Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

What are you planning to read this month? Are you following whim or challenge plans? Are you following monthly read schedules like February Black History Month?

My plans for February:

finish from last month:
✔ Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Stories (Truman Capote) ★★★★★ (4.5)

very likely:
1. The Conference of the Birds (Attar of Nishapur)
✔ 2. Love in the Big City (Sang Young Park) ★★★★ (4.0)
✔ 3. The 39 Steps (John Buchan) ★★★ (3.5)
✔ 4. Nubia: The Awakening (Omar Epps) ★★★ (3.0)

probably:
1. Praise of Folly (Erasmus)
✔ 2. The Silence of the Girls (Pat Barker) ★★★★★ (4.5)
✔ 3. What Moves the Dead (T. Kingfisher) ★★★★ (3.5)

possibly:
1. The Last House on Needless Street (Catriona Ward)
✔ 2. Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (Elizabeth Taylor) ★★★★★ (5.0)
✔ 3. Sea of Tranquility (Emily St. John Mandel) ★★★★ (4.0)

unplanned:
✔ 1. C.P. Cavafy: The Poems of the Canon (Constantinos P. Cavafy) ★★★★ (4.0)
✔ 2. The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Stories (Edgar Allan Poe) ★★★★ (4.0)

I'll have a 9-book start on my reading goal, so I'll dive into Infinite Jest. That'll probably take me into March.

At least that's the plan....

311 Plan

3 - 20th Century Reads
The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare by G.K. Chesterton
A Dram of Poison by Charlotte Armstrong
The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor

1 - 19th Century Read
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

1 - Short Story
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin

I have more that I would like to read than I know I can LOL. My only real plan is to try to finish ✔ A Journal of the Plague Year By Daniel Defoe Annotated Novel

✔ The Apparition by Guy de Maupassant

Also perhaps:
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
✔ The 39 Steps by John Buchan
The Ladies' Paradise by Émile Zola

Classics:
1. The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan
🌻2. Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
3. If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino
🌻 4. The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau
🌻 5. The Blazing World by Margaret Cavendish
🌻 6. The Eastern Front 1914-1917 by Norman Stone. Seminal work about the Eastern Front of WWI. Won the Wolfson History Prize.

Non Classics
🐝 1. Last Call at the Hotel Imperial: The Reporters Who Took on a World at War by Deborah Cohen
🐝 2. Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein
🐝 3. How Language Works by David Crystal
🐝 4. At Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson
5. Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang

I'm still reading Middlemarch – taking my time and enjoying the second book more than the first, just ready to start Book 3.

Other new-to-me reads are:
Dissolution by Sansom, historical mystery that's really good so far
The Hobbit and Philosophy: For When You've Lost Your Dwarves, Your Wizard, and Your Way
The Hollow audiobook by Christie, narrated by my favorite - Hugh Fraser

Rereads include:
North and South by Gaskell, just because I love this book so much
The Five Orange Pips and Other Cases a Sherlock Holmes short story collection
King Lear
Una arruga en el tiempo, A Wrinkle in Time by L'Engle for working on my Spanish

Rereading for various groups:
Airs Above the Ground by Mary Stewart, it's been ages since I read this
The 39 Steps
Venetia, a Georgette Heyer I haven't read in a long time

I always do some spur of the moment reading, and I don't ordinarily plan out my reading this much, but there were several read-alongs I wanted to take part in this month.

ok so my February "Core 8":
Julie, Or The New Heloise Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 1760 (to finish)
Canterbury Tales, The Chaucer, Geoffrey 1400 (to finish)
Conference of the Birds, The Attar of Nishapur 1177 (buddy read)
Man Without Qualities, The Musil, Robert 1930 (middle third)
Adventures of Augie March, The Bellow, Saul 1953 (first half)
How The Steel Was Tempered Ostrovsky, Nikolai 1932
Binodini (aka "Choker Bali"; aka "Grain of Sand, A") Tagore, Rabindranath 1903
From The Earth To The Moon Verne, Jules 1865

I am continuing The Tale of Genji and I Sing the Body Electric! & Other Stories. I also just started Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont.

Books and Audiobooks from January:

The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder

Open House by Elizabeth Berg

The Little House in the Fairy Wood by Ethel Cook Eliot DONE
These are my choices for the Bookwanderers Readathon.

The Diary of a Nobody by George and Weedon Grossmith for Kindred Spirits Club by Kate Howe on YouTube and also my January challenge for A Little Tree Hollow. DONE

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf for the Everyone Has Read This But Me The Catch-Up Classics

February's books:
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen for The Literary Society (we are reading it for January and February).

Middlemarch(parts 7 & 8) by George Eliot for the Everyone Has Read This But Me The Catch Up Read-a-Long. DONE

The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford for the Kindred Spirits Club on Kate Howe's YouTube channel.

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie for the Everyone Has Read This But Me The Catch Up

American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins for my local library book club. DONE

The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn for Historical Fashionistas

The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor for Women's Classic Literature Enthusiasts

Again more books than I can read/listen to in a month but they say, "Variety is the spice of life! "

Lynn wrote: "I have more that I would like to read than I know I can LOL. My only real plan is to try to finish A Journal of the Plague Year By Daniel Defoe Annotated Novel by [author:Daniel Def..."

I have that problem, too, when planning my monthly reads! :)

Teri-K wrote: "I'm still reading Middlemarch – taking my time and enjoying the second book more than the first, just ready to start Book 3.

Other new-to-me reads are:
Dissolution by..."

I am reading Middlemarch as well. :)

Now that I've got a solid start on my challenge, I'm going to dive into Infinite Jest-- which will be my reading plan for Feb and probably most of Mar, lol

Janice wrote: "Teri-K wrote: "I'm still reading Middlemarch – taking my time and enjoying the second book more than the first, just ready to start Book 3.

Other new-to-me reads are:
[book:Dissolut..."

You're way ahead of me! But I'm enjoying taking my time with it. How would you rate it so far?

Finish:
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont Elizabeth Taylor ☆☆☆☆☆
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida Shehan Karunatilaka ☆☆☆
Leech Hiron Ennes ☆☆☆
The Cider House Rules John Irving ☆☆☆1/2

Begin and finish:
Coming of Age in Mississippi: The Classic Autobiography of a Young Black Girl in the Rural South Anne Moody ☆☆☆1/2
The Book of Goose Yiyun Li ☆☆☆☆
Tomb of Sand Geetanjali Shree
Greenland: A Novel David Santos Donaldson ☆☆☆
The Stone Angel Margaret Laurence
Dangerous Rhythms: Jazz and the Underworld T.J. English ☆☆☆

Shorts:
Moldy Strawberries Caio Fernando Abreu ☆☆☆
New and Selected Stories Cristina Rivera Garza ☆☆☆
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man Fyodor Dostoevsky ☆☆☆☆

Begin or continue:
The Man Without Qualities: Volume I Robert Musil
A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century Barbara W. Tuchman
The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath
The Conference of the Birds Attar of Nishapur trans. Sholeh Wolpé ☆☆☆

Rereads:
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler Italo Calvino
In Praise of Folly Erasmus ☆☆☆
Assembly Natasha Brown ☆☆☆☆1/2

I did really well with my January plans, so am probably over-doing it, but here goes:

Currently Reading
✔The Nether World, George Gissing
✔Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont, Elizabeth Taylor
... Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself Into Print, Renni Browne

Starting Soon
X Assembly, Natasha Brown
The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, Brian Moore

Short Stories
✔The Guest, Albert Camus
✔A Party Down at the Square, Ralph Ellison
✔The Lottery, Shirley Jackson
✔A Woman on a Roof, Doris Lessing

And these two I just picked up for Black History Month:
✔Read Until You Understand: The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature, Farah Jasmine Griffin
✔The Awkward Black Man, Walter Mosley

This seems too many books for February, but let's see:

Group reads and buddy reads across my groups
The Book of the City of Ladies
The Conference of the Birds
The Women of Brewster Place
Verdict of Twelve
Tales and More Tales from Mountain
I have The Transit of Venus on order from the library

Currently listening to
The Wind Whistling in the Cranes

The library would like some of these back
The Sand Child
The Bookseller of Florence: The Story of the Manuscripts That Illuminated the Renaissance
The Lonely Londoners
The Lonely Girl
Girls in Their Married Bliss

To start
The Last Chronicle of Barset
The Night Will Have Its Say

I hope to finish 9-11 classics this month:

✔️1. Wodehouse: Summer Lightning (1929)
✔️2. Austen: Sense and Sensibility (1811)
✔️3. Pratchett: Equal Rites (1987)
✔️4. Dante: Vita Nuova (1292)
✔️5. *Dostoevsky: The Meek One (1876)
replace with Beerbohm: "The Mote in the Middle Distance," from A Christmas Garland (1912)
✔️6. Tyson: Vincent Van Gogh (Grt Achievr) (1996)
✔️7. Lovecraft: The Color Out of Space (1927)

...and at least a couple of the group reads
✔️8. Erasmus: The Praise of Folly (1511)
✔️9. Buchan: The 39 Steps (1915)
✔️10. Calvino: If on a Winter's Night a Traveler (1979)
11. Taylor: Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (1971)

The first 7 all fit into either BINGO or various challenge plans for me. I can use the Erasmus instead of The Prince for my millennium challenge. And, of course, any of the last four will contribute to the group reads challenge.

Updates:
* I had planned to use this Dostoevsky short story to satisfy a few challenges, but since his The Dream of a Ridiculous Man is a group read in March, I'm going to read that story next month instead of this one.

While waiting for my next audiobook to be available at the library, I listened to ✔️Oscar Wilde's The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888) and ✔️Hemingway's Three Stories and Ten Poems (1923) on Librivox.

Again, between audiobooks on reserve, I listened to ✔️Jerome's Three Men in a Boat (1889) on Librivox.

Currently reading:
Tales of the South Pacific (pulitzer challenge)
The Way We Live Now
Kampen om Tågeøen

To read
As Fast As Her: Dream Big, Break Barriers, Achieve Success (audio)
Enkernes land
Early Autumn: A Story of a Lady (pulitzer challenge)
White Egrets (nobel laureate challenge)
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (group read)
The Forever Man
Poetry collection by Sully Prudhomme (nobel laureate challenge)
The Song of Achilles (audio, old&new)
The Kalevala (serial reader) - started
Så mange liv
This Book Betrays My Brother (audio)
Netspinderen
Short story collection by various authors - started
The Anthropocene Reviewed (audio)
The 39 Steps
Fødselsdagsmordet
Gøgeungen
Speaker for the Dead - started

I plan to read

RJs FEBRUARY 2023 READS
I started working for a small but growing company in the financial services industry in mid-November and the hectic pace, along with my daughter's college basketball season starting around the same time, really curtailed my daily reading. However my work is cutting back on overtime, and basketball season is winding down, so hopefully things will soon return to normal or thereabouts.

Will Finish in February (or die trying)
Roadside Picnic by Arkady Strugatsky and Boris Strugatsky
Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Stories by Truman Capote
Intensity by Dean Koontz
Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho
The Quiet American by Graham Greene

Will Read but Will Not Finish in February
The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley
The Cartel by Don Winslow
The Road to Amber by Roger Zelazny
The Time Ships by Stephen Baxter
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino
On the Eve by Ivan Turgenev
Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson
The Damnation Game by Clive Barker
The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929-1964 edited by Robert Silverberg
The Collected Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe by Edgar Allan Poe

Well, this is probably too ambitious for one month, but this is what I'd ideally like to read:

I just joined this group about a week ago, so first I'd like to
Catch up on last month's reads:
The Haunted Hotel: A Mystery of Modern Venice
Twelve Angry Men
The Cider House Rules

Make Progress in my Challenges:
Candide
I, Robot
The Machine Stops
The Tale of Peter Rabbit (I can't believe I've never read a Beatrix Potter!)

.
Finished in January
Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination ****1/2
The 39 Steps ***

Continuing in February 2023
The History Of World Literature (reread)
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler (reread)
The Man Without Qualities: Volume I
Memories of the Future

Starting in February
Fin-de-Siècle Vienna: Politics and Culture
The Man Without Qualities: Volume II (possibly)

I am reading a nonfiction e-book called We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland. I have also been reading The Age of Reason Begins. This has been put on hold to concentrate on the former book.

I love to read non English (native) books in French. I therefore will touch on If on a Winter's Night a Traveler. But having just read the first sentences of Chapter I and II, I think I might not be a fan of the author's style.

I finished re-reading Nostromo. It's very difficult to follow but well-worth persevering with, in which connection I thoroughly recommend the televised serial, which is available on YouTube in three parts of roughly 100 minutes each.

I am presently about a third of the way through Madame Bovary de Gustave Flaubert, which I am reading in the original French, despite which I am finding it much easier to follow than Conrad's novel.

Teri-K wrote: "Janice wrote: "Teri-K wrote: "I'm still reading Middlemarch – taking my time and enjoying the second book more than the first, just ready to start Book 3.

Other new-to-me reads are: ..."

I love it as much as I did the first time I read it. :)

Leona wrote: "I plan to read "

I recently found this book at a wonderful Little Free Library in my town and hope to read it soon. :)

I am reading Kim by Rudyard Kipling. it is on my list of Nobel Prize Winners and G2 of Bingo, classic action or adventure. it also continues my study of India from the lifetime reading plan. also I just wanted to read Kipling.

I am doing this in reverse. I didn’t pre-plan my February reading it just happened. All books were on my years challenge reading plan, except one for my wife’s book club. I just pick the next one out of this year's pile. I have had a great February. All were finished in February others started and finished.

Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America's Race to the Moon
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. wife's book club read, the things I read for love,
The Ox-Bow Incident
The Forgotten Door
So Big
No Highway
The Haunted Hotel: A Mystery of Modern Venicel
King Solomon's Mines
The Yearling

Linda R, wrote: "I am reading Kim by Rudyard Kipling. it is on my list of Nobel Prize Winners and G2 of Bingo, classic action or adventure. it also continues my study of India from the lifetime reading plan. also I..."

I read Kim about ten years ago. It's definitely on my reread list. I found it fascinating, and especially liked the references to The Great Game. I had to do some digging on that subject - it was fascinating. I'm kind of surprised there aren't more books set during that time. How is it going for you?

Bob wrote: "I am doing this in reverse. I didn’t pre-plan my February reading it just happened. All books were on my years challenge reading plan, except one for my wife’s book club. I just pick the next one o..."

Your February has been prolific. That's quite a list of books.

Lynn wrote: "What are you planning to read this month? Are you following whim or challenge plans? Are you following monthly read schedules like February Black History Month?"

I'm only reading novels by white men until the publishing industry gets over its animus against us, and the culture in general stops attacking whiteness. At the moment, I am two thirds of the way through Madame Bovary de Gustave Flaubert, which I am reading in the original French. Next on my list is either Riders in the Chariot or The Princess Casamassima. A novel. In Three volumes. Vol. II. I am also awaiting delivery of L'Éducation sentimentale

I have been reading almost at random and enjoying doing that. I loved making the plans, but I am trying not to be married to them this year.

Yesterday I bought Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning. This scholarly work by Nigel Biggar, Oxford's Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology was subjected to an attempted cancellation by junior staff at his original publisher Bloomsbury Publishing. However, thankfully William Collins have shown the moral gumption to stand up to the woke fascist children, and I very much look forward to reading Professor Biggar's work.

I read three of the texts that I listed above, which I quite a lot for me!! I usually go far afield, LOL. Honestly, I have turned off the politics and talk shows of today. Books are my escape. Last year I focused on 19th Century Works, because my read books were overly 20th Century. This year I noticed I had not read many British authors, so that is my current focus.

This month I read:

Short stories
The Apparition by Guy de Maupassant(1883) 2/1/2023 3*
"The Answer" by H. Beam Piper (1959) 2/2/2023 4*
The 39 Steps by John Buchan (1915) 2/19/2023 4*
A Saucer of Loneliness by Theodore Sturgeon (1953) 2/20/2023 5*
"Who Can Replace a Man?" by Brian Aldiss (1958) reread 4*
"He" by H. P. Lovecraft (1926) 2/21/2023 4*
"They" by Rudyard Kipling (1904) 2/25/2023 4*

Books
A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe (1722) 2/12/2023 5*

Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman(1995) 2/23/2023 5*


Children's book
Finding Lincoln by Ann Malaspina (2009) 2/4/2023 4*

I try to complete the group read challenge each year and the short story challenge. This year I expanded the group read challenge a bit. I will try to read 12 texts from 2023 and also 12 texts from previous years that I missed along the way. So I have 7 short stories, 1 current group read, 1 past group read, and then Practical Magic which works for Bingo and other challenges.

I finished all the books I'd planned this month except Middlemarch and The Hobbit and Philosophy: For When You've Lost Your Dwarves, Your Wizard, and Your Way, which aren't quite done.

I also read A Month in the Country by Carr– which was excellent! I'm kind of surprised this group hasn't read that one yet; at least I don't think it has.

Continuing my Christie reading I added Hallowe'en Party and Murder is Easy. Other mysteries were Crooked Adam, No Wind of Blame, and two Murder She Wrote pbs I wanted to get off my shelves.

Amusing reads were Brighton Road and The Importance of Being Earnest by Wilde, which never fails to make me laugh and really brightened up a dreary February day.

Hope you are enjoying Middlemarch. Not a quick read, but a worthy one. I agree about A Month in the Country...it is a lovely read! And, The Importance of Being Earnest always makes me laugh as well, so glad it brightened up your winter. Great progress!

Thanks to some very long plane rides for work travel, I read quite a lot this month. On the 36 hours of plane travel (including layovers), I read 5 of the 10 of the month's books!

Overall this month, I read 8 planned books and 2 unplanned books. I skipped 2 of the books I'd planned (1 probably, 1 possibly). And there's 1 book I started that will carry over into next month.

My favorite two books this month were Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont and Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Stories.

Lynn, like you I have eliminated the pointless political squabbling of political news and talk from my diet over the past five or so years, and I feel like my entire physical, spiritual, and psychological health has drastically improved. I feel that it was like one of those notorious murder cases where someone slowly poisons their spouse with low dose poisons so it isn't detectable, except that I had been poisoning myself. I've replaced that time with reading and other more fruitful activities. A newspaper once a week is plenty to stay informed of what I need to do my civic duty - I don't require more.

finish from last month:
✔ Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Stories (Truman Capote) ★★★★★ (4.5)

very likely:
(started, will continue) 1. The Conference of the Birds (Attar of Nishapur)
✔ 2. Love in the Big City (Sang Young Park) ★★★★ (4.0)
✔ 3. The 39 Steps (John Buchan) ★★★ (3.5)
✔ 4. Nubia: The Awakening (Omar Epps) ★★★ (3.0)

probably:
(skipped) 1. Praise of Folly (Erasmus)
✔ 2. The Silence of the Girls (Pat Barker) ★★★★★ (4.5)
✔ 3. What Moves the Dead (T. Kingfisher) ★★★★ (3.5)

possibly:
(skipped) 1. The Last House on Needless Street (Catriona Ward)
✔ 2. Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (Elizabeth Taylor) ★★★★★ (5.0)
✔ 3. Sea of Tranquility (Emily St. John Mandel) ★★★★ (4.0)

unplanned:
✔ 1. C.P. Cavafy: The Poems of the Canon (Constantinos P. Cavafy) ★★★★ (4.0)
✔ 2. The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Stories (Edgar Allan Poe) ★★★★ (4.0)

Teri-K wrote: ".I also read A Month in the Country by Carr– which was excellent! I'm kind of surprised this group hasn't read that one yet; at least I don't think it has.."

I've seen so many positive comments about this one and it's quite thin. I own it and must get to it!

Greg wrote: "✔ 1. C.P. Cavafy: The Poems of the Canon (Constantinos P. Cavafy) ★★★★ (4.0)."

I read What's Left of the Night last year and I have wanted to read some of Cavafy's poetry since. Glad to see you liked it, I have to try and find it.

Carolien wrote: "I read What's Left of the Night last year and I have wanted to read some of Cavafy's poetry since. Glad to see you liked it, I have to try and find it"

Cavafy's poetry has a lot more variety than I had known. I'd read some of the more abstract historical ones that are typically anthologized before, but I didn't know that he also wrote more immediate, lyrical poetry as well. I quite liked the book as a whole.

well happy to have finished all 8 of my February "Core 8":
Julie, Or The New Heloise Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 1760 (to finish) - 4 Stars
Canterbury Tales, The Chaucer, Geoffrey 1400 (to finish) - 4
Conference of the Birds, The Attar of Nishapur 1177 (buddy read) - 3.5
Man Without Qualities, The Musil, Robert 1930 (middle third) - DNF
Adventures of Augie March, The Bellow, Saul 1953 (first half) - enjoying so far...
How The Steel Was Tempered Ostrovsky, Nikolai 1932 - 3.5
Binodini (aka "Choker Bali"; aka "Grain of Sand, A") Tagore, Rabindranath 1903 - 3.5
From The Earth To The Moon Verne, Jules 1865 - 2.5