Book for August

Hi all! Marie can't post to the blog yet, so asked me to add her book choice for next month. The book is Journey of a Thousand Miles: My Story, by Lang Lang, David Ritz.

My Take on Our Trip

Well, I updated my blog with our trip. If you want to read what I wrote, click here.

Book for May

Okay, so after much indecision, I've finally decided on a book. Because of language, "The Glass Castle" has been nixed. It's a good book, though. I would highly recommend it on your own time. "The Little Princess" is one of my all time favorites, and I was surprised that so many of you hadn't read it. Yes, it is a children's book but it is wonderful. So, I would recommend that one also! I was thinking about a couple of others, but I finally settled on "A Lantern in Her Hand." It's an inspiring book and I think it will provide some good discussion. Not a difficult read. I might save that one for next time. :)

When is it my turn to choose the book?

I thought this would be helpful to have posted on the blog. Mostly for my benefit, but others of you may find it helpful, too. Keri and Tanya are in charge of this show, so if you need to make changes when it's your turn to choose the book talk to one of them. I just post the info. :)

Tanya
Keri
Elizabeth
Missy
Sue
Kelly
Jonna
Joyce
Mary Alice
Marie
Daneen

My Sister's Keeper

Hi all! I just finished a good book that I think most of you would enjoy. (Even the fiction haters!) It's called My Sister's Keeper, and it's by Jodi Picoult. It's well written and raises some interesting moral questions in regards to genetic engineering, medical treatment, etc. It also illustrates the stress placed on family members when a child has a chronic illness like cancer. It's got some language, etc. so I wouldn't choose it as an official book club discussion book, but it's still pretty good. Check it out!

The Top 100 List

Have any of you actually used one of those lists to help you decide what you want to read next? I looked at one recently and I could only count less than forty that I had actually, legitimately read from start to finish.

Crime and Punishment is always on the list and I have read half the book, so I never give myself credit for it. Anyways, I went through a list this week and decided to check a couple of them out at the library. I want to get above 50.

From my friend Shanna's post...

But my x's

Where do you fall in the list? The BBC believes most people will have read only 6 of the 100 books here.
Copy this into your NOTES. Look at the list and put an 'x' after those you have read. Tag other book nerds.

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen X
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien X
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling X
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee X
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte X
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell X
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens X

Total: 8 (woo hoo, I am doing good. 8 out of 10, impressive right?)

11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott X
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller X
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier (This is the one I checked out at the library)
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger X (seriously, why is this book on this list...lame!!!)
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger (I requested this one, but since it is coming out as a movie, I should get it by the time my twins turn one)
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot

Total: 4
Total so far: 12

21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell X
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald X
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame

Total: 2
Total so far: 14 (Okay, many of those books I have read the beginning and then got distracted)

31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens X
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma-Jane Austen X
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen X
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis X (isn't this repetitive with #33)
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini X (thank you Sunset Book Club...I feel smart)
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne

Total: 5
Total so far: 19

41 Animal Farm - George Orwell X
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown X
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery X
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding X
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan

Total: 4
Total so far: 23

51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel X (book club in two months!!)
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen X
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens X
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Total: 3
Total so far: 26

61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck X
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas X
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy X (this is a depressingly stupid book...why is it on here?)
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville

Total: 3
Total so far: 29

71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno – Dante (I have tried, it is just not for me...I read a book about this book, does that count?)
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray X
80 Possession - AS Byatt

Total: 1
Total so far: 30

81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens X
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker X
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistr
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White X
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton

Total: 3
Total so far: 33

91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams X
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute X (book club...book club!!!)
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare (how can you have the complete works of Shakespeare, and then this one. It is double dipping!)
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl X
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo X

Total 4
Grand Total: 37

I have some work to do. What about you? How many have you read? Marie?

Book for August/September

Just a little more information about Echo's book for next month. The full title is Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, and the author is Immaculee Ilibagiza.