Zoe's Challenge

With 766 owned but unread books in my catalogue, I definitely need to take part in this challenge one way or another. I'm not yet completely sure what my goal will be--on the one hand, it would have to be pretty ambitious in order for me to make any sort of dent in the TBR pile; but on the other hand, I don't want the challenge to be so daunting that I just give up.

Tentatively, I'm going to start with two groups of 20: 20 books acquired before 2009 and 20 books acquired in 2009. I find that the longer books sit around unread, the less enthusiastic I am to read them. So I'm going to work on getting through the more challenging older books while at the same time taking preventative measures to make sure my recent purchases don't turn into "challenging older books" a few years down the line.

20 Books Acquired Before 2009
1. Briar Rose
2. Some Rain Must Fall
3. American Gods
4. Lirael: Daughter of the Clayr
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.

20 Books Acquired In 2009
1. Elisha's Bones
2. Three Cups of Tea
3. A History of the Ancient Near East
4. Obernewtyn
5. Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.

For reference, here is my list of books acquired this year and not yet read:

Books Acquired in 2009
1. Travels with Herodotus
2. The Silver Pigs
3. Elisha's Bones
4. Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves
5. Much Obliged, Jeeves
6. Blandings Castle and Elsewhere
7. Eclipse (previously read)
8. Time Out 1000 Things to Do in New York
9. The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall
10. Interworld
11. The Light-Bearer's Daughter
12. Obernewtyn
13. War for the Oaks
14. Edison's Eve
15. Galileo's Daughter
16. Brave New World Revisited
17. Enna Burning
18. The Diamond of Darkhold
19. Aladdin's Lamp
20. In Arabian Nights
21. Homer's History: Mycenaean or Dark Age?
22. Secrets of the Exodus
23. The World of Herodotus
24. Beyond the Edge of the Sea
25. Ornament of the World
26. Inside the Apple
27. Homer and Mycenae
28. Three Cups of Tea
29. The Host
30. Wise Child
31. Motel of the Mysteries
32. The Arabian Nights: A Companion
33. A History of the Ancient Near East
34. The Luxe
35. Daughter of Venice
36. Flow Down Like Silver
37. Across the Endless River
38. Straw Into Gold
39. The Lost World of Old Europe
40. The Heavenly Writing
41. $20 Per Gallon
42. Ancient Astrology
43. Murder on Astor Place
44. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language
45. The Blank Slate
46. The Eagle of the Ninth

This doesn't include the seven reference books I purchased, though I may actually end up reading through a couple of them.

If you've read and enjoyed any of these, encouragement would always be appreciated! (If you read and hated them, I think I'd rather not hear it yet....)

Hi, Zoe! Good to see you here, too!

Thanks for stopping by! It looks like there are a lot of familiar faces in this group :)

I'm also planning to attempt the TBR Challenge next year, so I thought I would post about that here as well since they're closely related. Basically, you decide in advance on a list of 12 books that you really want to get through in the year, and a list of 12 alternates just in case, and you read one every month. The books are supposed to have been owned for at least six months.

So, here are my two lists:

Briar Rose
The Riddle of the Rosetta Stone
Wise Child
Travels with Herodotus
Foucault's Pendulum
Islam: A Short History
The Green Man: Tales from the Mythic Forest
The Mismeasure of Man
The Gatekeepers
The Pope and the Heretic
They Wrote on Clay
The Raging Quiet

Hypatia of Alexandria
Lirael
Funeral Games
Euclid's Window
Abhorsen
Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy
Einstein's Dreams
The Greeks and the Irrational
Fire and Hemlock
Libraries in the Ancient World
The War for the Oaks
Beauty Sleep

You have some good books listed. I also have Obernewtyn and plan on reading it this year.

I loved The Host. I thought it was better than the Twilight series actually. War for the Oaks and Fire and Hemlock are two books on my top 20 favorite books ever read! I am interested to see what you think of them.

Good luck!

Oh, I'm glad to hear good things about some of the books on my list! Thank you.

It will be interesting to compare notes on Obernewtyn if we both read it this year.

I'm considering whether I should fix my list of qualifying books now, and not include any purchased for the remainder of this month. On the one hand, I do want to read any books that I happen to buy in the next few weeks... but on the other hand, I don't want to feel that I need to preemptively buy books now so that they'll count toward this challenge next year!

Nice to see you're doing this challenge too! It seems like we're both trying to clear off some of that elusive shelf space :)

Elusive is right! To be honest, I think I just need to buy some more bookcases. Because even after I read these books, I'm not really planning to get rid of them....

I think I just need to buy some more bookcases.

I tried that approach for a while, Zoe. But I ran out of places to put the bookcases . . . :)

(We actually took two bookcases to my husband's office to house some of the books that are mostly used by him in his work, and we're planning to put yet another bookcase over there.)

Well, the first step is just to get a new house ;).

I left about 8 full floor-to-ceiling bookcases in my bedroom at my parents' house, plus a bunch of smaller ones, and basically started fresh. I tell them that it's for their own benefit, having so many nice books at hand ;)

Sadly, I still have a lot of books in storage that I haven't even catalogued yet.

And I'm definitely counting on having an office full of books one day. I think it's the only possible solution....

Welcome to the group! When my new husband and I were looking for a new home, that was a primary--practically the only--criteria: it had to have room for lots of books and bookcases. Eventually I hope to line the basement walls with matched cases. For now, we're happy to have a hodge podge of shelves that, for now, holds all our books.

Yup, I think that would be pretty much my only criterion as well! I'd love to have a whole room to devote to books, though I'm not sure that would even be enough....

I consider books as the backbone of my home decor. Have you ever visited a house where there are no visible books at all? Blech.

"I think I just need to buy some more bookcases.

I tried that approach for a while, Zoe. But I ran out of places to put the bookcases . . . :)"

That's where we are now, and we have depressingly little space on the shelves that we have. "Next house" will have a designated library with big comfy chairs and all walls covered in shelves.

"Next house" will have a designated library with big comfy chairs and all walls covered in shelves.

*drools*

"Next house" will have a designated library with big comfy chairs and all walls covered in shelves.

In the selection of our house, I was the victim of conflicting priorities. I wanted a place with lots of big windows for light. But big windows take up lots of wall space that could have otherwise held bookshelves! (And, of course, there was a little thing called a budget . . .)

"Next house" will have a designated library with big comfy chairs and all walls covered in shelves.

That sounds wonderful!

I wanted a place with lots of big windows for light. But big windows take up lots of wall space that could have otherwise held bookshelves!

I'd definitely choose the wall space, I think. When I'm looking at condo floor plans, I'm actually happy whenever I see a room with no windows at all--that can be the library!

Skylights...think skylights :-)

>18 tymfos: - Windows can be great, but our current townhouse has left me a little wary of windows. If I make the mistake of leaving a curtain drawn all of my neighbors walk by and wave. Friendly is wonderful, but I'm a private person when it comes to my home.

I'm really looking forward to the start of this challenge! I have a feeling January will be my best month, while this year's purchases are still shiny and new.

Also, I'm happy that my SantaThing books arrived this year rather than at the beginning of January, like they did last time. This means they can count for this challenge and I won't have two books on my new acquisitions list almost before the year has started :).

I absolutely loved Galileo's Daughter. I'm pretty sure you'll enjoy that one.

My husband gave Galileo's Daughter to me when we were dating. He is a scientific kind of guy and I'm not. He thought this novel might be a good blend of our interests. I really appreciated the sentiment, but I could not get excited about starting the book. However, when I saw it in audio at the library, I jumped at the chance to listen to it. I enjoyed it very much. I learned a great deal and I really appreciated the story.

Zoe,

I read Murder on Astor Place last year and picked up the next two in the series last week. I thought is was good reading. Go for it.

I am definitely hoping to get to Murder on Astor Place in the next couple of months. It's one that I purchased recently, so the shine hasn't worn off yet....

On the other hand, I did finally manage to finish one that had definitely become a burden to me! An ER book from (gulp) January of last year. I feel better already.



Here's my review of Elisha's Bones:

I have to say, this book was not nearly as bad as I'd expected. I requested it from Early Reviewers because I was intrigued by the description, but came to expect the worst when I found out after the fact that a) It was from a Christian publisher and b) The average rating was below 3 stars, which is pretty terrible.

My first concern turned out to be entirely unfounded. Despite coming from a Christian publisher, this book isn't particularly preachy; the main character is extremely skeptical about the existence of God throughout most of the book, and as a non-Christian I found nothing to be troubled by even at the end.

My second concern was a bit more valid; this isn't a great book by any means. Especially after the halfway point, I got a bit tired of the repetitious nature of the plot: Protagonist visits old friend to ask for help. Old friend is assassinated in front of protagonist, while protagonist barely escapes with his life. Rinse and repeat. Still, the book wasn't nearly as awful as it could have been either. There was enough of interest to keep me reading, and I did ultimately come to care about the characters. I've certainly received ER books that were much worse. Considering that this is an Advanced Reader Copy of a debut book, I'm perhaps inclined to be more forgiving than some. While I can't really recommend this novel in itself, I do think the author has potential for the future.

Good for you, clearing the shelves of one of your older ones.

I thought it might be fun to list which other 19 books from last year's acquisitions I'm most likely to complete this year:

1. The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall
2. The Lightbearer's Daughter
3. The Arabian Nights: A Companion
4. Edison's Eve
5. The Diamond of Darkhold
6. Ancient Astrology
7. Murder on Astor Place
8. The Host
9. The Blank Slate
10. The Luxe
11. Flow Down Like Silver
12. Straw Into Gold
13. The Lost World of Old Europe
14. The Heavenly Writing
15. $20 Per Gallon

Read and removed from the list:
1. Three Cups of Tea
2. A History of the Ancient Near East
3. Obernewtyn
4. Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York

Interesting mix. Go for it.

Thanks!

Okay, I need an end-of-month summary just for the shame of it. I read zero books for this challenge in February. But it was a slow reading month overall, with only four books completed, so that's not too surprising.

I'll do better next time.

I've finally finished a second book for this challenge: Briar Rose, for the group read in the 1010 Challenge. This is a retelling of Sleeping Beauty combined with a Holocaust story; it's been sitting on my shelf forever, and I'm glad I've finally read it.

Congrats! Let the success motivate you to even greater success in March!

>33 lbradf: Thanks!

I did manage to get another read in March: Three Cups of Tea, from the Acquired in 2009 list. I'm glad to be making some progress there.

Somehow I've managed to make good progress this month, reading four books off my shelf (more than in the last three months combined!).

The books are A History of the Ancient Near East, Obernewtyn, Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York, and Some Rain Must Fall. The first three were acquired last year, making me optimistic that I may actually reach my goal of reading 20 of last year's acquisitions. Reading 20 from before that is going to be a much greater challenge....

Well, I haven't made much progress on this challenge, so I've had to resort to drastic measures: Today I selected 26 books to dispose of, many of them unread. Three were subsequently "saved" by family members, but 23 leaving the house is still good. I still need to get rid of about ten more to achieve my goals here, but it's a start anyway.

Yesterday I selected seven more books for disposal, though they still have to pass the scrutiny of other family members before being approved for departure.

I've started a new thread for 2011.