I've been away for too long, I apologize. I believe I owe at least one more round of stats on the original lists. Coming soon...I hope.
Has anyone else read Rebecca by Daphne DeMaurier? I'm in the middle of it. I don't understand why this is a classic. Can someone please enlighten me? I don't think I even know the protagonist's name...she doesn't even seem to be trying to make her own place in her marriage and it's driving me nuts. So many issues could have been avoided or alleviated if she just spoke up!
Reason for my long absence: Eternal Press published my novella today. Because of the holiday, I thought the launch was tomorrow...so, I'm having a twitter launch party tomorrow to give away some free copies. Do you tweet? You could win. More details on my home blog: http://kellyaharmon.com (Link opens new window...)
Showing posts with label Kelly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kelly. Show all posts
Monday, September 7, 2009
Monday, July 6, 2009
Kelly, Book Review: *Arthur Conan Doyle *The Hound of the Baskervilles
Wow, did I enjoy this book... (this excitement coupled by the fact that I didn't expect to like it).
Read the full review on my Web site (link opens in a new window).
In a nutshell: recommended.
Read the full review on my Web site (link opens in a new window).
In a nutshell: recommended.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Alice Hoffman: Will You Still Buy Her Book?
Has everyone seen the Alice Hoffman kerfluffle yet?
In a nutshell: Roberta Silman at the Boston Globe reviewed her latest book, The Story Sisters, and gave it what's being called "a lukewarm review." (Here is the Boston Globe Link (opens in new window).
It's not a glowing review, but I wouldn't call it "lukewarm" either. Silman has done her homework, and she's obviously familiar with (and has even enjoyed) Hoffman's earlier works. But, Silman does say that the book, "...lacks the spark of the earlier work. Its vision, characters, and even the prose seem tired. Too much of it is told rather than shown..."
She does have nice things to say about the book, too: "Admittedly, there are some wonderful passages as the book winds to a close - about the heirloom tomatoes Annie grew in her garden and how Claire learns to design jewelry"
Hoffman responded by tweeting Silman's phone number and email address and told her readers to "Tell her what u think of snarky critics."
Hoffman also disparaged Silman: "Roberta Silman in the Boston Globe is a moron. How do some people get to review books?"
And then Hoffman put down the Boston Globe: "No wonder there is no book section in the Globe anymore - they don't care about their readers, why should we care about them"
I double-checked my Project 100 list to see if I had planned to read any Hoffman. I'm glad to see that I hadn't, because I'd be giving serious consideration to removing those books from my list.
What about you? Would these kind of tantrums from an author make you run out and buy the book, or maybe burn the books sitting on your shelf?
In a nutshell: Roberta Silman at the Boston Globe reviewed her latest book, The Story Sisters, and gave it what's being called "a lukewarm review." (Here is the Boston Globe Link (opens in new window).
It's not a glowing review, but I wouldn't call it "lukewarm" either. Silman has done her homework, and she's obviously familiar with (and has even enjoyed) Hoffman's earlier works. But, Silman does say that the book, "...lacks the spark of the earlier work. Its vision, characters, and even the prose seem tired. Too much of it is told rather than shown..."
She does have nice things to say about the book, too: "Admittedly, there are some wonderful passages as the book winds to a close - about the heirloom tomatoes Annie grew in her garden and how Claire learns to design jewelry"
Hoffman responded by tweeting Silman's phone number and email address and told her readers to "Tell her what u think of snarky critics."
Hoffman also disparaged Silman: "Roberta Silman in the Boston Globe is a moron. How do some people get to review books?"
And then Hoffman put down the Boston Globe: "No wonder there is no book section in the Globe anymore - they don't care about their readers, why should we care about them"
I double-checked my Project 100 list to see if I had planned to read any Hoffman. I'm glad to see that I hadn't, because I'd be giving serious consideration to removing those books from my list.
What about you? Would these kind of tantrums from an author make you run out and buy the book, or maybe burn the books sitting on your shelf?
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Stats Update!
Statistics Update for the "Second 1000" Books
These statistics are for the second 1000 unique books in our list of books (for all lists entered by the end of April. I will be getting to lists entered after April after I clean up the initial entries...)
These 1000 books start with the letter "L" and go partially through books beginning with "The" in the title. In fact, the last book in this list (number 1000), begins, "The End..." (Appropriate, eh?)
These 1000 books contain about 900 duplicate reads, so our original list of 5300 has been winnowed down to about 3500 unique reads. This number will collapse further when I get to the third 1000...(The "third 1000" list is currently at 1534 entries. It would not surprise me to see the list be de-duped down to less than 1000 entries.)
Some books were entered with the beginning "The" in the title, some were not. I've combined them as I've come across them, but I'm certain I've missed a few. When I'm able to combine all the lists and sort by author, the numbers will collapse even more.
In this middle section of the list, the book with the highest number of projected reads is Middlemarch by George Elliot (20).
Second place (tied at 17 requests) are Lolita by Nabakov and Northanger Abbey by Austen.
Rebecca, by De Maurier, is in third place with 16.
These numbers may change slightly as the other lists make it to my tallies.
Other books with high read requests include: Life of Pi, Martel - 15, Love in the Time of Cholera, Marquez - 15, and Moby Dick, Melville. Slaughterhouse Five, Vonnegut; The Bell Jar, Plath; and, The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky, all have 13 read requests.
There are 779 unique reads on this "Second 1000" list.
The authors with the most requested books on the list are:
Sue Grafton and Alexander McCall Smith with 8 each. (Both are Mystery/Detective Authors)
Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare both have 7 books on the list.
Jane Austen "only" has 6 (but has 7 if you include her co-authored book with Seth Grahame-Smith, "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies...)
Mark Twain - 6
Toni Morrison, Jodi Picoult, Terry Pratchet, John Updike - 5
Margaret Atwood has 4 books on the list, as does A. S. Byatt, George Eliot, Neil Gaiman, Jenna Black, Steven King and Cormac McCarthy.
These numbers will climb higher when I combine all the lists.
Those readers with the most unique reads on their lists include:
Jason - 31
Iasa & Kristina - 34
Andromeda - 44
These numbers will go down as some of the "TBD" books are chosen and (will probably) duplicate some books already on the list.
As for paired reads...
Kelly and Moonrat have added 4 more to their list. Other players with uniquely-paired reads include:
Amanda/Amanda Snow - 2
Biblio Brat/Michelle - 3M - 2
Crystal/Merry M - 2
Goedi/Purple Clover - 2
Jason/Lisa - 2
Merry M/Shelley - 2
In this section of the list, we've actually got a trio with two uniquely-paired reads:
Briony/Kelly/Moonrat - 2
Contact me via email if you'd like to know what your uniquely-paired books are so you can hook up. I'll try to get these items posted to the Web ASAP so you can review yourselves...but it's still going to take a few weeks.
Thanks!
These statistics are for the second 1000 unique books in our list of books (for all lists entered by the end of April. I will be getting to lists entered after April after I clean up the initial entries...)
These 1000 books start with the letter "L" and go partially through books beginning with "The" in the title. In fact, the last book in this list (number 1000), begins, "The End..." (Appropriate, eh?)
These 1000 books contain about 900 duplicate reads, so our original list of 5300 has been winnowed down to about 3500 unique reads. This number will collapse further when I get to the third 1000...(The "third 1000" list is currently at 1534 entries. It would not surprise me to see the list be de-duped down to less than 1000 entries.)
Some books were entered with the beginning "The" in the title, some were not. I've combined them as I've come across them, but I'm certain I've missed a few. When I'm able to combine all the lists and sort by author, the numbers will collapse even more.
In this middle section of the list, the book with the highest number of projected reads is Middlemarch by George Elliot (20).
Second place (tied at 17 requests) are Lolita by Nabakov and Northanger Abbey by Austen.
Rebecca, by De Maurier, is in third place with 16.
These numbers may change slightly as the other lists make it to my tallies.
Other books with high read requests include: Life of Pi, Martel - 15, Love in the Time of Cholera, Marquez - 15, and Moby Dick, Melville. Slaughterhouse Five, Vonnegut; The Bell Jar, Plath; and, The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky, all have 13 read requests.
There are 779 unique reads on this "Second 1000" list.
The authors with the most requested books on the list are:
Sue Grafton and Alexander McCall Smith with 8 each. (Both are Mystery/Detective Authors)
Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare both have 7 books on the list.
Jane Austen "only" has 6 (but has 7 if you include her co-authored book with Seth Grahame-Smith, "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies...)
Mark Twain - 6
Toni Morrison, Jodi Picoult, Terry Pratchet, John Updike - 5
Margaret Atwood has 4 books on the list, as does A. S. Byatt, George Eliot, Neil Gaiman, Jenna Black, Steven King and Cormac McCarthy.
These numbers will climb higher when I combine all the lists.
Those readers with the most unique reads on their lists include:
Jason - 31
Iasa & Kristina - 34
Andromeda - 44
These numbers will go down as some of the "TBD" books are chosen and (will probably) duplicate some books already on the list.
As for paired reads...
Kelly and Moonrat have added 4 more to their list. Other players with uniquely-paired reads include:
Amanda/Amanda Snow - 2
Biblio Brat/Michelle - 3M - 2
Crystal/Merry M - 2
Goedi/Purple Clover - 2
Jason/Lisa - 2
Merry M/Shelley - 2
In this section of the list, we've actually got a trio with two uniquely-paired reads:
Briony/Kelly/Moonrat - 2
Contact me via email if you'd like to know what your uniquely-paired books are so you can hook up. I'll try to get these items posted to the Web ASAP so you can review yourselves...but it's still going to take a few weeks.
Thanks!
Friday, June 5, 2009
Stats Update - Woot!
An Update on Statistics: The First 1000 Books
Apologies for the delay on reporting any stats....May was an interesting Month for me, lots of time sinks, hardly and reading at all, and culminating in what I *thought* might have been a broken foot...but (thankfully) is not. (Still hurts like the dickens, though!)
I have been working on stats, but there's an incredible amount of data and it needs a lot of cleaning up: some folks didn't put authors on their list and I'm having to track down the ones for books I don't know. Some folks listed author names as First then Last, others the opposite...and to do any meaningful sort of the data, I've got to make sure that each entry is entered the same. The same type of thing is occurring for book titles: Some folks put titles with "The" in them with the "The" at the beginning, others dropped the "The."[Also: there's an incredible number of incorrect book titles on the list!]
Not complaining, just explaining! :)
So....keeping in mind that these numbers will more than likely change as I clean up the remaining data, here's what I've got for the first 1000 books on our list. This is 1000 unique books...starting with the letter "A" and ending partially in the letter "L."
The original number of entries was 5,137. This included any list entered on the blog up until April 29, 2009.
By sorting out the duplicates in the first 1000 books (in alphabetical order) we've reduced the actual unique entries by over 1040. So, my "total list" is down to about 4,300 items. This number will be further reduced as I match up the author/title records of entries beyond number 1000.
Here's what I have so far:
Entry number 666 is Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. (I thought this was funny.)
The number one book "to be read" in the first 1000: Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy (14 people want to read it)
Second Place book is a three-way tie: Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury), David Copperfield (Charles Dickens) and Brideshead Revisited (Evelyn Waugh). 13 people want to read these books.
Third place is shared by eight books: Bleak House (Charles Dickens), Crime And Punishment (Fyodor Dostoeveky), Catch-22 (Joseph Heller), Lady Chatterley’s Lover (D.H. Lawrence), Atonement (Ian McEwan), Gone With the Wind (Margaret Mitchell), Beloved (Toni Morrison) and East of Eden (John Steinbeck). 12 people want to read each of these.
There are 746 unique reads on the list for the first 1000.
The author with the most requested books in the first 1000 is Ernest Hemingway (8). William Shakespeare, with 7, comes in a close second. Charles Dickens and Neil Gaiman both have 6 requested books (two of Gaiman's are co-authored.). Jorge Luis Borges, William Faulkner and Stephen King each have 5 requested books.
There are 35 books on the list with a number in its title. The list doesn't contain any books with "Book 1" or "Volume 2" in the title. Nor does it contain any books with the word "number" in the title, such as: Ada, the Enchantress of Numbers, by Betty Toole. Here is the list:
1984, Orwell, George
2666, Belano, Roberto
10 Short Stories, Pritchett, V.S.
100 Years of Solitude, Marquez, Gabriel Garcia
13 Little Blue Envelopes, Johnson, Maureen
13 stories, Welty, Eudora
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Verne, Jules
2001: A Space Odyssey, Clarke, Arthur C.
28 Stories of AIDS in Africa, Nolen, Stephanie
60 Stories, Barthelme, Donald
700 Sundays, Crystal, Billy
84, Charing Cross Road, Hanff, Helene
A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters Barnes, Julian
A Million Little Pieces, Frey, James
A Tale of Two Cities Dickens, Charles
A Thousand Acres Smiley, Jane
A Thousand Splendid Suns Hosseini, Khalad
A Thousand Years of Good Prayers Li, Yiyun
A Widow for One Year, Irving, John
Around the World in Eighty Days, Verne, Jules
Across Five Aprils, Hunt, Irene
At Swim-Two-Birds, O'Brien, Flann
Attack of the Two-Headed Poetry Monster, McLaughlin, Mark & McCarty, Michael
Bat 6,Wolff, Virginia
Butterfield 8, O'Hara, John
Catch-22, Heller, Joseph
Child 44, Smith, Tom Rob
Die 13 1/2 Leben des Kapt'n Blaubar, Moers, Walter
Fahrenheit 451,Bradbury, Ray
Fever, 1793, Anderson, Laurie Halse
Fifteen Legs, Silva, Bonnie
Four Past Midnight, King, Stephen
Henry V, Shakespeare, William
Henvry VIII,S hakespeare, William
La Storia ; Five Centuries of the Italian American Experience, Mangione, Jerre & Morreale, Ben
As for ourselves...
Goedi has the most unique list, with 43 books on it no one else wants to read. Krista has the second most unique with 35. Leslie comes in third with 30.
The most "paired up" lists are Me (Kelly) and Moonrat who share 7 books (I'm not surprised there, because I did start-off using Moonie's list to begin with. The second-most paired are Becky and Melissa with 3 books. There are scads of books which two people share. (Note, Kelly and Moonrat, as well as Becky and Melissa share more than this number between them...this is just the number of unique pairings.)
There are no groups of three or more people who share more than 1 book between them.
Is there anything else anyone wants to know? I personally am dying to see how many Hugo Winners are on the list...as well as Pulitzers, Newberrys, etc. That portion will have to come with a little help from y'all...
Once I get the list sanitized, I'll post it on line so that we can add winning prizes and such (If the people who *know* add that info, it will save the rest of us a lot of time looking it up.) I'd also like to add a column in the DB for "Who's Read this Book?" to see how many we've actually read collectively.
Anything else?
Apologies for the delay on reporting any stats....May was an interesting Month for me, lots of time sinks, hardly and reading at all, and culminating in what I *thought* might have been a broken foot...but (thankfully) is not. (Still hurts like the dickens, though!)
I have been working on stats, but there's an incredible amount of data and it needs a lot of cleaning up: some folks didn't put authors on their list and I'm having to track down the ones for books I don't know. Some folks listed author names as First then Last, others the opposite...and to do any meaningful sort of the data, I've got to make sure that each entry is entered the same. The same type of thing is occurring for book titles: Some folks put titles with "The" in them with the "The" at the beginning, others dropped the "The."[Also: there's an incredible number of incorrect book titles on the list!]
Not complaining, just explaining! :)
So....keeping in mind that these numbers will more than likely change as I clean up the remaining data, here's what I've got for the first 1000 books on our list. This is 1000 unique books...starting with the letter "A" and ending partially in the letter "L."
The original number of entries was 5,137. This included any list entered on the blog up until April 29, 2009.
By sorting out the duplicates in the first 1000 books (in alphabetical order) we've reduced the actual unique entries by over 1040. So, my "total list" is down to about 4,300 items. This number will be further reduced as I match up the author/title records of entries beyond number 1000.
Here's what I have so far:
Entry number 666 is Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. (I thought this was funny.)
The number one book "to be read" in the first 1000: Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy (14 people want to read it)
Second Place book is a three-way tie: Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury), David Copperfield (Charles Dickens) and Brideshead Revisited (Evelyn Waugh). 13 people want to read these books.
Third place is shared by eight books: Bleak House (Charles Dickens), Crime And Punishment (Fyodor Dostoeveky), Catch-22 (Joseph Heller), Lady Chatterley’s Lover (D.H. Lawrence), Atonement (Ian McEwan), Gone With the Wind (Margaret Mitchell), Beloved (Toni Morrison) and East of Eden (John Steinbeck). 12 people want to read each of these.
There are 746 unique reads on the list for the first 1000.
The author with the most requested books in the first 1000 is Ernest Hemingway (8). William Shakespeare, with 7, comes in a close second. Charles Dickens and Neil Gaiman both have 6 requested books (two of Gaiman's are co-authored.). Jorge Luis Borges, William Faulkner and Stephen King each have 5 requested books.
There are 35 books on the list with a number in its title. The list doesn't contain any books with "Book 1" or "Volume 2" in the title. Nor does it contain any books with the word "number" in the title, such as: Ada, the Enchantress of Numbers, by Betty Toole. Here is the list:
1984, Orwell, George
2666, Belano, Roberto
10 Short Stories, Pritchett, V.S.
100 Years of Solitude, Marquez, Gabriel Garcia
13 Little Blue Envelopes, Johnson, Maureen
13 stories, Welty, Eudora
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Verne, Jules
2001: A Space Odyssey, Clarke, Arthur C.
28 Stories of AIDS in Africa, Nolen, Stephanie
60 Stories, Barthelme, Donald
700 Sundays, Crystal, Billy
84, Charing Cross Road, Hanff, Helene
A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters Barnes, Julian
A Million Little Pieces, Frey, James
A Tale of Two Cities Dickens, Charles
A Thousand Acres Smiley, Jane
A Thousand Splendid Suns Hosseini, Khalad
A Thousand Years of Good Prayers Li, Yiyun
A Widow for One Year, Irving, John
Around the World in Eighty Days, Verne, Jules
Across Five Aprils, Hunt, Irene
At Swim-Two-Birds, O'Brien, Flann
Attack of the Two-Headed Poetry Monster, McLaughlin, Mark & McCarty, Michael
Bat 6,Wolff, Virginia
Butterfield 8, O'Hara, John
Catch-22, Heller, Joseph
Child 44, Smith, Tom Rob
Die 13 1/2 Leben des Kapt'n Blaubar, Moers, Walter
Fahrenheit 451,Bradbury, Ray
Fever, 1793, Anderson, Laurie Halse
Fifteen Legs, Silva, Bonnie
Four Past Midnight, King, Stephen
Henry V, Shakespeare, William
Henvry VIII,S hakespeare, William
La Storia ; Five Centuries of the Italian American Experience, Mangione, Jerre & Morreale, Ben
As for ourselves...
Goedi has the most unique list, with 43 books on it no one else wants to read. Krista has the second most unique with 35. Leslie comes in third with 30.
Edit: Adding a written "wink, wink" here as I didn't mean to offend anyone by implying that no one else anywhere (!) wants to read their choices.
The most "paired up" lists are Me (Kelly) and Moonrat who share 7 books (I'm not surprised there, because I did start-off using Moonie's list to begin with. The second-most paired are Becky and Melissa with 3 books. There are scads of books which two people share. (Note, Kelly and Moonrat, as well as Becky and Melissa share more than this number between them...this is just the number of unique pairings.)
There are no groups of three or more people who share more than 1 book between them.
Is there anything else anyone wants to know? I personally am dying to see how many Hugo Winners are on the list...as well as Pulitzers, Newberrys, etc. That portion will have to come with a little help from y'all...
Once I get the list sanitized, I'll post it on line so that we can add winning prizes and such (If the people who *know* add that info, it will save the rest of us a lot of time looking it up.) I'd also like to add a column in the DB for "Who's Read this Book?" to see how many we've actually read collectively.
Anything else?
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Complete List of Books...
I've posted the list here as an html file. (Opens in a new window...)
You'll see there's much cleaning up to do...and I intend to do some (all?) this weekend....particularly where authors are concerned: some are listed last name first, some the other way around. (And we can't do an author sort or run author stats until that's fixed!) Lines are missing from the table, because excel doesn't add them to empty cells when you convert to HTML. Sorry, I wasn't coding this by hand! =)
There are columns for Awards and Genre because some folk had entered that on their lists. I'd be interested in seeing those columns fleshed out - just to see what kind of stats we'd get. I'll do some of that when I clean up the list...but I may need some help because there are some books I've just never heard of. (More than "some" actually! =) )
Does anyone know of a way that we can share the spreadsheet on line so that anyone could contribute? (I don't mind emailing files....but surely there's a better way?)
Finally....I want to thank Amanda for sending over her excel files to start with and for offering to help. And I want to thank Linda, Jen C, and the mysterious "M" for volunteering to help as well.... (Your time will come!) =)
Is anyone interested in keeping tally of when books are read? I admit I'm curious...but I can't begin to think how to organize that for the list. Perhaps if we can get folks to update a sharable list?
Off to write!
Kelly
You'll see there's much cleaning up to do...and I intend to do some (all?) this weekend....particularly where authors are concerned: some are listed last name first, some the other way around. (And we can't do an author sort or run author stats until that's fixed!) Lines are missing from the table, because excel doesn't add them to empty cells when you convert to HTML. Sorry, I wasn't coding this by hand! =)
There are columns for Awards and Genre because some folk had entered that on their lists. I'd be interested in seeing those columns fleshed out - just to see what kind of stats we'd get. I'll do some of that when I clean up the list...but I may need some help because there are some books I've just never heard of. (More than "some" actually! =) )
Does anyone know of a way that we can share the spreadsheet on line so that anyone could contribute? (I don't mind emailing files....but surely there's a better way?)
Finally....I want to thank Amanda for sending over her excel files to start with and for offering to help. And I want to thank Linda, Jen C, and the mysterious "M" for volunteering to help as well.... (Your time will come!) =)
Is anyone interested in keeping tally of when books are read? I admit I'm curious...but I can't begin to think how to organize that for the list. Perhaps if we can get folks to update a sharable list?
Off to write!
Kelly
eBook Reading on the Rise
I recently came across a very interesting survey about the reading of e-books being on the rise. It's an academic survey, but I can't help feeling like the findings translate (or will soon) to recreational reading.
You can read about it here on my blog. (This will open in a new window.)
I enjoy reading e-books - a lot. In fact, I'm going to be reading Middlemarch electronically, via Gutenberg.org.
There was a time (not too long ago actually) when if you'd asked me if I enjoyed reading electronically, I'd have told you, "no way." I just loved being surrounded by my (thousands of) books.
I still love my books, although I'm willing to part with a few these days...but the convenience of carrying several around with me at a time has been really eye-opening.
How about you?
Kelly
You can read about it here on my blog. (This will open in a new window.)
I enjoy reading e-books - a lot. In fact, I'm going to be reading Middlemarch electronically, via Gutenberg.org.
There was a time (not too long ago actually) when if you'd asked me if I enjoyed reading electronically, I'd have told you, "no way." I just loved being surrounded by my (thousands of) books.
I still love my books, although I'm willing to part with a few these days...but the convenience of carrying several around with me at a time has been really eye-opening.
How about you?
Kelly
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Statistical Update!
I have finished compiling "The List!"
I will post it when I have more time, probably tomorrow. However, I wanted to give a quick update to let everyone know that progress is being made.
This is a raw list with all readers and their choices. Consequently, there are many duplicates of books. If someone listed an author, but no title, I listed "TBD" in the "book" spot. I did the same for those who said, "next five Pulitzers" (or other prize) - so that at least we had numbers to work with.
Unless I've miscalculated, we have 52 lists posted, giving us a potential of 5200 books. The list has 5,137 books listed, for an average of 98.7 designated "reads" per poster.
I reserve the right to update the next statistic because the list needs to be cleaned up (the horrors of cut and paste from HTML into Excel!), but at first sort, the number one book to be read on the list is:
Middlemarch, by George Eliot! Nineteen people have chosen to read it.
The two runners-up on the list are Lolita (Nabakov) and Rebecca (Du Maurier). Sixteen people each want to read these two books.
I had help and many offers of help to compile the list...but their names are trapped in my mailbox. I thank them here...and will list them later when I can get to my mail.
More later!
Kelly
I will post it when I have more time, probably tomorrow. However, I wanted to give a quick update to let everyone know that progress is being made.
This is a raw list with all readers and their choices. Consequently, there are many duplicates of books. If someone listed an author, but no title, I listed "TBD" in the "book" spot. I did the same for those who said, "next five Pulitzers" (or other prize) - so that at least we had numbers to work with.
Unless I've miscalculated, we have 52 lists posted, giving us a potential of 5200 books. The list has 5,137 books listed, for an average of 98.7 designated "reads" per poster.
I reserve the right to update the next statistic because the list needs to be cleaned up (the horrors of cut and paste from HTML into Excel!), but at first sort, the number one book to be read on the list is:
Middlemarch, by George Eliot! Nineteen people have chosen to read it.
The two runners-up on the list are Lolita (Nabakov) and Rebecca (Du Maurier). Sixteen people each want to read these two books.
I had help and many offers of help to compile the list...but their names are trapped in my mailbox. I thank them here...and will list them later when I can get to my mail.
More later!
Kelly
Friday, April 24, 2009
Kelly's List
Hi All!
This project fascinated me as soon as I saw it announced. I knew I wanted to be a part of it. I started with Moonrat's list, since that's where I heard about the project...but I've refined it since then. I've blogged (a very little) about it on my Web site.
Moonrat's (Andromeda's?) list was great for me to start with since it included a lot of authors I wouldn't normally choose for myself. My refining criteria:
1. Native Son, Richard Wright
2. Gravity’s Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon
3. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
4. Watership Down, Richard Adams
5. Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow
6. Middlemarch, George Eliot
7. 1984, George Orwell
8. Women in Love, D.H. Lawrence
9. The French Lieutenant’s Woman, John Fowles
10. Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott
11. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, Michael Chabon (Hugo)
12. Moby Dick, Herman Melville
13. Moll Flanders, Daniel Defoe
14. Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
15. Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt
16. House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
17. Persuasion, Jane Austen
18. Chocolate War, Robert Cormier
19. The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
20. Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Truman Capote
21. Underworld, Don DeLillo
22. The Golden Notebook, Doris Lessing
23. Swann’s Way, Marcel Proust
24. Of Human Bondage, Somerset Maugham
25. Bless the Beasts and Children, Glendon Swarthout
26. The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
27. While I Was Gone, Sue Miller
28. The Best Short Stories, O. Henry
29. The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky
30. The Radetsky March, Joseph Roth
31. Digging to America, Anne Tyler
32. Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
33. The Stupidest Angel, Christopher Moore
34. East of Eden, John Steinbeck
35. The Privilege of the Sword, Ellen Kushner (Nebula Nominee)
36. The Conservationist, Nadine Gordimer
37. The Good Terrorist, Doris Lessing
38. Memoirs of a Good Daughter, Simone DeBeauvoir
39. Carry On, Jeeves, P.G. Wodehouse
40. The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexander Dumas
41. Rainbow’s End, Vernor Vinge (Hugo)
42. A Fable, William Faulkner (Pulitzer)
43. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
44. American Tragedy, Theodore Dreiser
45. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Susanna Clarke (Hugo)
46. Sophie’s Choice, William Styron
47. Tuesday with Morie, Mitch Albom
48. The Snow Queen, Joan D. Vinge (Hugo)
49. The Plague, Albert Camus
50. Miss Lonelyhearts, Nathaniel West
51. White Teeth, Zadie Smith
52. Charming Billy, Alice McDermott
53. Cauldron, Jack McDevitt (Nebula Nominee)
54. Farming the Bones, Edwidge Danticat
55. The Dispossessed, Ursula K. Le Guin (Nebula)
56. Ulysses, James Joyce
57. Temple of the Golden Pavilion, Yukio Mishima
58. Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold (Nebula)
59. The Known World, Edward P. Jones
60. Kokoro, Natsume Soseki
61. The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot
62. Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen
63. My Antonia, Willa Cather
64. Go Tell It on the Mountain, James Baldwin
65. The House of Spirits, Isabel Allende
66. Herzog, Saul Bellow
67. The Stories of John Cheever, John Cheever (Pulitzer)
68. The Boat, Nam Le
69. The Optimist’s Daughter, Eudora Welty (Pulitzer)
70. Three Lives, Gertrude Stein
71. Hounds of Baskerville, Arthur Conan Doyle
72. Stories of Your Life and Others, Ted Chiang
73. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
74. Possession, A.S. Byatt
75. Under the Net, Iris Murdoch
76. Housekeeping, Marilyn Robinson
77. Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace
78. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, Haruki Murakami
79. Runaway, Alice Munro
80. In America, Susan Sontag
81. The Stories of John Cheever
82. God’s War, Christopher Tyerman
83. Valley of the Dolls, Jacqueline Susann
84. A Model World, Michael Chabon
85. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
86. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, Oscar Hijuelos
87. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley
88. American Pastoral, Philip Roth
89. The Shipping News, E. Annie Proulx
90. The Book Borrower, Alice Mattison
91. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
92. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
93. Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller
94. Bad Behavior, Mary Gaitskill
95. Empire Falls, Richard Russo
96. Rebecca, Daphne DuMaurier
97. March, Geraldine Brooks
98. The Second Sex, Simone DeBeauvoir
99. Gilead, Marilyn Robinson
100. Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift
This project fascinated me as soon as I saw it announced. I knew I wanted to be a part of it. I started with Moonrat's list, since that's where I heard about the project...but I've refined it since then. I've blogged (a very little) about it on my Web site.
Moonrat's (Andromeda's?) list was great for me to start with since it included a lot of authors I wouldn't normally choose for myself. My refining criteria:
- Classics I hadn't read
- Hugo and Nebula Winners I Hadn't Gotten to Yet
- Pulitzer Winners
- Some Writers I'd Never Heard Of...
- No duplication of authors
1. Native Son, Richard Wright
2. Gravity’s Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon
3. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
4. Watership Down, Richard Adams
5. Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow
6. Middlemarch, George Eliot
7. 1984, George Orwell
8. Women in Love, D.H. Lawrence
9. The French Lieutenant’s Woman, John Fowles
10. Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott
11. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, Michael Chabon (Hugo)
12. Moby Dick, Herman Melville
13. Moll Flanders, Daniel Defoe
14. Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
15. Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt
16. House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
17. Persuasion, Jane Austen
18. Chocolate War, Robert Cormier
19. The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
20. Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Truman Capote
21. Underworld, Don DeLillo
22. The Golden Notebook, Doris Lessing
23. Swann’s Way, Marcel Proust
24. Of Human Bondage, Somerset Maugham
25. Bless the Beasts and Children, Glendon Swarthout
26. The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
27. While I Was Gone, Sue Miller
28. The Best Short Stories, O. Henry
29. The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky
30. The Radetsky March, Joseph Roth
31. Digging to America, Anne Tyler
32. Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
33. The Stupidest Angel, Christopher Moore
34. East of Eden, John Steinbeck
35. The Privilege of the Sword, Ellen Kushner (Nebula Nominee)
36. The Conservationist, Nadine Gordimer
37. The Good Terrorist, Doris Lessing
38. Memoirs of a Good Daughter, Simone DeBeauvoir
39. Carry On, Jeeves, P.G. Wodehouse
40. The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexander Dumas
41. Rainbow’s End, Vernor Vinge (Hugo)
42. A Fable, William Faulkner (Pulitzer)
43. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
44. American Tragedy, Theodore Dreiser
45. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Susanna Clarke (Hugo)
46. Sophie’s Choice, William Styron
47. Tuesday with Morie, Mitch Albom
48. The Snow Queen, Joan D. Vinge (Hugo)
49. The Plague, Albert Camus
50. Miss Lonelyhearts, Nathaniel West
51. White Teeth, Zadie Smith
52. Charming Billy, Alice McDermott
53. Cauldron, Jack McDevitt (Nebula Nominee)
54. Farming the Bones, Edwidge Danticat
55. The Dispossessed, Ursula K. Le Guin (Nebula)
56. Ulysses, James Joyce
57. Temple of the Golden Pavilion, Yukio Mishima
58. Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold (Nebula)
59. The Known World, Edward P. Jones
60. Kokoro, Natsume Soseki
61. The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot
62. Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen
63. My Antonia, Willa Cather
64. Go Tell It on the Mountain, James Baldwin
65. The House of Spirits, Isabel Allende
66. Herzog, Saul Bellow
67. The Stories of John Cheever, John Cheever (Pulitzer)
68. The Boat, Nam Le
69. The Optimist’s Daughter, Eudora Welty (Pulitzer)
70. Three Lives, Gertrude Stein
71. Hounds of Baskerville, Arthur Conan Doyle
72. Stories of Your Life and Others, Ted Chiang
73. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
74. Possession, A.S. Byatt
75. Under the Net, Iris Murdoch
76. Housekeeping, Marilyn Robinson
77. Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace
78. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, Haruki Murakami
79. Runaway, Alice Munro
80. In America, Susan Sontag
81. The Stories of John Cheever
82. God’s War, Christopher Tyerman
83. Valley of the Dolls, Jacqueline Susann
84. A Model World, Michael Chabon
85. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
86. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, Oscar Hijuelos
87. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley
88. American Pastoral, Philip Roth
89. The Shipping News, E. Annie Proulx
90. The Book Borrower, Alice Mattison
91. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
92. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
93. Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller
94. Bad Behavior, Mary Gaitskill
95. Empire Falls, Richard Russo
96. Rebecca, Daphne DuMaurier
97. March, Geraldine Brooks
98. The Second Sex, Simone DeBeauvoir
99. Gilead, Marilyn Robinson
100. Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift
