Aruba's 1010 Challenge

Well, I decided to join in, and decided I was too impatient to wait any longer to pick my categories. Since I'm not sure that I will be able to read 100 books, but want to try for the 10 books in 10 categories, I'm making my categories as broad as possible, so that most books I read will fit into at least one of the categories. That way, hopefully, I won't get sick of or slack off in a particularly category.

People's categories in this challenge have been incredibly creative, and I'm looking forward to follow everyone's reading journey. My categories are boring, but I'm hoping they'll boost my ability to meet the 100 books goal (and get rid of some of my substantial TBR pile).

Categories:

1. World Tour--written by authors from 10 different countries (not including US, Great Britain, and Canada)

2. From the 1001 List

3. The Oldies--Books I've owned for more than 5 years

4. Nonfiction

5. Books Written Before 1900

6. Books Written Between 1900 and 1950

7. Books Written Between 1950 and 2000

8. Books Written Between 2000 and 2010

9. ABC's--The Alpha--One author each of whom's last name starts with one of the first 10 letters of the alphabet (i.e. an author whose last name begins with A, one whose last name begins with B, and so on up to J)

10. ABC's--The Omega--One author with a last name starting with one of the last 10 letters of the alphabet (Q through Z, reserving the right that if there's no author I want to read whose last name begins with Q, I'll use P).

1. WORLD TOUR

1. The Emigrants by Vilhelm Moberg--Sweden 5 stars 1/10
2. Harp of Burma by Michio Takeyama Burma 3 stars 2/10
3. The Vagrants by Yiyun Li China 3/10
4. This Earth of Mankind by Pramoedya Ananta Toer Indonesia 3/10
5. The Angel Maker by Stefan Brijs Belgium 4/10
6. Voyage of the Short Serpent by Bernard du Boucheron France
7. The Cave by Tim Krabbe Holland
8. The Informers by Juan Gabriel Vasquez Colombia
9. Thursday Night Widows by Claudia Piniero Argentina
10. Almost Dead by Assaf Gavron Israel

2. FROM THE 1001 LIST

1. Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton 5 stars 1/10
2. Alamut by Vladimir Bartol 4 stars 1/10
3. The Case of Comrade Tulayev by Victor Serge 2/10
4. Santa Evita by Tomas Eloy Martinez 3 1/2 stars 4/10
5. The Case Worker by Gyorgy Konrad 3 1/2 stars 5/10
6. Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo 5 stars 5/10
7. The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell 4 1/2 stars 6/10
8. Growth of the Soil by Knut Hamsun 7/10
9. Ancestral Voices by Etienne van Heerden
10. Manon des Sources by Marcel Pagnol

3. THE OLDIES--BOOKS I'VE OWNED MORE THAN 5 YEARS

1. A Time to Dance, No Time to Weep by Rumer Godden 3 stars; 1/10
2. Desertion by Abdulrazak Gurnah 3 stars 5/10
3. The Law by Roger Vailland 4 stars 6/10
4. Mara and Dann by Doris Lessing 2 1/2 stars 6/10
5. The War of the End of the World by 38630::Mario Vargas Llosa 5 stars 7/10
6. Generations of Winter by Vasily Aksyonov

4. NONFICTION

1. Out of Egypt by Andre Aciman 3/10
2. Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent Into Madness by Jim Frederick 4/10
3. Drohobycz, Drohobycz by Henryk Grynberg 4 1/2 stars 5/10
4. The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World Ed. John Boardman 6/10
5. Columbine by Dave Cullen 4 stars 7/10
6. My Lobotomy by Howard Dully 8/10
7. In the Place of Justice by Wilbert Rideau 9/10
8. Clandestine in Chile by Gabriel Garcia Marquez 9/10
9. The File by Timothy Garton Ash
10. Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin

5. BOOKS WRITTEN BEFORE 1900

1. Desparate Remedies Thomas Hardy 3 stars 1/10
2. Bel-Ami Guy de Maupassant 4 stars 6/10
3. The Kill Emil Zola 5 stars 6/10
4. The Belly of Paris by Emile Zola 7/10
5. Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith

6. BOOKS WRITTEN BETWEEN 1900 AND 1950

1. Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada 2/10
2. 16421::Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust 2/10
3. 42585::The Guermantes Way by Marcel Proust 6/10
4. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh 7/10
5. Light in August by William Faulkner 2/10
6. The Hidden Force by 8585288::Louis Couperous
7. 67888::Against the Grain by Joris-Karl Huysmans
8. We by Yevgeny Zamyatin
9. The Liar by Martin Hansen

7. BOOKS WRITTEN BETWEEN 1950 AND 2000

1. Unto a Good Land by Vilhelm Moberg 1/10
2. Zombie by oatesjoycecaroloates::Joyce Carol Oates 2/10
3. Level 7 by Mordecai Roshwald 4/10
4. Force of Gravity by R.S. Jones 4/10
5. Nineteen Seventy-four by David Peace 4/10
6. Fires on the Plain by Shohei Ooka 7/10
7. Faces and Masks by eduardogaleano::Eduardo Galeano 8/10
8. The Settlers by Vilhelm Moberg
9. The Crime of Olga Arbyelina by Andrei Makine
10. The Sleeping Beauty by Elizabeth Taylor 10/10

8. BOOKS WRITTEN BETWEEN 2000 AND 2010

1. The Help by Kathryn Stockett 2/10
2. Generosity: An Enhancement by Richard Powers 2/10
3. Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips 3/10
4. A Time for Everything by Karl O. Knausgaard 3/10
5. Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver 4/10
6. Gather the Weeds by Patrick Kilgallon 4/10
7. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell 6/10
8. Yellow Blue Tibia by Adam Roberts 6/10
9. The Passage by Justin Cronin 8/10
10. Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson 8/10

9. ABC's--THE ALPHA (ONE AUTHOR EACH WITH LAST NAME STARTING WITH A THROUGH J)

A. Chicago by Alaa al Aswany 3/10
B. From A to X by John Berger 4/10
C. Brodeck by Philippe Claudel 5/10
D. Room by Emma Donoghue
E. The Broken Lands by Robert Edric 10/10
F. Spies by Michael Frayn 8/10
G. Still Alice by Lisa Genova 2 stars 7/10
H. The Liar by Martin Hansen 11/10
I.

10. ABC's--THE OMEGA (ONE AUTHOR EACH WITH LAST NAME STARTING Q THROUGH Z)

1. Q The Maias by Eca de Queiros 5 stars 8/10
2. R Isle of Passion by Laura Restrepo 2/10
3. S Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout 3 1/2 stars 6/10
4. T The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas 6/10
5. U
6. V The Royal Family by William Vollmann 8/10
7. W Lowboy by John Wray 7/10
8. X Half of Man is Woman by Zhang Xianliang 31/2 stars 1/10
9. Y Strangers by Taichi Yamada 9/1o
10.Z

8 SORRY, didn't mean to barge in in the middle of your list! When I started writing just the first post was up...

What I was going to say was:

The alphabet categories look like fun!

Raymond Qeuneau is a good tip for a fun, light and very enjoyable writer starting with a Q. Most of his books you'll read in a day. I recommend Zazie in the Metro!

Your alphabet categories impress me...can't wait to see which author you pick whose last name starts with "X"!

Gingerbreadman--I've read Zazie in the Metro. Are there any others by Queneau you can recommend?
Christina--re "X"--see below.

Since one of my ulterior motives in joining this challenge is to reduce my TBR pile, I've gone through it, and I am listing the authors by letter whose books I own (with a few exceptions) and haven't read. I'll make every effort to choose my alphabet reading from these.

A

Achebe, Aciman, Agnon(don't have, but want), Aksatov, Aksyonov, Akutagawa, al-Ghitani (don't have, but want), Alain-Fournier, Ali, Allison, Amado, Amis, Ammaniti, Anand (don't have, but want), Anderson, Andric, Antunes, Ahpelfeld (don't have, but want), Ariyoshi, Aslam, al Aswany, Atxaga, St. Aubyn, Auster

B

Babel, Bakis, Banks, Barbery, Barrett, Bausch, Becker (don't have but want), de Bernieres, Beyer, Biguenet, Birdsell, Boyd, Boyle, Bronte, Brown, Bryson, Burn (don't have but want), Butler, Buford

C

Cahill, Cather, Chandrasekaran, Charlesworth, Chatterjee, Childress, Christensen, Comyns, Connell, Conrad, Coover, Cortazar, Crace, Cronin

D

Dagerman, Dermout, Dessiax, Dew, Dickens, Dixon, Djebar, Donoso, Doestoevsky, Drewe, Dumas, Duncker, Duras

E

Echenoz, Echewa, Edge, Eliot, Endo, Exley

F

Faber, Fallada, Farah, Faulkner, Faulks, Feneon, Fergus, Fielding, De Forest, Franzen, Frederic

G

Gaitskill, Galeano (don't have but want), Gary, Gaskell, Gates, Gee, Ghosh, Gissing, Godden, Grant, Grass, Gray, Grossman, Gurnah, Gutterson

H

Hall, Hamilton, Hamsun, Hardy, Hay, van Heerden (don't have, want) Hensher, Hodgson, Hogan, Hospital, Howells, Hugo, Humphreys, Huong, Hyland

I

Irving, Irwin, Ishiguro

J

Jackson, Jelinek, Jelloun, Jewett, Jones

and the end of the alphabet:

Z

Zabytko, Zola, Zweig

Y

Yoshimura, Yezierska, Yates, Yamasaki

X

Xingjian, Xue (don't have, want), Xianliang (want don't have)

W

Woolf, Woiwode, Winton, Welsh, Welty, Wescott, Wesley, Wiesel, Williams, Wilsey, Weisskopp, Waugh, Wat, Wallant, Walker

V

Voltaire, Vollman, Vailland

U

Updyke, Undset

T

Twain, Thackery, Thiong'o, Trollope, Tucci, Tunstrom (want, don't have), Taylor, Takeyama, Tagore

S

Strout, Smollet, Sokolov, Solzhenitsyn, Soseki, Stace, Stafford, Stendahl, Steinbeck, Siga, Simpson, Slaughter, Smiley, Scott, Self, See, Seth, Shaogong, Sherwood, Said, Santmeyer, Saramago, Scholz, Schreber (want, don't have), Schreiner, Schulz, Schuyler, Scliar, Scott

R

Rynell (want, don't have), Richardson, Richter, Rosendorfer, Rushdie, Reiken, Restrepo

Q

?

I love this idea Aruba! The alphabetical authors categories.

There has been some mention of a possible alphabet challenge getting set up recently and I'd say the idea seems to be gaining momentum. Q does seem to be a bit of a stumbling block though.

I'd be interested in doing one haphazardly. I do love that there seem to be more new challenges popping up on LT lately. I enjoy reading in several that I don't actually belong to.

#15: It's been a long time since I read Queneau, and since I read him in swedish, I'm not at all sure what the titles might be in english. Exercises in style I assume you've already read, but that's a really fun experiment. I also remember enjoying one called something like "It's a small world" in swedish, with people ending up having the exact same conversations in a lot of different situations.

I love your alphabet idea! About the 'Q' challenge, I recently picked up The Mao Case by Qiu Xiaolong from my library. I'm pretty sure that Qiu is his surname, as it's the custom for the Chinese to write their names with the one-syllable surname first. I'm not sure if you're into Asian mysteries, and I haven't read the book yet so can't offer an opinion, but the reviews of this author seem to be generally positive.

For anyone that like the alphabet idea: http://www.librarything.com/groups/alphabetchallenges :)

In a pinch, you could use an Ellery Queen book. That's really a pen name however.

Two Qs I like are Amanda Quick and Julia Quinn.

There's also Kwei Quartey who wrote Wife of the Gods.

I just did this for a K author category but this site is good for researching http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/q/ takes you straight to the Q authors.

The home page lets you pick a letter to browse, only fiction though and I do not know if there is an American version of the site! :)

Have fun!

Maybe I should be posting in the alphabet challenge group!

>25 calm:
I am using this site almost daily when I need any information for a book or a series and I did not even think to use it to find authors with the letters that I am missing :)

AnnieMod and calm--Thanks for the links. Those are great resources. And thanks to mathgirl, hailelib and cyderry for the suggestions.

I've chosen my Q book now. I was in the bookstore last weekend and looked in the Q section and found The Maias by Eca de Queiros, which is described on the back by Harold Bloom as "one of the most impressive European novels of the nineteenth century, fully comparable to the most inspired novels of the great Russian, French, Italian and English masters of prose fiction." I'm looking forward to reading it.

Well, I have been patient for the last several months waiting to start this challenge, and now the time is almost here.

Several of the books I will read each month will be "dictated" by certain outside influences; the rest will be chosen by whim. My initial goal is to read 5 books in each of the categories, and if time permits to get to 10 in each category by the end of the year.

In January, my reading will include:

Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton for my RL Book Club--1001 category

The Emigrants by Vilhelm Moberg for Reading Globally, Sweden

Light in August by Wm. Faulkner, for a Faulkner Salon group read--1900-1950 category (we have through February to finish this)

Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust--For non-LT year-long Proust read--1900-1950 category

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo--I am slightly more than half way through this and should finish it in January. Will put in the pre-1900 category or the 1001 category.

A book by Thomas Hardy for Monthly Author Reads

We'll see if I have time for anything else in January.

In February, I'll be reading The Help for my RL book club, and that's as far ahead as I've planned.

That's an ambitious January. I need to get to some of those books also.

Finally got to finish my first two books for this challenge. I have written reviews of these books on my 75 book thread for 2010, and will only briefly describe them here. Both were 5 star books

1. The Emigrants by Vilhelm Moberg

1 of 1 WORLD TOUR CATEGORY (Sweden)--a wonderful saga of the Swedish emigration to America in the mid-19th century. Beautiful understated writing, and wonderful characters.

2. Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton

1 of 1 1001 CATEGORY--The hopeful tone of this story of 2 fathers--one an elderly Black clergyman and the other a wealthy white landowner--who fiercely love their sons and who are brought together by horrific circumstances, has not been justified by just how little has changed since the 1948 publication of this book.

The Alan Paton book was one of my favorites for 2009. Just incredibly moving. I read another one by him before - Ah, But Your Land is Beautiful. Also highly recommended.

I'll read Cry, the beloved country this year, thanks to cmbohn's recommendation. Good to hear others like it too!

I've finished two more books for this challenge. Once again reviews are on my 75 book challenge thread, which can be accessed from my profile page.

3. Alamut (wrong touchstone) by Vladimir Bartol

Book 2 of 10 1001 Category

The story, based on historical fact, of an 11th century Persian fortress and its leader who is training a cadre of young "fedai" to go on suicide missions, and who ensures their willingness to die by giving them a taste of paradise. While this may sound like a novel out of today's headlines, it was written in 1938.

4. Half of Man is Woman by Zhang Xianliang

Book 1 of 10 for the Omega Alphabet challenge, letter X

This is a novel, based on the author's true life experiences, of life in Chinese labor camps and jails during the Cultural Revolution.

I'm also planning to read Cry, the Beloved Country later this year - and also glad to hear that others are enjoying it.

I seem to be plodding along at two books a week:

5. A Time to Dance, No Time to Weep by Rumer Godden

Book 1 of 10 of my Oldies category (I've owned this book at least 15 years)

This is a memoir of Rummer Godden's life in India from her childhood through age 38. Her stories of her childhood are magical. During World War II, she and her two young daughters lived in a house in Kashmir without running water or electricity, and grew their own food. Her descriptions of Kashmir and the Himalayas were wonderful. My complaint about the book is the Godden never seems to recognize her position of privilege, and her only interactions with Indian people seem to be as servants. Even when they were growing their own food because they were so poor, she still had a cook.

6. Desparate Remedies by Thomas Hardy

Book 1 of 10 Pre-1900 Category

This book is a so-call "Sensation Novel" of the Victorian era. As such, it has: bigamous marriages, misdirected letters, romantic triangles, heroines in physical danger, drugs/potions/poisons, characters who adopt disguises, strained coincidences. It even has a short lesbian love scene (not a usual element of the Sensation Novel).

This is not Hardy's best. Not even near. If you are only going to read one or two Hardy novels, this should not be the one you read. However, it is the only Hardy novel to my knowledge that has a happy ending.

Full reviews of these two books are on my 75 book challenge which can be accessed from my profile page.

My final reads for January:

7. Unto a Good Land by Vilhelm Moberg

Book 1 of 10 Books Written Between 1950 and 2000

The emigrant families I became emotionally involved with in The Emigrants have landed in New York City and must make their way to Minnesota. This is the story of their journey by train (which none of them have seen before), boat through the Great Lakes, and finally on foot. They arrive too late in the season to plant a crop and must somehow endure their first winter in Minnesota with inadequate food supplies and shelter. I was not as impressed with this volume as with the first volume, but I'm still interested in the characters and the story of their first years in America, so I will probably continue with the next two volumes.

8. Light in August by William Faulkner

Book 1 of 10 of the Alphabet Challenge the Alpha--Letter F

Light in August begins with pregnant Lena Grove arriving in Jefferson, Mississippi in search of the father of her child, thinking, "I have come from Alabama: a fur piece. All the way from Alabama a-walking. A fur piece." The novel ends with Lena thinking, "My, my. A body does get around. Here we ain't been coming from Alabama but two months and now it's already Tennessee." In between, during the two weeks or so that Lena stays in Jefferson, events swirl all about her, murder and mayhem, as she remains focused on her baby and finding its father.

This is the most accessible of Faulkner's novels, and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to start reading this amazing American novelist. Full review will be on my 75 book thread, accessible through my profile page.

8. Light in August by William Faulkner

Book 1 of 10 of the Alphabet Challenge the Alpha--Letter F

Light in August begins with pregnant Lena Grove arriving in Jefferson, Mississippi in search of the father of her child, thinking, "I have come from Alabama: a fur piece. All the way from Alabama a-walking. A fur piece." The novel ends with Lena thinking, "My, my. A body does get around. Here we ain't been coming from Alabama but two months and now it's already Tennessee." In between, during the two weeks or so that Lena stays in Jefferson, events swirl all about her, murder and mayhem, as she remains focused on her baby and finding its father.

This is the most accessible of Faulkner's novels, and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to start reading this amazing American novelist. Full review will be on my 75 book thread, accessible through my profile page.

January Status Report on Books Completed

World Tour--1
1001--2
Oldies--1
Nonfiction--0
Before 1900--1
1900-1950--0
1950-2000--1
2000-2010--0
ABC's-Alpha--1
ABC's Omega--1

9. Harp of Burma by Michio Takeyama

Book 2 of 10 World Tour Category Burma

This novel written shortly after World War II follows a group of Japanese soldiers lost in the jungles of Burma. When they run into a group of English soldiers, they learn that the war is over. One of their men is sent to convince another enclave of Japanese soldiers who are continuing to fight that the war is indeed over.

He never returns, and over the next year, the group of soldiers are held in a prison camp, wondering what happened to their colleague. Was he killed? Will he ever be able to return to Japan?

The book is contemplative, and raises issues of why some cultures are warlike (Japan) and some are peaceful (Burma).

3 stars

I have added:

10. Isle of Passion by Laura Restrepo

Book 2 of 10 of the Omega Alphabet Category "R"

This fascinating book, based on true events, tells the story of a group of Mexican soldiers and their families who are abandoned on a remote, barren and inhospitable island in the early years of the 20th century. Highly recommended. Full review on my 75 Book Challenge thread.

11. The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Book 1 of 10 of Books Written Between 2000 and 2010 Category

The story of black maids in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960's. A quick, enjoyable read, but not the classic many think it is. Full review will be posted on my 75 Book thread.

12. Generosity: An Enhancement by Richard Powers

Book 2 of 10 of the Books Written Between 2000 and 2010 Category

Richard Powers is one of my favorite contemporary authors. Many of his books raise difficult scientific and ethical issues. In this book, Thassa, a young refugee from Algeria, is always happy and upbeat, despite the hardships she has endured. When a biomedical company on the verge of discovering the "happiness" gene, learns of her existence, her world is turned upside down. Full review will be posted on my 75 book thread. Recommended.

Wow, you are making great progress here. Lots of good books. And definitely love the alphabet challenge; that is a very good plan for getting through the TBR pile. I'm intrigued now to look over the books I have and see the distribution of last names alphabetically...

I'm interested in reading The Emigrants and the following books; I lived in South Jersey for awhile, and had dinner a couple of times at The Old Swedes Inn in Swedesboro, where I learned that it was part of the New Sweden colony...I was completely clueless about Swedish emigration to the US until then, and still don't know very much.

Hi Lisa--I hope you do read The Emigrants. I've found the last volume, but I'm still looking for the third volume.

Now to add a few more books. I added to to the category of books written between 1900 and 1950:

13. Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada

Book 1 of 10 of the Books Written Between 1900 and 1950 Category

Hans Fallad wrote this book in 24 days a year after the end of World War II, and after his release from a Nazi insane asylum. Based on true events, it details the story of a working class couple who express their resistance to the Nazi regime by writing postcards criticizing the Nazis and leaving them in public places. They hoped the postcards would inspire others to act or resist. Unbeknownst to them, the German people were so paranoid that almost every postcard was immediately turned over to the police. (However, the postcards did send the Gestapo into a tizzy for a few years.) The book examines the question of what one person can do in the face of overwhelming evil, and whether any act of resistance is futile. It is also the love story of Anna and Otto whose love deepens as they distribute the cards, and later during the time they are imprisoned in the dungeons of the Gestapo. Highly recommended.

4 Stars

14. The Case of Comrade Tulayev by Victor Serge

Book 3 of 10 Omega Alphabet Category--Letter S

Set during the Stalinist purges of the late 1930's, this book begins when Tulayev, a high party official, is assassinated in a random, unplanned shooting by an anonymous clerk. Since such a crime cannot go unpunished, the investigators, who themselves also come under suspicion, begin building cases against several, seemingly random, party or government officials, none of whom actually had anything to do with the assassination. The life of each of these officials is described, including the important role each played in the revolutions, and then their present lives and their growing awareness that they are next on Stalin's list of victims. Each must make a decision as to how he will act when the time comes. Highly recommended.

4 stars

15. Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust

Book 2 of 10 of Books Written Between 1900 and 1950 Category

This is Volume II of Proust's In Search of Lost Time. In it, Marcel falls in and out of love with Gilberte. He spends the summer at Balbec on the shore, where he meets Albertine and her group of beautiful young girls. What can I say--reading Proust is a life experience I think most readers would be amply rewarded for undertaking. I'm participating in a year long read of In Search of Lost Time and I look forward to my "Proust-reading Time" every day.

5 stars

February Progress Report:

World Tour--2
1001---2
Oldies--1
Nonfiction--0
Before 1900--1
1900-1950--2
1950-2000--1
2000-2010--2
Alpha--1
Omega--3

I'm spreading them out pretty evenly, but I need to get going on some nonfiction--my nemesis.

16. Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates

Book 2 of 10 of books written between 1950 and 2000

This book, based on the life of Jeffery Dahlmer, is not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach. It's one of the creepiest books I've ever read, and at the same time one of the most believable. Not recommended for even the most hard core Oates fan, unless you can handle being inside the head of a sexual pyschopath serial killer for a while.

17. Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Philips

Book 3 of 10 of books written between 2000 and 2010

I found this book to be very funny and very original, but there seem to be a fair number of other readers who did not care for it. The original Olympian gods are living in a decrepit house in London, and must work to make ends meet--Artemis is a dog walker, Aphrodite is a phone sex operater. They are not heroic figures, but like the gods of Greek mythology they are selfish, petty, vindictive, and promiscuous. When their antics go too far, the future of the world is in jeopardy, and a real hero must be found. This is not a novel in the conventional fantasy genre, but more of a parody of the genre.

18. Chicago by Alaa al Aswany

Book 2 of 10 of Alphabet--Alpha Challenge Letter A

One of the worst books I have ever read. Don't bother with it.

I just picked up Zombie and plan to use it for my Z read. Sorry to hear you didn't like it.

I liked it very much, but I guess I abbreviated my actual review too much. I was just trying to forewarn people that it's not a book for everyone. I gave it 4 stars on my 75 book thread because I thought what Oates did was amazing and very convincing.

Thanks for the update. Looks like I just misinterpreted what you had to say about the book. Makes me feel a bit better about it now. Not that I'll be getting to it anytime soon though as I'm only on Q at the moment.

18. A Time for Everything by Karl O. Knausgaard

Book 4 of 10 of Books Written Between 2000 and 2010 Category

In this unique book, Knausgaard explores human encounters with angels, through a fictional 16th century philosopher who studies their existence and nature, and through imaginative retellings of Bible stories, particularly the story of Cain and Abel and the story of Noah and the Flood. Highly recommended.

19. The Vagrants by Yiyun Li

Book 3 of World Tour Category China

This beautiful but sad book portrays the effect the execution of a young woman for being a counter-revolutionary had on a broad spectrum of the inhabitants of the Chinese town where she lived and died. The characters are deeply and truly imagined. The reader is drawn into the lives of one and all. I was especially affected by Tong, a seven-year old boy whose unwitting actions while searching for his lost dog led to his father's being beaten by the authorities into a permanent vegetative state.

#51 . . . I thought Gods Behaving Badly was lots of fun!

Nickelini--I'm glad you liked it too.

20. This Earth of Mankind by Pramoedya Ananta Toer

Book 4 of World Tour Category--Indonesia

Volume I of the Buru Quartet this is a comprehensive look at colonial Indonesia in the early twentieth century from the point of view of a young native noble man who falls in love with the daughter of a Dutch merchant and his concubine.

21. Out of Egypt by Andre Aciman

Book 1 Nonfiction

Memoir of growing up Jewish in Alexandria Egypt in the 1950's. The city of Alexandria shimmers, and he had an Edenic childhood.

22. From A to X by John Berger

Book 5 of Books Written between 2000 and 2010 Category

A series of love letters between Aida and Xavier, her lover who is in prison for life for being a terrorist, in an unnamed country where day to day life is punctuated by Apache helicopters and Humvees.

23. Gather the Weeds by Patrick Kilgallon

Book 6 of Books Written 2000 and 2010 Category

Set in the dystopian future where "weeds," those who are born less than perfect, i.e. the deaf, epileptic, mentally challenged, etc., are gathered into compounds at an early age and segregated from the "perfects." I found the book to lack coherence, and I would not recommend it.

For the remainder of April I've added and will review soon:

Santa Evita by Tomas Eloy Martinez 1001
Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent into Madness by Jim Frederick NF
Level 7 by Mordecai Roshwald 1950-2000
Force of Gravity by R.S. Jones 1950-2000
The Angel Maker by Stefan Brijs World Tour
Nineteen Seventy-four by David Peace 1950-2000

Thank you for the reviews, Aruba. The Fallada and the Serge are now on the Book Depository wishlist.

Thanks for stopping by Pamelad, I think you'll enjoy both books.

Very abbreviated comments about the books above; full reviews are on my 75 book challenge thread:

24. Santa Evita by Tomas Eloy Martinez Book 3 of 10 1001 Category

Eva Peron, wife of Argentine dictator Juan Peron, is a somewhat mythical figure in Argentine history. After her death in her early thirties, she became a cult figure. On the orders of Juan Peron, her body was perfectly preserved, and was to be put on display in a shrine. However, before the shrine could be built, Juan was ousted, and Eva's body disappeared.

This book, part fact, part imagination, portrays the events of the 16 years during which her body was missing, as her body is shifted from place of hiding to place of hiding. It also describes the unusual effects she had on those who came into contact with her after her death. This book is a fascinating recreation in life and death of a unique woman, and the country she so heavily influenced.

25. Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent into Madness by Jim Frederick

Book 2 of 10 Nonfiction Category

This book explores the pyscological isolation and breakdown of the platoon, day by day, week by week, from the time it arrives in Iraq, until the horrific war crime some of its soldiers committed when they raped a 14 year old girl and murdered her, her parents and her 4 year old sister.

The point that comes through loud and clear in this powerful and stunning book is that responsibility for such crimes reaches far above the four soldiers who actually committed the deed.

26. Level 7 by Mordecai Roshwald

Book 3 of 10 of Books Written Between 1950 and 2000 Category

This book, a contemporary of On the Beach, has been called the most powerful attack on nuclear madness. While the 1950's premise of an all-out nuclear war between two super powers may have been surpassed by the scenario of a rogue nation or terrorist unleashing nuclear bombs, the book still underscores the futility of believing that we can build bunkers and save humanity in the event of nuclear contamination.

27. Force of Gravity by R.S. Jones

Book 4 of 10 of Books Written Between 1950 and 2000 Category

When I saw this book described as a charming exploration of a character moving between emotional sensitivity and florid paranoia, I knew I wanted to read it. It lives up to my expectations: Emmett is one of the most engaging fictional characters I've come across recently, and despite his mental illness, one I think many people could identify with.

28. The Angel Maker by Stefan Brijs

Book 5 of 10 of World Tour Category

Victor Hoppe, raised in an orphanage where he was believed to be mentally retarded, grows up to become a brilliant scientific researcher. The book begins when Victor returns to the remote mountain village of his birth with identical triplet sons, and no mother in sight. His experiences in the orphanage had led him to believe that God is the embodiment of evil, and he sets himself up in competition with God. Such hubris can only lead to tragedy.

29. Nineteen Seventy-four by David Peace

Book 5 of 10 of Books Written Between 1950 and 2000 Category

This is the first in the Red Riding Hood Quartet murder mystery series, but it is a stand-alone read. The setting is bleak Northern England, and the plot involves the death of a child and dirty political and real estate dealings. Police corruption is rampant, and the exploration of such corruption is an important part of this book. Not a "cozy" mystery.

And for May, reviewed on my 75 thread--will add comments here later:

Brodeck by Philippe Claudel--Alpha Category the letter C
Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo--Book 4 of 10 1001 Category
The Case Worker by Gyorgy Konrad Book 5 of 10 1001 Category
Drohobycz, Drohobycz by Henryk Grynberg Book 3 of 10 Nonfiction
Desertion by Abdulrazak Gurnah Book 2 of 10 Oldies Category

For June: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell book 7 of 10--Books Written after 2000
The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas The Alphabet T

Will review later:

Yellow Blue Tibia by Adam Roberts--Book 8 of 10 Books 2000-2010 Category
The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World ed. John Boardman--Book 4 of 10 Nonfiction
The Guermantes Way Book 3 of 10 Books 1900-1950

Time to do submit reviews of the books above:

30. Brodeck by Philippe Claudel (2007, 2009)

Alpha Category, the Letter C

This book begins as quietly as a whisper, albeit with a murder, and I almost thought it was going to be boring. But the author so cleverly peels away layer after layer of the facade of the idyllic mountain village in which this novel is set, that I was stunned by the rotten core ultimately revealed.

Brodeck has just returned to the village after surviving an unnamed war in a horrific prison camp. He endured the dangers and degradations of his internment by focusing on his beloved wife Amelia back in the village. Shortly after his return, the "Anderer" (the Other) arrives in the village. It is the murder of the Anderer that occurs in the opening pages of the novel, and Brodeck is required to write an official report to explain the "Ereignies", "a curious word, full of mists and ghosts; it means more or less, 'the thing that happened,'...a word to describe the indescribable."

This book is a fable about how and why people do evil things; it is about the innate fear of the unknown, even the unknown within ourselves, and it is about remembering, not forgetting. Highly recommended

31. Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo (1955)

Book 4 of 10 of 1001 Category

I read this for Reading Globally's Mexico month. In fact, I read it twice, and I will probably read it again in the future. It is a book that, despite its brevity, will continue to reward and enlighten a reader with each successive reading.

It is the story of a son's quest for the father he has never known. Juan Preciado promised his mother on her deathbed that he would seek his father, Pedro Paramo. He travels to the town of Comala, where he has been told his father lives.

At first Comala appears to be deserted and abandoned. It is actually a place "swarming with spirits: hordes of restless souls whoe died without forgiveness, and people would never have won forgiveness in any case..." Comala is a town permeated with rain, fog, falling stars, and murmurs.

From the murmurings, Juan learns the story of his father. The story is told with seamless shifts in points of view; it is non-chronological and non-linear. In that sense, it reminded me of Faulkner, but without the dense and wandering prose. Rulfo writes in simple language, as in a fable or fairy tale.

The novel is intense, surreal, and almost hallucinatory. It was extremely influential on Latin American writers who followed Rulfo, including Donoso, Vargas Llosa, and Garcia Marquez. In fact, Marquez said that he had memorized the entire book

32. Drohobycz, Drohobycz by Henryk Grynberg (2002)

Book 3 of 10 Nonfiction Category

Drohobycz is a town located in that area of Europe that has been batted back and forth between Poland and the Ukraine. At the start of World War II, nearly 50% of its population was Jewish. Grynberg is a child survivor of the Holocaust, and most of his 26 books of prose, poetry, and fiction deal with the Holocaust and its aftermath.

Drohobycz, Drohobycz consists of 13 "True Tales of the Holocaust and Life After." Because of Drohobycz's location, a few of the stories also relate to the Stalinist purges.

The stories read like interviews that have been transcribed into narrative form. In each, the individual character of the narrator is fully realized and clearly distinguishable from the narrators of the other tales, although their experiences parallel each other. In the title story, the murder of the writer Bruno Schulz by the Nazis is described by the narrator, who was one of Schulz's former secondary school students. The murder is almost an aside to the other horrific events that unfold in the account.

I have read many books, fictional and factual, on the subject of the Holocaust, and this is one of the best

33. The Case Worker by Gyorgy Konrad (1969, 1974)

Book 5 of 10 of 1001 Category

Hungarian writer Gyorgy Konrad has been called the "true heir of Kafka," and this, his first novel, was one of the books added to the list of 1001 books to read before you die in 2008.

The case worker, a child welfare worker in Budapest, has become increasingly dissatisfied with his job. As he tries to resolve the situation of a brain-damaged child who has spent his entire life chained to a feces-smeared crib, and whose parents have just committed suicide, he ruminates on his life:

"My defensive reflexes are slack, more and more often the blows hit me in the pit of the stomach....Other people's sufferings have been affecting me lately: my head is full of their stories, my dreams are live with them....What can I do in the face of this frenzied squirming, which gets nowhere and regularly ends in defeat? Nothing, or next to nothing. I observe it, I draw parables from disaster, and compile records of failure...My job is to sell indifference and normalcy."

This is how he describes his job:

"I must huddle and render judgement. Don't throw the newborn into the garbage pail. Don't let your infant starve. If baby is ill, call a doctor. It is not advisable to tie a baby to his crib, sit him down on a hot stove, shut him up in the ice box, put his finger in an electric socket, or beat him with a trouser belt, rolling pin, chair leg, carpet beater, wooden spoon, broom stick, clothes line or shoe heel. Refrain from raping teenage girls, particularly your own. While making love do not crush your sleeping child against the wall. Do not feed him brandy, don't pawn his winter coat, don't give your girl friend his supper, don't let him be devoured by lice, don't call his mother a whore or his father a bastard, don't threaten him with your service pistol, don't send him out begging, don't sell him to elderly queers, don't urinate in his school bag, don't leave him behind on the train, don't cheat him, don't laugh at him, don't shout him down, don't bellow at him, don't shame him; in a word, as far as possible respect the innocence of his beginnings."

He comes to the final realization:

"Actually, what I do amounts to nothing. I regulate the traffic of suffering, sending it this way and that, passing on the loads that pile up on me to institutions or private citizens."

This is a bleak and grim book. I know there are lots of readers who quite understandably prefer not to read books like this. But if you can handle it, the writing is stellar, and the questions raised are profound

34. Desertion by Abdulrazak Gurnah (2005)

Book 2 of 10 of Oldies Category

Gurnah, born in Zanzibar, is the author of two books I previously read and liked very much: Admiring Silence and By the Sea. Regretfully, I cannot say the same for Desertion, although it deals with similar themes.

The novel begins in 1899 when an Englishman who is near death stumbles out of the desert near Mombasa and is rescued by a Muslim Indian shopkeeper. As he recovers, the Englishman begins to fall in love with the shopkeeper's sister. Rather abruptly, after more than 100 pages of build-up, we learn in a few short paragraphs that the Englishman finally contrived a way to meet the sister alone (although we aren't told how), that they live together in Mombasa for a while, and that the Englishman eventually returns to England, abandoning the sister.

The second half of the book shifts 50 years into the future at the time of Zanzibar's independence to relate the story of two brothers. Rashid leaves Zanzibar to study in England, and does not return to Zanzibar. Amin stays behind, having had to terminate a love affair with an "unsuitable" woman. The divergent paths the lives of the two brothers (and their sister) take are explored.

The two parts of this novel feel like two entirely separate books. The parts are loosely connected by the theme of desertion (and, as is revealed seemingly only in passing, through a familial connection), but the two parts of the book do not amount to a cohesive whole.

35. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell (2010)

Book 7 of 10 of Books Written After 2000

In 1799, Jacob de Zoet arrived in the Dutch East Indies to seek his fortune; he intends to remain in the east for 5 years, then return, a wealthy man, to Holland to marry the woman he loves.

Jacob is a principled, prim, moral, and somewhat humorless young man. He seems particularly well-suited for the job to which he is assigned: he is to audit the books to expose the rampant corruption of the outgoing Dutch East Indies Company's administrators at Dejima, the Company's remote trading post with Japan.

Dejima is a man-made island in Nagasaki harbor. It is 200 paces long and 80 paces wide, and contains 25 buildings. It is connected to mainland Japan by a closely-guarded bridge, and it is the sole window for trade between Japan and the West. While contacts between the Westerners on Dejima and the Japanese are severely restricted, Jacob catches sight of a young Japanese woman shortly after he arrives, finds himself intrigued, and perhaps in love with her. Otori is a Japanese midwife whose extraordinary talents saved the lives of Nagasaki's highest governing official's infant son and his mother during childbirth. As a reward, Otori has been granted the privilege of studying medicine with the Dutch doctor on Dejima.

The story of Jacob's first months on Dejima, with its portrayal of the trade practices (and corruption) on both the Dutch and Japanese sides is fascinating. Otori's story, in particular the historical details of medical practices at the time, also forms a fascinating narrative.

Mitchell writes poetically; he frequently uses short one sentence paragraphs which read like blank verse or haiku. Through-out the book he uses a technique of alternating thoughts/descriptions in short sentences or phrases. For example, here is Jacob, in the Company's offices among its specimens of various lifeforms from its realm, recalling his final conversation with his future father-in-law:

"A pickled dragon of Kandy bears an uncanny resemblance to Anna's father, and Jacob recalls a fatal conversation with that gentleman in his Rotterdam drawing-room....'Anna has told me,'her father began,'the surprising facts of the situation, de Zoet...
"The Kandy dragon's neighbour is a slack-jawed viper of the Celebes.
"'...and I have, accordingly, enumerated your merits and demerits.
"A baby alligator from Halmahera has a demon's delighted grin.
"'In the credit column: you are a fastidious clerk of good character...
"The alligator's umbilical cord is attached to its shell for all eternity.
"'...who has not abused his advantage over Anna's affections.
"It was a posting to Halmahera from which Vorstenbosch rescued Jacob.
"'In the debit column, you are a clerk: not a merchant, not a shipper...
"A tortoise from the Island of Diego Garcia appears to be weeping.
"'...or even a warehouse-master, but a clerk. I don't doubt your affection.
"Jacob touches the jar of a Barbados lamprey with his broken nose.
"'But affection is merely the plum in the pudding: the pudding itself is wealth.
"The lamprey's O-shaped mouth is a grinding mill of razor-sharp Vs and Ws."

The next part of the novel shifts to mainland Japan and focuses on Otori. After the death of her father, she is sold to a remote and sinister monastary/nunnery. Here, the story becomes melodramatic, and somewhat less believable. Instead of the more intellectually engaging first section, Mitchell now presents a sort of adventure story.

The third part of the novel involves the attempt by the British to wrest control of Dejima from the Dutch. A large portion of this section is narrated from the point of view of the gouty sea captain of the British vessel attacking Dejima. Jacob once again plays an important part in the story.

Mitchell is one of my favorite contemporary British novelists. I have read all of his books, and Cloud Atlas is on my list of desert island books. In Cloud Atlas, Mitchell plays games with the reader with a series of apparently unrelated narratives, each in a different genre. He brilliantly unifies the narratives however. Here, the "adventure" part of the novel just didn't come together with what I saw as the more interesting aspects of the story--the clash between East and West, the trade practices and political milieu of the time and place, and the other historical narratives. For that reason, while this is an entertaining and highly-readable book, and I have no problem in recommending it, I can only rate it at 3 1/2 stars.

36. The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas

Omega Category Letter T

Aisha and Hector give a barbecue attended by family and close friends. At the barbecue, Hugo, the four-year old son of Aisha's close friend, a spoiled brat who has never been disciplined, raises a bat to threaten Harry's son. Harry, Hector's cousin, steps forward and slaps Hugo, who, astonished, drops the bat. End of the matter? No. Hugo's parents file criminal charges against Harry for assaulting their son. The remainder of the book is narrated in separate sections by eight characters, each of whom had been at the barbecue. Some adamantly support Harry, some adamantly support Hugo's parents, and a few are somewhere in-between. It should be noted that Harry apologized profusely to Hugo's parents for his momentary lapse of "adult" self-control, stating that he feared for the safety of his own son. In addition, Hugo was in no way harmed.

The eight narrators, including Aisha and Hector, raise interesting issues: Should it make any difference that Harry is known to have a violent temper? That Hugo is in some ways being abused by his own parents: his father is a raging alcoholic and his mother is so oblivious to Hugo's need for boundaries that she breast feeds him whenever he cries "Boobie," no matter where there are? Should it matter that one of the characters is also a child abuser, carrying on a torrid love affair with an underage teenage girl?

What I really didn't like about this book, it sounds so prudish to say it, is that it's vulgar. There are frequent and gratuitous explicit scenes of often violent, usually extra-marital sex. Drug use among both the adults and the teenagers is rampant. Most of the adults in the book are supposed to be upstanding suburban middleclass professionals with young children; yet they, seemingly routinely, fortify themselves with drugs before bringing their children to something like a family barbecue. The mother of one of the teenagers who is going to an end-of-school dance almost seems to congratulate her daughter on the daughter's plan to celebrate the event by taking drugs (ecstasy).

These complaints may be just with the subject-matter of the book. But I also felt there were problems with the way the book was written. Tsiolkas chose to use eight different narrators, who range from teenagers to an elderly Greek emigrant. While the diverse narrators obviously have different thoughts and opinions, they all sound the same. None of them has an individual, unique voice, and that does not make for a successful book

37. Yellow Blue Tibia by Adam Roberts (2009)

Book 8 of 10 Books Written After 2000 Category

I was intrigued by the premise of this novel. In the 1930's, Stalin, fearing that the Soviet people would lose their unity once their common enemy, the West, was overcome, sought to create a new common enemy for the people to unite against. He brought together a group of respected science-fiction writers and asked them to create a credible scenario for an alien invasion.

The writers do as they are asked, but are abruptly disbanded and told to forget everything they have just done. Several of the writers disappear. Flash forward to the 1980's. One of the writers is working as a lowly translator when a series of events occur which mirror the events the group wrote about in the 1930's. Things start to move quickly, and the writer is hounded by the Moscow police, the KGB, a taxi driver with Aspbergers, a couple of Scientology adherents, and (perhaps???) aliens.

I would describe this book as madcap and surreal. It didn't always make sense and I didn't really connect with it, but if this sort of thing intrigues you, try it, you might like it.

By the way, one of the funniest parts of the book comes when we learn the significance of its title. You might be able to guess what that is if you speak Russian. I don't, and I was wondering most of the way through if the title had any meaning

38. The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World, Ed. John Boardman et. al. (2001)

Book 4 of 10 Nonfiction Category

My art history study group has finally completed our study of Greek art, and we are moving on to Etruscan and Roman art. (We've been together for a year now, and started with Paleolithic Art).

I read this book as a good summary of what we have learned. It is, however, more than a summary of art, and is divided into the various Greek historical periods (Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic). Within each of those periods there are separate chapters on the history of the era, and also on the important cultural subjects of the era. For example, in the Archaic section, there are chapters on Homer, Myth and Hesiod, Lyric Poetry, and Early Greek Philosophy. The Classical section has chapters on Greek Drama, Life and Society, Classical Greek Philosophy and Greek Art and Architecture. The Hellenistic section has chapters on Hellenistic Culture and Literature, Hellenistic Philosophy and Science, and Hellenistic and Graeco-Roman Art. Each of the chapters is written by a particular expert in the subject matter covered by the chapter.

I am by no means a Greek scholar, but I was impressed with this book

39. The Guermantes Way by Marcel Proust

Book 3 of 10 of Books Written Between 1900 and 1950 Category

I finally finished the third volume of In Search of Lost Time. I am reading Proust as part of a year-long non-LT group read pointed out to me by Avatiahk (sp?), and still thoroughly enjoying it, although I am a few weeks behind the group. The Guermantes Way focuses primarily on Marcel's entree into the upper echelons of Parisian society. (200+ pages of the 800+ page book are devoted to one dinner party).

You've been reading some amazing books. I've added Drohobycz, Drohobycz to my wishlist. I won't be adding the Case Worker, although it looks fabulous. And I disagree that The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet isn't Mitchell's best.

Read on...you always add to my wishlist or have me arguing with you in my head.

Thanks for visiting RidgewayGirl. There's an interesting article in today's NYT magazine about David Mitchell. Based on some of the things he said, it sounds like his future writing will be more character driven (as is Jacob de Zoet,), and less experimental, (as is Cloud Atlas. He also had some interesting comments about that monastary in the woods part of the book that I didn't like.

I moved The Case of Comrade Tulayev from the alphabet category ("S") to 1001 category, so I could include Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout in the alphabet category as the "S" book.

Also, for some reason my numbering/counting system is off, as I've read more books on my 75 thread than here. I'll try to reconcile when I get time. (Hah!)

40. The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell

Book 7 of 10 of 1001 category

This nearly 1000 page tome is everything you've probably heard about it: gruesome, disgusting, repulsive, difficult to take. It is also gripping, intelligent, informative, insightful, and well-written. It is the story of World War II through the eyes of Max Aue, SS officer. Aue is with the Nazis when they invade Poland; he's at Babi Yar and the Battle of Stalingrad; he's with Eichmann at the concentration camps; he's in Hungary near the end of the war when the Germans proposed "blood for trucks;" and he's in Hitler's bunker in April 1945. When we meet him, in present time, he is a well-respected French lace manufacturer with a past no one questions. He is also unrepenetant.

Aue is a cultured and intelligent man, but never a sympathetic character. His personal life mirrors the depravity of the war--he is sexually obsessed with his twin sister and acts out this obsession in homosexual affairs. His mother and stepfather are brutally murdered. And, as you may have read elsewhere, there's a lot of diarrhea, blood, vomit and guts.

When Aue is not on the frontlines, he is a bureacrat--a clear manifestation of the banality of evil. His job involves such things as determining how much food a concentration camp inmate should get daily. What is the optimal amount of time to keep a concentration camp inmate alive so as to maximize the benefit of his labor vis a vis the cost of his upkeep? Should Jews get less food than other types of prisoners, since they are destined for execution anyway?

There are also endless discussions with "racial anthropologists," linguists, and other experts as to what circumstances make a person or group of people Jewish, which would almost be silly if these weren't life or death matters for the people under discussion. There's even the discussion among the starving soldiers at Stalingrad as they consider cannibalism on whether they should eat a dead Russian or a dead German. If they eat the meat of a Slav or a Bolshevik, won't they become corrupted? On the other hand, wouldn't it be dishonorable to eat a German?

Aue is clearly a psychopath. I don't know if all SS officers were psychopaths, or whether some were just temporarily insane. This book isn't The Diary of Ann Frank. You will know whether you can stand to read something like this or not. If you can stomach it, and you want to try to understand how and why the Germans did what they did, it is a book you should read.

4 stars

41. The Law by Roger Vailland (1957)

Book 3 of 10 Oldies CategoryI'm not sure I can do this little gem of a novel justice. It's the story of life in a small village in Apulia, "that wild, remote heel of the Italian peninsula." It proceeds at a leisurely, meandering pace, yet each paragraph and each section fit as perfectly within the book as pieces fit within a jigsaw puzzle: I can't imagine any other way to have put it together.

The book is funny and, at times, a little sad. It centers around Marietta, who on the verge of womanhood, inspires lust in all the men in the village. Several old lechers argue among themselves about who will "take" her virginity. I'm happy to report that Marietta outsmarts them all, in more ways than one.

The plot involves 500,000 lira that was stolen from some Swedish tourists. The Judge, Allesandro, is getting pressure from above to solve the case, but is stuck with a corrupt and lazy police chief. The Judge's beautiful wife, Dona Lucrezia, meanwhile, is secretly in love with Francesco, a naive young student, who is the son of one of the "capos" in town. However, this is not a mystery novel, but a novel of characters, and these characters and others charm, enchant and amuse us. Vaillard brings this small village at a time shortly after the end of World War II to vivid life.

And, then there's the sinister game of "The Law," which is apparently played in the bars and taverns of Southern Italy, and which in this case motivates some of the characters to take the actions they do, and in other cases serves to illustrate their true nature.

The New York Times said that this book deserves every reading it will get, and I agree.

4 Stars

42. Bel-Ami by Guy de Maupassant (1885)

Book 2 of 10 of Books Written Before 1900 CategoryGeorge Duroy is a penniless ex-soldier when this novel opens, but he is amoral and ruthless as he climbs his way to the top of Parisian society. His good fortune is due primarily to the mistresses he chooses and discards as his needs dictate. He's not a "family values" kind of guy; his nickname, Bel-Ami is kind of a cross between "handsome" and "lover-boy."

Although written in the 19th century, this book reads like a modern novel, and it caused quite a scandal when first published. De Maupassant's sympathies are quite clearly with the women. Their characters are fully developed and very believable. Although some of the women are definitely more accomplished and more intelligent than Bel-Ami, de Maupassant is able to make us understand to a certain extent why they put on blinkers where matters of love are concerned.

This was an easy read, and kept me fully engaged at all times (none of those long 19th century digressions here).

4 stars

43. Mara and Dann by Doris Lessing

Book 4 of 10 of Oldies CategoryNobelist Doris Lessing's early fiction was often set in Africa where she grew up. In Mara and Dann, she returns to Africa, but an Africa hundreds or thousands of years in the future known as Ifrik. There is a new Ice Age, and everything north of the Mediterranean is solid ice. Northern Ifrik is a frozen tundra, and southern Ifrik is experiencing terrible drought and rapidly evolving into desert.

The novel begins when Mara and her brother Dann are wrenched from their parents at a very young age, and sent to live with the "Rock People." Their childhood is characterized by the hardship conditions of drought--not enough food, not enough water, with resultant starvation and illness. One by one, the Rock People begin to migrate to the North, where conditions are supposed to be better. Mara and Dann leave for the North after the death of their caregiver. They don't know what is there, only that it has to be better than life in the south.

The book chronicles their journey. Lessing is a wonderful writer, and she has created coherent, imaginative and very believable cultures and societies that Mara and Dann encounter on their journey. Unfortunately, the plot quickly devolves into somewhat repetitive silliness: Mara and Dann travel through danger; they are separated, imprisoned or both; they escape and find each other and move on. Then it starts all over again. Along the way, they keep running into the same people, who turn up in the strangest places under the strangest circumstances. Then there's the evil Kulik, who is pursuing them to the ends of the earth for no apparent reason. And the ending is downright sappy.

I kept reading because I so enjoyed Lessing's depictions of the future landscapes and societies, and the characters' speculations of how people in the past might have lived based on relics from our time. I wish the plot had had some integrity and had made sense.

2 1/2 stars

44. Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

Alphabet Category--Omega--Letter S

Most people have either read or heard of this book by now. It's a series of interconnected short stories focusing on Olive. Some are told from Olive's point of view; some from the point of view of another inhabitant of Olive's small Maine town, who may hardly know Olive. Despite her faults, I liked Olive. She was stubborn, prickly, and never admitted to being wrong about anything. But her heart was mostly in the right place.

3 1/2 stars

45. The Kill by Emile Zola

I've read several of Zola's well-known classics, some of which constitute part of his 20 volume Rougon-Macquart series. Each novel in the series is stand-alone, and they do not have to be read chronologically. However, I decided to read/reread the entire series in order. I read the first volume last December and found it only so so. The Kill is the second volume in the series, and it is magnificent.

The Kill (La Curee in French, which means something like 'the division of the spoils') focuses on Aristide Rougon, although his brother Eugene and sister Sidonie play prominent roles as well. Aristide has assumed the surname of his first wife, Saccard, and has come to Paris to make his fortune. Through his brother, he obtains a bureaucratic position as the assistant surveyor of roads for Paris. While initially disheartened by his nominal salary, he soon realizes that his position could enable him to make a fortune in real estate, as the boulevards and throughfares of Paris are just being platted and the property through which they will run is being acquired by the city at grossly inflated prices. However, he can't use his insider information, because he has no capital to invest.

This problem is solved when he is offered the opportunity to marry a rich heiress (she is 'damaged goods'), even as his first wife is still on her deathbed. The Kill chronicles the rise and fall of Aristide as an unscrupulous, dishonest real estate wheeler dealer with his second wife Renee, an extravagant, selfish socialite. They flaunt their wealth in their obscenely opulent mansion, Renee's exquisite wardrobe (300,000 F dressmaker bills are not uncommon) and the lavish galas they host. Still, Renee is bored, and seeks something more to make her feel alive. She begins a love affair with her stepson, Aristide's son from his first marriage.

This book ran afoul of the censors when it began appearing in serial form in 1871, for its outrage to "public morals" and "gross materialism." Today, I think it is particularly relevant as we continue to feel the after-effects of our own real estate bubble and rampant over-consumption. Although not as comprehensive and wide-ranging as some of Zola's other novels, it is as well-deserving of readership, and I highly recommend it.

Book 3 of 10 Books Written Before 1900 Category

46. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh

Letter W for Alphabet Category

This book starts laugh-out-loud funny, as through a series of misunderstandings and blunders a mild-mannered nature columnist is sent by a newspaper to be its ace reporter covering a bloody civil war in Africa. It's also kind of funny at the end, as the nature reporter seeks to avoid the limelight, and the newspaper seeks to honor him with a banquet and a knighthood. It's the in-between part I have big problems with.

Sometimes literature from certain eras will use negative, racist terms and words to describe a person, peoples or practices. And sometimes in the context of such books we can read around this, as simply being chronologically representative of the way things were then. These terms and words are used in profusion in Scoop. Here, however, the attempted humor of the book too frequently depends on the reader's acceptance of the negative characteristics implied by the racist terms. In other words, if the reader doesn't accept the blatant racism of some of the "humor," it's not easy to find anything to laugh about. There are a few zingers about the way the press sometimes manufactures news, but not enough to ignore the cringe-inducing remainder of the reporter's African adventures. Not recommended.

47. Columbine by Dave Cullen

Book 5 of 10 Nonfiction Category

This book has made the (well-deserved) rounds on LT, and I don't have much to add to what has already been said. For the most part, I found it riveting and bone-chilling. As a parent who was deeply involved in my kids' schools (their high school was a "sister school" with Columbine), I've had occasion to wonder why sometimes seemingly wonderful parents have deeply problematic children. This book did an excellent job of portraying Eric, a psychopath, and Dylan, a follower, and helping us to understand how and why Columbine happened. At times, I felt the book was a bit repetitious, but overall I highly recommend it.

48. Fires on the Plain by Shohei Ooka

Book 6 of 10 of Books Written Between 1950 and 2000

The end of World War II is approaching, and the Americans have arrived on the island of Leyte in the Phillipines. The Japanese are fleeing to the west coast in hopes of being evacuated. Tamura was separated from his unit when he could no longer carry his weight foraging for food due to his illness. He is sent away, with one grenade to kill himself with, if he can't find a hospital unit to take him in.

As he travels, Tamura sinks deeper into degradation and madness. He cannot decide whether he prefers to live or to die; sometimes he cannot decide whether he is alive or dead. He wonders if there is a God, and if there is, where that God has gone:

"Why, when after all these years I had again been stirred by religious feelings and even been drawn to them by this village, should I have been forced to see only the mangled corpses of my fellow soldiers and the tortured body of Jesus painted by some unskillful artist? Was it fate that had contrived this cruel jest, or did the fault lie within myself?"

While this is an anti-war novel, and there are graphic scenes of death and destruction, the novel's focus is the philosophical and existential exploration by one soldier trying to determine his place in the world, rather than an examination of more universal issues

Well at the half-way point, my reading has been pretty evenly spread over my 10 categories, and hopefully I will complete the challenge by year's end. I'm a bit behind on my books written before 1900 and books written between 1900 and 1950 categories, so I should start concentrating on those. I'm also way ahead on books written after 2000. This is largely due to books chosen by my RL book club and ER books, so I'll just go with the flow on that.

Aruba, I had a similar reaction to Scoop. A while later though, I read an article about Liberia in Ryszard Kapuściński's The Shadow of the Sun, an excellent book which I cannot recommend highly enough. Some of Waugh's patronisingly racist descriptions of the ruling families might have been based on fact. By no means all, though, and I still cringe.

Thanks for the recommendation to The Shadow of the Sun Pamela. I will look for it. I realize that there were/are excesses in some of the dictators in Africa (and elsewhere), but what bothered me in Scoop was the portrayal of these excesses as inherent in the African race.

I've moved Scoop from my alphabet category to the catgory of books written between 1900 and 1950, in order to make room for Lowboy by John Wray in the W alphabet category.

Also added The War of the End of the World by Mario Vargas Llosa to the Oldies category, and Still Alice by Lisa Genova to the Alphabet category for G. Reviews to follow.

I have added more books, and still intend to post my review of those above, as well as these newly read:

I moved As I Lay Dying by Faulkner from the letter F to the Books Written Between 1900 and 1950 category.

I added: Spies by Michael Frayn as the letter F book
Growth of the Soil by Knut Hamsun--1001 Category
Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson--Books Written After 2000
Lowboy by John Wray as the letter W book
The Passage by Justin Cronin--Books Written After 2000
The Belly of Paris by Emile Zola--Books Written Before 1900
Voyage of the Short Serpent by Bernard du Boucheron--World Tour
My Lobotomy by Howard Dully--Nonfiction
Faces and Masks by Eduardo Galeano--Books Written Between 1950 and 2000
The Maias by Eca de Queiros--the letter Q

Taking stock I have left to read:

4 in the World Tour Category
2 in the 1001 Category
5 in the Oldies Category
4 in the Nonfiction Category
6 in the Pre-1900 Category
5 in the 1900-1950 Category
3 in the 1950-2000 Category
0 in the After 2000 Category
5 in the letters A-I
4 in the letters Q-Z

Still possible to complete the challenge if I hurry.

I added:
The Royal Family by William Vollmann to the Alphabet Category;
Strangers by Taichi Yamada to the Alphabet Category;
In the Place of Justice by Wilbert Rideau to the Nonfiction Category;
Clandestine in Chile by Gabriel Garcia Marquez to the Nonfiction Category;
Settlers by Vilhelm Moberg to the 1950-2000 Category;
The Cave by Tim Krabbe to the Around the World Category.

What I have left:

Alphabet: D,E,H,I,U,Z
1950-2000: 2
1900-1950: 5
Pre-1900: 6
Nonfiction: 2
Oldies: 5
1001: 2
World Tour: 3

Total Left: 31

I added Room by Emma Donoghue to the Alphabet Category
The Hidden Force by Louis Couperous to the 1900-1950 category
Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith to the Pre-1900 category
Generations of Winter by Vasily Aksyonov to the Oldies category
Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin to the Nonfiction category
The File by Timothy Garton Ash to the Nonfiction category
The Crime of Olga Arbyelina by Andrei Makine to the 1950-2000 categoy
The Informers by Juan Gabriel Vasquez to the World Tour category (Colombia)
Thursday Night Widows by Claudia Piniero to the World Tour Category (Argentina
Almost Dead by Assaf Gavron to the world Tour category (Israel)

I have now completed the World Tour, Nonfiction, and Post 2000 categories.

Left to complete:

1001 2
Oldies 4
Pre-1900 5
1900-50 4
1950-2000 1
Alpha 3 (E,H, I)
Omega 2 (U, Z)

Total left 21

So you should finish up right before the new year. Excellent planning on your part.

Added:

The Broken Lands by Robert Edric--Alphabet E
The Liar by Martin Hansen--Alphabet H
We by Yevgeny Zamyatin--1900-1950
Against the Grain by Joris-Karl Huysmans 1900-1950
The Sleeping Beauty by Elizabeth Taylor 1950-2000

We and Against the Grain are also 1001 books, and could be switched to that category if need be.

Left to complete:

1001--2
Oldies--4
Pre-1900--5
1900-1950--2
Alpha--I
Omega--U, Z

I've added Ancestral Voices by Etienne van Heerden to the 1001 category.

I've added The Liar by Martin Hansen to the 1900-1950 category. It was published in 1950.

I may have trouble finishing the Oldies and the Pre-1900 categories, since I'm pretty much choosing books randomly, and not to fit in categories. I've read lots of books recently that don't fit anywhere or fit in already completed categories.

I've added Manon des Sources by Marcel Pagnol, a lovely book (read it with its companion Jean de Florette), upon which the two delightful movies of the same name were based, to complete my 1001 category. I am reading The Conquest of Plassans by Emile Zola, the fourth book in the Rougon Macquart series, so I will add at least one more to my pre-1900 category.