what i’m reading now
12
Oct 09
Tackling the BBC 100 books list
Since I’ll have so much free time over the next few months, I’ve decided to tackle the books I haven’t read on the BBC 100 books meme that went around earlier this year. Since I’m late to the game, I had to do a little research to find the list, and realized that the meme and the actual BBC top 100 favorite books are different. This blog does a good job of comparing the two.
The original BBC list appears to be more fun than the meme – like I really want to read the entire Bible – so in my extended vacation, I’ll be filling in the gaps on the original BBC list. X marks the spot of the books I’ve read so far.
1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen X
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman X
4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams X
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee X
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis X
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë X
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë X
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger X
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot X
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck X
30. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez X
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen X
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery X
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald X
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck X
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy X
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough X
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding X
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt X
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce X
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy X
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie
Wow, I’ve only read 21 of these books. There are a couple I started but didn’t finish, like Tess of the D’Ubervilles, which I was reading in China till my cousin told me the ending, and a couple I think I read but don’t remember (The Secret Garden). Then there are some I’d love to reread, like Anne of Green Gables and Thornbirds (yay for trashy!).
Next week I’ll be picking up Lord of the Rings from the library.
In other news, I’ve changed my blog theme to go along with my sunny SF adventures. Let’s see how long before I get bored with it.
07
Aug 09
Mary Karr’s soul
I just finished reading Mary Karr’s Lit.
It’s not out till November, but I was able to get a copy when I went to Book Expo in June. I also had the opportunity to hear Karr speak, and as always she was charming and funny, a great story-teller.
Karr is one of my favorite memoirists. I read The Liars’ Club back in a nonfiction writing class a couple of years ago. It details her crazy, sometimes violent childhood in Texas with charismatic but alcoholic parents. I’ve yet to read Cherry, which is about her adolescence.
Lit is the third in the triptych of “Mary-laying-her-soul-bare,” and tells of her struggles with depression and addiction. It’s interesting to compare The Liars’ Club with Lit – while the former is purely a story, the latter is more like the autobiography of a famous person. It’s more episodic than The Liars’ Club, which to me is a perfect jewel (maybe a little dusty with Texas dirt), and it’s almost like she’s writing knowing all these people are reading it, not just her friends and family, but famous people as well, like Tobias Wolff, who was her mentor back in the day.
The beginning of the book is sort of all over the place – leaving home, meeting her future husband, meeting his uptight, blue blood family, so unlike her own – but when she starts writing about her recovery is when it gets really interesting. It’s heartbreaking, but I can’t look away, like a good episode Intervention. And her time in a psych ward is like a 40-something Girl Interrupted: at first the women seem cool, but then slowly cracks in the foundation start to surface.
Also fascinating is seeing these famous literary people “in action.” Aside from Tobias Wolff, there’s a troubled young man named David in Karr’s recovery group, also a writer and “boy genius,” never without bandanna and work boots, and with whom she has a tumultuous affair. Can you guess who that is? Why yes, it’s David Foster Wallace. At first I thought it wasn’t because I didn’t know he had had problems with drugs (mental illness yes), but I saw in Wikipedia that Karr and Foster Wallace dated back in the ‘90s. He was so private. I think this is the first glance I’ve seen into his personal life.
Anyway this is not a post about David Foster Wallace. I think anyone would enjoy Lit. Like I said Karr’s a great storyteller and the drug/depression/recovery stuff really draws you in, but maybe it’s not as “literary” as The Liars’ Club. The Liars’ Club is what you’d read if you’re studying how to write a great memoir; Lit is if you love Mary Karr. She probably doesn’t give a hoot either way.