The odds of my actually reading the books in my queue - not even *thinking* about the other 50+ I'd need to read to hit 100 - are slim if my progress of late is any indicator of how the rest of the year will go.
In my defense, I'm getting divorced, moving and raising a three-year-old, but still ... less Internet, more books would be a pretty good idea ... sigh.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
100 + Reading Challenge
Sponsored by J. Kaye's Book Blog
I'm in.
Books so far:
1. The Golden Compass - Philip Pullman
2. The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman
3. The Amber Spyglass - Philip Pullman
4. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
5. Innocent in Death - J.D. Robb
6. Seven Up - Janet Evanovich
7. Hard Eight - Janet Evanovich
8. Unconditional Parenting - Alfie Kohn
9. To the Nines - Janet Evanovich
10. Tourist Season - Carl Hiaasen
11. The Secret Life of Bees - Sun Monk Kidd
12. Crazy Time: Surviving Divorce and Building a New Life - Abigail Trafford
13. Ten Big Ones - Janet Evanovich
14. Guilty Pleasures - Laurell K. Hamilton
15. The Ruby in the Smoke - Philip Pullman
16. Double Whammy - Carl Hiaasen
17. The Accidental Tourist - Anne Tyler
18. Blood Brothers - Nora Roberts
19. Eleven on Top - Janet Evanovich
20. The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing - Melissa Bank
Up Next (in no particular order):
Raising Your Spirited Child - Mary Sheedy Kurcinka
The Emotional Life of the Toddler - Alicia F. Lieberman
Between Parent and Child - Haim G. Ginott
Playful Parenting - Lawrence J. Cohen
A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini
1-2-3 Magic - Thomas W. Phelan
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk - Adele Faber
Adventures in Gentle Discipline - Hillary Flower
Child-Friendly Divorce - Diane M. Berry
Growing Up With Divorce: Helping Your Child Avoid Immediate and Later Emotional Problems - Neil Kalter
Nights of Rain and Stars - Maeve Binchy
Women Who Run with the Wolves - Clarissa Pinkola Estes
The Tiger in the Well - Philip Pullman
The Shadow in the North - Philip Pullman
Bare Bones - Kathy Reichs
Blood Brothers - Nora Roberts
Black Rose - Nora Roberts
Blue Dahlia - Nora Roberts
Red Lily - Nora Roberts
Morrigan's Cross - Nora Roberts
Dance of the Gods - Nora Roberts
Valley of Silence - Nora Roberts
Eternity in Death (Dead of Night Anthology) - JD Robb
Creation In Death - JD Robb
Strangers In Death - JD Robb
Eleven on Top - Janet Evanovich
Twelve Sharp - Janet Evanovich
Lean Mean Thirteen - Janet Evanovich
Fearless Fourteen - Janet Evanovich
The Memory Keeper's Daughter - Kim Edwards
Icy Sparks - Gwyn Hyman Rubio
Auriel Rising - Elizabeth Redfern
Odd Thomas - Dean Koontz
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - Conscious Divorce : Ending a Marriage with Integrity - Drowning Ruth -
Raising Your Spirited Child - Mary Sheedy Kurcinka
The Emotional Life of the Toddler - Alicia F. Lieberman
Between Parent and Child - Haim G. Ginott
Playful Parenting - Lawrence J. Cohen
A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini
1-2-3 Magic - Thomas W. Phelan
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk - Adele Faber
Adventures in Gentle Discipline - Hillary Flower
Child-Friendly Divorce - Diane M. Berry
Growing Up With Divorce: Helping Your Child Avoid Immediate and Later Emotional Problems - Neil Kalter
Nights of Rain and Stars - Maeve Binchy
Women Who Run with the Wolves - Clarissa Pinkola Estes
The Tiger in the Well - Philip Pullman
The Shadow in the North - Philip Pullman
Bare Bones - Kathy Reichs
Blood Brothers - Nora Roberts
Black Rose - Nora Roberts
Blue Dahlia - Nora Roberts
Red Lily - Nora Roberts
Morrigan's Cross - Nora Roberts
Dance of the Gods - Nora Roberts
Valley of Silence - Nora Roberts
Eternity in Death (Dead of Night Anthology) - JD Robb
Creation In Death - JD Robb
Strangers In Death - JD Robb
Eleven on Top - Janet Evanovich
Twelve Sharp - Janet Evanovich
Lean Mean Thirteen - Janet Evanovich
Fearless Fourteen - Janet Evanovich
The Memory Keeper's Daughter - Kim Edwards
Icy Sparks - Gwyn Hyman Rubio
Auriel Rising - Elizabeth Redfern
Odd Thomas - Dean Koontz
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - Conscious Divorce : Ending a Marriage with Integrity - Drowning Ruth -
Monday, February 25, 2008
The Kite Runner
Wow.
Just, wow.
I loved this book, as hard as parts of it were to read. It's very well-written and takes you inside Afghanistan before and during the rule of the Taliban - a world few Westerners have seen or understand. It follows the life of Amir, a privileged youth who, with his father, flees Afghanistan when Russia invades. They emigrate to the United States, where Amir builds a new life and buries his past. But the past has a way of catching up with you, as it does with Amir, and he returns to Afghanistan to confront it and to find a way to be good again.
It's a breathtaking novel, and impossible to put down.
Just, wow.
I loved this book, as hard as parts of it were to read. It's very well-written and takes you inside Afghanistan before and during the rule of the Taliban - a world few Westerners have seen or understand. It follows the life of Amir, a privileged youth who, with his father, flees Afghanistan when Russia invades. They emigrate to the United States, where Amir builds a new life and buries his past. But the past has a way of catching up with you, as it does with Amir, and he returns to Afghanistan to confront it and to find a way to be good again.
It's a breathtaking novel, and impossible to put down.
Monday, February 18, 2008
His Dark Materials
I just finished Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy and I've gotta say I loved it. I think I may like it even more than the Harry Potter series, simply because it was a richer, more dimensional read. Both the books' content and their prose were on par with novels directed at an older audience, where the HP series was ... not pedantic, but just not of the same ilk.
The characters in Pullman's books were very well developed and believable; they are people you'd like to know. Well, most of them, anyways. It did take me a little while to get into the first book: it takes place in another world, one like ours but different, and the phraseology took a little getting used to. But once I was immersed in the setting and the verbiage, I was hooked.
The first book introduces us to Lyra Belacqua, who is being raised by the scholars at Jordan College, in Oxford. But we soon realize that Lyra's Oxford differs from our own, and we are introduced to a world that is both parallel and divergent at once. It is in this world, and several others, that this engrossing and addicting trilogy takes place. We meet witches, humans, angels, daemons, ghosts and armored bears as we traverse these worlds and discover the secrets of Dust and witness struggle to defeat The Authority.
Controversy surrounds His Dark Materials because of the author's Atheism and own words: "My books are about killing God." The theology, physics and philosophy of these books, however, are so well-written they transcend controversy. Read these books - you will not be disappointed.
The characters in Pullman's books were very well developed and believable; they are people you'd like to know. Well, most of them, anyways. It did take me a little while to get into the first book: it takes place in another world, one like ours but different, and the phraseology took a little getting used to. But once I was immersed in the setting and the verbiage, I was hooked.
The first book introduces us to Lyra Belacqua, who is being raised by the scholars at Jordan College, in Oxford. But we soon realize that Lyra's Oxford differs from our own, and we are introduced to a world that is both parallel and divergent at once. It is in this world, and several others, that this engrossing and addicting trilogy takes place. We meet witches, humans, angels, daemons, ghosts and armored bears as we traverse these worlds and discover the secrets of Dust and witness struggle to defeat The Authority.
Controversy surrounds His Dark Materials because of the author's Atheism and own words: "My books are about killing God." The theology, physics and philosophy of these books, however, are so well-written they transcend controversy. Read these books - you will not be disappointed.
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