Booksloth bites the bullet

It had to happen sooner or later. I hereby swear on all I hold sacred (chocolate?) that the next year will see me at least 50 books into Mount TBR. I can't imagine for a moment that that will stop me buying as well (I already have 2 batches due to arrive from Amazon any day) so I'll have to find a way of keeping my 'old' books separate from 'new' ones but that shouldn't be too much of a problem. Taking into account the ones in the post, it'll be everything I buy after Jan 1st that will count as 'new'. Maybe if I know I'm not allowed to read them for a while I might not be quite so desperate to buy them.

So, at 3am last night I started on the first of the pile, Leviathan by Philip Hoare and, so far, I couldn't be more pleased that I picked it; I'm loving every word.

So here's the list - as I read them:
1 Leviathan - Philip Hoare
2 Cold Spring Harbor - Richard Yates
3 Dreams From My Father - Barack Obama
4 Stealing Athena - Karen Essex
5 Lottery - Patricia Wood
6 The Loop - Nicholas Evans
7 The Anniversary Man - R J Ellory
8 A Girl Made of Dust - Nathalie Abi-Ezzi
9 The Library of Shadows - Mikkel Birkegaard
10 Blood and Guts in High School - Kathy Acker
11 Purple Hibiscus - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
12 Kingdom of the Golden Dragon _ Isabel Allende
13 The Long March - William Styron
14 Dreams of Water - Nada Awar Jarrar
15 Dead Man Walking - Helen Prejean
16 The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer
17 The People of the Abyss - Jack London
18 Luke and Jon - Robert Williams
19 The Almost Moon - Alice Sebold
20 A Thousand Acres - Jane Smiley
21 Beholden - Clare Littleford
22 Reading Like a Writer - Francine Prose
23 Crippen - John Boyne
24 Fliegelman's Desire - Lewis Buzbee
25 Sweet Thames - Matthew Kneale
26 Snow Country - Yasunari Kawabata
27 How Novels Work - John Mullan
28 My Dog Tulip - J R Ackerley
29 The Road - Cormac McCarthy
30 Out On a Limb - Joan Hess
31 Sovereign - C J Sansom
32 Reclaiming the F Word - Catherine Redfern
33 A Severed Head - Iris Murdoch
34 At Large and At Small - Anne Fadiman
35 The Angel's Game - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
36 The Dark Labyrinth - Lawrence Durrell
37 Ghostheart - R J Ellory
38 The Vicar of Wakefield - Oliver Goldsmith
39 Nightingal Wood - Stella Gibbons
40 Ghostwalk - Rebecca Stott
41 Hangover Square - Patrick Hamilton
42 She's Come Undone - Wally Lamb
43 The Circus Fire - Stewart O'Nan
44 The Devil's Mask - Christopher Wakling
45 A Watermelon, a Fish and a Bible

Welcome to the group. You've set yourself an ambitious challenge. I don't remember who, but I know that at least one other person in this group has Leviathan on their list--maybe even reading it now. Perhaps you can find each other....

It shouldn't be too ambitious. I've kept track of my reading for the past couple of years and get through around 150 books p.a. so it's just a case of making sure a third of those are oldies. If I can actually whittle down the TBR list without adding too many more to it as I go along I'll be quite pleased with myself but book buying is a bit of an addiction so I'm not that hopeful.

THe question begs - do the books we have forgotten we've read count?

That's funny-I would say yes- if I have forgotten that I read a book, then it is in a sense new to me.

That's why I keep a check on LT - so that I know what I've read and what I haven't - but it's a good question; I do enjoy a reread at times. For me, though, it's all about whittling down Mount TBR so I don't think I'll be counting those.

Yeah but. I find that in going through my exisiting library to log books in, I find either that I am genuinely uncertain whether or no I have read something, or, I believe I did but cannot tell you thing one about it. Not lead character, not plot, not nothing. What do we call those?

I don't think you have read those. You should definitely count them.

That's why the owned but unread count is so scary. If you add in diminishing memory capacity to book buying habits, then Mt. TBR will never be scaled.

True, but at least you never have buy another book again.

"Never buy a book again"?!?!?!

I can think of nothing more horrible.

Me too, but I do know my mum saved a small fortune in her later years because she'd forgotten the endings of everything she'd ever read.

Pleased to say this is going rather well so far and I'm sneaking a good head-start on the new year with 4 books under my belt already. I just received the first batch of self-ordered Xmas books (my pressie to me) but have marked them 'not eligible' for this challenge. I mean, they're on Mount TBR now, but they weren't when I started. That's not to say I won't read them yet - just that I won't count them.

That's not to say I won't read them yet - just that I won't count them.

I want to count everything! That's why I will always have at least two challenges going--this very specific one and a more generic one like the 50 or 75 book challenge. Last year was my first year on LT and I loved tracking my books on the 50 book challenge.

>13 Booksloth:

I was very careful in my thread to say anything acquired by December 31 qualifies. Especially since I pretty much only get books as gifts.

To balance it out, however, I'm not counting anything read before Jan 01. It's all catching up on library books and magazines until then anyway.

Well, I do keep a record of what I read during the year on here - http://www.librarything.com/groups/bookofthemonthclub - but I really need this one as an excuse to whittle that pile down. I'm counting the ones I'm reading now, but only if they were already on that pile.

So, it's Xmas tomorrow and I've got 7 out of the way so far. I'm guessing the next few books I read will be Xmas ones (which won't count towards this challenge) but I feel I've got a good start on my 2010 reading.

And here we are, three days into the new year. Yes, I do have a huge pile of Xmas books to get through but the challenge still starts in earnest now. I've stolen a bit of a march with the seven books already completed in 2009, which leaves me 43 to go.

Beloved One put up a new shelf above the others 2 days ago and, being a bloke, didn't bother to cover or remove the books that were already there, so yesterday was a day of taking down and dusting one full wall of books - which will inevitably lead to doing all the other bookshelves in the house over the next few days. That's not necessarily a bad thing though, as it means I get a fresh look on everything that is there and start noticing books I'd more or less ignored for years. I'm now quite excited about digging some of those out and finally getting round to reading them.

Things have naturally been delayed by the arrival of the p/b of The Little Stranger, which demanded immediate reading and I plan to do more writing this year so there's a chance I'll be reading rather less than usual (though I doubt it - somehow that reading always gets sqeezed in) but it's a pretty cope-able-with target so shouldn't present much of a problem.

Other projects for the year - improving my Greek, improving my harping (playing, not nagging, don't need any improvement with that), more dog-walks and sorting out the family history - plus my voluntary hours should hopefully increase soon so I'm hoping for a busy-ish year (though without a real job these days, it still doesn't exactly compare with 12 hours a day down a coal mine). These things might have some influence on which books I choose from the pile, we'll have to wait and see.

Books I hope to see this year - though not eligible for this challenge - are the p/b of Last Night in Twisted River, something new maybe from Donna Tartt, Michel Faber, Louis de Bernieres, Robert Shearman, Margaret George, Jeffrey Eugenides, Steven Sherrill, Yann Martel, Jose Carlos Somoza and Joseph O'Conner, just for starters - how would that be for a great year! Wishing everyone a happy year's reading and good luck with all those challenges!

That's number 8 out of the way - A Girl Made of Dust. Must admit I just couldn't get into this one despite it being my second try. Still, at least I've got it off the TBR pile at last.

Oh no! 10 new books just arrived! That brings Mount TBR up to nearly 300 and I'd vowed that wouldn't happen. Why do they keep sending me these books? Nothing to do with me having ordered them, surely?

Last week I placed an Amazon order completely on autopilot. I'd planned to not buy any books in January (it's bad enough the quantity I bring home from the library) but I happened to remember one that I'd meant to buy last month and didn't, while sitting at the computer, and it just happened. And of course I had to throw in a couple more titles to get free shipping, etc. The earlier vow didn't cross my mind at all until about a minute after I completed the order.

I suspect that if I stopped ordering now one of two things would happen: either they'd keep sendng them out of habit or they'd go out of business. Nobody here on LT would want that to happen, I know, so I'm doing you all a favour really.

Finished The Library of Shadows. Now taking a bit of time out to read one or two of the new ones before I get back to the challenge.
Ed to fix Touchstones

You've made GREAT progress. I agree, time to reward yourself with a couple of newbies!

>21 kristenn: Like I always say: "Oops!"

#25 THAT's the word I was looking for!

Father, I cannot tell a lie - book number 10 is definitely a cheat but I'm going to count it anyway and here's why: Blood and Guts in High School has been on Mount TBR for quite a while now and I finally took it off and tried to read it. I did manage several pages before I finally decided it was pretentious rubbish that I might have thought was clever when I was about 15. I'm not 15 any more and life is too short to keep going with something quite this tedious. So I dumped it. BUT I'm counting it here for two reasons - 1) because it's still one book less on Mount TBR and 2) because I deserve some reward for the time wasted on those 30-odd pages. On to better stuff. I'm now starting Purple Hibiscus and I won't be dumping this one because I love Adichie's writing and can't think why it's taken me so long to get round to this one. This will definitely be one of the rewards of the challenge!

Getting the book out of your house certainly allows it to count in this challenge.

I will definately be counting books that I don't finish. My goal is to move of my 2009-acquired books out of the TBR category by the end of 2010. Disposing of the book certainly counts!

Yep, I think everyone's goal is to make space for more books - so as long as I move a book along, I will count it.

Off the shelf is off the shelf!

And of course I had to throw in a couple more titles to get free shipping, etc.

Oh, the dangers of free shipping! I've decided that in many cases it's better just to pay a couple of extra dollars in the store for the one book I really want, rather than filling an online order with a few extras that will realistically just end up sitting in the TBR pile. Also, I recently discovered bookdepository.com, which has free (though slow-ish) shipping on everything!

Finished Purple Hibiscus. Now I'm off to read Yannis, another non-challeng book. It's a biggie so I might be gone for a while.

Back to the challenge - just finished Kingdom of the Golden Dragon. This and its sister book, City of the Beasts aren't exactly my favourite books by Allende but they make a nice change from more 'grown-up' stuff and are still worth reading. Now I'm going to freak myself out with a non-challenge book, The Murder Farm, before continuing to whittle at the mountain.

Ed to correct touchstones

All that I could think of when I read this series was, "How lucky can you get?" To have a grandmother who takes you along on photographing trips for a magazine like National Geographic would have been heaven for me as a teen! I love the combination of adventure and fantasy.

You have a point there - that would have been quite an upbringing!

Number 13, The Long March is a mere 90 pages long! That was easily got out of the way!

Book number 14 was Dreams of Water - a book I thought I would love but it just didn't grab me. Maybe that's because I've just spent almost a week concentrating on Drood. I thought Drood was one that didn't count towards this challenge but now I'm not so sure. Must go and check.

ETA - Darn it - I was right! Seems such a shame when it was 770 pages long but I have to stick to my own rules. I loved the book though.

Sadly, this challenge just doesn't seem to be bringing down the total of books I have to read. I still get drawn to bookshops everywhere I go and even found a pile in the loft the other day that I hadn't listed (though at least those will count towards the challenge). It is forcing me to read some of the stuff that's been sitting there for years feeling neglected though so I guess that's something. I'm also starting - just a bit - to acquire a habit of keeping a wishlist, rather than going online and ordering every book I ever fancy the sound of the moment I hear about it. That has to be a habit that's worth getting because at least by the time I get to put in another order, I may have gone off a few of them. We'll see.

I keep a spreadsheet of books I want to read someday. Periodically, I'll go down the list (currently at almost 400), and say, "you know, that really doesn't appeal to me anymore" and I'll take it off the list. That's easier to do if I don't own it! (and truth be told, it really doesn't get rid of a lot of them!)

That really seems to be the only way to go for someone likie me. Having said that though, I have a lunch date with a friend tomorrow and jhave agreed to meet at Waterstones. Now how stupid was that?

My current spreadsheet has over 2000 titles on it. I do go through it periodically as well but I keep most things on it because my tastes seem to ebb and flow over the years and inevitable if I take it off the list, I will want to remember it at some point later on.

Yesterday Mount TBR finally crept over the 300 mark and I suspect it will creep a little more today. Something has to be done!

More bookcases? ;)

The trouble with that is I need more rooms to put the bookcases in. And, as predicted, I came home with 11 new books today. One is a replacement for an oldie so at least that doesn't exactly count as one for the TBR pile but for the other 10 I have no excuses at all except a lack of will power.

On the positive side, I did finish book #15, Ocean Sea. I can't say I enjoyed this as much as I did Silk (by the same author) but it was an interesting read and a beautifully written little book.

Do we really need a bed, a couch, or a kitchen table??? I mean, they take up so much space that could be put to better use...like using that space for bookcases!!! =-O

While book shopping the other day I chatted to a lovely young man who was telling me all about the table he had just built himself entirely out of old books. There was some other piece of furniture he mentioned too but I can't remember what it was. It sounded incredible and, although it means he won't be able to reread those books at least he can always check on having owned them in the first place. I'd love to see it. It's made me start wondering about all kinds of furniture made out of books and I'm rather tempted to get cracking myself on building something.

What a clever idea...making furniture from old books. But, do you have to...*glup*...destroy the books to make the furniture? I couldn't bare to do that!!!

That's just what I thought but he insisted they were all books he would have otherwise got rid of. Of course, if there was a way of doing it so that you could still extract the odd book to read that would be a perfect world!

Can you image sitting in your favorite chair and thinking...hmmm, I want to read a book. You reach into the cushion and pull out a book. ;-> Even if it is a book I plan on parting with I still would be unable to destroy it to make furniture...no matter how unique the idea.

There is a thread on this very subject in the 50 Something Library Thingers group. It started with this link: http://www.wikihow.com/Reuse-Books. Those of you who are incredibly attached to your books and can't imagine making them unreadable might want to take a Valium before going to the website. :-)

Love that table! I don't have a problem with this. I keep books I have enjoyed enough that I might want to reread them in the future but others just have to go - I simply don't have endless space. First choice, of course, is passing them on to friends, then either selling them or giving them to charity but after those options run out I'd much rather make furniture with them than. . . . uuugghhhhhh, shudders . . . . throw them away. Putting books into a dustbin has to be the ultimate in 'impossible-to-do' so furniture building seems like a reasonable option to me.

Just reached the end of book no 16, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I'd had doubts about this for a long time for various reasons but I'm so glad I got round to it in the end - such a delight and a real pleasure to read!

I felt the same way about The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I kept thinking it couldn't be as good as it was hyped to be, but it was!

The style of the writing was so like 84 Charing Cross Road that I spent the first few pages thinking Well, this is just a rip-off of a great book. It didn't take long, though, to separate the two and actually appreciate the similarities. I do avoid over-hyped books when I can so it was sheer luck that led me to this one.

I am planning on reading 84, Charing Cross Road soon, sounds like I will enjoy that one too!

It's an almost (if not completely) perfect book. If you love it half as much as I do you are in for a massive treat.

I'm planning to re-read 84 Charing Cross Road, ever since I read Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society. When my book club discussed Guernsey, I brought a potato peel pie -- it was a big hit. (But I cheated and used butter and salt and baked it in a real oven...none of which would have been possible during the war!)

Really? I thought the pie sounded pretty awful but I do think it was a great thing for you to do.

I've now mentally added this book to a very short list of books I can only describe as utterly charming. They are books my mum would have loved (well, she DID love Charing Cross and my other choice The Enchanted April but died last year before I could force Guernsey onto her. I'm visiting her younger sister on Monday and taking Guernsey with me for her to read - I know she'll love it.

All three books are gentle and sweetly humorous without ever crossing the line into 'twee' - it takes a really light touch to do that. I heartily recommend April to all of you who loved the other two though it is not similar in any other way (and is a straightforward novel and not epistolary like the others). They are books you can happily pass on to your aged relations. So-called 'bad' language, sex or violence in books don't bother me at all (provided they are in context and not gratuitous) but it's when I've read a succession of those that these three little books feel like a read palate-cleanser and remind me there is also a gentler side to life.

Ever since I started this challenge I've been wondering, should it or should it not include ER books? They ought to count from the point of view that I do 'have to' read them if I'm not to be refused further books. Then again, I could just stop requesting them until I've whittled down the TBR pile. I spent several nights tossing and turning and worrying about this (bit of poetic license there maybe) then I decided that it's my challenge and I can do what I like with it. So I'm including them.

So book no 17 was The People of the Abyss - an ER book I feel very lucky to have been awarded. My review is here - http://www.librarything.com/work/432113/book/55041484 if anyone's interested. I loved it.

So, if ER books count, number 18 is a rather sweet little tale called Luke and Jon. Review coming up any day soon.

Back to the ones that have been sitting there for years. The Almost Moon is a book I've been put off for a while because of negative comments from others but, after doing the same with The Lovely Bones for the same reason then finding I really enjoyed it, I decided it was time to tackle this one. And, as with Bones, I found it utterly absorbing. Sebold is a writer who isn't afraid to tackle the dark side of life and she does so courageously and with an honesty that is often uncomfortable to read yet I can't put her books down. I'm looking forward to the next one and I just hope she doesn't suddenly decide to go all 'soft' on us. So that's book #19.

I thought The Almost Moon was excellent too. I loved that the main character was so relentlessly unsympathetic and had a knack for making the wrong decision.

So I got up to #20 - I'm quite pleased about that, it feels like a bit of a milestone. #20 was A Thousand Acres, a book I'd been rather looking forward to but, in the end, found somewhat dull. It gets such great reviews from the rest of the world but I just couldn't care much about any of the characters. Although it gradually becomes clear throughout the book why they are such an unlikeable lot, nonetheless, unlikeable they are and I was quite glad to get this one out of the way.

And #21, Beholden was a real quickie.

Look at you go!

Regarding your discussion of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and the books it made you think of--it brought to my mind Daddy Long Legs. Now your post makes me want to find 84, Charing Cross Road and The Enchanted April.

Oh you really should! Such beautiful books no-one should miss. (I've drifted off onto a couple of non-shelf ones now so expect to see things slow down here for a while.)

There's a thing called (I think) nominative determination, or something like that, which means there is a pre-disposition to go into a career that matches your name - so Mrs Baker might well end up making bread and Mr Cooper might become a barrel- maker. That's why it especially pleases me to find a book on learning from other writers by an author called Francine Prose. I've been reading Reading Like a Writer for a while now, in between fiction, and it is a lovely book - certainly more inspiring, I found, than any number of 'how to write a bestseller' books because this is about writing where the words really matter; it is about wanting to come as close as we can to the writing of the 'greats' even if we never achieve it, even if we never get published. It's one I shall delve in and out of for a long time. And it brings my score up to 22.

You're almost to your half way point and the year's not close to half over. Well done!

Thank you - every bit of encouragement helps! I did set it deliberately low so that I could set a second one if things went well - always better than setting it too high and failing. I still haven't tackled that handful of very old ones that have been sitting there for years yet though; they're the real challenge.

Reading Like a Writer is a fantastic book! Do you find yourself reading differently now? Do you need to run right out and get several books because of how she described them?

#72 I think I am reading a bit more carefully now. Of course, there are some writers who force me to slow down and read them properly anyway and they have become my favourites - I'm talking about people like Lawrence, Forster, Faber, Virginia Woolf's non-fiction, Steinbeck etc; when I find myself slowing right down to digest every word I know I'm onto a goodie!

Unfortunately that whole wanting to dash out and buy the books mentioned was bound to happen and it doesn't do this challenge any good at all! There are quite a few she talks about that have now been added to my wishlist and I'm trying to resist buying them yet but who knows how long THAT will last?

If you haven't already read it, I think you would be quite amused by 84 Charing Cross Road - a book I'm forever banging on about because it is another real favourite. It charts the author's relationship with the owner of a London bookshop and is a glorious book for a million reasons but the part I really identify is the way Hanff orders a book and starts reading it, only to find it mentions another book - so then she has to pause, order the other book, start reading that . . .of course, soon enough, that book mentions another book and she has too pause, order that one, start reading it - then it mentions another book etc, etc, etc . . . . I know just how she felt and it's what got me into this damn challenge in the first place! I blame her completely for the fact that I can no longer move in my own house for books everywhere!

Book number 23 was Crippen and it was a great read. Although I've only recently added it to my collection, I actually ordered the book many months ago but it never arrived. When I finally managed to track down another copy I felt I'd waited long enough to count it as part of this challenge

Nudging up against that halfway mark! Number 24 was Fliegelman's Desire. Buzbee is the kind of writer you read more for style than content, to be honest and I'm glad I finally got round to this one although the story itself wasn't that gripping.

Halfway through your challenge by the end of the first quarter, Booksloth!

Nice.

84 Charing Cross Road sounds wonderful - I've wishlisted it on BookMooch.

It is, km - hope you strike lucky soon!

Sweet Thames brings me to the halfway mark. Time to break off for a while and get some of those newer ones out of the way!

Okay, I notice at least one person here (thanks bragan!) is keeping a proper record of everything they read and which are old/which are new etc. That makes sense so I tried to work out my own statistics so far for the year.

I'm currently on my 50th book so far this year and, coincidentally, 25 books into this challenge (ie, half way through) which means that if I had just stuck with 'books off the shelf' all year so far I'd have completed it! But I didn't.

That makes 25 new books read in Jan/Feb/March and if I add them to the newly bought ones I haven't yet read (no, I'm not disclosing that figure) that sounds about right. The number of TBRs has increased rather than gone down but I still have hopes of, at the very least, one day getting it back below the 300 mark.

Those stats also mean that if I carry on at a similar rate I should complete the challenge by the end of June and be able to extend it a bit. Again, working on those numbers, I should read 150 books this year, 75 of which should be 'off the shelf' ones. See how easy this would be if Amazon and all the other online shops didn't exist AND I could get myself banned from my local Waterstones?

Unfortunately, I also have an overwhelming urge right now to reread some of my favourites, which will slow the whole thing down even more - so I really don't know what to do. Would life be easier if we knew exactly when we were going to die? Then we'd know exactly how much time we have left for all these books. I want to get through a pile of unread ones but I couldn't bear to think I might die without another reread of The Grapes of Wrath.

It's definitely worth putting other books on hold for Steinbeck!

Thank you mamzel - that was all the permission I needed! I'm actually just finishing Lewis Buzbee's Steinbeck's Ghost (wonderful book - higly recommended) which is about a boy for whom Steinbeck's characters start coming to life in his home town near Salinas. It really is a gem! Anyway, that book refers back to a lot of Steinbeck's work and the one it most frequently references is The Long Valley - so that's the one I now have the greatest urge to reread. And now I know there's just one other person on the planet who thinks it's worth delaying the 'Off the Shelf' challenge to read that one again I'm definitely going for it!

When my daughter read Grapes in high school the whole family took a car tour to Salinas and Monterrey. It was so inspiring to be in the same area that he wrote about.

Oh god, I envy you so much! I'm usually much more interested in the books than any of the tours and museums that go with them. I'm a big Daphne du Maurier fan and I live about 40 miles from Jamaica Inn and the DdM museum and I've never bothered to go but I swear I'd crawl on my hands and knees to Cannery Row! (And that's from England.)

And after the reread, you could take a look at Obscene in the Extreme, which is a look at how that part of California reacted to the book and provides a fascinating background to both Steinbeck's writing of the book and the Great Depression. It sent me off on a reading tangent about the Great Depression and really enhanced my understanding of The Grapes of Wrath.

>83 Booksloth: Book, you might be terribly disappointed if you saw what a commercial mess Monterrey has become. I first visited it about 15 years ago with my daughter. The main drag had tons of small shops and restaurants and a wonderful arcade with games and a merry-go-round. When we were last there, about 4 years ago, they were building a most atrocious complex of hotel and storefronts that completely blocked the view of the bay. I doubt I'll go back again. The aquarium is fantastic, though! My favorite exhibit is of the shoreline and the viewer is practically eye to eye with sea birds. The Steinbeck Museum in Salinas is very interesting.

#84 Thank you for reminding me about that one. I waited ages and ages for it to come out in p/b over here then gave up and forgot - it must be available by now!

In fact, while I seem to have the attention of a couple of Steinbeck fans, I wonder if either of you can help with a query I've posted on Name That Book - so far without success. It dawned on me while reading Steinbeck's Ghost that I don't actually own a biography of the great man. Do either of you know of one that is especially good? There are so many around, I don't want to have to plough my way through the whole lot.

#85 I know what you mean. To be honest, that's more or less what I would expect by now but I still cling to the longing that there might still be just a whiff of Steinbeck in the air.

And I'm again going to recommend Steinbeck's Ghost which I finished last night and which was an utter joy from start to finish. Aimed at the YA market, it's actually one of those books that can be enjoyed by readers of any age and I think it's a must for all Steinbeck fans. Normally, I'd just recommend Steinbeck, but for anyone who has read all of his (and it sounds as if both of you probably have) I thought this was the perfect follow-up and it gave me a real feel or both the books and the area. I started rereading The Long Valley in the early hours of the morning and it's just given me an urge to dig out all the others.

Oddly, one of very few that I haven't yet read is The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights though it's been on Mount TBR for years. My reason for avoiding it so far (although I'm actually quite fond of the King Arthur stories) is that one of my biggest reasons for loving JES is the sense all his books give me of those long hot dust-bowl days. I normally dig out the books to read in the summer when they add to that summery feeling. Now, forgive me if I've got this wrong, but Tintagel and all the King Arthur places are very close to where I live and one thing we don't often get is long hot days. I think I'm a little scared that I might not enjoy thie one as much as the others for that very reason. If either of you can say something nice about the book that will encourage me to make it my next 'off the shelf' read you'll be doing me another big favour!

Hey, you are half-way to your goal! Keep it up!

I added Steinbeck's Ghost to my wishlist after reading your take on it, despite my determination to stop feeding the beast.

Is it very bad that I feel quite good about that? ;-)

Slipped almost unnoticed over that halfway mark with How Novels Work - one of those books I was keeping beside me to dip into now and then. So that's another one out of the way to make up for the rereading!

>79 Booksloth:: Okay, I notice at least one person here (thanks bragan!) is keeping a proper record of everything they read and which are old/which are new etc.

Heh. I am a little bit obsessive that way. :)

And those are excellent numbers you have! Congrats on doing so well in this challenge so far.

#91 Hi bragan - obsessive here, too! - I have my 75 book challenge thread which records everything finished on or after January 1st, and my Books Off the Shelf challenge which I started in December and only includes books that were on my shelves before that date (except for The Devil's Oasis, which I had purchased but not yet received when I opened my challenge thread but counted anyway.)

I've finally gotten the hang of whether to put the books on one or both threads.

#89 Booksloth - I must admit that I too, get a lot of satisfaction when people take my recommendations.

>92 karenmarie:: I've been reviewing and discussing the books I've read this year in the Club Read 2010 group, and using this one to keep track of the ups and downs of the TBR Pile, with, of course, a special emphasis on the question of how many older vs. newer books I've been reading.

It does get complicated when more than one list is involved. My only other LT one is the Book of the Month Club where I do a monthly round up and try to pick a favourite (or three). And I do keep a running list on my iPaq of everything I read year by year. Oh, and my email signature is 'Now reading . . . '. The problem is remembering to update all the different lists and tick off which 'collection' they're in (to read, currently reading, read etc). It takes a while. I could probably read twice the amount if I didn't have all that to keep up with.

Book 27 was My Dog Tulip. Despite having loved and shared my life with dogs for longer than I care to remember, I'm not really a fan of 'dog books'. Partly, I think, it's the anthropomorphy that puts me of, plus the fact that they always seem to end with the dog's death. Mostly, though, I think it's that books that are honest about a person's relationship with their dog - especially ones that were written more than a few years ago - are just too upsetting in detailing the ignorance and casual cruelties inflicted, often unintentionally.

The writer of this book clearly adored his dog, Tulip, yet caused he a great deal of suffering than was merely (for the most part, at least) a product of his time. This book is beautifully written and, in parts, a pleasure, but it didn't change my opinion, or dislike of, dog books in general. On to happier things.

I also love dogs, and books, but am luke warm about real-life 'dog books'. Marley and Me, etc -- meh. A beloved dog is a wonderful thing, but it doesn't usually make compelling reading.

I don't even particularly like dogs except for Dobermans (having had 2 and 10 puppies at one point in my life), but I did read and remember liking My Dog Tulip. I don't remember the details at all, so might get upset if I read it again.

I think that people talking about their dogs or cats (and by extension, writing about them) are like people talking about their children. Unless you're related to the ankle-biter or know the child well, it's bound to be interesting only to the person talking. That said, I'm always willing to tell you how fabulous my children and my dogs are. I do wish that people looking for easy gift ideas would not assume that because I have a cat and I like to read, that I would like that new book out about that cat.

Oh yes, RidgewayGirl - I have way too many books about cats given to me by family and friends. Cat book marks, cat posters, cat magnets. I have 5 live cats, so that's really enough cats.

It is, however, never enough books, but I prefer gift cards these days unless I mention a specific book I want.

I agree. Not that I would wish to criticise another person's gift choice - a gift is a gift after all - but I don't understand why people think that, just because I read, I would like a book - any book - as a gift. The problem is that people who don't read seem to think tokens are boring. It's only when I sit them down and describe at length that the fun of browsing the shelves, picking out the books, bringing them home and anticipting all the way back how much I'm going to enjoy them, is all part of the gift that they start to understand and realise that, to me, a token means they really care - not that they couldn't be bothered.

#100 - Booksloth - you hit the nail on the head! A great part of the joy of books for me is involved in the shopping, browsing, smelling, and handling of books in the bookstore. Deciding what I want to take home, what I wish to read. My favorite present of all is a gift card to a bookstore.

I've got a $20 gift certificate to a used book store in the next town over and a $10 gift card to QuailRidge books in 2 towns over the other way..... No sense in hurrying things - I've had the $10 for 9 years (it gets temporarily lost for years at a time) and the $20 since Christmas.

my problem is that, with a $20 gift card, I usually spend at least $50!

#LOL! Me too! I have a £20 gift token in my purse right now. I went to spend it the other day - bought £60 worth of books, forgot to use the token.

Book #28 - Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

I think you need a new name. There's clearly no sloth in your reading!

Not in my reading, no, but the reading does tend to get in the way of everything else (besides hanging upside down in trees, that is).

We're not addicts, not us.

Just because you are addicted to something doesn't mean that's a bad thing, does it?

I took a break from the challenge for a while to read a few of my newer aquisitions: The Well and the Mine, Lady Audley's Secret, My Cousin Rachel (a reread), The Lady in the Tower, The Darkest Night and The House on Moon Lake, but I'm back now having just completed The Road and having skimmed then abandoned Out on a Limb - nothing wrong with that one at all, just not really my kind of thing. I wasn't sure I should include it in the challenge but it's now waiting to go to the charity shop so I guess it's well and truly 'off the shelf'.

And book #31 was Sovereign, the third in the Shardlake series - always happy to go back to that.

I said earlier that I'd thought long and hard about whether to include ER books here and my reasons for doing so are somewhere in this thread. So book #32 is Reclaiming the F Word, whch I thoroughly enjoyed and which gave me quite a bit of hope for the future at a time when I was beginning to think today's young women thought feminism was about whether or not you're allowed to wear a Wonderbra. I was wrong and I apologise to all those women (well, the ones I was wrong about, anyway). I haven't actually written my review yet but that will appear shortly. I've now moved on to The Owl Killers which won't count towards this challenge but which I'm enjoying immensely.

Ed for typos

Yippee! The Owl Killers (just finished) doesn't count towards this challenge but it DOES bring my TBR list down to 300! I was beginning to think I'd never see that again.

On the other hand, today is my birthday and I have a total of £60's worth of book tokens to spend. Here's the theory: I plan to wait until I have read several more books from Mount TBR, then replace that exact number with new ones, ensuring I never again go over that 300 mark. Here's the reality: I'm meeting a friend for lunch tomorrow just a couple of hundred yards away from my favourite branch of Waterstones. Is it really likely that I'll come home without at least some of the books on my ever-growing wishlist? Watch this space . . . . .

Happy birthday, Booksloth!!! Many happy returns of the day.

"the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley"

I bet you come home with a book or two. Have fun. I'll be watching...

Thank you! I suspect you are right.

Yes - happy birthday!

I wish my TBR was only 300. And I haven't added very much that I've gotten this year from BM yet as there aren't spaces on the shelves to put them.

On the other hand - I wish people would give me book tokens/cards. As much as everyone knows how much I love to read, it just doesn't happen.

I wish my TBR was only 300, too! I'm still straining to get it down to 400. Of course, people do give me books. Sometimes for absolutely no reason. It's delightful, but it is not helping.

Thank you dudes! You have to learn to be very firm indeed about the tokens thing. For so many years people either refused to give me tokens at all or, if I really insisted, they would give me a small amount in tokens then spend more than that on 'something to open'. In the end I sat down my nearest and dearest and explained slowly and at some length all about how exciting it is for someone like me to be able to spend the day on Amazon making up a list of what I want, then another day anticipating all the good stuff I plan to buy, then another day browsing around a 'reaL' shop with that list in hand while I choose and discard for hours, then bringing two bulging bags home in the car and shelving them (the books, not the bags, not to mention cataloguing them on LT) and that's way before I even turn to the first page of the first book. Now, at last, they are beginning to understand. I make sure I reinforce all that by giving effusive thanks, both when I get the tokens and when I get the actual books. I've kicked around long enough now to know life is too short and birthdays too few to waste them on yet more smelly thngs I shall never get round to using. If you want something badly enough you have to be prepared to be very, very clear about it. Keep trying - you'll get there in the end.

ETA - Oh, and I've pretty much already talked myself into the theory that saving book-buying until the sensible time is no kind of a birthday treat. I suspect tomorrow will be a buying day after all.

Some of my family members do get it about gift certificates being fun gifts, not lazy and thoughtless ones, at least when they're for books. My mother, though, has this weird obsession with having to give you things to unwrap. We've come up with a great solution for that, though: she picks stuff -- mostly books -- off of my Amazon list and sends it to me. Since it's always something I picked out, it's always something I actually want, but since there are literally hundreds of books on there -- every time a book catches my eye as being interesting, I throw it on the wishlist -- it's always an exciting surprise.

#119 And that's every bit as good an idea. The only problem for me is that I have a tendency to buy things and forget to cross them off the list. Still, if you can overcome that particular problem it's the ideal solution.

I'm usually very good about remembering to do that. Of course, the only times I haven't been, it's resulted in me getting duplicate books, just by the sheer force of Murphy's Law. Still worth it, though!

Happy Birthday, Booksloth! Hope it's wonderful for you! I feel the same about book tokens/gift cards. My 6 year-old goddaughter gives me a card for every occasion, and she can't wait to see how excited I will be about the Borders gift card in there. Some day I'm going to take her to the bookstore with me so she can see that I'm not faking it!

My daugher-in -law always gives me a gift card for my favorite garden center for my birthday (which is in Apr) and I just got done spending it for plants for the garden, which I love ( and her). And once my sister put a couple of cloth lengths in my Christmas stocking for me to use quilting which was a joy. I do put actual books on my Christmas list and mostly get them so I really can't complain.

Happy Birthday Booksloth, I hope you have a great day. Being a little selfish I hope you do indulge in some books - I always get such great ideas from your posts! Right now I am awaiting a call from my library telling me that one of your recommendations, 84 Charing Cross Road, is ready to be picked up.

Happy Birthday, booksloth! Enjoy the shopping, and don't feel guilty!

Happy Birthday, booksloth!
Go ahead and indulge. You earned it.

Thank you everyone for those good wishes. I finished A Severed Head taking this challenge up to 33 and bringing the TBR pile down to 299 - actually under for the first time in many, many years!

And now I'm going shopping . . .

. . . And now I've been.

Jasper Jones, Remarkable Creatures, Sharp Objects and The Slap just got added to the heap bringing the TBR pile back up to 303 and I'm now in the middle of spending another £45 online but I think we'll keep quiet about those until they actually arrive. What else are birthdays for?

ETA - (later) There we go! A total of 13 books bought/ordered using 3 tokens and my Waterstones loyalty card and costing me (aside from those because we all know they don't count) £4.57! Now, is that a day well spent or wot?

Bravo, Booksloth! Score!

That is absolutely what birthdays are for! Happy B-Day to you!

Don't you love being in a place where people understand the excitement of getting many books for little money? No one else seems to understand how much fun it is to be set loose in a bookstore and not have to worry about your budget!
Congratulations!

Thank you again for all those nice birthday wishes and for making me feel that having lost both kids 20 years ago under a pile of books (I still hear the odd whimper from time to time) is somehow okay;-)

Glad you had fun with your spending spree, Booksloth. Yes and only spending less than 5 pounds! Brava.

The box arrived this morning. The Seance, The White Woman on the Green Bicycle, Catherine Howard, Bluestockings, A Crime in the Neighbourhood, Now by Morris Glietzman (no touchstones for title), A Wrinkle in Time, After the Fire, A Still, Small Voice and The Life and Opinions of Maf the Dog and of His Friend Marilyn Monroe are all sitting in a pile squabbling over who gets read first. And none of them count towards this challenge.

ETA - And that drags the total TBR count back up to 311. Oops.

But it's a very nice problem to have, Booksloth. :)

True - and I still feel like a child on her birthday when those packages arrive.

Book no 34 is At Large and At Small. God only knows why it has taken me so long to get round to this lovely little collection of essays because I adore Fadiman's writing. I guess that's the real upside to this challenge in that it ensures we finaly read those books that we always knew we would love before our shallow love of all that is new and shiny took over.

I'm still mainly going through the newer stuff but I don't feel under quite so much pressure now I'm 68% of the way to my target and the year isn't half over yet.

A belated Happy Birthday! You are at a very happy place--people who understand potential books as gifts, a community here who gets the joy of lots of books for a little money, and being more than halfway to a goal. As for the TBR pile, you have learned that it is possible to bring the total under 300 anytime you want to--you just don't want to right now, LOL.

#138 Still laughing at that! There are some wonderful people here when it comes to justifying my mania. Thank you.

The Angel's Game sat on that shelf far too long - especially considering how much I enjoyed Zafon's earlier book, The Shadow of the Wind. Anyway, I finally got round to it and wasn't disappointed. It comes in at number 35 on the list.

Glad to hear you liked The Angel's Game. I just picked it up at B&N. I plan on taking it on vacation with me.

I'm glad to hear it, too, since I also just picked it up recently. Not sure when I'll get to it, though.

In at 37 - Ghostheart. R J (aka Roger Jon) Ellory writes some of the most gripping and readable 'thrillers' I know. I put the word 'thrillers' in inverted commas because this one, at least, wasn't so much a thriller as a slightly menacing . . . um . . . mystery maybe? Hard to define and, though probably not his best book, still a joy to read. And if this one doesn't appeal to everyone I'd certainly recommend Candlemoth, The Anniversary Man and especially A Quiet Belief in Angels.

I recently read A Quiet Belief In Angels and I too had trouble describing it as a mystery, it was so much more. I loved it, and am looking forward to reading more of his work.

Always happy to find a new crime writer, so have added Ghostheart to the wishlist.

Nice to find another fan, DQ50! Pamelad - hope you enjoy the books as much as I do, let us know how you get on.

Oh no! I just shot over that 300 mark again. By 15. Oops!

Hi Booksloth:

I don't think you should worry until you hit about 500 or so. That way you can get lots more books and not have stress. :)

I just added a few books to the old tbr stack myself. It's fun, isn't it?

Hmm, now there's a thought. A whole new mind-set change. You're right - I do feel better when I give in completely . . .

I'm well over 500. Should I despair?

Definitely not. There comes a point where you have to embrace your addiction and I think you've hit it;-)

I reached it a long time ago - I have 1015 books listed as tbr. I read about 100 books a year, so that's got me covered until I'm 67!

Of course I'll be buying more new books in the meantime.....

RidgewayGirl - do not despair! Think of the flexibility you have to find something JUST right for the mood.

Oh karenmarie! Now you've made me feel so much better! It's true we have plenty of choice for whatever mood we're in (and yet I still get times when I can't find just what I want) but it is that thought of dying before I've read them all that bothers me. Maybe I should try to change my mind about an afterlife. Maybe heaven, for me, would be getting to read all my books at last.

Oh hooray - I finally dug out another from the TBR pile (I've had far too many new books screaming for my attention lately). Anyway, I just read The Vicar of Wakefield, which I probably should have read years ago. Like its many other critics over the years, I had trouble deciding whether it is satire or ingenuous tosh (it seemed to me as if it started out as satire but then degenerated in the final few chapters) but at least it's another one off the list that now stands at 311 - and that's not counting the several million I have on order.

An annoying little thing. Every time I edit my first message to add another book the touchstones insist on changing back to state that Leviathan is the one by Scott Westerfield; it isn't, it's the one by Philip Hoare. Nowadays I don't even seem to get the option to select a different author so I'm mentioning it here so that it can at last have its own touchstone. So there.

Hi Booksloth:

I've had problems, too, when I edit my first post. Sometimes the touchstones come out fine, and sometimes they all go away again like they've done to you.

I even posted a thread in Bug Collectors recently about it but got no response..... think I'll bump it up and see.

It's one thing I hate about touchstones in general. Every time you edit any post you need to reset them. That's not the end of the world when you go back to repair a typo (though it's still really annoying - especially if your book is one of those that comes way down the list of possible options) but on a message you continually add to it's infuriating. Just imagine what it was like trying to keep up the list of books people had read in the 1000 Books Before You Die thread - I very soon abandoned touchstones there altogether! If you want to send a link to your comment in the Bug Collectors I'll happily contribute to it.

Here 'tis:

Touchstone problem link

Thanks!

Maybe more than one voice will get a response.

Thanks for that! I've joined the protest but I'm not sure it'll do any good.

Hi again:

There are some more posts on the thread.

What I've done is go back, take all the #s out, AND un-touchstone the authors in all cases.

So far the thread looks good.

And _Zoe_ is right (in my thread) - things are worse before and a broken touchstone wrecks the rest of the message.

But for now I'm happy - for now, my thread looks clean.

Thanks for joining the protest, Booksloth!

I'm still peeved that nobody official responded on the thread, just helpful LTers.

Isn't that usually the case? To be fair, I suppose Tim can't be everywhere at once. It still hasn't made any difference to the problem I was having but I'm too old and cynical to have really thought it would. Sigh.

In at 39 is Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons. I do wish her other books were easier to get hold of (and at sensible prices). Loved this one very nearly as much as the delightful Cold Comfort Farm.

I just Bookmooched Cold Comfort Farm but it hasn't "called" to me yet.

I'm reading A Prayer for Owen Meany for my September bookclub meeting. I sem to recall that it's one of your favs or am I confusing you with someone else?

I'm easily confused (in all senses) but yes, I do love Owen Meany. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea but I think it's Irving's best and that's saying something. Hope it works for you too.

I just got ruthless and pruned Mount TBR (can you prune a mountain? Probably not.) Got rid of 11 boks which, hand on heart, I know I'm never going to get round to reading. Seeing that sudden dip from 313 to 302 gives me some hope that I just might slip below that 300 mark again one day. Or does it just mean I've now got more room for new ones? I think we all know which is most likely.

Heh, yeah, I know my immediate reaction when I culled 30 books from my own TBR mountain was, "Great! Now I can go buy more!"

Just got rid of another 2. That brings me down to 300! Yippeeeee!

Yay! I know how exciting those round numbers are. :)

Uh? What? (Booksloth emerges hesitantly, blinking into the light.) Blame it on me trying to be a good student. Study has taken over my life and I'm not reading half as much as usual, either new or old books. Still, there has been a little bit of movement and I finally got round to Hangover Square and Ghostwalk, bringing my total to 41. I need to make a special effort now to hit my target before the end of the year and at only about 5 books a month right now it's going to be a close-run thing. Maybe I can find a few really short ones? I'm working on another one at the moment so there's hope!

And then I was bullied - bullied I tell you - into reading She's Come Undone, and about time too if I may say so. I should never have left anything by Lamb languishing for so long. Another great book by a superb author and my thanks go to Sholofsky for encouraging me to finally get round to it and for bringing my total now to 42!

I failed. I utterly and completely failed. Everything was going so well until I started studying and all that 'fun' reading just ground to a halt.

However, the up-side is that I've now bought all the course books so they will count towards 2011's challenge (you thought I was giving up?) which is here - http://www.librarything.com/topic/106068&newpost=1#lastmsg. How did everyone else get on?

That a bookworm's reach should extend to the shelves, or what's a challenge for? No failure at all, Booksloth! You've earned your place in 2011's challenge -- consider that an honour as we'll all be glad to have you around.

Booksloth, I would only consider it a complete and utter failure if you had read NO books from your shelves. 42 out of 50 is quite respectable!

You're all too kind. The challenge always looks so easy from this end of the year and I suspect it will take a seige at the very least to stop me over-buying again but at least this gives me some incentive to try! Good luck to everyone taking part.

#43 was The Circus Fire. With the end in sight I'm getting really excited at the thought of being able to real all new book for (hopefully) the second half of the year.

And #44 (read simultaeneously with The Circus Fire) was ER book The Devil's Mask. Several hours I'll never get back.

And my ticker in message#1 has disappeared. The url is still there so I'll keep fingers crossed that it comes back and continue to update on my profile (if that one hasn't gone too).

And in a frantic flurry, another one that was half read then put on hold - A Watermelon, a Fish and a Bible. And I got the ticker back too!