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FA 2017 Completed Tasks
15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Australia
What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty
+15 Task
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 265 (assumes mid-season with a previous total of 250)
15.1 Reading Globally Setting: Antarctica
Ice Station by Matthew Reilly
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Antarctica
Book total = 30
Season total = 30
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Antigua (North America)
Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid (Lexile 1130)
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Antigua
Task total: 30
Season total: 30
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Tunisia
Monty Python's Tunisian Holiday: My Life with Brian by Kim Howard Johnson
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Tunisia
Task total: 30
Season total: 30
15.1 Reading Globally Wittgenstein's Nephew by Thomas Bernhard
15 task
15 first visitor to Austria
____
30
Running total: 30
20.2 HouseHouse of Spirits and Whispers: The True Story of a Haunted House by Annie Wilder
+20 -Task
+10 - Combo (20.3 shelved 6 times, 10.8)
+10 - nonfiction
Task Total - 40 pos
Season Total - 40 pts
15.1 Reading Globally Setting: Korea, Dem. People's Republic of
Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick
+15 task
+15 first visitor to country
Post Total: 30
Season Total: 30
15.1 Reading GloballyThe Old Man Who Read Love Stories by Luis Sepúlveda
Setting: Ecuador
+15 task
+15 first visitor to country
Task Total = 30
Grand Total = 30
20.6 ClergyChasing Francis: A Pilgrim's Tale by Ian Morgan Cron
Chasing Francis : A Pilgrim's Tale by Ian Morgan Cron has been one of the most challenging reads for me in quite a while. First of all I picked up the book thinking it was a nonfiction story about St. Francis. Wrong. It is a novel about an evangelical megachurch pastor having a crisis of faith about the purpose of his life. He winds of going to Italy to meet an uncle who is now a friar and travels with him and others to places that Francis lived and finding out how he dealt with his times which have a parallel to our own. While the ending was predictable and this isn't great literature, it still for me challenged some of my own concepts about how I live. It has a nice long bibliography of books about Francis which I will be added to my TBR list. 5 stars
+20 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 30
15.2 Reading GloballySetting: Surinam
Oroonoko by Aphra Behn
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Surinam
Task total: 30
Season total: 60
15.2 Reading GloballySetting: Chile (approx 60%)
Portrait in Sepia by Isabel Allende
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Chile
Book total =30
Season total = 60
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: USA, North America
Miss Julia Meets Her Match by Ann B. Ross
+15 task (reading Z-A)
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 15
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: United States
Take Me, Take Me With You by Lauren Kelly, another pseudonym of Joyce Carol Oates
+15 task
Task Total=15
Season Total=15
(reading Z-A )
20.5 OldDestiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard
Candice Millard is a wonder! She brings history to life. I feel that I know President Garfield, his wife, Lucretia, and his assassin, Guiteau. Millard can put the reader in the scene, whether it is a convention hall or a prison courtyard. The story flows. The author has a way of focusing on the themes by telling a story, for example, Lister trying to bring his idea of antisepsis to American doctors by describing his presentation at the Chicago Centennial Fair.
The book is never dry or long-winded. Even though I knew the eventual outcome, the characters, the settings, the details and the story that Millard writes kept me turning the pages.
+20 The book covers Garfield's assassination and ends with the execution of his murderer in 1882.
+10 review
+10 not a novel
Task total: 40
Season total: 40
15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Peru
The Cardboard House by Martín Adán
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Peru
Task total: 30
Season total: 90
15.2 Reading Globallya-z
Bahamas
Thunderball by Ian Fleming
15 task
15 first to Bahamas
______
30
Running total: 60
Cat wrote: "15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Egypt
Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie
+15 Task
Season total = 75"
I'm sorry, but this book does not work for the sub-challenge. Some of Agatha Christie's books, and this is one of them, are used in classrooms in Brooklyn and are shelved as "Assignment" at BPL and also have a low lexile.
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Antarctica (71%)
Out of the Ice by Ann Turner
+15 Task
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 15
20.10 Uncommon LetterThe Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry
Review
I had high hopes for this book but it fell flat. I did like the main characters of Cora and Will. I felt that there wasn't enough of the Essex Serpent story. I was saddened about Cora's friend, Stella and her illness. I gave it three stars. I had a hard time following the plot. I was hoping Will and Cora would end up together but I was confused if they were together or not.
Task +20
Style +10 Review
Book Total: 30
Grand Total: 30
itpdx wrote: "20.5 OldDestiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard
Candice Millard is a wonder! She brings history to lif..."
From post 15
+5 combo 10.8
Total: 45
15.2 Reading GloballySetting: United Kingdom
Passing On by Penelope Lively
+15 task
Task Total=15
Season Total=30
(reading Z-A )
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Ukraine
Baba Dunja's Last Love by Alina Bronsky
+15 Task
+ 15 first to Ukraine
Post Total: 30
Season Total: 30
15.2 Reading GloballySetting: New Zealand
As the Earth Turns Silver by Alison Wong
+15 Task
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 30
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Cat wrote: "15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Egypt
Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie"
I'm sorry, but this book does not work for the sub-challenge. Some of Agatha Christie's books, and this is one of them, are used in classrooms in Brooklyn and are shelved as "Assignment" at BPL and also have a low lexile. .."
Bother! I even had it in my head to check that before turning it in!
Coralie, you get an extra 15 points for post 24 for being the first person to visit Ukraine
15.2 Reading GloballySetting: South Africa, Africa
In the Heart of the Country by J.M. Coetzee
+15 task (reading Z-A)
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 30
20.2 The HouseInto Oblivion by Arnaldur Indriðason
There are actually 2 dwellings that are central on the story:
- Camp Knox, and old US army base that became slum is central on the investgation regarding the disappearance of a high school girl 25 years before (it is also the title of the book in icelandic)
- The current US army base near Keflavik which is the location of the other investigation regarding an icelander working on the base, and which is als central for both cases, as the book globally revolves around the relations between icelanders and americans living on the base
+20 Task
Task total = 20
Points total = 20
15.3 Reading Globally a-z
Gabon
Tropic Moon by Georges Simenon
15 task
15 first to Gabon
____
30
Running total: 90
20.1 Gothic AuthorsThe Gabriel Set-Up by Peter O'Donnell
(graphic novel, no styles)
+20 task (confirmed in help thread this is the right Peter O'Donnell)
Task Total: 20
Season Total: 50
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: USA
Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult
+15 Task
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 15
15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Russian Federation, Asia
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
+15 task (reading Z-A)
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 65
15.4 Reading GloballySetting: Portugal, Europe
Pereira Maintains by Antonio Tabucchi
+15 task (reading Z-A)
+15 first to visit Portugal
Task Total: 30
Season Total: 95
*phew* now I can slow down :)
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Botswana
The Woman Who Walked in Sunshine by Alexander McCall Smith
+15 Task
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 15
20.10 Uncommon LetterThe Man Who Shot Out My Eye Is Dead: Stories by Chanelle Benz
The ten stories in this collection felt as if someone had grabbed only statement pieces from a jewelry box: each one is wholly distinct, strikingly memorable, and wildly clashing with one another. Very little about any of these stories either faded into its neighbors or was meant to simply take up space; each story was crafted in its own voice and its own form. I'm thrilled to have found that kind of imaginative range and vision here, because I share a lot of Benz's interests: the way violence shapes our world and our lives, the idea of complicity, and the expectations and constraints placed on women of color. There was a steady and eloquent thematic cohesion: each story seems to hinge on the decision of whether to commit violence, and what that does to the characters involved. There's a lot of brutality here, but it wasn't irredeemably bleak. Just clear-eyed and curious.
+20 Task
+10 Not-a-Novel
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.8 Double Letter Names)
Task Total: 45
Season Total: 45
15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Jamaica
The Painted Canoe by Anthony C. Winkler
+15 task
+15 first visitor to Jamaica
Task Total=30
Season Total=60
(reading Z-A )
10.8 Double Letter NamesSetting: USA
The Japanese Lover by Isabel Allende
Alma Belasco, now an octogenarian living in a retirement residence, is telling the story of her life to her grandson Seth and her immigrant care worker Irina. Alma met Ichimei Fukuda, the son of her family's Japanese gardener, when they were children. Their instant connection eventually turned into a lifelong love affair which is recounted through letters and flashbacks. The Fukuda family was sent to an internment camp for Japanese-Americans during World War II, and lived under terrible conditions in the Utah desert. Ichimei and Alma started corresponding at that time. Alma was a Jew from Poland who had been sent to relatives in the United States as the Nazis invaded her country, so she had also been a victim of prejudice.
The book has a large number of characters and covers many social problems, tragedies, and important events in the 20th Century. There were humorous passages about growing old, and the romance was a sweet story. But it seemed that we got to know a lot of characters in a superficial way. I would have cared more about their outcomes if the book had gone deeper into the emotions of the main characters, and found it took a while to warm up to them.
+10 task
+10 review
Task total: 20
Season total: 20
Task 20.10 Uncommon Letter (Elizabeth (Alaska)'s Task)Read a book where a Q, X, or Z is the first or last letter of any word in the title (but not the subtitle) or the first or last letter of one of the author's names, hyphenated names included.
Murder by the Book (Nero Wolfe #19) (1951) by Rex Stout (Paperback, 246 pages)
Review: When I was young, middle-school aged, I used to go to my mother’s side of the couch where she had her stack of paperbacks that she was reading. The game I played was to ‘borrow’ one of her books BEFORE she read it. I learned to read carefully, so that afterwards it would be hard to tell if the paperback had been read or not (though she usually figured out where her new novel had disappeared to). Her ‘authors’ included: Georgette Heyer, Victoria Holt, Phyllis A. Whitney, Dell Shannon, ….. and Rex Stout. I know I read Rex Stout because I can remember the overweight man (Nero Wolfe) with his orchids. I don’t remember which novels of the Nero Wolfe series that I read. I think Murder by the Book is a new-to-me read. I picked this one up for nostalgia reasons, not expecting very much. I was therefore pleasantly surprised.
Mr. Nero Wolfe is a private detective. He cooperates with the police more often than not (and always when legally obligated to do so); he has a client who pays his bill; he employs several private detectives on a freelance basis to do a lot of the running around for him. These facts make this novel more plausible than most of present-day “cozy mysteries”.
For a 1951 novel, I expected sexism. I was therefore pleasantly surprised to read in this novel that: only INTELLIGENT women are attractive; and that the women in this novel all had their own lives and agendas unrelated to the mystery Mr. Wolfe was investigating and unrelated to dating & marriage. Thinking on it, I do believe this would pass the Bechtel test, as there were a couple of conversations between female characters unrelated to men.
Overall, I’d recommend this for someone looking for a 1950s mystery that doesn’t insult one’s intelligence nor insult women as a gender. I will have the caveat that I don’t know how the other 71 novels in the series are – long series tend to be uneven in quality – I’ll just say that this one was good.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+05 Oldies -25 to 75 years old: (1942-1992)
Task Total: 20 + 10 + 05 = 35
Grand Total: 00 + 35 = 35
10.8 Double Letter Names (Cat's task)The Ice Beneath Her by Camilla Grebe
2 Ls in author's first name, camiLLa
Review
I enjoy crime thrillers but I must confess to not being keen on psychological thrillers such as Gone Girl (which I picked the ending by 1/3 of the book). I don't particularly want to know what's going on in the minds of these unreliable characters or maybe I don't like having to change loyalty at the end of the book because that's where the twist will take you, right?! This strange bent of mine meant that I skimmed (I listed on audio so I just turned up the speed of the audio) Emma's perspectives but listened at normal speed to Hanne's and Peter's perspectives. Peter, I found, was just your average broken fictional detective but I did very much enjoy Hanne's thoughts. She's a behaviorist consultant to the police and is ill. She was very thoughtful and I liked her reflections on life, illness, love, etc. I would like the book a lot better if it was less of a psychological thriller (ie. at least 50% less of Emma's pov and more on the detective work). And no... I didn't find the ending to be an unexpected twist.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Post Total: 20
Season Total: 35
15.1 Reading GloballyCircling the Sun by Paula McLain
Setting: Kenya, Africa
+15 Task
Task total: 15
Challenge total: 15
15.2 Reading GloballyCamino Island by John Grisham
Setting: USA, North America
+15 Task
Task total: 15
Challenge total: 30
15.3 Reading GloballySetting: Equatorial Guinea
By Night the Mountain Burns by Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel
+15 Task
+15 first visitor
Book total = 30
Season total = 90
(my Christie fail turned out to be a win!)
15.4 Reading GloballySetting: Nauru
Paradise for Sale: A Parable of Nature by Carl N. McDaniel
+15 Task
+15 first visitor to Nauru
Task total: 30
Season total: 120
20.5 OldGillespie and I by Jane Harris
It's 1888, and the Glasgow Exhibition is drawing crowds. Among them is 30-something spinster Harriet Baxter, who makes friends with the family of artist Ned Gillespie as if by chance. It quickly becomes clear to the reader that Harriet is being economical with the truth, but will Ned and his wife see through her in time to avert a tragedy?
This is a long novel but I was gripped from the beginning and hardly put this down at all. The setting of time and place was done well without being overdone. Harriet is a supremely unreliable narrator but her obsessions and deceits make her fascinating and often comic.
+20 task (pub. 2011, main storyline 1888)
+ 5 combo (10.8)
+10 review
+ 5 jumbo (504 pages)
Task Total: 40
Season Total: 135
15.1 Reading GloballyA-Z. (Bolivia, South America)
The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia by Rosario Santos
+15- task
+15- First to Bolivia
Task Total - 30 pts
Season Total - 70 pts
15.1 Reading GloballySetting: Egypt (not doing in alpha order)
Nefertiti: The Book of the Dead by Nick Drake
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 15
15.4 Reading Globally a-z
Haiti
Claire of the Sea Light by Edwidge Danticat
15 task
15 first to Haiti
_____
30
Running total: 120
I know there are no reviews for the sub-challenge.... but, Wow! What a great book.
20.1. Gothic author. The Castle of OtrantoHorace Walpole
20. Task
20. Oldies. Published 1764
5. Combo 20.2
45 total
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Reading with Style
Books mentioned in this topic
Borne (other topics)The Woman in White (other topics)
A Few Days in the Country and Other Stories (other topics)
Slave: My True Story (other topics)
Dead Woman Walking (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Jeff VanderMeer (other topics)Wilkie Collins (other topics)
Elizabeth Harrower (other topics)
Mende Nazer (other topics)
Sharon J. Bolton (other topics)
More...
Please use the add book/author link for the book titles. When claiming combo points, tell how the book qualifies, and provide a link if requested in the task description.
If using an outside source to qualify a book for points or combo, please be sure to post in the appropriate task thread prior to posting in this thread.
20.1 Gothic Authors
Literary Criticism, Vol. 1: Essays on Literature, American Writers, and English Writers by Henry James
(insert 100+ word review here)
+20 Task
+ 5 Combo (10.4 - 809 at BPL)
+10 Review
+10 Not a Novel
+ 5 Oldies (1984)
+25 Jumbo (1504 pgs)
Post Total: 70
Season Total: 250 (assumes mid-season with a previous total of 180)