Lately I haven't been reading as much but am hoping to rekindle the passion a bit. I have a half-read book graveyard around my bed. It is unlike me not to finish even a terrible book but seems the older I get the less I am willing to invest in something if it doesn't spark my interest.
Anyone read anything good lately they can recommend?
I am borrowing the idea below from G in Berlin's blog post. Books I have read are marked in blue. Seems I still have a few books left to read!
The BBC list of the most beloved books:
1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller (in the book graveyard)
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier (my favorite Hitchcock movie)
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett (lost on airplane partially read, book graveyard)
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac (left in the seat back pocket of an airplane, book graveyard)
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie
7 comments:
You should finish Catch 22. It helps make sense of living life as an expat. :-)
You've described my dilemna with reading accurately. I taught literature for 30 years and I've read a lot of the books on this list also. They are all classics and worthy of reading. At present, I'm in the process of searching out good contemporary writers. I'll let you know if I come across something worth our time and effort.
I've started a thread over on the expat discussion board about swapping books during the meetup in Munich, in case your own stash of reading material doesn't inspire you.
Of those ones listed there, I can recommend the Yiddish Policemen's Union, Bel Canto, and The Kite Runner.
See
http://www.expatbloggersingermany.com/meetup/topic.php?id=46 for the whole list. I haven't read or didn't like the rest of them listed there, but that doesn't mean that someone else won't like them.
I loved The Yiddish Policemen's Union with a passion that forced my book club to read it, has resulted in my giving three copies away and forcing it upon people. (I also voted for it -it won- in the Hugos).
I just read The Lizard Cage by Karen Connelly. Very different, very moving- perhaps the best book I have read this year. The lyrical writing made the difficult subject bearable.
Catch 22- ehh. I didn't include it because I think I stopped reading it thirty years ago and have no real desire to try again. Kite Runner- I read 1000 Splendid Suns and much weeping later will wait to read that (also, reviews said that Suns was a better book, and it is woman focused, something I am glad of occasionally).
I try to read books, but I just don't enjoy them as much as magazines. I've finally come to terms with the fact that I'm no longer a book reader.
Zadie Smith's "On Beauty." Robertson Davies' "Fifth Business." David Simon's "Homicide." For summer, try Henning Mankell's Inspector Wallander series or Ian Rankin's John Rebus series.
- Bayern fan in Minneapolis
I would like to encourage you to add the Bible to this list, my favorite translation in English is the New Living Translation.
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