Reading with Style discussion

10.3 - The plus: Read a book with a two-word title that begins with "The". For example, The Firm works, but The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court does not.

My TBR had some great choices for this task:

The Sanctuary
The Awakening
The Neighbors
The Storyteller
The Storyteller
The Witness
The Witness
The Namesake
The Namesake
The Wife
The Pact
The Position
The Litigators
The Appeal
The Bookshop
The Bridge
The Confidant
The Enclave
The Uncoupling
The Keep
The Sisters
The Dovekeepers
The Imperfectionists
The Girls

Hope these suggestions are helpful to someone!

Camille wrote: "My TBR had some great choices for this task..."

Oooh, thanks for sharing your list!

Choices, and choices:

The Absentee
The Chouans
The Bostonians
The Ambassadors and others by James
The Hamlet
The Rainbow
The Collector
The Master
The Hours

I am considering The Partner, The Borrower, and The Historian.

These are on my shelf:


The Sparrow
The Dispossessed
The Colour
The Sea
The Road
The Notebook
The Unseen

were on my shelf

The Magicians by
Lev Grossman
The Russlander aka Katya by Sandra Birdsell

itpdx wrote: "The Magicians by
Lev Grossman
The Russlander aka Katya by Sandra Birdsell"

I looked on isbndb.com and the correct title of the Sandra Birdsell book is simply "The Russländer" so I have changed it on Goodreads. There is another edition titled "Katya" and I assume whoever added the book to Goodreads was trying to flag that up by adding "aka Katya" to the title, but it's not the correct way to do it. (Not suggesting this was anyone here.)

Thanks, Rosemary. I looked at the cover of that book, and there was some very small print on the right side, so I couldn't tell for certain if it was aka Katya. It did look more like only "The Russlander."

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Thanks, Rosemary. I looked at the cover of that book, and there was some very small print on the right side, so I couldn't tell for certain if it was aka Katya. It did look more like only "The Russ..."

I've found that cover on Amazon where you can enlarge it a bit more and that writing says "a novel" in lower case.

Ah, didn't think to look at Amazon, for "look inside". Yep, would have been a good idea. Thanks for correcting the title, Rosemary.

So, does that mean that additions to the two word title like "a novel" or "stories" would be okay for this task?

Katy wrote: "So, does that mean that additions to the two word title like "a novel" or "stories" would be okay for this task?"

Fortunately, Liz thought of this situation when she was writing the FAQ.

For title-based tasks, do subtitles count?
The generic ones like "A Novel" and "A Story" do not count as part of a title. Unique subtitles, however, do count.

So, you can ignore those for this task. (Yay!)

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Katy wrote: "So, does that mean that additions to the two word title like "a novel" or "stories" would be okay for this task?"

Fortunately, Liz thought of this situation when she was writing the F..."

Yay! Thanks for the FAQ reminder...should have checked that first! :)

Katy wrote: "Yay! Thanks for the FAQ reminder...should have checked that first! :) ..."

~laugh~ I initially wrote the darned things because when such questions were asked I would have a vague memory of answering it previously, which would be followed by a hour of searching/poking around the group to find the earlier answer -- this cuts down on some of research for us mods!

The Rope by Nevada Barr
The March by E.L. Doctorow
The Deerslayer by James Fenimore Cooper
The Pathfinder by James Fenimore Cooper
The Spy by James Fenimore Cooper (there were lots of other books with this same title)
The Source by James A. Michener
The Trees, The Fields, book:The Town|115468] by Conrad Richter (the last one is a Pulitzer Winner)
The Other by Thomas Tryon
The Sinner by Tess Gerritsen
The Eight by Katherine Neville
The Odyssey by Homer
The Republic by Plato (these last two good for Oldies)
There is a whole saga of the Kent Family written by John Jakes and I think every single title would fit

Would definite articles in a foreign language (e.g. the French le/la or the German der/die/das) for foreign language titles work as well?

I just got the German Die Zauberer (The Wizards) from my local library and wanted to check whether I could use it for this task.

Yes, foreign language equivalents of English "The" qualify for this task.

Thanks for the clarification, Elizabeth.

Does The Italian by Ann Radcliffe work? Some of the editions I saw had a title of The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents .

Rebekah wrote: "Does The Italian by Ann Radcliffe work? Some of the editions I saw had a title of The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents ."

I'll accept it. Even the edition with the expanded title only has "The Italian" on the cover image.

Don (The Book Guy) wrote: "Does The Pastor: A Memoir work for this task?"

Yes, "A Memoir" is generic enough that we can ignore it for this task.

Question - I'm reading The Briefcase... but I'm reading it in Japanese. The Japanese title, like the Japanese language, is without definite articles. Could I use it for this task?

Kazen wrote: "Question - I'm reading The Briefcase... but I'm reading it in Japanese. The Japanese title, like the Japanese language, is without definite articles. Could I use it for this task?"

Yes, we will go by the English title, so it works!

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Yes, we will go by the English title, so it works!"

Woo-hoo! Thank you for your swift response!

Will Les Misérables by Victor Hugo work?

Deedee wrote: "Will Les Misérables by Victor Hugo work?"

Yes! Enjoy!