“Fiddle-de-dee’s not English.”

Promises to myself, hah. I should try harder to keep those.

Statistics — not terribly interesting!

It is now July! I still have a whole backlog of stuff from the beginning of May to post. I’m not entirely sure if I’ll ever get to those. It’s been a combination of lethargy and general disinterest in a lot of things (including books, imagine that) that’s been bringing me down lately, and I can’t seem to shake it off. Oh well.

OK. Just checking in here, then. At the end of June, I’ve read forty-two books this year, eighteen of those from April onwards. Not as much as the first quarter, but that’s not really surprising since I read only three books in June. Still, the one-book-a-week average that I’ve been hoping to achieve looks like it will be met (if I ever start sitting down and concentrating on a book again, that is) so this is a good thing!

There’s also a new page listing the books I’ve read since 2007, sorted by author’s name, here.

There’s still no clear favourite book of 2008, aside from the whole Lymond Chronicles by Dorothy Dunnett (I don’t think I can pick a favourite book out of the whole series and it probably doesn’t really matter; aside from the first two books, there’s no way for the other books to stand alone and make sense) which still comes out at the top of the list. Other books worth noting from Q2: David Mitchell’s number9dream, John Green’s An Abundance of Katherines, Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora.

Challenges updates

I don’t join many challenges, simply because fixed reading lists scare me. Sure, I have a “to read” list and I like having it around (very useful when you’re stumped and find yourself quite unable to choose a book from the library!) but I deviate from it all the time.

But anyway. I joined Renay’s 342,745 Ways to Herd Cats challenge, mostly because, well, it’s Nay, and when was the last time I said no to her crazy ideas?, and because it has an awesome list of book recommendations. I like rec lists. It makes you notice all sorts of new books you never even heard of before. And the challenge was simple, recommend ten books you love (my list is here) and read at least three books from the 632-item rec list. I actually finished reading and reviewing three books, but I think I’ll just go on adding books to the list until the challenge ends on 30 November.

For the 888 challenge, I’ve read thirty books out of the minimum fifty-six — a little more than half of the list. Which is good, I suppose, since we’re at the middle of the year, though it’s a bit embarrassing that the “Classics” category still hasn’t been touched yet. I’ve started books — I’m having problems finishing them.

For Dewey’s Man Booker Challenge, I’ve finished three books: The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood, number9dream by David Mitchell, and Fingersmith by Sarah Waters. Tentatively, the other three books for the list I’m planning to read are The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, Possession by AS Byatt (currently reading and getting a little cross-eyed at the Victorian poetry) and possibly Empire of the Sun by JG Ballard (no, I haven’t given up on it yet). I’d very much like to throw in Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas into the list as well, but I can’t seem to find a copy.

Currently reading

I’m still reading the same books since the last update. Nothing much to say here. The library books are late — they were due on Friday and I was too tired and I hadn’t finished either (sigh), so I decided to go tomorrow instead, possibly renew both Possession (AS Byatt) and East (Edith Pattou). East I haven’t even started. Possession is something of a struggle to read when the Victorian poets make their appearances — I can’t quite concentrate on what’s going on. It leaves me in a sort of “oh, pretty language” kind of daze and I end up not really paying attention to what’s going on.

Game of Kings (the Lymond/Dunnett reading group on Yahoo!Groups) is planning to read Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice starting next week as a break after finishing Checkmate (the last Lymond book) before starting Dunnett’s King Hereafter, so I’ll give both books a go, for the sake of following the discussion. I’ll have to admit I’ve never read Austen’s Pride and Prejudice before. Weird, isn’t that?