Tuesday, September 27, 2011

September Reading Roundup


Yes, yes, I know it's not the end of the month yet, but in 2 short days at this time I'll be having a late lunch in Trinidad so I've got to post this before I go.

Obviously, most of September was taken up with the Booker Prize Longlist, which I finished last night about 11 p.m.  Hooray for me. Although the list loomed large in my literary life, there were other books as well.

Here's the summary:

Fiction from the UK
The Last Hundred Days, Patrick McGuinness (review soon)
- The Testament of Jessie Lamb, Jane Rogers (review soon)
- On Canaan's Side, Sebastian Barry (review soon)
- The Stranger's Child, Alan Hollinghurst (review soon)

-The Sense of an Ending, by Julian Barnes
- Pigeon English, by Stephen Kelman
-Jamrach's Menagerie, by Carol Birch
-A Cupboard Full of Coats, by Yvvette Edwards



translated general fiction
Aside from the crime fiction, nada.


nonfiction/history
once again, nada

scandinavian crime fiction
The Hand That Trembles, by Kjell Eriksson
The Demon of Dakar, by Kjell Eriksson
Dregs, by Jorn Lier Horst

japanese crime fiction
The Devil's Disciple, by Shiro Hamao (just finished, not yet reviewed)
 

other book-related stuff:
1) my book group read and disagreed about State of Wonder by Ann Patchett. Next month it's The Submission, by Amy Waldman


2) Added to the Amazon wishlist this month
Requiem, by Antonio Tabucchi
Bharathipura, by U.R. Anantha Murthy
Witness the Night, by Kishwar Desai
Close Sesame: Variations on the Theme of African Dictatorship; Sardines: Variations on the Theme of African Dictatorship; Sour Milk: Variations on the Theme of African Dictatorship, all by Nuruddin Farah



3) Books bought this month:


Chronicle of a Death Foretold, by Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
News of a Kidnapping, by Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
The Dinosaur Feather, by Sissel Jo-Gazan
Tin Kin, by Eleanor Thom
Noon, by Aatish Taseer
The Breaking of Eggs, by Jim Powell
Crossbones; Links; Knots, by Nuruddin Farah
Mad Toy, by  Roberto Arlt
Jimmy the Terrorist, by Omair Ahmad
The Thing About Thugs, by Tabish Khair
Books Burn Badly, by Manuel Rivas
You Deserve Nothing, by Alexander Maksik
Extensions, by Myrna Dey
The Unlucky Lottery, by Hakan Nesser
The New Finnish Grammar, by Diego Marani
Cell 8, by Anders Roslund and Borge Hellstrom


4) Indiespensable (from Powells Books) and the Signed First Editions book club at BookPassage finally straightened things out and aren't sending duplicates: from Indiespensable is The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides and from Book Passage, The Barbarian Nurseries, by Hector Tobar.


So that's it.  October will be a focus on books that are mercifully short and hopefully sweet.  Actually I'm ready for a LOT of escape reading to clear my fatigued brain.



2 comments:

  1. Nancy, you put me to shame! What a wonderful reading month. I hope you have a beautiful time in Trinidad!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks! We were originally supposed to have gone in December, but with my trips to Seattle & California and Larry's work schedule, we just didn't get to go. So now that it's hurricane season, we both have the time. Most of October Larry's away on business, then I'm off to Seattle, so it's the perfect opportunity.

    It was a tough book month, and each year I wonder why I do this!

    ReplyDelete

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