The Next Best Book Club discussion

I just read the following list - see link below. Has anyone made any dents on this list? It seems so daunting! It is divided by centuries - and I think I have read only 3 in the 2000s!

http://www.listology.com/content_show...).

Yea, I saw that on BookCrossing. The tool will calculate how many books you have to read a year to finish the list... I have to read about 35 books a year until I die (egads!!) to finish that list plus all the other ones I want to read... Too stressful! lol!
but it's an interesting collection.

I'm working on it, actually, but haven't made a dent in it yet. I think I have 2% of the list read. Yuck. But I am sort of obsessive about lists, so I really am aiming to read them all before I die - I have to read something like 18 a year, which actually sounds pretty reasonable (and yet somehow daunting all at the same time!).

I started paying attn to it last year, but really, honestly, I dont just want to read those books, there are tons of others I want to read as well..... So i will never complete it (not to mention there are quite a few I have no interest in picking up at all!)

But overall, its a great list to browse and find novels to add to your TBR list!

Fiona, why are some of them in Italics?

Kate - that pizza's makin me hungry !!!

I've only managed to read 36 of the titles on the list...I feel like such a slacker. Although, now I have a new place to find titles for my TBR list.

I have actually read 37 of these. I just went through and updated, since I completely forgot I had it saved!

I have read 57 of the books so far, and I have only had the list for 6 months. Obviously I had read some of the novels in high school and university, but a lot of them I had read for fun, and I have been using the list for book recs when I go to the library. In general they are good reads. :)

Oh, there is also a goodreads community called 1001 books to read before you die, or something like that, in which ppl who are trying to read the books come to discuss them. We have a monthly book, and it is a good place for recs. I love to read and don't just read the novels on the list. I went to the library the other day and got about 8 books from the list and 8 that aren't. It's a good place to find quality literature. And the list is based on book, and I think the list was compiled with the opinions of a hundred editors/ book critics etc.

Read 36 on this list. Some of them I last year thanks to GR. Perfume is an example. Many of the ones listed under the 2000's and 1900's I have on my TBR, but there are many that I have no interest in reading.

Hayes - Where is the tool to calculate how many you have to read each year? I'm curious. Is it on BookCrossing or on Listology?

I've read 40. Is it sad that I haven't read ANY of the books from the 2000s and most of my books come from the 1800s? Ah, the life of an English major...

I've read 70 ish. Some I have given up on and about half I don't even want to start.
I would probably be happy to read most of the pre-20th C recommendations and a lot of them are already on my TBR list

I've read 68, but I'm curious what people think of the books on this list.
There are some obvious classics, but I picked a few books of this list (like The Red Queen and The Book of Illusions) was really disappointed by both. On the other hand, I fell in love with Aldous Huxley.

I've read 201 and am actually working on the 202nd. I like book lists and consider it fun to make my way through them.

I've only read 38 of the list, but I own another 26 that I haven't read yet.

Read
19. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
52. The Devil and Miss Prym (Didn't like it)
86. The Poisonwood Bible
93. Memoirs of a Geisha
242. The Handmaid's Tale
272. The Color Purple
275. Schindler's Ark/List
301. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
312. The Shining
358. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
437. A Clockwork Orange
448. Solaris
456. To Kill a Mockingbird
494. The Lord of the Rings
496. Lolita
508. Lord of the Flies
547. 1984
610. The Hobbit
619. Gone with the Wind
649. Brave New World
790. The War of the Worlds
794. Dracula
796. The Island of Dr. Moreau
825. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
846. Far From the Madding Crowd
863. Little Women
868. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
883. A Tale of Two Cities
897. The Scarlet Letter
903. Agnes Grey
904. Jane Eyre
906. The Count of Monte Cristo
911. The Pit and the Pendulum
916. The Fall of the House of Usher
931. Frankenstein
937. Mansfield Park
938. Pride and Prejudice
940. Sense and Sensibility

Own to read:
33. Middlesex
116. The Reader
200. Foucault's Pendulum
223. Beloved
238. The Cider House Rules (couldn't finish!)
367. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
451. Catch 22
559. The Plague
603. Rebecca
663. A Farewell To Arms
726. Age of Innocence
754. Howard's End
804. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
808. Tess of the D'Urbervilles
809. Picture of Dorian Gray
820. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
837. The Brothers Karamazov
853. Middlemarch
861. The Idiot
880. The Woman in White
886. Madame Bovary
890. Bleak House
893. Uncle Tom's Cabin
922. The Hunchback of Notre Dame
936. Emma
953. The 120 Days of Sodom

I've read a whopping 17 and am working on 18. I'm chipping away but know that I'll never read them all.

56 Books read, 40 that I own on TBR pile. Oh and I have to read 16 books a year, assuming I live to be 80. Of course I have no real interest in reading all of those books, as there's a lot that I want to read which invariably are not on the list.

Some of the ones on that list that I've actually read, just make me cringe. There are a few that I consider to be strange choices of book for the given author. For example, Choke by Chuck Palahniuk, and The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood. Obviously they're just my personal opinion, it just struck me as strange. It's an interesting list, being that it contains (what appears to me) a weird mix of bestsellers, and then a number of books by bestselling authors.

I couldn't really believe that The Devil and Miss Prym was on the list. I thought that book was terrible and pointless.

As I started reading the list, I crossed my fingers and hoped for 100 books read. Sadly, my number was 53. Still pretty good though. I agree- there are some odd ommissions. 2 books by Camus, but neither "The Stranger"? "Choke"?? really? As much as I like Jane Austen, did she have to take 5 spots? von Goethe without "Faust"?
Still....I love lists :)

Um...I'm kinda pathetic. I've read none from the Pre-1700s list, 3 from the 1700s (Marquis de Sade), 8 from the 1800s, 8 from the 1900s, and none from the 2000s.
I really do read, I promise!

Bevin wrote: " ...there are some odd ommissions. 2 books by Camus, but neither "The Stranger"?..."

579 is L'etranger by Camus just the old fashioned translation is The Outsider rather than The Stranger.

Melissa wrote: "Um...I'm kinda pathetic. I've read none from the Pre-1700s list, 3 from the 1700s (Marquis de Sade), 8 from the 1800s, 8 from the 1900s, and none from the 2000s.
I really do read, I promise!"

See I'm the opposite I have read and intend to read a much larger percentage of books from the centuries before the 20th & 21st.

Esther wrote: "Melissa wrote: "Um...I'm kinda pathetic. I've read none from the Pre-1700s list, 3 from the 1700s (Marquis de Sade), 8 from the 1800s, 8 from the 1900s, and none from the 2000s.
I really do read..."

The problem is, when I was growing up I never read the any classics that weren't required for English class and now I have to catch up! I do plan on reading many more, it's all a matter of getting around to it. I've recently bought Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, The Woman in White, and all of the Jane Austens in an attempt to catch up!

Fiona wrote: "Buy Elizabeth Gaskell as well, Melissa. Less well known then Austen, but I prefer her stories."

I will definitely check on that! Thanks!

Melissa wrote: "Um...I'm kinda pathetic. I've read none from the Pre-1700s list, 3 from the 1700s (Marquis de Sade), 8 from the 1800s, 8 from the 1900s, and none from the 2000s.
I really do read, I promise!"

Now I feel silly! I guess that makes my number 54 instead of 53 though. Thanks!!

I've only read 33 from the list and here's 9 on the list that I really want to read at the moment. The list is massive but at the same time it's pretty interesting to pour over and check out what books to read next :)

That is really an odd list in some ways, I think.

Good authors, but not always the books you would expect. Also - it is very heavy on the recent. What happened to the ancient Greeks, for example?

Also, I for one like to read a play now and again. I saw no Shakespeare or Moliere etc. etc. on this list.

I started trying to keep track and read books only off that list...but there are way too many other books I want to read.

Plus, I'm afraid it would turn me into a literary snob..."oh I'm sorry, I can't read that trash you recommend if its not on this list."

Susanna wrote: "That is really an odd list in some ways, I think.

Good authors, but not always the books you would expect. Also - it is very heavy on the recent. What happened to the ancient Greeks, for example?..."

They tried to keep the list just restricted to adult novels, which is why there's very little non-fiction, very little YA, and, as you mentioned, no plays.

I use the list as a jumping off point. I actually do intend on reading most of them, but not only list books. I still read a LOT of books that are not on the list, so it will take me forever to get through. :)