kittykay's 2009 75 books challenge!

Hi everyone!

I finally decided to open my little place here too! I'm all ready with my pile(s) of books and my large cup of hot cocoa to start the challenge!

I feel quite confident about this one, way more than about my 999 to be honest! Most of the books you will see here will also be in my 999 challenge, with maybe a few more from uiversity. I'm a art history and classis studies student, so my reading will revolve about those thems (ancient Rome and Greece, Renaissance) but also other things (fantasy, vampires, classics, etc.) Here, rather than class them in categories, I will list them in order of reading and, hopefully, I'll ba able to share my thoughts with you all!

I also made a ticker for this one :




Ratings:
***** (Favorites! I very rarely give 5 stars to a book)
**** (Very good)
*** (Good, not great)
** (It was ok...)
* (Didn't like it)

Books read in 2009:
1 - Think like a cat by Pam Johnson-Bennett (4/1/2009) ****
2 - Vous qui croyez me possèder by Denis Richard (7/1/2009) *
3 - Industrial Magic by Kelley Armstrong (11/1/2009) ***
4 - Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan (14/1/2009) ****
5 - The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (16/1/2009) *****
6 - The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling (16/1/2009) ***
7 - Roma: the novel of ancient Rome by Steven Saylor (27/1/2009) ****
8 - Anna of Byzantium by Tracy Barrett (28/1/2009) ****
9 - Profession: historienne d'art by Johanne Lamoureux (1/2/2009) ****
10 - Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson (6/2/2009) *****
11 - The girl with the dragon tattoo by Stieg Larsson (11/2/2009) ****
12 - I was told there'd be cake by Sloane Crosley (13/2/2009) ****

I cannot wait to see your book suggestions on ancient Greece and Rome! Welcome to the group!

Welcome kittykay! Cute bunny in your ticker ...

Hi kitty,

The tickers a cute idea. I'll be watching your list for anything on art history. It's been a subject I loved back in college but have not kept up. Happy reading.

I'm also looking forward to hearing about your Rome and Greece books! And fantasy and even vampires, for that matter....

Looks like some fun stuff is coming... right? :)

Classics and fantasy!!! Whoo-hoo!!! Welcome to the group! There's a few more of us Classicists around, and plenty of people who love ancient history, so you'll have a good audience.

6> Absolutely! I plan on having an amazing reading year - hopefully the books will mesure up!

7> Thank you! I'm so glad to meet other classicists and ancient history lovers; I don't know many except from the people I go to university with, and some of them don't even seem interested in exploring books on the topic outside of the classroom - which, I think, is very sad.

I put a cumulative list of my books read at the top of this topic, the most recent being :
Industrial Magic by Kelley Armstrong, which is the 4th book in the series. I had enjoy the first two books, and the third one had really, really disappointed me. This one was a lot better by comparison, even if I didn't enjoy it the most.

Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan: This book was a short read, but each word carried such a weight that it won't be forgotten soon. I read it as part of the "1001 books to read before you die" challenge, and I had never heard of it before: to be honest, I was just so glad I could read it in french! The narrator drags you into the story very quickly, her feelings going from guilt to being very manipulative and vice versa all along the novel. It is a novel of innocence and the lost of it, and knowing the author wrote is when she was only 18 or 19 adds to the beauty of it.

I began The Bell Jar now, and also a few books on roman history and Etruscan Art for school. Those will probably stay on my "currently reading" list until April!

>8 kittykay:: I think Armstrong's series is uneven. Like you, I found the third disappointing. Then the series picked back up, but I haven't really enjoyed the last two. There's another this year...we'll see.

>9 TadAD: : I'm glad to hear (read!) that I wasn't the only one with that impression! I decided to take a little break from the series, but I'll definitely try the next ones, I especially want to read "Broken". I just think that Paige wasn't a great character to read about.

So since my last post I finished The Bell Jar, which I loved. I also read The tales of Beedle the Bard, which was a ok but not an amazing read.

And today I finished Roma, for which I wrote a small review on my blog and on the book's page. It is a good portraying of Rome's history, with plenty of characters and that read a little like a short stories book.

hey kittykay! I'm glad you enjoyed The Bell Jar and, if you're also interested in Plath's poetry I could recommend some poems for you to read. I also read The Tales of Beedle the Bard this year - it was among the first books I reviewed for my challenge. And while I did love it as part of the Potter madness, I don't really think it stands alone without the Potter books. But then again, I don't think Rowling meant it to. I think she just did it for charity.

Btw I'm happy to note that our rating system is almost identical - I hate it when people give a book three stars and mean they disliked it! :) Fortunately, I've been very lucky so far this year and have had lots of four-stars so far!! I wish the same to you - happy reading!

Hi girlunderglass! Yes, I'm also interested in Plath's poetry. I enjoyed The Bell Jar in a surprising way, for the story but mostly for her writing. I'm definitely interested in your recommendations. And I agree with your view of Rowling's most recent book; I think this book holds interest mostly for those who miss having new Potter books to read, a little candy for the fans!

I hate it too when people rate a book 3 stars and they didn't like it, or when they give the 5 stars easily! It makes the rating lose its sense, its value. Well in any case, I certainly hope to have as good a reading year as yours :)

On the reading subject, I finished Anna of Byzantium last night. I posted my review on my blog and on the book's page, but I enjoyed it!

Heh, I think I'm one of the people guilty of giving a book 3 stars when I didn't like it.... I can usually manage to find some redeeming value even if the book didn't work for me. I think I'm too used to thinking in terms of school grades.... 60% means the book passes, but pretty weakly. At least I'm stingy with my 5-star ratings, though!

well...I just checked my library just to be sure, and I counted 16 books with 5-star ratings (7 of them the Potter books haha) and 20 books with 4-and-a-half. Not too bad, I would say :) I also hate it when people give 5-stars away too easily, it DOES make the rating lose its value!!!

In my copy of Sylvia Plath's Selected Poems I've starred all the ones I liked best, but unfortunately I don't have it handy right now. However, I do remember some of my favorites, namely: Daddy, The Babysitters, Mad Girl's Love Song, The Stones, and Wuthering Heights.

Going to check out your review of Anna of Byzantium! I finally finished Mein Kampf yesterday and reviewed it today - actually, a reread of "Daddy" is in order here, because Plath uses WWII as a metaphor for her feelings in that poem (see wiki for more info) . Now that I think about it, "Daddy" is probably my absolute favorite of hers.

Hi Zoe!
I certainly didn't want to sound like I was judging anyone's rating, so hopefully I didn't come across like I was!
I think your appreciation of the "3 stars" books is fair. The way I rate my books, the "4 stars" and up are the ones I am most likely to remember and recommend over time. As you said so well (I like you comparing it to school grades), "3 stars" books are not the best reads.
Personnally, those "3 stars" books are usually the ones that were fun read, but not to be reread or highly recommended to other people. But, everyone's appreciation varies, and this is why, when someone rates a book and adds a review, I always read the review to have a clearer idea. I am still puzzled though by people who put 2 stars and say it was an amazing read, or those who put 4.5 and say the book was mediocre.

Well, sorry I talk so much! I didn't want to sound like I was "star-snobbing" anyone ;) This "language barrier" thing makes me paranoid some times!

Girlunderglass : Thank you! I will certainly look for those. I feel like I don't read enough poetry, although I've always enjoyed it. I think this will make for a nice change of pace while refreshing my mind from school.

I updated my list of books I read so far! I tend to update my 999 challenge topic more often, and then I don't want to duplicate all my posts here!

I posted reviews on my most recent reads, I was told there'd be cake (a fun and light reading) and the french translation of The girl with the dragon tattoo. I asked this in my 999 thread but I will ask it here, too: "Why all the hype around this book? It's not that I didn't like it; I really did, and I thought the writing really draws you in. Maybe it's because mysteries are not my main genre, but I'm not sure why this book it talked about so much. Is it because it really is a great mystery? Is it because it's enjoyable enough for a public who, on the contrary, doesn't read much of mystery books? I'm just curious, if anyone has toughts on the subject! :)"

I liked The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo because I thought it was a decent mystery with interesting characters in a setting new to me. Generally, it was fun to read with an author that promises more good material. Does the hype accurately represent the book? Probably not.

>16 kittykay:: I think authors whose output is all going to be posthumous always attract a certain degree of interest; look at the way everyone went mad for Eva Cassidy, even though she'd only one album to her name. People are still interested in the stories behind the artists.

#16: I have to go with doc on this one - I loved it more for the interesting characters than the mystery itself.

I firmly believe that it extremely rare for anything to live up to hype.