Fifty book challenge 2009

[Fiona_B]

1. piercing - ryu murakami
2. cross country - james patterson
3. in the miso soup - ryu murakami
4. darkly dreaming dexter - jeff lindsay
5. dearly devoted dexter - jeff lindsay
6. dexter in the dark - jeff lindsay
7. the unbearable lightness of being - milan kundera
8. the catcher in the rye - j.d. salinger
9. american psycho - bret easton ellis
10. after dark - haruki murakami
11. dexter by design - jeff lindsay
12. three and out - tom henry
13. coraline - neil gaiman
14. fleshmarket close - ian rankin
15. too weird for ziggy - sylvie simmons
16. the runes of the earth - stephen donaldson
17. how the dead live - will self
18. anansi boys - neil gaiman
19. beggars banquet - ian rankin
20. amber spyglass - philip pullman
21. completely unexpected tales - roald dahl
22. screen burn - charlie brooker
23. the curious incident of the dog in the night-time - mark haddon
24. pride and prejudice and zombies - jane austen/seth grahame smith
25. sputnik sweetheart - haruki murakami


26. mr toppit - charles elton

this is a debut novel from the author and it's bloody fantastic. one of those "richard and judy summer read" books, which i never fail to enjoy. richard and judy may be annoying, but they have good taste.

[princessoPUNK]

1. Diary of a Wife - Anias Nin
2. Scoop - Evelyn Waugh
3. Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination - Helen Fielding
4. The Weight of Water - Anita Shreve
5. A Wedding in December- Anita Shreve
6. The Unconsoled - Kazuo Ishiguro
7. Love, Etc. - Julian Barnes
8. Vienna - Eva Menasse
9. The Family Way - Tony Parsons
10. A Girl's Guide to Modern European Philosophy - Charlotte Grieg
11. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
12. The Pilot's Wife - Anita Shreve
13. New Moon - Stephenie Meyer
14. Eclipse - Stephenie Meyer
15. Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer
16. Class, The Secret diary of a Teacher in Turmoil - Jane Beaton
17. Those Faraday Girls - Monica McInerney
18. Stories we Could Tell - Tony Parsons
19. My Favourite Wife - Tony Parsons
20. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - John Boyne
21. Q and A - Vikas Swarup
22. Testimony - Anita Shreve
23. The Snows of Kilimanjaro - Ernest Hemingway
24. P.S. I love You - Cecilia Ahern
25. As I Lay Dying - William Faulkner
26. How to be Good - Nick Hornby
27. Art Therapy with Children on the Autistic Spectrum - Kathy Evans, Janet Dubowski
28. The History of Love - Nicole Krauss
29. Plan B - Emily Barr
30. The Sweetheart Season - Karen Joy Fowler
31. The Other Ariel - Lynda K. Bundtzen
32. The Perfect Life - Rafaella Barker
33. Eragon - Christopher Paolini
34. The Oxford Murders - Guellermo Martinez
35. Inner Circle - T.C. Boyle
36. Friday Nights - Joanna Trollope
37. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
38. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
39. Year of Wonder - Geraldine Brooks
40. Body Surfing - Anita Shreve
41. The Gallows' Girl - Melanie Gifford
42. Harry Potter and the Order of the Ph - JOn Mcoenix - J.K. Rowling
43. The Chocolate Run - Dorothy Koomson
44. Light on Snow - Anita Shreve

45. The Weekend - William McIlvanney
46. So Many Ways to Begin - Jon McGregor

[Runt]

1. Hitch hikers guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
2. The restaurant at the end of the Universe - Douglas Adams
3. Life, the Universe and everything - Douglas Adams
4. The Violin - Anne Rice
5. Revolution in Eastern Europe - Peter Cipkowski
6. Minority Report - Philip K Dick
7. Sandman (The dream hunters) - Neil Gaiman
8. Anansi boys - Neil Gaiman
9. Female Chauvinist Pigs - Ariel Levy (meh)
10. another Sandman (can't remember which) - Neil Gaiman
11. The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
12. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
13. New Moon - Stephenie Meyer
14. The Female Eunuch - Germaine Greer

15. The eclipse - Stephenie Meyer
16. Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer

...and then I read all the Twilight books over again haha - I have to disagree with the general opinion that the fourth is the one worth waiting for. I liked the second & third LOTS...there's definitely more 'story' in the last one but I'd have been quite happy if they just went on being tortured in love forever without all the action.

Now reading Great Expectations - Charles Dickens is hilarious (for the first 30pages at least) - the sister is quite a character

[sylvianorth]

I only think the last one is worth waiting for for the completely horrific and out of place birth scene. I really dislike the Twilight books overall, but that one was entertaining in how ridiculous it was.

Btw, Stephanie Meyer started writing 'Midnight Sun' which was Twilight from Edward's perspective. It was leaked out so she stopped writing it, but there's a hundred or so pages of it online. It is also ridiculous.

[Runt]

hah - I was actually thinking I might skip the last film because of that bit! and I was a bit annoyed coz I'd been trying really hard to ignore all the chastity crap throughout them but it was a bit hard to escape in that last one. Wouldn't say the books are any more than teen trash but I still really enjoyed them.
Oh! She gave in and put a tidier version of it online herself...I'm not really interested in reading it till it's finished properly though...would feel like I was intruding or something.

[Runt]

I forgot I need book help too - I can only afford one so has anyone read and could recommend one of the following:
Bodies(big ideas) - Susie Orbach
Unbearable Weight - Susan Bordo
The Beauty Myth - Naomi Wolf

[Rowsbette]

Fraid I've not read any of them, but I read about half of another book by Susie Orbach (Fat is a Feminist Issue) about two months ago, and really liked it. Some fairly bizarre ideas alongside the reasonable ones, but generally fun and readable. Can't mind why I never finished it... I think I was reading something else at the time and ended up leaving it somewhere obscure.

Keep meaning to read The Beauty Myth, it looks a lot more fun than other feminist texts and what little I've read of it is pleasantly angry. Fraid I've not heard anything about the Bordo one though.

Wait... just realised it looks like you weren't a big fan of Female Chauvinist Pigs, which is a book I really liked. So we've probably got totally different tastes, rendering this post pretty useless.

[Runt]

Fraid I've not read any of them, but I read about half of another book by Susie Orbach (Fat is a Feminist Issue) about two months ago, and really liked it. Some fairly bizarre ideas alongside the reasonable ones, but generally fun and readable. Can't mind why I never finished it... I think I was reading something else at the time and ended up leaving it somewhere obscure.

Keep meaning to read The Beauty Myth, it looks a lot more fun than other feminist texts and what little I've read of it is pleasantly angry. Fraid I've not heard anything about the Bordo one though.

Wait... just realised it looks like you weren't a big fan of Female Chauvinist Pigs, which is a book I really liked. So we've probably got totally different tastes, rendering this post pretty useless.

Hah, no that's pretty helpful actually, the Beauty Myth is probably what I'll go with then for the 'pleasantly angry' reason. I didn't get on so well with the Ariel Levy book because she wasn't passionate enough....or I didn't get it anyway. It was like the book was heavily edited or she got bored with bits and moved on.
I just watched a couple of lecture snippets from the author of the Beauty Myth - make-up, jewellery, tight fitting suit, hair done. Not saying I'm opposed to any of that but it'll be interesting to find out more about her coz she opened by ripping into advertising images and consumerism and asking 'what are we/what am I going to do to change these things?'.

[endless psych]

1) The Stuff of Thought - Steven Pinker
2) Counterknowledge - Damian Thompson.
3) Can robots Really think? - Peter Cave
4) Freakonomics - Stephen D Levitt, Stephen B. Dubner
5) Mistakes were made (but not by me) - Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.
6) Elephants on acid - Alex Boese
7) Chaos - James Gleick
8) The black swan - Nicholas Taleb Tassim
9) Predictably irrational - Dan Ariely
10) Quirkology - Richard Wiseman
11) Emergency - Neil Strauss
12) Irrationality - Stuart Sutherland
13) Flat Earth News - Nick Davies
14) Critical Mass - Phillip Ball
15) The Road - Cormac McCarthy
16) The motorcycle Diaries - Ernesto 'CHE' Guevara
17) Blink - Malcolm Gladwell
18) Human Universals - Donald E. Brown
19) Omnibus #1: At the mountains of Madness - HP Lovecraft
20) The Zombie Survival Guide - Max brooks
21) World War Z - Max Brooks
22) Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - Jane Austen and Seth Graham Smith
23) Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance - Robert M Pirsig
24) What works? Evidence based policy and practice in public services -Huw Davies, Sandra Nutley and Peter Smith (EDS)
25) Brainwashing the science of thought control - Kathleen Taylorr
26) The Shock Doctrine - Naomi Klein
27) :59 - Richard Wiseman

28) America Unchained - Dave Gorman

[the.definitive]

14. The Testament of Gideon Mack - James Robertson

This just didn't do it for me at all, really had to force myself to finish it.

15. The Gunslinger - Stephen King


Not exactly high brow but I'm unashamed of my love of Stephen King! This was bit crap though, I decided to give the Dark Tower books a shot, started reading this and realised I'd definitely read it before...but if I'm going to read the rest I had to read it again, and it wasn't very enjoyable because I sort of hazily remembered it all and found reading it a bit of chore. I'm still going to read the rest out of principle, though.

[Witch]

1 - patricia cornwell -scarpetta
2 - patricia cornwell - cruel and unusual
3. patricia cornwell - the body farm
4. patricia cornwell - black notice
5. patricia cornwell - last precict
6. patricia cornwell - trace
7. patricia cornwell - predator
8. patricia cornwell - point of origin
9. patricia cornwell - book of the dead
10. patricia cornwell - blow fly
11. toni maguire - dont tell mummy
12. virgina andrews - heaven
13. jackie collins - american star
14. virgina andrews - dark angel
15. virgina andrews - web of dreams
16. virgina andrews - gates of paradise
17. virgina andrews - fallen hearts
18. Matthew Reilly - Scarecrow
19. Matthew Reilly - Temple
20. Matthew Reilly - Ice station

[endless psych]

1) The Stuff of Thought - Steven Pinker
2) Counterknowledge - Damian Thompson.
3) Can robots Really think? - Peter Cave
4) Freakonomics - Stephen D Levitt, Stephen B. Dubner
5) Mistakes were made (but not by me) - Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.
6) Elephants on acid - Alex Boese
7) Chaos - James Gleick
8) The black swan - Nicholas Taleb Tassim
9) Predictably irrational - Dan Ariely
10) Quirkology - Richard Wiseman
11) Emergency - Neil Strauss
12) Irrationality - Stuart Sutherland
13) Flat Earth News - Nick Davies
14) Critical Mass - Phillip Ball
15) The Road - Cormac McCarthy
16) The motorcycle Diaries - Ernesto 'CHE' Guevara
17) Blink - Malcolm Gladwell
18) Human Universals - Donald E. Brown
19) Omnibus #1: At the mountains of Madness - HP Lovecraft
20) The Zombie Survival Guide - Max brooks
21) World War Z - Max Brooks
22) Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - Jane Austen and Seth Graham Smith
23) Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance - Robert M Pirsig
24) What works? Evidence based policy and practice in public services -Huw Davies, Sandra Nutley and Peter Smith (EDS)
25) Brainwashing the science of thought control - Kathleen Taylorr
26) The Shock Doctrine - Naomi Klein
27) :59 - Richard Wiseman
28) America Unchained - Dave Gorman

29) A question of Torture - Alex W. McCoy

[Pretty Kitty]

1. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
2. Emma - Jane Austen
3. The secret garden - F. Hodgson Burnett
4. Alice's adventures in wonderland - Lewis Carroll
5. Through the looking glass - Lewis Carroll
6. The adventures of Pinocchio - Carlo Collodi
7. What Katy did - Susan Coolidge
8. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
9. The call of the wild - Jack London
10. Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare
11. Round the world in eighty days - Jules Verne
12. The importance of being Earnest - Oscar Wilde
13. The picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
14. Carpe Jugulum - Terry Pratchett
15. Casino Royale - Ian Fleming
16. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - A.C.Doyle
17. Duma Key - Stephen King
18. Macbeth - William Shakespeare
19. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
20. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
21. The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare
22. The Comedy of Errors - William Shakespeare
23. A Midsummer Nights Dream - William Shakespeare
24. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea - Jules Verne
25. Twelfth Night - William Shakespeare
26. Black Beauty - Anna Sewell
27. White Fang - Jack London
28. All's Well That Ends Well - William Shakespeare

29. The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes - A.C. Doyle
30. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain

[princessoPUNK]

I only think the last one is worth waiting for for the completely horrific and out of place birth scene. I really dislike the Twilight books overall, but that one was entertaining in how ridiculous it was.

Btw, Stephanie Meyer started writing 'Midnight Sun' which was Twilight from Edward's perspective. It was leaked out so she stopped writing it, but there's a hundred or so pages of it online. It is also ridiculous.

I LOVE Midnight Sun(I have a quite bad teenage crush on Edward, and on Robert Pattinson for that matter). I think the books have alot more going for them than the birth scene in the last one. As long as you take them for the teen trash that they are, they are good books.

If you disliked them as a whole, why would you read all four? Surely if you don't enjoy the first one, you just stop.

[Runt]

1. Hitch hikers guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
2. The restaurant at the end of the Universe - Douglas Adams
3. Life, the Universe and everything - Douglas Adams
4. The Violin - Anne Rice
5. Revolution in Eastern Europe - Peter Cipkowski
6. Minority Report - Philip K Dick
7. Sandman (The dream hunters) - Neil Gaiman
8. Anansi boys - Neil Gaiman
9. Female Chauvinist Pigs - Ariel Levy (meh)
10. another Sandman (can't remember which) - Neil Gaiman
11. The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
12. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
13. New Moon - Stephenie Meyer
14. The Female Eunuch - Germaine Greer
15. The eclipse - Stephenie Meyer
16. Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer
)

17. Brass - Helen Walsh - Didn't enjoy but it was short so I kept reading on and thought it was slightly less shite for the last 15pages. Won't be reading anything else purely on recommendation from those at vogue, the guardian, the independent or the times. Some really decent scenes in there but the characters were quite badly written/confused.