The Actually Pretty Doable Summer Reading Challenge discussion

When you think you've got 10 titles (including one Old Book and one Long Book), post them here.

Okay I have my 10.
Over 500 pages..
The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough
Over 100 years old
Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

The rest:
The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout
The Passage by Justin Cronin
The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin
Alice I have Been by Melanie Benjamin
Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah
Me before you by JoJo Moyes
Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan
Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Happy Reading!

Sweet Tooth sounds great. Good luck!

1. 100 years:
The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne

2. 500 pages:
The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

3. 4:50 from Paddington by Agatha Christie
4. Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla by Marc Seifer
5. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
6. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
7. The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
8. The Science of Leonardo by Fritjof Capra
9. Turn of the Screw by Henry James
10. Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho

100 years old- Dubliners-James Joyce (Actually 99 years old, but I figure it's close enough)

500 pages- Mystic River-Dennis Lehane

3-Billy Bathgate- E.L. Doctorow
4-Ragtime- E.L. Doctorow
5-Angels- Denis Johnson
6-In Persuasion Nation-George Saunders
7-Grapes of Wrath- Steinbeck
8-How the Dead Live- Will Self
9-The Fight-Norman Mailer
10-A Short History of Nearly Everything- Bill Bryson

Greg, I love your number 10 choice. So good.

You read it already? I'm really looking forward to that one

Yes, and I really loved it. Enjoy!

Slaughterhouse 5 is one of the books that got me in to reading. Enjoy!

1. A song of Ice and Fire 1: A game of Thrones - George Martin (over 500 pages)

2. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley (over 100 years old)

3. Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy - Douglas Adams (I re-read it every year anyway!)

4. Stay Close - Harlan Coben

5. Life of Pi - Yann Martel

6. The hunger games: Catching fire - Suzanne Collins

7. Northern Lights - Philip Pullman

8. Moby Dick - Herman Melville

9. The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris

10. Connectome: how the brain's wiring makes us who we are - Sebastian Seung

As you may be able to tell, I plan on spending my summer reading titles I should have read a long time ago.

Here are my 10 (subject to change at any moment because I'm a flighty fellow):
1 - 172 Hours on the Moon by Johan Harstad
2 - You Shouldn't Call Me Mommy by Susan Tsui
3 - Burnt Children by Rachel Washington
4 - London Falling by Paul Cornell
5 - The Lost Ones by Ace Atkins
6 - Tommyknockers by Stephen King (500+)
7 - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne (100 yrs)
8 - The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle
9 - The Warlord of the Air by Michael Moorcock
10 - Morlock Night by K.W. Jeter

My list is probably going to change seeing as I have a hard time choosing what to have for dinner but this is the tentative plan. I think it's a pretty good mix of old and new as well as a number of genres. Excited for the Farewell To Arms because it's the latest edition with all three alternative endings.

Enders Game- Orson Scott Card
Inferno- Dan Brown (guilty pleasure)
Transatlantic- Collum McCain
Nos4a2 (500)- Joe Hill
A Farewell to Arms- Hemingway
Triburbia- Karl Tard Greenfeld
The Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy-Douglas Adams
Beautiful Ruins-Jess Walter
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (100) - Twain
Interpreter of Maladies- Jhumpa Lahiri

My list is as follows:

Old Book: The Portrait of Dorian Gray

500 pages: The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larson

3. The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry
4. Gideon's Sword by Preston Childs
5. Unnatural Acts by Stuart Woods
6. Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen
7. The Girl Who Kicked Over The Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larson
8. Ladies Night by Mary Kay Andrews
9. The Seville Communion by Arturo Perez-Reverte
10. Inferno by Dan Brown

Here's my list--

I have them all. They've just been sitting on the shelf, waiting for a motivated reader!

1. Stoner & Spaz by Ron Koertge
2. Stolen by Lucy Christopher
3. Lying by Lauren Slater
4. The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
5. Looking for Alaska by John Green
6. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
7. Aberrations by Penelope Przekop
8. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
9. The Awakening and Selected Stories by Kate Chopin (over 100 years old)
10. The Art of the Personal Essay by Phillip Lopate (over 500 pages)

Mickey-- is this list set in stone once the start date hits?

Thanks to an amazing used book sale this weekend, I'm switching #10 to The Poisonwood Bible!

switching my 500+ page book from "Mystic River" to "The Executioner's Song"

1. Sweet Machine by Mark Doty
2. Sailing Alone Around the Room by Billy Collins
3. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
4. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
5. Horoscopes for the Dead by Billy Collins
6. Down the Rabbit Hole by Juan Pablo Villalobos
7. My Father's Ghost is Climbing in the Rain by Patricio Pron
8. The Two Yvonnes by Jessica Greenbaum
9. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (over 500 pages)
10. Daisy Miller by Henry James (over 100 years old)

1. Sweet Machine by Mark Doty
2. Sailing Alone Around the Room by Billy Collins
3. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
4. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
5. Horoscopes for the Dead by Billy Collins
6. Down the Rabbit Hole by Juan Pablo Villalobos
7. My Father's Ghost is Climbing in the Rain by Patricio Pron
8. The Two Yvonnes by Jessica Greenbaum
9. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (over 500 pages)
10. Daisy Miller by Henry James (over 100 years old)

The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale
Les Miserable by Victor Hugo
How Successful People Lead by John C. Maxwell
Earn the Right To Win by Tom Coughlin
Anti Cancer; A New Way of Life by David Servan Schreiber
UP; How Positive Outlook Can Transform Our Health and Aging by Hillary Tindle
Finding Your Element by Ken Robinson
The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Thomas Jefferson; The Art of Power by John Meachum

I almost cheated. I almost stayed in last night and got started on one of my books. Instead, I had three beers and fell asleep like the hound-man I've become.

Thank you all for giving this silly idea a shot. I'm really impressed with the amount of folks who agreed to do this (and doubly impressed with so many fantastic book lists!), and I can't wait to see who gets to all ten books.

In the words of the Tenth Doctor: "Allons-y!"

So, I have finished The Lace Reader by Brutonia Barry.