Because I am a (reading) sheep
Jul. 31st, 2007 03:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pjthompsonI like making lists, I always have. I like to joke that it keeps my neurotic left brain occupied and out of the way of the right brain's creative work. I started making reading lists a few years back.
I've seen a few people on my flist do this, so here's my reading list so far for 2007. Not a particularly weighty or impressive list. There are a number of entries in continuing series here. Also, if I'm reading something heavy, large, or dark, I tend to take breaks from it now and then and pick up something lightweight, which tends to skew my finished list somewhat, but oh well. That's just PJ doing her perpetual self-justification routine...
Finished in 2007
Fiction
1. Blood Lines by Eileen Wilks
2. Dead Beat by Jim Butcher
3. Innocent in Death by J.D. Robb
4. Fast Women by Jennifer Crusie
5. Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews
6. Black Ice by Anne Stuart
7. Death of a Stranger by Anne Perry
8. Unshapely Things by Mark Del Franco
9. Faking It by Jennifer Crusie
10. All Together Dead by Charlaine Harris
11. The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff
12. Undead and Unappreciated by Maryjanice Davidson
13. Chill Factor by Rachel Caine
14. The Harlequin by Laurell K. Hamilton
15. Triangle by Katharine Weber
(A frustrating book - parts of it were moving, other parts totally irritating. The stuff about the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911 was pretty riveting; the mysterious story and character of Esther who went through the fire are engaging. But the contemporary characters and most of those long tangents on music bugged the hot holy cr*p out of me. Frankly, I think Ms. Weber had enough story for a novella and tried to stretch it to book length with all this other "arty" stuff. Yeah, yeah, it was supposed to be some kind of cockamamie a metaphor—but most of it didn't work for me. Esther's story, however, has stayed with me.)
16-19. Plus four novels in draft. I wasn't sure their authors wanted to be listed, so I've left them off.
Non-fiction
1. Black Dahlia Avenger by Steve Hodel
(He's solved the Black Dahlia case, as far as I'm concerned. Not for the squeamish.)
2. My Dark Places by James Ellroy
(One of the best, most uncompromising memoirs ever. I loved it. You will see why Ellroy's fiction is so dark. He tells the truth without blinking or making excuses for himself.)
Books I'm still actively working on:
(I read in fits and starts, more so lately than usual, and tend to have several things going at once. I'm close to done on several of these.)
1. My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding, ed. P. N. Elrod
2. Guardian of the Horizon by Elizabeth Peters
3. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Tarot by Arlene Tognetti and Lisa Lenard
4. The Passion of Mary Magdalen by Elizabeth Cunningham
(Big book, big book, but so engaging. I need periodic breaks, though.)
5. Spook by Mary Roach
6. Territory by Emma Bull
(This is the one I'm most actively reading at the moment, not much left, and I'm enjoying the wonderful fusion of Old West Tombstone, Wyatt Earp, and sorcery.)
7. Magic and Witchcraft in Europe: The Twentieth Century, eds. Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark
8. Reiki: A Comprehensive Guide by Pamela Miles
9. The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
10. The Undead by Roxanne Longstreet (aka Rachel Caine)
(Truth: I'm afraid it has an unhappy ending and I've gotten very involved with the characters and don't want to go there at this point in time, so I've laid it aside for the moment. I am sometimes a cowardly reader.)
Books I started but lost interest in for one reason or another:
I may finish these some day, but they're currently in the not-interested pile.
1. Brown's Requiem by James Ellroy
(First novel, and it shows, I think)
2. Snake Agent by Liz Williams
(Not crazy about her voice.)
3. Chasing Eden by S. L. Linnea
(So badly written, so very very bad. Even though the premise was interesting, I couldn't get beyond the writing.) (Yeah, I know, I read LKH and have no shame, but this was bad.)
4. Captain Alatriste by Arturo Perez-Reverte
(I'm not opposed to Gary Stuism, per se, since many writers do it to one degree or another, but this is so Gary Stu.) (Look for the movie starring Viggo Mortensen!) (Hubba hubba!)
Wow, I'm really impressed you got this far. You must like pain and boredom.
I've seen a few people on my flist do this, so here's my reading list so far for 2007. Not a particularly weighty or impressive list. There are a number of entries in continuing series here. Also, if I'm reading something heavy, large, or dark, I tend to take breaks from it now and then and pick up something lightweight, which tends to skew my finished list somewhat, but oh well. That's just PJ doing her perpetual self-justification routine...
Finished in 2007
Fiction
1. Blood Lines by Eileen Wilks
2. Dead Beat by Jim Butcher
3. Innocent in Death by J.D. Robb
4. Fast Women by Jennifer Crusie
5. Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews
6. Black Ice by Anne Stuart
7. Death of a Stranger by Anne Perry
8. Unshapely Things by Mark Del Franco
9. Faking It by Jennifer Crusie
10. All Together Dead by Charlaine Harris
11. The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff
12. Undead and Unappreciated by Maryjanice Davidson
13. Chill Factor by Rachel Caine
14. The Harlequin by Laurell K. Hamilton
15. Triangle by Katharine Weber
(A frustrating book - parts of it were moving, other parts totally irritating. The stuff about the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911 was pretty riveting; the mysterious story and character of Esther who went through the fire are engaging. But the contemporary characters and most of those long tangents on music bugged the hot holy cr*p out of me. Frankly, I think Ms. Weber had enough story for a novella and tried to stretch it to book length with all this other "arty" stuff. Yeah, yeah, it was supposed to be some kind of cockamamie a metaphor—but most of it didn't work for me. Esther's story, however, has stayed with me.)
16-19. Plus four novels in draft. I wasn't sure their authors wanted to be listed, so I've left them off.
Non-fiction
1. Black Dahlia Avenger by Steve Hodel
(He's solved the Black Dahlia case, as far as I'm concerned. Not for the squeamish.)
2. My Dark Places by James Ellroy
(One of the best, most uncompromising memoirs ever. I loved it. You will see why Ellroy's fiction is so dark. He tells the truth without blinking or making excuses for himself.)
Books I'm still actively working on:
(I read in fits and starts, more so lately than usual, and tend to have several things going at once. I'm close to done on several of these.)
1. My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding, ed. P. N. Elrod
2. Guardian of the Horizon by Elizabeth Peters
3. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Tarot by Arlene Tognetti and Lisa Lenard
4. The Passion of Mary Magdalen by Elizabeth Cunningham
(Big book, big book, but so engaging. I need periodic breaks, though.)
5. Spook by Mary Roach
6. Territory by Emma Bull
(This is the one I'm most actively reading at the moment, not much left, and I'm enjoying the wonderful fusion of Old West Tombstone, Wyatt Earp, and sorcery.)
7. Magic and Witchcraft in Europe: The Twentieth Century, eds. Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark
8. Reiki: A Comprehensive Guide by Pamela Miles
9. The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
10. The Undead by Roxanne Longstreet (aka Rachel Caine)
(Truth: I'm afraid it has an unhappy ending and I've gotten very involved with the characters and don't want to go there at this point in time, so I've laid it aside for the moment. I am sometimes a cowardly reader.)
Books I started but lost interest in for one reason or another:
I may finish these some day, but they're currently in the not-interested pile.
1. Brown's Requiem by James Ellroy
(First novel, and it shows, I think)
2. Snake Agent by Liz Williams
(Not crazy about her voice.)
3. Chasing Eden by S. L. Linnea
(So badly written, so very very bad. Even though the premise was interesting, I couldn't get beyond the writing.) (Yeah, I know, I read LKH and have no shame, but this was bad.)
4. Captain Alatriste by Arturo Perez-Reverte
(I'm not opposed to Gary Stuism, per se, since many writers do it to one degree or another, but this is so Gary Stu.) (Look for the movie starring Viggo Mortensen!) (Hubba hubba!)
Wow, I'm really impressed you got this far. You must like pain and boredom.
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Date: 2007-08-01 01:24 am (UTC)lol...I keep my list in my sidebar....
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Date: 2007-08-01 06:39 pm (UTC)I'm not organized enough to keep a reading list, but I do the same thing you do. I always have a few books in progress, either because I just needed a break or because I fell out of the mood that prompted me to pick them up in the first place. And some books I set aside because I *want* to like them, but just can't quite manage it. :P
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Date: 2007-08-01 06:48 pm (UTC)And if something is just bad or irritating or pretentious or whatever on the bad side, I don't bother finishing them anymore, no matter how intriguing the premise is. Life's too short, there's too many other things to read...
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Date: 2007-08-01 07:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-01 10:00 pm (UTC)