Tags
Adulthood, Arthur, Book list, Books, Jews, JRR Tolkien, Libraries, Literature, Lord of the Rings, Mothers, Porn, Reading, Risk, The Hobbit
You’re right Arthur, books are fun. They’re a gateway into other worlds, other times and other lives. Books are an escape, an adventure, a journey. I adore books.
I’ve always been a voracious reader, ever since I was a very small child. I devoured books, reading one after another without pause. I stayed up late most nights, solely because I was unable to put down my current book. My mom yelled and I was always cranky in the mornings but I had to find out what happened.
In elementary school the librarian taught me how to use the computer system so I was able to check out books myself. I think she just got sick of my revolving door book borrowing.
I could probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve not finished a book. Even when they’re awful I can’t put them down or I’ll be left wondering what happened.
Unfortunately, Arthur was wrong about the first part. Finding time to read is fucking hard. Especially once adulthood sets in. The Hobbit recently came out in theatres and it then became doubly apparent to me how little time I have for reading.
I originally read the Hobbit in grade 4 but I decided, in honour of the movie, to reread it. While I was at it, I began reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy. For the first time. Ever. I know, I suck.
This may be the longest it’s ever taken me to read a book. Multiplied by three. It’s taken me longer than it took the Jews to wander the desert to finish these books. Longer than it takes to play a game of Risk. Longer than it takes my computer to load porn… I would guess.
The worst part is, I bought a library card 4 months ago and haven’t used it once. So, I’ve resolved to read more. Not only that, to read better. Without further ado, I introduce,
The Book List Challenge
1. 1984 George Orwell
2. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain
3. The Alchemist Paulo Coelho
4. Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll
5. All the King’s Men Robert Penn Warren
6. All the Pretty Horses Cormac McCarthy
7. The Ambassadors Henry James
8. And Then There Were None Agatha Christie
9. Anne of Green Gables L.M. Montgomery
10. Beloved Toni Morrison
11. Brave New World Aldous Huxley
12. Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh
13. Bridget Jones’s Diary Helen Fielding
14. The Call of the Wild Jack London
15. The Canterbury Tales Geoffrey Chaucer
16. Catch-22 Joseph Heller
17. The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger
18. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Roald Dahl
19. Charlotte’s Web E.B. White
20. Cloud Atlas David Mitchel
21. The Color Purple Alice Walker
22. A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole
23. Count of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas
24. Crime and Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky
25. Darkness at Noon Arthur Koestler
26. Don Quixote Miguel De Cervantes
27. Dracula Bram Stoker
28. Dune Frank Herbert
29. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test Tom Wolfe
30. Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury
31. A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry
32. Go Tell It on the Mountain James Baldwin
33. The Golden Notebook Doris Lessing
34. Gone With The Wind Margaret Mitchell
35. The Good Soldier Ford Madox Ford
36. The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck
37. Gravity’s Rainbow Thomas Pynchon
38. Great Expectations Charles Dickens
39. The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald
40. Gulliver’s Travels Jonathan Swift
41. Hamlet William Shakespeare
42. The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
43. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone J.K. Rowling
44. The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers
45. Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad
46. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams
47. Howard’s End E.M. Forster
48. In Search of Lost Time Marcel Proust
49. Invisible Man Ralph Ellison
50. Jane Eyre Charlotte Brontë
51. The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini
52. Les Miserables Victor Hugo
53. Life of Pi Yann Martel
54. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis
55. The Little Prince Antoine De Saint-Exupery
56. Little Women Louisa M Alcott
57. Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
58. Lord of the Flies William Golding
59. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring J.R.R. Tolkien
60. Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert
61. Main Street Sinclair Lewis
62. The Maltese Falcon Dashiell Hammett
63. Memoirs of a Geisha Arthur Golden
64. Middlemarch George Eliot
65. Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie
66. Moby Dick Herman Melville
67. Naked Lunch William S. Burroughs
68. Native Son Richard Wright
69. Northern Lights (The Golden Compass) Philip Pullman
70. The Old Man and the Sea Ernest Hemingway
71. On The Road Jack Kerouac
72. One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel Garcia Marquez
73. A Prayer for Owen Meaney John Irving
74. Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen
75. The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro
76. The Scarlet Letter Nathaniel Hawthorne
77. The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett
78. The Secret History Donna Tartt
79. A Separate Peace John Knowles
80. The Shadow of the Wind Carlos Ruiz Zafon
81. Sister Carrie Theodore Dreiser
82. Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut
83. Sons and Lovers D.H. Lawrence
84. The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner
85. Stranger in a Strange Land Robert Heinlein
86. Swallows and Amazons Arthur Ransom
87. The Time Traveler’s Wife Audrey Niffenegger
88. To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
89. To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf
90. A Town Like Alice Nevil Shute
91. Tropic of Cancer Henry Miller
92. Ulysses James Joyce
93. Under the Volcano Malcolm Lowry
94. War and Peace Leo Tolstoy
95. Watership Down Richard Adams
96. The Way of All Flesh Samuel Butler
97. The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame
98. Winnie the Pooh A.A. Milne
99. Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte
100. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Robert M. Pirsig
I’ve read 18 of the books on this list, they’ve been highlighted. I plan on rereading them all, excluding the Lord of the Rings. I literally just finished reading it. It was tedious (the fuck was up with all the singing?!) and I’m no glutton for punishment. Except when it comes to ice cream, I’ll eat that shit until I explode.
I’ll be updating you periodically on my progress, so just let me hang on to the illusion that you care.
I have read the majority of the books on your list good luck 80 percent of them are identical to lotr do not feel bad though I have been reading moby dick for 8 years now and I have 5 more chapters to go I suspect I will be well into my 40s when I finish this master piece of shit good luck