Tag: book lists

A Century of Books: How Am I Doing? January Report

~ whatmeread ~ 6 Comments

In January, I foolishly decided to join Simon Thomas’s Century of Book Challenge, even though I knew that reading 100 books, one for each year in a century, from 1925-2024, would be tough because last year I only read 169. So, how am I doing?

Well, unlike Simon, who seems to have a huge library of unread books from just about every decade, I have just been reading through my pile, and my worst fears are being justified. Just in the first weeks, I read seven books written in 2023! I had to decide whether, on my page for keeping track, I would list just one book per year or go ahead and list every book I read for that year, and I decided to do the latter, because the former was just too frustrating. I also had to decide, because my first few book reviews for the year were for ones I read in 2023, whether to list those. I decided to do that even though it might seem like cheating, because it’s unlikely that I am going to meet this challenge at the rate I am going. And in any case, by the end of the year, I won’t have posted reviews of the books I read towards the end of the year yet.

I will summarize my progress so far by decade. If you want to see the details, see my Century of Books page.

  • 1925-1934: 4 books (however, 3 of them are for 1934—I don’t know how I did that)
  • 1935-1944: 1 book
  • 1945-1954: 1 book
  • 1955-1964: 2 books
  • 1965-1974: 2 books
  • 1975-1984: 1 book
  • 1985-1994: 0 books
  • 1995–2004: 0 books
  • 2005-2014: 2 books
  • 2015-2024: 16 books, but 7 of them are from 2023

So, although Simon said the first half of the year you could just plug in the years and later begin to purposefully look for books for the years you don’t have, I may have to come up with a plan that is more specific sooner, because random reading doesn’t seem to be working well for me.

I’ll post this report each month, so you can see how I’m doing.

12th Anniversary! Top Ten Books of the Year!

~ whatmeread ~ 12 Comments

Today I’ve been blogging for twelve years, which means it’s time for my anniversary post, where I list my top 10 books of this year of blogging. This year I found it much more difficult to pick this list than in previous years. Working from my Best of Ten list, I had several cases of more than one book by the same author that I had to choose between. I also didn’t have as many books that I was absolutely sure would end up in my top ten for the year as I usually do. (When I’m sure, I mark them in purple on my list.)

Of the books I’ve chosen, six are historical novels, three are vague as to time, and only one is clearly contemporary, but harks back to the 1970s (which some of us can remember). Eight are by women. This is an international group of novels. I’ve chosen books set in far northern Canada, islands off the coast of Denmark and in the Moluccas, France, Iceland, Michigan, Texas, and Ireland. My choices are by Canadian, Danish, American, Icelandic, Indo-European, French, and Irish authors. Seven of the books were written relatively recently, while three are older books. This year, all are novels.

So, in the order in which they appeared on my blog, here are my top ten books of the year:

  1. The Other Side of the Bridge by Mary Lawson
  2. The Unseen by Roy Jacobsen
  3. The Flight Portfolio by Julie Orringer
  4. Miss Iceland by Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir
  5. The Ten Thousand Things by Maria Dermoût
  6. News of the World by Paulette Jiles
  7. We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
  8. Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
  9. The Child and the River by Henri Bosco
  10. Foster by Claire Keegan

Classics Club Spin #36!

~ whatmeread ~ 10 Comments

It’s time for another Classics Club Spin. What’s it all about? Members of the Classics Club select 20 books from their Classics Club lists (here’s mine) and list them by number on their blogs before Sunday, January 21. On that day, a spin number is selected by the club, and that number determines which book on the list the member will read by the spin deadline, which is Sunday, March 3. I am always ready to play, so here is my list:

  1. The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy
  2. Cecilia, Memoirs of an Heiress by Frances Burney
  3. The Prophet’s Mantle by E. Nesbit
  4. The Passenger by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz
  5. The Methods of Lady Walderhurst by Frances Hodgson Burnett
  6. The Tavern Knight by Rafael Sabatini
  7. The Book of Dede Korkut by Anonymous
  8. Weatherley Parade by Richmal Crompton
  9. The Princess of Cleves by Madame de La Fayette
  10. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs
  11. The Book of Lamentations by Rosario Castellanos
  12. Love’s Labour’s Lost by William Shakespeare
  13. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
  14. Merkland, A Story of Scottish Life by Margaret Oliphant
  15. The Deepening Stream by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
  16. Tis Pity She’s a Whore by John Ford
  17. Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
  18. Hero and Leander by Christopher Marlowe
  19. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (1862)
  20. Weatherley Parade by Richmal Crompton

I Insanely Decide to Join the Century of Books Challenge

~ whatmeread ~ 10 Comments

Last Wednesday, Simon Thomas put up a Century of Books challenge, in which he selects 100 years and attempts to read a book published in each of those years. This time, he selected 1925-2024. I have insanely decided to join him, even though this challenge may determine 2/3 of my reading for the year.

As if I’m not doing enough challenges. We’ll see how I do! I’ll post a link under my Projects tab so you can watch my progress.

What’s Your First Book This Year?

~ whatmeread ~ 11 Comments

I frankly stole this idea from Book Journey after reading about it on This Reading Life. She has folks submit photos of themselves holding the first book they’re reading for 2024. A really cute idea. I couldn’t submit my photo, because my flip-around feature on my very old phone doesn’t work anymore, but I sent her a picture of the book cover for my first book, which is Homestead by Melinda Moustakis.

I see now as I look back at Book Journey’s original post that I missed the deadline, because she asks people to submit their first books between December 17 and 31. But I’m not that good a planner, so I would have had to know about this on December 31, which was when I started this book, and I didn’t see Brona’s post until today.

So, just for fun, for all you nonplanners like me, what was your first book to read in 2024? Are you still reading it, or have you already finished?