AnneDC's 2016 Reading: A New Hope

Welcome old friends and new! I was such a stranger to LT in 2015 that old friends have probably given up on my thread altogether, but I finally have had a long and quiet weekend to sit down and set up shop here. I'm looking forward to being more active around here this year.



Word on the Water, a floating bookshop on London’s Regent’s Canal

(What could be better than a Book Barge?)

And a poem to go with it…

There is no Frigate like a Book

BY EMILY DICKINSON

There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry –
This Traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of Toll –
How frugal is the Chariot
That bears the Human Soul –

I am Anne and as you might guess from my LT name I live in Washington, DC (and have for 30 years though I grew up in Connecticut). I work for an education nonprofit and I have three children--two in college and one in middle school. Plus a husband and a Westie named Albus.

I’ve been an LT member since 2010 and a member of the 75 group since 2011—though I was mostly absent in 2015 for reasons that aren’t entirely clear even to me. I am going to try to be more present this year, even if it means reading a little less.
I read a lot and am a sucker for challenges. Challenges I will definitely be participating in this year include Year 3 of Mark's American Author Challenge, Year 2 of Paul's British Author Challenge, Suzanne's Nonfiction Challenge, Reading Globally, my own 16 Categories challenge, and of course always TIOLI.

Currently Reading



Reading:

The Abundance - Annie Dillard
Millard Fillmore - Robert Rayback
Blonde - Joyce Carol Oates
Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson
The Unwinding - George Packer

Read in 2016
January
1. John Tyler - Gary May
2. My Brilliant Friend - Elena Ferrante
3. Lamentation - C. J. Sansom (audio)
4. The Ruby in the Smoke - Philip Pullman
5. Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates
6. Noah's Compass - Anne Tyler
7. Polk: The Man Who Transformed the Presidency and America - Walter Borneman (audio)
8. The Various Haunts of Men - Susan Hill (audio)
9. The Bridge of Beyond - Simone Schwartz-Bart

February
10. Eragon - Christopher Paolini (audio)
11. Dangerous Games - Joan Aiken
12. The Partly Cloudy Patriot - Sarah Vowell
13. The Burning of the World: A Memoir of 1914 - Bela Zombory-Moldovan
14. Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World - Liaquat Ahamed
15. The Wordy Shipmates - Sarah Vowell
16. Zachary Taylor - John S. D. Eisenhower
17. The Lake - Banana Yoshimoto
18. The Book of Three - Lloyd Alexander
19. Assassination Vacation - Sarah Vowell
20. The Secret Adversary - Agatha Christie
21. American Patriots - Gail Buckley
22. Straight Man- Richard Russo

March
23. Neither Here nor There - Bill Bryson (audio)
24. Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth
25. Round Ireland with a Fridge - Tony Hawks
26. The Accidental - Ali Smith
27. The Return of the Native - Thomas Hardy (audio)
28. Strawberry Girl - Lois Lenski
29. Polk - Walter R. Borneman
30. Haiti: The Aftershocks of History - Laurent Dubois
31. Unfamiliar Fishes - Sarah Vowell (audio)

April
32. Beezus and Ramona - Beverly Cleary
33. The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins (audio)
34. Traveling Mercies - Anne Lamott
35. Silas Marner - George Eliot
36. Locked Rooms - Laurie R. King (audio)
37. The Language of Bees - Laurie R. King (audio)

May

38. The Buddha of Suburbia - Hanif Kureishi
39. The God of the Hive - Laurie R. King (audio)
39. Rounding the Mark - Andrea Camilleri (audio)
40. A Little Life - Hanya Yanagihara
41. The Whistling Season - Ivan Doig
42. Last Friends - Jane Gardam
43. Play to the End - Robert Goddard
44. The Vanishing Velazquez - Laura Cumming
45. Sabriel - Garth Nix
46. The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck - Beatrix Potter

June
47. The Boy Born Dead - David Ring
48. I Let You Go - Clare Mackintosh
49. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
50. The Westing Game - Ellen Raskin
51. Egg and Spoon - Gregory Maguire
52. The Patience of the Spider - Andrea Camilleri
53. Donny's Brain - Rona Munro
54. Yes, Chef - Marcus Samuelsson
55. Words in the Dust - Trent Reedy
56. I'll Give You the Sun - Jandy Nelson
57. Every Last Word - Tamara Ireland Stone
58. How it Went Down - Kekla Magoon
59. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
60. The Green Road - Anne Enright
61. Zac and Mia - A. J. Betts

July
62. What's the Matter with White People: Why We Long for a Golden Age That Never Was - Joan Walsh
63. The Ice Princess - Camilla Lackberg
64. The Summer of May - Cecilia Galante
65. The Time Machine - H. G. Wells
66. The Tenderness of Wolves - Stef Penney
67. Symphony for the City of the Dead - M. T. Anderson
68. Grasshopper Jungle - Andrew Smith
69. Atlantic - Simon Winchester
70. Boy Meets Boy - David Levithan
71. Among the Mad - Jacqueline Winspear
72. The Mapping of Love and Death - Jacqueline Winspear
73. Accordion Crimes - Annie Proulx

August

74. Mandela: An Audio History - Desmond Tutu
75. From the Holy Mountain - William Dalrymple
76. The Prime Minister - Anthony Trollope
77. Pennies for Hitler - Jackie French
78. Hoot - Carl Hiaasen
79. The Paper Moon - Andrea Camilleri
80. A Time of Gifts - Patrick Leigh Fermor
81. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Jack Thorne
82. August Heat - Andrea Camilleri
83. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
84. Fat Angie - e.E. Charlton-Trujillo
85. Moonwalking with Einstein - Joshua Foer
86. The Dream of the Celt - Mario Vargas Llosa
87. The Red Umbrella - Christina Diaz Gonzalez

September

88. Bird by Bird - Anne Lamott
89. Emma - Jane Austen
90. True Grit - Charles Portis
91. The Book of Unknown Americans - Cristina Henriquez
92. Early Warning - Jane Smiley
93. Cider With Rosie - Laurie Lee
94. Howl's Moving Castle - Dianna Wynne Jones
95. The Constant Princess - Philippa Gregory
96. The Wings of the Sphinx - Andrea Camilleri
97. Before We Were Free - Julia Alvarez
98. The Elected Member - Bernice Rubens
99. All-of-a-Kind Family - Sidney Taylor

October

100. The Towers of Trebizond - Rose Macauley
101. A Great Reckoning - Louise Penny
102. The Swerve: How the World Became Modern - Stephen Greenblatt
103. Pie - Sarah Weeks
104. The Trespasser - Tana French
105. The House of the Spirits - Isabel Allende
106. How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer - Sarah Bakewell
107. Murder on the Links - Agatha Christie

November

108. The Twin - Gerbrand Bakker
109. The Secret Tree - Natalie Standiford
110. The Return of the Soldier - Rebecca West
111. Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else - Chrystia Freeland
112. Capital in the Twenty-First Century - Thomas Piketty
113. Berlin Game - Len Deighton
114. We Should All Be Feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
115. All the Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr
116. Men Explain Things to Me - Rebecca Solnit
117. Chickadee - Louise Erdrich
118. Getting Things Done - David Allen
119. The Cider House Rules - John Irving
120. Mexico Set - Len Deighton
121. Falling Man - Don DeLillo
122. The Spire - William Golding

December
123. Agnes Grey - Anne Bronte
124. East of Eden - John Steinbeck
125. Just Mercy - Bryan Stevenson
126. Perilous Question - Antonia Fraser
127. Moby-Duck - Donovan Hohn

Books that came into my possession in 2016

January
Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth (Kindle)
Sister Carrie - Theodore Dreiser (Kindle)
Polk: The Man who Transformed the Presidency and America - Walter Borneman (Audible)
The Return of the Native - Thomas Hardy (Alan Rickman narration) (Audible)

February
Under the Tuscan Sun - Frances Mayes (Friends of the Library sale)
The Road from Coorain - Jill Ker Conway (Friends of the Library sale)
Mountains Beyond Mountains - Tracy Kidder (Friends of the Library sale)
Clever Girl - Tessa Hadley (Friends of the Library sale)
Cakes and Ale - W. Somerset Maugham (Friends of the Library sale)
Straight Man - Richard Russo (Friends of the Library sale)
Outline - Rachel Cusk (gift)
An Event in Autumn - Henning Mankell (Little Free Library)
Lords of Finance - Liaquat Ahamed (Audible credit)
More Was Lost - Eleanor Perenyi (NYRB subscription)

October
The Twin (Kindle)
(big Powell's haul)

November
The Abundance
The Return of the Soldier
Berlin Game
Mexico Set
Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis - Robert Putnam
Golden Age - Jane Smiley
Chickadee - Louise Erdrich
Men Explain Things to Me - Rebecca Solnit
The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks About Race - Jesamyn Ward
Some Luck - Jane Smiley
Early Warning - Jane Smiley
The Orenda - Joseph Boyden
My Struggle: Book 1 - Karl Ove Knausgard
We Should All Be Feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

2015 Favorites (in the order I read them)

1. Heat Wave – Penelope Lively
2. The Door – Magda Szabo
3. The Member of the Wedding – Carson McCullers
4. A Spool of Blue Thread – Anne Tyler
5. Euphoria – Lily King
6. A God in Every Stone – Khamila Shamsie
7. Station Eleven – Emily St. John Mandel
8. The Last Picture Show – Larry McMurtry
9. A God in Ruins – Kate Atkinson
10. Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell

Favorite Classic: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Bronte
Book I was Surprised to like: The City & The City – China Mieville
Favorite New Series: Etiquette and Espionage – Gail Carriger
Favorite Continuing Series: Revelation – C. J. Sansom
Favorite Nonfiction: To End All Wars – Adam Hochschild
Favorite Rereads:
Mansfield Park – Jane Austen
Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
The Bean Trees – Barbara Kingsolver
Ella Enchanted – Gail Carson Levine

Saving room for some more year in review statistics...

in reserve

Found you! And I'm first! Delighted to see you, Anne : ).

Welcome back! Good o see you again!

Hi, Anne, welcome back!

Welcome back and happy 2016! I just finished Between the World and Me for a RL book group.

Welcome home, Anne! I look forward to your thoughts on the books you've read so far. I am on my third Ferrante book and enjoying the Neapolitan Quartet very much. I'm also a fan of the Sansom series. It looks like the Challenges are calling to you as well. It's fun trying to keep up with everything I want to read.

Hi Anne!

Welcome back, Anne! It's great to see you.

Really happy to see you back this year, Anne. I know you'll add loads of great books to my list!

Hi, Anne!

Oooh, a Book Barge! That's...unusual but marvelous. Like something out of a fantasy novel.

Welcome back. I love the thought of "prancing Poetry."

Welcome back, Anne!

Welcome back, Anne - I have missed you. Are you going to post your favorites of 2015? I always get some good ideas from your lists.

Visitors! It is nice to be back.

>5 lit_chick: Hi there Nancy, my very first visitor! As soon as I check in here I will go off to drop some stars of my own. It is taking me a long time to get organized this year.

>6 drneutron: Thanks Jim and good to see you again too. And thanks as always for keeping the group in running order.

>7 lyzard: Hi Liz and thanks for visiting! Will there be some Trollope in 2016? (I hope)

>8 qebo: Happy 2016 to you too Katherine. I guess I will have to head over to your thread to see what you thought of Between the World and Me. I'm about halfway through and should finish it today or tomorrow.

>9 Donna828: Hi Donna, it is nice to see you. I've finished with the first in the Neapolitan series and loved it. I got them all for Christmas and they've come highly recommended--so far I am not disappointed.

>10 norabelle414: Hi Nora, thanks for stopping by.

>11 katiekrug: Hi Katie--I'm hoping to keep better track of you this year.

>12 cushlareads: Nice to see you Cushla--I look forward to seeing what you read this year. You always give me good ideas.

>13 scaifea: Hi Amber--nice to see you here.

>14 dk_phoenix: Yes, Faith, it does have the ring of a fantasy novel doesn't it? We were visiting London over the holidays and stumbled upon the Book Barge while on a walk. Sadly, it wasn't open when I went past (or I would definitely have bought a book) but I was charmed.

>15 arubabookwoman: Thank you, Deborah. I guess not all poetry "prances," but some most definitely does.

>16 kidzdoc: Thanks Darryl--I look forward to seeing what's going on over on your thread for the year.

>17 BLBera: Hi Beth, I've missed you too! Ask and you shall receive--I saved room to post my favorites list at the top and it is now there. I'll make it a new post too just to move the thread along.

Now I will head off to do some thread surfing before bed.

2015 Favorites (in the order I read them)

1. Heat Wave – Penelope Lively
2. The Door – Magda Szabo
3. The Member of the Wedding – Carson McCullers
4. A Spool of Blue Thread – Anne Tyler
5. Euphoria – Lily King
6. A God in Every Stone – Khamila Shamsie
7. Station Eleven – Emily St. John Mandel
8. The Last Picture Show – Larry McMurtry
9. A God in Ruins – Kate Atkinson
10. Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell

Favorite Classic: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Bronte
Book I was Surprised to like: The City & The City – China Mieville
Favorite New Series: Etiquette and Espionage – Gail Carriger
Favorite Continuing Series: Revelation – C. J. Sansom
Favorite Nonfiction: To End All Wars – Adam Hochschild
Favorite Rereads:
Mansfield Park – Jane Austen
Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
The Bean Trees – Barbara Kingsolver
Ella Enchanted – Gail Carson Levine

>18 AnneDC:

Starting in March, with a group read of The Prime Minister. There is also quite a lot of random Trollope reading going on around the threads, I am happy to say. :)

Glad to see some love for The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall, I think it's an underappreciated work.

Lovely to see you back, Anne. I think that the 20 plus posts in the day you return are ample proof that you have been missed in these parts.

Have a great weekend.

Hurrah, hurrah!! So glad to see you back! Hope you are having a lovely, snowy, book-filled weekend... Missed your posts and reading last year; you're one of those readers who keeps me on my toes with their reading and their comments so I'm delighted that you'll be around to do so again in 2016.

Well, we were pounded by snow this weekend, but I'm not complaining. We have food, books, power, and internet access, and everything we needed to do got canceled.

Here is my daughter standing in front of a pile of shoveled snow.


Our back yard:


A glacier of snow coming down the stairs to the entrance of our basement:


My car. I don't think it's going anywhere anytime soon.

>20 lyzard: That's great, Liz, I will prepare for March.

>21 PaulCranswick: and >22 Chatterbox: Welcome Paul and Suzanne, two of my favorite people. I have missed being around here but I have especially noticed that an extended absence from LT really cuts down on the number of new books I "have to have." Looking forward to collecting lots of book bullets as I resume reading your threads.

Hi Anne,

So happy to find you! I also found myself mysteriously absent on LT last year -- maybe it was a DC thing?! Anyhow, this snow is amazing - and I took advantage of it to finish A Spool of Blue Thread - which I liked, although I really wanted to understand Denny better. On your best of 2015 list, I have to say that Station Eleven was also among my favorites. My husband read it first, and insisted that I read it - and I couldn't put it down. Stay warm and I'm looking forward to seeing you around LT in 2016!

>23 AnneDC: Anne, how I miss the cold weather.........from this safe tropical remove. Great photos.

Well, Anne - Some good reading time. Will you have to shovel out your car, or can you get others to do it?

I love your 2015 favorites,at least the ones I've read. I haven't read the Lively although she is one of my favorites, and I've heard lots of good comments on The Door, so I'll have to try to fit those in.

Good grief, that's some snowfall, Anne! I'll say you won't be going anywhere any time soon, at least not in your car, LOL!

>20 lyzard: and Liz, I neglected to latch on to your Wildfell Hall comment. I had never read Anne Bronte though I have read both Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre countless times beginning in my teens. So I tackled The Tenant of Wildfell Hall thinking "Why have I never read anything by Anne Bronte?" and I finished it thinking "Why have I never read anything by Anne Bronte?" It was an excellent discovery and clearly underappreciated. I think it stacks up well against those more famous works by the more famous sisters.

Meant to mention that I'm just about to embark on the new Putin bio...

>25 lalbro: Hi another Liz. Welcome and I'm glad you got some reading done this wintery weekend. I too finished up an Anne Tyler novel during the snowstorm (Noah's Compass for me). I know what you mean about Denny. I thought that too--but then I also thought, isn't that just like real life? Some things and some people you just never figure out. I think that is one of the things I appreciate about Tyler--she portrays the untidiness of life very well.

>26 PaulCranswick: from this safe tropical remove Haha, Paul, funny you should mention that. While the snow was coming down my siblings and I were finalizing plans for a Christmas week extended family escape to Puerto Rico next year--and wishing it could start immediately.

>27 BLBera: Well, Beth, I haven't gotten quite as much reading done as I'd hoped but I did finish some books and catch up (sort of) around here. On Friday my office was closed and I was planning to work from home, but decided that to work from home I needed to clear off my desk, which launched me into a major filing/organizing/cleaning frenzy. But my desk is clear and I've been able to sit at it today (office closed again) and work while looking out at the winter wonderland.

My husband has already kindly cleaned off my car, so I am spared that.

>28 lit_chick: Nancy, you are right that I will not be taking that car anywhere soon. For one thing, my street hasn't seen a snowplow yet and once they plow, my car will once again be buried in a bank of snow. Plus, if I move it, I will have to find a new place to park it which is daunting under present conditions. Schools are closed again tomorrow, so although I may have to go to work, I can walk there and leave the car undisturbed. I will only need the car when it's my turn to carpool, and I'm thinking I can put that off until the snow melts if I'm lucky.

>30 Chatterbox: And I meant to mention how excited I am about the Non-Fiction Challenge! But I don't think I'm in the mood for Mr. Putin right now. You might be able to change my mind, though.

Great photos, Anne. Are you sure that is your car?

YAY! Anne's back! And with snow pictures!! Hope to see you around a lot from now on. For a second I thought you were on a real Barry Unsworth kick. *Hunger* is a really, really fine book. I almost misread The Ruby in the Smoke for The Ruby in her Navel, another good Unsworth. Those are the only two I've read, but I'll surely be back for more!
And I adore the idea of the bookstore on the canal barge. Brilliant!

Question of the Day:

When one's office is closed due to snow and one is officially "working at home" (for the third straight day), when is it too early to have a beer?

Just pondering.

>32 kidzdoc: Yes, I am positive it is my car as I know exactly where I parked it. But since that isn't always the case, I can imagine it being pretty difficult to distinguish among snow piles. Enough snow has melted now so that you can see all the cars, but that wasn't true over the weekend. of course, no one was going anywhere, anyway.

>33 LizzieD: Nice to see you Peggy! No Barry Unsworth kick over here, just dipping in for the British Author January selection (and a new author for me). But I've been confused myself by those two Ruby titles, sounds like the makings of a TIOLI challenge.

>34 AnneDC: 10 AM. 10:01, you're good. It's called "brunch". :)

^What Jim said.^ And he's a rocket scientist, so you know he's smart :)

>34 AnneDC: I don't keep beer in the house for the simple reason that it is never too early!

Hi Anne! >23 AnneDC: That's a lot of snow! 2 or 3 inches is a Big Deal here. The one time we got over a foot of snow, the power was out for three days.

>34 AnneDC: It's completely academic. As long as your voice doesn't sound blurred and you don't giggle inappropriately (or worse still, fall asleep and start snoring audibly) during work phone calls, it. just. doesn't. matter. (Spoken as someone who has worked from home for 13.5 years...)

Wow, your car really was buried!

>34 AnneDC: excellent question. I say go with what feels right ;)

Eta: car, not 'ar' *oops*

>29 AnneDC:

I assume you're familiar with this? (Never mind if you are: any excuse to reproduce it!)

Anne was always my favourite! :D

Welcome back, Anne! Love your best of 2015 list and that book barge... does it travel up and down the river and make various stops along the way, kind of like the bus bookmobile of my youth, but on water?

Great snow shots!

>34 AnneDC: I think that a beer with lunch is entirely appropriate when the office is closed :)! We finally were plowed out about 6 pm last night. But now there's lots of lovely black ice out there :(! So have another beer, open a book, and stay toasty and warm inside. And, you are right about Denny and life -- but one of the great joys of fiction is that we can get explanations - right?!?!?

Dude Watching' with the Brontes is too much, LOL!

Anne, I hope life is not too hectic at the moment and that you will have a lovely weekend.

No Anne in February?

I trust that life is treating you with the utmost respect Anne and that we will see you back soon.

>47 PaulCranswick: Exactly!
(Hi, Anne!)

You really had a Vowell February, Anne. Isn't she great? I haven't read Partly Cloudy Patriot yet, but I loved the other two.

Oh no--looks like I disappeared! What happened to February?

The Partly Cloudy Patriot, so you should read that one if you liked the others. Assassination Vacation was probably my least favorite but probably only because I has had too much of a good thing.

Back soon with an Ambitious Reading List for March.

Nice to see you back Anne. Looking forward to seeing your reading plans.

Have a wonderful Easter.

Missing you in these parts, Anne. xx

Huh. Anne? Anyone home?
I guess yourer busy with RL
:)
Just saying hello.

>56 LovingLit: Hi Megan and thanks for the hello!
>55 PaulCranswick: And Paul, too, who visits my thread more than I do.
>54 DianaNL: Thank you for the Easter wishes even though it is long past Easter
>48 LizzieD: Waving at Peggy…

RL has been very busy and is getting in the way of both my LT time and my reading time. Currently I'm in New York for the weekend with my 13-year-old and her friend, as a belated birthday treat, and we are having some down time in the hotel as the girls are tired of walking. Lately (like, for several months) it's been feeling like anytime I crack open my computer I need to do work work, so I'm resisting that and am going to spend some time here.

First I plan to spend a little time updating my thread, and then I hope to get out and visit. I've missed everyone!

>57 AnneDC: Lovely to see you back Anne.

You always have good reads, Anne. I can't wait to see your updates.

I feel like I have been lugging two serious chunksters around with me for months and making only marginal progress, so it was a relief to finish one on the train yesterday. At 720 pages A Little Life is a serious doorstopper, and I thought very hard about leaving it behind since I only had 25 pages to go. However, I couldn't stand to spend another weekend not finishing it, so into the bag it went. Now I need to do some serious mulling before I can even say anything about it. Not a book I would recommend without a lot of caveats. So far it's the only one of the Baileys (Orange) shortlist titles I've managed to read--I was hoping to read more, but that one took me so darn long I may be done.

The other doorstopper is William Dalrymple's From the Holy Mountain: A Journey among the Christians of the Middle East, which I started way back in January for the British Author Challenge of the month. This one I'm fully enjoying but it is taking me a while, partly because I don't usually take it out of the house and I haven't been reading at home very much. I may finish it this month, or not. And here's an update on my BAC--pretty good, overall. I'm planning to read Last Friends and Play to the End for this month's Gardam and Goddard selections.

British Author Challenge Progress
January
Susan Hill: The Various Haunts of Men
Barry Unsworth: Sacred Hunger (finished in March)

February
Agatha Christie: The Secret Adversary
William Dalrymple: From the Holy Mountain (still reading)

March
Ali Smith: The Accidental
Thomas Hardy: The Return of the Native

April:
George Eliot: Silas Marner
Hanif Kureishi: The Buddha of Suburbia (finished in May)

>58 PaulCranswick: Hi Paul and >59 BLBera: Hi Beth--I will get around to both of your threads but now, dinner and theater beckon.

Dear Anne, I always look to see if you have updated your reading here and so you must be ok; but to no avail.

Have a great weekend. xx

>62 PaulCranswick: Wow, Paul--you are so right! I had no idea my reading list had fallen quite so far behind. I am perfectly okay--just too busy to update my thread it seems. (I thought I had missed October and maybe part of September--time flies I guess). Thanks for popping in. I'm off to update my list--and maybe to pay a few calls.

Hi Anne,
I feel like I know you after we shared so many reads at TIOLI in September. The YA sync audios, plus, you read the same mysteries I do. I like seeing what you are reading on the challenges since I think we have similar reading tastes.
I hang out at Orange Jan/July but don't do a ton of commenting around the forums.

Yay! I just happened to see activity here as I was cruising by the group. Happy to know that all is well with you and that you're reading some. I have hopes that both of us may be more present in these parts.

What a lot of reading you've been doing. I've enjoyed some of the same books this year. I can't wait to see your "best of" list.

Hi Anne, lovely to "see" you, even if briefly! Miss you around here.

Pleased to see you are doing well, Anne, and lovely to see a visit here from your goodself.

Hi Anne,

Really nice to see your thread active again. Mine is still dormant but I am nearly back! As usual, you are reading lots of great books. Both Plutocrats and Capital appeal but I have had a year of keeping on buying books and reading at my slowest rate ever, not helped by sticking with a tome (Armageddon by Max Hastings). I loved Chrystia Freeland's earlier book on Russia and have been trying to keep up with her political career a bit - I love that she is now the Minister of International Trade! She would be on my list of interesting people to have dinner with.

Oh, wow--how gratifying to post to my thread and come back to find visitors! I've missed you!

>64 raidergirl3: Hi raidergirl3! I've loved your company on TIOLI challenges and thank you for reminding me about the YA SYNC--I think I ended up reading almost all of them this summer.
I have a thread over at Orange Jan/July but I haven't been there for a long time. I definitely am overdue with an update to my Orange books read and acquired stats--maybe in time for January.

>65 LizzieD: Peggy! I stopped by your current thread yesterday and got overwhelmed (in a good way) reading months' worth of quotes for the day--didn't quite make it to the end, but I will go back and leave a note.

>66 BLBera: Hi Beth! I guess it is getting to be time to think about best of lists--where did the year go? I will have to go see what you've been reading--you always give me good ideas. (*Looks around the room at stacks of unread books, wonders whether "good ideas" are a good idea.*)

>67 lit_chick: Hi Nancy--it has been a while since I've checked out your thread (or anybody's) but I have an extra hour this weekend so maybe...

>68 PaulCranswick: And Paul, again. Look what you've started here!

>69 cushlareads: Hi Cushla--I'm really enjoying both Plutocrats and Capital and it's very nice to be reading them at the same time. I'm reading the Piketty book via audio (though I also had to buy it so I could refer to the print version) so I am really reading them both simultaneously.

Reading plans for November

My primary reading goal throughout this year seems to have been to achieve a TIOLI sweep, but since I am reading fewer books it always eludes me. Still, every month I have a plan.

1. The Secret Tree - Natalie Standiford
2. The Cider House Rules - John Irving
3. The Twin- Gerbrand Bakker
4. Like Water for Chocolate - Laura Esquivel
5. The Abundance - Annie Dillard
6: Berlin Game - Len Deighton
7: Enduring Love - Ian McEwan
8: All The Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr
9: The Unwinding - George Packer
10: The Return of the Soldier - Rebecca West
11: Plutocrats - Chrystia Freeland
12: Capital in the Twenty-First Century - Thomas Piketty
13: Millard Fillmore - Robert Rayback
14: Getting Things Done - David Allen
15: The Yiddish Policeman's Union - Michael Chabon

Other books I'd like to get to if time permits:
East of Eden - John Steinbeck
The Story of a New Name - Elena Ferrante
The Grass is Singing - Doris Lessing
Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

Great list for November, Anne. I will be rereading All the Light We Cannot See for my book club and I'd like to get to The Story of a New Name and Behind the Scenes at the Museum this year. We'll see.

I loved The Yiddish Policeman's Union; I'm waiting for Chabon's new one, which will be out soon, I think.

You've had a great reading year.

I am thankful for your occasional forays onto the threads. xx

Wouldn't it be nice if 2017 was a year of peace and goodwill.
A year where people set aside their religious and racial differences.
A year where intolerance is given short shrift.
A year where hatred is replaced by, at the very least, respect.
A year where those in need are not looked upon as a burden but as a blessing.
A year where the commonality of man and woman rises up against those who would seek to subvert and divide.
A year without bombs, or shootings, or beheadings, or rape, or abuse, or spite.

2017.

Festive Greetings and a few wishes from Malaysia!

This is the Christmas tree at the end of the Pacific Beach Pier here in San Diego, a Christmas tradition.

To all my friends here at Library Thing, I want you to know how much I value you and how much I wish you a very happy holiday, whatever one you celebrate, and the very best of New Years!

Looking forward to your continued company in 2017.
Happy New Year, Anne