Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

Challenge #1 - New & Old TBR
Challenge #2 - Second Place or Worse
Challenge #3 - Decade/Century/Millennium
Challenge #4 - Members Choice
Challenge #5 - Short Story
Challenge #6 - Group Reads and/or Buddy Reads
Challenge #7 - Expand Your Horizon With New Authors
Challenge #8 - Most Popular Goodreads Books Listed by Year
Challenge #9 – Fiction/Non-Fiction
Challenge #10 - The Half a Millennium Challenge with a Sour Lemon Twist of Difficult
Challenge #11 - Old and New Linked Categories
Challenge #12 - A-Z Author
Challenge #13 - A-Z Title

Challenge #1 Old and new TBR

Old school
1.✅ La Bête Humaine fin Jan14 5*
2. ✅Money fin Mar11 4*
3. ✅ La Débâcle fin May5 4*

New school
4. ✅Women in Love fin Feb5 4*
5. The Unconsoled DNF
6.✅ The Painted Veil fin Oct5 5*

Wildcards
7. ✅ When We Were Orphans fin Oct31 5*
8. ✅ Sword of Kings fin Feb19 4*
9. ✅ War Lord fin Dec12 5*
10.✅ The 22 Murders of Madison May fin Jan15 4*
11. ✅The Christie Affair fin Oct1 3*
12. ✅Beautiful Little Fools fin Nov13 4*

Alternates
13. ✅Doctor Pascal fin Aug3 4*
14. Sons and Lovers
15. Learwife

Challenge #2 Second place or worse

New School
1. ✅Being There by Jerzy Kosiński fin Feb17 4*
2. ✅Mildred Pierce by James M. Cain fin May18 4*
3. ✅The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham fin Oct5 5*

Old School
1.

Poor folk Dostoyevsky DNF


Short Story/Novella
1. ✅Gimpel the Fool fin Jan21 3*
2.✅ A Hunger Artist fin mar23 4*
3. ✅The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas fin Apr28 4*
4.✅ A Very Easy Death by Simone de Beauvoir fin Jun23 4*


Quarterly Long Read
1. ✅Daniel Deronda by George Eliot fin Apr21 3*

Challenge #3 Decade/Century/Millennium

Decade
1970 Being There
1971 Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont
1972 The Word for World Is Forest
1973 The Girl Who Was Plugged In
1974 Separating
1975
1976 Interview with the Vampire
1977
1978 What Dreams May Come
1979 Hear the Wind Sing

Century
1910-1919 The Lodger
1920-1929 Women in Love
1930-1939 Voyage in the Dark
1940-1949 The Tunnel
1950-1959 Hand in Glove
1960-1969 A Very Easy Death
1970-1979 I Will Fear No Evil
1980-1989 In the Winter Dark
1990-1999 The English Patient
2000-2009 When We Were Orphans

Challenge #4 - Members Choice Challenge Choose one book per category/genre for a total of 12 books.

✅ 1. 19th Century, La Bête Humaine by Émile Zola fin Jan14 5*
✅ 2. 20th Century, The Hotel by Elizabeth Bowen fin Jan8 3*
✅ 3. A book originally written in a language other than your own, First Love by Ivan Turgenev fin Jan22 4*
✅ 4. Current or Past Group Read, The Haunted Hotel by Wilkie Collins fin Jan18 3*
✅ 5. An Author not read before, Silvina Ocampo Leopoldina's Dream fin Jan24 3*
✅6. Diversity Classic, read a book from a religion, culture, country, or race different than yours. The Joys of Motherhood by Buchi Emecheta 4*
✅7. Science Fiction/Fantasy, The Word for World Is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin 4*
✅8. Action/Adventure, The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan 2*
✅9. Childrens/Young Adult, The Complete Fairy Stories of Oscar Wilde 4*
✅10. Nonfiction, Katherine Mansfield: A Secret Life by Claire Tomalin 5*
✅11. Mystery/Thriller, Tokyo Express by Seichō Matsumoto 3*
✅12. Horror or Humor, Being There by Jerzy Kosiński 4*

Challenge #5 Short story

1. A Clean Well-Lighted Place by Ernest Hemingway fin Jan8 3*
2. Paste by Henry James fin Jan9 4*
3. Hand in Glove by Elizabeth Bowen fin Jan11 4*
4. The Demon Lover by Elizabeth Bowen fin Jan13 4*
5. Why I Live at the P.O by Eudora Welty fin Jan21 2*
6. Gimpel the Fool by Isaac Bashevis Singer fin Jan21 3*
7. I Stand Here Ironing by Tillie Olsen fin Jan25 4*
8. The Swimmer by John Cheever fin Jan29 3*
9. The Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoevsky fin Jan30 4*
10. The Guest by Albert Camus fin Feb5 5*
11. A Party Down at the Square by Ralph Ellison fin Feb15 4*
12. The Woman at the Store by Katherine Mansfield fin Feb23 3*
13. A Woman on a Roof by Doris Lessing fin Feb25 4*
14. Report on an Unidentified Space Station by J.G. Ballard fin Mar7 4*
15. A Company of Laughing Faces by Nadine Gordimer fin Mar4 4*
16. A Hunger Artist fin Mar23 4*
17. The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin fin Apr28 4*
18. The Hand Patricia Highsmith fin May5 3*
19. The Red Inn by Honoré de Balzac fin May6 3*
20. Separating by John Updike fin May8 3*
21. Cathedral by Raymond Carver fin May13 4*
22. A Small, Good Thing by Raymond Carver fin May22 4*
23. Nightfall by Isaac Asimov fin Jun11 4*
24. Mars is Heaven by Ray Bradbury fin Jul1 4*
25. The Snow Goose by Paul Gallico fin Jul7 4*
26. The Iron Shroud... by William Mudford fin Jul18 3*
27. The Bear by William Faulkner fin Aug3 3*
28. The Lamplighter by Charles Dickens fin Aug3 3*
29. The Girl Who Was Plugged In by James Tiptree Jr. fin Sep3 5*
30. Venetian masks by Adolfo Bioy Casares fin Oct7 3*
31. The School by Donald Barthelme fin Oct11 4*
32. The Playground by Ray Bradbury fin Oct17 4*
33. The Mysterious Mansion by Honoré de Balzac fin Dec4 3*

Collections
1. Leopoldina's Dream by Silvina Ocampo fin Jan24 3* (32 stories)
2. The Complete Fairy Stories of Oscar Wilde fin Jan29 4* (9 stories)
3. Where All Good Flappers Go: Essential Stories of the Jazz Age fin Jul24 3*
4. The Siren’s Lament: Essential Stories by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki fin Oct12 3*
5. Kafka: A Graphic Novel Adaptation by Nishioka Kyoudai fin Oct16 5*
6. Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination by Edogawa Rampo fin Oct26 3*

Challenge #6 Group reads (poll winners or buddy reads)

1. The Haunted Hotel by Wilkie Collins fin Jan18 3*
2. The Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoevsky fin Jan30 4*
3. The Son by Philipp Meyer fin Feb9 4*
4. The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan fin Feb17 2*
5. Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor fin Mar8 4*
6. Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx fin Mar28 3*
7. The Moon Is Down by John Steinbeck fin May11 3*
8. Welcome to Hard Times by E.L. Doctorow fin Jul19 2*
9. Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde fin Jul27 4*
10. The Bear by William Faulkner fin Aug3 3*
11. A Very Easy Death by Simone de Beauvoir fin jun30 4*
12. The Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle fin Nov11 3*

Challenge #7 New authors
(at least 6)

1. Buchi Emecheta The Joys of Motherhood
2. Seichō Matsumoto Tokyo Express
3. Isaac Bashevis Singer Gimpel the Fool
4. Eudora Welty Why I Live at the P.O
5. Silvina Ocampo Leopoldina's Dream
6. Tillie Olsen I Stand Here Ironing
7. John Cheever The Swimmer
8. Lalla Romano A Silence Shared
9. Ralph Ellison A Party Down at the Square
10. John Buchan The Thirty-Nine Steps
11. Jerzy Kosiński Being There
12. Lao She Mr Ma and Son
13. Michael Ondaatje The English Patient
14. Richard Matheson What Dreams May Come
15. Raymond Carver Cathedral (short story)
16. Ernesto Sábato The Tunnel
17. James M. Cain Mildred Pierce
18. E.L. Doctorow Welcome to Hard Times
19. Margaret Drabble The Millstone
20. William Lindsay Gresham Nightmare Alley
21. Joan DidionPlay It As It Lays
22. Annie Ernaux Shame
23. Rafael Sabatini Captain Blood
24. Marie Belloc Lowndes The Lodger
25. Jun'ichirō Tanizaki The Siren’s Lament: Essential Stories

Challenge #8 –Most Popular Goodreads Books Listed by Year
Locate and list 10 books that most interest you from the year of your choice. The challenge is to read five 5 books from that list. You can use the year of your birth, the birth year of a family member, or friend, or any random year you choose.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/popula...

1970
✅1. Being There by Jerzy Kosiński fin Feb17 4*
2. This Perfect Day by Ira Levin
3. The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark
4 The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer
5. Ripley Under Ground by Patricia Highsmith
✅6. Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion fin Aug18 4*
7. Laughable Loves by Milan Kundera
✅8. The Atrocity Exhibition by J.G. Ballard fin Mar21 5*
✅9. I Will Fear No Evil by Robert A. Heinlein fin May2 5*
✅10. A Maze of Death by Philip K. Dick fin Mar26 5*

Challenge #9 – Fiction/Non-Fiction

Select five different subjects of interest to you and read a fiction book and a non-fiction book about that subject. Total number of books for this challenge is ten.

Zola

✅Zola Photographer fin Feb10 5*
✅Money fin Mar11 4*

George Eliot
✅Daniel Deronda fin Apr21 3*
✅The Marriage Question: George Eliot's Double Life by Clare Carlisle fin Nov5 4*

Katherine Mansfield
✅Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence fin Feb5 4* (Gudrun is based on KM)
✅Katherine Mansfield: A Secret Life fin Feb27 5*

Dune/Frank Herbert
✅The Worlds of Dune: The Places and Cultures that Inspired Frank Herbert by Tom Huddleston fin Oct2 5*
✅Soul Catcher by Frank Herbert fin Oct3 4*

Sherlock holmes
✅The Worlds of Sherlock Holmes: The Inspiration Behind the World's Greatest Detective by Andrew Lycett fin Oct8 4*
✅The Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle fin Nov11 3*

Challenge #10 - The Half a Millennium Challenge with a Sour Lemon Twist of Difficult

Select five books from five diffetent centuries, using the same decade for each century you select. They do not have to be consecutive centuries, but must be the same decade.

Challenge #11 - Old and New Linked Categories

Select five categories of your choice or use some of these sample categories. Once you make your category selections, link the categories by finding and reading an Old School (1899 or older) and a New School book (1900-1999) that contains some part or is all about your selected categories.

Murder/Railways
Old: ✅La Bête humaine by Émile Zola fin Jan14 5*
New : ✅Tokyo Express by Seichō Matsumoto fin Jan10 3*

Money/rich people
Old: ✅ Money fin Mar11 4*
New: ✅The Great Gatsby fin Nov8 5*

War
Old: ✅La Débâcle by Émile Zola fin May5 4*
New: ✅The Moon Is Down by John Steinbeck fin May11 3*

Meaning of life/death/philosophy
Old : ✅The Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoevsky fin Jan30 4*
New : ✅A Hunger Artist by Franz Kafka fin Mar23 4*

Pirates/Caribbean
✅Old: Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini fin Aug28 4*
✅New: Voyager by Diana Gabaldon fin Aug 27 3*

Challenge #12 - A-Z Author Challenge


A Isaac Asimov
B Elizabeth Bowen
C Wilkie Collins
D Fyodor Dostoevsky
E Buchi Emecheta
F William Faulkner
G Ursula K. Le Guin
H Robert A. Heinlein
I Kazuo Ishiguro
J Henry James
K Jerzy Kosiński
L D.H. Lawrence
M Seichō Matsumoto
N Nadine Gordimer
O Silvina Ocampo
P Annie Proulx
R Jean Rhys
S Christina Stead
T Ivan Turgenev
U John Updike
V
W Eudora Welty
Y
Below Only One Letter Needed for Successful Challenge
Q
X
Z Émile Zola

Challenge #13 - A-Z Title Challenge


A The Atrocity Exhibition fin Mar21 5*
B La Bête Humaine fin Jan14 5*
C The Complete Fairy Stories of Oscar Wilde fin jan29 4*
D The Dream of a Ridiculous Man fin Jan30 4*
E The English Patient fin Mar17 5*
F First Love fin Jan21 4*
G The Guest fin Feb5 5*
H The Hotel fin Jan8 3*
I In the Winter Dark fin Mar12 4*
J The Joys of Motherhood fin Jan8 4*
K Katherine Mansfield: A Secret Life fin Feb27 5*
L Leopoldina's Dream fin Jan24 3*
M The Man Who Loved Children fin Feb16 4*
N Nightfall fin Jun11 4*
O The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas fin Apr28 4*
P Pinball, 1973 fin Aug16 4*
R Rebecca fin Sep8 4*
S The Snow Goose fin Jul7 4*
T Tokyo Express fin Jan10 3*
U
V Voyage in the Dark fin Jul17 5*
W Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence fin Feb5 4*
Y
Below Only One Letter Needed for Successful Challenge
Q Quartet by Jean Rhys fin May13
X
Z Zola Photographer fin Feb10 5*

Ooh! Your Old and New looks fun already, Janelle. What a great idea to focus on a few specific authors! And how can you go wrong, with Zola and Lawrence and Maugham and Ishiguro?

Your Most Popular by Year looks great too. I'll be following you with 1971 :-)

Enjoy!

Still tentative Kathleen, but I wanted to give myself a good chance of succeeding with the old and new, I didn’t finish it this year!

I’m surprised how many books from the seventies catch my eye, must be the old scifi.

Your Old/New list is inspiring me, Janelle! I, like you, have not finished it this year (I'm going to be just a couple books off!). But, for some reason, I often do not finish this one. Maybe because it cannot be changed and manipulated throughout the year! So, I just read what I can and, if I'm really desperate to read those I missed, I push them on to the next year!

I think I'll keep planning an Old/New challenge for 2023 and see how it goes. Good luck with your buffet :)

Thanks Terris :)
I try and put books on the old/new challenge I really want to read (at least when I’m planning) but sometimes my reading just takes me elsewhere!

I too, didn’t finish my Old & New challenge this year, along with several more. May we both have better luck this year. Enjoy!

Thanks Bob :)

Good luck on your challenges. Your lists for the Second Place or Worse are very helpful. I might use some of those!

Thanks Lynn :)
I always get lots of additions to my TBR from the polls!

Just finished The Word for World Is Forest as my sci-fi book for challenge #4 members choice and this challenge is now complete!

It's really amazing that you're done one of the challenges so early in the year. Congrats!

Thanks Wobbley :)

Congrats!!

Thanks Bob :)

Wow. To complete the genre challenge this early in the year is quite an accomplishment! Congrats, and I'm glad to see you enjoyed the Emecheta--The Bride Price is also good.

You're going to have to double up on all of these challenges at the rate you're going, Janelle!

Checking my challenges, I intend to read in December War Lord to complete my old and new and Poor Folk to complete the second place or worse.

Then I can prepare for next years feast!

Well done -- Challenge #1 is so hard to complete! You've done really well.

Thanks Wobbley :)

I couldn’t get into Poor Folk so I’ve decided to leave the 2023 buffet table there.

Successful challenges:
#1 old and new 🎉🎉
#3 century 🎉🎉
#4 members choice 🎉🎉
#5 short story 🎉🎉
#6 group reads 🎉🎉
#7 new authors 🎉🎉
#8 goodreads most popular 1970 🎉🎉
#9 fiction/nonfiction 🎉🎉
#11 old/new linked 🎉🎉

Incomplete
#2 2nd place or worse - didn’t complete old school
#3 decade
#12 alphabet author
#13 alphabet title

Not attempted
#10 millennium twist

Overall an excellent feast!

Wow, you completed 9 challenges. That's fantastic!

An excellent feast and a great bunch of books for us to shop through. I was particularly glad to see how much you liked When We Were Orphans and The Painted Veil, as I'm hoping to get to those next year. Congratulations!

Congrats, Janelle! 9 challenges is quite a lot.

Thanks Wobbley, Kathleen and Ila :)

Kathleen wrote: "An excellent feast and a great bunch of books for us to shop through. I was particularly glad to see how much you liked When We Were Orphans and The Painted Veil, as I'm h..."

Those two books were great, Kathleen! I hope you enjoy them too :)

Congratulations on completing so many challenges this year, Janelle!
I'm happy to see that The Painted Veil got 5 stars from you also. I read that this year and loved it. Also glad to see you liked Woman In Love because I hope to get to that one next year.

Thanks Sue :)
I loved The Painted Veil! I hope you enjoy Women in Love, I liked The Rainbow more. I have Sons and Lovers on my list for this year.

Janelle wrote: "Thanks Sue :)
I loved The Painted Veil! I hope you enjoy Women in Love, I liked The Rainbow more. I have Sons and Lovers on my list for this year."

I have to get to Son's and Lovers too because it's on my Modern Library challenge

9 Complete Challenges is great! Congratulations.

Thanks Lynn :)