yossy's 11 in 11 chalenge

Well better late than never ….. After problems with the interweb and not being on at all most of last year here’s my 11 in 11 challenge list. Even though it’s 2 months late I was determined to put one in after messing up the 2010 challenge …

I’ve gone for the step system, one book in category one and two in the next category etc (am trying to catch up with missed talk in the forums but this seems to be permissible for the challenge …?). Am planning to keep this flexible (except – for obvious reasons – the first category) and might end up with more books in a category. I’ve tried to be sensible and have a vague idea of the books to fill each category from my ever increasing TBR pile so I’ll add in what I hope to be reading but I’m sure it’ll change as I read about more intriguing sounding books on the LT forum and that TBR pile gets even higher ..!! J

I also tend to pick up a few graphic novels from the library after meeting there for our book club so I have added a ‘bonus’ “graphic novel category” at the end too.

1) Ulysses – (I’ve been trying to read this book for years …)
2) politics (2)
3) Ancient history & mythology (3)
4) european history (4)
5) plays (5)
6) Anthologies (zombie / sci-fi / fantasy / thrilling / western / steampunk) (6)
7) Bio (7)
8) Modern prize winners (8)
9) TBR (sci-fi / crime / thriller) (9)
10) Book club (10)
11) Audio (& e-)books (11)
+ graphic novel bonus

2) Politics

1.
2.

3) Ancient History

1.
2.
3.

4) European History

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2.
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5) Plays

1.
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6) Anthologies

1.
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7) Biography

1. Moab is my washpot - Stephen fry
2. If Only They Could Talk - James Herriot
3.
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6.
7.

8) Modern Prize Winners

1. The Hole - Guy Burt
2.
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9) TBR (sci-fi / crime / thrillers / ....)

1. Treasure - Clive Cussler
2. Great Los Angeles Blizzard - Thom Racina
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5.
6.
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8.
9.

10) Book Club books

1. Juliet Naked - Nick Hornby
2. One Good Turn - Kate Atkinson
3. The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde
4. The Siege - Helen Dunmore
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

11) Audio (& e-)books

1. Thunderball - Ian Fleming
2. Night Watch - Terry Pratchett
3. The Truth - Terry Pratchett
4. At the Mountains of Madness - H P Lovecraft and Call of Cthulu / Herbert West reanimator by Lovecraft, hoping to finish off the Cthulhu mythos this year on e-books
5. casino royale - Ian Fleming
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.

The stepped version of the challenge is a great way to include some of the more meatier tomes that you may struggle to include in a full one. Last year I was putting books aside in favour of the smaller/quicker reads in order to complete the challenge so decided to play it this way this time around as well. Your set-up looks good so will be watching what you read with interest. Enjoy your challenge!

thanks wolfy, that's what I was hoping for ... especially in the first category, I now figure I have no excuses for not reading ulysses this year!!
I love the different categories you have on your challenge list, there are some very imaginative category titles in some people's challenge; I feel I've been rather lazy ... will have to start thinking now for better titles for 2012 :)
I look forward to seeing what you think of quicksilver too ... I bought it about a year ago after reading some very conflicting reviews about it here on LT and have had it very near the top of my TBR pile ever since.

Graphic Novel Bonus Category

1. y the last man series (books 1-10) - Brian Vaughan
2. batman year one - frank miller
3. wolverine origins - paul jenkins
4. old man logan - Mark Millar
5. ultimates volume 1 super human - Mark Millar
6. ultimates volume 2 homeland security - Mark Millar
7. ultimates 2 volume 1 gods and monsters - Mark Millar
8. ultimates 2 volume 2 grand theft america - Mark Millar
9. batman whatever happened to the caped crusader - neil gaiman
10. batman rip - Grant Morrison
11. batman hush volume 1 - Jeph Loeb
12. batman hush volume 2 - Jeph Loeb
13. batman heart of hush - paul dini
14. batman battle for the cowl - tony daniel
15. batman and son - Grant Morrison
16. batman and robin volume 1: batman reborn - Grant Morrison
17. batman and robin volume 2: batman vs robin - Grant Morrison

After the Hole - Guy Burt

This is a book I first read a couple of years ago but loved straight away, it has (for me) a real ‘twist of the knife’ ending to it. Guy Burt won the Betty Trask Award for it in 1994 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_Trask_Award



This is Guy Burt's first book and the first book of his I read, and I really enjoyed it, in fact I re-read it again straight afterwards (it's not a long book!).
It's the unlikely story of a group of teenagers trapped (or more literally willingly locked) in a 'hole', a room underground, by a friend of theirs who has assured them all he will come and let them out at an appointed time. Of course he doesn't come and they remain trapped down there with food and water running out, ways of escaping disappearing fast and tensions running very very high.
It is one of those rare stories with a truly stomach-dropping, we've just hit the high point of the rollercoaster, ending that simply turns what you had previously read upside down (other examples I can think of are perhaps The Getaway by Jim Thompson and Grifter's Game by Lawrence Block). The story is narrated by Liz who is writing what happened as part of her ongoing therapy she is having because of her experiences but the ending reveals a truth far worse than she is describing in her journals. ( **** )

@13, I'm actually thinking of replacing my reading of The Baroque Cycle as it's looking like it might get ousted by the Bas-Lag books by China Miéville instead. I've just started reading Perdido Street Station and loving it so far. I've also heard that it's better to read Cryptonomicon prior to reading the others and as that's also still on the tbr pile I think that's probably what's going to happen.

haha, it's a small world. I'd now be interested in seeing what you think of perdido street station ... China Mieville's giving a talk at a bookshop in Bath (can I mention names? I'm not affiliated with them, I just get their e-newsletter after having visited them. I don't even live anywhere near Bath ... ) in May, talking about his new book Embassytown. I'd not heard of him before this but have now got Embassytown on my TBR pile after reading reviews ... I seem to be seeing his name everywhere I turn right now :)

Welcome to the group! Glad you got your internet sorted out. Great categories, I look forward to hearing what you fill up #6 with! The Hole just went on my wishlist :)

thanks bcteagirl, I hope you enjoy the hole!
category #6 is the easiest one for me I think, got no idea what will definitively go into the other ones but I have a few anthologies I've been dying to get around to reading that will definately fit nicely in there ... one of the great stories of crime and detection volumes, a steampunk anthology (touchstone isn't working) edited by ann vandermeer, the best of best new sf, mcsweeney's mammoth treasury of thrilling tales, mammoth book of zombies and then complete western stories of elmore leonard. Though I concede the last one isn't technically an anthology as such .... :)
Can't wait!

Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby



I have to be honest, I have actively resisted reading any Nick Hornby books in the past. For whatever reason, right or wrong, I didn’t think they’d be ‘for me’. Whether it was the films, the subject matter (I think I always thought they were ‘romantic’ books, about couples meeting in odd circumstances – at football grounds, in music stores or because of a child who didn’t fit in at school) or the fact that he’s a gunners fan (just kidding) I just put him firmly in the ‘not for me’ category. All this changed a couple of months ago when we read About a Boy in our book club … after some of the rather dire thrillers they’ve put us through I thought it would be churlish not to try it. Got it, read it, loved it. It is still about relationships but it is definitely ‘for me’, his writing is funny and insightful full of little touches, characteristics and thoughts that immediately made me think of people I knew and could identify with. The story went from one seemingly improbable situation to another quite realistically and immediately hooked me, I couldn’t put it down.

So when another book club I’m in also suggested a Nick Hornby book (Juliet, Naked) I was really looking forward to it and I wasn’t disappointed. There’s the same humour (note the email conversations and online chat forum excerpts that end each chapter, he manages to exactly capture the funnier aspects and crazed dynamics of the message boards with several strangers trying to argue that their opinion is the better one, that they know more about an obscure singer-songwriter than the next person and then the non-fan coming in and rubbishing their views claiming that the singer he prefers is far superior …) and the same depth to the characters that make you believe in them. The title refers to a new, stripped down, acoustic album of demo versions of songs by a singer-songwriter (Tucker Crowe) from his most famous album called “Juliet” that has recently been released. It’s the first new material from Tucker in about 20 years and no-one has seen or heard from him in all this time; Duncan, the founder of the Tucker Crowe fanclub website (his fans, mainly middle aged men, like to refer to themselves as Crowologists), is the first to receive it and rushes to be the first to write a (very) enthusiastic review of it while his long suffering partner Annie who has had to put up with Duncan’s obsession for all things Tucker (when Annie observes that she has long accepted the Crowe thing as "part of the package, like a disability", you know all you need to know about life with Duncan) disagrees and also puts up a review of the album expressing her differing view of it. This then leads to Tucker (reclusive for two decades) contacting Annie to agree with her disparaging views (stick with me here … unlikely I know but at no point do you ever put down the book thinking; “yeah … as if!!”). A friendship then develops between Annie and Tucker over emails and at this time we are introduced to Tucker (nothing at all like the picture Duncan has portrayed, no doubt this is what Nick Hornby had in mind, showing us that our idols are not as we think of them but just as real and with the same problems as ourselves) and his extended family of famous ex-models, ex-wives and step-children and the truth behind the myth that has developed surrounding Tucker from Duncan and the other Crowologists. This is very well done and we can see exactly how the larger-than-life legends have developed, what Tucker thinks of them (and also of the people claiming that these are facts!) and the truth behind them. In fact at this point I can do no better than steal a sentence from another review which perfectly captures the book; “ The book’s likably bleak humour lies mostly in Hornby's pitch-perfect examination of male fandom … and the way in which the web has enabled fans to stalk and even, somehow, take possession of their idols from the safety of darkened bedrooms.” When Tucker inevitably comes across to England to visit Annie after Duncan leaves her following an affair at work there seems no way of proving to Duncan that this is in fact Tucker Crowe the person he has idolised all his life because as they say he knows more about Tucker than Tucker himself!

By the end of the book what happens to the characters is left beautifully unclear, we are not let down with a sickly sweet soppy ending where Annie and Tucker go off into the sunset hand in hand and Duncan is happier and far more content for having met his idol but instead we are left with the possibilities of this happening. Annie discusses at the end with her therapist (a sort of physical voice-in-her-head character used to show us what she is thinking and feeling) all the options available to her - staying in Goolness (a fictional and dismal north eastern seaside town well past its heyday) or going to America to start a new life, possibly with Tucker or possibly without. Because of the events in the books everyone seems to have come out better and stronger with both Duncan and Annie happier (the former in his own way and the latter with seemingly impossible-to-conceive-before avenues open to her now, for example the idea of moving out of Goolness) and Tucker as well has been touched and come to terms with his semi-celebrity status and fans and releases a new album of new material which is discussed on Nick Hornby’s fictional online chat forum at the end in one of the books funnier moments … I’ll not spoil it for you but I do hope you read this yourself to find out … highly recommended. (****)

I really enjoyed Juliet, Naked as well. Since you liked it so much, I'd definitely recommend High Fidelity, which I personally think is even better!

I have that one on my tbr pile so it's good to see a positive review for it. I've read a couple of his books so far and have another couple waiting as well when I can fit them in to the schedule. I can agree with Christina that High Fidelity is excellent.

Treasure by Clive Cussler



This is only the second Clive Cussler book I’ve ever read and to be honest I didn’t really enjoy the first one Blue Gold but a friend recommended this one and I thought I would give it a go …. I certainly thought it was better.
It was another Dirk Pitt story, the bucaneering and wise-cracking protagonist of a series of adventure packed thrillers and this book was certainly action-packed! Together with his wise cracking, comic sidekick Al Giordino they travel from Greenland to the tip of the Southern Americas foiling various plans to; stop Middle Eastern terrorists gaining control of the Egyptian government, to kill the leader of the UN, a world wide criminal families plans to gain control of Mexico and storm the borders to America and also discover the lost treasures (the ‘treasure’ of the title) from the library of Alexandria … and all in time to get back to wine and dine the alluring female scientist helping them … *phew*!
The story is fast paced with a lot happening to each character all around the world in a very short period of time which does make it rather an addictive page turner but ultimately by the end I thought the story was flagging, there just seemed to be too much going on, there were a lot of ideas and I think it might have been better to have concentrated on just one or two. I enjoyed the search for the lost treasure and also the idea of a criminal family trying to mastermind their way to positions of power and ultimately control of various countries but combine them together with various assisantion plots, a stolen ship full of kidnapped government officials and some cardboard characters (there seemed no time to introduce or describe the characters fully) and towards the end I was struggling a bit to finish it. (***)

I've also finished the Y the last man series of graphic novels by Brian Vaughan. A great idea - one man wakes up and finds he is 'the last man' of the title and of planet earth. He scours the resultant post-apolcalyptic-esque ( .... is that a word??) world for his fiancee (she was working on the other side of the world in Australia when it happened), and becomes the centre of murder, mystery and intrigue along the way trying to find out what happened, why it happened and escape the clutches of various groups of women who either want to kill, kidnap, clone or ......*ahem* (well he is the last man in the world after all!! :-0 ) him.
There are some nice touches here to this story, some unexpected twists and directions the writer takes, so while it feels that you have read some of it or seen some of it before there is still more than enough to keep the reader guessing. The developing power struggles around the world, the politics of a one sex society and governments without men is also very well examined, as the series goes on we follow Yorrick around the world over a number of years seeing as he does through his eyes the changes that are made and the way in which the women adapt.
The ending is very, and unexpectedly, emotional, it also doesn't tie everything up in a neat little bow at the end which I liked. There were still some questions left to your own imagination and still yet others that you were left to decide for yourself having been given several clues along the way.

I think Y the Last Man will certainly be a title I check out as I explore more graphic novels having so far only dipped my toe into those particular waters. Thanks for the good review.

I hope you enjoy it wolfy, there were maybe a couple of the 10 volumes that I didn't enjoy so much but there was always a cliffhanger that made you come back ... and I did like the way it all tied together at the end.

I've also had to slightly change my lists and TBR piles after reading your review of perdido street station too, it's really made me want to read it so I've ordered it and it goes straight to the top of the pile! :)

Perdido Street Station is not to everyone's liking so I hope you're one of those that do enjoy it. It definitely whetted my appetite for more of what's being classed as New Weird fiction and I'll be reading the 2nd book, The Scar, some time in the near future I think. It's also pointed me in the direction of Gormenghast which I've not yet read.