Pages

Friday, December 19, 2008

A post about challenges





Well, the ones I decided to sign up for, anyway.
I have lists done for the Art History Challenge and the Dewey's Books Challenge; and my own Classics challenge. I have other classics, too, that I'd like to try and find, and read during the course of the year, but these 12 are my one-a-month books.
It was a good compromise for me, and helped me focus my list. :
So.

My Classics challenge books are:
January: The Count of Monte Christo by Alexander Dumas
February: The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
March: Mrs Dalloway by Virgina Woolf
April: The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling
May: A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth
June: Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
July: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
August: The Woman in White by Wilke Collins
September: Intensive Care by Janet Frame
October: The House of the Spirits by Isabelle Allende
November: A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K LeGuin
December: To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway
To date, I've read seven of the 12 novels I earmarked for this year's list. Not bad, I feel, but Must Improve.


For the Dewey's Reading Challenge, I took the read six books, one from each year that Dewey blogged, and came up with this list:
1): Grass by Sherri S. Tepper (2003)
2): The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time (2004)
3): The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant (2005) (crossover to the Art History challenge)
4): March by Geraldine Brooks (2006)
5): Enstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman (2007)
6) The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett (2008)
And in one of those serendipitous moments, I was talking today about The Uncommon Reader with our features editor, who pretty much sung its praises. :)


For the Art History Challenge, here is my list:
The Agony and the Ecstacy by Irving Stone
The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant (crossover with Dewey challenge)
Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland
The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine Turbulent Weeks in Arles by Martin Gayford
Death and Restoration by Iain Pears
The Illuminator by Brenda Rickman Vantrease

I have a copy of The Agony and the Ecstasy, so that segues nicely into the Read Your Own Books challenge.
I don't have a list. But last night, with little effort, I managed to gather together 35 books from my bookshelves that I haven't read. They're in the photo. I know that new books and review books will also cross my path, but for that challenge, those 35 are my starting-points.






Last but not least, are the Support Your Local Library and 100+ Books challenges. Given my lists above, I'm (very) cautiously optimistic.
We'll see.

2 comments:

Ana S. said...

Good luck with all of those, Maree! You picked some great books.

Bookfool said...

Goodness, that's a lot of challenges! Have fun reading. I love your kitty pics.