October 2015: What 1001 Books Are You Reading?

A late start for this thread...
I'm reading them for the group read, which is so deeply depressing that I am only surviving because on audio I'm listening to Evelina. It's hilarious! I was not prepared for an 18th-century novel to be so completely funny.

I finally finished Buddenbrooks and have started them, which is indeed quite depressing but I enjoy a lot. Later this month I visit Venice a few days, I am planning to take Death in Venice and The Comfort of Strangers with me, if they arrive in time.

I'm reading A Farewell to Arms and closing in on the last 1/3 of Se questo è un uomo (If This Is a Man), which I'm very slowly reading in Italian.

I'm listening to Howard's End as an audio book. I like it - not as much as I loved A Room With a View, but much more than A Passage to India which I really did not like.

I finished last month's Les Choses by Georges Perec, which is very short with about 90 pages, but sure felt much longer. And I finally read and enjoyed my first Anne Bronte, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

I've interrupted Maldoror to read The Leopard for my bookclub. I should be finishing the audio version of Under the Volcano during weekend chores.

I'm reading the last of Austen's major works that I haven't read: Northanger Abbey. I'll probably reread Persuasion next month to make it a nice round set of reading them all this year.

Currently reading Sodom and Gomorrah, the fourth book in In Search of Lost Time. I have them, Dining on Stones and The Princess of Cleves lined up for this month as well if I ever make it through Proust.

#6, how is Under the Volcano on audio? That's one of my TBR's and I wonder if it's one I could better endure listening to than reading.

>9 annamorphic: Maybe? I think I have come to the conclusion that I needed to listen to it to hear the beauty of the prose and get the gist of it, but I should have read the text in order to understand who is saying what, whether the dialogue is inner or outer, to see the allusions/symbols that float past unnoticed in audio....

So, I am going to have to re-read this someday.

I've stalled in my reading of Living and Jacques the Fatalist. But am making progress on, and am intrigued by, the audio version of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.

Although I took Troubles away with me on my travels I didn't get to reading it in September so I am reading it now and enjoying it very much. I am also still making my way, episode by episode, through Ulysses which is kind of an interesting juxtaposition.

I started Invisible Cities/ Le Città Invisibili to check off the last Calvino. Started two other books that had been on my shelves forever, but gave up after some pages. Still not back in full 1,001 mood it seems.

Just finished The Riddle of the Sands and I'm beginning Orlando.

I listened to The Awakening (a re-read), finished The Leopard and Maldoror and am now reading The Debt of Tears (vol. 4 of The Story of the Stone / The Dream of the Red Chamber) and am also listening to London Fields.

Reading The English Patient and have just started Day of the Triffids.

>4 japaul22: I'm listening to Howard's End as an audio book. I like it - not as much as I loved A Room With a View, but much more than A Passage to India which I really did not like.

For some reason A Passage to India has never interested me, even though I've liked everything else I've read by Forster. Maybe I'll just skip it then.

A Passage to India took away two months of my life. It was torture.

I'm listening to Northanger Abbey which I'm really enjoying.

I am reading Wings of the Dove, assisted by Shmoop, and Death in Venice. The last one because I am in Venice, so I thought I should read it now. Next will be Siddharta and House of Leaves.

and Death in Venice. The last one because I am in Venice, so I thought I should read it now.

Niiice!

>20 Simone2: Despite being less than 40 km from Venice, I haven't yet started that one. I'll get to it eventually. I do, however, keep accidentally reading books set in Italy (I didn't realize The English Patient took place here).

Does it? I don't even remember! But so is The Comfort of Strangers, which I just finished.

Still slogging through A Fine Balance. It's not actually an uplifting, girl-overcomes-tough-childhood-to-run-a-successful-business novel.

>24 jfetting: That's an understatement. Can't wait to read your review.

>24 jfetting: Most list books are actually depressing girl/boy-defies-promising-start-in-life-to-wallow-in-unhealthy-nueroses-and-lose-everything type novels.

>26 puckers: Really! (???) I'll have to think about this a bit to decide if I agree or not. But nice synopsis! Reminds me of my own synopsis of the typical Oprah book: "Woman has a crappy life. A bunch of crappy things happen. The ending is sort of crappy." Fits a lot of her books, but not all of them. Still, I'm trademarking it. You could do the same.

And now mentally running through the 200+ list books I've read to see if I agree.

> 27 I await your analysis with bated breath! What I meant was that with the exception of the Austen/Burney period I can't think of many happy endings.

that describes my (short) experience with Oprahs book recommendations as well, read a couple and realised it wasn't my kind of book list.

>26 puckers: I haven't felt that way at all. I mean out of 1300, sure I don't deny there's probably a fair few that have that sort of deal, it's one of the various "styles" found in the "literary" novels, but it's one among many. There are certainly faults with the list, no doubt, but I do not think that is one of them.

I've found the list pretty varied. I'm making sure to mix it up a lot with more relaxed reading as well though; although I don't think all of the list is comprised of rather depressing works there is enough there to make me need lots of Agatha Christies and P. G. Wodehouse to leaven it out.

them was clearly an Oprah book but Evelina continues to be both upbeat and hilarious and actually Life is a Caravanserai is pretty cheery too. So far.

Finished A Fine Balance and really cannot blame Maneck AT ALL for his decision at the end of the book. What a completely heartbreaking book. Just when you think things are going to be ok for this group of misfits...

So now I'm reading Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe which seems like it may also be depressing but at least it is 1/3 the length.

I've finished a couple of chunksters (Gone with the Wind, Magic Mountain) and am still plodding along with Thousand and One Nights so am going to have a flurry of shorter books to see if I can hit 200 books by the end of the year.

To that end I'm currently reading Around the World in Eighty Days on real paper, Less than Zero on digital paper and The Country Girls on aural paper.

Reading The Young Man for the Read All challenge, about one third in. There are worse books on the list but no, it's not good either.

I am finishing up October by listening to The Awakening which I am loving. I didn't know anything about this book before starting it. So imagine my surprise to find it opening on Grand Isle, Louisiana where I vacationed last October.

I'm listening to Moll Flanders at the moment and about to start The Collector