Monday, November 25, 2013

No pictures. Just a list. List of books. My favorite kind of list.

Here's a list of the books I've read this year, in no particular order, and I'm sure it's not the complete list:

1. World War Z by Max Brooks - So good. I read it surreptitiously all day on my iPad while at work. Took me 2 days. I've never been a "what if?" doomsday planner type of person, but you can't help but start to look around and take stock of your surroundings and wonder how long you'd last if an epidemic began to run rampant over the entire world, and how you'd try to survive. It's not so much a zombie book as it is a book about individuals, cultures, relationships, and civilization. <---worst description ever. The Oatmeal describes it perfectly, I think. {Conclusion: DO read!}

2. Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill - I think I read it in one day. Pretty spooky, and really well done. I loved it! Spooky/ghost stories are totally my thing. Highly recommended. {Conclusion: DO read!}

3. Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McReight - meh. {Conclusion: I mean, if you have nothing better to do...}

4. The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith aka. J. K. Rowling - LOVED this one. Couldn't put it down! You will fall in love with the main characters so, so hard. {Conclusion: DO read!}

5. The Wettest County in the World by Matt Bondurant - This is the book that the made the movie "Lawless" out of with Shia LeBouf and Jessica Chastain and a bunch of other people. I didn't like it (the book, I mean: I haven't seen the movie), but it wouldn't take much to tell the story better than this author did. He had good intentions and good material, but someone else could have probably done a better job. I slogged my way through this one and I'm not sure if I actually finished it. {Conclusion: Read something else.}

6. Serena by Ron Rash - This one was pretty cool overall. I think it could have been a tiny bit better, but I really mostly loved the writing and the characters. A friend described perfectly it as "Appalachian Gothic." Jennifer Lawrence is starring in the movie adaptation. It will be interesting to see her as a character to hate! {Conclusion: DO read!}

7. Rules of Civility by Amor Towles - This is one of those books where I wanted to underline every other passage, it was so well written. "It was as if America had launched the Depression just to teach Manhattan a lesson." The whole book was just unbelievably good. I read it on my Kindle in Cancun but I want to get a hardback copy to keep forever and ever. {Conclusion: DO read!}

8. A Mind to Murder by P.D. James - Not my favorite P.D. James that I've read, but still good. Adam Dagliesh has got to be one of the most well-written detectives out there. "Original Sin" was way better, but still, you've got to love James. {Conclusion: Just read everything P.D. James has written.}

9. Night Chill by Jeff Gunius - This one must have been a $0.99-er on Amazon or something, but I love reading scary stories, even if they aren't totally great. A little creepy, a little fun - I wouldn't necessarily recommend it, but if you're like me and love reading for the sake of reading, then, whatever. {Conclusion: I mean, if you have nothing better to do...}

10. Dirty Weekend by Helen Zahavi - Jaw dropping. So entertaining. Dark and weird and icky and awesome. I don't even want to tell any of the plot at all, but I can say that Bella woke up one day and decided she'd had enough. READ THIS BOOK. (Also, I'm not sure what it says about me that I think everyone should read this, but I'm pretty sure I'm not a psychopath.) {Conclusion: DO read!}

11. The Woman in Black by Susan Hill - She's no Shirley Jackson, and I didn't think this was as scary as other people had reported, but maybe I read it too fast. Dracula is way better. Not that this has anything to do with Vampires, but as far as first-person recountings go, Harker wins. {Conslusion: I mean, if you have nothing better to do...}

12. Inferno by Dan Brown - Ugh. Seriously, I should have stopped with Deception Point and Angels & Demons. Don't read this. But do read this! {Conclusion: Read something else.}

13. In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson - Larson uses primary sources to recreate the experience of the family of the Ambassador to Berlin in 1930's post-war pre-war Germany. Really incredible read, and makes you think hard about how you would have acted at the time with the information that was coming out of Germany at the time. {Conclusion: DO read!}

14. A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness - started off so good! But then the main character turned into another Bella Swan and turns completely daft and obsessed with her "angelic looking" vampire boyfriend. Or whatever he was. I don't remember, and I don't care to go back and find out. I also don't care to read the next two books of the trilogy. {Conclusion: I mean, if you have nothing better to do...}

15. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn - I can't remember now if I read this this year or last year, but it was a page turner! I read the first half on a Monday after work and as soon as I got home Tuesday I sat down and didn't move til it was done. I will definitely be re-reading this one before the movie comes out! {Conclusion: DO read!}

16. The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss - As soon as I finished the second one (see below) I turned right back to the first page of this and started them all over again. I can't get enough. I almost don't want the third one to come out because then it'll be over. {Conclusion: DO read!}

17. The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss - see above. I honestly can't say which one I like more. These are probably my two most highly recommended books ever. I've read them each at least 2.5 times now. {Conclusion: DO read!}

18. The Magicians by Lev Grossman - Grossman captures so perfectly what it's like to be an adolescent and young and bored and scared and curious. Yes, the kids go to a school for magic, but I assure you, this is no Hogwarts. {Conclusion: DO read!}

19. The Magician King by Lev Grossman - Just go ahead and read the both of them. The third is coming out (hopefully) next year. {Conclusion: DO read!}

20. Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? by Mindy Kaling - Mostly pretty funny. Read it, don't read it, whatevs. But DO watch the Mindy Project. {Conclusion: I mean, if you have nothing better to do...}

21. ROOM by Emma Donoghue - told in the perspective of a 5 year old boy who lives in the same world we're all in, but who perceives it totally differently for a very icky reason. I don't want to give it away, because I like how Donoghue slowly reveals bits and pieces about the boy and his mother's situation. {Conclusion: DO read!}

22. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - the movie's coming out and the trailers seem pretty close to the book, so I don't need to go into much detail. Just do yourself a favor and pick this up. (It's under $3 on Amazon for Kindle right now, if you're into that sort of thing!) {Conclusion: DO read!}

23. The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom - Read this for book club. So bad. All tell and no show, and it's one of those where I want to slap the author because she has no business writing (or selling!) books! {Conclusion: Read something else. Like, anything else.}

24. Seraphina by Rachel Hartman - A friend was clearing out her book collection, so I re-homed 38 of them to help her out. This one I grabbed is YA Fantasy, and damn good YA Fantasy at that. Dragons, music, court intrigue - what more could you want? {Conclusion: DO read!}

Reading now:
1. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt - David gave me The Secret History really early in our relationship, so Tartt is kind of special to the two of us. He saw Goldfinch at Costco and picked it up! I started this last night and I'm already hooked.

2. Dr. Zhivago by Boris Pasternak - at the rate I'm going I'll finish this in about 8 years, but I think it'll be worth it.

3. Snow by Orhan Pamuk - I can't believe I haven't read any Pamuk yet, considering how close Turkey is to my heart, but he's a mesmerizing writer.

5. Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

6. Sandman by Neil Gaiman - rereading this one, really. Kindle had a deal for the first volume so I snatched it up. It's my dream to someday have the entire (physical) collection.


1 comment:

  1. Oooh, awesome list! I definitely need to read Cuckoos Calling, and I keep hearing amazing things about Joe Hill.

    Sarah Allen
    (From Sarah, with Joy)

    ReplyDelete