This is the way to London town: bjace's 2015 challenge

Gay go up and gay go down
This is the way to London Town

My 2015 challenge will be based on the children's rhyme Oranges and Lemons. It lists 15 churches in London. I found it when I was trying out themes for my 2013 challenge and decided to keep it for 2015. I will try to read mostly British authors or books set in Britain or the colonies when they were colonies. I want to read some more Dickens and to finish Anthony Trollope's Barchester Chronicles. I also want to read some Agatha Christie and Edgar Wallace and to get through the Oxford book of English verse. Of course, anything that will allow me to read P. G. Wodehouse is a really good thing.

I'm also going to read progressively down the scale. I'll do 15 children's books, 14 books by women, etc. and end with one REALLY big book--John Cooper Powys' Glastonbury romance, which is over 1000 pages long and which I've been thinking about reading for a while.

nges and lemons
Say the bells of St. Clements

Starting out a children's rhyme with children's books. I will read at least 15 books by British Children's authors

Possibles:

Edge of the cloud by K. M. Peyton
Jo of the Chalet School by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer
Warrior scarlet by Rosemary Sutcliff
Tom Brown's school days by Thomas Hughes
Tom's Midnight garden by Phillipa Pearce
Just so stories by Rudyard Kipling
Children of Primrose Lane by Noel Streatfeild
Autumn term by Antonia Forest
Dream of Sadler's Wells by Lorna Hill
Brendon Chase by B. B.
Peter Duck by Arthur Ransome
National Velvet by Enid Bagnold

Mistress Masham's repose by T. H. White

READ

Dangerous games by Joan Aiken--***
The Borrowers afloat--by Mary Norton--***

Kettles and pans
Say the bells of St. Anne's

St. Anne is the patron saint of unmarried women, housewives and grandmothers. A lot of British women in those three categories wrote books and I will read at least 14 of them.

Possibles:

The faraway bride by Stella Benson
The shooting party by Isabel Colegate
The blessing by Nancy Mitford
Cousin Kate by Georgette Heyer
A severed head by Iris Murdoch
Wives and daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth and her German garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
The semi-attached couple and the semi-detached house by Emily Eden
Black narcissus by Rumer Godden
Infernal world of Bramwell Bronte by Daphne du Maurier
Middlemarch by George Eliot
Sanditon by Jane Austen
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark

READ

The provincial lady in London by E. M. Delafield--***

Bull's eyes and targets
Say the bells of St. Margaret's

St. Margaret is the patron saint of exiles. What better way to describe P. G. Wodehouse, who wrote all his quintessential novels on the British upper class from Long Island. I will read 13 books by Wodehouse.

Possibles:

Cocktail time--1958
Eggs, beans and crumpets--1940
Uncle Dynamite--1948
Young men in spats--1932
Pearls, girls and Monty Bodkin
Doctor Sally--1932
Girl in blue--1970
Plum pie--1966
Money in the bank--1946

READ

Piccadilly Jim--***
Adventures of Sally--***1/2
Barmy in Wonderland--***
A few quick ones--***

Pokers and tongs
Say the bells of St. John's

St. John was the Beloved disciple. I will read 12 books on religion and Christian living

Possibles:

God in the dock by C. S. Lewis
Problem of pain by C. S. Lewis
Serious call to a devout and holy life by William Law
Prayer of Jabez by Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Basic Christianity by John Stott
Involvement by John Stott
Bringing sons into glory by Oswald Chambers
With Christ in the school of prayer by Andrew Murray
If I perish, I perish by Ian Thomas
The saving life of Christ by Ian Thomas
The highest good by Oswald Chambers
Shadow of an agony by Oswald Chambers
Book of Margery Kempe

Pancakes and fritters
Say the bells of St. Peter's

Surely St. Peter was a man of letters. I will read 11 books by Britsh male writers.

Possibles:

An Irish country village by Patrick Taylor
All hallows' Eve by Charles Williams
The well at the world's end by William Morris
Passage to India by E. M. Forster
Heart of the matter by Graham Greene
Month in the country by J. L. Carr
The untouchable by John Banville
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
No more parades by Ford Madox Ford

READ

A quiet neighborhood by George Macdonald--***
Three men on the bummel by Jerome K. Jeromr--***1/2

You owe me ten shillings
Say the bells of St. Helen's

Ten is the word. I've had a good deal of fun over the last few years dedicating a category to books published 100 years previously. I will read 10 books published in 1915.

Possibles:

Of human bondage by W. Somerset Maugham
Dr. Syn by Russell Thorndyke
Wine, water and song by G. K. Chesterton
For the sake of the school by Angela Brazil
The man who bought London by Edgar Wallace
The lost prince by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The rainbow by D. H. Lawrence
The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T. S. Eliot

READ

Miss Million's maid by Mrs. Oliver Onions--***
1914 and other poems by Rupert Brooke--***

Pray when will that be?
Say the bells of Stepney

Stepney grew out of a medieval village and is one of London's older sections. Lots of history. I will read at least 9 books of history.

Possibles:

She-wolves by Helen Castor
Mary, Queen of Scots, and the murder of Lord Darnley by Alison Weir
The sisters of Henry VIII by Mary Perry
Warrior queens by Antonia Fraser
The great hunger by Cecil Woodham-Smith
Britain's royal families: the complete genealogy by Alison Weir
Longitude by Dava Sobel

READ

The magnificent century by Thomas B. Costain--***1/2
The three Edwards by Thomas B. Costain--***

Two sticks and an apple
Say the bells of Whitechapel

Whitechapel being, of course, the stalking ground of Jack the Ripper. I will read at least 8 mysteries by British authors.

Possibles:

Forfeit by Dick Francis
Mystery of a hansom cab by Fergus Hume
Scandal in Belgravia by Robert Barnard
All on a summer's day by John Wainwright
Red Redmaynes by Eden Phillpotts
Man who knew too much by G. K. Chesterton
The journeying boy by Michael Innes

READ

Death comes as the end by Agatha Christie--**1/2

When will you pay me
Say the bells of Old Bailey

As a young man, Charles Dickens worked for a time for a lawyer and lots of lawyers hang round the Old Bailey. I will read at least 7 books by those two Victorian masters Charles Dickens and Anthony Trollope.

Possibles:

David Copperfield by Dickens
Mrs. Lirriper's legacy by Dickens
Mystery of Edwin Drood by Dickens

FINISHED

Framley parsonage by Anthony Trollope--****
Small house at Allington by Anthony Trollope--****
Last chronicle of Barset by Anthony Trollope--***1/2
Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens--****

Halfpence and farthings
Say the bells of St. Martin's

St. Martin is the patron saint of soldiers. I will read at least 6 books on the British experience in the Great War.

Possibles:

Road to Verdun by Ian Ousby
In Flander's fields by Leon Wolff
First day on the Somme by Martin Middlebrook
Memoirs of an infantry officer by Siegfried Sassoon

READ

The perfect summer by Juliet Nicolson--***
To end all wars bby Adam Hochschild--****

I do not know
Says the great bell of Bow

Saving this one for books that are difficult to categorize. I will read at least five of them.

Possibles:

Wallet of Kai Lung by Ernest Bramah
World's last night and other essays by C. S. Lewis
A room of one's own by Virginia Woolf
Sixpence house by Paul Collins

READ

Tremendous trifles by G. K. Chesterton--***

Old father Baldpate
Say the slow bells of Aldgate

Aldgate (or Old gate) was where Geoffrey Chaucer was stationed as a customs agent. While I have no interest in reading Canterbury tales I do like poetry and will read at least 4 volumes of it.

Possibles:

Oxford book of English verse
Four quartets by T. S. Eliot

READ

Wild swans at Coole by W. B. Yeats--**1/2
Barrack room ballads by Rudyard Kipling--***

When I grow rich
Say the bells of Shoreditch

Shoreditch was the site of the first playhouse in England. I will read at least three plays. No idea which ones yet.

READ

Henry IV, Part 1 by William Shakespeare--***1/2
Henry IV, Part 2 by William Shakespeare--***

Brickbats and tiles
Say the bells of St. Giles

I will read at least two biographies.

Possibles:

My family and other animals by Gerald Durrell
Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee

CATEGORY FINISHED

Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey--***
Testament of friendship--**1/2

This is the end
Says the bell of Big Ben

This is a fairly ambitious reading plan, so I will commit myself to only one chunkster. I will read one thousand page novel.

Glastonbury romance by John Cowper Powys.

I love your theme, it's very cleverly planned. I've always loved the rhyme too. Your books fit beautifully in each category. If I was to list books I intended to read, it would only mean I'd read something else instead.

What a great idea. I recognized some of the lines, they cropped up in the Sharpe movies, but I had no idea where they come from. It's amazing what you can learn from other LTers threads!

What a lovely challenge! And great books listen for reading (lots of ones I'd recommend, and lots that are on my own TBR list).

anything that will allow me to read P. G. Wodehouse is a really good thing.
Yes, indeed! Love Wodehouse. I'm hoping to fit a few of his in myself.

Great theme and I learned something new. I'm looking forward your reading :)

Nice theme, and mega planning. I have to admit that I'm like Vivienne. To list books that I planned to read usually means I won't read them. I admire the fact that some people can stick to their reading plans and not get distracted by shiny new covers (like me).

Very nice theme. I do enjoy the geographic ones. :)

Love your theme! I anticipate lots of book bullets from here. :)

Great theme, Beth! I admire how detailed your planning is, your reading year is all mapped out, now you just have to relax and enjoy it.

I don't think I have ever heard the whole poem! Thanks for setting up your challenge with it!

Great theme! Will be keeping an eye out for book bullets; I do love my British literature.

Very cool use of the poem, which is new to me. Starring your thread . . .

What a clever theme! Looking forward to following along.

Clever theme!

How very intriguing. Love that you have a whole Wodehouse category!

I like your categories too. I'll be including Dickens in one of my categories for 2015, but I haven't chosen which books I'll read, so I'll be keeping an eye on your choices. And I hope you enjoy Sixpence House; it made me want to go to Wales so badly.

What a clever challenge!! I'll definitely be following along.

I love British literature and I love your categories! I will follow along and probably pick up quite a few book bullets throughout the year.

Interesting categories! It must have been hard to sit on your idea for 2 years!

Piccadilly Jim by P. G. Wodehouse--***
Category: The bells of St. Margaret's

As God is my witness, I never intended to start this one until 1/1/15, but I was disenchanted with everything I'm currently reading and I had downloaded a big P. G. Wodehouse collection onto my Kindle. "Piccadilly" Jim Crocker, a light-hearted ex-journalist, has been scandalizing London for years with his antics and he is the despair of his strong minded step-mother and step-aunt, though their ideas for how to change his behavior couldn't be more different. (His step-mother wants him to buddy up to the aristocracy and his step-aunt wants him to go into her husband's Wall Street office.) Independent of both of them, Jim's life changes because he falls in love with a beautiful girl. Add a repulsive small boy, two baseball fans, three or four imposters and a powerful explosive and you have the standard Wodehouse mix. I had fun with this; it's not top-drawer Wodehouse but it whiled away a pleasant couple of hours.

Can be gotten for free and downloaded several places.

Thornton37814, you are correct. I thought it was a great idea from the get-go and it was hard to put aside.

Love the theme!

Framley parsonage by Anthony Trollope--****
Category: The Bells of Old Bailey

With the exception of The Warden, which I found hard to get into, I have raced through Anthony Trollope's Barsetshire novels and Framely parsonage is no exception. Mark Robarts is one of the luckiest men alive. He has a wonderful wife who loves him dearly, a profession for which he is both constitutionally suited and ridiculously well-paid, health and youth. Mark, however, is tempted by, and used by, worldly elements that he should have ignored and finds himself in a pickle. All of this is exacerbated by his wealthy patroness, who is kind and always means well, but does not handle young men very well. Add a star-crossed love affair, an impecunious parson and his family, a rich, somewhat vulgar spinster and her love affair and a shifting government and you have a lovely story with which to while away the hours. Several of the characters from the earlier Barset novels show up and this adds to the pleasure.

One of the things I love about Trollope is that he almost never sees anyone as all good or all bad--even his villains have redeeming features and his heroes have feet of clay. (His heroines don't usually; his good women are angels in human shape.) I'm looking forward to the final 2 Barset novels as 2015 goes on.

Great start to 2015!

Thank you, VivienneR! I'm really looking forward to a lot of the titles I've already chosen this year.

I am looking forward to following your British reading in 2015, and I have know learned a new children's rhyme - I don't remember Oranges and Lemons from my childhood.

Great start to your 2015 reading!

Henry IV, Part One by William Shakespeare--***1/2
Category: The bells of Shoreditch

I have generally thought that the historical plays of Shakespeare are a yawn, but Henry IV, Part One is fun and is probably fun to see. There isn't a woman's part worth spit, but with the two vigorous young men--Prince of Wales Harry and Harry "Hotspur" Percy--and the droll rogue Falstaff, with a few other eccentric lords to round things out, this wasn't hard to read at all.

I haven't read that one yet and have been meaning to for about a year now, since seeing the latest BBC version. Glad you've started the year with a good one.

The provincial lady in London by E. M. Delafield
Category: The bells of St. Anne's

Second in the 5-volume Provincial Lady series by E. M. Delafield. The novels are vaguely autobiographical. Delafield was well-educated and middle class and lived in the country and had 2 children, all of which are the same as her character. In the second volume, the Provincial Lady (we are never given a first name) has sold a book and after she gets over being overjoyed over (temporary) payment of bills, decides that she must take a flat in London so as to be able to write more conveniently. The action is split between her city friends (literary and sometimes somewhat madcap) and the more sedate and solid people who populate her life in Devon.

Nothing much happens, and the Provincial Lady seems to go from muddle to muddle, but she is sufficient ascerbic in her comments and her family is so pleasant, that the book is a lot of fun.

I was able to buy this whole series of 5 volumes on Kindle for $1.00, so I will probably read more of it this year.

The magnificent century by Thomas B. Costain--***1/2
Category: The bells of Stepney

Second volume of Costain's history series about the Plantagenet dynasty in England. The title seems a bit of a misnomer, although the author does explain, but the book chiefly deals with evil King John's son, Henry III, a charming but vacillating young monarch who made complete hash of ruling England and was saved at the end by Edward, Prince of Wales. Good, solid history written in a fairly engaging style.

Wild swans at Coole by W. B. Yeats--**1/2
Category: The Bells of Aldgate

Rough poetry with some memorable lines. Certainly not the Yeats of The Lake at Innisfree or The Golden Apples of the Sun.

Miss Million's maid by Berta Ruck--***
Category: The bells of St. Helen's

One of the categories I have had the most fun with over the past few years is the one in which I read a group of books published 100 years ago. I never seem to gain any particular insight on society, but it's fun to use them as a sort of time machine. Miss Million's Maid, by Berta Ruck (who wrote dozens of romances from about 1910-1975), was a fun little romp through society pre-WWI. Million, a kitchen maid in the home of impoverished gentry, inherits $1 million dollars from her uncle, the Sausage King of Chicago. In the impoverished home is Beatrice, who is completely under the thumb of her snobbish and tyrannical aunt. Beatrice proposes to Million that she hire her as her ladies' maid and the two set out to enter London society. Beatrice tries to protect her mistress from two very different types of men with an eye on her fortune, but isn't quite so lucky herself. Actually, the characters are all fun, the story is lighthearted and a little muddled, but entertaining. This book should be available free in several places.

>47 Bjace: Haha, was the uncle really the Sausage King of Chicago, or was that a Ferris Bueller reference? ;)

#48, Christina: the book was published in 1915 so I doubt it's a reference to Ferris Bueller. Maybe someone who wrote the script read Elizabeth Onions' books.

Death comes as the end by Agatha Christie--**1/2
Category: The bells of Whitechapel

Agatha Christie's 2nd husband was an archaeologist and several of her books are set in the Near East where I'm sure she went on digs with him. This book goes whole hog and is set in Ancient Egypt. When a prosperous man brings a young and beautiful concubine into his home and installs her among is children who are already all unhappy in many ways, he sets in motion a train of hatred and murder. I'm not sure how authentic the setting was, but it probably wasn't the point. Christie's strong suit is observation of character and misdirection and she employs both liberally. I did suspect the murderer but only because by the end there weren't too many characters left to suspect. I thought the motive was plausible but only just.

I think there are two ways to try to read Christie--to either try to go toe-to-toe with her and actively figure the puzzle out or to let yourself be pulled along and just enjoy the ride. This book was such that I didn't even consider method one. It is not a compliment. This is one of the weakest novels I have read by Dame Aggie.

>50 Bjace: I read that one last year and enjoyed it a bit more than you did. I liked that she chose an exotic location and the set-up of a new, unexpected and snotty wife who everyone wants to see dead was a good plot. Ultimately, it was still a family of jealous relatives with an axe to grind though.

>49 Bjace: Haha, fair enough! I wondered if the phrasing was yours or the book's. Question answered!

Dangerous games by Joan Aiken
Category: The bells of St. Clement's
The 5th in the Wolves of Willoughby Chase series

Will poor Dido Twite ever get home to London? After foiling a dastardly plot on Nantucket and a detour to South America, the ship is sailing home on is sent to the mysterious island of Aratu to find a wandering aristocrat needed by Good King James. Aratu is filled with dangerous animals and even more dangerous people who seem determined to thwart Dido in her mission to find His Lordship, but a mysterious lady doctor and a group of magical forest people befriend her. This has been the most fantastical of the Wolves Chronicles and at times the plot left me a little at sea. I confess I will also be glad when Dido gets back to London. Still, it's a fun and charming book.

January reading recap: 8 books
Favorite: Hard to say. I really loved Framley parsonage, but the gentle charms of The provincial lady in London were also a treat
Least favorite: Probably Yeats' Wild swans at Coole, a little rougher poetry than I like

Up in February: Peter Duck, the third book in Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series, Testament of friendship by Vera Brittain (her biography of author Winifred Holtby), The three Edwards, which continues the Thomas Costain Plantagent Chronicles, and The Wallet of Kai Lung, humorous pseud-Oriental tales from Ernest Bramah.

1914 and other poems by Rupert Brooke--***
Category: The bells of St. Helen's

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England.

Those are great lines, probably the best in the collection. The first few poems in the collection are about WWI and are the most remembered. Brooke was writing early in the war and seemed to view it as a summons to a great crusade for his generation. Brooke died (of disease while in the army, not or battlefield wounds) long before the end of the war and it's safe to say that as time went on his views would have changed. There's more to this collection than WWI. About 25% of the collection is about love and romance. As Brooke wasn't too lucky in love, most of these are melancholy or sentimental. The last poem in the collection is a poignant memory of Cambridgeshire which I liked very much.

Brooke wrote in the sonnet format about 25% of the time and I found that I liked that. Some gems here and some good lines.

The perfect summer by Juliet Nicolson--***
Category: The bells of St. Martin's

WWI, the prequel. An account of the Coronation summer of 1911 which focuses on the aristocracy at play, the weather (abnormally hot), the Russian ballet, crippling transportation strikes, and the writer Elinor Glyn. The book is well-researched but seems rather trivia-stocked. A better book on the subject is Barbara Tuchman's The proud tower

Adventures of Sally by P. G. Wodehouse--***1/2
Category: The bells of St. Margaret's

Meet Sally, the utterly adorable heroine of her own adventures. Sally is a typical Wodehouse heroine, pretty, smart and able to run her own life and everyone else's, too. When she receives a considerable legacy, Sally leaves her New York boarding house for a pleasure trip to the Riviera where she meets and captivates Ginger, a more than usually muddled young Englishman--(think a slightly more competent Bertie Wooster)--and his rich, stuffy cousin. Upon returning to New York, she is drawn by her fiancee and her brother into theatrical production, ends up penniless and alone and is rescued by her prince, who finally discovers one thing he can do.

The plot is the ever-present Wodehouse tangle, full of rich characters. I especially liked Sally's brother, who is a pompous twit, and the illusionless actress he marries. Sally herself is a slightly less interesting character than Bertie, Jeeves, Uncle Fred Twistleton or Lord Emsworth, which is probably why she got only one sequel, which I am looking forward to.

That's a Wodehouse I'd never heard of- thanks for the review!

>57 Bjace: Well that sounds delightful! I need some more Wodehouse in my life. :)

I'm not familiar with Sally as a Wodehouse character - must add to wishlist.

Three men on the bummel by Jerome K. Jerome--***1/2
Category: The bells of St. Peter's

I actually liked this better than Three men in a boat Our three companions, two of whom now have wives and family, decide they need a holiday and take off for a bicycling trip of Germany. Mostly it is a good-natured play on the German love of order and beer, although Jerome spent a whole chapter, not necessarily good-natured, on the German practice of dueling. A little slow to read, but enjoyable.

A quiet neighborhood by George Macdonald
Category: The bells of St. Peter's

Welcome to the quiet village of Marshmallows, where a young minister on his first assignment is trying to move gently into the lives of his parish. His attraction to his poorer parishioners puts him out of joint with the parish's richest--and most troubled--family, who he nevertheless tries to help. When he falls in love unexpectedly with the most unlikely woman possible, his life takes an unexpected turn. I loved the characters in this book, who have very little theology, but an ernest desire to live as Christ would. Slowed down by several sermons, many of which I would guess Macdonald actually preached.

The three Edwards--by Thomas B. Costain--***
Category: The bells of Stepney

This 3rd volume in Costain's history of the Plantagenet dynasty in England features the wise Edward I and his flamboyant, uber-general grandson Edward III. Sandwiched between them is the tentative Edward II, who was deposed by his wife and who, rumor has it, died a horrific death (which Costain plays down.) There's a lot about battles in this, which Costain explains lucidly. History which reads like a novel.

Barrack Room ballads by Rudyard Kipling--***
Category: The bells of Aldgate

"Making mock o' uniforms
That guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms
And they're starvation cheap."

Somehow it doesn't matter to me that Kipling is jingoist and a patronizing racist and that occasionally I can't understand what he's talking about. Barrack room ballads was written for soldiers and Kipling understodd the soldier's experience and is not always complimentary to the Army command or to "The Widow of Windsor" and her wars. Readers will also find many phrases that have become commonplace in the language. While it lacks the some personal favorites ("If", "The Ballad of East and West"), this is a good collection to get an introduction to Kipling's poetry.

Henry IV, Part 2 by William Shakespeare--***
Category: The bells of Shoreditch

O.k., this historical play was a yawn. Mostly it deals with a battle that never happens and how various sides arrange themselves. There still isn't a woman's part worth spit. The most dramatic and memorable moment may be when Henry V--now king after his father's death--repudiates the toadying Sir John Falstaff, who expects to be able to live off the fat of the land now that his old drinking buddy is on the throne. I'm just glad I didn't have to sit through it on the stage.

Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey--***
Category: The bells of St. Giles

This book is not what you expect from the title. It covers the lives of Archbishop Manning, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Arnold and Charles George "Chinese" Gordon, all revered Victorians and rather solemnly debunks them. Manning is shown to be a manipulative cleric whose jealousy of Archbishop Newman led him to all sorts of petty nastiness toward him. Florence Nightingale is seen as a brilliant administrator who used the people around her ruthlessly. Thomas Arnold is seen as a somewhat unintelligent school administrator, whose personal religious convictions and prejudices towards the Classics and school sports prevented the modernizing of British public school education for years. Gordon is portrayed as a self-willed loose cannon, whose personal dreams of glory interfered with his performance of duty. (Gordon ended up beheaded by Sudanese religious fanatics.) The book is not exactly balanced and Strachey doesn't seem to like religion much. There are things I would like to know about each of the characters that I doubt Strachey would want to tell me, but it was interesting, except for the Archbisoph Manning section, which I knew (and cared) little about.

Testament of friendship by Vera Brittain--**1/2
Category: The bells of St. Giles

As a general rule, it probably isn't a good idea to write your best friend's biography. Vera Brittain and Winifred Holtby met at Oxford after WWI and were close friends and associates for most of their lives until Holtby's death of Bright's Disease in 1935. They even lived together for years after Brittain married. Holtby, a novelist, political activist and journalist, made good use of her short life, publishing several novels and making significant contributions to British political journalism between The Wars. This tone of this book is rather heavy. (Brittain's Testament of youth is the same, but somehow it fits better there.) Also, Brittain goes into exhaustive detail and interlards the book freely with Holtby's poetry, which was not her best literary format. Holtby was an interesting woman, but a more balanced account would have been more what I wanted.

>61 Bjace: I literally just bought Three Men on the Bummel today! I loved Three Men in a Boat, so I have high hopes. :)

I enjoyed it very much, although Jerome was not a fan of the German practice of duelling. His chapter on that tries to be sarcastic and really isn't.

To end all wars by Adam Hochschild--****
Category: The bells of St. Martin's

WWI was talked of as the War to end all Wars, the war to break the militaristic spirit and usher in a new age of rational peace. It was, also, a war fought for foolish and greedy reasons with 20th century technology by 19th century methods with tragic results. (Army commanders in Great Britain and Russia were thoroughly convinced that the horse cavalry was a superior and relevant way to fight.) It also was the first war in which Europeans practiced total warfare on each other--using chemical weapons, treating civilians like combatants. (Most European armies had done that sort of thing to non-white populations on other continents.) Hochschild also focuses on opposition to the War in Great Britain. Very good.

>61 Bjace: I adore Three Men in a Boat so I have high hopes for Three Men on the Bummel. It's patiently waiting its turn on my e-reader.

>66 Bjace: That one is on my TBR list, but who knows how soon I'll get to it? If I retired today and did nothing but read full time it would probably take years to get through all of the books on my list.

Carrie, I know what you mean. I have over 700 books on my TBR list. My reading challenges are partly designed to help me whittle it down. but it never works as well as I'd like.

>72 Bjace: And for things like the CATs, the challenge itself can add even more titles to the TBR when you see what others are reading!

>65 Bjace: Re Henry IV Part 2, I liked the "Hollow Crown" TV adaptation, but haven't read the actual play yet. And admittedly it is my least favourite of the four plays that make up the Hollow Crown set. As you say it does tend to drag on a bit.

>72 Bjace: Only 700? I'm showing 1245 at the moment (and that doesn't include things that are already in my personal collection just waiting for me to get to them for the most part).

>72 Bjace: & >74 thornton37814: Reading challenges just make me buy more books that I haven't a hope of reading anytime soon. I'll just save them up for a time when I won't be able to add to my wishlist or collection, aka "a rainy day"!

Since I joined LT I seem to have developed a compulsion to buy books! Pre LT I probably only had a TBR of about 30 books and today it's well over 1,000 (including my Kindle). I have no idea if I will ever get to all of them. It seems to be a universal problem here.

>76 DeltaQueen50: Same here! Especially library book sales. I'm a fiend for them now.

>76 DeltaQueen50: I may not have as many TBRs as you but at least (and Monsieur agrees) you're not buying something like shoes or cars or jewelry!

>78 mamzel: So very true, shoes, jewelry and cars would all have a much bigger impact on our disposable dollars! As my hubby turns to me for his reading material, he is pretty much on board with my book buying habits.

>75 VivienneR: >76 DeltaQueen50: >77 rabbitprincess: >78 mamzel: Also, if you think of books as an addictive substance, you can tell yourself you will never be busted for it (although your shelves may be) and you get to reread and donate.

I just added a book to my husband's Amazon order (printer cartridge). The problem is on-going.

Then, I sprung for another one for my iPad that was on sale ...

I just pushed the button on my Kindle a couple of times this morning. I guess we simply can't control ourselves. ;)

>82 DeltaQueen50:
That "one-click" is just so easy to use... :)