back by popular demand it's the 2017 reading challenge thread

[Yuwipi Woman]

1/40 The Changes Everything: Capitalism versus the Climate - Naomi Klein
2/40 Feed - MT Andersen

 

[Smokeandsteam]

3/25 David Harvey - Rebel Cities

 

[Shirl]

1/25 Dead Tomorrow - Peter James
2/25 August is a wicked Month - Edna O'brien
3/25 Gallows View - Peter Robinson
4/25 Lady Lupin's Book of Etiquette - Babette Cole
5/25 Talking to the dead - Harry Bingham

I think I've been reading much more than usual because of sober January, not sure how February's reading will go.

 

[BoatieBird]

1/65 - Laurie Lee - Village Christmas and Other Notes on the English Year
2/65 - John Irving - A Prayer for Owen Meany (1/10*)
3/65 - Ben Aaronovitch - Moon Over Soho
4/65 - William Boyd - Any Human Heart (2/10)
5/65 - Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
6/65 - John Steinbeck - Tortilla Flat

7/65 - Andrew Michael Hurley - The Loney

 

[Fozzie Bear]

1/25 Malcolm X and Alex Haley - The Autobiography of Malcolm X

2/25 Alex de Jonge - Nightmare Culture: Lautremont & "Les Chants de Maldoror"

 

[Voley]

1/30 Substance: Inside New Order - Peter Hook
2/30 The Illustrated A Brief History Of Time - Stephen Hawking
3/30 A Clash Of Kings - George R.R. Martin
4/30 Reelin' In The Years: The Soundtrack Of A Northern Life - Mark Radcliffe

Mixed feelings about this one. His jokes fall flat a fair bit, which surprised me as ''Showbusiness'' made me laugh loads. And there are some overly-nostalgic bits that are really dreary. However, the chapter on Kraftwerk made me want to give them more of a chance than I have so far and there's a bit on Nirvana that is miles ahead of most things you read about them.

 

[Threshers_Flail]

1/50 Vladimir Nabokov - Speak, Memory
2/50 Larry McMurtry - Lonesome Dove
3/50 Steve Reicher - Mad Mobs and Englishmen?: Myths and realities of the 2011 riots
4/50 Stuart Jeffries - Grand Hotel Abyss
5/50 Sean Birchall - Beating the Fascists: The Untold Story of Anti-fascist Action
6/50 Alasdair Gray - Lanark
7/50 Shirley Jackson - The Haunting of Hill House
8/50 Jon Ronson - So You've Been Publicly Shamed
9/50 Justin McGruick - Radical Cities
10/50 Mark Fisher - Capitalist Realism
11/50 Hannah Arendt - Eichmann in Jerusalem

 

[ringo]

1/45 And The Ass Saw The Angel - Nick Cave
2/45 Rant - Chuck Palahniuk
3/45 Thank You, Jeeves - PG Wodehouse

 

[spartacus mills]

01 Arkady & Boris Strugatsky – Monday Starts On Saturday
02 Jackie Higgins – Why It Does Not Have To Be In Focus, Modern Photography Explained
03 Ed McBain – Fuzz
04 Fyodor Dostoyevsky – Netochka Nezvanova
05 James M. Cain – The Postman Always Rings Twice
06 Spike Milligan – Open Heart University
07 Tom Callaghan – A Killing Winter
08 John Steinbeck – East of Eden
09 Ed McBain – Let’s Hear It For the Deaf Man

 

[Voley]

1/30 Substance: Inside New Order - Peter Hook
2/30 The Illustrated A Brief History Of Time - Stephen Hawking
3/30 A Clash Of Kings - George R.R. Martin
4/30 Reelin' In The Years: The Soundtrack Of A Northern Life - Mark Radcliffe
5/30 Look Back In Hunger: The Autobiography - Jo Brand

Bit disappointed by this, too. I've always really liked her live act so was expecting something in that vein but it ends just as she gets into comedy. Presumably so she can write a sequel. Good bit about working as a psychiatric nurse, though. Maybe she saved all the good stuff for the next one? Can't blame her, I think Stephen Fry's done three autobiographies so far so you'd be forgiven for wanting to pad it out a bit, I guess.

 

[ringo]

1/45 And The Ass Saw The Angel - Nick Cave
2/45 Rant - Chuck Palahniuk
3/45 Thank You, Jeeves - PG Wodehouse
4/45 Disgrace - J.M. Coetzee

 

[Plumdaff]

1/25 Junk by Melvin Burgess
2/25 The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters
3/25 The White Album by Joan Didion
4/25 Short Cuts by Raymond Carver

5/25 Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
One I've meant to read for a long time. An absolute classic, I loved it. The first Mrs Rochester gets to tell her story. It touches on empire, race, sex, female disempowerment, I thoroughly recommend.

 

[Voley]

3/29 Bill Beverley Dodgers

Group of kids on the bottom rungs of an LA drug gang go on a road trip. Hypnotic- read it in an evening.

This is dead good, Manter, thanks for recommending it. I'm only a few chapters in but really like the punchy style. Not a spare word. Characters developing well too.

 

[ringo]

5/25 Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
One I've meant to read for a long time. An absolute classic, I loved it. The first Mrs Rochester gets to tell her story. It touches on empire, race, sex, female disempowerment, I thoroughly recommend.

Blew me away too, fantastic book

 

[ringo]

This is dead good, Manter, thanks for recommending it. I'm only a few chapters in but really like the punchy style. Not a spare word. Characters developing well too.

I started it this morning on the train; one chapter done and hooked

 

[Signal 11]

1/20 - Trawl - B.S. Johnson
2/20 - Games Without Frontiers - Joe Kennedy

 

[Pickman's model]

5/50 georges simenon, the late monsieur gallet (london: penguin, 2013)

6/50 dennis lehane, the given day (london: black swan, 2009)

 

[Pickman's model]

1. Peter Barham. Schizophrenia and human value.

I'll read a novel next.

That should be a novel

 

[marshall]

6/109 - Bill Beverly, Dodgers - LA teenage crack house watchman fucks up and has to undertake an exhausting 2,000 mile road trip with a few fellow corner boys - and his psychotic 13 year old hit man/child younger brother - to make amends for his mistake. His first time out of LA and into a rural, mid USA environment, he discovers he likes the countryside. Really good, gritty, great tone of voice throughout.

 

[marshall]

7/109 - Phil Hogan, A Pleasure and a Calling - super stalker main character, young estate agent, small town, keeps duplicate keys of all the houses he ever sold, quite happily pops in whenever he likes, does 'stuff', really funny but wrong. Like Ripley, you can't help but root for him.

 

[marty21]

1/75 Sanctuary : After it Happened Book 5 - Devon C Ford.
2/75 1916 : The Mornings After - Tim Pat Coogan.
3/75 Last Stand at Saber River - Elmore Leonard.

4/75 After : The Shock - Scott Nicholson
5/75 After : The Echo - Scott Nicholson
6/75 After : Milepost 291 - Scott Nicholson
7/75 After : Whiteout - Scott Nicholson

 

[Fozzie Bear]

1/25 Malcolm X and Alex Haley - The Autobiography of Malcolm X
2/25 Alex de Jonge - Nightmare Culture: Lautremont & "Les Chants de Maldoror"

3/25 Viv Albertine - Clothes Clothes Clothes Music Music Music Boys Boys Boys

 

[BoatieBird]

1/65 - Laurie Lee - Village Christmas and Other Notes on the English Year
2/65 - John Irving - A Prayer for Owen Meany (1/10*)
3/65 - Ben Aaronovitch - Moon Over Soho
4/65 - William Boyd - Any Human Heart (2/10)
5/65 - Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
6/65 - John Steinbeck - Tortilla Flat
7/65 - Andrew Michael Hurley - The Loney

8/65 - Tana French - Into The Woods (Dublin Murder Squad 1) (3/10)

As recommended by cyberfairy in the detective fiction thread.
Cheers cyberfairy, I really enjoyed it

 

[Pickman's model]

6/50 dennis lehane, the given day (london: black swan, 2009)

7/50 dennis lehane, world gone by (london: abacus, 2016)

 

[polly]

1/29 Garth Risk Hallberg, City on Fire
2/29 Raymond Chandler, The High Window

Jesus Christ, that first one was more than 900 pages long and I reckon at least 800 of those were superfluous. Don't believe the hype.

 

[kropotkin]

1. Tom Rob Smith - child 44
2. Louisa Lim - People's Republic of Amnesia: Tiananmen Revisited
3. Robin Yassin-Kassab, Leila Al-Shami - Burning Country: Syrians in revolution and war
4. Daniel Kahneman - Thinking, Fast and Slow
5. John Courtenay Grinwood - Arabesk
6. Harsha walia - undoing border imperialism


Aiming for 45. Doing ok so far.

 

[SpookyFrank]

1/48 Sanjay Chaturvedi and Timothy Doyle - Climate Terror: A Critical Geopolitics of Climate Change
2/48 Poul Anderson - Tau Zero
3/48 David Mitchell - The Bone Clocks
4/48 Asa Briggs - Victorian Cities

 

[May Kasahara]

1/49 - Dave Eggers - The Circle
2/49 - John Masefield - The Box of Delights
3/49 - Jenny Nimmo - The Rinaldi Ring

4/49 - Sarah Helm - If This Is A Woman. Fucking hell. Essential reading, especially now.

 

[Voley]

1/30 Substance: Inside New Order - Peter Hook
2/30 The Illustrated A Brief History Of Time - Stephen Hawking
3/30 A Clash Of Kings - George R.R. Martin
4/30 Reelin' In The Years: The Soundtrack Of A Northern Life - Mark Radcliffe
5/30 Look Back In Hunger: The Autobiography - Jo Brand
6/30 Dodgers - Bill Beverly

All the good things that Manter marshall and ringo said about this are spot on. Really good crime novel, great writing style. Will deffo keep an eye out for more of his stuff.

 

[Me76]

I'm stalling at the moment. Got two books on the go but both are a bit hard going and not making me want to read. I'm too invested to leave them though.