Sunday, April 26, 2020

The Books List, Part Two


20 Books I Would Recommend Reading, 5 Books I Wouldn't, and 50 from my Reading List


Still in quarantine, so time for another Books List post! I hope that you found the first post helpful in bringing some enjoyable books to your attention. If you didn't read it, go here:https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/03/the-books-list-part-one.html

You'll probably note that there is a continuing pattern in the proportion of books that I liked (20), books I didn't like (5), and books I might like (50). It's true that I do enjoy the majority of the books that I read, but that's not because I have low literary standards. Although I tend to be an optimistic chick, I don't appreciate bad writing, nor will I recommend a book that left me flat, even if it's by a favorite author (out of fairness, I almost always finish a book, even if it's not great, to give it every chance).

So how do I get so lucky? Well, it's because I tend to read books that have either come well-recommended or that are by an author I like. Sometimes I am betrayed, but most of the time I am delighted. Sometimes I just idly pick something out or read what's handy, and that's where taking my chances is less likely to pay off (sometimes it does). Basically what I'm saying here is that you, too, stand a better chance of liking something that was recommended – hence my list!

My likes/loves: These are books that entertained me, moved me, taught me things, made me think, inspired me, and that I would heartily recommend. They are not ranked – they are merely in the order in which I read them.

  1. 3001: The Final Odyssey – Arthur C. Clarke
  2. Moses, Man of the Mountain – Zora Neale Hurston
  3. Seraph on the Suwanee – Zora Neale Hurston
  4. Bird by Bird – Anne Lamott
  5. Odd Thomas – Dean Koontz
  6. The Haunting of Hill House – Shirley Jackson
  7. The Taking – Dean Koontz
  8. The Dark: New Ghost Stories – Ed. By Ellen Datlow
  9. A Cold Heart – Jonathan Kellerman
  10. The Conspiracy Club – Jonathan Kellerman
  11. The Last Juror – John Grisham
  12. Writing the Breakout Novel – Donald Maass
  13. A Primer on Mental Disorders – Allen, Liebman, Park, Wimmer
  14. Wake Up, I'm Fat! - Camryn Manheim
  15. Wasted – Marya Hornbacher
  16. Helping Someone with Mental Illness – Rosalyn Carter
  17. When the Wind Blows – James Patterson
  18. Cradle and All – James Patterson
  19. Sons and Lovers – D.H. Lawrence
  20. Along Came a Spider – James Patterson

My meh/yuck list: Did not find these appealing for any number of reasons – some were boring; some had an interesting subject but did not do it justice; some were flat-out terrible. All simply left me cold in some way. Although I am likely to read multiple books by authors I like (you will see a lot of Dean Koontz, Jonathan Kellerman, Margaret Atwood, Charles deLint and Zora Neale Hurston), I do not excuse those authors when they write a book I didn't like, so they might just show up here, as well.

  1. Unexplained! - Jerome Clark
  2. The Chronicle of Crime – Martin Fido
  3. 563 Stupid Things People Do to Mess Up their Lives – Dr. Larry
  4. Moby Dick – Herman Melville
  5. Their Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston

My Reading List: these are books I haven't read yet, so I don't have a reaction for you. However, I could semi-recommend them, based on the reasons they made it onto my list:

  1. They were on one of those “100 Greatest Books” lists;
  2. They are other books written by authors I really enjoy; or
  3. I read a review, and it sounded like something I'd like.
#1 can be a bit hit-or-miss; #2 is almost (but not always) foolproof for me (but maybe not for you), and #3 usually works out pretty well, as it's a combination of the first two. As always, your results may vary, but consider them suggestions. These may tend to come in chunks of stuff by author (apologies). There are literally over 1400 books currently on my reading list (I'm stupidly ambitious), so this is a very small chunk. Don't worry; there will be more of these posts.

  1. The Princess of Cleves – Madame de LaFayette
  2. The Stranger – Albert Camus
  3. The Counterfeiters – Andre Gide
  4. The Good Soldier – Ford Madox Ford
  5. Germinal – Emile Zola
  6. U.S.A. Trilogy – John dos Pasos
  7. Hunger – Knut Hamsun
  8. Berlin Alexanderplatz – Alfred Doblin
  9. Cities of Salt – Abd al Rahman Munif
  10. The Death of Artemio Cruz - Carlos Fuentes
  11. The Last Chronicles of Barset – Anthony Trollope
  12. The Pickwick Papers – Charles Dickens
  13. The Sorrows of Young Werther – Goethe
  14. Oblomov – Ivan Goncharov
  15. Waverly – Sir Walter Scott
  16. Snow Country – Yasunari Kawabata
  17. The Betrothed – Alessandro Manzoni
  18. Cold Sassy Tree – Olive Ann Burns
  19. Dawn – Octavia Butler
  20. Boys and Girls Together – William Goldman
  21. Bimbos of the Death Sun – Sharyn McCrumb
  22. Suttree – Cormac McCarthy
  23. Mythago Wood – Robert Holdstock
  24. Illusions – Richard Bach
  25. The Cunning Man – Robertson Davies
  26. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
  27. In Search of Lost Time – Marcel Proust
  28. The Tale of Genji – Murasaki Shikibu
  29. Emma – Jane Austen
  30. Bleak House – Charles Dickens
  31. The Ambassadors – Henry James
  32. 100 Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
  33. Finnegans Wake – James Joyce
  34. The Man without Qualities – Robert Musil
  35. Women in Love – D.H. Lawrence
  36. Yarrow – Charles de Lint
  37. Memory and Dream - Charles de Lint
  38. Trader - Charles de Lint
  39. Greenmantle - Charles de Lint
  40. The Little Country - Charles de Lint
  41. Mulengro - Charles de Lint
  42. Spirits in the Wires - Charles de Lint
  43. Medicine Road - Charles de Lint
  44. The Blue Girl - Charles de Lint
  45. Angel of Darkness - Charles de Lint
  46. Dreams Underfoot - Charles de Lint
  47. The Fair in Emain Mancha - Charles de Lint
  48. From a Whisper to a Scream - Charles de Lint
  49. I'll Be Watching You - Charles de Lint
  50. Into the Green - Charles de Lint

That's all for now; hope you find these lists useful as you think about things you might like to read.




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