All About Books discussion

What books are you thinking of reading in May? You can share them here.

There are only two books that I am definitely going to try to read in May:

Orlando
Dom Casmurro

I'm sure other books will come along also!

I have quite a few long and daunting group or buddy reads planned for May. I'll try to fit some easier library books around them when I have time.

Anna Karenina DNF
Dead Souls 3 stars
Finnegans Wake DNF
Orlando 3 stars
The Professor currently reading

Adding library books -
The Birth Machine 3 stars
Charlotte Brontë: A Life 4 stars
The Complete Poems of Emily Bronte 3 stars
The Hate U Give 4 stars
The Tidal Zone
Stay with Me 3.5 stars
Do Not Say We Have Nothing

I have always less time to read and this year I'm picking up a lot of not easy non-fiction.

I hope to finish In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching who has some flowing parts but other parts aren't. All in all I'm not liking it because I'm becoming aware that also Gurdjieff's teaching was a little bit weird. I'm glad I'm reading it because I was curious to know more about Gurdjieff, but I'm pretty sure that after this book I won't read more by him or about him.

I hope to pick up this month The Neverending Story.

And then I'm still reading The Complete Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen but this is an ongoing read in between the other books I'm reading or to have something easy to read when I'm too tired.

Just like Pink, I have some long reads planned for May, so I don't know which books I'll actually manage to read.

However, here's my plan:

Finish The Lives of Others in case I don't manage to finish reading it in April
Oracle Night
Dorando Pietri. Una storia di cuore e di gambe - no English edition; it's a graphic novel so it shouldn't take me much time
Waking Lions
The Crimson Petal and the White

Those I will read for sure. Then, there are some books I should be reading in order to complete some challenges, but it's highly unlikely I will be able to read them all. The list is as follows:

Paradise Lost
Fiasco
Big Sur - which would be a re-read anyway
Bicentenario - no English edition, it's a short novel by a Haitian author
Either Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell or The Plot Against America, as they both fit the challenge

A pretty ambitious plan! I'm 100% sure I won't be able to read them all, but I like planning anyway :)

I will probably not be reading much in May because of our big trip.

At present I am a third of the way through Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China. I can't take it with me to China because it is banned!
Anyway I have decided to pause it before it get to some of the more extreme elements of Chinese history. For the same reason I am not starting Mao: A Life. Our guide said we should read up some background for the trip but I am pretty sure this wasn't quite what he meant. :0)

I will be taking City of Bones because it is part of a challenge and I won't be heart broken if the book gets damaged or lost.
Also it seems I will be taking my tablet so I will finish up Rotherweird and start The Collapsing Empire.

Esther, are you enjoying Wild Swans? I loved it. What a pain that you have to break in the middle. That would really irritate me. What happens if you have such a banned book on your tablet? Can they check what is on your tablet, and what if you downloaded the remaining portion not at the border but when there? Probably I wouldn't dare do that though.

Wow, all the great food you will eat. Chinese food is my favorite food. Bean sprouts, yum!

Chrissie wrote: "Esther, are you enjoying Wild Swans? I loved it. What a pain that you have to break in the middle. That would really irritate me. What happens if you have such a banned book on your tablet? Can the..."

Wild Swans is strangely compelling.
The writing is quite inelegant and she retells the background history in a plain no-nonsense fashion. There is definitely no poetry here but quite a few non-sequiturs. And I don't feel there is an attempt at world building: In Lisa See's Snowflower and the Secret Fan the writing was also quite plain but I felt pulled into the world of a chinese woman of the time. With Wild Swans I always feel like I am being told a story.
Despite all that the story is gripping, a total page turner. I keep telling myself to put the book down but I can't!
I have studied Chinese history enough that I know it is going to be horrendous but I still want to read more.

Chrissie wrote: "Esther, are you enjoying Wild Swans? I loved it. What a pain that you have to break in the middle. That would really irritate me. What happens if you have such a banned book on your tablet? Can the..."

Yes I am totally looking forward to the food even though I know it will be very different from the 'Chinese food' we eat in the West.

As to banned books. I don't think they check tablets but the physical book is a hard-to-miss-brick and I wouldn't want to lose it. Other considerations are weight allowance and time because I won't have much of either!
China blocks Goggle and FB for its own citizens though it is legal for tourists to set up a VPN to bypass the censor.
I will probably only read on the 11 hour flight and will just take a technology break during the trip using my 'down time' to rest in preparation for the next day's sightseeing.

Esther I read Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China actually decades ago. It is definitely more plot oriented than lyrical. ....as I remember it! when I read it I loved it. I wonder what I would think now.

You must be terribly excited. Have fun.

Two more books that I forgot about, but I'm hoping to read in May:

NW for a face-to-face bookgroup
Dr. Faustus for this season's drama selection in AAB

I will be reading the following:
Two which I did not complete in April:
The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism by Ross King 3 stars read
Marking Time by Elizabeth Jane Howard 3 stars read
(I may want to continue this series further and then follow up with her biography. I am not going to continue the series but may pick up her biography in the future.)

Black Narcissus by Rumer Godden 4 stars read
Stormy Weather by Paulette Jiles 2 stars read
Miller's Valley by Anna Quindlen 3 stars read
The Absolutist by John Boyne 3 stars read
The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald 3 stars read
The People's Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century by Steven Watts 4 stars read
The Nine of Us: Growing Up Kennedy by Jean Kennedy Smith 2 stars read
The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father by Kao Kalia Yang 5 stars read

See message 44 for other books read this month.

My reading month:

The Fireman - read
Vinegar Girl - read
The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father - read
All the Missing Girls - read
Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things
Sisterhood Everlasting
I Let You Go

Collen, do yo u know if it is important to read Kao Kalia Yang's The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir before The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father? I too have been considering them for May. The first is about the author's grandmother and the second about her father....if I am not mistaken. Or is it that one is a repeat of the other? I am kind of confused.

Chrissie wrote: "I will be reading the following:
Two which I did not complete in April:
The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism by Ross King (..."


Thank you for those. I added The Absolutist to my TR pile ad also two of your authors....Anna Quindlen and Elizabeth Jane Howard.

Chrissie wrote: "I will be reading the following:
Two which I did not complete in April:
The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism by Ross King (..."


Thank you for those. I added The Absolutist to my TR pile ad also two of your authors....Anna Quindlen and Elizabeth Jane Howard.

Lisa, i liked Howard's The Light Years and so want to continue with more in the series. I do not usually go for series so I am not sure if I will start getting bored. The thing is I do want to read her biography and I cannot read that until I have first read more of her books! Boyne and Quindlen are new authors for me!

Colleen, I just went ahead and added Kao Kalia Yang's The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father to my list of books for May! I had to stop thinking and just decide!

Chrissie wrote: "Lisa, i liked Howard's The Light Years and so want to continue with more in the series. I do not usually go for series so I am not sure if I will start getting bored. The thing is I d..."

I can do short series. The long ones I never finish even when they are good.

I have way too many books to read. Some of my library and library hold books are:

Non Fiction
The Elephant and the Dragon: The Rise of India and China and What It Means for All of Us
Chinese Lessons: Five Classmates and the Story of the New China
Prison Profiteers: Who Makes Money from Mass Incarceration
Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference
The Boy on the Wooden Box
Bad Science
A House in the Sky
Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?


Fiction
Hannah's Dream
The Bookshop on the Corner
Red Rising
The Tortilla Curtain
Dark Matter
The President's Hat
Of Mice and Men
My Family and Other Animals
The Bear and the Nightingale


My PIFM:
Brilliance
Inside Mrs. B.'s Classroom: Courage, Hope, and Learning on Chicago's South Side

First read
The Awkward Age
Stranger, Father, Beloved


I'm not sure how many I will get through, lol.

Lisa, it is also important to note that all of the books in the the Cazalet Chronicles series are very long. Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence is the biography that I am planning on reading about the author.

Of Mice and Men is really fantastic. i recently reread that. Gerald Durrell's books are all fun. His brother's I can do without. T.C. Boyle's The Tortilla Curtain, sure I liked it but it could have been better. I think some of his other books are much better, for example The Women and San Miguel. They tend to be violent and I have gotten a bit bored by them. I am OK with the violence if what is described is based on fact.

Chrissie wrote: "Colleen, I just went ahead and added Kao Kalia Yang's The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father to my list of books for May! I had to stop thinking and just decide!"

Good for you! Can't wait to see what you think. I did not realize the two books were by the same author and I have not read the first about her grandfather yet, but is on my TBR. The author was just in my town of Lakeville, MN as it is our One Book One Lakeville selection for this year, and I was sorry to have missed it.

For group reads I'm planning to read
The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War (ongoing, started in April) - Well Educated Mind Histories Group
Orlando - AAB

I might join a group read of The Lord of the Rings in one of my other groups that goes until June

I want to read Julius Caesar this month or next so I can go to see it while a local theater is performing it. Maybe I'll put it off until later, as the play is showing until October.

If I fit in an audiobook it will probably be Acceptance the 3rd book in the Southern Reach trilogy

Colleen wrote: "Chrissie wrote: "Colleen, I just went ahead and added Kao Kalia Yang's The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father to my list of books for May! I had to stop thinking and ..."

What a shame that you missed meeting the author!!!!

Th second book could be better than the first, about her grandMOTHER, not grandfather. I will be listening to the audio version and this could prove to be a bit of a challenge; I wasn't impresses with the sample, but we'll see. I hope we both like the text; I can live with a lousy narration.

I am adding another to my list of books to be read this month. I just picked it up free: The Beautiful and Damned. I wouldn't say that the books I have so far read by F. Scott Fitzgerald have been to my taste, but this will be another try. Petra and Pink, you both thought it was definitely worth reading, so I will give it a try.

I listened to the first 10-20% on audiobook, narrated by William Dufris and I absolutely hated it. I thought the problem was with the book, not the narration, but once I switched to a physical copy I started to love it. I'm not sure this book will be any more suited to your tastes, as it's typically bleak Fitzgerald, similar in style to Tender is the Night, which I don't think you liked. Always worth a try though, especially if it's free.

Chrissie, I agree with Pink. The fascination with this story is the pampered, entitled, spoiled people and their concept of the world and how they fit into it. These are people I would not want to meet.
The story is truly Fitzgerald bleak.

Hmph. I have the same narrator! One of these audiobooks where I will have to repeat the words in my head rather than listening!

Pink, two minutes ago I finished Black Narcissus. It is a wow book. I have to recommend it to you b/c I know you like classics.

Thanks Chrissie, I haven't heard of that one before, I'll take a look :)

Pink wrote: "Thanks Chrissie, I haven't heard of that one before, I'll take a look :)"

She is new for me too. Gill read In This House of Brede. I figured I would try Black Narcissus because it is set in India and some compare it to A Passage to India....which to me is totally ridiculous. The two are very different. All that is the same in the country.

Petra wrote: "Chrissie, I agree with Pink. The fascination with this story is the pampered, entitled, spoiled people and their concept of the world and how they fit into it. These are people I would not want to ..."

I'll keep that in mind when I read it. I'll try and read something lighter beforehand. I really hated The Great Gatsby because of the people, but I read it decades ago. Bleak books are fine by me, BUT there has to be something to make it worthwhile. Good writing or good characterizations.

Chrissie wrote: "Hmph. I have the same narrator! One of these audiobooks where I will have to repeat the words in my head rather than listening!

Pink, two minutes ago I finished Black Narcissus. I..."

Oh, I must try BN Chrissie. Glad you enjoyed it.

Just finished Americanah.
Currently reading The Swimming-Pool Library
I also want to read:
Foucault's Pendulum
Letters to a Young Poet
The Guermantes Way
The Waves

And if I still can, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Gill wrote: "Chrissie wrote: "Hmph. I have the same narrator! One of these audiobooks where I will have to repeat the words in my head rather than listening!

Pink, two minutes ago I finished [book:Black Narci..."

Seriously, I was considering five stars. I loved the message. I loved lines and it had me laughing.

First off I'm trying to finish the following long reads I've been on for a while:

Plato: The Complete Works
The Pickwick Papers
Charlotte & Emily Brontë: The Complete Novels

Plus finish a group discussion book where I get points
I, Claudius

Plus my first graphic novel
The Complete Maus

As I finish some of this, I'll see what I am going to read next. I do have another book or two to read for points.

I loved Americanah Raul. I think she's very talented with something to say.

Colleen wrote: "I loved Americanah Raul. I think she's very talented with something to say."

I agree, Chimamanda is really talented and she managed to fuse socio-political matters with fiction well. I still think that Half of a Yellow Sun is her best work I have read so far.

Raul, I have read three of her books and I have come to the same conclusion - Half of a Yellow Sun is the very best. So far!

Great to see we agree on that Chrissie, Half of a Yellow Sun was incredible!

I agree with you, Chrissie and Raul.

Half of a Yellow Sun is on my TBR, I guess I should move it up the list. I bet it's good.

Colleen wrote: "My reading month:

The Fireman
Vinegar Girl
The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father
All the Missing Girls
I Let You Go
&&&"

Colleen, The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father is fantastic.

It's a wonder, I was able to read the two books I wanted to read this month! Now I have to pick up something else and I think I will read something for my challenge "books I already own since a very long time".
So most likely a book with all the short stories by Kafka and then I will see but after a lot of non-fiction now I need some fiction.

(See message 12 for other books read this month.)

I need more books to read:
Fiction
On Canaan's Side by Sebastian Barry 4 stars read
Isadora by Amelia Gray 1 star read
Where Angels Fear to Tread by E.M. Forster 4 stars read
A Long Way from Verona by Jane Gardam 3 stars read
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson 1 star read
Non-fiction
Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies by Ross King 4 stars read
Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah 1 star read

What I didn't finish this month are moved over to June.