2011: review of my completed reading

I’ve fallen behind the number of books I read last year. With only a couple of weeks of 2011 I doubt I’ll match the 63 from 2010.
I intended to mention my favourite books of the year, but looking back at my reading list I find so few that REALLY excited me. So instead of a top 10 or a top three books of the year that I intended to write – all I can do is mention the books that kept my interest and made me reluctant to put them down.


• The year started with Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall. Despite its length I was caught up in the story and enjoyed it enough to be interested in the promised sequel.
• I always find Mike Gayle very easy to read. With all of his books I’ve been reluctant to put them aside when I’ve started them. I’ve now read them all.
• Jasper Ffforde, one of last year’s favourites had only one book on this year’s list. I really love his writing but I think I needed a break. I have several unread Fforde’s on my shelves waiting for next year.
• Richard Harland’s Liberator also needs a mention. A great sequel to Worldshaker from last year’s reading list. I really wanted to revisit the world he created in the first book and I would certainly be interested in a third instalment should he write one.
• Neverwhere was the first Neil Gaiman book I’ve read. Very inventive but at times verged on being overly grotesque for my liking. Fantasy with some very dark aspects.
• The Power of Six was another sequel, related to a book from last year’s list. This one is the follow up to I Am Number Four, while it kept me reading I found it less rounded than the first book. It was clearly part of a series rather than a stand-alone book, like pulling a collection of chapters out of a longer piece of fiction.
• Duma Key was the first Stephen King book I’ve read in over ten years. I enjoyed most of it. I’ve written about some of my concerns about the book in an earlier post. I recently came in for some questioning on a Christian forum – why would I want to read such things? I can understand the concern. King’s reputation perhaps gets in the way. People have preconceptions about the type of thing her writes, and I may write something about that issue at another time.
• Divergent by Veronica Roth, another first episode of a series. I am very interested in the next instalment due sometime next year.

All of the above are works of fiction. What about non-fiction?

• David Hick’s Guantanamo: My Journey will only reinforce whatever people already believe about his imprisonment at Guantanamo Bay and what led him there. While the book answers a lot of questions, at times he seems to avoid telling us what really happened. I feel he was not as innocent as he tries to make out – but neither was he as guilty as the political powers insisted. I think he was an idealist but foolish young man in the wrong place at the wrong time who continually fell into the hands of the wrong people.
• Unzipped, Suzi Quatro and Haunted Heart by Lisa Rogak. I’d like to write a separate article incorporating these two books. One clearly about Suzi Quatro, the other about Stephen King – famous people I’ve had some kind of attachment to in the past. Very interesting to find out what went on behind the scenes.
• Several food books – the stand out perhaps being In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. His views of food are essential reading for anyone who has real concern about what they are eating.

After this listing and commentary of “readable” and “interesting” books – there is one book from 2011 that I have to single out as my book of the year. If I can only recommend one book out of all of those I’ve read this year it would be The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.
Why the recommendation? I suggest you read it for yourself and find out.

I loved it.

Wuthering Heights - CELEBRATION!!!

I finally did it!

I reached the end of Wuthering Heights more than a year after I started. This reading experience was more about endurance than enjoyment. It was a battle from the first page.

I will admit that I was beginning to enjoy it towards the end, but I think that may have been the elation of realising I was getting close to that last page.

Apart from the satisfaction of not giving up, reading the book helped me appreciate and understand Jasper Fforde’s Wuthering Heights references in his Well of Lost Plots.

Now I think I should concentrate on getting this blog up to date.

So many books read – but nothing written about them!

Anniversary

This blog has now been going for a year.
Here are a few statistics related to that period between 4th November 2009 and 3 November 2010

Books completed: 55
Non fiction 24
Fiction 31

Top 10 fiction in order of reading:
Worldshaker, Richard Harland
Blackout, Connie Willis
Slam, Nick Hornby
My Legendary Girlfriend, Mike Gayle
Anita and Me, Meera Syal
The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde,
For All Time, Meredith Resce
All Clear, Connie Willis
Lost in a Good Book, Jasper Fforde
Brand New Friend, Mike Gayle

Not quite making top 10 fiction list:
Mr Commitment, Mike Gayle
I Am Number Four, Pittacus Lore
Reckless, Cornelia Funke

Top 5 non-fiction:
Animal Vegetable Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver
Howards End is on the Landing, Susan Hill
A Man on the Moon, Andrew Chaikin
Foxeys Hangout, Cathie Gowdie
The Alternative Kitchen Garden, Emma Cooper.

Not quite making the top 5 non fiction list:
Like Me, Chely Wright
Our Hands Are Stained With Blood, Michael Brown.

Now the first year of the blog has been completed, I am turning to the calendar year.
So far I’ve read 45 books in 2010. I would like to at least equal the anniversary total of 55 books by the end of the year and hopefully exceed that by reaching 60.

Jasper Fforde

Reading Jasper Ffforde’s Thursday Next series is like jumping into a blender with an armful of books selected from almost every genre. His stories defy narrow categorisation. They combine elements of Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Crime and Humour, seasoned with a few pages from literary criticism and grammar text books. If I have overlooked a genre, it’s probably there anyway, like a familiar spice that you recognise in a meal but can’t quite isolate and identify.

My first attempted Jasper Fforde book was The Well of Lost Plots, the third in his Thursday next series. I struggled with it several years ago and eventually gave up. Recently I decided to try again, but this time starting with his first book, The Eyre Affair; and I now realise it is essential that the Thursday Next series be read in order as each volume builds upon what has happened in previous books.

Today Fforde would be my favourite writer (although tomorrow may bring about change). I love his continuing flood of strange ideas and distorted realities. I think his special talent is to bring so much weirdness together into one place and somehow give it a logical credibility.

In Forde’s “Nextian” universe, movement between the “real” world and literary worlds is possible. Some of the action of The Eyre Affair takes place within Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre as Thursday Next follows villain Acheron Hades into the pages of that classic text. Can she save that book from a man whose proven ruthlessness challenges the security and stability of well-loved literature?

Lost in a Good Book follows Thursday’s life after the events of the first book and adds to our knowledge of her world which has similarities to our own but has a significantly different history, technologies and priorities: the national sport seems to be croquet, literary societies are a powerful political force and the power of coincidence can be used as a lethal weapon.

After reading those first two books, I am definitely ready to return to The Well of Lost Plots. And despite my earlier experience I am looking forward to it.

Fforde’s website is worth a visit (there is a link in the side bar, see "links for writers"). I have now bought most of his books, the majority from the author himself. While this did work out a bit more expensive than buying them locally, all the books are autographed and come with a free, randomly selected postcard, some of which are limited editions.

I know this isn't the most enlightening book "review" written. I feel any detailed attempt to describe and critique these novels would be like a regression to my youth when friends and I would quote Monty Python, Goon Show and Fawlty Towers dialogue to each other. Second hand experience is just not the same. You need to go to the source for yourself and enjoy the vibrancy of the original.

From my personal viewpoint, Jasper Fforde's books have been one of the best discoveries I've made for years.

So Many Books...

I have been overwhelmed with potential reading material after going overboard buying books. I addition to my excess purchases I have received a copy of The Alternative Kitchen Garden an A-Z to review. As the title indicates this is a gardening book, and it was written by Emma Cooper, presenter of the internet podcast The Alternative Kitchen Garden. This is a wonderful book that I’ll write about in more detail on my gardening blog when I’ve read more of it (my article will be linked here after it has been written).
It’s not the kind of book I want to rush through. I prefer to read and enjoy an article at a time and there must be around 150 separate entries of around two pages each.

To get a good idea of what the book is like, I recommend listening to the podcast which can be found here: http://coopette.com/akg . There are currently 109 episodes.

A recent discovery I've made has been Jasper Fforde and I am now enjoying the first of his novels The Eyre Affair. I’ve had another of his books for a few years but never took the time to read it, but my interest in his work was stirred after hearing some interviews he’s done. I then had a look at his website (see side bar) and decided to buy the first of his books so I could read his work in order. While I could have bought it locally for a few dollars less, I decided to buy through the author’s website and get an autographed copy.

Not only do I have an abundance of new books, I was finally able to rescue my existing library from packing boxes where it has been stored for many years due to lack of space for book shelving. The boxes made access very difficult and I even forgot that I had some of the books in my collection. While the bookcase situation hasn’t improved, I now have a compromise solution. I bought two cupboards that are like bookcases with doors. All of my books have now been relocated to these cupboards in the garage and it is much easier to access them, so I have no excuse for not reading them – apart from lack of time.