Just started Marked. Guess Vampires are a must now, after the Twilight series, here comes The House of Night series..

Meghan wrote: "ooh, amy, you definitely need to read north and south AND wilkie collins.

you guys! i am STILL reading vanity fair, and i am not even joking. it's killing me! i have a lot of vacation time comin..."

Meghan - I was recently introduced to Little Dorrit via the BBC mini series. I fell in love! If you read it, I'd be curious to know what you think of it (I've yet to read the book yet...). Of course, some of my love for the series MAY have something to do with a certain Matthew Macfadyen... ;>

I just finished The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman and truly enjoyed the book. It will not be the last Gaiman book that I'll be reading. ♥

I'm currently reading Graceling by Kristin Cashore.

Grain de Beaute, have you read Gaiman's Coraline? It's another one of his children's books I really liked.

Dini wrote: "Grain de Beaute, have you read Gaiman's Coraline? It's another one of his children's books I really liked."

Hello Dini,

The Graveyard Book is the first Neil Gaiman book that I've read and I loved it. Haven't read Coraline though. But I'm planning to read it soon together with American Gods.

Just started Drood by Dan Simmons

Grain de Beaute wrote: "The Graveyard Book is the first Neil Gaiman book that I've read and I loved it. Haven't read Coraline though. But I'm planning to read it soon together with American Gods."

Those two books should be interesting to compare/contrast as they are quite the opposite from each other. Coraline is a short children's book while American Gods reads like a saga and is for adults. I remember it took me so long to finish AG.

I FINISHED VANITY FAIR!!! you guys, i'm so excited. dini, you're so right -- it's just like running a marathon (except i've never done a full, just a half). halfway through, you think you're going to die and it'll never end, but when the end's in sight, you get a burst of energy and push on. when it's over, you look back and realize you actually really enjoyed the whole experience.

Am loving North and South.

Congrats on finishing the Vanity Fair marathon, Meghan! :D

My very first post ever in this group and on Goodreads was on December 10, 2008. In that post I announced that I was reading Anna Karenina, which I had picked up about a month prior to that post. I am pleased to inform everyone that at 11:34 central time on November 3, 2009 I finished Anna Karenina.

Yay! Congrats, Lori :) Unfortunately, I didn't end up taking the Anna Karenina Seminar for the spring semester.. It just didn't fit my schedule :(

Way to go, Lori!

Lori, congrats!
Marion, do they really do that in the States? Spend an entire seminar on one novel? and off topic but: how are you doing over there?

Thanks! It was a huge weight off my shoulders because it had taken so long to read despite my actually really liking the overall story (the long discussions about religion, agriculture, and politics were not my favorite) and because I decided that I wanted to finish by the end of my birthday. I finished over a week ahead of schedule.

Right now I'm going to finish The Grapes of Wrath; I only have 175 pages left, so it shouldn't take very long. It's a really depressing story! I don't think Oklahoma, where I've lived my whole life, has ever really recovered from the Depression.

Kristel, it depends from class to class. There are classes that talk about a certain time period. Talking about one novel only is definitely a special format, this class I am talking about is a first year seminar at my school, which means it is designed especially for freshmen and it's supposed to transition the way from high school to college classes, so I guess that's why. It said in the course descriptions that they were going to read the book really slowly with special attention to symbolism and the setting within the time period, and they are going to watch a couple of movie adaptions to contrast them with the book.
I'm doing pretty good, I really like my college and I've made a lot of friends here. Seems like I managed to pick a lot of classes that are A LOT of work (in comparison to my roommate, who never has any homework although she didn't pick easy classes on purpose), so I didn't read anything that wasn't for class so far. But I hope my schedule for the spring is more balanced and I can actually get some other things done apart from school work.
We've got a gorgeous library here, and since my college is in the pioneer valley, which claims to be the most book-loving part of the US, there are a lot of used bookstores around, so I can't wait until I've actually got some time to explore the area and the bookstores :)

Recently started the third Percy Jackson book The Titan's Curse. :)

Rolling merrily along through The Grapes of Wrath. I will finish soon.

Currently, I have received my copy of Anna Karenina, so I will begin to read it after I have finished reading Mansfield Park by Jane Austen . (for the second time =D)

Coery, I'll be interested to see what you think about Anna K.

For anyone who is interested...after I finish The Grapes of Wrath (25 pages left) I'm going to read the Collette biography they mention on the show Secrets of the Flesh A Life of Colette if anyone is interested in joining me.

I am currently reading [and indulging:] in Olive Kitteridge A Novel in Stories. It is a wonderful novel thus far with intertwining short stories, and written in an eloquent manner.

I'm reading The Woman in White and finding it intriguing and enjoyable, if a little on the long side.

angie, i love wilkie collins! i agree with it being a bit long, but i found the structure of the novel fascinating. The Moonstone is shorter, and just as intriguing.

i'm not reading anything worth mentioning right now -- i've kind of lost focus lately. i think it's finishing up the first trimester of my first pregnancy, and getting ready for a cross-country move, and counting down the days (11!) left in my current frustrating job. so i'm hoping to pick back up again in december and tackle something satisfying.

I just bought The Woman in White for 50% off at a book fair over the weekend :D Don't know when I'm gonna read it, but I'm glad I decided to get it.

Meghan wrote: "angie, i love wilkie collins! i agree with it being a bit long, but i found the structure of the novel fascinating. The Moonstone is shorter, and just as intriguing.

i'm not reading an..."

Meghan, I agree that the concept of using multiple first person narrators was pretty creative. I am getting pretty excited to know what's going to happen next and what the big Secret is! I'll add The Moonstone to my tbr list, thanks for the recommendation!

I finished Alice in Wonderland last night. I believe I'll read Swann's Way for a while. It might be interrupted by a quick reading of Gone With the Wind, which I promised I'd read with a friend.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay | Michael Chabon

Dini,
I think you will love THE WOMAN IN WHITE.It is one of my absolute favorites and I just finished rereading it a couple of weeks ago and what I have found is that at each age I read it I take something else out of it as mu own life experience changes.
I wish you the joy of it!

Thanks, DJ. I'll find the right mood to read it so I can enjoy the book properly :)

Please let me know what you think once you have read it...

Rzecz o zabłąkanej duszy | Sergey Sadov

Been reading a lot of mysteries by Patricia Cornwell lately. Just finished reading All That Remains. I'm going to try sqeaking in Cruel & Unusual before I, Cross by James Patterson is released. Been waiting for this Cross book for over a year! Can't wait to read it.

Reading We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which I like so far.

Der Vulkan | Klaus Mann

Brideshead Revisited

DJ, let me know how that one is. I've been wanting to read it for a while.

DJ, I love the language in Brideshead Revisited, it's just so beautiful and poetic. The story and characters can also be great fodder for discussion, I think.

After you've read it you can also check out the movie.

Dini wrote: "DJ, I love the language in Brideshead Revisited, it's just so beautiful and poetic. The story and characters can also be great fodder for discussion, I think.

After you've read it you can also che..."

Don`t worry Dini,I was at the Scottish Premiere..it was good but you got more of it with the BBC Series...
I appreciate you saying...

I have read Brideshead this summer (short review is somewhere in this thread). I just loved the imagery and the language.

I recently finished Her Royal Spyness and am now starting:
The Titan's Curse
and
Which Witch?
so far I'm enjoying both:)

Currently reading Janet Frame's Scented Gardens for the Blind and just started Stephen King's Under the Dome A Novel because... well, like the rest of the world if he keeps pooping them out, I'll keep reading them. Sigh.

Austerlitz | W.G. Sebald

I'm reading The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath. Both are really good. The Electric Kool-Aid is supposed to balance the melancholy of Sylvia.

I'm just finishing Painted Shadow The Life of Vivienne Eliot, First Wife of T. S. Eliot. And El, I have Under the Dome A Novel on hold at the library. I actually think that King will get a better shake from literary history than he currently enjoys from critics. There's something almost Dickensian about his best stuff, like The Stand.

I'm currently reading Toward a New Cold War Essays on the Current Crisis and How We Got There by Noam Chomsky because I am now allowed to read at work. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to get any reading done at all :( I'm looking forward to next semester a lot, where my classes will hopefully be more balanced.

Misty wrote: "Reading We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which I like so far."

An excellent choice!

THE QUEEN AND I by Sue Townsend.

The Seance by John Harwood was recommended to me by an avid supernatural reader I met while working at the library, and I absolutely love it! It is dark and elemental with amazing setting description. I can't wait to read the Ghost Writer, also by John Harwood next!

The Death of Achilles | Boris Akunin

Now on THE BIRTHING HOUSE by Christopher Ransom.
THE QUEEN AND I was hyseterically funny.....