Kristelh reads 75+ books in 2020

Hello! I am Kristel from Minnesota. I enjoy this group. Not sure how many years I've participated but am always happy here. I am sorry that I don't get around and visit as much as I should. I seem to have so many things that distract me, but I am here and happy to have you all stop by and say hi or leave your comments.

January
1.Century of Wind by Eduardo Galeano
2. Under the Volcano by Malcom Lowry
3. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
4. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
5. The Devil's Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea
6. The Grass is Singing by Doris Lessing
7. Swan Song by Robert McCammon

February
8. The Red and the Black by Stendhal
9. Daisy Jones & the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
10. Germinal by Emile Zola
11. Vathek by William Beckford
12. Amok by Stefan Zweig
13. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
14. The Good Girl by Mary Kubica

March
15. Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
16. The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter
17. The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
18. The Midnight Examiner by William Kotzwinkle
19. Journey to the West Volume 1 Wu Cheng'en
20. Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel
21. The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson
22. Invisible by Paul Auster

April
23. The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner
24. The Go-Between by L.P. Hartley
25. The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. by Neal Stephenson
26. The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier
27. The Diary of Anne Frank by Frances Goodrich

May
28. The Great Indian Novel by Shashi Tharoor
29. The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton
30. Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty
31. The Razor's Edge by Maugham
32. The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
33. Marya: A life by Joyce Carol Oates
34. Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie
35. Caffeine by Michael Pollan
36. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
37. A Heart so White by Javier Marias

June
38. River of Teeth by Sarah Gailey
39. Where Angels Fear to Tread by E. M. Forster
40. Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald
41. The City We Became by N.K.Jemisin
42. White Teeth by Zadie Smith
43. The First Time She Drowned by Kerry Kletter
44. You by Charles Benoit
45. The Galactic Gourmet by James White
46. Becoming Kareem by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
47. Solo by Kwame Alexander
48. Swing by Kwame Alexander

July
49. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
50. The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West
51. A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh
52. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
53. She: A history of adventure by H. Rider Haggard
54. Johnny Get Your Gun by John Dudley Ball
55. Being Mortal by Atul Gawande
56. The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides
57. The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui

August
58. The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold
59. Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
60. In My Hands by Irene Gut Opdyke
61. My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite
62. Amsterdam by Ian McEwan
63. The Book of Disquiet: The complete Edition by Fernando Pessao

September
64. Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell
65. Contact by Carl Sagan
66. a mercy by Toni Morrison
67. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
68. The Breast by Philip Roth
69. A Brightness Long Ago by Guy Gavriel Kay
70. A Girl is a Half-formed Thing by McBride

October
71. The Alice Network by Kate Quinn
72. The Southern Book Club Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix
73. Sixty Degrees North b Malachy Tallack
74. Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson
75. Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
76. The Crucible by Arthur Miller
77. Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
78. The Vice-Consul by Marguerite Duras

November
79. Adam Bede by George Eliot
80. 'The Devil and Tom Walker' by Washington Irving
81. Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin
82. The Queen of the Damned by Anne Rice
83. The Sound of Thunder Ray Bradbury

December
84. The Institute by Stephen King
85. At Swim, Two Boys - Jamie O'Neill
86. Money: a Suicide Note - Martin Amis
87. Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
88. Uncle Silas by Le Fanu
89. Winterfair Gifts by Lois McMaster Bujold

Welcome back!

Best wishes for 2020!

Another resolution is to keep up in 2020 with all my friends on LT. Happy New Year!

Happy reading in 2020, Kristel!

1. Finished the trilogy Memory of Fire by Galeano. This is a must read if a person wants to read about the history of the Americas from 1500s to 1984 from the viewpoint of Uruguayan journalist/novelist Eduardo Galeano.

I loved that book. I also read the next two in the trilogy, which continue the history (almost) to the present day.

Have a great reading year!

2. finished Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry. This was a very good book but hard to read. Needs a reread. Great book to read after Memory of Fire.

3. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid. Read for book club. Story combines realism and magical realism to tell a story of migration, confinement and escape, and also loss. Rated 3.4 stars.

4. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas, on shelf since 2012. Enjoyed!

5. The Devil's Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea. Very good, nonfiction. Highly recommend this one.

>12 Kristelh: That was one of the AudioSync books in the last couple years. I listened to it, but I didn't love it as much as you did.

Good to see your reading off to a decent start, Kristel.

6. The Grass is Singing by Doris Lessing. Rated this 4.2 stars. Debut novel.

7. Swan Song by Robert McCammon, NPR 100 top horror. A good one. Rated it 3.8 or 4 stars.

8. The Red and The Black by Stendhal
Read for Reading 1001, Quarterly Read, 1001 Books
Rating 3.8

9. Daisy Jones & the Six - Taylor Reid Jenkins, okay, not a fan of music groups, drugs, sex but over all some merit in the book

10. Germinal by Emile Zola, a good story about early strike in the coal minds in Northern France.

11. Vathek by William Beckford, 1782, Gothic/Orientalism combined in this work.

#12, Amok by Stefan Zweig 1001 Books, Z alpha.

#13. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, Historical Novel, been on my shelf since 2016.

>20 Kristelh: Large following little >19 Kristelh:. I reckon large won that one, Kristel.

# 14. The Good Girl by Mary Kubica, mystery, psychological thriller - read in February

#15 Elantris by Brandon Sanderson, started in February but finished in March. Cosmere Universe, high fantasy, magic

#16, The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter by Theodora Gross
#17. The Hunchback of Notre Dame by victor Hugo.

#18. The Midnight Examiner by William Kotzwinkle. See my review. 3 stars but I did appreciate the author's writing and what he was doing with this book.

19. Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel.
And I also completed Journey to the West, volume 1 by Wu Cheng'en. #20

21. The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson

21. The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson

22. Invisible by Paul Auster, hart to like this one, 3.2 stars

23. Finished The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner. A chore, but I got it read. If I had followed Nancy Pearl's rule, it would have been a DNF, but I did finish, it has merit, author can write some great lines but the plot is disjointed, characters only partly fleshed out. Great research as far as historical novel and placing it in time and place.

Have a lovely, peaceful, safe and healthy weekend.

#24. The Go-Between by L.P. Hartley. 3.6 stars, coming of age story of the loss of innocence.

25. The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. by Neal Stephenson. Time travel/witches. Not his best, rated 3.2 stars.

23. The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner
24. The Go-Between by L.P. Hartley
25. The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. by Neal Stephenson

26. The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier 3 stars
27. The Diary of Anne Frank by Frances Goodrich 4 stars

May
28. The Great Indian Novel by Shashi Tharoor 4 stars
29. The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton 3 stars

30. Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty

#31. The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham, 4 stars.

32. The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
33. Marya: A life by Joyce Carol Oates
34. Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie
35. Caffeine: How Caffeine created the modern world by Michael Pollan
36. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

37. A Heart so White by Javier Marias 3.5 stars
38. River of Teeth by Sarah Gailey 2 stars
39. Where Angels Fear to Tread by Forster, 3.8 stars

40. Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald completed.

41. The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin 3.6 stars.

42. White Teeth by Zadie Smith.

43. The First Time She Drowned by Kerry Kletter
44. You by Charles Benoit
45. The Galactic Gourmet by James White
46. Becoming Kareem by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
47. Solo by Kwame Alexander
48. Swing by Kwame Alexander

49. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender f2f july book, 4.2 stars

In this difficult year with an unprecedented pandemic and where the ills of the past intrude sadly upon the present there must still be room for positivity. Be rightly proud of your country. To all my American friends, enjoy your 4th of July weekend.

>43 PaulCranswick: thank you

#50. The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West. Really enjoyed this one.

#51. A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh, 4.2 stars. Best Waugh thus far.

52. Oliver Twist Charles Dickens
53. She: a history of adventure by H. Rider Haggard

54. Johnny Get Your Gun by John Dudley Ball

55. Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande

56. The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui

57. The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

I didn’t realize that there was a series of Virgil Tibbs books. Definitely a series of books I need to read!

58. The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold enjoyed this story of Miles early years
59. Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift. Was very familiar with the story but don't think I had ever read the full edition. So got that done. Satire. 1001 books.

60. The Coldest War: America and the Korean War by David Halberstam
61. In My Hands by Irene Gut Opdyke
62. Amsterdam by Ian McEwan

63. The Book of Disquiet: the complete edition by Fernando Pessoa 0.12 stars
64. Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell 3.8 stars

65. Contact by Carl Sagan 4.5 stars
66. a mercy by Toni Morrison 3.3 stars

67. The Vanishing Half Story of twin sisters, one chooses to disappear, passing as white. Looks at identity, choices. So so read. Rated 2.8 stars. Read for f2f book club.

68. The Breast by Philip Roth. Short novella that also looks at identity. A man becomes a 155 lb breast. so so Rating 2.5. Doesn't belong on 1001 list.

69. A Brightness Long Ago Fantasy set in the 1500s. Story of hired mercenaries, rivalries, secondary characters. Choices, impulses that effect outcomes. My first book by Canadian author Guy Gavriel Kay. Rating 4.2 stars.

70. A Girl is a Half-formed Thing by Eimear McBride. Irish author, experimental style, hard story to read both for style and subject matter.

71. The Alice Network by Kate Quinn. Read for bookclub (Nov/Dec). Very entertaining.

72. The Southern Book Club Guide to Slaying Vampires by grady Hendrix. Also for bookclub, October. Disgusting, some humor, fell flat for me.

73. Sixty Degrees North by Malachy Tallack. nonfiction. Travel log and dealing with grief. Two favorite types of books for me. I enjoyed learning about places I knew little about. See my review.

74. The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson, 2013,Pulitzer. Super Rooster. I liked it
75. The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann, 1001 books, LT group read, I liked it.
76. The Crucible by Arthur Miller, had this on my horizons a long time. I listened to the dramatization.

Made my 75. Yahoo!

Congratulations on reaching 75, Kristel!

Congrats!

77. Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. This book is described as a combo of Lovecraft and Brontes set in Mexico. The time period is the 1950s. Noemi is sent by her business man father to check on a cousin who married and is living in the Mexican countryside. Noemi is in part superficial debutant and in part a strong, brave heroine. The setting of High Place is creepy with mold, mushrooms, rain, darkness. There is the hint of romance but it is a minor theme. Really most of the male characters are just plain creepy or milk toast. Over all, I enjoyed the story, it entertained, I didn't have to work to hard to read it and it worked for me at this time. Rating 3.4 stars.

78. Finished The Vice-Consul by Marguerite Duras. 3 stars

79. Adam Bede by George Eliot, 4.2 stars.

Well I haven't kept up here I see.

80. Melmoth the Wanderer, 1001, Horror, classic
81. The Queen of the Damned by Rice, Horror, series
82. The Institute by Stephen King, Horror, King family
83. At Swim, Two Boys, 1001, Historical Gay Romance
84. 'The Devil and Tom Walker' by Washington Irving, short story
85. The Sound of Thunder Ray Bradbury, I confess, I need to reread this one, I rushed it to get it back to library on time.

Some really strong reading , Kristel including two 1001 books on my shelves but not yet read.

Have a lovely Sunday.

86. Money: a suicide note by Martin Amis, witty, about addictions, a whole lot of profanity, pornography.... 1001, TBR takedown,

87. Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens. Last Dickens from 1001 list. 4.4 stars.

88. Uncle Silas by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (horror, Gothic, Victorian) 3.5 stars.

89. Short story, Winterfair Gifts Lois McMaster Bujold. mostly romance

90. A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik First book of a series. YA flavor, romance, boarding school, magic, a twist on Harry Potter?

91. Reread Adventures of the Blue Carbuncle a Christmas short story, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

92. The Dutch House by Ann Patchett, a story of family and a house.

93. The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch, 1001, Booker,

94. Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh, fantasy, novella, free, tor folklore, Green man

I hope you get some of those at least, Kristel, as we all look forward to a better 2021.

95. Baker's Magic by Diane Zahler
96. Volume 2 of Journey to the West by Wu Cheng'en
97. Martin Fiero by Jose Hernandez
98. Bibliophile: an illustrated Miscellany by Jane Mount

Kristel

As the year turns, friendship continues