I know I stand a good chance of going to Hell for this, but here's another call-and-response meme that I copied from alcottacre's "75 Books Challenge" thread.

Copy the questions into your own post and answer the questions.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

18) Roth or Updike?

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

21) Austen or Eliot?

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

23) What is your favorite novel?

24) Play?

25) Poem?

26) Essay?

27) Short story?

28) Work of nonfiction?

29) Who is your favorite writer?

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

31) What is your desert island book?

32) And... what are you reading right now?

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Thorne Smith

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I weed out multiples, as a rule. I have bought sixteen copies of The New Astrology by Suzanne White over the past 23 years. Does that count?

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

Yes, pedant that I am, I can commit the sin but not forgive it.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Russell Quant (Amuse Bouche et alii)...marry me, Russell!

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

The One Hundred and One Dalmatians by Dodie Smith, fifty-nine times checked out from the library before I was eleven; I was forbidden to check it out again by the librarian who said, "Have your mother BUY you one, this one is for everyone to read!" Still have never owned a copy.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

See above.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

Manservant and Maidservant by Icky Crumpet-Burnoose...I mean Ivy Compton-Burnett...the worst book no contest.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Bestiary by Nicholas Christopher

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears by Dinaw Mengestu

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't know how to answer this question. I read primarily in English, whether in translation or native tongue and so I have no earthly idea who does superb work in Cantonese or Hindi or Wolof, and no way to learn about them even if I knew I didn't know about them.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Ethan of Athos

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

Anything else by Stephenie Meyer, oof

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

This is a public forum!! I can't use that kind of language!

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

I put this term in quotes because it irks me mightily. Who the hell gave the creator of this list the chutzpah to phrase a question about opinions so opinionatedly?!

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Ulysses was a huge, hard slog, still unfinished.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Dunno. I've never actually *seen* as in "Stayed awake during" a Shakespeare play. I hate 'em.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

French.

18) Roth or Updike?

Neither. John Cheever.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

ICK! "Pancreatic cancer or terminal AIDS?" is an equally appealing choice.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

A different English lit course, please.

21) Austen or Eliot?

Eliot, though by an eyelash, and with much groaning and pleading for this cup to be taken from me.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Poetry before 1950...and I have no plans to rectify that.

23) What is your favorite novel?

The Tale of Genji gets the nod...it was the first one anywhere ever, and it's still very readable.

24) Play?

Don't like plays, don't read 'em, and don't go to see 'em unless I have or want to sleep with the playwright.

25) Poem?

"Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" by Wallace Stevens

26) Essay?

We've hit on another lacuna in my reading. ~duh~ Dunno.

27) Short story?

"The Girls in Their Pretty Summer Dresses"...a beautiful Sunday, a couple goes to brunch married and goes home irretrievably estranged, all in 6000 words. Stellar.

28) Work of nonfiction?

Why We Hate Us by Dick Meyer, just as trenchant and tendentious as anything I've ever read!

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Vladimir Nabokov

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

Dave Eggers...no wait...Jonathan Safran Foer...no, no it's Rick Moody...ummm now, wait a sec...no, really it's Dave Eggers.

31) What is your desert island book?

A fully-loaded Kindle. And a generator.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Charles De Lint ( 31)

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
n/a

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
ahhh, that would be telling!

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Mists of Avalon .. 10-12 times

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Joan d'Arc

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Edgar Sawtelle

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
The Hummingbirds Daughter

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
probably The Sparrow

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
?no idea

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
The Sparrow but only if it was true to the book, and the author was involved.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
? no idea

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
? no idea

14) What is the most lowbrow book you've read as an adult?
I ordered a book recently from Amazon Marketplace called
Stop Dressing Your Six-Year-Old Like a Skank: And Other Words of Delicate Southern Wisdom by By: Celia Rivenbark.( no T-stone for book) I haven't read it yet, but think it will fit the bill. Why did I order it? Because I have often had thoughts along those lines myself, and it sounds funny.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
War and Peace dull dull dull and I never finished.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
n/a

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
for what?

18) Roth or Updike?
Neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
I own 2 Sedaris books, which I have never read,
and had 1 Eggers book which wandered off with my son, so..?

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Chaucer

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I have no "embarrassing" gap. I read what I read when I want to read it.
I am not embarrassed by anything I haven't read...

23) What is your favorite novel?
The Sparrow

24) Play?
I don't enjoy reading plays

25) Poem?
If You Have A Friend by ( there is controversy about this, some sources say anon.. other sources other things.. not sure) And anything by William Butler Yeats.

26) Essay??
can't think of any favorites

27) Short story?
I generally avoid short stories, but Charles De Lint has written a few that I like

28) Work of nonfiction?
Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Charles De Lint

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephanie Meyer

31) What is your desert island book?
Too hard to choose..

32) And... what are you reading right now?
The Various Haunts of Men by Susan Hill

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Richard Brautigan

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
The Hagaddah (for Passover)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No :)

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Have to mull over that question...

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
The Haggadah - every Passover! :)

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Lad: A Dog by Albert Payson Terhune

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
The Woman Who Can't Forget by Jill Price

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Either Loon: A Marine Story by Jack Mclean or The Tennis Partner by Abraham Verghese

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Maus by Art Spiegelman

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Amos Oz

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
The Tennis Partner by Abraham Verghese

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The Woman Who Can't Forget by Jill Price :)

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Can't think of any.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
The first two books of the Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
My textbook for nursing school describing the "Nursing Process" - I couldn't stay awake to read it. Boring!!!

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Much Ado About Nothing - I'm not a fan of Shakespeare

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
the French

18) Roth or Updike?
Roth

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Definitely Eggers

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
None

21) Austen or Eliot?
Neither

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Classics - Prefer contemporary reading

23) What is your favorite novel?
The World According to Garp by John Irving or The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh - I can't decide

24) Play?
The Man of La Mancha

25) Poem?
"Annabelle Lee" by Edgar Allen Poe

26) Essay?
Can't think of a specific one offhand - but probably one from Barbara Kingsolver's books

27) Short story?
"The Family Affair" in The Eelephant Vanishes by Haruki Murkami

28) Work of nonfiction?
I'll have to think about that...

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Perhaps Haruki Murakami, but there are so many others...

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
*thinking*

31) What is your desert island book?
It's a huge book of short stories by T.C.Boyle

32) And... what are you reading right now?
The Big year by Mark Obmascik

Message edited by its author, Apr 13, 2009, 11:56pm.

Note: I mostly ignored the instructions to pick just one of anything. Too difficult.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I think it is probably L.M. Montgomery or C. S. Lewis

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Jane Eyre. I have 3 different versions (one in a Bronte omnibus)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not at all.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Mr. Darcy, Mr. Rochester, Benedick, the Marquis of Carabas, Nick Jenkins, Zaphod Beeblebrox

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Jane Eyre again.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Emily's Quest by L.M. Montgomery

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Nostromo. I just don't like Conrad.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
So hard to pick one! A Dance to the Music of Time? The Periodic Table? If On a Winter's Night a Traveler?

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Lolita, the annotated version. Then we could talk about how great Nabokov is.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I'd say Saramago but he already won.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Neverwhere (I know there is one already, but it looks kinda crappy, so I want them to do it again and good this time)

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The History of the Siege of Lisbon. The movie would never be able to get into Silva's brain the way the book does.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Don't have any. I hardly ever remember my dreams, and when I do they are about everyday events.

14) What is the most lowbrow book you've read as an adult?
Either the An Assembly Such as This faux Jane Austen books, or Outlander

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Finnegan's Wake

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
None of the obscure ones. Does Much Ado About Nothing count? What if it was a version set in the Wild West?

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
The Russians

18) Roth or Updike?
No, thank you.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
no, no, no

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Oh, God, this one is hard. Shakespeare, I guess.

21) Austen or Eliot
Austen!

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Really recent stuff, actually. The highly acclaimed books of the last 10 years, I probably haven't read.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Lolita. Jane Eyre. The Sound and the Fury

24) Play?
Hay Fever. Copenhagen. Hamlet

25) Poem?
Mary Oliver's "The Journey". Elizabeth Bishop's "One Art". Milton's Paradise Lost

26) Essay?
Stephen Jay Gould's essay in Bully for Brontosaurus about Ted Williams' great hitting year and how it was statistically impossible. Don't remember the name.

27) Short story?
"Lamb to the Slaughter" by Roald Dahl. "Rappuccini's Daughter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne

28) Work of nonfiction?
Man's Place in Nature by T.H. Huxley. The man, the myth, the legend...

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Can't narrow this - Nabokov, Charlotte Bronte, William Faulkner, Saramago, Ishiguro

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Dave Eggers. That guy who wrote "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime". Salman Rushdie. *ducks, covers*

31) What is your desert island book?
Shakespeare, complete works. I think there is a lifetime worth of material in there

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Decline and Fall, Noel Coward Collected Stories, The Complete Poems of John Keats

1) What author do you own the most books by?
William Shakespeare, largely because I have taught several of his plays.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Not including books I’ve taught and therefore have different versions of, Anna Karenina and Johnny Got his Gun, two favorites.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
As an English teacher, it should, but, for some reason, it did not.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
I almost never reread a book. I can’t even remember one I intentionally reread that I didn’t have to read for school.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Pippi Longstocking!! She rocks!

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
The Implacable Order of Things – I only finished it out of stubbornness.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
The one I enjoyed the most was Darkmans, by Nicola Barker.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Hmm, either Anna Karenina or Confederacy of Dunces. Can I make them read both if I have them tied up?

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Haruki Murakami, only because I like him so much. Just once, I would like to see a favorite of mine win.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Can I say none? They never quite live up to my vision of the movie and they seem to dissuade people from actually reading the book.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
I second a ban on any Stephanie Myers movies.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Me down in a tunnel, a la The Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I read all the Dexter books. Hey, it was summer.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Paradise Lost

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I don’t attend plays often… how about the movie version of Hamlet? The “Moonlighting” episode of Taming of the Shrew?

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Can I have both?

18) Roth or Updike?
neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Chaucer

21) Austen or Eliot?
Eliot

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I almost never read nonfiction and I know there is a lot of really good nonfiction out there.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Anna Karenina

24) Play?
Long Day’s Journey into Night by Eugene O’Neill

25) Poem?
“The Ball Poem” by John Berryman

26) Essay?
Um….

27) Short story?
“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, or maybe “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut

28) Work of nonfiction?
I don’t read nonfiction much, but my favorite of this past year is Bonk: the Curious Coupling of Science and Sex.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Tolstoy

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
J.K. Rowling

31) What is your desert island book?
I like the idea of a fully-loaded Kindle with generator, but I think this might be the time I need to finally get through In Search of Lost Time.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
A Case of Exploding Mangoes and Nazi Literature in the Americas.

edited to wait for touchstones - wish me luck!

Message edited by its author, Apr 13, 2009, 3:24pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by? Agatha Christie

2) What book do you own the most copies of? The Bible

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? Yes. It sounded awkward.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Fitzwilliam Darcy

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? The Source by James A. Michener

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? The Secret of the Old Clock by Carolyn Keene

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? Any Given Doomsday by Lori Handeland

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? The Source by James A. Michener

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? Michael Chabon

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? Napoleon’s Pyramids by William Dietrich

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? The Mermaid’s Chair by Sue Monk Kidd gag

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. I can’t recall one

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? Too broad. Within the last year? The Passion of an Angel by Kasey Michaels trashy pseudo-Regency romance

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? not so obscure – Twelfth Night

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? French

18) Roth or Updike? neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Chaucer

21) Austen or Eliot? Austen Austen Austen!!!

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?classics of antiquity

23) What is your favorite novel?Pride and Prejudice

24) Play? don’t have one. Don’t like reading them.

25) Poem? I love you much (most beautiful darling) by e.e. cummings, Sonnet 116 by William Shakespeare

26) Essay?don’t have one

27) Short story? Roman Fever by Edith Wharton or The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry

28) Work of nonfiction? A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson or anything by Frederick Lewis Allen

29) Who is your favorite writer? Agatha Christie or Dorothy Sayers

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? Margaret Atwood

31) What is your desert island book? first thought was the OED. Realistic thought was The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon, comfy thought was, once again, The Source

32) And... what are you reading right now? Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond, The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett, and Dancing with Clara by Mary Balogh

Message edited by its author, Apr 13, 2009, 3:51pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Clamp - 82 manga or for novels Piers Anthony - 17

2) What book do you own the most copies of? At the moment one I haven't read called Witchcraft by Julia Ann Krentz. I was poking around and discovered I had a duplicate copy the other day.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

Not at all.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Fai D. Flowright from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle, however it is not so secret, just embarassing LOL!

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

I used to do a lot of re-reading, now not so much. It would probably be a toss up between Black Beauty, White Fang and The Book of Three.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? I'm guessing probably The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

One I didn't finish called The Lords of Were.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Host by Stephenie Meyer IMHO (since the beginning of 2009)

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Mine LOL, although I might get lynched by the literary snobs!

(Yes, this is a joke. I don't believe in forcing anyone to do anything.)

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

J.K. Rowling :-)

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Ransom by Lee Rowan. It would beat the heck out of Brokeback Mountain and has a better ending.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

The Host by Stephenie Meyer, just because I resent her fame and fortune.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I remember having a weird dream with Woody Allen or Gene Wilder in it, but I can’t remember which it was or what exactly was weird about it.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The Lords of Were . Just didn’t like it. Smutty erotica (as opposed to nice and interesting erotica).

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

That I’ve actually enjoyed, I’d say At Swim, Two Boys or Candide

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Romeo and Juliet, that would be the only Shakespeare play I’ve seen.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I’m not sure I’ve read any Russian writers so I’ll have to go with French.

18) Roth or Updike?

Huh?

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

Sedaris (only because he makes my co-worker laugh hysterically)

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

None of the above.

21) Austen or Eliot?

On my list of things to read so no opinion at the moment.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Classics.

23) What is your favorite novel?

This is such a hard question to answer. It would be a toss up between a lot of different ones; Twilight , Luck in the Shadows or The Unicorn Creed.

24) Play?

I’ve never actually read a play. The format puts me off.

25) Poem?

La Complainte de Fantômas by Robert Desnos

26) Essay?

None.

27) Short story?

Backup by Jim Butcher. This was the most recent short story I've read and it was pretty good.
28) Work of nonfiction?

There are very few I enjoy. I guess the one I’ve liked the best that I can remember is The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls .

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Lynn Flewelling

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

I’m not quite sure, I don’t read a lot of the highly rated writers works.

31) What is your desert island book?

Can I only take one? Right now I’ll say Acheron by Sherrilyn Kenyon because it is big and I haven’t had an opportunity to get to it.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Dragon Actually by G.A. Aiken

Message edited by its author, Apr 14, 2009, 2:19pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Carlos Castaneda

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

Pride and Prejudice (2)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

They did?

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

If I was, and I told you, it wouldn't be a secret

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Unsure - possibly Quest For The Future by AE Van Vogt simply to unravel the time paradoxes?

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

Oh dear, I simply cannot remember !

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

Eats, Shites, and Leaves, A Parody

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Dawkins Delusion (cannot remember the author)

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

Oh lord, I have no idea

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

The Saint Closes The Case, but unlike the dreadful movie of the 90s, this would capture the period 1940s action-adventure in Indiana Jones style, with added sepia tones, and a real romantic added flavour : it would be the "Casablanca" of adventure movies

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

no more Harry Potter PLEASE

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

cannot remember any

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

pffft, what a nonsense term - I don't think in those terms and cannot answer

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

I've not seen any of the obscure ones - the nearest would be Two Gentlemen of Verona (twice)

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

This is a meaningful question ... why?

18) Roth or Updike?

ditto

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

ditto

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

ditto

21) Austen or Eliot?

ditto

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

only read two Dickens

23) What is your favorite novel?

Pride and Prejudice

24) Play?

The Bacchae Euripides

25) Poem?

The Jabberwock

26) Essay?

The power and influence of the essay seems to have waned in the era of the TV documentary. I will therefore nominate Simon Schama's History of Britain

27) Short story?

Anything from Beasts and Super Beasts by Saki

28) Work of nonfiction?

The Eagle's Gift Carlos Castaneda

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Saki

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

J K Rowling

31) What is your desert island book?

The Penguin Complete Saki

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Not The End of the World Kate Atkinson

33) Finally, what irritates you most about this quiz?

Having a straightforward questionnaire described as a "meme", a nonsense word invented by Richard Dawkins specifically to discredit religion, and for the existence of which, there is no evidence whatsoever.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

It's a tie between Patrick O'Brian and Ruth Rendall 19 of each

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I don't have any multiple copies

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

It changes weekly.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Little Women

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

The Little Princess

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

No Place For A Lady by Ann Harries

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Book Thief and Snow Flower And the Secret Fan

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Idon't know about everyone, but I sure forced my family to read The Book Thief, The Kite Runner and The Book of Wonders

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't really have a clue

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

The Temple Dancer by John Speed. I like action-adventure movies

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

A Thousand Splendid Suns because I think, like The Kite Runner,
it wouldn't adapt well to the big screen.


13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
N/A

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

I have read Bridget Jones Diary and other 'chick-lit' books which I
find light, refreshing and amusing rather than "low-brow"

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Books I find to difficult I usually don't finish like Moby Dick,
but I did struggle through both Anna Karenia and War and Peace
but I am glad that I finished them.


16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Not a big Shakespeare fan, but I have seen "As You Like It"
and "The Taming of the Shrew"

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
?

18) Roth or Updike?

Roth

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

Neither

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

If I had to choose - Shakespeare


21) Austen or Eliot?

Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Not a big non-fiction reader, and I probably should have
read more classics.

23) What is your favorite novel?

I don't think I can commit to only one!

24) Play?

Haven't seen a lot, probably 'The Mousetrap' by Agatha Christie

25) Poem?
A collection called The White Dove by Jane Candia Coleman,
poems about the American West

26) Essay?
N/A
27) Short story?
The Moon Is Down by John Steinbeck

28) Work of nonfiction?

Don't read many, but really enjoyed Across the Wide Missouri by
Bernard DeVolto last year

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Too many to list

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

Maybe Dan Brown or John Grisham

31) What is your desert island book?

Gone With the Wind since it's a long one!

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Fellowship of Fear by Aaron Elkins

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I just had to look through my whole library to find out.. I thought at first it was J.K. Rowling, Mary Higgins Clark or John Grisham (about 14 of each) but it is Johanna Lindsey

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
That would have to be the Harry Potter Books because I have a few sets of them.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not until you mentioned it.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
I can't reveal that at this time.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Are You There God It's Me Margaret by Judy Blume

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Don't know.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Wow this is hard, I read the Twilight books and was entertained by them. One book that I really enjoyed this year was Roadside Prey by Alva Busch since it was a true story.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Oh I don't know.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Don't know

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Roadside Prey

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Can't think of any right now.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Don't have one....

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
????

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Okay I would have to say Catcher in the Rye because I read that when I was in high school and didn't understand it then.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
None

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I really don't know...

18) Roth or Updike?
I can't choose since I haven't read either of them yet.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
See Above

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
I am going to say Shakespeare because I have read a few of his books

21) Austen or Eliot?
Same as #18 & 19

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
The biggest gap is reading classics I would guess. I don't feel that I have a most embarrassing gap in my reading.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Oh there are just too many to choose just one.

24) Play?
Don't know

25) Poem?
Can't think of any right now.

26) Essay?
Not really

27) Short story?
Not sure about this. I haven't read any short stories.

28) Work of nonfiction?
Roadside Prey because it is a most recent read.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
J.K. Rowling, Mary Higgins Clark, Johanna Lindsey, Stephenie Meyer and Janet Evanovich

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Don't really know

31) What is your desert island book?
Oh to choose one is just too hard... I guess I would have to say my Harry Potter Books

32) And... what are you reading right now?
I am currently re-reading Stronger After Stroke to find the mistakes from when I originally read it. I am also going to start reading Sworn to Silence by Linda Castillo and Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown.

That was fun and hard at the same time. Now I am off to read or to possibly do that other meme you posted...

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Tanith Lee (26)

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
not sure - The Two Towers, but one is in Russian.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? nope

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? hm...Arithon s'Ffalenn? I really don't know.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Swordspoint

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? The Blue Sword

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
The Devil's Labyrinth

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Anathem

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Master and Margarita

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I have no idea.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? Galilee

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? Atlas Shrugged

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. Once I had this dream that was a combination of I Am Legend and The Dark Shore

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
The Devil's Labyrinth

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
The Sound and the Fury

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
none

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians

18) Roth or Updike?
neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
also, neither

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?
as in T.S. Eliot? If yes, then that would be my answer

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Don Quixote

23) What is your favorite novel?
There is a tie. Master and Margarita and Atlas Shrugged

24) Play?
Not much of a play person.

25) Poem?
The Wasteland

26) Essay?
?? No idea

27) Short story?
The Yellow Wallpaper

28) Work of nonfiction?
Lots of anthropology could go here...how about In Search of Respect

29) Who is your favorite writer?
That is too hard, but I will pick for today Storm Constantine as she hasn't made it onto this list yet in any way. But maybe honestly Mikhail Bulgakov.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephen King

31) What is your desert island book?
The Brothers Karamazov

32) And... what are you reading right now?
too many books to list.

Message edited by its author, Apr 13, 2009, 8:27pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Howard Lovecraft (17)

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

Tie between The Art of War and Absalom, Absalom! (both 2)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

What should they have ended with?

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

What about fictional locations, since they sometimes serve as characters? Though I probably wouldn't survive, I'd love to spend a day in Ambergris, aka The City of Saints and Madmen.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

I've done little rereading in my adult life, but I think Song of Kali at 2½ times gets the win. Actually, it would be Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance which I've read 3 or 4 times. It had slipped my mind since it's been a while.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

I'm a bit fuzzy on what I was reading at that exact age, perhaps The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy or some Mafalda collections.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

Tie between Simmons' The Hollow Man and King's Danse Macabre.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

I'd give it to For Whom the Bell Tolls, since it dramatically changed my opinion of Hemingway.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Collapse because what it has to tell us about the fragility of social and ecological systems and how quickly hubris can turn to catastrophe.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't believe in prizes for literature, or at least don't pay attention to them.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

K.J. Bishop's The Etched City, though possibly as an anime.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

Having recently read Toda Mafalda and then watched adaptations of some of the strips on YouTube, I'd say it should really stay on the page.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I dreamed I was a character in a poem being written. The poet kept fiddling with the poem, so he'd change a few lines and the room would go from being slightly dishevelled to crumbling and gothic. It was very disconcerting.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

I have read three Graphic Classics collections, which are basically comic book versions of real literature. Heck, I'd have read more of them if I'd gotten my hands on them.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Gravity's Rainbow. I get that the narrative starts to fragment along with the psyche of the main character near the end, and that there's a lot of naughtiness and singing, but I can't think about it too long without thinking I'm going to fragment a little myself.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

The Tempest--ok, not that obscure.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

I haven't read enough of either to think of them as categories that can be held up for comparison.

18) Roth or Updike?

Haven't read either.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

Sedaris, but for his TAL segments, as I've never read any of his books.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

It'd be Shakespeare by default, which isn't really fair.

21) Austen or Eliot?

Austen.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

There are several. The one I'm most embarassed about are the authors I really liked but have not been brave enough to really tackle. (Kafka and Faulkner immediately come to mind.) I seem to find too many excuses to put them off, and there's nothing quite so embarassing as replying--to someone's query about whether you like a particular author: "I always thought I'd like so-and-so's work, but I've neglected to actually read much of it."

23) What is your favorite novel?

The Name of the Rose--fun and intelligent.

24) Play?

I haven't been gotten much out of reading plays since a phase of being into Theater of the Absurd, but I still have a fondness for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.

25) Poem?

"The Raven"

26) Essay?

Can't think of any off the top of my head, though some time going through my library might turn something up.

27) Short story?

"Nethescurial"

28) Work of nonfiction?

I've already mentioned Collapse. For something more fun, I'd turn to The Botany of Desire.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Borges, Lovecraft, Thomas Ligotti, Ricardo Piglia

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

There's certainly a good handful of writers whose work I hold in less esteem than other people seem to, but I don't know if I'd go so far as to call them overrrated. Oh, what the heck, John Irving. (If you're going to have beef, it may as well be sacred cow.)

31) What is your desert island book?

I can't really pick one. I'd want some massive short story collection, part The Book of Fantasy, part The New Weird and part every other short story I'd like to have on hand. Here is where that Kindle could come in mighty handy.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

The Lizard's Tail by Luisa Valenzuela and Companions on the Road by Tanith Lee.

Message edited by its author, Apr 22, 2009, 10:39pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Mercedes Lackey (83!)

2) What book do you own the most copies of? Stranger in a Strange Land (4)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Didn't notice until you mentioned it. Don't care.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
This is embarrassing. Jean Claude from the Anita Blake series.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Hmm. Might be The Fire Rose by Lackey. I know it's the only one I've had to replace because I read it so much the binding broke.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Off the top of my head, probably Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? Tied with my rating of 2 out of 10 - The Druids by Piggott and The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Two books that got 10 out of 10 - Katherine by Seton and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Smith

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Nothing. I have no desire to force someone to read anything.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
No opinion.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Stranger in a Strange Land

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
No opinion.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
None that I can think of. My dreams (all weird anyway) have self-created characters when they aren't family or celebrities.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I'd say 50% of my reading some people would call lowbrow. So look at my library? Heh.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
In the last year, Little, Big by Crowley.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Never seen one.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Haven't read the Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?
Haven't read either.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven't read either.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Have read only some Shakespeare.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Have read only Austen.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Biggest gap - the Russians. Not embarrassed about it.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Can't pick one.

24) Play?
Don't read them.

25) Poem?
Dream Within a Dream by Poe

26) Essay?
Anything from Ex Libris by Fadiman

27) Short story?
I don't usually care for short stories. If I had to pick, it would be one of Spider Robinson's

28) Work of nonfiction?
Essential Spirituality by Walsh

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Can't pick. Though Geraldine Brook moving up there.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephenie Meyer

31) What is your desert island book?
A book on how to survive on a desert island

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Nothing. Just finished Over the Moon.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Apparently, it's Arthur C. Clarke. Followed closely by Rex Stout.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I try to avoid owning multiple copies of books. That's why I'm on LibraryThing!

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

Ending sentences with prepositions is something up with which I will not put.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Holly Golightly.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

I don't have an exact count, but it would have to be one of the following: The Lord of the Rings, The Brothers Karamazov, or Stranger in a Strange Land.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

Time of the Great Freeze, by Robert Silverberg.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

I try to avoid bad books, so I'll have to go back a few years and say The Da Vinci Code.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

Life and Fate by Vasili Grossman.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

October Light

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

No opinion.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Years ago, I imagined A Canticle for Leibowitz produced as a three part mini-series with Jack Nicholson playing different roles in each time period.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

The Bridges of Madison County. Oops, too late!

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I once dreamed that a co-worker was having sex with Phil Donahue with lots of heavy breathing. When I opened my eyes, my dog's face was six inches from mine. He was panting heavily waiting for me to wake up and let him outside.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The Exorcist

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Finnegans Wake

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Troilus and Cressida

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?

Neither.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

Who?

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Shakespeare.

21) Austen or Eliot?

Austen.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Thursdays.

23) What is your favorite novel?

The Brothers Karamazov

24) Play?

Waiting for Godot. If you've never seen a production, you may not have realized how funny it is.

25) Poem?

My beard grows to my toes.
I never wears no clothes.
I wraps my hair
around my bare,
and down the road I goes.

Shel Silverstein

26) Essay?

Don't have one.

27) Short story?

Tough one. Hmm. What comes to mind is Youth by Joseph Conrad.

28) Work of nonfiction?

The Eighth Day of Creation by Horace Freeland Judson. Kind of out of date, but it was a brilliant bit of science journalism.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Richard Powers.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

Dan Brown.

31) What is your desert island book?

How to Build a Wooden Boat

32) And... what are you reading right now?

I just finished The Wages of Destruction, and I'm about to begin Nickel Mountain.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

I don't know; possibly Trollope.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I don't know, but it is probably one that I purposefully bought various copies of, like Paradise Lost or War and Peace

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

It didn't bother me; it caught my eye. If I had written the questions, I would at least have asked myself whether I wanted to recast them.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

I haven't been able to figure that out yet. Author: Margaret Nussbaum; Non-fictional character: Gertude Bell. I'm also looking for a new diva crush, but they seem all to be married.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Probably Paradise Lost

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

I'm pretty sure I was only starting books then and hadn't likely settled on anything, but if I had a favorite genre it was probably science fiction.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

That Early Reviewers book with supernatural rapes and whatnot.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Leopard; I am more excited about the books on Gertrude Bell -- the writing isn't very good, but I love the story.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Historians' Fallacies

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't know.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Paradise Lost

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

The Springfield, Massachusetts, white pages of the telephone directory.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

The only dream of that sort was about Pogo, and there was no narrative.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The Prayer of Jabez

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Either Europe Central or a certain book on Nietzsche.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

I've seen only a few, all front running ones.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

As people, French; as novelists, Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?

Updike

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

I haven't read Eggers beyond a few isolated paragraphs.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Each as each is called for.

21) Austen or Eliot?

I don't care.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

I have read enough that I am not embarrassed about not reading anything. The gap of which I am most conscious is the poetry I haven't read.

23) What is your favorite novel?

Independent People

24) Play?

Possibly The Tempest

25) Poem?

Buffalo Bill's by e.e. cummings

26) Essay?

So many are exquisite; I have no favorite.

27) Short story?

Is A Christmas Carol short enough to be a short story?

28) Work of nonfiction?

"Jeez, that was so good!" And a whole bunch comes to mind.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Maybe Bertrand Russell

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

I am by the few people who have read the little things I have written and by me.

31) What is your desert island book?

American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Le Petit Larousse Illustre, or a folio sized 500 page journal with a fountain pen and plenty of ink.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

This questionnaire. Last night I read in The Hindus by Wendy Doniger; tonight I will probably read first and second Samuel in the Old Testament; currently underway also are The Essential Dr. Strange, How to Read the Bible, and Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

I don't know; possibly Trollope.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I don't know, but it is probably one that I purposefully bought various copies of, like Paradise Lost or War and Peace

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

It didn't bother me; it caught my eye. If I had written the questions, I would at least have asked myself whether I wanted to recast them.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

I haven't been able to figure that out yet. Author: Margaret Nussbaum; Non-fictional character: Gertude Bell. I'm also looking for a new diva crush, but they seem all to be married.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Probably Paradise Lost

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

I'm pretty sure I was only starting books then and hadn't likely settled on anything, but if I had a favorite genre it was probably science fiction.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

That Early Reviewers book with supernatural rapes and whatnot.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Leopard; I am more excited about the books on Gertrude Bell -- the writing isn't very good, but I love the story.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Historians' Fallacies

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't know.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Paradise Lost

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

The Springfield, Massachusetts, white pages of the telephone directory.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

The only dream of that sort was about Pogo, and there was no narrative.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The Prayer of Jabez

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Either Europe Central or a certain book on Nietzsche.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

I've seen only a few, all front running ones.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

As people, French; as novelists, Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?

Updike

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

I haven't read Eggers beyond a few isolated paragraphs.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Each as each is called for.

21) Austen or Eliot?

I don't care.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

I have read enough that I am not embarrassed about not reading anything. The gap of which I am most conscious is the poetry I haven't read.

23) What is your favorite novel?

Independent People

24) Play?

Possibly The Tempest

25) Poem?

Buffalo Bill's by e.e. cummings

26) Essay?

So many are exquisite; I have no favorite.

27) Short story?

Is A Christmas Carol short enough to be a short story?

28) Work of nonfiction?

"Jeez, that was so good!" And a whole bunch comes to mind.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Maybe Bertrand Russell

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

I am by the few people who have read the little things I have written and by me.

31) What is your desert island book?

American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Le Petit Larousse Illustre, or a folio sized 500 page journal with a fountain pen and plenty of ink.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

This questionnaire. Last night I read in The Hindus by Wendy Doniger; tonight I will probably read first and second Samuel in the Old Testament; currently underway also are The Essential Dr. Strange, How to Read the Bible, and Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

I don't know; possibly Trollope.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

I don't know, but it is probably one that I purposefully bought various copies of, like Paradise Lost or War and Peace

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

It didn't bother me; it caught my eye. If I had written the questions, I would at least have asked myself whether I wanted to recast them.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

I haven't been able to figure that out yet. Author: Margaret Nussbaum; Non-fictional character: Gertude Bell. I'm also looking for a new diva crush, but they seem all to be married.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Probably Paradise Lost

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

I'm pretty sure I was only starting books then and hadn't likely settled on anything, but if I had a favorite genre it was probably science fiction.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

That Early Reviewers book with supernatural rapes and whatnot.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Leopard; I am more excited about the books on Gertrude Bell -- the writing isn't very good, but I love the story.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Historians' Fallacies

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't know.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Paradise Lost

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

The Springfield, Massachusetts, white pages of the telephone directory.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

The only dream of that sort was about Pogo, and there was no narrative.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The Prayer of Jabez

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Either Europe Central or a certain book on Nietzsche.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

I've seen only a few, all front running ones.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

As people, French; as novelists, Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?

Updike

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

I haven't read Eggers beyond a few isolated paragraphs.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Each as each is called for.

21) Austen or Eliot?

I don't care.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

I have read enough that I am not embarrassed about not reading anything. The gap of which I am most conscious is the poetry I haven't read.

23) What is your favorite novel?

Independent People

24) Play?

Possibly The Tempest

25) Poem?

Buffalo Bill's by e.e. cummings

26) Essay?

So many are exquisite; I have no favorite.

27) Short story?

Is A Christmas Carol short enough to be a short story?

28) Work of nonfiction?

"Jeez, that was so good!" And a whole bunch comes to mind.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Maybe Bertrand Russell or maybe me

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

I am by the few people who have read the little things I have written and by me.

31) What is your desert island book?

American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Le Petit Larousse Illustre, or a folio sized 500 page journal with a fountain pen and plenty of ink.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

This questionnaire. Last night I read in The Hindus by Wendy Doniger; tonight I will probably read first and second Samuel in the Old Testament; currently underway also are The Essential Dr. Strange, How to Read the Bible, and Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

Message edited by its author, Apr 14, 2009, 12:15am.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I will sheepishly answer Stephen King, as I cast my eyes to the floor and refuse to look up until you stop laughing.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Don Quixote, I see 5 on the bookcase.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Only slightly.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
I really liked Biff (Lamb), but 'love', you say? I had a crush on Bilbo Baggins until I was 12.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Mists of Avalon and Don Quixote tie at around 12-15 each. Oh, but I've read Jane Eyre about 10 or 12, Podkayne of Mars at least 10. When I was younger I would read a book over and over until the cover fell off.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Chronicles of Narnia! and the Time Trilogy and Podkayne of Mars and...oh yea, The Secret Garden and the entire Eloise Series and... and... I liked books. (still do)

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Angel Fire, Andrew Greeley. (touchstone went to Terry Prachett)

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Any of Christopher Moores books. I was just introduced to him in February... I've been in stitches with them and I've needed to laugh.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Just one? I'd rather tailor the book to the person. Inflicting my booksense on others doesn't seem fair.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I think a funny, timely, irreverent book should win. We need more humor in the world.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
None. The movie industry butchers every book ever written. Although, I say that with such vehemence and then look to later questions and remember a version of Hamlet, called Scotland, PA, with Christopher Walken, that was the funniest version of Hamlet I've ever seen. Hamlet set in a 1970s burger joint. Outrageous.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Any.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
There isn't enough space on LT!! I just finished God's Debris, Scott Adams, today. I fell asleep with it last night. Had a very interesting dream about the nature of probability!

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I will admit to reading everything by VC Andrews until the family ran out of partial manuscripts (up to 1995?)

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
The original, unabridged English translation of War and Peace. My copy was printed in 1942, in 10 pt typeface...however, has the neatest readers guide and bookmark with all sorts of reference information, including maps. Oh! This question means the most difficult to get through, not to physically read. Would have to be The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana but Umberto Eco.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I don't remember the name of it. Ashland Shakespeare festival, 1993. There were two I'd never heard of.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I lean towards the Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?
Updike

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven't read either.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Yes, Yes, Yes
21) Austen or Eliot?
Yes, Yes

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I missed out on a ton of the classics, having not gone to college. The Classic Greek section of my library is woefully thin.

23) What is your favorite novel?
I adore Jane Eyre

24) Play?
Death of a Salesman

25) Poem?
Kahlil Gibran, Song of the Soul

26) Essay?
Steve Alan's contribution in The Courage of Conviction

27) Short story?
All the Myriad of Ways, Larry Niven from The Way It Wasn't: Great Science Fiction Stories of Alternate History

28) Work of nonfiction?
Lies My Teacher Told Me

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Favorite authors vary based on mood. What do I want to read and who writes it?

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Most of the authors whom I would consider overrated, I simply refuse to read, so suggesting a name would simply be prejudicial.

31) What is your desert island book?
May I have two please? I would cry in great sobbing bouts without either Don Quixote or Mists of Avalon.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
I just picked up The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl. We'll see how well he does after Club Dumas. Slaughterhouse Five is in my bag, and I'm about 60 pages into The General in His Labyrinth.

Message edited by its author, Apr 14, 2009, 12:52am.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
J. K. Rowling

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
So far I’ve managed to keep from buying duplicates.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No, I didn’t notice it at all.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Mr. Rhett Butler! Oh, and you know, Mr. Darcy.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books
That’s got to be Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. In addition to reading the entire series before every new release, I had an obsessive HP-face when it first came out where I read it over and over and over.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Beyond the Deepwoods by Paul Steward.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
I’m going to have to say Embers by Sandor Marai

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
It’s a toss-up between Cold Mountain and Winter in Madrid.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frankand Wild Swans:Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I have no idea, honestly.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
I don’t think I can come up with a book that hasn’t already been made into a movie.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I know I’ve had a few, but can’t remember any on the top of my mind.

14) What is the most lowbrow book you've read as an adult?
Twilight, definitively.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Nothing springs to mind.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Hamlet. So, not obscure at all.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians, I think.

18) Roth or Updike?
Sorry, both unfamiliar to me.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven’t read either of them.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare. But only ‘cause that’s the only one I’ve read anything by.

21) Austen or Eliot?
As I’ve only read Austen.. I’d have to say Austen! Lover her work.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Definitively classics. Tolstoy, Eliot, Hemmingway, Dickens. The list goes on and on. Working on it though.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Oh my. Hmm. Too hard, can’t pick just one you know?

24) Play?
Ghosts by Henrik Ibsen

25) Poem?
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

26) Essay?
Not an essay fan, to be honest.

27) Short story?
Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx

28) Work of nonfiction?
Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang

29) Who is your favorite writer?
I couldn’t possibly say!

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephenie Meyer. I meet people everyday trying to convince me she’s the greatest writer ever! Oh please.

31) What is your desert island book?
Oh, wow. That’s an impossible question to answer! Perhaps Gone with the Wind; it’s thick, with a lot of action and layers.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Right now I’m reading The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.

1) What author do you own the most books by? Arthur C. Clarke

2) What book do you own the most copies of? Star Wars (1st edition paperback, the classic gold edition, a UK edition, & a book club hardback)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? Should it?

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? It's a secret.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? Toss up between Shane, White Fang, and Star Wars.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? Star Wars, obviously...

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? Rama II couldn't finish it. Finished Butterfield 8 but hated it.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Air Raid-Pearl Harbor!: The Story of December 7, 1941

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? What would be the fun in forcing them?

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? ME!

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? Rendezvous With Rama

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? Rama II

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. When I was little I dreamt the Joker was chasing me through a foggy woods.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? Most of them!

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? The Bible

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? None of them

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? I'm a military history buff...take a wild guess (You left out my favorite choices!)

18) Roth or Updike? David Lee?

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Eggers and Bacon.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? D

21) Austen or Eliot? Steve or Gould?

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? The 99% of books I want but don't own.

23) What is your favorite novel? Whichever one I am reading.

24) Play? Yes, Monopoly.

25) Poem? wrote a few

26) Essay? nope

27) Short story? To Build a Fire

28) Work of nonfiction? Yeager

29) Who is your favorite writer? No favorite among mortals

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? no comment

31) What is your desert island book? As many as I can carry!

32) And... what are you reading right now? I'm in between books today, will pick something new (to me) tonight.

1) What author do you own the most books by? Jean Plaidy

2) What book do you own the most copies of? Little Women

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? had not a clue

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
I wouldn't mind knowing Laurie from LW but really don't have any secret loves

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? Goodness, boring me is going to have to say Little Women again!!

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? LOL I Read Little Women in 5th grade... it took a LONG time... an I enjoyed Dickens also.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? The Other Queen by Phillippa Gregory

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? the one listed in #8

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
hmmmmm excellent question

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? A Georgette Heyer Historical novel

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? a Harlequin romance

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. ??

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? In the past year it would be the Wars of The Roses by Alison Weir because of the details

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
nada

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
French
18) Roth or Updike?
Updike
19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? who?

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare
21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen
22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I am not embarassed about not reading the Harry Potter books
23) What is your favorite novel? Little Women series; also love the Sharon K. Penman Henry II Trilogy

24) Play? Romeo & Juliet

25) Poem? Do not got gentle into that good night by Dylan Thomas

26) Essay? ?

27) Short story? Poe's

28) Work of nonfiction? Any Tudor NonFiction, I recently enjoyed Sarah Gristwood's Arbella

29) Who is your favorite writer? Jean Plaidy

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Twilight author.. don't bite me

31) What is your desert island book? The Bible

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Jean Plaidy ST THOMAS'S EVE, aka Kings Confidante

Copy the questions into your own post and answer the questions.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Joseph Conrad

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Lord Jim

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No. What bothers me is that people continue to stick to the discredited belief that it's wrong to end sentences with prepositions.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Tuesday Next

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
The Kid from Tompkinsville

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
The Yiddish Policeman's Union

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Don't know

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Lord Jim. It's been made into a very, very bad movie. I'd like to see a good one.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Sabbath's Theater by Philip Roth. A great book with an extremely dislikeable character that would make a very bad movie. Also, I'm extremely grateful to Jasper Fforde for refusing to allow any of the Thursday Next books to get movies.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Can't think of one

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Who knows?

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Gravity's Rainbow

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Don't think I've seen any of the obscure ones.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
For books, the Russians
For salad dressing, the French

18) Roth or Updike?
Roth

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven't read either. There. I said it.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?
Yes

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I've only read one Austen, Emma. I haven't read enough Nabakov

23) What is your favorite novel?
Lord Jim

24) Play?
Death of a Salesman and Henry IV, Part II

25) Poem?
anyone lived in a pretty how town

26) Essay?
On Killing an Elephant by Orwell

27) Short story?
A&P

28) Work of nonfiction?
The dictionary

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Joseph Conrad

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Don't know

31) What is your desert island book?
Don Quixote

32) And... what are you reading right now?
GraceLand by Chis Abani

Message edited by its author, Apr 14, 2009, 6:34pm.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No. What bothers me is that people continue to stick to the discredited belief that it's wrong to end sentences with prepositions.

Tsk tsk. "...the discredited belief that prepositions are the wrong thing to end sentences with". PLEASE, make an effort.

;-)

Copy the questions into your own post and answer the questions.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Stephen King
2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I have one of each
3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
My position was sitting down
4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Sarah Palin
5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Bible
6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Treasure Island
7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
2066 by Bolano
8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Hour I first Believed
9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Anything by Martha Stewart
10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Littell
11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Dreamers of the Day
12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Anything by Gaiman
13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
In Saskatoon with Cameling, Richard and moi, only there's only one hotel room left. (wait, Bergman already did that)
14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Origin of Species
15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
War and Peace (I was two years old at the time)
16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Omelette
17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Let me check the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition again
18) Roth or Updike?
David Lee Roth, definitely
19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
I give up
20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
All were great outfielders
21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen, her works are on TV all the time
22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
World According To...
23) What is your favorite novel?
Exodus
24) Play?
Getting my much younger wife to marry me
25) Poem?
Yech
26) Essay?
South Africa (figure that one out)
27) Short story?
Little Women
28) Work of nonfiction?
Anything by Winston Churchill
29) Who is your favorite writer?
Richard Russo
30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Suzanne Sommers
31) What is your desert island book?
Robinson Crusoe
32) And... what are you reading right now?
Everything Under the Sky by Matilde Asensi

1) What (I’m sure she meant to say “Which”) author do you own the most books by? Jane Austen and Anne Tyler

2) What (ditto) book do you own the most copies of? I don’t intentionally buy multiple copies of books, but I recently noticed I have two copies of The Hours, and still haven’t read it.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? Yes, see notes above.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Edward Rochester

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? Heidi

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? Heidi

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? Childhood’s End

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Of books which weren’t a re-read: Fiction: No Country for Old Men; Non-Fiction: Enrique’s Journey

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? To Kill a Mockingbird

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? Don’t know that I’m qualified to suggest anyone, but my vote would be J. M. Coetzee

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? The Bartimeas Trilogy

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? The Elegance of the Hedgehog

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. Meeting Rick Bragg at a Southern Quilting Festival. Particularly weird because I’ve never been to the South and don’t quilt.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? Probably one of the numerous Mills & Boon books I read in high school.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? Probably Doctor Zhivago because it was my first Russian novel and I hadn’t been introduced to the name changes in Russian novels.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? Timon of Athens

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? Russians

18) Roth or Updike? Updike, though I’m not a fan of either

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Neither

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot? Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? 1985 and Animal Farm

23) What is your favorite novel? To Kill a Mockingbird

24) Play? Death of a Salesman or Long Day’s Journey Into Night

25) Poem? Prufock

26) Essay? A Hanging, George Orwell

27) Short story? Can’t remember the name. Hemingway short story about two soldiers of opposing sides meeting in a garden in WWI, it’s incredibly short (one paragraph?).

28) Work of nonfiction? Currently, Team of Rivals

29) Who is your favorite writer? Changes constantly.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? Richard Evans

31) What is your desert island book? Collected Works of William Shakespeare

32) And... what are you reading right now? Confederates in the Attic and SweetSmoke

1) What author do you own the most books by? Agatha Christie

2) What book do you own the most copies of? None.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? Yes!

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Captain Wentworth from Persuasion

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? Catch-22

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? From Earth to the Moon

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? The French Lieutenant's Woman

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Room with a View

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? Joy of Cooking

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? don't know

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? The Scarlet Pimpernel

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? Pale Fire

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. nope. :)

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? The Devil in the Junior League

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? War and Peace

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? Taming of the Shrew

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? I have an obsession with Russians.

18) Roth or Updike? Updike

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot? Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? Jane Eyre

23) What is your favorite novel? Catch-22

24) Play? Romeo and Juliet

25) Poem? Nothing Gold Can Stay by Frost

26) Essay? none.

27) Short story? The Raven

28) Work of nonfiction? Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant

29) Who is your favorite writer? Agatha Christie

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? don't know

31) What is your desert island book? How to cook anything

32) And... what are you reading right now? Love in the Time of Cholera

#24>

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No. What bothers me is that people continue to stick to the discredited belief that it's wrong to end sentences with prepositions.

Tsk tsk. "...the discredited belief that prepositions are the wrong thing to end sentences with". PLEASE, make an effort.

;-)

Nice!

Or in the words of Patricia T. Conner, author of Woe Is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English, on the Grammar Myths page of her blog (http://www.grammarphobia.com/grammar.html)

"At any rate, this is a rule that modern grammarians have long tried to get us out from under."

LOL

1) What author do you own the most books by? I would guess Stephen King

2) What book do you own the most copies of? I don't think I own duplicate copies of any books

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? I wouldn't say that it bothered me but I definitely noticed it.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Atticus Finch (I noticed this one too.)

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? I don't re-read too many books but I have read To Kill a Mockingbird more than once and have also read quite a few Nancy Drew mysteries and Agatha Christie books more than once.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? Either Little Women or any of the Nancy Drew books

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? I can honestly say that I haven't read any terrible books in the past year although I wasn't very fond of The Alchemist

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Too many to list here.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? I don't think anyone would enjoy being forced to read a book - remember high school?

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? I don't have enough information to answer this.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? I'm not sure.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? Anything by Stephen King - they very rarely translate well.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. Can't recall any.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? While I do not like the term "lowbrow", I will admit to loving everyone one of the Stephanie Plum books by Janet Evanovich.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Ann Karenina or The Fountainhead

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? I don't think I have seen any.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? For what?

18) Roth or Updike? Neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Can't say - haven't read either.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Don't think I prefer any of them.

21) Austen or Eliot? Not sure.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? I am not embarrassed by anything that I haven't read but can say that my biggest gap would be the fact that I couldn't answer the 5 questions above as I haven't read most of the authors.

23) What is your favorite novel? To Kill a Mockingbird, East of Eden and The Grapes of Wrath are among my favorites but there are many, many more.

24) Play? Arsenic and Old Lace

25) Poem? don't really have one although I do enjoy Shel Silverstein

26) Essay? can't really answer this

27) Short story? The Lottery by Shirley Jackson

28) Work of nonfiction? Too many to choose just one

29) Who is your favorite writer? I don't think I have just one.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? James Patterson, Dan Brown and that woman who writes the Twilight series

31) What is your desert island book? I could never pick just one

32) And... what are you reading right now? The Zookeeper's Wife, The Red Convertible and The Hour I First Believed

I'm amazed by the number of responders saying their "most overrated writer" is Dan Brown. Surely, he's always been regarded as rubbish? :-)

1) What author do you own the most books by? Patrick O’Brian beats out Edgar Rice Burroughs.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?I seem to have four Odysseys.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?No. This is English, not algebra.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?The incomparable Dejah Thoris, Princess of Mars.
Brian
5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?Ulysses, or maybe Moby Dick.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?Book of Knowledge, an encyclopedia.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?Double or nothing : how two friends risked it all to buy one of Las Vegas' legendary casinos.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?Life and death are wearing me out : a novel.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?Ulysses

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?I’m a big fan of Mo Yan.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?Freddy and Fredericka would make a good movie.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?Flower Portraits in Cross Stitch

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.Nothing comes to mind.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?Island of the Sequined Love Nun

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?I found Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid to be a tough go. Plus, you keep asking, “why am I reading this?”

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?I’ve only seen common ones.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?After Tolstoy, you have to go with the Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?I prefer JohnBarth.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?I prefer Gerald Durrell.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?I outgrew my Joyce fascination before finishing Finnegans Wake.

23) What is your favorite novel?Look Homeward, Angel

24) Play?The Innocents (an adaptation of The Turn of the Screw), probably from being cast as one of the kids back in the Middle Ages.

25) Poem?”The force that through the green fuse drives the flower”

26) Essay?Probably Thoreau’s Cape Cod, unless that’s too long for your definition of essay.

27) Short story?From Dubliners, I’ll take “Araby” instead of “The Dead”.

28) Work of nonfiction?First Contact, about the opening of interior New Guinea.

29) Who is your favorite writer?Depends upon when you ask…at various times Thomas Wolfe, James Joyce, Isaac Asimov, John Barth, J.P. Donleavy, Anthony Burgess, so many more…

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

31) What is your desert island book?I’ll take War and Peace – it does a wonderful job of creating a world to get lost in…

32) And... what are you reading right now?Manipulative monkeys : the capuchins of Lomas Barbudal, a fascinating study of monkeys and primatologists in Costa Rica.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Thomas Hardy, Douglas Coupland or Armstead Maupin

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

On the Road and I have never read it

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

No (what’s a preposition?)

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Michael ‘Mouse’ Tolliver from Tales of the City series or Adam from the Man Who was Magic or Gabriel in Far From the Madding Crowd

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

The Man Who Was Magic

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

The Man Who Was Magic

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

Oliver’s Story (the sequel to Love Story)

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

Julie and Julia or The Food of Love or … The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society can’t choose

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

I don’t understand tagging

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I’m not terribly literary and I’m guessing Sophie Kinsella wont

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

It was the Shopaholic series …

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

Secret life of a Shopaholic… but they did and turned Becky Bloomwood into Shannon from Home & Away (I’m not best pleased)

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

None all my dreams seem to involve Zombies

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

The De Vinci Code made worse by the fact I was teaching the Crucifixion for Relgious Studies A'level and all my students had read it and believed it, spent a lot of time trying to convince them that the examining board weren't using it as a set text

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Persuasion

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Julius Ceaser

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

Russians

18) Roth or Updike?

Haven’t read either

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

Haven’t read either

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?

Eliot (but give me a Bronte any day)

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Jane Austen just cannot stand her books and I haven’t really read any modern ‘literature’ I’m ashamed to say

23) What is your favorite novel?

Jude the Obscure

24) Play?

King Lear

25) Poem?

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T S Eliot

26) Essay?

A Room of One’s Own

27) Short story?

The Withered Arm, Thomas Hardy

28) Work of nonfiction?

Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Thomas Hardy

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

Ben Elton, Tony Parsons, Dan Brown they're rubbish (imo) but they always seem to sell in my shop

31) What is your desert island book?

Jude the Obscure I might be stuck on a desert island but atleast my life isn’t that bad!

32) And... what are you reading right now?

The Night Watch, Sarah Waters

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Off the top of my head, I think that would be Faulkner.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I know I own a couple of copies of some books, but that's always accidental and not very interesting in my case.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
A little.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Jessica Rabbit.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
I think...As I Lay Dying.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Woolf's The Waves. I'm a devoted fan of avant garde stuff, but this one just never really came together. That said, I didn't hate it. I don't really read books that I think I'm not going to like.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Suttree. Magnificent.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Maybe Infinite Jest. It seems a little bit silly to call a book like that "underrated," but more people really ought to read it.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Let's see...James Joyce, Marcel Proust, Vladimir Nabokov... Yep, none of them ever got it. I'm not so sure the Nobel Prize is all it's cracked up to be. With that said, I truly believe Cormac McCarthy ought to be recognized big-time before he dies. Undoubtedly too provincial for the Nobel committee though...

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
I'm finishing up Drood, and I think it would make a pretty good movie.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The Road. At least not the big studio version that's apparently in the works. There's just no way they're going to be able to do the book justice with so much money on the line. Too much compromise. Makes my head hurt.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I don't generally remember my dreams.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
The Da Vinci Code, I guess. I thought it was alright.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
See, I really enjoy "difficult" books. It was tough to read Only Revolutions, because I could never figure out how to incorporate the historical sidebar into the narrative in an organic-feeling way. I thought the book was great, though.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Let's see...does a "The Matrix"-themed production of Julius Caesar count? No? Then probably Coriolanus.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
In theory, the Russians sound a lot cooler. In practice, I haven't enjoyed much Russian lit besides Solzhenitsyn. I haven't gotten around to Bulgakov yet, though. He's on the list...

18) Roth or Updike?
Roth.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Eggers, though I mostly admire him for his role in all things McSweeney's. His short fiction is miles better than his longer stuff.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Ehhh...Shakespeare. Milton's close, but I despise Chaucer.

21) Austen or Eliot?
I also despise Austen. I haven't read anything by (George, I take it) Eliot.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Early post-modernists and proto-post-modernists. I've begun picking through some Barthelme stories, though, and I recently bought a copy of Carpenter's Gothic, so I'm patching that hole.

23) What is your favorite novel?
This is impossibly hard. I'll give my stock answer--Blood Meridian.

24) Play?
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.

25) Poem?
Yeesh, and I thought the novel question was hard. I think some people consider John Berryman's Dream Songs one poem, so I think I'll just go with that.

26) Essay?
In general, anything by David Foster Wallace. "Authority and American Usage" and "E Unibus Pluram" in particular.

27) Short story?
I love love love Joyce's "The Dead".

28) Work of nonfiction?
The Omnivore's Dilemma is extremely well researched and thoughtful.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
McCarthy, DFW, Helprin, Berryman...I have no idea how to answer this one.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
I don't know. Joyce Carol Oates maybe?

31) What is your desert island book?
Leaves of Grass.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Freddy and Fredericka, Sixty Stories, and 2666.

) What author do you own the most books by? Anonymous

2) What book do you own the most copies of? Tao Te Ching

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? No, that should only bother a prescriptivist who doesn't know any better.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Rhett Butler

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? Ivanhoe

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? The Witch of Blackbird Pond

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? Ten Days to Sex Appeal an early reviewer too

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? Life is a Mix Tape: Love and Loss One Song at a Time

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? My Losing Season

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? I can't keep up with who's hot right now.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? Serenade by James M. Cain

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? There are so many stinkers take your pick.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. I don't know that I've ever had one, but I do end up in a lot of bookstores and libraries in my dreams.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? Sugar, Baby, Cookie, Honey

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? Safety and Health for Engineers

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? Not that obscure The Merry Wives of Winidsor

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? French

18) Roth or Updike? Neither, though I've met Updike and found him very nice. I wonder if the signature I got is worth anything since his demise?

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Shakespeare, though Chaucer would have been fun to party with. Milton seems like a drag. I didn't like the way he treated his first wife.

21) Austen or Eliot? Austen she's less stressful.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? technical literature

23) What is your favorite novel? Serenade by James M. Cain

24) Play? 1776

25) Poem? Beans in Blossom by John Claire

26) Essay? I don't really do essays though Sedaris is pretty funny.

27) Short story? The Bats out of Hell Brigade by Barry Hannah

28) Work of nonfiction? This is a moving target, but for the moment The Search for the Coelocanth. I like those fisheys that stand on their heads.

29) Who is your favorite writer? Tie James M. Cain and Marguerite Yourcenar Can you imagine them together at a dinner party?

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? Dan Brown

31) What is your desert island book? The Decameron because it's the only way I'll ever get around to it.

32) And... what are you reading right now? Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose

I don't want to edit because I'll lose my touchstones, but #16 is Windsor, the other one would be pretty obscure.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I haven't counted but I think Murakami.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Can't think of any I have more than one of. Oh, actually there is Beyond Black and Empire of the Sun but that's by accident, not because I love them.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No, I didn't know it was wrong.
ETA: I just committed the same sin myself above, too!

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
None now, though I used to fall in love with all the male characters in Jilly Cooper's romances.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Not sure. Maybe Harriet by Jilly Cooper. I adored her when I was about 18.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Probably a famous five.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
I'm guessing at The Alchemist. Dreadful.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Hard question. Maybe If This Is A Man.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Forgotten Voices of the Holocaust

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Not really sure of the kind of people who win this. Usually very literary people.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
On The Beach by Nevil Shute. Though it probably has been.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
I think The Alchemist would be terrible.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Can't think of any.

14) What is the most lowbrow book you've read as an adult?
Lucky by Jackie Collins.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Bleak House

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I've only seen one - Henry V. So that one.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
My immediate answer is Russians, though I did really enjoy Les Miserables.

18) Roth or Updike?
Have read neither.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Easy. I dislike Sedaris and think Eggers is great.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Only read Austen so far, though Middlemarch is on my tbr.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Can't think of anything.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Impossible question. At the moment Keep the Aspidistra Flying by George Orwell.

24) Play?
Not ready many plays. Hamlet or the one with Mrs Malaprop. Can't remember the name. By Sheridan.

25) Poem?
The Robert Frost one where 2 paths diverge in a wood. And the one by Yeats about with the line: Tread softly because you tread on my dreams..

26) Essay?
Not sure.

27) Short story?
This is hard too. Maybe something by M R James or Murakami.

28) Work of nonfiction?
River Town by Peter Hessler. I'm fascinated by China.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
George Orwell, Eric Newby, Bill Bryson, Paul Theroux, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Jane Austen, Haruki Murakami, Evelyn Waugh, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Sorry guys - I think for me it's J K Rowling. Also I can't understand the appeal of The Book Thief, though I haven't read anything else by Zusak.

31) What is your desert island book?
Something big, uplifting and comforting. No idea what though. Will think it over.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Half of a Yellow Sun

Message edited by its author, Apr 15, 2009, 2:37pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I think Ian McEwan.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (I currently have three copies; at one point I had four, but decided to part ways with one)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
A little, but grammar seems to be shifting, and it is no longer quite as taboo to end sentences with prepositions.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Captain Wentworth from Jane Austen's novel Persuasion.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Pride and Prejudice

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Probably something from the Babysitter's Club series. I read a lot of those when I was younger.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Cracked Up to Be by Courtney Summers. It's not that it was all that bad, it was just disappointing. The worst book I gave up on was Any Given Doomsday by Lori Handeland. I quit for my own sanity.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters or Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Gosh, I don't know. Most of my favorites are books everyone has already read.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Unfortunately, I don't follow modern literature well enough to be able to answer this question.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
I'd love to see Megan McCafferty's Jessica Darling series made into a movie, but it actually might make a better TV show. It would probably require a lot of voice over narration to get Jessica's attitude down.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Anything else by James Patterson

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Most of my weird dreams tend to involve people I know, rather than authors or books.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
My best friend got me a book of short stories involving people in uniform (and not just military uniforms- one was about a doctor, one a pilot, and one a chauffeur). I haven't read the whole thing, but I did read some of the stories, and they were pretty smutty.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Um, Thou Shalt Kill by Anna Geifman. I had to read it for a class a few years ago, and I really struggled with it. It was full of facts, but it was really, really dry.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I've actually only seen Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night's Dream performed, so I guess you could say I don't know much about obscure Shakespearean plays.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Um, French. But this isn't fair because I've not read much of anything that's Russian.

18) Roth or Updike?
Roth

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare, then Chaucer. I hated Milton.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen!

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Non-English European classics, pretty much all world literature. I'm so anglicized.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Pride and Prejudice

24) Play?
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde

25) Poem?
William Wordsworth's Ode: Intimations of Immortality

26) Essay?
Don't have one

27) Short story?
Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway

28) Work of nonfiction?
Hm. Maybe A Monarchy Transformed by Mark Kishlanksy. I thought it provided a really accessible analysis of the Stuart dynasty in England.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Jane Austen

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
James Patterson

31) What is your desert island book?
Pride and Prejudice

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Perfect Fifths by Megan McCafferty

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Well, I own 18 volumes of Saiyuki/Saiyuki Reload by Kazuya Minekura, and I also own Bus Gamer and all 6 volumes of Wild Adapter so I guess that makes 25 volumes of manga by the same author. Whoo. Can you tell I adore her art?

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Erm, I only own one copy of anything, I think.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Oh, enormously.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
What d'you mean secretly? And where do I start? .. Acheron is number one at the moment, Genjyo Sanzo, Light Yagami, Biff (a.k.a. Levi) from Lamb, Crowley and Aziraphale of Good Omens fame, and actually, Elena from Bitten. *stares at that list* Yikes. I need to get out more.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Good Omens - about 8 times or so. Other than that, Harry Potter could probably double that if I count all the books in the series and divide them over it ...

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Harry Potter. Hands down.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Shadow's Return by Lynn Flewelling. I didn't even finish it.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Discounting a Good Omens re-read, Lamb. Or all the Saiyuki Reload I got my hands on this year ...

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Er. Probably Good Omens. God, I'm predictable.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
... Neil Gaiman. No, seriously. All his stuff is amazing, you don't know until you've read it.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Sunshine by Robin McKinley. They might get it wrong though ...

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
All the manga series I follow, especially Wild Adapter, I think. They never get manga > live action movie conversions right ...

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Well, I think Acheron turned up in my dreams the other day - it was about a petrol station or something. I wasn't fussed, I was just staring at him :D

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Hrm. Probably The Princess Diaries. I don't care, I really don't; I'll just protest that it's a guilty pleasure until I'm blue in the face.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
I tried to get through The Magus once. What a load of crap. (no offence to any fans :)

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Henry something ... oh, I'm smart.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
... ? Russians? ... more dramatic, I guess.

18) Roth or Updike?
Neither.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Who?

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare all the way.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I really don't go for non-fiction or autobiographies or anything, they bore me to tears.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Good Omens.

24) Play?
The Crucible

25) Poem?
My Last Duchess

26) Essay?
...

27) Short story?
Murder Mysteries by Neil Gaiman.

28) Work of nonfiction?
.. see #22

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Neil Gaiman, or Robin McKinley. Or JK Rowling, or Terry Pratchett, or I could just go on and on ...

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Dan Brown. Da Vinci Code, what? How is this guy so popular?

31) What is your desert island book?
Good Omens :D obviously, really.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Acheron by Sherrilyn Kenyon. And loving it.

>39 I didn't even realize Bus Gamer and Wild Adapter were by the same person! I love the Bus Gamer anime (although it cut off too quck) and plan to buy the manga someday. I just recently finished off reading all the Wild Adapter volumes (this series also cut off too quick) and really enjoyed them.

Very interesting!

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Anthony Trollope

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
N/A

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not really

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Laurie Odell of The Charioteer by mary Renault

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Either Lulu in Hollywood by Louise Brooks or Dale Spender's Mothers of the Novel, not sure which.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Cioccolata da Hanselmann by Rosetta Loy

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Closely Watched Trains by Bohumil Hrabal

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Shutter of Snow by Emily Holmes Coleman

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
No idea

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Les Amants de Byzance/Dark Angel by Mika Waltari

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The Waves by Virginia Woolf

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
N/A

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Velvet Chains

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Romola, because I hated almost everything about it.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Cymbeline

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
The French, but only because I can read them in the original.

18) Roth or Updike?
Neither

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Current authors

23) What is your favorite novel?
I have many favorites

24) Play?
Much Ado about Nothing

25) Poem?
Remember by Christina Rossetti

26) Essay?
Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses by Mark Twain

27) Short story?
Big Blonde by Dorothy Parker

28) Work of nonfiction?
Lulu in Hollywood by Louise Brooks

29) Who is your favorite writer?
I have many favorites

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
No idea

31) What is your desert island book?
I need at least two.
The Bible and
Remembrance of Things Past or The Riverside Shakespeare

32) And... what are you reading right now?
El juego del ángel by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Message edited by its author, Apr 15, 2009, 5:54pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
J. K. Rowling
2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Probably the Iliad or Odyssey

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Nah.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Atticus Finch

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
GWTW or Life is a Banquet. Don't ask. I don't know.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Probably Charlotte's Web though it made me cry.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Three Cups of Tea Good idea, good work, terrible book.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Probably a reread of Austen.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
To Kill a Mockingbird

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Do people really read those?

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
City of Thieves

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
They have already done it--The Road

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
What?

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Bridges of Madison County--bleah.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
The Road. The Sparrow is a close second. Both are great, but not really books you can recommend.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Twelfth Night and it was great!

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
They both do nice things with potatoes. But I must go with the Russians. Possibly because I am reading City of Thieves and find them heroic.

18) Roth or Updike?
You have to be kidding.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Ditto. Thurber.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Tough one--but will go with Bill.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
See # 25.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Oh, Gawd. Please don't do this to me.

24) Play?
Phaedre

25) Poem?
Really not well read in poetry.

26) Essay?
Please.
27) Short story?
N/A

28) Work of nonfiction?
Cary Grant a Class Apart

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Harper Lee

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Just one?

31) What is your desert island book?
GWTW

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Haunted Ground

Message edited by its author, Apr 15, 2009, 9:30pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
J.K. Rowling

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I've never own duplicates of anything.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Honestly, I didn't even notice it until this question...

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Robbie Turner from Atonement (partly because James McAvoy was perfect in the movie)

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Confederates in the Attic. I've read it twice for pleasure and once for a class. I don't tend to read things more than once...

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Catherine, Called Birdie. Such a wonderful book about a girl struggling with societal expectations during the Middle Ages.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Rock Bottom: A Novel. It had such promise, but I just couldn't get into it.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Atonement

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
I have no idea. I can't think of a book that I think would be universally adored.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Again, no idea.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Love Walked In because chick lit and chick movies are my guiltiest pleasure.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Life of Pi. Great book, but I just can't picture it as a movie.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Never had one.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I hate that term 'lowbrow" but I guess Sex and the City maybe? I was kind of embarrassed to bring it out in public.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Easily A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man. That chapter on aesthetics nearly killed me.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Never even seen a well known Shakespeare play.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Never read the Russians (though a few titles are on my TBR list) so I have to defer to the French.

18) Roth or Updike?
Can't say. I've never read them.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
I love Sedaris, but I've never read Eggers (though it's on my TBR pile). Still, I have a hard time imagining anyone being better than Sedaris.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
I love all three, but I have a slight preference for Chaucer simply because I still know the prolog for the Canterbury Tales in Middle English by heart.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Never read Eliot, but I do love Austen so I guess Austen?

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
World literature in general. I've been trying to branch out beyond American and British authors.

23) What is your favorite novel?
That's such a hard one. I guess A Prayer for Owen Meany.

24) Play?
It's a tie between Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Our Town

25) Poem?
"Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas

26) Essay?
Repeat After Me by David Sedaris (both hilarious and heartbreaking)

27) Short story?
Ligeia by Edgar Allan Poe

28) Work of nonfiction?
A tie between Confederates in the Attic and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

29) Who is your favorite writer?
I really love Jeffrey Eugenides and David Sedaris.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
I really hated Diane Setterfield who wrote The Thirteenth Tale

31) What is your desert island book?
I guess ...and Ladies of the Club since it's gigantic.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Paper Moon by Joe David Brown

Message edited by its author, Apr 15, 2009, 11:07pm.

#40 Yeah, I think all Minekura's series are pretty awesome so I made it a rule to buy whatever I saw of hers, which is how I ended up with a Minekura shelf, lol. Bus Gamer had such style, I thought, what with the cowboy hats and the hacking and all ...

I really love Wild Adapter, I think because it's just so different in feel to anything else I read. It's so noir-ish it feels like art rather than a comic, and I think it's considered her best work by people who probably know better than me. (I love Kubo/Toki as a pairing, as well *blush* Well, they're pretty much as close to being a couple as they could get without actually being one, I think. Minekura is such a tease that way lol!)

1) What author do you own the most books by?
jerry spenelli

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
King of the wind

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
not realy

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Edward Cullen (ironic, huh?)

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Twilight

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Milkweed

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
the Bible

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Twilight

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Esperanza Rising

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Edgar Allan Poe (I know he's not alive) (but still)

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
a dog's life

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Love that dog

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Unknown

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I'm not an adult. Will get back to you in seven years ;)

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Unknown

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I have only read the plays, and only the common ones...

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
French (I love their culture)

18) Roth or Updike?
unknown

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
unknown

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare all the way!

21) Austen or Eliot?
unknown

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
mystery

23) What is your favorite novel?
I fogot the name

24) Play?
Romeo and Juliet

25) Poem?
Fractions by Edgar allen

26) Essay?
Unknown

27) Short story?
unknown

28) Work of nonfiction?
eat,pray,love (or is it eat,love pray?

29) Who is your favorite writer?
stephanie meyer

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephanie meyer

31) What is your desert island book?
I don't know

32) And... what are you reading right now?
a dog's life

Message edited by its author, Jun 3, 2009, 4:46pm.

Confession, I am stealing this and putting it on my facebook page.

1) What author do you own the most books by? John Irving

2) What book do you own the most copies of? The House at Pooh Corner

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? A little

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Dirk Pitt for the old Clive Cussler series… he’s a little bit James Bond and a little bit scruffy-looking hottie.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? The Secret Garden

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? The Girl who Loved to Climb Trees or Free to be Me and You… I was a bit of a feminist.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? The Grift (book club choice, it was awful).

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? The Geography of Bliss

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? If I could force all of my friends to read a book it would probably be Man’s Search for Meaning.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? No idea, I am really happy that I am not on that committee.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? Shadow of the Wind

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? The Color of Magic they would just ruin the Discworld for me

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. After meeting David Sadaris I dreamed that he was my best friend and we went to Transylvania together to buy roses… is that weird?

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? I read a Romance novel, I can’t even remember the name of it.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? Emile, by Jean-Jacque Rousseau, because I had to pull psychological theory from his ramblings.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? As You Like It

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? French

18) Roth or Updike? Roth

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? Sedaris

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot? Eliot

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? Classics

23) What is your favorite novel? The Princess Bride

24) Play? A Midsummer Night’s Dream

25) Poem? The Congo (A Study of the Negro Race) by Vachel Lindsay

26) Essay? John Irving wrote an article on Gunter Grass that he published in the book My Imaginary Girlfriend. I can’t remember the name of the essay, but I loved it and I became a fan of Gunter Grassbecause of it.

27) Short story? Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

28) Work of nonfiction? I know why the Caged Bird Sings

29) Who is your favorite writer? John Irving

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? Dan Brown

31) What is your desert island book? Infinite Jest (maybe I’d finish it)

32) And... what are you reading right now? Animal Dreams

Edited to fix touchtones

Message edited by its author, Apr 21, 2009, 10:14pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by? -- P.G. Wodehouse (94 books by or about him in my catalogue)

2) What book do you own the most copies of? -- not sure, probably the Bible. As LT counts it, I have quite a few duplicates, but no real work with more than two copies.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions? -- To be honest, "what" instead of "which" bothered me more. I had to remember Churchill's (apocryphal?) comment about the preposition rule - "This is a bit of nonsense up with which I shall not put."

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? -- several others have said "that's a secret" already, so I'd better be frivolous and say the Empress of Blandings. Or unoriginal and say Mr Darcy. I do have a soft spot for Michael Tolliver, but I suspect that we wouldn't get on.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)? -- if I were brutally honest, it would probably be some dull legal text, or something I wrote a dissertation on; for pleasure, it's probably Summer Lightning

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old? -- Swallows and Amazons

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year? -- someone lent me Me talk pretty one day when I was in hospital, that probably qualifies. Though I have read a couple of really incompetent technical books as well.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year? -- Rob Roy. I can't think why it took me so long to discover Scott.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be? -- Novel on yellow paper - it might not be the greatest work in world literature, but it deserves to be a lot better known.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature? -- discounting the dead and those who already have it, and resisting the urge to say "George W Bush" (if Dario Fo can win it...), it's clearly about time it was given to a woman writer from Asia - maybe Jung Chang or Arundhati Roy?

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie? -- La vie, mode d'emploi - I think it would be fascinating to see how cinema copes with a book in which there is no passage of time.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie? -- Pride and Prejudice - oops, too late!

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character. -- Shan't!

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult? -- everything I read acquires, ipso facto, highbrow, or at least cult status :-)
But I do read a lot of detective stories. And Terry Pratchett.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read? -- probably Landau and Lifshitz, Statistical physics. Well, you did ask.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen? -- I don't think I've ever seen Cymbeline or Titus Andronicus performed, so The winter's tale is probably the most obscure I've seen.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians? -- as lovers, as cooks, or as authors? Probably the French, in all three categories...

18) Roth or Updike? -- possibly Roth, by a whisker, but I'm not a big fan of either

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers? -- neither

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer? -- all three. Shakespeare if I had to take just one.

21) Austen or Eliot? Austen. (If I were allowed a free choice of Eliots, I would have a hard time deciding between George and T.S., so it's probably best to stick with Jane)

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading? -- modern American authors is the biggest; 19th century French authors probably the most embarrassing.

23) What is your favorite novel? -- there are so many. Probably Pride and Prejudice, if I really had to pick one.

24) Play? -- The tempest

25) Poem? -- The love-song of J. Alfred Prufrock (or perhaps "The owl and the Pussycat")

26) Essay? -- difficult. Probably something by George Orwell - "The Lion and the Unicorn", or "Decline of the English murder", perhaps.

27) Short story? -- probably "Uncle Fred flits by". Or something by Kipling or Saki, depending on mood...

28) Work of nonfiction? -- difficult. Maybe J.R. Ackerley's My father and myself?

29) Who is your favorite writer? -- P.G. Wodehouse

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today? -- judging by the talk on LT, I suspect it must be whoever wrote Twilight; of authors I've actually read, probably J.K. Rowling. She's good, but not that good.

31) What is your desert island book? -- The Oxford book of English verse, 1250-1918 (I'd take the Quiller-Couch edition, like Rumpole, although the Helen Gardner one is very good as well)

32) And... what are you reading right now? -- the screen of my computer (but when I've finished this questionnaire, I'll probably go back to Mr Sponge's sporting tour)

...my main conclusion would be that I'm terribly indecisive: most of those are questions I could have answered another way equally honestly.

(ETA Orwell)

Message edited by its author, Apr 21, 2009, 7:18am.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Probably Diane Duane or Roald Dahl. I own everything the latter has written, and all of the former's Young Wizard books, as well as her Door Into Fire series and Star Trek novels.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I got five copies of The Princess Bride for one birthday, once.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Jo March.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Oh, this is difficult -- possibly Matilda by Roald Dahl, or To Kill a Mockingbird.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Twilight by Stephenie Meyer.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Oh, always so tough. I adored Kafka on the Shore, recently, and really loved Misfortune by Wesley Stace, as well, but then I also read a ton of classics, like Sense and Sensibility.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Giver by Lois Lowry.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Oh, I have no idea.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
If the stars ever aligned and promised us a good cast and production, Ender's Game would be really cool as a film.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The Giver. (I know it's happening.)

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I once had a dream that Draco Malfoy from the Harry Potter books went through a sparkly pink inter-dimensional portal, lost his memory, and was living quite contentedly as a hairdresser in a trailer park, until a bookworm teenage neighbor of his and Hermione Granger teamed up to restore order to the universe.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
And enjoyed? Well hell, I read a ton of YA fiction, so I guess a lot of it would qualify -- I just really enjoyed the first Mediator book by Meg Cabot.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Paradise Lost by Milton. I had to read it aloud to follow it.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Probably Cymbeline, unless I have a skewed sense of the relative obscurity of Measure for Measure due to my obsession with it.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
The Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?
Haven't read either, and don't much foresee myself doing so anytime soon.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Oh, I am a Shakespeare girl all the way.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Haven't read Eliot, but I do love Austen.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
...I still haven't read Hamlet, despite having taken five Shakespeare courses and planning a Master's thesis on him. I've seen it! (But not until last year.)

23) What is your favorite novel?
Hm. I love Les Miserables, but haven't reread it since 9th grade. Otherwise... Brideshead Revisited? A Passage to India? The God of Small Things?

24) Play?
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Albee, Streetcar Named Desire by Williams, and Arcadia by Stoppard. (I'm majoring in dramatic lit and writing a thesis on two of these guys. Obviously I kind of love them.)

25) Poem?
"The Chimney Sweeper" by William Blake.

26) Essay?
"Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" by Mark Twain. (Do yourselves a favor and read it here: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1...)

27) Short story?
Um. "Harry" by Rosemary Timperley, in Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories.

28) Work of nonfiction?
Screened Out by Richard Barrios.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Oh...I pass!

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephenie Meyer.

31) What is your desert island book?
The Lord of the Rings, maybe? Don't make me pick!

32) And... what are you reading right now?
The Liar by Stephen Fry and The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Manga - Natsuki Takaya (21)
Books - C.S. Lewis (11)

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
Companion to Narnia, Little Women, and The Hobbit (two each, and purposely)

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not really

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Mr. Darcy (like everyone else) and um Kyo Sohma

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Probably the Chronicles of Narnia, with the Lord of the Rings and the first four Harry Potter books as close seconds

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Bad Twin by Gary Troup

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
I wouldn't, I would try to recommend a book based on each person's interests

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature
No idea

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
I don't know

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
um...of books I've read recently, I think The School of Essential Ingredients wouldn't make a very good movie

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I once dreamed that the Scarlet Pimpernel was my father and there was some court case involved...it was weird

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
I don't classify books in those terms; everyone needs a light and fluffy read from time to time

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
A Brief History of Time without a doubt

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I saw one of the Henry plays (I have no idea which one), and it's the only one I've seen.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I haven't read enough of either to form an opinion

18) Roth or Updike?
I haven't read either

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Ditto

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Definitely Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen by default

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Current fiction and poetry, but I'm not embarrassed enough to do much about it

23) What is your favorite novel?
I have to pick one? I can't do that

24) Play?
Macbeth

25) Poem?
I don't read enough poetry...um...probably something by Emily Dickinson

26) Essay?
I don't know

27) Short story?
The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry

28) Work of nonfiction?
I can't pick just one

29) Who is your favorite writer?
See above.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Oh I don't know

31) What is your desert island book?
Um...it's a toss up for The Bible, Pride and Prejudice or The Lord of the Rings

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Reinventing Shakespeare for Children and Young Adults, edited by Naomi J. Miller and Krakatoa by Simon Winchester

>48
26) Essay?
"Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses"

--ooh yes, I'd forgotten that. More fun than Orwell, definitely.

Interesting how few people seem to have views on qn. 10 - maybe the Nobel committee need to improve their PR a bit. Or introduce a Nobel Prize for manga and fantasy...

1) What author do you own the most books by?
If you include graphic novels, Neil Gaiman. If not, Ayn Rand.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
The Bible, though they're all different translations. I have two copies each of Atlas Shrugged, Fountainhead, The Koran, and Winter of Fire by Sherryl Jordan. And I have Lolita in English and Russian.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not a bit.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Joscelin Verreuil from Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel trilogy

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Winter of Fire, probably. It was my favorite book as a child, and it holds up well.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Winter of Fire, I think. I might have been a bit older when I read that for the first time.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
The End of Faith by Sam Harris

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
It's a tie between Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges and Skin Folk by Nalo Hopkinson

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Skin Folk. It's such a different take on mainstream scifi and fantasy tropes.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I haven't the foggiest

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
The Master and Margarita

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Wraeththu - they'd never do it right

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I don't recall

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Not sure. I read lots of fluffy books.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. I never actually finished it.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I've seen a fair amount of Shakespeare, but nothing especially obscure.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians. Hands down.

18) Roth or Updike?
Roth.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris. He doesn't impress me, but I hate Eggers.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Middleton! Failing that, Milton. I love hating Milton.

21) Austen or Eliot?
Eliot.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
There are probably many.

23) What is your favorite novel?
If I have to pick just one? Never Let Me Go.

24) Play?
Women Beware Women

25) Poem?
What Lips My Lips Have Kissed by Edna St. Vincent Millay

26) Essay?
There was something awesome in Femininst Interpretations of Ayn Rand, but I don't recall what, and I don't have the book in front of me.

27) Short story?
"Looking Through the Lace" by Ruth Nestvold in The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1

28) Work of nonfiction?
Who Hates Whom by Bob Harris

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Currently, Nalo Hopkinson.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Margaret Atwood. Some of her books are brilliant, but most are not so good.

31) What is your desert island book?
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. I thik that's the only way I'll finish it.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Roger Ebert.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

The Bible.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

Nah - sometimes what is wrong just feels so right.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

I don't think that I am - can't think of one.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Fahrenheit 451 (but only twice - I read so slowly . . . )

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

I'm thinking that it was probably Pippi Longstocking or Ramona the Pest.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

I haven't really read any "bad" ones.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

Fluke: Or, I Know Why The Winged Whale Sings by Christopher Moore. I'm just really excited to have finally read one of his books and found an appreciation for his wit. I knew my husband would like him so I had him read him first (because he reads so much faster than me) and from the passages he read to me and laughed at I was sure I wanted to read him, too. My husband read 3 of Moore's titles before I was free to read 1.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

I'm not bothered by the terminology, here, like several others have been. I know the intent of the question.
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

I don't feel qualified - and read much too slowly - to even guess.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Robert Frost: A Life by Jay Parini.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I don't think I've had one. My husband did tell me, though, that I was talking in my sleep last night and I said, "Once upon a time."

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

Sex Signs by Judith Bennett. I don't even believe in astrology. I just found it fun to read.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Probably something that I read in my advanced placement english class in high school but nothing that I can remember now. These days, if it gets too difficult I just don't finish it. I'm not all that interested in "difficult".

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

I saw something at the Stratford Festival in Stratford, Ontario in Canada but I don't remember what it was.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

The Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?

I haven't read either.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

I've never read Eggers. I like Sedaris - especially "listening" to him.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Shakespeare.

21) Austen or Eliot?

Hmmmm.......I've never read either. I've seen, and enjoyed, many movies based on Austen, though.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

It's not embarrassing but I regret it. When I was a kid and early teen, I could have been reading more quality literature. Instead, I got into some crap (teenage romances, Harlequins, anything I could find with sex, John Saul . . . ). I'm sorry if anyone finds those things to be good. I really wasted my younger reading years and I wish I hadn't.

23) What is your favorite novel?

I can never choose just one - and it changes depending on when I'm being asked. So - here are some of them:
1984 by George Orwell, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell, Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy, Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen, Bel Canto by Ann Patchett, A Fine and Private Place by Peter S. Beagle, Before and After by Rosellen Brown, Cast of Shadows by Kevin Guilfoile, Open House by Elizabeth Berg, The Sweet Hereafter by Russell Banks, We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver, The Secret History by Donna Tartt . . . . . . and so many more! I really couldn't help myself, here. This is one of my favorite things to do - tell people about really good books.

24) Play?

25) Poem?

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost.

26) Essay?

27) Short story?

The Mysterious Stranger by Mark Twain.

28) Work of nonfiction?

Used and Rare: Travels in the Book World by Lawrence and Nancy Goldstone, Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich, Robert Frost: A Life by Jay Parini, The City of Joy by Dominique Lapierre, Conversations With Anne Rice by Michael Riley, Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg . . . . . :)

29) Who is your favorite writer?

Too many to choose.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

I always think I'm going to like her - and I have many of her books - but they are always just "o.k.". - Anne Tyler.

31) What is your desert island book?

I guess if I had to choose just one I would choose the Bible.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings by Christopher Moore. And I'm loving it.

Message edited by its author, May 4, 2009, 12:37pm.

post and answer the questions.

1) What author do you own the most books by?
Dick Francis

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
The Bible

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No, didn't notice.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with? Archie Goodwin

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Illusions by Richard Bach

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Robin Hood

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Son of Man

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Canterbury Tales

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Illusions by Richard Bach

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Don't know.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Dragon riders of Pern

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Don't Know

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Never had one

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Pride of the Peacock

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
The Brother Karamazov

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
Twelfth Nights

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians

18) Roth or Updike?
Haven't read either

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven't read either.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare

21) Austen or Eliot?
Jane Austen

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Didn't read classics in high school.

23) What is your favorite novel?
The one I'm reading.

24) Play?
The Importance of Being Ernest

25) Poem?
El Dorado by Edgar Allen Poe

26) Essay?
The Attack of the 50 foot Verbose Mutant Killer Fountain Pens from Mars by Mark Cantrell

27) Short story?

28) Work of nonfiction?
Metropolitan Opera Stories of the Great Operas

29) Who is your favorite writer?
The one I'm reading.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephanie Meyer

31) What is your desert island book?
the Bible

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Arthurian Romances

1) What author do you own the most books by?
J.K. Rowling, closely followed by Bret Easton Ellis.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I don't own any multiples, but I've gone through three copies of Catcher in the Rye. The first was stolen, the second was borrowed by an ex and then burned in a house fire (which he started), and my third copy is never leaving my bookshelf again.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No. I know it isn't proper, but I'm not picky about syntax.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
This is the part where I say Edward Cullen, right?

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
I read all of these compulsively: Girl, Interrupted; Exquisite Corpse; The Edna Webster Collection of Undiscovered Writings; Apathy and Other Small Victories; Me Talk Pretty One Day; Anne Sexton: The Complete Poems.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Hmm. I don't know if I had a favorite book when I was 10, but my favorite when I was 11/12 was definitely Walk Two Moons.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
The Crow: The Lazarus Heart. Love Poppy Z. Brite, hated this book.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Tie between Lolita and Jenny and the Jaws of Life.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
A Confederacy of Dunces.

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I haven't the foggiest idea.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Motherless Brooklyn. Edward Norton's been on the project for years now, but for some reason it has yet to progress out of the pre-production stage.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Catcher in the Rye.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I read Everything is Illuminated shortly after seeing the movie, and I dreamed that I went on an adventure through the Ukrainian countryside with Alex.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Oh, I dunno. I try to balance out the material I read--heavy, involved reading; light, fun reading; mixture of both. Maybe Apathy and Other Small Victories, because the plot takes a backseat to the humor.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
Any required reading book for school. The book itself wasn't usually at fault; it was more that being told to read a certain book by a certain date made me not want to do it. I always used cliffnotes for the test, then went back and read the actual book after the class was over. Mostly they weren't so bad. The only one I simply could not get into was The Great Gatsby.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
I've never seen a Shakespeare play.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians.

18) Roth or Updike?
I haven't read either, but I think I'd probably prefer Updike.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Sedaris!

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Chaucer!

21) Austen or Eliot?
Hmm... that's an odd comparison. Really, I enjoy both. But I guess Eliot.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
I go through phases. I'll read non-stop for six months, and then for three months I won't even glance at my bookcase. Sometimes I just get burnt out on books.

23) What is your favorite novel?
That's a difficult question. Every time I decide on a favorite, I read one that tops it.

24) Play?
Meh.

25) Poem?
"Starry, Starry Night" by Anne Sexton.

26) Essay?
Does Very Bad Poetry count? I see it as one long essay.

27) Short story?
Brokeback Mountain.

28) Work of nonfiction?
Dreams from My Father by Barack Obama.

29) Who is your favorite writer?
I never really think about it until someone asks me. Having a favorite isn't as important to me as having a wide variety of books at my disposal.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
It would be so easy to say Stephenie Meyer, but I won't. Salman Rushdie, maybe.

31) What is your desert island book?
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Jenny and the Jaws of Life by Jincy Willett.

Message edited by its author, May 4, 2009, 11:15pm.

And here, finally, is my response to richardderus/alcottacre's meme:

1) What author do you own the most books by?
I have 10 by David Eddings - his Belgariad and Malloreon series. In terms of individual books rather than series, I have 9 by Nicholas Sparks and 7 by Joanne Harris.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?
I just cleared out the couple of duplicates I had for the shop. I DO, however, still have two copies of Russell Brand's My Booky Wook (had the paperback, got the hardback for the shop, want to swap them over as pb will sell better, can't now FIND pb amongst the mountains...). I also have the paperback and the large illustrated hardback editions of Labyrinth by Kate Mosse.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not until you pointed them out!

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Shall we count them off? Mr Rochester, Henry Winter (The Secret History), Noah Calhoun (The Notebook), Jacob Black/Jasper Hale (Twilight Saga), Lazarus Jones (The Ice Queen), Max de Winter...

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?
Some of the early Harry Potters (I read them all over again each time a new book came out), the Narnia books, and Enid Blyton books like the Malory Towers and Cherry Tree Farm series. More recently, probably The Picture of Dorian Gray.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
I was addicted to Nancy Drew, if I remember rightly!

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?
Who Moved My Cheese? by Spencer Johnson. Jeeeez, what a load of self-promoting twaddle.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?
Maybe Nefertiti by Michelle Moran, The Ice Queen by Alice Hoffman or... dare I write these words... Twilight by Stephenie Meyer (sexy men to fantasize about, and the thrill of first love, what more can I say?).

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
Alice Hoffman, for bringing a little magic to our lives

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
The Secret History - apparently they got the ball rolling for one but it stalled and has never been heard of again...

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Any more of the prize-winning novels that always seem to be set in a bleak environment (take your pick of: a refugee camp, the slums of a poverty-stricken African country, a filthy house in the outskirts of a dockside town, a desert) with a depressing-as-hell plot to boot.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
There may have been some dramatic adventures involving Hogwarts, flying curses and Draco Malfoy at some point. I don't really remember!

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?
Some chick lit from the library, The Da Vinci Code, The Notebook, the Twilight series - and you know what, I loved every last page!

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?
I tried reading Ulysses for uni but ended up just reading notes on it instead and milking the lectures for all they were worth. A large stash of hallucinogenic drugs/bottle of absinthe might have helped put me in the right mindset to make sense of it!

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?
At school a theatre company came and put on a weird two-man version of Macbeth that was performed on a climbing frame structure in the middle of the room.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Not sure, but I'll have to go for French just because I can't keep up with the names in Russian literature - even Dr Zhivago which I loved on TV!

18) Roth or Updike?
Never read either.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Never read either, but I have a David Sedaris book or two on my wish list.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Chaucer

21) Austen or Eliot?
Austen - so far.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Sci fi and crime, maybe.

23) What is your favorite novel?
Eeeek - I have to pick one? I'll say The Secret History and The Picture of Dorian Gray.

24) Play?
The beautiful Romeo and Juliet.

25) Poem?
'She Walks in Beauty' by Lord Byron

26) Essay?
One of the Ex Libris collection by Anne Fadiman

27) Short story?
I don't really read short stories - they never satisfy, somehow. I have Murakami's book Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman to read soon so maybe I'll find a favourite there.

28) Work of nonfiction?
Notes on a Big Country by Bill Bryson

29) Who is your favorite writer?
Alice Hoffman or Bill Bryson

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Some of the 'celebrated' authors of yawnsworthy award-winners that nobody actually reads.

31) What is your desert island book?
Something long - like maybe The Count of Monte Cristo.

32) And... what are you reading right now?
Under the Paw: Confessions of a Cat Man by Tom Cox. My mum's library book, very sweet, quite amusing...

Message edited by its author, May 19, 2009, 4:20pm.

1) What author do you own the most books by?

Probably Bernard Cornwell, mainly because of the Richard Sharpe series set during the Napoleonic wars. In graphic novels, I'm up to #29 in the Vagabond series by Takehiko Inoue.

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

Pride and Prejudice, my favorite, in various forms, and Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman, in various forms.

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

That's something I can never get enough of.

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Elizabeth Bennett, but it's not much of a secret.

5) What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children; i.e., Goodnight Moon does not count)?

Pride and Prejudice has been exceeded by Nine Princes in Amber by Roger Zelazny, which continues to grab me with Corwin's overcoming of amnesia and discovery of fantastic worlds and abilities.

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

Fourth grade? L. Frank Baum's Oz books, starting with the Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

7) What is the worst book you've read in the past year?

It wasn't terrible, but I was disappointed by Savvy by Ingrid Law, a YA title that had gotten good reviews and nominated for awards.

8) What is the best book you've read in the past year?

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, another YA title, sticks out. Pascal Mercier's Night Train to Lisbon also was a quite different and memorable read, and I liked Murakami's After Dark.

9) If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

Pride and Prejudice - so good!

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?

Haruki Murakami. He brings the East and West together in a captivating and surreal Japan.

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

Lee Child's Jack Reacher novels. They're naturals for film, and he's such a great character.

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

Hard to say - Gilead by Marilynne Robinson comes to mind, because boiling it down to a visual presentation would lose the beautiful language and nuances.

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I have plenty of weird dreams, but I can't think of one that fits this.

14) What is the most "lowbrow" book you've read as an adult?

My daughter convinced me to try Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, which turned out to not be my cup of tea.

15) What is the most difficult book you've ever read?

Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami comes to mind. Challenging, but in a good, I really want to keep reading this, kind of way.

16) What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you've seen?

Troilus and Cressida.

17) Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

My wife has Russian ancestry, but I'd have to say the French. Especially since we were just in Paris.

18) Roth or Updike?

Neither, please.

19) David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?

David Sedaris. We went to his performance in Chicago - he is always funny reading his stories, but his impromptu humor was impressive.

20) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

Shakespeare! Can't ever get enough.

21) Austen or Eliot?

Austen! But I like Eliot, as in George, and T.S., too.

22) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Tolstoy and Melville. Have trouble with both.

23) What is your favorite novel?

Pride and Prejudice. If you want one not previously mentioned, Kafka on the Shore is right up there for me.

24) Play?

Twelfth Night is mighty good. Modern: August: Osage County by Tracy Letts.

25) Poem?

James Wright has one about watching graceful horses and feeling like he's about to "break into blossom". Edward Dorn's epic Gunslinger and Allen Ginsburg's Howl get me. Ancient: The Odyssey by Homer - I like the Robert Fagles translation.

26) Essay?

Well, it's pretty long to be called an "essay", but what comes to mind is Mountains Beyond Mountains, Tracy Kidder's book about Paul Farmer's Haiti clinic and his work on world health issues.

27) Short story?

I like Lois McMaster Bujold's Miles Vorkosigan stories, and a good one is Borders of Infinity.

28) Work of nonfiction?

See above - Mountains Beyond Mountains. Another good one is American Shaolin.

29) Who is your favorite writer?

I have several, but Jane Austen would top the list.

30) Who is the most overrated writer alive today?

Updike (sorry! may he rest in peace) and Roth come to mind.

31) What is your desert island book?

I've always thought The Complete Works of Shakespeare would last the best if I'm stuck there for a long time.

32) And... what are you reading right now?

Here Be Dragons by Sharon Kay Penman, a novel set in 12th and 13th century Wales and England, and a very different one, Feed, by M.T. Anderson, a YA dystopian novel.

Message edited by its author, May 19, 2009, 8:14pm.

P.S. Thank you, richardderus, for putting together these interesting questions.