MarthaJeanne's English 1010

Talk1010 Category Challenge

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MarthaJeanne's English 1010

1MarthaJeanne
Edited: Sep 5, 2010, 3:26 am

Fiction

This list is getting too unwieldy, so I'm splitting it. See messages 33ff.

Statistics on all three challenges and lists of completed topics are here:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/79211#1667146

A Science Fiction and Fantasy
http://www.librarything.com/topic/79211#2117929

B North America
C Europe
http://www.librarything.com/topic/79211#2117931

D Asia
E Southern Hemisphere
F Ancient and pre-history
http://www.librarything.com/topic/79211#2117933

G Classics and specific authors
H Humour
I Books written for children
http://www.librarything.com/topic/79211#2117934

2MarthaJeanne
Edited: Aug 11, 2010, 3:18 pm

Non-fiction

Moved to new topic

3MarthaJeanne
Edited: Aug 11, 2010, 3:18 pm

This message has been deleted by its author.

4MarthaJeanne
Edited: Dec 22, 2009, 3:44 am

I have a separate challenge for books read in German. http://www.librarything.com/topic/79212

I would like to finish a full fiction challenge and a stepped non-fiction challenge in English.

5MarthaJeanne
Edited: Dec 27, 2010, 3:21 pm

Statistics

SOURCE of books (This also includes the German books):

New Books 91

Library books 101

Other 123
To be Read - older new books, 2nd hand books 60
LT inspired 18
Just picked up; rereads 45

CATEGORIES Filled

Fiction (10 per category)
..1 Ac Darkover
..2 Cb Europe, historical
..3 Ba USA, modern
..4 Ad Pern
..5 Aa Heinlein
..6 Ga Margaret Atwood
..7 Ab Valdemar
..8 I Children's Books
..9 Asia, Africa and Southern hemisphere
.10 Ca Europe, modern

Nonfiction (Stepped version)
!Finished this way so upgrading!
..10 Biography (some theology)
...9 Science
...8 Liturgy and Spirituality
...7 Food
...6 Crafts
...5 General Theology
...4 Travel
...3 Biblical
...2 History
...1 General Non-Fiction

Nonfiction (10 per category version)
..1 Biography
..2 Theology (Biblical)
..3 Theology (General))
..4 Needlework and Crafts
..5 Science
..6 Travel
..7 Cookbooks
..8 Food and Gardens
..9 Theology (Spirituality and Liturgy)
.10 History and General non-fiction

German (stepped)
..10 Fiction
...9 Cookbooks
...8 Theology
...7 Austria
...6 Crafts and Gardens
...5 Biography
...4 Other
...3 German Language
...2 Other Food
...1 USA - Auf Deutsch

German 10 per category
..1 Fiction
..2 Children's books
..3 Theology and Religion
..4 Cookbooks
..5 Food and Gardens
..6 Austria
..7 Biography
..8 Other

6MarthaJeanne
Dec 25, 2009, 4:35 pm

I've decided that the challenge will run from Christmas to Christmas - rather than wait to read some of the lovely new books I have.

7MarthaJeanne
Dec 31, 2009, 6:22 pm

This message has been deleted by its author.

8MarthaJeanne
Jan 7, 2010, 3:37 am

Olympiad was fun. The games finally happen - well, sort of - but both the way they are brought about, and the way the story is told are fun.

I suppose you could read the book without the Prologue. But with it, the whole thing is a sort of meta-history.

9MarthaJeanne
Edited: Jul 23, 2010, 3:46 am

Small batch baking

The dangers of walking past bookstores with money in the wallet: At least a fair number of the books I bought were being sold off cheap.

This will be very useful. We had the Mixed Berry Cobbler for desert tonight, and enjoyed it very much, although it needed cinnamon. II am also pleased that there were no seconds or left-overs. That really minimalized the guilt. I wish she had given diameters for the cans she usesas pans for several of the recipes. I would also like more savory recipes.

10MarthaJeanne
Feb 2, 2010, 1:39 am

No Idle Hands

Very well written, and very interesting.

11prezzey
Feb 2, 2010, 3:37 pm

Oooh, color me envious, I haven't even contemplated starting a separate 101010 challenge for the German books (though I was wondering about Hungarian... I've already read a few Hungarian books that do not fit my 101010 categories).

12MarthaJeanne
Feb 12, 2010, 7:17 am

Frances Young Brokenness and Blessing

The first book by Frances Young that I ever read was 'Face to Face' - the story of dealing with a severly handicapped son. Several years later I read 'the Making of the Creeds' as part of a theology course. Both are very good books, but it took me a while to connect the two. Since then I read anything of hers I get my hands on.

This book is in many ways more challenging to read than either of the first two. It is a very personal theology of the connection in her life of themes of those two books - living with the severly handicapped, and studying the early Christian Fathers - combined with the love of Christian Hymnody that could be expected of a Methodist minister.

The introduction has a long reference list of names and theological terms. I found that I did fairly well on recognizing the people. Less well on the words - and that list was not complete enough for me. This is serious theology, and although it might well be useful for someone not used to theological writing, it might be difficult to get through.

I love hymns, and found myself singing several that she mentions, but as neither Methodist nor British, there were many more that I did not recognize. She also includes a lot of references to her personal life and cultural background that were sometimes hard to follow.

I called this book 'challenging' . I mean that in two ways. It was not easy to read. And it will make changes in the way I think. The later is more important.

13MarthaJeanne
Feb 17, 2010, 3:24 am

Itty-bitty nursery
Essential Kids

I feel a bit funny about adding these as 'read' because reading through a book of knitting patterns is fast. The Bliss is a much better book, but I found a sweater in each book to knit for my grandsons, and a few other projects I might do later. Good purchases.

14MarthaJeanne
Feb 19, 2010, 3:05 pm

A Short History of Women

What good there was in this was as notes on interesting books that the author could have written. None of the characters was developed. If you ever got to the point where a character was beginning to interest you the chapter ended and you were back to trying to figure out who this one was, what you knew about her, and where this chapter fit into her story...

I would feel better about the book if I had any idea of where the book was trying to go. It didn't get there.

15MarthaJeanne
Feb 26, 2010, 4:23 pm

Magic Flutes As far as romantic fluff goes, this wouldn't be half bad if it were located in an imaginary setting. But the setting is done so very, VERY badly...

16MarthaJeanne
Edited: Mar 25, 2010, 7:48 am

What She Wants
Woman in trouble meets strong man. Woman and strong man have misunderstandings. Woman and strong man fall in lust. Strong man solves all problems. Woman and strong man live happily ever after.

If you like that formula mixed with a lot of sex scenes, you'll like this. It took me half way through the boook to realize that I hadn't actually read this particular example before.

2 stars

17MarthaJeanne
Apr 1, 2010, 4:23 am

The Oxford Companion to Christian Thought

An amazing work! Often dictionaries of this type are just collections of articles, but this holds together through the articles written by Adrian Hastings, but has added texture and interest through the really good choice of authors of the other articles. I was pleased to find articles by many of my favourite theological writers, and discovered new people to read through their articles in this book.

I read it through A - Z, and kept reading more and more the further I got into it.

18MarthaJeanne
Apr 20, 2010, 6:34 am

I should be in England buying new books. Oh, well, thank goodness for internet bookstores.

19MarthaJeanne
May 20, 2010, 4:05 pm

Working through some long ones. Shogun is very good, but there is a certain amount of relief in getting to the end of it.

20AHS-Wolfy
May 20, 2010, 4:19 pm

@19, I'd imagine that one is quite a hard read. Hope it was rewarding enough for you.

21MarthaJeanne
May 21, 2010, 3:43 am

Oh, yes. I remember enjoying the whole series years ago (20-30) and want to at least start to reread it NOW while I still have access to the school library. My supply of borrowed books in English will diminish greatly when Steven graduates next month.

It's still as good as it was then, and it's not like rereading books I've read often and recently - I don't remember the details at all any more. The real problem is that I try to keep three books going at once - Fiction in English, Nonfiction in English, and something in German. I got stuck with all three long and slow at once, and it got frustrating not to be finishing anything. Four days between finishes! Usually I finish 5-7 a week.

22MarthaJeanne
Edited: May 21, 2010, 2:38 pm

Doing much better today with two finishes:

Heinlein's Space Cadet
Ethics and world religions

And yes, I make sure that alternate fiction books are short and fun. (BTW does anyone have a spare copy of Space Cadet floating around near here? Ours is in pieces.)

The second book is based on a great idea: Take specific ethical quandries from various international situations and have representatives of various religions comment on them. The situations themselves are varied and interesting.

Unfortunately, most of the comments spend a lot of time on 'my tradition is such and such, and historically we come from this and that... In the end the specific situation is only addressed briefly (if at all) and rarely is there any sort of concrete advice on how the situation should be handled. I gave it 2 1/2 stars.

23MarthaJeanne
May 22, 2010, 2:31 pm

Another Atwood. Lady Oracle

I've had dreams like this - when the doctor had me on opiates. The main character has a disfunctional life, as in many Atwoods, but this time she seems to call most of it on herself. She makes her way through a web of varying fictions, until it is unclear whether the main story of her life is another fiction she is telling, or a fiction she is living. Three stars.

24MarthaJeanne
May 23, 2010, 5:38 am

Yes, I'm working through Heinlein now:

Citizen of the Galaxy.
I think this is (one of) Heinlein's best. A wonderful mix of basic ethics, pragmatic reality, and great narrative skill. 41/2 stars. This one is falling apart, too.

25MarthaJeanne
Jun 24, 2010, 4:42 pm

The conservationist

This book has sections that are very enjoyable, but then it gets rather literary and hard to follow. I can deal with having to read several paragraphs before finding out who is speaking, even if I then have to go back and reread to get the gist, but when I can't tell after several pages whether a certain scene is supposed to be real or dream (I hope dream) I start to think I should avoid reading 'masterworks'.

26MarthaJeanne
Jul 1, 2010, 1:01 am

The book of excuses

My review reads 'Funny once.' And some of it is, but en masse, most of it is rather boring.

27MarthaJeanne
Jul 9, 2010, 4:40 am

This message has been deleted by its author.

28mathgirl40
Jul 9, 2010, 5:25 pm

I've read a lot of Heinleins but I don't think I've read Citizen of the Galaxy yet. Will have to put this on my wishlist.

29bruce_krafft
Jul 11, 2010, 9:11 pm

I too will have to put Citizen of the Galaxy on my wish list. I don't think that i ahve read any Heinlein in ages.

DS
(Bruce's evil twin :-))

30MarthaJeanne
Edited: Jul 12, 2010, 4:01 am

I'm glad to have brought him and this particular book of his back to people's notice.

31MarthaJeanne
Jul 18, 2010, 4:22 am

I've just read two Danielle Steels: One day at a time and Journey. I enjoy all her novels, but they certainly divide into two separate groups.

The first book is a fairytale romance set among the rich and famous. As I said, I enjoy reading these, but they are read-once fluff.

The second book is a fictional attempt to deal seriously with the issue of abuse. I am always delighted to get into one of Steele's novels and find that besides the romance there is a real issue being dealt with. I wonder if there is any way to get a separate list of her 'issue' fiction.

32MarthaJeanne
Edited: Jul 22, 2010, 12:39 pm

Just finished my 10th Atwood. Rude Ramsay and the roaring radishes. I highly recommend it.

37MarthaJeanne
Aug 11, 2010, 3:05 pm

The English non-fiction stepped challenge is done. Guess I'd better try to make it a full one.

38MarthaJeanne
Edited: Aug 22, 2010, 3:04 am

Predictably, I am overfilling some categories. Now I need to figure out how to move some of my biography to other categories, because I see a lot more biographies coming.

39MarthaJeanne
Edited: Sep 5, 2010, 12:37 pm

Twilight. I had a chance to borrow this, and decided to see what the big fuss is about. I must admit that I still don't see it. Escapist fiction, fairly well written, Not worth getting all excited about either way.

The touchstone is loading, but then not working. Oh well.

40pammab
Sep 6, 2010, 8:59 am

I had the same reaction -- I picked up Twilight on CD from the library before a car trip, and I'm not sure if it was the way the author read the characters or whether it was inherent in the writing itself, but I just couldn't get into it. And sometimes the descriptions were so bad I had to laugh. I got about halfway through the book on the trip, but I haven't been able to convince myself to pick up the book and finish it since...

41MarthaJeanne
Sep 9, 2010, 6:54 am

With the German one done, that makes both stepped challenges done. I'm hoping that the nonfiction will become a 10x10 challenge, but doubt that I can do that with the German.

42MarthaJeanne
Edited: Oct 14, 2010, 3:46 am

Right now I'm trying to catch up on the reading (and bookbuying) I did on our trip.

43MarthaJeanne
Edited: Dec 6, 2010, 5:26 pm

Reading the Outlander series is slowing me down. I'm alternating with other books, but these seven tomes are 8 - 10 hundred pages each, so I don't get through as many books. I love them, though. These first 5 I had already read, but the next two are new to me.

44ivyd
Dec 6, 2010, 3:00 pm

>43 MarthaJeanne: I just finished the first one, and can't wait to get to the others.

45MarthaJeanne
Dec 6, 2010, 5:24 pm

It's interesting to see the series and the characters develop. She has managed to stay fairly consistant, but lots of issues have come up that she obviously hadn't thought through at first.