1000 Books Before You Die discussion

Here is your Reading Room, Dawn. Happy reading.

COMEDY


Previously read -

1. The History Man by Malcolm Bradbury
2. Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding
3. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
4. Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin
5. Porterhouse Blue by Tom Sharpe
6. Blott on the Landscape by Tom Sharpe
7. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
8. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh


2017 -

2018 -

9. The Diary of a Nobody by George & Weedon Grossmith {3.5*}
10. Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis {3*}

CRIME


Previously Read -

1. Double Indemnity by James M Cain
2. The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
3. The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler
4. And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
5. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie
6. The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie
7. The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
8. Dead Lagoon by Michael Dibdin
9. Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
10. The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett
11. Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
12. Red Dragon by Thomas Harris
13. A Taste for Death by PD James
14. Cop Hater by Ed McBain
15. The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
16. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
17. The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan


2017 -

18. Toxic Shock by Sara Paretsky (03/08/17 - 4*)

2018 -

19. The Glass Key by Dashiell Hammett (26/08/18 - 4*)

FAMILY & SELF


Previously Read -

1. Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
2. Wise Children by Angela Carter
3. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
4. Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee
5. The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
6. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
7. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
8. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson
9. To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
10. Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf


2017 -

LOVE


Previously Read -


1. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
2. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
3. Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown
4. The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald
5. The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall
6. The Go-Between by LP Hartley
7. Lady Chatterley's Lover by DH Lawrence
8. Patience and Sarah by Isabel Miller


2017 -


2018 -

9. By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept by Elizabeth Smart

SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY (and HORROR)


Previously Read -


1. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
2. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
3. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
4. The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks
5. Weaveworld by Clive Barker
6. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
7. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
8. Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There by Lewis Carroll
9. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K Dick
10. Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
11. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
12. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
13. The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
14. I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
15. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
16. Beloved by Toni Morrison
17. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
18. His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
19. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by JK Rowling
20. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
21. The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
22. Dracula by Bram Stoker
23. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien
24. The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
25. The War of the Worlds by HG Wells
26. Orlando by Virginia Woolf
27. The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham

(also The Discworld Series by Terry Pratchett. I don't know why they've counted the whole series as one, when they picked just the 1st book from other series - Harry Potter, LOTR etc - but I've currently read 27 out of the 41 titles, so I think it counts)

2017 -


2018 -

28. A Voyage To Arcturus by David Lindsay (30/06/18 - 2.5*)

STATE OF THE NATION


Previously Read -


1. Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
2. Shirley by Charlotte Bronte
3. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
4. Hard Times by Charles Dickens
5. Silas Marner by George Eliot
6. Animal Farm by George Orwell
7. Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
8. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
9. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain


2017 -

WAR & TRAVEL


Previously Read -

1. When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs
2. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
3. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
4. The African Queen by CS Forester
5. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
6. On the Road by Jack Kerouac
7. A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute
8. Maus by Art Spiegelman
9. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque


2017 -


2018 -

10. Regeneration by Pat Barker

A whopping 88/1000 so far! Lol

It is interesting to see which genre we read the most of. I can tell you like Science Fiction and Fantasy the most. My category with the highest number is Family and Self, followed by Love. But I like all kinds of books, except those with graphic descriptions of murders and other nasty things.

Dawn wrote: "SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY (and HORROR)


Previously Read -


1. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
2. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
3. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
4. The W..."

I think you have defineitely read the Discworld books if you have read that many.
Great job on doing your lists by category- and on the number of books you have already read.

Dawn wrote: "A whopping 88/1000 so far! Lol"

You are still ahead of me. :) When I joined this club, I had only read 50. Now I am at 74.

Any plans for your first read, Dawn? At the moment I am half way through Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes (from the comedy category). It is quite an unusual book but immensely enjoyable - only my third title so far this year. Like you, I have only recently joined the group. Happy reading and hope to see you around.

Rosemarie wrote: "It is interesting to see which genre we read the most of. I can tell you like Science Fiction and Fantasy the most. My category with the highest number is Family and Self, followed by Love. But I l..."

Before I started listing them I thought the most might be crime, but I'm not at all suprised science fiction & fantasy won out :)

And I agrre with you about not liking to read books with graphic descriptions of murders and other nasty things
I've avoided, or started and left, many books I would or have found too nasty/disturbing for my comfort.

Debra wrote: "Dawn wrote: "A whopping 88/1000 so far! Lol"

You are still ahead of me. :) When I joined this club, I had only read 50. Now I am at 74."

It doesn't look like I'll be ahead for long though!

You must read quite fast. Whereas I'm a fairly slow reader.

I doubt I could read 24 books from this list in such short time period - especially not with all the other challenges I've joined too! Lol

Paula wrote: "Any plans for your first read, Dawn? At the moment I am half way through Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes (from the comedy category). It is quite an unusual book but immensely enj..."

Hi Paula :)
As this month's title was from the war & travel section, I figure I'll take my first title from that list (I'm leaving Robinson Crusoe as I don't have it, & judging by the reviews it really looks like I wouldn't like it!)
So I think I'm going to pick - Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier to get my toes wet :)

Dawn wrote: "So I think I'm going to pick - Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier to get my toes wet :) "

Looks interesting. No, I haven't chosen Robinson Crusoe either - perhaps one of these days. All the best with your challenge.

Finished my first book from the list for this year (finally)

CRIME -

Toxic Shock by Sara Paretsky (4*)


A solid hard-boiled P.I. thriller, plenty of action & Suspense. Though I'm a little surprised it's on a must read list.
Maybe as much for pop-culture value as the story itself?

Toxic Shock looks good. And my local library carries it, yay.

I wonder what the criteria is for the Guardian must read list. There are several books on there that are questionable.

Debra wrote: "Toxic Shock looks good. And my local library carries it, yay.

I wonder what the criteria is for the Guardian must read list. There are several books on there that are questionable."

I agree, Debra, it makes me wonder too.
Also, who are the mystery panel of expert judges?

Sometimes I wonder if these things are just subjective and down to personal taste.

I noticed some odd books on their list as well, but I much prefer the Guardian list to the Boxall list since it has a bigger focus on classics. I admit I was surprised ti see Sara Paretsky there too. I have read one of her novels-that one, so I picked the right one when I read it way back when I went through a mystery reading phase.

As a further, Toxic Shock was called Blood Shot in the version that I read. It was okay, and the quality of the writing was better than in many other of the popular mysteries.

I've noticed that too, there are a lot of series on the list! As for LOTR, that is technically one book, but it is so big that publishers split it into 3. Another one is His dark Materials- it's actually 3 books, and Hitchhikers Guide is 5... So many more than 1000 books! But, I would say if you have read one from a series on the list, it counts, especially if you don't like it haha.
Also, I have just started the Discworld series and I am really liking it so far. I have read The Color of Magic and am working on Witches Abroad. They are both pretty funny.
Happy reading!

I'm back (after a long illness stopped me reading for quite a while, and then another while before I wanted to start again), and my first read for 1001 books (June 2018) is A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindssay.
Unfortunately I didn't enjoy this one at all.
I couldn't stand the main character, and I found it repetitive, tedious and self-indulgent.
So I'm sorry to say: only 2.5* for this one. (I gave it an extra half a star for some of the world building.)

I'm hoping I enjoy the next BoTM more (Lucky Jim) :)

Glad to have you back, Dawn. I didn't like Voyage to Arcturus either.

COMEDY:

The Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith {3.5*}


This was up for the BoTM for July so I reserved it from the library just in case (you never know how long it could take).
It didn't win, but I decided to read it anyway, and I'm quite glad I did.
It's a slim, quietly amusing, book. And although written over 120 years ago, contains a lot of attitudes and situations that are still pertinent today.

I liked that one too, Dawn. I only read about 3 chapters of Lucky Jim before abandoning the book. I didn't think it was funny.

Rosemarie wrote: "I liked that one too, Dawn. I only read about 3 chapters of Lucky Jim before abandoning the book. I didn't think it was funny."

I'm still working my way through Lucky Jim - albeit qite a bit slower! - but mostly through determination to finish it rather than enjoyment!
I hope to finish it soon so I can crack on with this month's pick - which I'm really looking forward to :)

COMEDY

Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis {3*}

I think the fact it's on this list is probably the only reason to read this one. I found it more tedious than amusing (except for spot on descriptions of room-spinning drunkeness and raging hangovers)
Glad that's over and done with.

CRIME

The Glass Key by Dashiell Hammett {4*)

An slim, 'twisty', detective yarn. The chracters aren't especially likeable, but it's quite easy to look past that. Quite enjoyable.

LOVE

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept by Elizabeth Smart

Hmmm. Well, I managed to follow the general gist of this 'prose-poem', but I freely admit a lot of the metaphorical writing went over my head :/
And I found it all rather irritating after a while.

Congrats on finishing it, Dawn.

WAR & TRAVEL

Regeneration by Pat Barker

This was a BotM, and one that I picked at that.
I enjoyed it, although not as much as I was expecting to.
My favourite parts were definitley the fictionalisation of a few real life people. And it does have a lot to say about how we deal with war etc. But ultimately it seemed to me a bit disjointed.
I'm not sure I liked it enough to read further in the trilogy.

I only read the first book and quit after one chapter of the second one.
However, I really enjoyed the books by Siegfried Sassoon that were the inspiration for this book:
Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, Memoirs of an Infantry Officer and Sherston's Progress.
They are a fictional account of his own experiences, and much better written, in my opinion.

Rosemarie wrote: "I only read the first book and quit after one chapter of the second one.
However, I really enjoyed the books by Siegfried Sassoon that were the inspiration for this book:
[book:Memo..."

Ah, I prefer the fictionalised versions of most people so they might be interesting, thanks :)

I'm reading this at the moment. I like it, but it doesn't seem to have a lot of forward impetus to it. Maybe the trilogy as a whole works better.

Bryan wrote: "I'm reading this at the moment. I like it, but it doesn't seem to have a lot of forward impetus to it. Maybe the trilogy as a whole works better."

I agree with the forward impetus. It seems more of a sketch of a particular time than a story with a plot to drive things forward.

I doubt I'm going to try the other 2 books in the trilogy, especially as Rosemarie says (in the main Regeneration thread) how she couldn't read the second one.