LibraryLover23's 2018 TBR Challenge

2018 TBR Challenge List
1. The Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander
2. The Kitchen Boy: A Novel Of The Last Tsar by Robert Alexander (finished 1/31/18)
3. The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot (finished 2/7/18)
4. The Power Of One by Bryce Courtenay
5. The Raven And The Nightingale: A Modern Mystery Of Edgar Allan Poe by Joanne Dobson (finished 4/8/18)
6. Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow
7. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
8. Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn (finished 3/21/18)
9. The Ocean At The End Of The Lane by Neil Gaiman (finished 3/28/18)
10. The Vintage Teacup Club by Vanessa Greene (finished 12/16/18)
11. The Silence Of The Lambs by Thomas Harris (finished 5/19/18)
12. Mudbound by Hillary Jordan (finished 11/22/18)
13. Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King
14. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
15. Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky
16. Clabbered Dirt, Sweet Grass by Gary Paulsen (finished 3/14/18)
17. Alive: The Story Of The Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read
18. In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepherd
19. Let The Circle Be Unbroken by Mildred D. Taylor
20. The March Of Folly: From Troy To Vietnam by Barbara W. Tuchman
21. The Woman In Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware (finished 9/11/18)
22. The Once And Future King by T.H. White
23. To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf (finished 12/29/18)
24. Sorcery & Cecilia, Or, The Enchanted Chocolate Pot by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer (finished 1/17/18)

Varied list!

Némirovsky I've sampled, but not that one (if I read one more by her, Suite française would be the one). I've been eyeing Flynn's Sharp objects, too, and will probably get to it at some point in 2018. Madame Bovary I've now read three times, I think, at various stages in my life, and at no point did I get what all the fuss was about. The ocean at the end of the lane was fun, but not entirely satisfying, I thought.

Good luck!

Great list! I'm curious about that Gaiman and that literary mystery sounds interesting. Happy reading!

From your list, I've only read the Gaiman book, so I'm looking forward to reading your review and comparing thoughts.

>2 Petroglyph: Thanks! I'll be interested to see if we share the same opinions.

>3 Narilka: The Raven and the Nightingale is the third entry in a mystery series that I really enjoy, about an English professor who solves crimes with a literary bent. I was excited to get it for Christmas so I put it on there, thinking it would be an easy one to cross off my list!

>4 passion4reading: I'm looking forward to it too, I read his American Gods last year and I'm interested in exploring his other work.

Couple of books that I recognize - two that I enjoyed and one that I just couldn't finish as it was a bit dark for my tastes. Oh! Just saw American Gods on your list. I just bought that one this year and hope to read it sometime in 2018.

>6 LittleTaiko: I liked American Gods, it's grown on me the more I've thought about it. I hope you like it too!

Loved the Prydain Chronicles, and I've been thinking about reading them with my kid this year. Bryce Courtenay is an author I keep circling around, never sure if I want to try him or not. Almost the same story with Doctorow, I did read Billy Bathgate but that's it. Flaubert is great, it's only too bad I can't read him in the original French. Lambs is a fantastic thriller, I've never seen the movie but liked reading it. I've a different Tuchman on my TBR pile, I hear she's great. I chose to read The Sword in the Stone but skipped the rest of T.H. White, will like reading your take on it. I'm a little afraid of Virginia Woolf, lol, but I have that on the pile for eventually.

>8 Cecrow: Aw, don't be afraid of Virginia Woolf! ;) I know I've read Mrs. Dalloway and A Room Of One's Own and both were fantastic. Plus, she gave one of my all-time favorite bookish quotes:

“I have sometimes dreamt ... that when the Day of Judgment dawns and the great conquerors and lawyers and statesmen come to receive their rewards -- their crowns, their laurels, their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble -- the Almighty will turn to Peter and will say, not without a certain envy when He sees us coming with our books under our arms, "Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading.”

1. Sorcery & Cecilia, Or, The Enchanted Chocolate Pot by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
Fun, frothy, light read about two cousins who write letters back and forth detailing their exploits in both romance and magical occurrences. Cecy lives in the English countryside, Kate in London, and both learn to navigate their respective boy troubles, a missing brother, and magic being practiced by both bad and good wizards. An enjoyable YA read for this snowy day.

You have a great list of books with intriguing titles. Looking forward to following your reading journey this year. I especially like the sound of The Vintage Teacup Club, Alive The Story of the Andes Survivors and Clabbered Dirt, Sweet Grass. I don't even know what 'clabbered' means.
I have read The Ocean at the End of the Lane. I couldn't put it down though I think it was meant for a YA audience not a woman in her late 50s. I tried and failed to read American Gods but reading the comments above I'm thinking I should give it another go. I struggled through parts of The Once and Future King and some parts I flew through.
Good luck with your reading.

>11 socialpages: Thank you! Clabbered just means "curdled." How it refers to dirt I don't know, but I'll be interested to find out! And I don't think you're ever too old to read any books. Sometimes it's fun to see what the kids are reading these days, although I think Gaiman is pretty well suited to everyone.

2. The Kitchen Boy: A Novel Of The Last Tsar by Robert Alexander
Very good historical fiction about the last days of the Romanovs, as told from the perspective of their kitchen boy, Leonka. The tension as the date of the execution drew near was almost unbearable, and the description of the act itself was hard to stomach, but the book as a whole was very well done. My only quibble is that I didn't really buy the twist at the end, the book would have been stronger if it had just left off the epilogue I think. Still it was well worth reading, and I'm looking forward to the big Nicholas and Alexandra biography I have languishing somewhere on my shelves.

3. The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot
Very cute read about an insecure 14 year-old girl who learns she's actually the princess of a small European principality. This might be one of the rare instances where the movie was just as good as, if not better than, the book. (I didn't care for book grandma nearly as much as I did Julie Andrews' grandma in the movie.) Still, it was very cute and funny and I'll most likely be reading the next few entries forthwith while the plot is still fresh in my mind.

>2 Petroglyph:, it's a great topic but yes, that ending (based on looking at others' reviews) doesn't sound appropriate.

4. Clabbered Dirt, Sweet Grass by Gary Paulsen
Dreamy, lyrical writing about four seasons on a farm. I'm a big fan of Paulsen's - this one was a bit different from the other books of his I've read as there was no linear plot to speak of, it was more just vignettes of the people and places that make up farm life (which is a subject matter that I love reading about).

Having grown up on a dairy farm and having a brother who works on a ranch, this book sounds like something I could really get into.

>17 LittleTaiko: I'm a sucker for reading any farm life/prairie life/homesteading type of story. It's a fascinating subject matter I think.

5. Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
I think I can safely say I won't be reading any more Gillian Flynn books. I can usually handle dark and disturbing, but this one was too much, even for me. (I also didn't care for her bestselling Gone Girl, as I couldn't stand either of the two main characters.) In this one the mystery was compelling, but the details were disgusting - a reporter who cuts herself returns to her small Missouri hometown to investigate a serial killer who is targeting children. (And did I mention the killer removes the victims' teeth?) Also, as a newly minted vegan, the descriptions of the activity in a pig slaughterhouse made me physically ill. No thank you, Gillian. I'll be moving on to something lighter next.

>19 LibraryLover23:, yeah, there's market for that sort of slasher-thriller, but I'm definitely not in it.

I tried to read this one years ago before she became so popular for Gone Girl and just couldn't finish it. Sounds like I stopped before it got even more gruesome and dark. Strangely enough I did actually like GG quite a bit though.

>19 LibraryLover23: Thanks for the warning. I think I'll avoid that one.

>20 Cecrow:, >21 LittleTaiko:, >22 Narilka: It bothered me big time. She is a good writer in that I wanted to find out how the mystery was solved, but usually with books like this the killer is the one with the disturbing affectations, in her books it seems every character is nauseating in some way. Her stuff just isn't for me I guess!

6. The Ocean At The End Of The Lane by Neil Gaiman
This one was strange but good, like the other Neil Gaiman books I've read. After visiting an alternate reality with his friend Lettie Hempstock, our unnamed child narrator is horrified to discover that he's brought a creature from that reality back with him. Not only that, the creature has also hoodwinked his family into thinking she's their beautiful new tenant, and the children's new nanny besides. The narrator then needs the help of Lettie, her mother and grandmother to send the creature back where it belongs. Odd but intriguing, I'm looking forward to reading the other Gaiman(s) I have on my shelves.

7. The Raven And The Nightingale: A Modern Mystery Of Edgar Allan Poe by Joanne Dobson
I adore these literary mysteries about an English professor who gets caught up in solving crimes at her prestigious liberal arts college. For a cozy, it's very erudite, bookish and New England-y, and there's a nice slow-burn romance between Professor Pelletier and the police chief, Lieutenant Piotrowski. This is the third in the series and, as you can tell by the title, the works of Edgar Allan Poe come into play. Very enjoyable stuff.

8. The Silence Of The Lambs by Thomas Harris
Having never seen the movie version of this story, I'm glad that I now know what the title means and why the cover always features a picture of a moth. Anyway, this was a very good, breakneck-paced thriller about an upstart FBI agent who interviews and somewhat befriends the notorious cannibal Hannibal Lecter in order to find another serial killer. I do have to say that I think I'd give the slight edge to the first book of this series, if only because Frank Dolarhyde was a bit more of a creeper to me than the killer in this book. But Lecter is reliably great in any capacity, truly one of the best fiction villains out there.

>26 LibraryLover23:, similarly I've only read the book, can't stomach movies like that. Although the movie is so heralded, it's sometimes tempting.

>26 LibraryLover23: That book kept me up at night when I read it in high school lol

And I still compare creepy basements to the one at the end of that book. Did it just a couple of weeks ago actually, lol.

I actually thought the book was creepier than the movie.

I'm not sure if I'll watch the movie or not, but I'm loving the books. And it's crazy how Harris gets you (well, me, anyway) to like and even somewhat root for Hannibal Lecter.

Almost everyone loves dear ol' Dr Lecter, haha; Harris does indeed do a great job at making us root for the sociopathic murderer. Anthony Hopkins does, too, though, he's amazingly excellent as Lecter and the movie is fabulous.

>32 .Monkey.: Maybe I'll watch the movie sometime. If I think I can handle it!

9. The Woman In Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware
I didn't care for this one that much. I never warmed up to the main character, which is a problem as she's pretty much the only character through big chunks of the book. Lo, a writer for a travel magazine, joins an exclusive cruise ship on its maiden voyage, only to hear someone in the cabin next to hers get thrown overboard. When she raises the alarm however, no one believes her, as no one was staying in that cabin. Lo then takes it upon herself to solve the mystery, while not being sure who she can trust. Overall I thought some parts of the book were good, but the plotline stretched credulity a little bit too much for my taste.

10. Mudbound by Hillary Jordan
Well-written story about the uneasy relationship between a white family and their black sharecropper tenants in the Mississippi Delta just after World War II. The book opens with the death of hated patriarch Pappy, and trickles down to give the perspectives of his sons, daughter-in-law, and their neighbors. The ending in particular was very well-done and elevated the book overall.

I've heard really good things about that one. Wasn't it turned into a movie recently?

>36 LittleTaiko: Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's a Netflix movie. I'd be interested to see how it's portrayed.

11. The Vintage Teacup Club by Vanessa Greene
Better-than-expected tale of three women who bond over a vintage tea set that they find at a flea market. The chapters alternate in perspective between Maggie, a divorcée trying to land a big client for her florist business, Alison, struggling with financial troubles and two unruly teenage daughters, and Jenny, who is planning her upcoming wedding with the pain of her mother abandoning her as a child lurking in the background. The ending wrapped up a bit too neatly to be believable, but I thought all of the characters were distinctive and well-drawn.

Nice review!

>39 billiejean: Thanks, BJ!

12. To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
The book opens on the Ramsay family, their eight children, and various friends and acquaintances as they spend the day at their summer home in the Hebrides. The stream-of-consciousness style jumps from one character's perspective to the next as they attend to their various activities over the course of one summer day. (For example, youngest son James would like to visit the lighthouse on a nearby island but is told that the weather won't be suitable.)

There then follows a time jump, where we see that the house is closed up and the fates of various characters are revealed. The final section of the book finds some of the characters back at the summer home again, ten years later, with one final visit to the lighthouse. I loved the descriptions in this one, particularly of the ramshackle beach house with everyone's comings and goings, it was very evocative. Not a book that you can skim through by any means, as it demands your full and complete attention, but you'll be richly rewarded for it.

Great review. I would like to read that one.

>42 billiejean: It was challenging, but worth it!

>43 LibraryLover23:
I think it's my favourite by Woolf (so far).

>41 LibraryLover23:, I haven't read Woolf but that's where I intend to start with her; it's in my TBR pile, somewhere, under something, someplace.