Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

I am in the midst of reading books I bought long ago and just neglected. Calling it my Clean-Off-the-Shelf challenge. Most are fiction and some are very long (maybe why I ignored them). A few belonged to my mother and look pretty old - she would be over 100 if she were still here. When I started this some weeks ago I vowed not to buy any more books or check any out of the library. I'm doing pretty good on that score. I do have to make room for books being read by a Roman history reading group I'm in. And books in this group, which I'm very glad I found.

Alaska by James A. Michener
Alien Pregnant by Elvis by Martin H. Greenberg
By Inheritance by Octave Thanet
Child of the Morning by Pauline Gedge
Dirt Music by Tim Winton
Ethelyn's Mistake by Mary J. Holmes
The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad by Fareed Zakaria
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Journeyer by Gary Jennings
The Medusa and the Snail: More Notes of a Biology Watcher by Lewis Thomas
Modern Manners: An Etiquette Book for Rude People by P.J. O'Rourke
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich
The Once and Future King by T.H. White
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Raptor by Gary Jennings
River God by Wilbur Smith
Sacajawea by Anna Lee Waldo
Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin
Selected Stories of Sholom Aleichem by Sholem Aleichem
Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson
Song of the River by Sue Harrison
The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version by Philip Pullman, 406 pp - A
The Lair of the White Worm by Bram Stoker, 156 pp - C-
The Cave by José Saramago, 307 pp - A-
A Plague of Angels by Sheri S. Tepper, 559 pp - A

I finally read The Once and Future King this year. My sister gave it to me... 30+ years ago! I wish I had read it ages ago. I hope you like it! Alaska was my first Michener book, and it was hard for me to get through the first chapter but then I enjoyed the rest. Happy reading!

Great idea and nice list of books Vicki. I'm looking forward to reading about your adventures in reading for 2018.

Just finished the first one, Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version. Not sure how to keep track, but I think I'll add a grade and move them to the bottom of the post.

Happy Reading, Vicki!

Just finished Lair of the White Worm, and I can't recommend it. The characters were underdeveloped and the monster was insufficiently scary.

Glad you read it and not me then. Thanks for letting us know to avoid it.

I finished The Cave by José Saramago. His writing style takes a little getting used to. He doesn't use quotation marks to denote what people say. A conversation is generally one long paragraph, with the beginning of each speaker marked by capitalizing the first word of what they're saying, then using commas to separate speakers. The story itself was quite ordinary (until near the end) but there's a good bit of philosophizing along the way.

Now I'm reading A Plague of Angels by Sheri S. Tepper - it's been quite a while since I read any sci-fi, and she's really good.

Just finished A Plague of Angels, it was really good. A combination of sci-fi and fantasy, about life on Earth many years after most people left for the stars. Cities are ruled by competing gangs, there are many archetypal villages containing types of people like Oracles, Orphans, Heros, etc., and mythical creatures like trolls and griffins roam the land. And there are talking coyotes and talking bears.

That one sounds very good. Thanks.