100 books to read before you die discussion

I have been working my way through the 2003 big read list and now still have to go:
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot

Currently reading 63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens and 72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell.

I've loved this project because it's made me read books I would never normally read. Not sure about having to read 4 Jacqueline Wilson's though!

Finished 'A tale of two cities' which took some getting into, but was definitely worth the effort. Loved the descriptions of revolutionary Paris.

'The ragged trousered philanthropists' was very readable, very amusing, very thought-provoking. It reminded me a lot of 'Atlas shrugged' in the sense that it is a political novel. However, TRTP was much more entertaining!

On to 'The count of Monte Cristo'!

I absolutely loved The Count of Monte Cristo. I've been distracted by reading 'The age of innocence' which doesn't feature in the top 100 (and now I've read it I know why!)

On to 'The grapes of wrath'

Finished 'The grapes of wrath' (5*) and 'Noughts and crosses' (4*). I loved East of Eden and Of mice and men, so it was no surprise that I found a lot to love in GOW too. It was such a heart breaking story and so relevant to the financial problems of today.

On to 'Brideshead revisited'!

Very disappointed with 'Brideshead revisited'. It just seemed to meander around the lives of spoiled aristocrats. I enjoyed the humour of Sebastian but even this charm seemed to fizzle out after the initial third of the book. I appreciate you don't have to like the characters to love a book but I found little else to redeem this novel.

I then moved on to 'The Story of Tracey Beaker', which was charming in its own way.

Now half way through 'The Secret History' which I am enjoying immensely so far.

Oh how I loved 'The Secret History'! Dark, moody, fantastic.
It's inspired me to try a challenge. On to 'War and Peace'. I tried to read this in 1998 when I was an undergrad but I gave up after 200 pages or so. Let's see if I can do better this summer.

So, given that the UK has been having the hottest summer in years, I switched to' Emma' by Jane Austen which was more suited to the weather. It was as expected- light, trivial, charming. Really enjoyed it! Now beginning to tackle' War and peace'. So far, so good...

Finished 'War and Peace' last night. There were elements of it I really enjoyed but I found the way Tolstoy pontificated about the philosophy of history, military tactics, and the nature of free will, to be irritating rather than illuminating. And as with many of the books on this list, there seemed to be a lot of self-involved upper class people navel gazing throughout it. 3 stars.

I couldn't sleep last night so I immediately started 'Holes' for a change of pace. It took me about 90 minutes to read and I absolutely loved it. Short, punchy, brilliant. It reminded me of the magical realism of '100 years of solitude' but much more accessible. Loved Stanley Yelnats. 5 stars.

On to another novel for young people: 'Black Beauty'.

Black beauty gets 3 stars. I imagine it was ground breaking at the time of publication but it didn't really engage me.

'Far from the madding crowd' confirms how much I dislike Thomas Hardy. Even though I quite liked the characters I find his style of writing tedious to the point that I couldn't force my way through the book until I'd been trying for four months! So relieved I've finished and can move on.

Just finished 'Perfume' which was a wonderful change of pace from Thomad Hardy. It's an incredibly readable book, with a very original plot and style. I love a good anti-hero!

Just finished ‘The Magus’, which centred around another anti-hero. I think this is the sort of book you love or hate. I can imagine people hate it because it’s frustrating, obscure and long-winded. Fortunately I loved it! 5* book.
Only 19 more reads left!

Finished 'I capture the castle' - beautifully gripping and bittersweet. A 5* read for me.

Started 'Middlemarch' a few days ago. I had to admit my heart sank a bit when I aw it was 900 pages but so far I am loving it! My favourite part so far is a description of a young man's attitude: "Plain women he regarded as he did the other severe facts of life, to be faced with philosophy and investigated by science". I found this wickedly amusing.

Charlotte wrote: "Finished 'I capture the castle' - beautifully gripping and bittersweet. A 5* read for me."

Glad to here you say this. I just started, about 100 pages read. At first I did not like it but it is beginning to grow on me.

I definitely think it's worth persevering with.

It's gone up to at least a 4 star rating. It's sweet.

Took me a while to get through but I really enjoyed 'Middlemarch'. I particularly liked Dorothea. She reminds me of myself at that age: evangelical about my desire to save the world, self sacrificing in a totally unnecessary fasion and ridiculously naive! Of course, Dorothea develops and matures as the novel goes on (wish I could say the same for me! ) Her heart is always in the right place and I empathised with her completely.
I gave the book 4* because despite the finely drawn characters, I think it would have really benefited from some more stringent editing. I'm sure many would disagree!

17 to go! Think I'll move to another marathon read - 'Bleak House'. I've found Dickens hard going in the past. I read in another thread that he was paid by the word. This novel is over 1000 pages so let's hope it's value for money!
I watched the bbc series about eight years ago so I have my memories of that as a bit of a guide. The series was fabulous, so hopefully the book will be even better.

Well, Bleak House took three months to read but it was definitely worth it! It's the first Dickens that I've found easy to read. Brilliant characters, great plots, all drawn together neatly. There were even a few twists I didn't see coming.

As 'Bleak House' was a 5* read for me, I've decided to crack on with more Dickens and go straight on 'Great Expectations'. Hello there Pip!

I found 'Great Expectations' the easiest Dickens to read. It's a classic story of ignorance, arrogance and ambition. The stand out feature for me is Miss Havisham, the archetypal spurned bride. The story lost pace for me in the final third but overall a fantastic read, 4*.

I have a long train journey tomorrow in which I'm planning to read 'Love in the time of cholera'. I loved '100 years of solitude' so really looking forward to it.

Changed my mind and read 'Cold comfort farm' on the train instead which fitted beautifully into a five hour journey. I just loved Flora. No nonsense, no sentimentality, no prisoners. A brilliant heroine and an amusing and diverting novel (as she would say). 5*

Working my way through 'Love in the time of cholera'. It's enjoyable but I don't find myself racing through it which is what happens when I love a book.

I had my nieces staying with me this week, gorgeous girls aged 9 and 13, so I read 'Double act' to them. I asked the nine year old if she thought it should be on the top 100 books of all time and she said it was the third best Jacqueline Wilson she'd read! I think I enjoyed it more for sharing it with them and I preferred it to 'Tracey Beaker' but I'm still not a massive fan of Jacqueline Wilson.

Disappointed by 'Love in the time of cholera'. It just didn't grip me in the way I'd expected. Some very questionable sexual ethics as well. I find it hard to empathise with a main character who sleeps with his 14 year old blood relative.

...when he is in his seventies.

I have read 'Vicky Angel' and 'Girls in Love', both by Jacqueline Wilson, over the past few days. Both were much better than I expected and I can see why she's such a well loved author. I suspect if I was in my early teens, rather than my mid thirties, they would be on my top 100 too. I'd give them both a strong 3 stars, maybe even 4 stars for Vicky Angel, because they deal with really gritty subjects: death, sex and drugs. However, they lose out for me because I have never heard any teenager talk like the ones in her books! It gets a bit Enid Blyton like at times. Speaking of which, I'm moving on to 'The magic faraway tree' next. I want to finish off all the children's books before moving on to some epic novels.

I went for 'Swallows and amazons' after the Jacqueline Wilson books. I found it hard going because it is incredibly posh and written about a bizarre time when children were allowed to sail to an island, alone, for weeks on end and the only concern their mother had was to make sure they had enough matches! it was charming but so far removed from modern life as to be ridiculous.
I've moved straight on to 'The pillars of the earth' which I absolutely love. I started it today and have already read 200 pages.

'Pillars of the earth' was absolutely brilliant. The struggle between the powers of the church and the powers of nobles is fascinating. Wonderful characters, beautiful descriptions, great story telling. Loved it!
Now only nine books to go!

Two more books finished. First, I read "The Princess Diaries" which was pretty much everything I expected. Very readable, entirely preposterous, instantly forgettable.

After that, I read "Magician" which is a much meatier epic. I read the revised version which is much longer as the original was edited heavily. I think the book would have been much better with some serious editing. It jumps back and forth between characters, which isn't normally a problem but I found it hard to engage with any of them. The only part which really intrigued me was Pug's training as a magician, which actually made up very little of the book. Instead it rambled on and on about imaginary wars, in imaginary places. Not my thing.

I've become a bit distracted on the way and started trying to read a poem a day as well. Doesn't take long but it change your whole perspective on a day.
7 books to go!

Read 'Anne of green gables' which was charming and now working my way through 'Gormenghast'. Slow going. Why use ten words when a thousand will do?

Just finished Gormenghast. Uh. I don't know such interesting characters and inventive story lines could be made so boring. Glad it's finished. 5 to go!

Just finished 'A suitable boy'. 1500 pages, dozens of characters, scores of plots... I just got lost in it. I plowed through but it was not pleasurable reading. Some parts were wonderful, like the description of the festival of Holi and the paint flying everywhere. But mostly it was too complex to be readable, let alone enjoyable.

Now only 4 books to go - The Wishing Tree, Katherine, The Shell Seekers and... Ulysses. The last is formidable. I read 'Dubliners' and discussed reading Ulysses with my English teacher. She advised me to steer clear for several decades. Well decades have gone by so I'll give it a whirl. Will save it until last though. 'Katherine' next.

I loved Katherine. Hope you do as well.

Loved 'Katherine'! It was such a joy to read a book that was enjoyable after the hard slog through A Suitable Boy and Gormenghast. I knew a little of John of Gaunt from studying Shakespeare's Richard II, but fortunately there were still twists and turns in the plot that I didn't see coming.

Also whizzed through Enid Blyton's The Magic Faraway Tree, which was charming. Two books to go! On to The Shell Seekers.

Shell seekers was charming - really enjoyed it. I don't think it would be fair to say I enjoyed Ulysses... I spent as much time trying to understand it (God bless spark notes!) as I did actually reading it. But I got through... and I've read them all. All 100. Yowza!

I realised after I I'd started writing on this group that I'd picked the wrong list - the Big Read, rather than the 100 to read before you die. There is a lot of overlap between them so perhaps I'll pick up the ones I've missed. In the meantime I am going to treat myself to some YA fiction, switch my brain off and read the Scorch Trials. I'll then move on to my favourite author of all time, the very underrated Stephen King.

Happy reading to you all!

Well, congratulations on a list well read anyway!!

I've just checked and I've read 84 of the 100 books to read before you die, so it shouldn't be too much of a task to read the last 16. Although I'm a bit apprehensive about Moby Dick. And has anyone really read the COMPLETE works of Shakespeare? I've read or seen 10 of his plays (Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Richard II, Hamlet, Othello, Comedy of Errors, Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night's Dream, As you like it). But - every play, every poem? Doesn't sound like something even full time English lit students would do.