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I read 60 last year. So I'm going to try for 65 this year. (I am back in school however, so this will be a challenge)
1) Dewey
2) The Hour I first Believed by Wally Lamb
3) The Gurnsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society
4) The Sound and the Fury by Faulkner
5) The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroeblewski
6) The Forever War by Dexter Filkins
7) To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
8) The Reluctant Fundamentalist
9) Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

Excellent choices thus far!

3 more this week.

10) 2666 by Roberto Bolano (finished finally)
11) Testimony by Anita Shreve
12) UR by Stephen King

13) A Mercy by Toni Morrison
14) Free Range Chickens by Simon Rich

15) Summer's Path by Scott Blum
16) The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
17) Dear Mr. President by Gabe Hudson

You are doing great!

18) Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay

a few more updates since I last posted:
19) The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
20) The Caged Virgin by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
21) The Swallows of Kabul
22) In Our Time by Hemingway
23) Ghosts Among Us by Van Pragh
24) The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death by Laurie Notaro

25) Their Eyes Were Watching God
26) Fine Just the Way It Is by Annie Proulx
27) No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
28) A-Rod by Selena ???

Connie wrote: "25) Their Eyes Were Watching God
26) Fine Just the Way It Is by Annie Proulx
27) No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
28) A-Rod by Selena ???"

Selena Roberts. Did the book deserve all the attention it received? I saw that it bombed shortly after being released.

I haven't checked back here in a while Molly. Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. The A-Rod book was o.k., but it didn't derserve all the attention it received. I think the author tried to portray him in a very poor light, so if someone is an A-Rod fan they may not like the book. I really just did a quick read and skimmed most of the boring sections.

29) Big Stone Gap by Adriana Trigiani
30) Triptych by Karin Slaughter
31) Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz
32) 4th of July by James Patterson
33) Four Blind Mice by James Patterson
34) Netherland by Joseph O'Neill
35) My Soul to Lose by Rachel Vincent

36) Down Range: Navy Seals in the War on Terror by Dick Couch.
37) Lark & Termite by Jayne Anne Phillips

38) The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

39) The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga
40) Disquiet by Julia Leigh
41) A Dog Named Christmas by Greg Kinkaid

42) Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

I enjoyed this book. It's not a page turner. It's a collection of related short stories. I think I liked it because they were all related. I don't always like collections of short stories, but I did enjoy this book.

43) The Senator's Wife by Sue Miller. I loved this book. I highly recommend it.

44) Kabul Beauty School by Deborah Rodriguez.

This book was interesting. It's non-fiction but didn't read like a lot of non-fiction books. I have read that some of the Afghan women featured in the book have said that a lot of what was put in the book was not true. Hard to tell. I was a little disturbed that the author would put some of what she did in the book if these women were her friends. Having lived in Afghanistan she had to have known her revelations could be life-threatening to these women. All-in-all an interesting read though.

45) Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan

If you like books of short-stories you may like this one. There were a few compelling stories in here. I could take it or leave it. However, I may think about these stories for a while.

46) Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris

47) Dashing Through the Snow - Mary & Carol Higgins Clark.

this was the first book I read by either author, and probably the last. It was an o.k. book, but I'm not a fan of their prose. I can't explain it, it just came across as kind of "amateurish" in their writing style. Not my kind of writing style.

48) Paris City of Night by David Downie

This was an O.K. book. It was just over 200 pages but I had other things that I was doing this week so it did take me about 5 days to get through. Although some of the reviews called it a page turner, I disagree.

49) The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz.

I liked this book. It was written in a very different voice then any I've read before. I think that is why it won the Pulitzer. What made this book so interesting (the voice) was also the same thing that at times made it a little annoying. He uses a lot of slang and not just any slang, but New Jersey Dominican slang and Spanglish. he threw in a lot of Spanish which he always didn't explain. So as the reader you were kind of left to guess at the author's intent or message.

50) The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

This was a fabulous book. Finally a book about life on a reservation and about American Indians that didn't deal with all the spiritual/mystifying b.s. like shapeshifting etc. This is a YA book but I enjoyed it. I have never been able to read the Harry Potter books because I thought they were just too young, but this book was good. Quick little read.

51) American Salvage by Bonnie Jo Campbell

I liked this book. It is a collection of short-stories. It was nominated for a National Book Award in fiction this year. Bonnie Jo Campbell is a Michigan author and that's why I ultimately decided to read this book. I like how with short-stories, even protagonists with no redeeming qualities are tolerable becuase you only have to read about them for 10 or 20 pages as opposed to 300. This book made me think about life in rural America.

52) Beat the Reaper by Josh Bezell.

This is a fast paced book. Very different from anything I've read before. The ending was a little bazaar, but good book overall. I gave it a 4 star rating.

53) The Humbling by Phillip Roth

This is the first Phillip Roth book I've read and I did like it. I may pick up another of his books to read. It's an odd little tale but kept me turning the page.

54) Three Girls & Their Brother by Theresa Rebeck.

I enjoyed this book. It was written in 4 parts, with each sister and the brother taking turns as narrator. Basically it is about a family, whose sisters, because of a photo in the New Yorker, turn into the new "It" girls, and what this does to their family. This was a different type of book for me and a good break from what I normally read. Quick little read.

55)The Good Soldiers by David Finkel

This was an excellent non-fiction read. If you are interested in what war is like, in particular the Iraq war this is an excellent book. The author completely kept himself out of the narrative and focused completely on the soldiers and their thoughts and feelings.

56)

Connie, I just read the reviews (the official one and then the personal ones) by clicking on the icon for 'Honeymoon In Tehran'. The review promises an interesting read, as I am very interested in getting to know the people and customs of Iran, how they really are, not just the political aspect of that country. This book sounds like a good one to be put on my 'To Be Read' shelf. What did you think of it, and has it changed your thinking at all?

I did like this book. I read this for my book club and wasn't really in the mood for a nonfiction. That being said, there were a lot of things I learned about Iran and the people that were different from what we are told by the Western media. I think if it's a topic you are interested in, you will like this book. she also wrote a book before it called "Lipstick Jihad" which I haven't read but may put it on my tbr.

57) Wishin' and Hopin' A Christmas Story

I absolutely Loved this book!!! so unexpected. although I love Wally Lamb, his subject matter is usually quite serious. Not this book, just a great little coming of age story set in 1964. There were parts of this book that actually made me laugh hysterically out loud!!! Highly recommend 5 stars!!! [image error]

58) The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson

I really liked this book. I gave it 4 stars and would recommend to anyone. Probably one of the best books I've read this year.

59)

I liked this book, but I think it may only be because the author grew up in Michigan around the time I did and the topics and descriptions were so familiar. This is not a pager turner although I did read it all today. But the story moved along o.k. I give it 3 stars.

I was wrong my very first entry that I had read 62 books for 2008. I had counted from April to April, but since I've decided to go by year I only read 48 books from 1/1/08 to 12/31/08. So this year I read 59.
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