January reading roundup

It's the end of the month (or at least it will be tomorrow) and time for a recap of January's reading.  It's been a  good month, and while I didn't come close to getting through all of the books I wanted to, the books I read (for the most part) made me happy, so that's what counts.  I've decided that I'm not even going to try to come up with a reading list each month any more -- I tend to get very frustrated when I veer off target or don't get to the books I intended to read.  Stress is something I'm trying to do away with so why worry about something that in the long run is just not a big deal?

on we go.

The reading lists are as follows:    

fiction/literature

Oyster, by Janette Turner Hospital

Andrew's Brain, by E.L. Doctorow (discussion coming shortly, but let me say that when all is said and done, this is a fine book)

Foreign Gods, Inc. , by Okey Ndibe

crime

Gold, Frankincense and Dust, by Valerio Varesi (Italy)

The Dark Angel, by Dominique Sylvain (France)

The Cabinetmaker, by Alan Jones (Scotland)

Pilgrim Soul, by Gordon Ferris (Scotland)

nonfiction

The Burglary: The Discovery of J.Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI, by Betty Medsger

Kansas City Lightning: The Rise and Times of Charlie Parker, by Stanley Crouch

weird fiction/horror/fantasy/sci-fi

Hive, by Tim Curran

The Spawning, by Tim Curran

Now, the usual book stuff:

1) ** Books I'm giving away this month -- for US readers only. I pay postage, be the first to leave a comment to let me know which book you want (or books). 

Dave Eggers  The Circle

Jane Gardam  Crusoe's Daughter

**Please follow up with an email to me (oakesn@gmail.com) with an address. No email, no book. Sorry.    --  

 2) Added to the  wishlist this month:

 

 crime fiction:

  The Case of the Sharaku Murders, by Katsuhiko Takahashi
Moon in a Dead Eye, by Pascal Garnier
The Good Suicides, by Antonio Hill

 general fiction/literature:

Faster I Walk, The Smaller I Am, by Kjersti A. Skomsvold

 

the weird, the strange, supernatural etc:
nothing here

nonfiction
America's Great Game: The CIA's Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East, by Hugh Wilford

3) Books bought this month:

• The Madonna on the Moon, by Rolf Bauerdick (crime fiction)
  
• The Frozen Dead, by Bernard Minier (crime fiction)
• Mapuche, by Caryl Ferey (crime fiction)
• On Such a Full Sea, by Chang-Rae Lee (science fiction)
•  The Blue Angel, by Heinrich Mann (translated fiction/literature)
• The Late Mattia Pascal, by Luigi Pirandello (translated fiction/literature)
• Dust, by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor (African fiction/literature) 

4) Indiespensable and Book Passage Signed First Edition books for this month (in that order):
Orfeo, by Richard Powers
Radiance of Tomorrow, by Ishmael Beah

5) The book group read: The Circle, by Dave Eggers. We all thought it was not the best book in the world, but we did have fun talking about the ideas presented by the author.

6) Currently reading:
 The Shock of the Fall, by Nathan Filer
The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler

So that's it -- now it's back to the bookshelves and trying to find time to read.