Tag: resolutions

November marks the seventh anniversary of the crazy idea I would read everything indexed in Book Lust by Nancy Pearl. Subsequently that idea mushroomed into reading everything indexed in More Book Lust and most recently, Book Lust To Go as well. Let’s do a little math, shall we? In six years I have read 583 books. That is approximately 97 books a year. If I continue at that rate I will finish the Lust Challenge when I am 93 years old, give or take a year or two…..

I had this conversation with someone a few days ago and without warning the thought that I might not finish this challenge depressed me. Not because of my own mortality but because of all the interesting books I will miss. I had a horrible thought – what if I spent a considerable time slogging through something I found only mildly interesting while I missed out on something completely riveting? What a not nice thought. I shared this ugly-ugly and my companion stridently changed the subject. What if you were to consider November a “new” year and you list out the books you are planning to read? This, of course, would not include LibraryThing and the Early Review program. It would not include the “strays” (as I’ve taken to calling them). Those are the books picked up for no other reason than a good suggestion or an intriguing cover. Accountability. I like it. It gives me structure. So, without further ado, here is the conservative list for Year Seven 11/2012 – 11/2013 in alphabetical order, of course:

1. Abide By Me by Elizabeth Strout
2. Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
3. Among the Missing by Dan Chaon
4. Apollo: the epic journey to the moon by David West Reynolds
5. Arctic Grail by Pierre Berton (I started this last year)
6. Ariel by Sylvia Plath
7. At Home in the Heart of Appalachia by John O’Brien
8. Beautiful Swimmers by William Warner
9. Before the Knife by Carolyn Slaughter
10. Beneath the Lion’s Gaze by Maaza Mengist
11. Beyond the Bogota by Gary Leech
12. Brass Go-Between by Oliver Bleeck
13. Breakfast with Scot by Michael Drowning
14. Burma Chronicles by Guy Delise
15. Burning the Days by James Salter
16. Camus, a Romance by Elizabeth Hawes
17. Cardboard Crown by Martin Boyd
18. Cat Who Ate Danish Modern by Lillian Jackson Braun
19. Child that Books Built by Francis Spufford
20. Churchill, a life by Martin Gilbert
21. Conspiracy and Other Stories by Jaan Kross
22. Deafening by Frances Itani
23. Death in Verona by Roy Harley Lewis
24. Diamond Classics by Mike Shannon
25. Dining with Al-Qaeda by Hugh Pope
26. Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby
27. Domestic Manners of the Americans by Fanny Trollope
28. Edward Lear in Albania by Edward Lear
29. Fanny by Edmund White
30. Final Solution by Michael Chabon
31. Fixer by Joe Sacco
32. Footnotes in Gaza by Joe Sacco
33. Full Cupboard of Life by Alexander McCall Smith
34. Gabriel Garcia Marquez by Gerald Martin
35. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos
36. Girl in Landscape by Jonathan Lethem
37. Going Wild by Robert Winkler
38. Golden Spruce by John Vaillant
39. Good Thief’s Guide to Paris by Chris Ewan
40. Good Thief’s Guide to Vegas by Chris Ewan
41. Good-bye Chunk Rice by Craig Thompson
42. Grand Ambition by Lisa Michaels
43. Guardians by Geoffrey Kabaservice
44. Hole in the Earth by Robert Bausch
45. House of Morgan by Ron Chernow
46. House on the Lagoon by Rosario Ferre
47. Joy of Cooking by Irma Rombauer
48. Kalahari Typing School for Men by Alexander McCall Smith
49. Light Infantry Ball by Hamilton Basso
50. Lives of the Painters (vol 2, 3 & 4) by Giorgio Vasari
51. Mortality for Beautiful Girls by Alexander McCall Smith
52. No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
53. Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin
54. Ocean of Words by Ha Jin
55. Old Friends by Tracy Kidder
56. Panther Soup by John Grimlette
57. Points Unknown edited by David Roberts
58. Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson
59. Return of the Dancing Master by Henning Mankell
60. Rosalind Franklin by Brenda Maddox
61. Rose Cafe by John Hanson Mitchell
62. Scar Tissue by Michael Ignatieff
63. Scramble for Africa by Thomas Pakenham
64. Southpaw by Mark Harris
65. Tattered Cloak by Nina Berberova
66. Tea Time for the Traditionally Built by Alexander McCall Smith
67. Tears of the Giraffe by Alexander McCall Smith
68. Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
69. Time, Love, Memory by Jonathan Weiner
70. Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club by Dorothy Sayers
71. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackery
72. Viceroy of Ouidah by Bruce Chatwin
73. What you Owe Me by Bebe Moore Campbell
74. Widow for One Year by John Irving
75. Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken
76. Working Poor by David Shipler

I’ll update this list May 1st, at the halfway mark. I haven’t spelled out which books I will listen to on CD. This also doesn’t reflect when I’ll read them either. All I know is that I will continue to read whenever and wherever I can. Standing in line at the grocery store, trapped in the backseat of a moving vehicle, before bed, in the bath, while my kisa watches hours of football, with a glass of wine, during storms, by candlelight and sunlight, on vacation, while I’m sick, or waiting for the pasta water to boil. I will skip the books that bore me to tears. I will start books early and finish them late. This is my new year’s resolution.