Amis
> 
> Thought I would have read more when I was on holiday, my target is looking a little overly ambitious now


 
28/62 Tokyo Year Zero - David Pearce


----------



## fractionMan (Aug 10, 2010)

Just tried reading 23) spook country - william gibson but gave up.  It's crap.


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 10, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Hieroglyphics and other stories by Anne Donovan *(30/30)*



Surviving the Blues: Growing Up in the Thatcher Decade edited by Joan Scanlon *(31/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 12, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Surviving the Blues: Growing Up in the Thatcher Decade edited by Joan Scanlon *(31/30)*



Closely Observed Trains by Bohumil Hrabal *(32/30)*


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 13, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 28/62 Tokyo Year Zero - David Pearce


 
29/62 Heliopolis - James Scudamore


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Aug 14, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "Dreamcatacher" Stephen King - good, I enjoyed it though found my concentration laspsed a bit at times (14)


 
"The City and The City" (15) - China Mieville


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 14, 2010)

the twelve - 27/100
the ipcress file - 28/100
red riding 1974 - 29/100


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 16, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Closely Observed Trains by Bohumil Hrabal *(32/30)*



The Blinder by Barry Hines *(33/30)*


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 17, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 29/62 Heliopolis - James Scudamore


 
30/62 Broken - Karin Fossum


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 18, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> the twelve - 27/100
> the ipcress file - 28/100
> red riding 1974 - 29/100


 
red mutiny - 30/100


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 18, 2010)

oh - and lion of the sun - 31/100


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 18, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> red mutiny - 30/100



It'd be handy if you mentioned who they are by. We can't use search engines with our internet provider.


----------



## marty21 (Aug 19, 2010)

28/50  Bryant and May: On the Loose.  Christopher Fowler.


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 19, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Blinder by Barry Hines *(33/30)*


 
The House of Sleep by Jonathan Coe *(34/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 20, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The House of Sleep by Jonathan Coe *(34/30)*



Don't Be A Soldier? The Radical Anti-War Movement in North London 1914-1918 by Ken Weller *(35/30)*


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 20, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 30/62 Broken - Karin Fossum


 
31/62 The Third Party - Harry Ritchie

Twas utter gash


----------



## colbhoy (Aug 21, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> Stalingrad - Anthony Beevor (9/21)
> 
> Fascinating and unsettling read.



The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson (10/12)


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 24, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> oh - and lion of the sun - 31/100


 
wine of satan (laverne gay) - 32/100


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 24, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Don't Be A Soldier? The Radical Anti-War Movement in North London 1914-1918 by Ken Weller *(35/30)*



The Complaints by Ian Rankin *(36/30)*


----------



## machine cat (Aug 25, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 15/30 - The Player of Games - Iain M Banks


 
16/30 - Consider Phlebas - Iain M Banks
17/30 - Excession - Iain M Banks


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 25, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> wine of satan (laverne gay) - 32/100


 
oh - and it seems i forgot the killer inside me and the talented mr ripley (so > 34/100)


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 27, 2010)

and 'full dark house' by christopher fowler (35/100)


----------



## marty21 (Aug 27, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> and 'full dark house' by christopher fowler (35/100)


 
I'm a big fan of Fowler, did you enjoy it?


----------



## tar1984 (Aug 28, 2010)

Getting a laptop / internet connection really did for my reading, I stopped for about six months.  It's totally stopped me from getting near my estimate.  Just finished a book today though and I'm well into a second


----------



## tar1984 (Aug 28, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)
> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> ...


 
Terry Pratchett - Thud (14/70)

Ace.  It's put me in the mood of reading some of the classic discworld tales again - jingo, the truth, etc.

I'm now reading 'Belle & Sebastian: Just a Modern Rock Story' by Paul Whitelaw.  I also have 'a confederacy of dunces' and 'lolita' lined up.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Aug 28, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Terry Pratchett - Thud (14/70)
> 
> Ace.  It's put me in the mood of reading some of the classic discworld tales again - jingo, the truth, etc.
> 
> I'm now reading 'Belle & Sebastian: Just a Modern Rock Story' by Paul Whitelaw.  I also have 'a confederacy of dunces' and 'lolita' lined up.



Not read the B&S book but the others are crackers


----------



## Pickman's model (Aug 28, 2010)

marty21 said:


> I'm a big fan of Fowler, did you enjoy it?


 
yes


----------



## pennimania (Aug 28, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 69 Justine Lawrence Durrell
> 70 Balthazar
> 71 jean de Florette Marcel Pagnol
> 72 Le chateau de ma Mere - Marcel Pagnol
> ...


 
Well I had almost forgotten about this thread I have been so busy, tho still reading. Mostly crap mind.


76 Malevil  - Robert Merle  (slowed me right down) and I must reread it, because now I have a much better dictionary.
and I have just had a HUGE wallow through the Tudor Court novels.

77 The Constant Princess
78 The Other Boleyn Girl
79 The Boleyn Inheritance
80 The Queen's Fool
81 The Virgin's Lover
82 The other Queen   - all by the rather dreadful Philippa Gregory. It's like eating Mars bars - you crave one, you gallop through it, feel sick and wish you hadn't. 

The next day you want another 

Also, as I have been stressed I have read some pony books which I will list, but not count.


Tessa and some Ponies - Lady Kitty Ritson. This is as good a pony book as I have ever read, full of really good advice.

Tessa in South Africa   "           "       "  - terribly racist illustrations! but good story.

Tessa and the Rannoch Dude Ranch  - loved this as a kid -still very enjoyable.


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 29, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Complaints by Ian Rankin *(36/30)*



The Last Party: Britpop, Blair and the Demise of English Rock by John Harris *(37/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 30, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Last Party: Britpop, Blair and the Demise of English Rock by John Harris *(37/30)*



The Big Blowdown by George P. Pelecanos *(38/30)*


----------



## tar1984 (Aug 30, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> Not read the B&S book but the others are crackers



I'm looking forward to them  I'll read confederacy of dunces first I think.


----------



## imposs1904 (Aug 31, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Big Blowdown by George P. Pelecanos *(38/30)*



Near Neighbours by Gordon Legge *(39/30)*


----------



## tar1984 (Sep 1, 2010)

> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)
> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> ...



Belle & Sebastian: Just a Modern Rock Story - Paul Whitelaw (15/70)


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 2, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Near Neighbours by Gordon Legge *(39/30)*



A Firing Offense by George P. Pelecanos *(40/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Sep 3, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Well I had almost forgotten about this thread I have been so busy, tho still reading. Mostly crap mind.
> 
> 
> 76 Malevil  - Robert Merle  (slowed me right down) and I must reread it, because now I have a much better dictionary.
> ...


 
83 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood - just adored it.


----------



## marty21 (Sep 5, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 28/50  Bryant and May: On the Loose.  Christopher Fowler.


 
29/50 - Matterhorn - Karl Marlantes
30/50 - Diamondhead - Patrick Robinson
31/50 - Bryant and May - Off the Rails - Christopher Fowler
32/50 - The Aachen Memorandum - Andrew Roberts
33/50 - Washington Shadow - Aly Monroe
34/50 - Low Life - Alexander Baron

just read all these in the last week , apart from Matterhorn which I finished about a week ago - on holiday with little internet access - I was hoovering up the books!.


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 5, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> A Firing Offense by George P. Pelecanos *(40/30)*



Boiling A Frog by Christopher Brookmyre *(41/30)*

I like Brookmyre's novels but 400 pages could have been and should have been 250 pages.


----------



## heinous seamus (Sep 6, 2010)

I've reached eleven, which is quite surprising actually. Hopefully I can make twenty before the end of the year!

Candide - Voltaire
Journey to the centre of the earth - Verne
Death in Venice - Mann
King Lear - Shakespeare
Ossian - McPherson
Nausea - Sartre
Cannery Row - Steinbeck
Tropic of Cancer - Miller
Doctor Faustus - Marlowe
The Gambler - Dostoevsky
Blood Meridian - McCarthy

I'm reading the Watchmen just now, not sure if it counts


----------



## strung out (Sep 6, 2010)

tar1984 said:


> Getting a laptop / internet connection really did for my reading, I stopped for about six months.  It's totally stopped me from getting near my estimate.  Just finished a book today though and I'm well into a second


 
same. i spend far too much time on the net nowadays, pissing around talking shit, instead of reading books


----------



## strung out (Sep 6, 2010)

strung out said:


> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell
> 2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
> 3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
> 4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
> ...


 
8/50 Amaryllis Night and Day - Russell Hoban

i'm also halfway through starmaker by olaf stapledon but have had to give it a rest because it was quite hardgoing. there's no real plot to get to grips with. in the meantime, i've moved onto a couple of others, so at least hope to make 20 before the end of the year, even if i'm going to be way off 50. i start two OU english lit courses next month, so i'll hopefully get well back on track.


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Sep 6, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 31/62 The Third Party - Harry Ritchie
> 
> Twas utter gash


 
32/62 Big Sur - Jack Kerouac


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 7, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Boiling A Frog by Christopher Brookmyre *(41/30)*
> 
> I like Brookmyre's novels but 400 pages could have been and should have been 250 pages.



Scully and Mooey by Alan Bleasdale *(42/30)*


----------



## ericjarvis (Sep 7, 2010)

In August:

Ian Rankin - Bleeding Hearts
PD James - A Taste For Murder
Patrick O'Brian - Desolation Island
Romesh Gunesekera - Reef
Charles Stross - The Fuller Memorandum
Iain Banks - Transitions
Len Deighton - An Expensive Place To Die
CJ Cherryh - Gate Of Ivrel
Elmore Leonard - Cat Chaser
CJ Cherryh - Well of Shiuan
Geoff Dyer - Yoga For People Who Can't Be Bothered To Do It
Terry Pratchett - The Third Elephant
CJ Cherryh - Fires Of Azeroth
Patrick O'Brian - Fortune Of War
Neil Gaiman - M Is For Magic

So that's 89 in 8 months, over 11 books a month. I think I may be a problem reader if not a fully fledged bookaholic. Or maybe it's just that there's been nothing good on TV.


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 12, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Scully and Mooey by Alan Bleasdale *(42/30)*


 
Strip Jack by Ian Rankin *(43/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Sep 13, 2010)

ericjarvis said:


> In August:
> 
> Ian Rankin - Bleeding Hearts
> PD James - A Taste For Murder
> ...




I know I have a problem.

I read all the time, even when I'm cooking.

When my kids were tiny babies, I used to balance a book on them while breastfeeding.

You, me and W. Somerset Maugham eh ?   (vide 'The Book Bag')


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 23, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Strip Jack by Ian Rankin *(43/30)*



Heartland by Anthony Cartwright *(44/30)*


----------



## Pickman's model (Sep 23, 2010)

Pickman's model said:


> and 'full dark house' by christopher fowler (35/100)


 
the water room (36/100)
77 clocks (37/100)
ricin! (38/100)
black house (39/100)


----------



## machine cat (Sep 24, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 16/30 - Consider Phlebas - Iain M Banks
> 17/30 - Excession - Iain M Banks


 
still going through Banks' sci-fi

18/30 Use of Weapons - Iain M Banks


----------



## pennimania (Sep 24, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 83 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood - just adored it.


 
84 - Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood
85 - Couching at the Door - DK Broster

i have about 20 more to add but can't remember details accurately - that shows how great they were not?

ok I'll  admit to all 700 odd pages of this (just published) bodice ripper

86 Jump - Jilly Cooper


----------



## Ich bin ein Mod (Sep 25, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 32/62 Big Sur - Jack Kerouac


 
33/62 They Called It Passchendale - Lyn MacDonald
34/62 This Is Your Brain On Music - Daniel Levitin


----------



## marty21 (Sep 29, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 29/50 - Matterhorn - Karl Marlantes
> 30/50 - Diamondhead - Patrick Robinson
> 31/50 - Bryant and May - Off the Rails - Christopher Fowler
> 32/50 - The Aachen Memorandum - Andrew Roberts
> ...


 
35/50 Duane's Depressed - Larry McMurtry 

loved this, it's the 3rd part of a trilogy that started with ' The last Picture Show' and continued with 'Texasville' you don't need to have read the others for it to make sense though - thought it might be a bit...depressing as it is about Duane and he is depressed, and acting strangely to his family - but I loved it, probably the least depressing novel about depression evah! Very funny in parts, very moving in others - couldn't put it down once I'd started it, well I had to put it down, to do stuff, but read it at every opportunity - might go back and re-read the other 2 now.


----------



## strung out (Sep 29, 2010)

strung out said:


> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell
> 2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
> 3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
> 4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
> ...


 
9/50 A Scanner Darkly - Philip K Dick
10/50 Northern Lights - Philip Pullman
11/50 The Cherry Orchard - Anton Chekhov

finally got my reading mojo back. think i'm still going to have to refine my target to just over 20 though!


----------



## imposs1904 (Sep 30, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Heartland by Anthony Cartwright *(44/30)*



Little Green Man by Simon Armitage *(45/30)*


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Oct 1, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "The City and The City" (15) - China Mieville


 
"Nemesis" - Jo Nesbo (16)


----------



## colbhoy (Oct 3, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson (10/21)



The Given Day by Dennis Lehane (11/21) - very good.


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 3, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Little Green Man by Simon Armitage *(45/30)*



A Darker Domain by Val McDermid *(46/30)*


----------



## starfish (Oct 3, 2010)

I think im on my 20th.


----------



## machine cat (Oct 5, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> still going through Banks' sci-fi
> 
> 18/30 Use of Weapons - Iain M Banks


 
19/30 Look to Windward - Iain M Banks


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 8, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> A Darker Domain by Val McDermid *(46/30)*



From Doon With Death  by Ruth Rendell *(47/30)*


----------



## colbhoy (Oct 9, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> The Given Day by Dennis Lehane (11/21) - very good.



Killer's Choice - Ed McBain (12/21)

Light but very enjoyable.


----------



## pennimania (Oct 10, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 84 - Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood
> 85 - Couching at the Door - DK Broster
> 
> i have about 20 more to add but can't remember details accurately - that shows how great they were not?
> ...


 
87 - Widdershins - Oliver Onions

88 - The London Nobody Knows - Geoffrey Fletcher   -thoroughly recommend this - it's OP, but you can easily get it cheaply on Amazon 

89 The Texts of Festival - Mick Farren - er, might have posted this one before - yet more post apocalyptica.....


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 11, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> From Doon With Death  by Ruth Rendell *(47/30)*



To An Early Grave by Wallace Markfield *(48/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Oct 11, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 87 - Widdershins - Oliver Onions
> 
> 88 - The London Nobody Knows - Geoffrey Fletcher   -thoroughly recommend this - it's OP, but you can easily get it cheaply on Amazon
> 
> 89 The Texts of Festival - Mick Farren - er, might have posted this one before - yet more post apocalyptica.....



I really need to get up to date with this thread.

90 Blindness - Jose Saramago - very harsh - loved it.


----------



## tar1984 (Oct 11, 2010)

> Iain M Banks - The state of the art. (1/70)
> Christopher Brookmyre - a tale etched in blood and hard black pencil. (2/70).
> Iain M Banks - Player of games. (3/70)
> Iain M Banks - Use of weapons (4/70).
> ...



Christopher Brookmyre - One fine day in the middle of the night (16)


----------



## machine cat (Oct 12, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 19/30 Look to Windward - Iain M Banks


 
20/30 - The Man in the High Castle - Philip K Dick


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 12, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> To An Early Grave by Wallace Markfield *(48/30)*



Shame The Devil by George P. Pelecanos *(49/30)*


----------



## marty21 (Oct 13, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 35/50 Duane's Depressed - Larry McMurtry



36/50 Brendan Behan - Ulick O'Connor 

mad mad drunken talented Irish writer who fucked himself on the drink.


----------



## machine cat (Oct 14, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 20/30 - The Man in the High Castle - Philip K Dick


 
21/30 - Blowback - Michael Forwell/Lee Bullman


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 15, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Shame The Devil by George P. Pelecanos *(49/30)*



The Gift by David Flusfeder *(50/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 18, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Gift by David Flusfeder *(50/30)*



Weekend by William McIlvanney *(51/30)*


----------



## imposs1904 (Oct 18, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Weekend by William McIlvanney *(51/30)*


 

Malvinas Requiem by Rodolfo Fogwill *(52/30)*


----------



## pennimania (Oct 19, 2010)

pennimania said:


> 87 - Widdershins - Oliver Onions
> 
> 88 - The London Nobody Knows - Geoffrey Fletcher   -thoroughly recommend this - it's OP, but you can easily get it cheaply on Amazon
> 
> 89 The Texts of Festival - Mick Farren - er, might have posted this one before - yet more post apocalyptica.....



90 Atonement - Ian Mc Ewan


----------



## QueenOfGoths (Oct 24, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> "Nemesis" - Jo Nesbo (16)


 
Matthew Pearl "The Poe Shadow" (finally!) - (17)


----------



## marty21 (Oct 24, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 36/50 Brendan Behan - Ulick O'Connor


 
37/50 - The American Civil War - John Keegan - really enjoyed it, John Keegan is a British military writer, so it was a slightly different approach. It's got me into the civil war again (I studied it in then 80s) so I went and ordered Ken Burns -DVD on the civil war.


----------



## machine cat (Nov 1, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 21/30 - Blowback - Michael Forwell/Lee Bullman


 
22/30 The Stand - Stephen King


----------



## heinous seamus (Nov 1, 2010)

heinous seamus said:


> Candide - Voltaire
> Journey to the centre of the earth - Verne
> Death in Venice - Mann
> King Lear - Shakespeare
> ...


 
Up to 17 now:

Heaven or Hell - Alduous Huxley
Stargazing - Peter Hill
Murphy - Samuel Beckett
Gulliver's Travels - Jonathon Swift
One day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Alexander Solzhenitsyn
2001: A Space Odyssey - Arthue C. Clarke


----------



## imposs1904 (Nov 2, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Malvinas Requiem by Rodolfo Fogwill *(52/30)*


 
The Man Who Killed Himself by Julian Symons *(53/30)*


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## Captain Hurrah (Nov 2, 2010)

Captain Hurrah said:


> Policies of Chaos: The Organizational Causes of Violence in China's Cultural Revolution - Lynn T. White
> 
> Red Guard Factionalism and the Cultural Revolution in Guangzhou (Canton) - Stanley Rosen
> 
> ...



*In subject area, and with putting my pseudo-intellectual hat on:*

Black Hundred: The Rise of the Extreme Right in Russia by Walter Laqueur

Russian Fascism: Traditions, Tendencies, Movements by Stephen D. Shenfield

The Russian Question: Nationalism, Modernization, and Post-Communist Russia by Wayne Allensworth

Russian Messianism: Third Rome, Revolution, Communism and After by Peter J. S. Duncan

Russian Eurasianism: An Ideology of Empire by Marlene Laruelle

*A bit of a change,*

The People's Republic Of Kampuchea, 1979-1989: The Revolution After Pol Pot by Margaret Slocomb

Colons & Coolies: The Development Of Cambodia's Rubber Plantations by Margaret Slocomb


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## imposs1904 (Nov 3, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Man Who Killed Himself by Julian Symons *(53/30)*


 
Mr Alfred M.A. by George Friel *(54/30)*


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## machine cat (Nov 3, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 22/30 The Stand - Stephen King


 
23/30 Children of men - PD James


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## imposs1904 (Nov 5, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Mr Alfred M.A. by George Friel *(54/30)*


 
New Cinema in Britain by Roger Manvell *(55/30)*


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## marty21 (Nov 5, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 37/50 - The American Civil War - John Keegan -



38/50 - If The Dead Rise Not - Phillip Kerr

might not finish any this month due to       http://www.nanowrimo.org/


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Nov 9, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 33/62 They Called It Passchendale - Lyn MacDonald
> 34/62 This Is Your Brain On Music - Daniel Levitin


 
35/62 On The Front Line: True World War 1 Stories - Malcolm Brown
36/62 I Shall Wear Midnight - Terry Pratchett
37/62 Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman


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## machine cat (Nov 15, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 23/30 Children of men - PD James


 
24/30 The Algebraist - Iain M Banks


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## strung out (Nov 15, 2010)

strung out said:


> 1/50 1984 - George Orwell
> 2/50 Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
> 3/50 Pygmy - Chuck Palahniuk
> 4/50 The Drowned World - J G Ballard
> ...


 
12/50 The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman
13/50 The Amber Spyglass - Phillip Pullman

that was a few hours of my life i won't be getting back  the whole trilogy was fucking dogwank.


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## marty21 (Nov 15, 2010)

strung out said:


> 12/50 The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman
> 13/50 The Amber Spyglass - Phillip Pullman
> 
> that was a few hours of my life i won't be getting back  the whole trilogy was fucking dogwank.



  it so isn't dogwank


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## strung out (Nov 15, 2010)

was. poorly written, ideology packed, wet rubbish. all the characters were annoying turds and the few that weren't got killed off inexplicably. random plot elements that didn't go anywhere, unsatisfactory conclusions to various bits of the storyline, and many of the central premises didn't even make sense. my biggest gripe is that pullman made it 'exciting' enough for me to read all three books. what a fraud


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## colbhoy (Nov 18, 2010)

colbhoy said:


> Killer's Choice - Ed McBain (12/21)
> 
> Light but very enjoyable.



Five Seasons, A Baseball Companion - Roger Angell (13/21)


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## Voley (Nov 20, 2010)

Neglected this thread fairly badly but have neglected reading a fair bit too. I'll try and remember what I've read since I last posted.

(11/25) Child Of God - Cormac McCarthy
(12/25) Culture Clash - Don Letts
(13/25 A Delusion Of Satan - Frances Hill
(14/25) Disgusting Bliss: The Brass Eye Of Chris Morris - Lucian Randall
(15/25) The Hell Of It All - Charlie Brooker
(16/25) The Emperor - Ryszard Kapuscinski

Target of 25 ain't gonna happen.


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## imposs1904 (Nov 22, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> New Cinema in Britain by Roger Manvell *(55/30)*



Zoo Station by Ian Walker *(56/30)*

 A journalist for The Leveller, New Society and The Observer, Walker was a wonderful writer. One of my favourite rereads.

If you never read any of his stuff before check out these two essays/articles which first appeared in New Society 30 years ago:

Anarchy in the UK
Skinheads: the cult of trouble


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## machine cat (Nov 29, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 24/30 The Algebraist - Iain M Banks


 
25/30  Shanghai Baby - Wei Hui
26/30  Inversions - Iain M Banks
27/30  Archangel - Robert Harris
28/30  Short Stories - Edgar Allan Poe


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## marty21 (Nov 29, 2010)

I've read nothing this month - thanks to nanowrimo - my target looks a little out of reach now


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## machine cat (Nov 29, 2010)

What is it, 5 or 6 weeks until next year? Should be able to exceed my target in that time.


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Nov 29, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 35/62 On The Front Line: True World War 1 Stories - Malcolm Brown
> 36/62 I Shall Wear Midnight - Terry Pratchett
> 37/62 Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman


 
38/62 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
39/62 The History Man - Malcolm Bradbury

No way I can reach 62 now


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## strung out (Nov 29, 2010)

i hope we can do this again next year. i might shame myself into reading more next time round, seeing as how miserably i've done this year.


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## fractionMan (Nov 29, 2010)

billions that I've forgotten now.


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## Jon-of-arc (Nov 29, 2010)

I went for 6-10, something I've smashed in the last few months.  Unemployment does have its benefits.  Don't ask me to recount them all, though.



> What's the most dangerous thing in England?  A middle class white boy with a library card...


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## imposs1904 (Dec 5, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Zoo Station by Ian Walker *(56/30)*
> 
> A journalist for The Leveller, New Society and The Observer, Walker was a wonderful writer. One of my favourite rereads.
> 
> ...



The Other Britain edited by Paul Barker *(57/30)*


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## imposs1904 (Dec 6, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> The Other Britain edited by Paul Barker *(57/30)*


 
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck *(58/30)*


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## marty21 (Dec 7, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 38/50 - If The Dead Rise Not - Phillip Kerr
> 
> might not finish any this month due to       http://www.nanowrimo.org/


 
39/50 Ordinary Thunderstorms - William Boyd 

50 is not looking possible now.


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Dec 10, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 38/62 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
> 39/62 The History Man - Malcolm Bradbury
> 
> No way I can reach 62 now


 
40/62 The Glass Village - Ellery Queen
41/62 Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency - Douglas Adams


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## imposs1904 (Dec 13, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck *(58/30)*



Bogue's Fortune by Julian Symons *(59/30)*


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## machine cat (Dec 13, 2010)

drcarnage said:


> 25/30  Shanghai Baby - Wei Hui
> 26/30  Inversions - Iain M Banks
> 27/30  Archangel - Robert Harris
> 28/30  Short Stories - Edgar Allan Poe


 
29/30 Redemption Ark - Alastair Reynolds

On target to reach 30, but I should have read a lot more tbh.


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## QueenOfGoths (Dec 14, 2010)

QueenOfGoths said:


> Matthew Pearl "The Poe Shadow" (finally!) - (17)


 
The Devil's Star - Jo Nesbo (18)
Heartstone - CJ Sansom (19)


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## strung out (Dec 15, 2010)

looking forward to next year's challenge now. going for 52 books in 52 weeks, with a book review on my blog each week. hopefully since i got my blog regular again, this'll be an incentive to read more and keep it updated.


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## machine cat (Dec 16, 2010)

30/30 - '48 - James Herbert

Might be able to get another one or two read before the year's out but I'm glad I reached my target.


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## marty21 (Dec 18, 2010)

marty21 said:


> 39/50 Ordinary Thunderstorms - William Boyd
> 
> 50 is not looking possible now.


 
40/50   Breakfast at Tiffany's - Truman Capote


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Dec 19, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 40/62 The Glass Village - Ellery Queen
> 41/62 Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency - Douglas Adams


 
42/62 Journey To The Centre Of The Earth - Jules Verne


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## pennimania (Dec 19, 2010)

Right.

I think I'm on 91

91 Diaries - Noel Coward
92 Diaries - Cecil Beaton
 there are more.......


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## imposs1904 (Dec 19, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Bogue's Fortune by Julian Symons *(59/30)*



Bloody Confused! by Chuck Culpepper *(60/30)*


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## pennimania (Dec 19, 2010)

do you know I fucking love this thread.

I went through all my posts on here and it was like a diary  i haven't put my latter reads up yet, but I have made  a Word doc of them all - I will post it if anyone can stand it !


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## marty21 (Dec 19, 2010)

pennimania said:


> do you know I fucking love this thread.
> 
> I went through all my posts on here and it was like a diary  i haven't put my latter reads up yet, but I have made  a Word doc of them all - I will post it if anyone can stand it !


 
we love lists 


do a list of all the books we have read  (if you have  time )


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## pennimania (Dec 19, 2010)

marty21 said:


> we love lists
> 
> 
> do a list of all the books we have read  (if you have  time )



I probably am the only person here who does - it's on MY list


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## imposs1904 (Dec 20, 2010)

marty21 said:


> we love lists
> 
> 
> do a list of all the books we have read  (if you have  time )



One step ahead of you:

booksiveread2010

booksivereread2010

Front cover plus a sample of the book to give the passing reader a flavour of the book.


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## heinous seamus (Dec 20, 2010)

I've got a list of every book I've read since 2005


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## imposs1904 (Dec 29, 2010)

imposs1904 said:


> Bloody Confused! by Chuck Culpepper *(60/30)*



Starter For Ten by David Nicholls *(61/30)*


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## Ich bin ein Mod (Dec 29, 2010)

Ich bin ein Mod said:


> 42/62 Journey To The Centre Of The Earth - Jules Verne


 
43/62 The Zombie Survival Guide - Max Brooks


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## pennimania (Dec 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Right.
> 
> I think I'm on 91
> 
> ...




ooh - I haven't been keeping this thread up to date AT ALL 

93 - Present Indicative - Noel Coward
94- Self Portrait with Friends -  Cecil Beaton
95 - Diaries - Duff Cooper
96- Slipstream - Elizabeth Jane Howard
h 
There are more - including more apocalyptica and a great big run of books about nuns (which I love) I will try to put my definitive list up by end of today!


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## pennimania (Dec 31, 2010)

*Penni's reads*

Huge apologies for cut and paste odyssey - here is my list (of the books I'm prepared to admit to! 
Penni’s reads
1 Walden – Henry Thoreau
2- Day of the Triffid
3-The Kraken Wakes
4 – The Chrysalids – all by John Wyndham – prompted by TV adaptation – set me off on a long jag of apocalyptic fiction thru the year.
5 - The Jewel in the Crown
6 – The Division of the Spoils – books 1 & 4 of Raj trilogy by Paul Scott – still haven’t read other 2!
7- Because Cowards Get Cancer Too – John Diamond
8 – The Rack A E Ellis
9 The Painted Veil W Somerset Maugham - re read, still brilliant, much better than The Rack.
10 Tender Nigel Slater
11 Stanley Spencer – Collected Works – huge book – needed a hydraulic lift to read comfortably
12 (I think) Catalina W Somerset Muagham - started well. Got a bit fed up with it. I am currently exploring a shelf of very old Penguins that have been recently exhumed from our container.
13 Antic Hay Aldous Huxley
14 The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
15 The Diana Chronicles - Tina Brown
16 Three Women Marge Piercy
17 Sleeping With Cats -ditto
18 A Life of Contrasts - Diana Mitford
19 The Pursuit of Laughter ditto (includes bits lifted from the above
20 The Road –Cormac McCarthy
21 - The Lormes of Castle Rising - Fanny Cradock   
but I HAD to have an antidote to 'The Road' - I mean I was retching and thinking about gnawed bones ALL the time
22 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold - daughter's recommendation - not too impressed.
23 The Secret Life of France -Lucy Wadham
24 The Letters of Evelyn Waugh - gosh what a beastly man! but absolutely unput downable
25 Secret Diary of a Grumpy Old Woman - emotionally dishonest. Worst book I've read in years - Mrs Cradock rates as a genius in comparison. 
26 -First Childhood - Gerald Berners - excellent 
27 - Journeying Boy -diaries of Benjamin Brtten - Schoenberg good-Vaughan Williams bad
28 ( I think) The Jewel Garden -Monty Don
29- Turnip Tops -E.M. Boileau
30 - The Legacy - Sybille Bedford
31 - (reread) The Well Tempered Garden Christopher Lloyd - one of my favourite books and just the right time of year for it
32 Diaries Edwina Currie
33 the Blunkett tapes – david Blunkett
34 The Philadelphian Richard Powell
35 – House Music – Oona King 
36 Raven Seek Thy Brother - Gavin Maxwell
37 reread Diaries - Alan Clark - I just lerrrve political diaries and this is one of the best! 
38 The Tories and The Nation State - Alan Clark - very waspish and entertaining.
39 Cuttings Christopher Lloyd
40 The Plumed Serpent DH Lawrence
41 – Exotics – Christopher Lloyd

42- Into Politics – diaries 70’s-1982 Alan Clark
43 – William Pitt the Younger – William Hague
45	oly Terrors Arthur Machen –
45 The Snow Goose Paul Gallico
46 A Canticle for Leibowitz -Walter Miller jr -reckon Cormac McCarthy has read this
47 Diaries 1942-54 James Lees Milne - words cannot express how entertained i have been by this man's wit and the way he rogered indiscriminately through posh society in the 40's and 50's. Yet very poignant at the same time. Try it
48	The Death of Grass - John Christopher - absolutely tore through this
49	 Down to a Sunless Sea - David Graham 
50 Last Light Alex Scarrow - interesting idea but hated the way it was written. In fact worst book I've read this year - and it could have been so good
51	The Last Diaries - Alan Clark
52	 Nella Last's Peace -post war diaries Nella Last
53	 Harold and Vita - letters edited by Nigel Nicolson
54	 Diaries- Harold Nicolson
55	- Children of the Dust - Louise Lawrence (more apocalyptic crip-crap) 
56	Alas Babylon Pat Franks
57	 Patriots - James Wesley, Rawles
58	 Swansong - Robert McCammell - absolute tosh 
59	- The Ghost Road - Pat Barker
60	- Mrs Miniver - Jan Struther 
61	-One second After -William R Forstchen 
62	The Plague Albert Camus
63	Flood Stephen Baxter \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
64	My Favourite Wife Tony Parsons –rubbish
65	The Girl in a Swing Richard Adams - rubbish but compulsive
66 The Commitments Roddy Doyle (re read)
67 something by Georgette Heyer (gite book - can't remember its name)
68 The wasp Factory – Iain banks
69	Justine Lawrence Durrell
70	Balthazar
71 Jean de Florette Marcel Pagnol
72 Le chateau de ma Mere - Marcel Pagnol
73 (if we're counting Kids' books) ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeil
74 Curtain Up - Noel Streatfeild 
75 Malevil - Robert Merle (slowed me right down) and I must reread it, because now I have a much better dictionary.
and I have just had a HUGE wallow through the Tudor Court novels.

76 The Constant Princess
77 The Other Boleyn Girl
78 The Boleyn Inheritance
79 The Queen's Fool
80 The Virgin's Lover
81 The other Queen - all by the rather dreadful Philippa Gregory. It's like eating Mars bars - you crave one, you gallop through it, feel sick and wish you hadn't.
82 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood - just adored it. 
83 - Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood
84- Couching at the Door - DK Broster 
85 Jump - Jilly Cooper 
86 - Widdershins - Oliver Onions
87 - The London Nobody Knows - Geoffrey Fletcher -thoroughly recommend this - it's OP, but you can easily get it cheaply on Amazon 

89 The Texts of Festival - Mick Farren - er, might have posted this one before - yet more post apocalyptica..... 
90	Blindness - Jose Saramago - very harsh - loved it. 
91	Atonement - Ian Mc Ewan 
92	Diaries - Noel Coward
93	Diaries - Cecil Beaton

94- Present Indicative - Noel Coward
95- Self Portrait with Friends - Cecil Beaton
96 - Diaries - Duff Cooper
97- Slipstream - Elizabeth Jane Howard
98 – Green Darkness Anya Seton
99- How we die –Sherwin Nuland
100- Aging With Grace –the Nun Study David Snowdon
101-A Touch Of God –Maria Boulding
102- I Choose the Cloister – Margaret Bennet
103 – Through the Narrow Gate – Karen Armstrong
104 – A Gift Upon the Shore MK wren
105The Postman David Brin
106 – The World Ends in Hickory Hollow Ardath Mayhar
107 – The Last Ship William Brinkley
108 Diaries James Lees Milne 1984 -97
109   “          “     “       “     the middle years – I love this man – he has been one of my best finds thus year!

There are more – a lot of rubbish and comfort reads – which I won’t bore you with.

Are we doing this again next year?


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## imposs1904 (Dec 31, 2010)

pennimania said:


> Are we doing this again next year?



There's a 2011 Reading Challenge thread on the list somewhere.

Here it is.


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## imposs1904 (Jan 1, 2011)

imposs1904 said:


> Starter For Ten by David Nicholls *(61/30)*



Roseanna by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo *(62/30)*


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## spartacus mills (Jan 2, 2012)

01 - PHILIP ZIEGLER - The Black Death
02 - GOGOL - Collected Tales
03 - MERL FLUIN - The Reality Binge Trick
04 - COLIN SPENCER - The Miners and Coal Levels of Gwent
05 - WU MING - Manituana
06 - SUSAN JEFFERS - Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway
07 - RAY LAWRENCE - Unknown Human Remains: The Abercarn Colliery Explosion of 1878
08 - STEPHEN MOSS - This Birding Life
09 - (ROYAL COMMISSION) HUGHES, MALAWS, PARRY, WAKELIN - Collieries of Wales: Engineering and Architecture
10 - GLYN TILLEY - The Surviving Engines of Glyn Pits, Pontypool
11 - J H MOrris & L J WILLIAMS - The South Wales Coal Industry 1841-1875
12 - RICHARD HERRING - How Not to Grow Up
13 - RUDOLF ROCKER - Anarcho Syndicalism
14 - ALAN HILL - The History and Development of Collliery Ventilation
15 - STEWART HOME - Blood Rites of the Bourgeosie
16 - R A S REDMAYNE - The Ventilation of Mines
17 - JEAN PAUL SARTRE - Nausea
18 - KATHY ACKER - Young Lust (3 early novels)
19 - STIEG LARSSON - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
20 - HELEN WALSH - Brass
21 - CHARLOTTE WALSH - Wetlands
22 - STIEG LARSSON - The Girl Who Played With Fire
23 - ANDRE BRETN - An Anthology of Black Humour
24 - STIEG LARSSON - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest
25 - JULIAN RATHBONE - The Last English King
26 - GEORGES BATAILLE - Blue of Noon
27 - VITESLAV NEZVAL - Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
28 - GERGES BATAILLE - My Mother / Madame Edwarda / The Dead Man
29 - VARIOUS - Borough Satyr: The Life and Art of Austin Osman Spare
30 - TRACEY EMN - Strangelands
31 - PHIL CULLEN - Gwendraeth Valley Coal Mines
32 - CHRIS TOWNSEND - Vile Bodies: Photography and the Crisis of Looking
33 - MISHLEN LINDEN - Typhonian Teratomas
34 - STEWART HOME - Red London
35 - THIERRY JONQUET - Tarantula
36 - DAWN ADES - Photomontage
37 - VITESLAV NEZVAL & JINDRICH STYRSKY - Edition 69
38 - MATTHEW COLLINGS - Sarah Lucas
39 - MELISSA P - The Scent of Your Breath
40 - JOSH COHEN - How to Read Freud
41 - SUSAN SONTAG - On Photography
42 - RICHARD D ZAKIA & DAVID A PAGE - Photographic Composition
43 - CHRIS GEORGE - The Book of Digital Photography


----------

