the grand 2015 reading challenge thread

[Yuwipi Woman]

1/27 The Universe in a Single Atom -- The Dalai Lama
2/27 The Last President -- John Barnes
3/27 Walden -- Henry David Thoreau
4/27 Walden on Wheels -- Ken Ilgunas
5/27 Walk to the End of the Word -- Suzy Charnas
6/27 Leading the Way: Asian American Artists of the Older Generation -- Paul Karstrom, et al.

7/27 Vacant - Alex Hughes
8/27 Earthbound - Joe Haldeman
9/27 Insurgent - Veronica Roth (yeh, I know. )

 

[colbhoy]

1/20 - Strange Loyalties by William McIlvanney
2/20 - Calico Joe by John Grisham
3/20 - Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane
4/20 - Band of Brothers by Stephen E Ambrose
5/20 - Joyland by Stephen King

 

[rich!]

40. A Delicate Truth, John le Carre

41. The Eighth Court, Mike Shevdon.

 

[imposs1904]

1/52 The In Between Time by Alexander Baron
2/52 King Mob : A Critical Hidden History by David Wise with Stuart Wise & Nick Brandt
3/52 Miss Lonelyhearts by Nathanael West
4/52 The Beiderbecke Affair by Alan Plater (Reread)
5/52 The Hour of the Innocents by Robert Paston
6/52 The Beiderbecke Tapes by Alan Plater (Reread)
7/52 Bellies and Bullseyes: The Outrageous True Story of Darts by Sid Waddell
8/52 In The Thirties by Edward Upward

9/52 Bright Summer, Dark Autumn by Robert Barltrop (Reread)

 

[el-ahrairah]

1. Kyme & Priestley, ed. - Tales Of Heresy
2. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - Out Of The Pit
3. Mike Lee - Fallen Angels
4. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain
5. Stella Gibbons - Christmas At Cold Comfort Farm
6. Anne Lecki - Ancillary Justice
7. Rick Pristley - Slaves To Darkness
8. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron
9. Luke Haines - Bad Vibes: Britpop And My Part In its Downfall
10. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron V.2
11. Marc Gascoigne - The Trolltooth Wars
12. Ian Watson - Chaos Child
13. John French - Ahriman Sorcerer
14. Chiang Yee - The Silent Traveller In London
15. Graham McNeill - A Thousand Sons
16. Richard Saunders - If A Pirate I Must Be - The Story Of Bartholomew Roberts, King Of The Caribbean
17. Steve jackson - Citadel Of Chaos
18. Ian Livingstone - Forest Of Doom
19. Alan Grant & John Wagner - Doomlord: The Deathlords Of Nox
20. Andrew Ward - Football's Strangest Matches
21. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron V.3
22. Aaron Dembski Bowden - The First Heretic
23. Ian Livingstone - City Of Thieves
24. Kent Greenfield - The Myth Of Choice
25. Dan Abnett - Prospero Burns
26. Joe Haldeman - The Forever War
27. Marianne Grabucker - There's A Good Girl: Gender Stereotyping In The First Three Years, A Diary
28. Christian Dunn - Age Of Darkness
29. Ian Livingstone - Deathtrap Dungeon
30. Richard Halliwell - Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Rulebook
31. Steve Jackson - Scorpion Swamp
32. Alan Bligh - Imperial Armour Volume Nine: The Badab War Part One
33. Alan Bligh - Imperial Armour Volume Ten: The Badab War Part Two
34. Alisdair Alpin MacGregor - The Ghost Book: Strange Hauntings In Britain

 

[marty21]

1/60 - 'Til Death - Ed McBain
2/60 - How to Connect with Nature - Tristan Gooley
3/60 - The Dead Women of Juarez - Sam Hawken
4/60 - Jericho: Season 3 Civil War - Dan Shotz,Robert Levine,Jason Burns (Graphic Novel)
5/60 - jericho: Season 4 - Kalinda Vazquez (Graphic Novel)
6/60 - The Black Echo- Michael Connelly
7/60 - The Black Ice - Michael Connelly
8/60 - Concrete Blonde - Michael Connelly
9/60 - The Last Coyote - Michael Connelly

 

[BoatieBird]

1/60 - JM Barrie - Peter Pan*
2/60 - Joe Hill - NOS4R2
3/60 - Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons*
4/60 - Belinda Bauer - Rubbernecker
5/60 - Roddy Doyle - The Guts
6/60 - Phillipa Pearce - Tom's Midnight Garden*
7/60 - Mildred D Taylor - Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry*
8/60 - Denise Mina - Exile
9/60 - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Americanah
10/60 - Jon Ronson - Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries
11/60 - Iain McEwan - The Children Act
12/60 - Denise Mina - Resolution

13/60 - Neil Gaiman - Stardust

 

[toggle]

1. Mike Cronin - The failure of British fascism
2. Raymond E Feist - Rides a Dread legion
3. Robin Hobb - Dragon keeper
4. Terry Pratchet - Unseen Academicals
5. Campagna and Campiglio - What are we fighting for?
6. Dunleavy et al. - Voices of the people
7. Conan Doyle - A study in Scarlet
8. Stuart Bell - The conservative party and british politics
9. Robin Hobb - Dragon haven
10. William Morris - News from Nowehere
11. Philippa Gregory - The white Queen
12. Raymond E Feist - Exile's return
13. Catherine Hall - White, male and middle class
14. D. H. lawrence - lady Chatterley's lover
15. Raymond E Feist - Flight of the nighthawks
16. jack London - call of the wild
17. jack london - white fang
18. H Rider haggard - King Solomon's mines
19. Neil gaimin - American gods
20. Rodney Bolt - the impossible life of Mary Benson
21. Gorden marsden - Victorian values
22. Phillipa Gregory - The other Boleyn girl
23. mark Guy pearse - the pretty ways o providence
24. Raymond E Feist - into a dark realm
25. bernard Cornwell - harlquin
26. Bernard Cornwell - vagabond
27. Phillipa Gregory - the boleyn inheritance
28. Bernard Cornwell - Sharpe's honour
29. bernard Cornwell - sharpe's fury
30. sue townsend - adrian mole, minor to major
31. sue townsend - weapons of mass destruction
32. Bernard Cornwell - Sharpe's escape
33. Bernard Cornwell - Sharpe's triumph
34. Phillipa Gregory - lady of the rivers
35. Phillipa Gregory - The kingmaker's daughter
36. naomi Novik - temeraire
37. naomi novik -throne of jade
38. naomi novik - black powder
39. naomi novik - empire of ivory
40. naomi novik - victory of eagles
41. naomi novik - tongues of serpents
42. naomi novik - crucible of gold
43. naomi novik - blood of tyrants
44. joe abercrombie - the blade itself
45. joe abercrombie - before they are hanged
46. joe abercrombie - last argument of kings
47. robin hobb - city of dragons
48. robin hobb - blood of dragons
49. robin hobb - fool's assassin
50. Raymond e feist - wrath of a mad god
51. raymond e feist - at the gates of darkness
52. raymond e feist - a kingdom besieged
53. raymond e feist - a crown imperiled
54. raymond e feist - magician's end
55. Phyliss Schafly - the flipside of feminism.

56-71. robret jordan - the wheel of time series.

yes, the whole fucking thing. because not sleeping and as a result i'm not alive enough to write. starting to realise how much time i was spending studying, it's easy to loose count when you never get to finish a book, and you pick up something to scan through every time you sit down.

 

[MrSki]

56-71. robret jordan - the wheel of time series.

yes, the whole fucking thing. because not sleeping and as a result i'm not alive enough to write. starting to realise how much time i was spending studying, it's easy to loose count when you never get to finish a book, and you pick up something to scan through every time you sit down.

Enjoy. It is a lot of reading & gets a bit slow around book six but I enjoyed the last couple where a bit more humour is introduced.

Sorry about your sleeping though.

 

[toggle]

the characters certainly came to life a little more with the second author's input. I got a little fed up with the listy feel of the new and heroic ways to die versus the miraculous survivals. the journey was definately better than the ending imo.

 

[rich!]

Enjoy. It is a lot of reading & gets a bit slow around book six but I enjoyed the last couple where a bit more humour is introduced.

Sorry about your sleeping though.

Is book 6 the one where everyone in the world moves around one place from where they were at the start? And nothing else happens?

 

[MrSki]

Is book 6 the one where everyone in the world moves around one place from where they were at the start? And nothing else happens?

Something like that. It has been a while since I read it.

 

[treefrog]

Aiming for 25 this year, currently on my 4th:
A Wife on Gorge River by Catherine Stewart
Expecting Better by Emily Oster
In the shadow of the banyan by Vaddy Radner

Currently halfway through The Man in the High Castle by Philip K Dick. Going to try and get a good spread of authors too, and cut down on rereads.

4: The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Team Eng

 

[el-ahrairah]

1. Kyme & Priestley, ed. - Tales Of Heresy
2. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - Out Of The Pit
3. Mike Lee - Fallen Angels
4. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain
5. Stella Gibbons - Christmas At Cold Comfort Farm
6. Anne Lecki - Ancillary Justice
7. Rick Pristley - Slaves To Darkness
8. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron
9. Luke Haines - Bad Vibes: Britpop And My Part In its Downfall
10. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron V.2
11. Marc Gascoigne - The Trolltooth Wars
12. Ian Watson - Chaos Child
13. John French - Ahriman Sorcerer
14. Chiang Yee - The Silent Traveller In London
15. Graham McNeill - A Thousand Sons
16. Richard Saunders - If A Pirate I Must Be - The Story Of Bartholomew Roberts, King Of The Caribbean
17. Steve jackson - Citadel Of Chaos
18. Ian Livingstone - Forest Of Doom
19. Alan Grant & John Wagner - Doomlord: The Deathlords Of Nox
20. Andrew Ward - Football's Strangest Matches
21. Shane McCarthy - All Hail Megatron V.3
22. Aaron Dembski Bowden - The First Heretic
23. Ian Livingstone - City Of Thieves
24. Kent Greenfield - The Myth Of Choice
25. Dan Abnett - Prospero Burns
26. Joe Haldeman - The Forever War
27. Marianne Grabucker - There's A Good Girl: Gender Stereotyping In The First Three Years, A Diary
28. Christian Dunn - Age Of Darkness
29. Ian Livingstone - Deathtrap Dungeon
30. Richard Halliwell - Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Rulebook
31. Steve Jackson - Scorpion Swamp
32. Alan Bligh - Imperial Armour Volume Nine: The Badab War Part One
33. Alan Bligh - Imperial Armour Volume Ten: The Badab War Part Two
34. Alisdair Alpin MacGregor - The Ghost Book: Strange Hauntings In Britain
35. Ian Livingstone - Caverns Of The Snow Witch

last night i discovered that my insomnia has become zopiclone-proof. still, i got half way through Stalingrad so there is a slight upside.

 

[Patteran]

1) Language in the News, Discourse & Ideology in the Press - Roger Fowler.
2) Hold Everything Dear, Despatches on Survival & Resistance - John Berger.
3) The Continuum Concept - Jean Liedloff

4) The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Edward Tufte
5) Selected Poems, Rumi

 

[spartacus mills]

01 Nikola Mihov: Forget Your Past: Communist-Era Monuments in Bulgaria
02 Bohumil Hrabal: Closely Observed Trains
03 Joe R Lansdale: Mucho Mojo
04 Andrew Lanyon: Circular Walks Around Rowley Hall
05 Ismail Kadare: The File on H
06 Slavoj Zizek: Trouble in Paradise – From the End of History to the End of Capitalism
07 Iceberg Slim: Pimp
08 John Grindrod: Concretopia: A Journey Around the Rebuilding of Postwar Britain
09 T R Pearson: Cry Me a River
10 J G Ballard: Concrete Island
11 Charles White: The Life and Times of Little Richard, the Quasar of Rock
12 Elmore Leonard: Get Shorty

Next up: Mikhail Bulgakov: Notes On a Cuff and Other Stories

 

[Belushi]

'Mirror to Damascus' Colin Thubron (1/24)

A slow start to this year.

 

[braindancer]

1/30 - I know why the caged bird sings - Maya Angelou
2/30 - Unknown pleasures - Peter Hook
3/30 - The Free - Willy Vlautin
4/30 - Under the Skin - Michael Faber
5/30 - The Child Thief - Dan Smith

 

[rich!]

40. A Delicate Truth, John le Carre
41. The Eighth Court, Mike Shevdon.

42. Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, George Macdonald Fraser

 

[tufty79]

1. The Girl With All The Gifts - M. R. Carey
2. Mark Z. Danielewski's House Of Leaves
3. The Millionaire's Death Club - Mike Hockney
4. The Child Thief - Dan Smith
5. Midwinter Sacrifice - Mons Kallentoft
6. Lean On Pete - Willy Vlautin
7. Motel Life - Willy Vlautin
8. Dolly: A Ghost Story - Susan Hill
9. The Beacon - Susan Hill
10. The Bear - Claire Cameron
11. Cell - Stephen King
12. Knots & Crosses - Ian Rankin
13. The Black Book - Ian Rankin

14. Revival - Stephen King

 

[Fozzie Bear]

1/30 Roger Hewitt - White Talk Black Talk: Inter-racial friendship and communication amongst adolescents
2/30 Charles Dickens - Oliver Twist
3/30 Ambalavaner Sivanandan - Catching History on the Wing: Race, Culture and Globalisation
4/30 Angela Carter - The Bloody Chamber

 

[rich!]

40. A Delicate Truth, John le Carre
41. The Eighth Court, Mike Shevdon.
42. Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, George Macdonald Fraser

43. Half-Off Ragnarok, Seanan McGuire

 

[billy_bob]

12/50: Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea. Beautiful.

13/50: Roald Dahl, Collected Stories Vol. 1
14/50: Roald Dahl, Collected Stories Vol. 2
I'd read a few of these before but this is all of them. In terms of content, the early ones, which are mostly little vignettes based on his wartime experiences in the RAF, are the most rewarding and worthwhile. The later ones are well honed little tales with a very enjoyable gleam of schadenfreude/sadism/black humour, but also a fair bit of misogyny, and a surprising amount of the petty moralising that he's supposed to be so famous for not indulging in, in the form of old testament style just-desserts.

 

[Pickman's model]

6. half the world, joe abercrombie

7. the fell sword
8. isis book by cockburn
9. crowley book by lachman

 

[QueenOfGoths]

1. "A Colder War" - Charles Cumming
2. "Sleepyhead" - Mark Billingham
3. "Lamentation"- CJ Samson
4. " The Child Thief " - Dan Smith
5. "The Murder Bag" - Tony Parsons

6. "Stolen Souls" - Stuart Neville. Excellent thriller.

 

[BoatieBird]

1/60 - JM Barrie - Peter Pan*
2/60 - Joe Hill - NOS4R2
3/60 - Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons*
4/60 - Belinda Bauer - Rubbernecker
5/60 - Roddy Doyle - The Guts
6/60 - Phillipa Pearce - Tom's Midnight Garden*
7/60 - Mildred D Taylor - Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry*
8/60 - Denise Mina - Exile
9/60 - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Americanah
10/60 - Jon Ronson - Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries
11/60 - Iain McEwan - The Children Act
12/60 - Denise Mina - Resolution
13/60 - Neil Gaiman - Stardust

14/60 - Karen Joy Fowler - We Are All Completely Besides Ourselves

 

[ringo]

14/60 - Karen Joy Fowler - We Are All Completely Besides Ourselves

Good? Some mates who work in publishing raved about it so I've bought it but not picked it up yet.

 

[BoatieBird]

Good? Some mates who work in publishing raved about it so I've bought it but not picked it up yet.

Yes, very good.
Me76 & QueenOfGoths (iirc) both said how much they enjoyed it so I thought I'd give it a go.
Didn't read too much about it beforehand so I didn't know what the twist in the tale was, it was a real surprise.

 

[ringo]

Yes, very good.
Me76 & QueenOfGoths (iirc) both said how much they enjoyed it so I thought I'd give it a go.
Didn't read too much about it beforehand so I didn't know what the twist in the tale was, it was a real surprise.

Cheers, I'll try to make sure I avoid any spoilers then

 

[QueenOfGoths]

Yes, very good.
Me76 & QueenOfGoths (iirc) both said how much they enjoyed it so I thought I'd give it a go.
Didn't read too much about it beforehand so I didn't know what the twist in the tale was, it was a real surprise.

It wasn't me but funnily enough it is on my list to read, I picked it up in the library today but wasn't sure I was in the right mood for it. Might have to go back tomorrow now and get it