the wonderful world of reading 2020 reading challenge thread

[Ptolemy]

1/30. Royal Babylon: The Alarming History of European Royalty. - Karl Shaw.
2/30. Hrafnkel's Saga and Other Stories - Unknown (translated by Hermann Palsson).
3/30. Born 1900 - Hunter Davies.
4/30. The Pearl - John Steinbeck.
5/30. A Journal of the Plague Year - Daniel Defoe.
6/30. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick.
7/30. A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf.
8/30. First Love - Ivan Turgenev.

A proto-YA novel from 1860? It was based on a strange and ultimately humiliating episode in the author's own life as a teenager. Wonderfully written and really gets to the heart of young love from afar.

 

[Shirl]

1/40 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf - Lauren Friedman. Yes I know, but it's a hard back book and I read it cover to cover.
2/40 The house on the Strand - Daphne Du Maurier
3/40 Afternoon of a Good Woman - Nina Bawden
4/40 Familia Passions - Nina Bawden
5/40 Spiderweb - Penelope Lively (5 books in 10 days is a lot for me but I've spent an awful lot of time hanging around in hospitals + nothing much on the telly.

 

[tim]

1/40 As you like it - Shakespeare (Arden Shakespeare). I've managed to get to see both this and Measure for Measure at the Barbican in the past few weeks, so decide I ought to become more intimate with the text. The RSC discount unsold seats on the day so nice seats towards the front of the stalls for just £10. I listened along to this rather stuffy radio adaptation as I read.

1/40 As you Like it by Shakespeare
2/40 Liquid by Mark Miodownik. Popular science about the fluids flowing through us and surrounding us. Lots of interesting stuff some
eof it quite basic that I was either never taught in my O level Physics or Chemistry classes or have forgotten.

 

[D'wards]

1/36 - Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
2/36 - Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread)

 

[Pickman's model]

1) Katherine Kerr, a time of war

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest

2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)

 

[chilango]

8/100: Free Exchange - Pierre Bourdieu & Hans Haacke

 

[Biddlybee]

1/20 - The Good Immigrant - ed Nikesh Shukla

 

[killer b]

1/25 Andre Gide: La Symphonie Pastorale
2/25 Emile Zola: Therese Raquin
3/25 fred vargas: chalk circle man

 

[MsHopper]

1/50 Bloody Brilliant Women - Cathy Newman
2/50 A Perfectly Good Man - Patrick Gale
3/50 All the Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr

 

[gaijingirl]

1/50 Bloody Brilliant Women - Cathy Newman

How was this?

 

[braindancer]

1/30 - Now in November - Josephine Johnson
2/30 - The Wanderers - Richard Price

 

[bellaozzydog]

1/59 Mortal causes, Ian Rankin a Rebus novel
2/59 Let it bleed Ian Rankin a Rebus novel
3/59 I know why the caged bird sings, Maya Angelou
4/59 Adolph Hitler, My part in his downfall. Spike Milligan
5/59 Rommel, Gunner who? Spike Milligan
6/59 Mussolini, his part in my downfall. Spike Milligan
7/59 Where have all the bullets gone? Spike Milligan
8/59 Diary of a nobody. George & Weedon Grosssmith

 

[Pickman's model]

1) Katherine Kerr, a time of war

2) Willie Carlin, thatcher's spy: my life as an mi5 agent inside sinn féin

 

[billy_bob]

1/40 Wilkie Collins - The Woman in White*
2/40 Nathaniel Hawthorne - The Scarlet Letter

3/40 Hans Rosling - Factfulness

* I thought seeing as I've lowered my target in order to read some longer books this year, I'd mark the ones that are 500+ pages. Otherwise I'll feel like some of you prolific buggers are putting me to shame

 

[Ptolemy]

1/30. Royal Babylon: The Alarming History of European Royalty. - Karl Shaw.
2/30. Hrafnkel's Saga and Other Stories - Unknown (translated by Hermann Palsson).
3/30. Born 1900 - Hunter Davies.
4/30. The Pearl - John Steinbeck.
5/30. A Journal of the Plague Year - Daniel Defoe.
6/30. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick.
7/30. A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf.
8/30. First Love - Ivan Turgenev.
9/30. The Color Purple - Alice Walker.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Never done the Challenge before, treat me gentle

Starting off with a Brat Pack vibe

• 1/52: Fast Times And Excellent Adventures: The Surprising History Of The 80s Teen Movie by James King - a nice overview of a decade of movies, connected only by being about and featuring stories about teenagers. The relentlessly chipper tone of King and the rigidly chronological structure can make it a bit of an eat-your-greens-before-you-chow-down-on-the-fun-stuff type ordeal at times, but it is pretty comprehensive.
• 2/52: Life Moves Pretty Fast: The Lessons We Learned From Eighties Movies (And Why We Don't Learn Them From Movies Anymore) by Hadley Freeman - a more personal, focused and stylised, less comprehensive selection from the former Graun fashion hack, who at least acknowledges the of its time rapey, racisty bits in numerous of the films covered.
• 3/52: You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried: The Brat Pack, John Hughes, And Their Impact On A Generation by Susannah Gora - a bit too fannish to be truly canonical, but packed with interview material and insights not/rarely discussed elsewhere.

• 4/52: Irregular Army by Matt Kennard - how an over-extended US military dropped minimum requirements (educational, fitness, probity, citizenship, mental health) in order to fill its ranks and meet the ever-growing operational requirements of the War on Terror.

 

[DaveCinzano]

9/30

Do you think maybe you've hit the starting gate rather early?

 

[Badgers]

1/? Lost Continent - Bill Bryson
2/? Watership Down - Richard Adams
3/? Kenny Dalglish Autobiography - Kenny Dalglish

 

[Ptolemy]

Do you think maybe you've hit the starting gate rather early?

Far earlier than I expected! My reading mojo has come back and work has been quiet so far, although to be fair I'm approaching some of the big ones I've put off for two years, so it'll slow down to a more respectable pace.

 

[ska invita]

1/100:

We Have Never Been Middle Class: How Social Mobility Misleads Us
Hadas Weiss

Any good?

I'm going to try this listing this year
Any reason why people dont write even a shortest of reviews on this thread?

 

[chilango]

Any good?

I'm going to try this listing this year
Any reason why people dont write even a shortest of reviews on this thread?

The central point about individualised "investment" as a constructed m/c value is interesting. It's a quick read.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Any good?

I'm going to try this listing this year
Any reason why people dont write even a shortest of reviews on this thread?

Some do

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest
2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)

3/70 - Liz Nugent - Unravelling Oliver

As recommend by Shirl in last year's thread.
I really enjoyed this and I'm looking forward to reading her other books, cheers Shirl

 

[chilango]

9/100: Is Equality Fair? - (Edited by) Tom Hampson & Jemima Olchawski

 

[ska invita]

9/100: Is Equality Fair? - (Edited by) Tom Hampson & Jemima Olchawski

out of interest are you reading these cover to cover?

 

[colacubes]

9/100: Is Equality Fair? - (Edited by) Tom Hampson & Jemima Olchawski

Is that a quickish read?

 

[chilango]

out of interest are you reading these cover to cover?

Yep, but generally the books I'm reading for studying I read "quickly", concentrating more on sections of interest as they appear.

I'm not including books I only read selected chapters or use the index to find relevant bits.

 

[chilango]

Is that a quickish read?

Yes. Very much so.

 

[8ball]

Blatant cheating - everyone here should be able to pass a test on whatever they’re counting against their total!