the grand 2015 reading challenge thread

[machine cat]

I've been really shit again this year...

1. Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins
2. Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins
3. Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins
4. The Orchard Keeper - Cormack McCarthy
5. I Couldn't Paint Golden Angels - Albert Meltzer

 

[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
6/20 - 1356 by Bernard Cornwell
7/20 - Indigo Slam by Robert Crais

 

[iona]

1/20 Proxima - Stephen Baxter
2/20 Glasgow Kiss - Alex Gray
3/20 Ancillary Justice - Ann Leckie
4/20 Matter - Iain M Banks
5/20 Crime - Irvine Welsh

 

[Manter]

1. Leaving Berlin, Joseph Kanon.
2. The child thief, Dan Smith.
3. Foxglove summer, Ben Aaronovich.
4. The beating of his wings, Paul Hoffman.
5. The cheapside corpse, Susanna Gregory.
6. Il metodo del coccodrillo- Maurizio de Giovanni.
7. The sin-eater's daughter- Melinda Salisbury.
8. Half the world- Joe Abercrombie
9. Tatiana- Martin cruz Smith
10. The 100 year old man who climbed out the window and disappeared- jonas jonasson.
11. The undertaking- Audrey Macgee
12. The book of life- Deborah Harkness.
13. Norwegian by Night- Derek Miller.
14. The luminous heart of Jonah s- Gina Nahai.
15. Holy spy-Rory Clements
16. The Angelic Darkness- Richard Zimmler.
17. Ghostman - Roger Hobbs
18. The whispering city- Sara Moliner.
19. The Mirrored World- Debra Dean
20. The silkworm- Robert Galbraith (or J K Rowling)
21. Getting by- Lisa Mckenzie. Yes, that Lisa McKenzie. Enjoyed it is the wrong phrase- it was very interesting and thought provoking. It almost doesn't read like a work by an academic as it is accessible, easy to read and you get into it- but it's not a work of popular social history or whatever that category is called because it's got something far too serious to say and references heavy difficult academic works in the full expectation that you'll either be familiar with them or want to look some up. I'm pleased I read it, it has no answers (and is honest about having no answers) but made me think about some stuff in a way it hadn't before.

 

[Belushi]

'Mirror to Damascus' Colin Thubron (1/24)
'The Death and Life of Great American Cities' Jane Jacobs (2/24)

 

[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
10/27 The Visitors - Clifford D. Simak

11/27 Tale of the Body Thief - Anne Rice
12/27 Confessions of an Economic Hitman - John Perkins
13/27 Missing Microbes: How the Overuse of Antibiotics is Fueling Our Modern Plagues - Martin J. Blaser, MD
14/27 Star Trek: To Rule in Hell - Greg Cox
15/27 To Engineer is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design - Henry Petroski
16/27 Allegiant - Veronica Roth

17/27 Imago - Octavia E. Butler

One of the more original portrayals of alien life I've ever read. Her aliens aren't just humans with alien bodies.

18/27 Parable of the Sower - Octavia E. Butler

A great morality tale about global climate change long before it was a house hold word.

 

[ringo]

1/45 Head On - Julian Cope
2/45 Bad Monkeys - Matt Ruff
3/45 The Ladies Of Grace Adieu - Susanna Clarke
4/45 Bring Up The Bodies - Hilary Mantel
5/45 The Blacker The Berry - Wallace Thurman
6/45 Once You Break A Knuckle - D W Wilson
7/45 The Child Thief - Dan Smith
8/45 The Epicure's Lament - Kate Christensen
9/45 East Of Eden - John Steinbeck
10/45 We Are All Completely Besides Ourselves - Karen Joy Fowler
11/45 The Prison House - John King
12/45 First Love - Ivan Turgenev
13/45 The Thin Man - Dashiell Hammett
14/45 Ready Player One - Ernest Cline
15/45 Ridley Walker - Russell Hoban

 

[8115]

1/20 We are all completely beside ourselves, Karen Joy Fowler.
2/20 Stasiland: Stories from behind the Berlin wall, Anna Funder.
3/20 In the realm of hungry ghosts: close encounters with addiction, Gabor Mate.
4/20 Glow, Ned Beauman.

 

[Kidda]

1/30 Inferno by Dan Brown
2/30 Saga by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
3/30 Tales of the city by Armistead Maupin
4/30 Rapture by Jd Robb
5/30 Saga Vol 2 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
6/30 Chew by John Layman and Rob Guillory
7/30 Kick-ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr
8/30 The Godfather by Mario Puzo
9/30 The Sicilian by Mario Puzo
10/30 The Last Don by Mario Puzo
11/30 Saga Vol 3 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
12/30 Omerta by Mario Puzo
13/30 Saga Vol 4 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples

 

[Greebo]

1/60 The Cowboy and the Cossack - Clair Huffaker
2/60 Briefe aus dem Gefängnis - Rosa Luxemburg
3/60 Chita: a memory of Last Island - Lafadio Hearn
4/60 Zla miłość - Aleksander Sowa
5/60 Frog Żaba - Colin Hann, Ryszard Bart and Pedro Páramo
6/60 Amexica: War along the borderline - Ed Vulliamy
7/60 Good mother, bad daughter? - Martha Penn
8/60 Czy wiesz, co widzę? - Richárde
9/60 Glaslügen - Nicholas Vega
10/60 Dreaming the Dark: Magic, Sex and Politics - Starhawk
11/60 Plötzlich Callgirl - Portia da Costa (one of the least clunky translations I've come across)
12/60 99% Darkness - Jacob Stringer
13/60 Stoner - John Williams
14/60 Auf der anderen Seite is das Gras viel grüner - Kerstin Gier. Chick lit with a very nasty little twist right at the end. Fate vs your own choices and actions vs the actions of others.

 

[Manter]

1. Leaving Berlin, Joseph Kanon.
2. The child thief, Dan Smith.
3. Foxglove summer, Ben Aaronovich.
4. The beating of his wings, Paul Hoffman.
5. The cheapside corpse, Susanna Gregory.
6. Il metodo del coccodrillo- Maurizio de Giovanni.
7. The sin-eater's daughter- Melinda Salisbury.
8. Half the world- Joe Abercrombie
9. Tatiana- Martin cruz Smith
10. The 100 year old man who climbed out the window and disappeared- jonas jonasson.
11. The undertaking- Audrey Macgee
12. The book of life- Deborah Harkness.
13. Norwegian by Night- Derek Miller.
14. The luminous heart of Jonah s- Gina Nahai.
15. Holy spy-Rory Clements
16. The Angelic Darkness- Richard Zimmler.
17. Ghostman - Roger Hobbs
18. The whispering city- Sara Moliner.
19. The Mirrored World- Debra Dean
20. The silkworm- Robert Galbraith (or J K Rowling)
21. Getting by- Lisa Mckenzie.
22. All who go do not return- shulem Deen. Memoir of a skeverer hasid turned 'heretic' who has to leave his five children behind when he is banished. He runs the unpious website, which is a very interesting place to read around the periphery of Orthodox Judaism. Very interesting- it's a much more fractured and fluid community than it looks from outside- and desperately sad.

 

[purenarcotic]

Have you read Deborah Feldman's book, Manter? She was part of the Satmar ultra orthodox sect in New York but left it all behind. Really well written.

 

[Manter]

Have you read Deborah Feldman's book, Manter? She was part of the Satmar ultra orthodox sect in New York but left it all behind. Really well written.

Next on the pile! Just started I am forbidden, Anouk markovitz.... It's fiction, but written by an ex satmar.

I used to live on the edge of a satmar community in Brooklyn and am fascinated by them....

 

[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
6/30 - Where late the sweet birds sang - Kate Wilhelm
7/30 - O Pioneers! - Willa Cather
8/30 - Clothes Music Boys - Viv Alpertine

 

[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
5/30 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels - The German Ideology (students edition)
6/30 Roger Mais - The Hills Were Joyful Together
7/30 Isaac Julien - Riot

 

[Kidda]

1/30 Inferno by Dan Brown
2/30 Saga by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
3/30 Tales of the city by Armistead Maupin
4/30 Rapture by Jd Robb
5/30 Saga Vol 2 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
6/30 Chew by John Layman and Rob Guillory
7/30 Kick-ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr
8/30 The Godfather by Mario Puzo
9/30 The Sicilian by Mario Puzo
10/30 The Last Don by Mario Puzo
11/30 Saga Vol 3 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
12/30 Omerta by Mario Puzo
13/30 Saga Vol 4 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
14/30 Fools Die by Mario Puzo

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

7/30 - O Pioneers! - Willa Cather

Being from her home state, I got that book shoved down my throat.

 

[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
10/60 - Trunk Music - Michael Connelly
11/60 - The Enemy Within - Seumas Milne
12/60 - Private Island:Why Britain Now Belongs to Someone Else - James Meek
13/60 - Angels Flight - Michael Connelly
14/60 - City of Bones - Michael Connelly
15/60 - A Darkness More Than Light - Michael Connelly.
16/60 - Lost Light - 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
14/60 - Karen Joy Fowler - We Are All Completely Besides Ourselves
15/60 - Shirley Jackson - We Have Always Lived in the Castle
16/60 - Ian Rankin - The Complaints
17/60 - Annie Proulx - Close Range: Brokeback Mountain and other stories
18/60 - Willy Vlautin - Lean on Pete
19/60 - Stephen King - Cell
20/60 - Philip Reeve - Mortal Engines*

21/60 - William McIlvanney - Laidlaw

 

[braindancer]

Being from her home state, I got that book shoved down my throat.

Lucky you. I can't say I enjoyed it overly.

 

[treefrog]

5: Trigger Warnings by Neil Gaiman. Having a mercifully very rare episode of sleeplessness tonight so read the whole thing today.

6: Complete short stories vol:1 by JG Ballard. 700-odd pages. Hard going.

 

[Kidda]

1/30 Inferno by Dan Brown
2/30 Saga by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
3/30 Tales of the city by Armistead Maupin
4/30 Rapture by Jd Robb
5/30 Saga Vol 2 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
6/30 Chew by John Layman and Rob Guillory
7/30 Kick-ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr
8/30 The Godfather by Mario Puzo
9/30 The Sicilian by Mario Puzo
10/30 The Last Don by Mario Puzo
11/30 Saga Vol 3 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
12/30 Omerta by Mario Puzo
13/30 Saga Vol 4 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
14/30 Fools Die by Mario Puzo
15/30 Sex Criminals Vol 1 by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky

 

[Manter]

1. Leaving Berlin, Joseph Kanon.
2. The child thief, Dan Smith.
3. Foxglove summer, Ben Aaronovich.
4. The beating of his wings, Paul Hoffman.
5. The cheapside corpse, Susanna Gregory.
6. Il metodo del coccodrillo- Maurizio de Giovanni.
7. The sin-eater's daughter- Melinda Salisbury.
8. Half the world- Joe Abercrombie
9. Tatiana- Martin cruz Smith
10. The 100 year old man who climbed out the window and disappeared- jonas jonasson.
11. The undertaking- Audrey Macgee
12. The book of life- Deborah Harkness.
13. Norwegian by Night- Derek Miller.
14. The luminous heart of Jonah s- Gina Nahai.
15. Holy spy-Rory Clements
16. The Angelic Darkness- Richard Zimmler.
17. Ghostman - Roger Hobbs
18. The whispering city- Sara Moliner.
19. The Mirrored World- Debra Dean
20. The silkworm- Robert Galbraith (or J K Rowling)
21. Getting by- Lisa Mckenzie.
22. All who go do not return- shulem Deen.
23. The Yellow Birds- Kevin Powers. It's about the war in Iraq, but told in flashbacks by a returned private. Oddly beautiful, sort of elegiac, but quite savage. There are some amazing images- of a boy dying in an orchard, a little girl trying to pull her grandmother to safety while the platoon that just killed her stand and watch, radioing each other not to shoot. There is a section about halfway through where he seems to let go of his constraints and just let's a stream of consciousness come out, when he is watching his friends swim in the waterhole, and it's incredibly powerful. I just read it in one sitting and now feel a bit unsettled. Not sure I'll sleep...

 

[billy_bob]

20/50: Gillian Slovo - Ice Road.
21/50: Hilary Mantel - Eight Months on Ghazzah Street
22/50: Lorrie Moore - Bark

 

[Kidda]

1/30 Inferno by Dan Brown
2/30 Saga by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
3/30 Tales of the city by Armistead Maupin
4/30 Rapture by Jd Robb
5/30 Saga Vol 2 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
6/30 Chew by John Layman and Rob Guillory
7/30 Kick-ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr
8/30 The Godfather by Mario Puzo
9/30 The Sicilian by Mario Puzo
10/30 The Last Don by Mario Puzo
11/30 Saga Vol 3 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
12/30 Omerta by Mario Puzo
13/30 Saga Vol 4 by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples
14/30 Fools Die by Mario Puzo
15/30 Sex Criminals Vol 1 by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky
16/30 COWL Vol 1 by Kyle Higgins et al

 

[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
13 Mikhail Bulgakov: Notes on a Cuff and Other Stories
14 Ismail Kadare: The Fall of the Stone City
15 Michael Howard: Children of Cain – A Study of Modern Traditional Witchcraft
16 Victor Sebestyen: Twelve Days – The Story of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution

 

[chainsawjob]

1. In the Midst of Life - Jennifer Worth
2. The Eye of the Leopard - Henning Mankell
3. A Grief Observed – C.S. Lewis
4. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet – David Mitchell
5. The Drama of the Gifted Child: the search for the true self – Alice Miller
6. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry – Rachel Joyce

7. Audacity to Believe: An Autobiography - Sheila Cassidy

 

[Me76]

1/50 Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk
2/50 The Child Thief, Dan Smith
3/50 Wanted, Nick Stephenson
4/50 The Graft, Martina Cole
5/50 Stardust, Neil Gaiman
6/50 Alys, Always, Harriet Lane
7/50 Bad Things Happen, K Leitch
8/50 Post Human Book 1, David Simpson
9/50 Bolthole, AJ Oates
10/50 Post Human book 2, David Simpson
11/50 The Bees, Laline Paull
12/50 Barracuda, Christos Tsiolkas
13/50 The Interpretation of Murder, Jed Rubenfeld
14/50 Her, Harriet Lane

15/50 Mobile Library, David Whitehouse - interesting. Story of childhood and family that isn't family.
16/50 Salvage The Bones, Jesmyn, Ward - girlhood, boyhood, family and hurricane Katrina. Emotional and descriptive with a few real showstopper moments.

 

[pennimania]

2/50 The Gift, Marcel Mauss
3/50 The Accursed Share, Georges Bataille
4/50 Heartburn, Nora Ephron
5/50 I'm Really Worried about my Neck, Nora Ephron
6/50 Penmarric, Susan Howatch,
7/50 Mythologies, Roland Barthes
8/50 Son of Rosemary, Ira Levin, ( reread)

9/50 Material Culture & Mass Consumption, Daniel Miller
10/50 Dies the Fire, S M Stirling
11/50 Beauty and the Contemporary Sublime, Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe
12/50 Objects of Desire, Adrian Forty

 

[pennimania]

Btw, Dies the Fire is absolute twunk. Within a 6 month period some Wicca hippies/ ex US Marines rebuild the world after an EMP, using Tolkien and some extremely dodgy sword fighting tactics

edited for typos