bk04011's 2010 10 x 10 Category Challenge

Category 1: 1001 Books

The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
Aesop's Fables
The Thousand and One Nights
Tale of a Tub, Jonathan Swift
Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe
Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen
Middlemarch, George Eliot
Sandokan: The Tigers of Momprakem, Emilio Salgari
Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad
Foucault's Pendulum, Umberto Eco
Bartleby and Co., Enrique Vila-Mata

Fixing typos as usual.

Last year, when everybody was building their categories, I so enjoyed it when the categories themselves, or their names, were witty or punny. Alas, my categories are once again going to be most 'scrutiating functional. (Elephant's Child, anyone?) I selected my 1001 reads to represent the full time span covered by the list. Middlemarch is there in case it ties into Foucault's Pendulum.

Category 2: A.S. Byatt

Shadow of the Sun, 1964
The Game, 1967
The Virgin in the Garden, 1978
Still Life, 1985
Angels and Insects, 1992
Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye, 1994
Babel Tower, 1996
Biographer's Tale, 2000
The Whistling Woman, 2002
The Children's Book, 2009

I read Possession for my 999 challenge and was amazed and delighted. Then a friend of my sister's passed my a copy of The Matisse Stories and I was again astounded, and that even though I tend not to be a fan of the short story form. So here I go, trying to play catch up on the other fiction she has written.

Category 3: On Books, Reading and Writing

A Gentle Madness, Nicholas A Basbanes
Becoming a Writer, Dorothy Brande
Book by Book, Michael Dirda
Conondrums for the Long Weekend, (about Dorothy Sayer), Robert Kuhn McGregor
Essays of Virginia Woolf, Volume 1, Virginia Woolf
How Proust Can Change Your Life, Alain de Potton
On Histories and Stories, A.S. Byatt
The Art of Fiction, John Gardner
Umberto Eco on Literature, Umberto Eco
The Pleasures of Reading, Robert Alter

Updated list.

I really enjoy reading about books. I especially enjoy reading writers writing about writing.

Category 4: Classic Whodunnits

The Moonstone, Wilkie Collins
Initials Only, Anna Katharine Green
Trent's Last Case, E. C. Bentley
The Mysterious Affair at Styles, Agatha Christie
The Red House Mystery, A. A. Milne
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Agatha Christie
Unnatural Death, Dorothy L. Sayers
The Greene Murder Case, S. S. Van Dine
The Footsteps at the Lock, Ronald Knox
The Poisoned Chocolates Case, Anthony Berkeley

You would think that Dorothy Sayers deserves a functioning touchstone. Rude word. The only re-reads listed above are The Moonstone and Unnatural Death.

Category 5: Dewey TBRs

100 – Philosophy and Psychology - Spell of the Sensuous, David Abrams
200 – Religion - Holy War, Karen Armstrong
300 – Social Sciences - The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan
400 – Languages - The Story of English, Robert McCrum
500 – Science and Mathematics - A Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold
600 – Technology and Applied Science - Proust and the Squid, Maryanne Wolf
700 – Arts and Recreation - Levels of the Game, John McPhee
900 – History - The Knights Templar, Barbara Frale
900 – History - Pendulum: Leon Foucault, Amir D. Aczel
000 – Computer science - Hackers and Painters, Paul Graham

The two history books are not strictly speaking TBR's. I got them to prepare me for reading Foucault's Pendulum. The Frale history of the Knights Templar actually has an introduction by Eco, so I am hoping, trusting that it is not one of the more bogus ones. I read The Name of the Rose for my 999 this year and was appropriate impressed and intimidated. And then intrigued. So, glutton for punishment, here I go again. The rest of the TBR list are real TBRs. I skipped the 800s because I need no encouragement to read fiction and, besides, I will have a stand alone Fiction TBR category.

Another typo fix.

Category 6: Fantasy Masterworks

Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
Time and the Gods, Lord Dunsany
The Worm Ouroboros, E.R. Eddison
Tales of the Dying Earth, Jack Vance
Little, Big, John Crowley
The Chronicles of Amber, Roger Zelazny
Viriconium, M. John Harrison
The Conan Chronicles, Volume I, Robert E. Howard
The Land of Laughs, Jonathan Carroll
The Compleat Enchanter, L. Sprague de Camp

Fantasy Masterworks and SF Masterworks are UK reprint lines that offer as good a list of the key works in both genres as any I have run across. There is, of course, the small problem of too many male authors selected and not enough women, but since I tend to read too many women and not enough men, that works for me. And one can make the argument that the list is, in fact, historically representative. The only re-read here is The Chronicles of Amber. Gene Wolfe I tried once and abandoned. I expect Conan to be a whole different kind of challenge.

Category 7: Fiction TBRs

The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas
The Truth About Lorin Jones, Alison Lurie
The Alienist, Caleb Carr
Trying to Save Piggy Sneed, John Irving
Talking to the Dead, Helen Dumore
Paradise, Toni Morrison
Kissing the Witch, Emma Donoghue
The Blue Place, Nicola Griffith
An Instance of the Fingerpost, Ian Pears
The Whole World Over, Julia Glass

These fiction TBRs are pretty much random grabs from my general fiction TBR list. Some are hand-me-downs from other readers in my life. Sometime this year I came across the wonderful notion (in an LT thread, of course) that you should allow any book you start 50 pages to win you over, so long as you are under 50. After that, you get to subtract one page for each year you are over 50, as your time is becoming progressively more valuable, in the long view. So, I will give each of the above 44 pages to persuade me they are worth reading. Looking at the list, I expect most of them to pass the test.

Added September 21st: I am switching The Three Musketeers (IN) for The Woman in White (OUT) so that I can participate in the TTM group read.

Category 8: Peter Matthiessen

The Tree Where Man was Born, 1972
The Snow Leopard, 1978
The Cloud Forest, 1961
Nine-Headed Dragon
Under the Mountain Wall, 1962
At Play in the Fields of the Lord
The Shorebirds of North America
Far Tortuga
Oomingmak
Tigers in the Snow

Don't know what to say. A grand old man. A personal hero. I'll be finding out more in 2010.

Category 9: Travel and Discovery Reading - Grand Canyon

Downcanyon, Ann Zwinger
The Man Who Walked Through Time, Colin Fletcher
Desert Solitaire, Edward Abbey
Gathering the Desert, Gary Paul Nabhan
The Exploration of the Colorado River and Its Canyons, John Wesley Powell
Cadillac Desert, Marc Reisner
Indians of the American Southwest, Steven L. Walker
Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert, Terry Tempest Williams
The Blessing Way, Tony Hillerman
Beyond the Hundredth Meridian, Wallace Stegner

Focus changed from Alaska to the Colorado River.

If my knees and budget permit (not at all a sure thing on either account), I am hoping to get to Denali Park in Alaska in 2010. I did one walking tour in Alaska a couple of years ago and I have a yen to get back.

Added September 21st: Well, Alaska isn't going to happen, at least not in 2010, but I am going ahead on the Alaska read anyway.

Added November 9th: I have had to change my 2010 vacation plans and will not be going to Alaska. Sadness. But, ta-da, all being well, I will be going to Arizona to the Grand Canyon and Sedona in May instead. I am therefore going to revise my Regional Reading category.

Category 10: SF Masterworks

The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
Cities in Flight, James Blish
The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
Babel-17, Samuel R. Delany
Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
The Fifth Head of Cerberus, Gene Wolfe
Gateway, Frederik Pohl
The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
Earth Abides, George R. Stewart
Martian Time-Slip, Philip K. Dick

So there we go. My reading plan for 2010. When I signed up for the 999 Challenge, I had difficulty thinking of categories, but that was early in my thus far (ta-da) one year career as an LT member. I have no such problem now. I find myself already thinking about the categories I would like to try in 2011 because I have run out of space for 2010. Virago Modern Classics come to mind for one thing, along with some of the Guardian 100 lists. I have so enjoyed following other people's threads even though I am behind in my reporting out and behind in my reading. And the reading I have done has been a great experience.

A fully populated list already. Such planning! I do envy you your return trip to Alaska as I visited there briefly as part of a trek tour (I was younger and fitter then) and still think it's the best vacation I've experienced. I wish you well with your challenge.

That is impressive! I liked your explanations for each category. And Foucault's Pendulum--I read that fifteen years ago, while living in Paris (and buying books based on value for money--the more pages the better) and would like to read it again. If you let me know when you start, I'll read at the same time and we can encourage each other.

Oh my gosh, you are in for so many great books! I can't wait to see how you react to the Agatha Christies...and if you want more, you should definitely also read Murder on the Orient Express and And Then There Were None (if you haven't read them already, that is)!

> 21 - My knees need your good wishes too. I may not get there. I need to lose weight and see a doc about some joints. Not to mention save some money.

> 22 - I would love but love to have someone to read Foucault's Pendulum with, so I will let you know when I get ready. I will want to get through Middlemarch and The Knights Templar first in case they help me make sense of Eco. Although, judging by The Name of the Rose, gaming his readers is one of Eco's primary goals, so prepare as you will, preparing for surprize will be the best bet.

> 23 - Thanks for the recommendations. I love recommendations. I have to admit that I am going into the Christie reads with a bias in favor of Sayers, Marsh and Tey. We'll see how I feel later.

BTW - I finally just changed my LT user name. When I initally set up my account I had no notion what-so-ever that I would engage with the groups, or even what they were, so I used one of my technical aliases. Very offputting I should think. For months, the change capability was shut down. The new alias is pretty on the money, I think.

>25 NeverStopTrying: It took me a minute to figure out what was going on... not enough coffee this morning, I guess. I didn't know it was possible to change user names...

It's a capability you get to via your edit Profile. Same place you can change your password.

You have made some great choices. Good luck.

You have some writers in here that I've never tried. I'll be interested to read your reviews later.

I love the classic mysteries. The Poisoned Chocolates Case was one of my favorites.

I might add a few of your books on books to my list. That was my most disappointing category for 999 x 1 so I've eliminated it but will probably collect ideas in case I decide to bring it back in future category challenges.

Every time I've checked on the change user name option it's always been disabled. Will have to give some serious thought to whether it's worth doing now.

>31 AHS-Wolfy: It was fixed today. See http://www.librarything.com/topic/70730

NeverStopTrying -I like the categories, and the fact that you already know what's going in some of them. Good Luck with the challenge

Wow, fully poulated lists already! I'll be interested in following categories 2 and 8, since both writers are unfamiliar to me.

The land of laughs I read something like 15 years ago, but that one really stuck with me. Strange and fascinating book. I'm really looking forward to seeing what you think of Viriconium as well. The stories have been written over many years, and it's quite interesting to see them reflect their times. To me, the later, more surreal and weird tales were more interesting than the early, gritty, grey-brownish ones.

> 31 - AHS-Wolfy, looks like you opted for changing, if I remember correctly (if vaguely) from yesterday.

> 33 - Thanks for the info on The Land of Laughs and Virconium. I am doing my 1001 reads pretty stab in the dark, although there are some authors I know already I won't bother with since they have already annoyed me. If you follow my thread you will likely see comments on my Byatt and Matthiessen reads since they are favorites.

@34 NST, Yes, I've had the operation and it was quite painless. ;) Now more in line with my other online communities and my Wolf category makes more sense now as well.

Like the new name Wolfy!

Wow, impressive, filled categories already. I love the Dewey one, I wonder if that will fit in with my 10. non-fiction. We share the 1001 category and I've got my 10 Virago Modern Classics so I'll be trying to read those in 2010. :-)

An Agatha Christie populated category is a neat idea too. Too many ideas, too few categories.

I agree chrine, I've been reading the new posts as they come up and so far I think I have it narrowed down to about 27 different categories :)
Great categories / books neverstoptrying, I'd be especially interested to see what you think of all those Byatt's books ... I've not read any yet myself but was thinking of including some for next year.

Wow! I'm impressed that you have your categories so thoroughly filled out. Gives us indecisive ones more ideas. Are these books from your TBR pile?

> #39 - I won't be trying to read all those Byatts consequetively and a good number of them are short collections of long short stories, so it should be doable.

> #40 - I managed to choose 41 TBRs for 2010. I started early on my 2010 list because 2009 was my first challenge year, being my first LT year, and, while I do like the choices I made, I did not even think about working my TBR problem deliberately. I am looking to increase the TBR count again in 2011. Tucking them into categories and making them part of a challenge will motivate me to actually read them finally instead of buying more and adding to the problem. A lot of my TBRs are my parents'. I cannot bring myself to pass them forward without reading them first.

Spelling error corrected.

Good plan! We parents have read some good ones! ;-) Hope you have some there that turn out to be worth keeping!

@#41 A very good argument. I might just start making some lists. And if you don't decide what order to read books in, you still have a lot of freedom (plus you can change under way of course...)

Great categories, I am very interested in your Classic Whodunnit's. I am going to try to fit some classic mysteries into my Crime Category so I'll be looking for your comments as you read yours.

Oh, I love your categories - and your organisational skills! I tried to start filling my categories already from Mount TBR, but I just KNOW I'll have acquired more books by the end of December. I figured I'd set a day aside after Christmas to eat mince pies and chocolate and play around with it...

Starring you now!

For your Book category you might look at Howards End is on the Landing by Susan Hill. I am really looking forward to reading that book this year. I will also be reading Viriconium as well so I am interested to see what you think of it.

Thanks for the suggestion, Belladonna - I did check it out. Books on Books is one of my favorite categories, so even if I don't get to it this year, I will add it to my list for another year. She sounds like an interesting woman. I will look to see what you think of it when you get there!

I'm going to watch for your thoughts on the Peter Matthiessen books. I saw your list and thought I should read all of those too. One of these days I'll get to some of them.

And you have Little, Big coming up. The other day I was scanning Amazon's Movers & Shakers and Little, Big had the number one spot. Silly, but that made me happy.

Just added Cities in Flight to my 1010 in the same category, SF Classics. I remember loving the Gateway series, a long time ago. I'll be interested to hear how you like them/it.

Little, Big is in my challenge too. It sounds like fun.

Little, Big is in my Magical Realism category for my 1010 challenge. I can't wait to see what everyone else thinks of it.

I'll be reading Little, Big if this ever actually comes out : http://www.littlebig25.com/

Happy New Year to one and all, including myself. I have to confess that I cheated just a little: I started by 2010 reading on December 26th, since there was no hope I would complete my next up 2009 book by EOY. Besides, I wanted to get started on The Picture of Dorian Gray for my first group read of the year. I finished it this morning. The other group reads I have signed myself up for include:

Three Musketeers for February, March
Briar Rose for March
Surfacing for Atwood in April
Foucault's Pendulum for June
Scarlet Pimpernel for July

While I have a reading plan for 2010 that allows for me completing at least ten books in ten categories, real life suggests that I will only get through 5 books for each. So I am going to cycle through my categories to see how many cycles I can complete. Since my only quality reading time is first thing in the morning before I head to work, and since some of my upcoming reads are sizeable, my proposed list for January is short:

The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas (736 pp)
Briar Rose, Jane Yolen
The Templars: The Secret History Revealed, Barbara Frale

I also have 2 ERs pending delivery. My secret? Being interested in stuff other people don't much want. Like discouraging natural science.

Book 1, Cycle 1, 1001 Books, for Group Read: The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Since this is for a group read, I won't say much here beyond that I am glad it read it. I had not done so before because I don't normally have the self discipline to read novels about people I would work hard to avoid in real life. For me, that includes exactly the kind of destructive, self indulgent, over-funded but underemployed types this novel is about. The issue of the hidden life of the Victorian homosexual is part of the story, of course, but I have known vigorously hetero people who were mad, bad, dangerous to know and expensive. Child of the sixties and there you go.

I found reading this work a rich and interesting experience. It made me sad for Wilde. Homophobia has cost us a lot of lives, talent and good work well done over time. Not to mention the alienation and suffering of the victims. It effectively terminated OW's career and possibly/probably abbreviated his life. (Collapses soapbox, tucks it in reusable shopping bag, and slopes off quietly to another room ... )

4.5 stars

#57: I'm starting in The Picture Of Dorian Gray soon, I've been meaning to read it for ages. Glad to see you enjoyed it!

@57 A very witty review, for all it's serious content. Like a little hommage to OW himself!

GBM - Glad you enjoyed the snarky. Thanks.

And of course Byron would be the epitome of a hetero who was mad, bad & dangerous to know! You have (re) whetted my interest in Dorian Gray...

Nice start to the year NeverStopTrying. I read Dorian Gray last year so might drop by the discussion to see what other people think.

I've also got Little, Big as a potential in my F&SF Masterworks category - as there seems to be so much interest do you fancy making it part of a group read later in the year?

Great categories! I read The Alienist some years ago and I thought it was brilliant (and I am usually a very critical reader).

Also signed up for the Dorian Gray group read. Reading that is on my agenda for today. . .after cleaning up from the week's festivities.

> #62 - A group read for Little,Big would be great. I'll add it to the group read thread the next time it floats past me. How do you feel about October? Towards the end of the year but before we are completely tired of 2010. It's amazing what the change over from one year's challenge to the next has done in terms of my reading energy. It makes no sense but there it is.

I'd be up for a Little, Big group read if it were towards the end of the year. Hopefully I'll have my copy by then.

Little, Big in October/end of the year sounds good to me - so many are already scheduled to start earlier in the year;-)

Looks like you've got some very interesting reading planned! I've starred you. :)

Book 2, Cycle 1, Bonus, for Group Read: Storm Front by Jim Butcher

Another group read work, so again, not going to say much here. This was a re-read for me, to refresh my recollection of the storyline so other folk's comments would make sense. I enjoy Harry's smart aleck, self-deprecating humor and I like the way Butcher sets up the rules for magic in his world - very TANSTAAFL (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch). Magic giveth and magic taketh away. I amused myself by being startled by the role a film cannister played in the plot. "Film cannister?" I said to myself, "You must be kidding!". I checked the publication date: Book was published in 2000 and film cannisters still applied back then. My sense of time duration is slipping, oh yes. Age creeping up and so on.

As paranormal, urban fantasy goes, Butcher writes some of the best plotted and written stories. As fiction goes, generally, it is good enough for its purpose.

3.5 stars

I love The Picture of Dorian Gray - it's one of my favourite books. And I LOVED your soapbox moment, I couldn't agree more. The ignorance of closed minds has cost us so much over the years... Looking forward to more reviews!

Book 3 , Cycle 1, Fiction TBR, 1001 Books, for Group Read: The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

Another choice prompted by a suggestion for a group read. I may never actually reread TTM but it would stand up to rereading. It's not just an adventure story but, at least in this translation, is wonderfully ironic and cynical about its very own major themes: love, money, sex, power, politics, war and food. The greats.

I read the Pevear translation and am glad I did. I have a Books of Wonder kids version also, which I took a quick look at and do not recommend. Leaden. All the wit seems disappeared.

4.5 stars

Book 4 , Cycle 1, Bonus, ER: The Intimate Ape: Orangutans and the Secret Life of a Vanishing Species by Shawn Thomson

Judging by his tone and writing style, Shawn Thompson intended The Intimate Ape: Orangutans and the Secret Life of a Vanishing Species to reach out to ordinary non-fiction readers and make orangutans important and real to them. The heart of Thompson’s argument is that, at a fundamental level, orangutans are persons: they reason, they solve problems, they remember, they retain personal relationships over time, they experience emotion. This being the case, how orangutans are treated, what is happening to the areas they need to live and the near certainty of their eventual disappearance is beyond criminal, it is immoral and tragic.

Thompson presented this argument in a highly personal manner, by recounting his own experiences traveling to the places where orangutans are studied, staying there for extended and repeated periods to observe, and interviewing the individuals engaged in the struggle to save individual orangutan lives. He did not present much information on who is engaged in the struggle to save the species or what that work entails.

I wanted to like this book, and I certainly believed his central argument before I ever picked it up. Sadly, I found the author’s tone somewhat juvenile and his narrative somewhat self-absorbed. I liked best the sections where he was most transparent. I don’t regret having read the book because I now know more than I did before about some of the work that has been and is being done, and by whom, but I cannot strongly recommend it for its own sake.

3 stars

Meaning to catch up on my reading log. Status: I have read 9 books and will complete my 10th on Monday without having read one of everything yet - too many group reads plus a couple of ERs. Having fun though.

Book 5 , Cycle 1, Bonus, Group Read: Briar Rose by Jane Yolen

I read Briar Rose for the 1010 group read after having avoided it for years because of the holocaust connection. I grew up among people, outside my family, who had been personally affected by the holocaust and am thin-skinned about it. I am deeply pleased that I finally got around to it. I highly recommend this work for the beauty of the writing and for its humane acuity about how people actually are -- adults, youths and children -- for good and ill.

Plot Summary: The relationships between and among three sisters and their grandmother is partially structured around a fairy tale, Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty), that the grandmother tells them over and over again as they grow up. The grandmother’s telling is, like the older tellings, dark and grim, not brightened up for children. It also serves as the metaphor for the first part of the grandmother’s life, about which the rest of her family know nothing. After the grandmother dies, the youngest of the three sisters hunts down the truth behind the fairytale.

Remarks: The relationships among the sisters repeat the ancient trope of two conventional older siblings versus the youngest. The narrative weaves back and forth among three realities: the girls’ youth, the girls’ early maturity and their grandmother’s youth and early maturity. Underlying all three story lines is a terrible beauty that shows the fantasy genre at its best, including both horror and and an underlying love story, in this case of grandmother and granddaughter. There is also a happy ending of sorts.

5 stars

Book 6 , Cycle 1, Bonus, ER: Death on the Barrens: A True Story of Courage and Tragedy in the Canadian Arctic by George James Grinnell

In A Death on the Barrens, George Grinnell recounts a disastrous canoe trip he took in 1953, across the Canadian Barrens with 5 other young men, one of whom died on the trek. I expected this to be a nature adventure tale with a dark ending, but one that focused on the Barrens themselves, the environment and the hardships endured. In one sense, that is the matter of the book but in another sense, the book is really about the internal lives of some of the travelers and the shifting relationships among them all. I found Grinnell’s tone dispassionate, and for awhile that made me distrust his telling of the tale, but I think also that the distanced, meditative tone he used made reading of the events bearable. At the end, Grinnell finished up by providing the reader an overview of the remainder of his life. My final response at the end of the book is that it was a hard story thoughtfully and powerfully but not extravagantly told. I do recommend it. The black and white watercolor illustrations are lovely and it is well written.

4.5 stars

Book 7 , Cycle 1, Dewey TBR - History: The Templars: The Secret History Revealed by Barbara Frale

I wanted to read a history of the Templars to help prepare me for reading Foucault’s Pendulum. I selected this specific work because it claimed to include recently discovered factual information, to debunk the fantastical myths and because it had an introduction by Umberto Eco, which I felt legitimized it -- there is a lot of trash out there on the subject. I realized eventually that I made a tactical mistake because FP likely makes more use of the fantastical myths surrounding the Templars than the facts. We’ll see. For my actual purposes, Frale recommends The Murdered Magicians by Peter Partner. I did find a reasonably priced second hand copy. It is not currently in print. I also think that reading Frale’s book will have been good preparation for reading Partner’s.

I recommend the work as a serviceable (and short) resource for people interested in the politics of the crusades, the rebellion of the kings of Europe against central governance by the Church and the Pope and/or a look at the Papacy as a political actor at that time.

3.5 stars

Touchstones not working. Will try again later.

Book 8 , Cycle 1, 1001 Books: Middlemarch by George Eliot

I decided to read Middlemarch this year because a lead character in Foucault's Pendulum shares the name, Casaubon, with one of the critical characters in Eliot's book. Reviewing Middlemarch, presenting a plot summary of the work or recommending it to the attention of other readers feels mildly absurd, like suggesting that Notre Dame is an architecturally interesting building. I did enjoy it, I do respect and highly recommend it. I plan to read it again. I also wish I had read some of Eliot's earlier works first because I think Middlemarch will be hard to equal, nevermind beat.

I read an Oxford World's Classics edition and found the introduction, while long, interesting and helpful. I recommend that too.

Plot Summary: The plot of Middlemarch, the actual storyline, centers on the courtship and subsequent marriages, and I do mean marriages not weddings, of four young women growing up at the beginning of the industrial revolution. Eliot turns her work into an examination of nearly anything you can think of: economics, philosoply, science, art, religion, morals, community and, oh yes, marriage. And she does this without killing the story.

Remarks: I have to admit that occasionally Eliot's complex phraseology would lose me, in spite of my having some practise and little discomfort reading Victorian prose. Baffled me a little without damaging my engagement with the book. Social criticism, irony and some intermittent sarcasm pervade the narrative but at the same time Eliot did not lose her keen and essentially forgiving eye for individual human complexity, motive and emotion. Loved it.

5 stars

Book 9 , Cycle 1, Classic Whodunnits: The Red House Mystery by A.A. Milne

I pulled this work off a list I found somewhere of recommended "golden age" mysteries. Meh. Adequate. Not nearly so witty as Sayers or March; not nearly so humanly real as Josephine Tey. Not rereading; not retaining.

3 stars

Book 10 , Cycle 1, A.S. Byatt: The Shadow of the Sun by A.S. Byatt

During this year and next, I intend to read my way through everything Byatt has published, even her criticism. Last year I got a head start by reading Possession, The Matisse Stories and one of her works of criticism. I find that Byatt's use of the presence of light and landscape in her fiction, along with her later use of myth and fantasy, as well as works of art as metaphors, resonates easily and deeply with me. I have to work less hard to "get it" with her than with other serious novelists.

This work was the first she published and, while not as amazing as Possession, is nevertheless impressive. The characters, the plot, the imagery and the outcome are believable and complex. I found the work rich and satisfying. I found the ending suitably ambiguous. I look forward to rereading the book, knowing the outcomes and therefore paying more attention to the whole of the work.

Plot Summary: The central characters are a famous writer, Henry Severell, and his over-shadowed, touchy daughter Anna. The writer is not just any renowned father but a possessed, manic-depressive "great" artist barely engaged with the rest of his family, absorbed by his work. The daughter is conflicted, resentful, passive aggressive and, in some ways, much like her father. Other major characters include the writer's wife, his lead critic and the critic's wife. The story is about the relationships between and among a great artist and two almost-artists plus the support team, the wives. It is also about the roles of women, as wives and in their own lives. The storyline takes us from the period just before Anna goes to university and the time she maybe makes a definite decision about what she will be doing with herself.

Remarks: The edition I read is a reprint and includes an introduction by Byatt. I recommend the introduction. Together, the introduction and the novel kicked off at least half a dozen TBRs for me.

4.5 stars

I have now caught up with logging my reading (sometimes colds in the head can be a good thing) and can say with real satisfaction that I have had a number of terrific reads so far this year. My plan for the remainder of March includes one of Byatt's collection of critical essays, Surfacing for my Atwood in April group read, Bester's The Stars My Destination and a book about the Grand Canyon.

I loved Middlemarch too, but only on the third plus try and because I finally slowed down and really read her words.