ÀÏ»¢»úÎÈÓ®·½·¨

A list of my books

I'm aiming for 40 to 50 books this year

1: Winter in Madrid by C.J.Sansom.
2: Call for the Dead by John Le Carré
3: 1984 by George Orwell
4: I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb
5: The Hotel Majestic by Georges Simenon
6: The Essential Enneagram: The Definitive Personality Test and Self-Discovery Guide
7: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
8: The Quiet American by Graham Greene
9: Cold Granite by Stuart MacBride
10: Black Mamba Boy by Nadifa Mohamed
11: Butcher's Crossing by John Edward Williams
12: Introducing Getting the Job You Want: A Practical Guide by Denise Taylor
13: 100 Must-read Prize-Winning Novels: Discover Your Next Great Read... by Nick Rennison
14: The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
15: Poirot and Me by David Suchet
16: The Dream of the Celt by Mario Vargas Llosa
17: The King's Speech: How One Man Saved the British Monarchy by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi
18: Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
19: Losing Nelson by Barry Unsworth
20: The Guilty One by Lisa Ballantyne
21: The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
22: The Small Boat of Great Sorrows by Dan Fesperman
23: The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barrry
24: Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey
25: The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa
26: The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
27: Op de vleugels van de draak by Lieve Joris; no English edition I'm afraid
28: Gem Squash Tokoloshe by Rachel Zadok
29: Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey
30: The Highly Sensitive Person
31: A Cupboard Full of Coats by Yvvette Edwards
32: Zangeres op Zanzibar en andere reisverhalen by Lieve Joris. No English edition. It's translated though in French and German. It's a collection of travel stories.
33: The Good Women of China: Hidden Voices by Xinran
34: Animal Farm by George Orwell
35: The Ruby in Her Navel by Barry Unsworth
36: A Street Cat Named Bob: How One Man and His Cat Found Hope on the Streets by James Bowen and Bob
37: Nemesis by Agatha Christie
38: Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen
39: Their Heads are Green and Their Hands are Blue: Scenes from the Non-Christian World by Paul Bowles
40: Embers by Sandor Marai
41: The View on the Way Down by Rebecca Wait
42: Shipwrecks by Akira Yoshimura
43: An Officer and a Spy by Robert Harris

I'm also doing an A-Z titles challenge and made a list for books to read:

✔ A: Animal Farm by George Orwell
✔ B: Black Mamba Boy by Nadifa Mohamed
✔ C: Call for the Dead by John Le Carré
✔ D: The Dream of the Celt by Mario Vargas Llosa
✔ E: Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey
✔ F: The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa
✔ G: The Guilty One by Lisa Ballantyne
✔ H: The Hotel Majestic by Georges Simenon
✔ I: I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb
✔ J: Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey
✔ K: The King's Speech: How One Man Saved the British Monarchy by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi
✔ L: Losing Nelson by Barry Unsworth
✔ M: Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
✔ N: Nemesis by Agatha Christie
✔ O: An Officer and a Spy by Robert Harris
✔ P: Poirot and Me
✔ Q: The Quiet American by Graham Greene
✔ R: The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
✔ S: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
✔ T: The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
U: The Unburied by Charles Palliser
✔ V: The View on the Way Down by Rebecca Wait
✔ W: The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
X: The Explorer by James Smythe
Y: You
Z: Zorro by Isabel Allende

New female authors

1: Eowyn Ivey; ÀÏ»¢»úÎÈÓ®·½·¨author. Like her writing, but found The Snow Child a disappointment.

2: Nadifa Mohamed. Would love to read more by Nadifa Mohamed. I found Black Mamba Boy a fascinating read about a boy's long march to a better life and the choices we make. Interesting due to the time frame: World War II seen from the perspective of a young African boy. That it is the story of Nadifa Mohamed's father makes it even more interesting.

3: Elizabeth Taylor. She writes in a prose that is spot on, yet it needs to drip through slowly. Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont is not a book you feel you had to finish yesterday rather than today. In fact, you can easily leave it be for a few days. From the moment you pick it up again, it feels so familiar that you can easily read a few chapters before putting it down again. Definitely going to read more by Elizabeth Taylor

4: Lisa Ballantyne. The Guilty One is Lisa Ballantyne's first book. A very moving and insightful read. The two main characters in the book are actually too big for the format of the book. You can feel, smell, imagine how they live and who they are.

5: Emma Healey. I liked Elizabeth Is Missing. I only didn't like the ending so much. But nevertheless a promising first book by a new author.

6: Rachel Zadok. Absolutely loved 'Gem Squash Tokoloshe'. I read it in two days.

7: Yvvette Edwards. Loved the built up of 'A cupboard full of coats' a lot.

8: Xinran. It probably wasn't wise of me to read this author after Lieve Joris. At first I was a bit annoyed by the interference of Xinran in the stories. But 'The good women of China' grew on me with every story. Definitely going to read more by Xinran

9: Anna Quindlen. I read Black and Blue and liked it enough to try out other books by Quindlen as well.

10: Rebecca Wait. Absolutely loved The View on the Way Down

New male authors

1: Stuart MacBride. I had to get use to his humour and his characters but eventually loved Cold Granite. Will read the other books in the series as well.

2: John Edward Williams. Liked Butcher's Crossing but it left me behind rather puzzled. The book follows Will Andrews but I can't really see him as the protagonist; he just seems to happen to be at a certain place at a certain time. Like the other men in the book he seems to go mostly by his family name which creates a certain distance.

My guess is that nature is in fact the real protagonist in this story. Williams shows nature in all its rawness. Men's actions just seem to be useless by the rawness and brutality of nature.

The end is rather abrupt and seems to be religiously inspired with the reference to men's vanity.

3: Nick Rennison. Liked his reference of 100 prize-winning novels.

4: Mario Vargas Llosa. 'The dream of the Celt' reads partly as a biography and a historical novel, partly as a poetic account and an epic novel. It paints a interesting picture of a man, who comes across as rather naive but also very complexed.

The Feast of the Goat. I had already come across the title of this book a few times, but had my reservations. After reading ‘The dream of the Celt’ I decided to give this one a go. At first I found it hard to get into ‘The feast of the Goat’ as it follows four interwoven storylines and knows two different time frames, but nevertheless the story as a whole flows quite naturally. Not an easy read, especially due to the many names, and it takes some time to get into the story, but definitely worth reading. I would have liked less graphical details at times though.

5: Barry Unsworth. In 'Losing Nelson' Barry Unsworth creates a shuffled chronology of historical events – in which you learn a great deal on naval war conduct – and at the same time you get an insight in the narrator’s mind. The latter proves to be a psychological deterioration of the protagonist Charles Cleasby who is working on a biography of Lord Nelson. It’s an unsettling story, yet suspenseful and engaging enough to keep on reading. Only at the end the story seems to run out of steam.

I also read The Ruby in Her Navel which is set in the Norman kingdom of Sicily under King Roger II (the 12th century). Latin, Greek, Arab and Jew live together in precarious harmony in the city of Palermo.

This story at first is rather slow and confusing. After an hour however(I listened to the audio version) I was fully in the story and enjoying it. Definitely worth the effort as there are many twits and plots that keep you guessing till the end.

6: Kazuo Ishiguro. I read 'Artist of the floating world' years ago and picked up the audio book version of The Remains of the Day. The book has such an anti-climax that I probably will read this again one day despite the fact that some things work rather repetitive.

7: Dan Fesperman. Nothing special about his way of writing but he sure knows to tell a story. Certainly going to read more by Dan Fesperman.

8: Sebastian Barry. Absolutely love his dramatic and poetic prose. Another author to add to my list.

9: George Orwell. I read both '1984' and 'Animal Farm'. I liked both books enough to finish them.

10: Craig Silvey. ‘Jasper Jones’ is a well-paced story with lots of humour and literary references. The plot for me however was not entirely satisfying. It was a bit too much to take in and it seemed more a scenario for a soap series. Nonetheless, ‘Jasper Jones’ is all in all a satisfying read due to its protagonists and their youthful wisdom.

11: Paul Bowles. I had Their Heads are Green and Their Hands are Blue: Scenes from the Non-Christian World already more than 10 years and finally came to read it. It is a collection of travel stories and I liked it a lot. Hope to read more by Paul Bowles

12: Sándor Márai.Embers was a quick and enjoyable read. In the meanwhile I saw they have quite a lot of books by Marai in the library.

13: Akira Yoshimura. Read his Shipwrecks for the quick challenge read; liked it and hope to find more of his work translated.

At the moment I'm re-reading Zorro and I have almost finished The Explorer.

Hope to be able to read You and The Unburied by the end of this year

Congratulations on meeting your challenge goal! I like how you wrote individual reviews for each new author and separated them by genre. Were you trying to read more new authors this year?

Thanks Cassandra.

I used to read mostly books by authors I knew, but at times it can become rather repetitive with regards to story lines, characters etc. And I used to read a lot of true stories or books based on true stories. When I joined ÀÏ»¢»úÎÈÓ®·½·¨ I was stunned by the fact that I had read so many books within the same genre or within the same themes - and I wanted to change this.

The challenges I'm doing in this group and other groups help me to expand my horizon. I suppose I also made a shift these last years from books written by authors I like to books with a good and/or interesting story line.

It surprises me though that I read so many new authors this year. And I'm especially happy that I read so many new female authors