I have started reading a book which may be unique in its not ticking a single item on the list: an anthology of poetry called 101 Portraits in Verse by my favourite poet, Hugo Williams. However I’ve left this at home and travelled up north with my kindle, so I’m also reading My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante. This is apparently one of a series of three, and therefore if I do manage to read the other two, will tick 31 (a trilogy), probably written originally in Italian (8), set in Naples (12), and recommended by Lisa (16).
When I picked up my kindle it opened in the middle of A Tale of Two Cities, which would have been 49, if I’d bothered.
Another Lisa? I’ve never heard of it!
I finished Mr Mac and Me (see last week) but haven’t found much time to read so have nothing to tick off this week. The Luminaries is next on the pile.
Was that not you? I wonder if I heard it on a podcast. What did you tell me to buy, then?
I don’t know. Umpteen books, I expect. Mr Mac and me, last week.
Perhaps you saw it on Twitter (#45)?!
I’ve just finished A Little History of the World by Ernst Gombrich, which satisfies numbers 8, 13, 40, 47 (by the Nazis because it was too pacifist) and 50 (although anyone could read it). I’d certainly recommend it and I plan to read it to Tom when we have finished the current interminable episode of HP.
I’m currently reading The Elephant by Slawomir Mrozek, which satisfies numbers 8, 11 and 40. I read Behind The Iron Curtain by Anne Applebaum last year and, in that context, these stories have more power because I’ve got a better understanding of the politics that prevailed at the time of writing (1950s Poland). As the review from the Speccie quoted on the cover says, the stories are Kafkaesque but funnier – my favourite so far is the story entitled “Poetry”, largely because it reminds me of my father’s recently-found interest in writing (generally awful, but occasionally good) poems.
So (for my own reference), I’ve now completed categories 1, 3, 4, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 26, 28, 35, 38, 40, 41, 47 and 50. Eighteen categories done – the easier ones, I reckon.
Oh, and 7. Nineteen done.