One of my new year's resolutions was to read more in 2011. I've got an incredible backlog of titles to get through, and more stuff is being published that I have my eye on (like the forthcoming The Art of the Hobbit by Tolkien scholars Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, authors of the highly recommended J.R.R. Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator and The J.R.R Tolkien Companion and Guide) that I despair of ever making any real progress. As I've said before, there's too much to read in the world and not enough time to do it.
I started out averaging a book a week this year, but have fallen off a bit, in part due to a week-long business trip in which I had almost no time to read (See? I'm already making excuses). In truth I'm a slow reader. I'm also prone to fits of stopping and jotting down notes that I later use in my reviews (this creates a very real problem when I'm driving in the car and listening to a book on tape when I'm hit with a flash of inspiration). I also surf the web too damn much, reading everyone else's interesting blogs when I could be reading books.
So here's the meagre list:
Roots and Branches, Tom Shippey
Legend, David Gemmell
The Sword of Rhiannon, Leigh Brackett
Grails: Quests of the Dawn, Richard Gilliam, Mercedes Lackey, Andre Norton (editors)
God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Christopher Hitchens
The Burning Land, Bernard Cornwell
No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy
The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun, J.R.R. Tolkien
Resolute Determination: Napoleon and the French Empire (The Modern Scholar)
The Company They Keep, Diana Glyer
The Desert of Souls, Howard Andrew Jones
The Brothers Bulger, Howie Carr
Phantastes, George MacDonald
Tolkien and the Invention of Myth, Jane Chance (editor)
The best one of the bunch so far? No Country for Old Men.
9 comments:
Your reading is clearly getting in the way of adventuring. Throw a few books in the bag of holding, hoist your bardiche and be of with ye!
after having met my goal last year I've been a bit more lax in keeping track.
Right now I'm starting on David Foster Wallace's Infinite jest.. though at 50 pages into the beasts 1000... I've not found too much of anything funny.. and I certainly wouldn't have actually bought the book if a cute girl hadn't recommended it to me after hearing me say I enjoyed Nick Hornby.
Barad: Agreed! Maybe I could re-read the DMG and PHB during our next session and kill two birds with one stone.
Lagomorph: Didn't you read like, 150 books in a year?
Infinite Jest... brave man.
last year I got to like 164 or so. This year i'm on track to maybe get a hundred finished... depending on how long this one takes.
Nothing brave about it Brian, as I said, cute girl.. who reads books.. even if they are insufferable post modernist tat.. is a rare animal.. one that needs be stalked carefully.. even if that requires pretending to enjoy her favorite foods.
I like Cormac McCarthy a lot, I'd say Blood Meridian is probably his best.
And when will we get your thoughts on Legend?
I think Brian wrote an article on legend on the bg blog
A meagre list... you're funny... some years I have read the mid of that 14 you have read in 4 months, do you know what's the key of the trouble for people like me? slow readers and books with 900 pages or so... I could read books of REH that area publishing in Spain with his stories of Kirby O'Donnel, Dark Agnes,the historicals... with less than 200 pages everyone in a week or so but when I read A song of ice and fire...
More things I spend a lot of time reading blogs and forums, and really some times are more interesting that some books
People like you or lagomorph rex, your free time is only for reading books? don't you read comics, watch films or tv series?
I tried to read Meridian of blood by Cormac McCarthy but the biblical tone was confusing for me, I didn't finished it, by the way do you know it is on a list of the 100 best horror books?
well I gave up on the Infinite Jest after 230 so odd pages.
Thing is, It's another example of a book that would be considered horrible if it were sold as Genre being touted as great art.
Cute girl or not, I'm letting that one go.
Ahhh, I actually read you Black Gate article on Legend and (I forgot I had read it)-I kept remembering the discussion of you having NOT read it yet.
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