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Fall 2013 RwS Completed Tasks - Fall 2013
20.7 September Jewish HolidaysPresumed Innocent by Scott Turow
+20 Task (Jewish author)
Points: 20
Total Points: 155
20.8 Stephen King's BirthdayDefinitely Dead by Charlaine Harris
+20 Task (vampires, weres and demons)
Points: 20
Total Points: 175
15.9 F5 French/Spanish/Italian/Portuguese/Romanian/Catalanwritten in Portuguese
Codex 632: The Secret Identity of Christopher Columbus (Tomás Noronha #1) (2005) by José Rodrigues dos Santos (translated from the Portuguese by Alison Entrekin) (Hardcover, 336 pages)
Grand Total: 750 + 30 = 780
10.2 Celebrate Book Lover's DayThe Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Review:I have had this book for a long time but for some reason never got around to reading it. The premise is interesting for those who are into British literature. I also know many people who love this series. That said, it did take me awhile to get into the story. There is a lot of world building the author gets into and it is confusing at times. Thursday Next is a SpecOps Literatec, but she also helps out with other numbered operatives. She is also a veteran of the Crimean war with Russia. Her main objective in this story is to apprehend Acheron Hades, a dangerous criminal who has stolen original copies of some of Britain's original manuscripts, therefore altering some of the world's most beloved pieces of literature.
Things I liked-all the Shakespeare related items: the Will Speak machines, the Richard III plays turned into Rocky Horror type shows, and the references to conspiracy theories behind who else may have written the plays. I also liked the literary references as well.
My main complaint is that it took a long time to get into the story. There is so much going on so early in the book that I just kept putting it down. I will probably read the next in the series.
+10 Task (#6 on list)
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.9-#12 on list)
Task Total = 25
Grand Total = 455 points
20.5 - One of the major themes of In Search of Lost Time is the role of art in society. From the linked list, read a novel about an artist or an autobiography/memoir/biography about a visual artist (potter, painter,sculptor, photographer, filmmaker, architect).The Moon And Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham 11/17/13
This book is based on the life of Paul Gauguin
Review:
W. Somerset Maugham’s novel, The Moon and Sixpence is based on the life of the artist Paul Gaugin. Told in the first person as if Maugham were an acquaintance of Gauguin, herein called Charles Strickland, the narration draws the reader in. We learn how Strickland, formerly a British stockbroker, one day tosses everything, including his family, to move to Paris and paint. He is not at all a likeable character, having no sympathy for the family he left with no money, the mistress he ruined, nor anyone else in his life. Ultimately, he leaves Europe to live out his life painting in Tahiti, where he seemed to have found some peace with the natives.
The characters in this tale are all flawed, and it would be easy to dismiss the work as maudlin had it not been for the gift of Maugham’s writing skills. There is much more going on than I have mentioned in my few words, and Maugham makes the reading of the tale a great way to spend the weekend.
Combos:
10.3 - Conjunction "and"
10.6 - Maugham died in 1965.
10.7 - The artist moved from England to Paris and to Tahiti.
20.2 - Maugham lived from 1874 to 1965.
20.3 - This book is #68 in the top Belle Epoque book list.
+20 task
+10 Canon
+10 review
+25 combo (10.3, 10.6, 10.7, 20.2, 20.3)
Task Total: 65 points
With this book, I've finished the challenge and earned my Mega Bonus!
RwS Total to date: 1045
Pick 'n' Mix Total to date: 200
Pick 'n' Mix Completion Bonus: 100
RwS Completion Bonus 100
Mega Finish Bonus 200
Grand Total to date: 1645
Books in Canon: 12
From Post 786Rebekah wrote: "20.2 In Search of Lost Time
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust
Review
10.8 - according to wiki list, title of the volumes comes from the Sonnets"
I can't find a specific reference to the title "Swann's Way". If you can find a sonnet number, that would help. For now, I have not included this combo.
Liz M wrote: "10.1 - Square Peg:Red by Alison Cherry
Disclaimer: Alison is a former co-worker and a friend, so I cannot be completely unbiased in my review.
I am not the targe..."
+10 Review
Kate S wrote: "I can't find a specific reference to the title "Swann's Way". If you can find a sonnet number, that would help. For now, I have not included this combo...."The title for the series is from a Shakespeare sonnet. However, It does not apply to the individual titles, unless you read all seven volumes that make up Remembrance of Things Past.
SONNET 30
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste....
Liz M wrote: "Kate S wrote: "I can't find a specific reference to the title "Swann's Way". If you can find a sonnet number, that would help. For now, I have not included this combo...."The title for the series..."
Kate S wrote: "From Post 786
Rebekah wrote: "20.2 In Search of Lost Time
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust
Review
10.8 - according to wiki list, title of the volumes comes from the Sonnet..."
Ok. I wasn't sure about it.
Rebekah wrote: "15.2 Pick n Mix - Round 2E - 3 Short Stories
Three John Silence Stories by Algernon Blackwood
Task Total - 15 pts
Grand Total - 1270 or 1275 pts"
Thank you for the 100 extra points on the readerboard but where did they come from?
Rebekah wrote: "Rebekah wrote: "15.2 Pick n Mix - Round 2E - 3 Short Stories
Three John Silence Stories by Algernon Blackwood
Task Total - 15 pts
Grand Total - 1270 or 127..."
Post 802: Mega Finish is 200 points not 100
Gee whiz! Am I ever going to remember that? I must think I'm not worthy.
20.8 Kate's Task "In honor of Stephen King's birthday"Only You Can Save Mankind by Terry Pratchett (Lexile: 600)
-> next to the main character Johnny Maxwell, stars the female ScreeWee captain (alien => non-human).
None of the ScreeWees have a name, she was always referred to as "Captain", but plays a major part.
Task Points: 20
Pick'n'Mix Points: 100
Grand Total: 130
10.10 Group ReadsThe Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Review: This is another book I have had for awhile and it took a challenge to read it.To say Jeannette Wall's parents were eccentric would still be an understatement. They both are obviously educated and smart, yet choose to live in the moment, taking their children with them across the US. Walls spends her young childhood in desert towns in the west. Their life is adventurous, but hard. The dad is an alcoholic dreamer whose plans never come to fruition. Her mother is an artist who never seems to want the responsibility to be a mother. She, along with her brother and sisters, do what they can to survive. There is some stability when the family moves to her father's hometown of Welch, West Virginia. The living conditions are deplorable and it is almost a wonder how the kids got out on their own to be successful in New York City. I felt bad for the kids and pissed off at a mom who could have done so much, but chose to not work (while holding a teaching credential) or take welfare and let her kids starve.
It reads like a novel and was a quick read.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Task Total = 20
Grand Total = 475 points
15.9 Pick n Mix - pub between 1976-2000The Secret by Julie Garwood
published in 1992
+30 task
Grand Total = 215 points
10.1 Square Peg Stuck in Neutral by Terry Trueman
Lexile: 820
Review:
This book was a creepy jumbled up mix of fantasy and disturbing, horrific musing. The author is the father of a disabled son who has made a name for himself based on writing a poem about his disabled son. Here, the narrator of this book is a disabled boy with a father who has become famous for writing a poem about his disabled son. On the one hand, the book is playing out the fantasy that behind the disabled façade is a genius boy who sees, hears, and understands everything and remembers everything he’s heard. On the other hand, the book is musing about whether it’s an act of love for a parent to kill a disabled child. Similarly, the book fantasizes that the boy’s seizures are not, as they may appear to an outside observer, tremendously painful, but instead are wondrously pleasurable experiences that allow an out of body projection and an escape from his disabled body. I’m not sorry to have read this book, but I won’t be seeking out the sequel.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 900
15.7 Pick n Mix – F5, translated from Spanish Kiss of the Spider Woman by Manuel Puig
+20 Task
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 920
10.5 - In honor of Labor DayBig Brother by Lionel Shriver
This was the first book by Lionel Shriver that I have read and I had a real love/hate relationship with it throughout. The writing was great ----- that wasn't the issue and I gave the book 4 stars. The problem was my discomfort with the attitudes and behaviors of the characters. It's not easy to be an overweight person and hear the awful things some people think about you and then walk out in the world every day. I almost just couldn't keep reading, but I am glad I did. The book did make other personal connections for me as well and when I got to the ending, I ended up on the love side of my relationship with the book. I can't say much more without spoilers, other than to say that all of the ways Shriver portrayed attitudes in the book have a clear purpose in the end.
+10 Task: on the linked page
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 1750
20.2 1909-1922Agatha Christie (born 1890, died 1976)
Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Chrisite
Style +5 (Combo 10.6 In Honor of Day of the Dead (died in 1976)
Review +10
This is the first Miss Marple mystery. I have read a few books by Agatha Christie. So far I liked them. This book however, I did not like. I did not like the plot. I felt it was too slow. I found the language old fashioned. I kept losing my place in the story. I couldn't find where it was going. I didn't care about who the killer was. No one liked the main character who was killed so I didn't really care about him either. What I did like is the character of Miss Marple. She is a sweet old lady. On a small note, I liked the reference they made about Sherlock Holmes. I disagree with the reviews. I didn't find this story that interesting.
Total: 35
Grand Total: 175
15.3 Pick n Mix - Round 2 F 2 translated from Arabic
Azazeel by يوسف زيدان ( I can't find his name in English on Goodreads but it is Youssef Ziedan
+15 pts - Task
Grand Total - 1390 pts
I would like to move a book.In post 845, I posted Stuck in Neutral by Terry Trueman for 10.1.
I would like to move this to
15.8, Pick n Mix – B2, published in 2000.
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 920-20+30 = 930
Theresa~OctoberLace wrote: "20.5 - One of the major themes of In Search of Lost Time is the role of art in society. From the linked list, read a novel about an artist or an autobiography/memoir/biography about a visual artis..."Congrats on your Mega Finish!
+5 Combo 20.4-on wiki list
Karen (post 14)Coralie (post 35)
Joanna (post 169)
Rebekah (post 661)
For The Moon And Sixpence
+5 Combo 20.3
Kate S, thanks for the pick-up on Combo 20.4 for The Moon And Sixpence. That brings my total to 1650. Do I need to repost that one?
Theresa~OctoberLace wrote: "Kate S, thanks for the pick-up on Combo 20.4 for The Moon And Sixpence. That brings my total to 1650. Do I need to repost that one?"You are welcome. No, there is no need to repost. The points have been recorded.
15.9 Pick n Mix, C2, 160 pages We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
+30 Task
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 965
20.8 Stephen King's BirthdaySomething Rotten by Jasper Fforde
Review:
My favorite installment so far in the Thursday Next series. I read the first book, then listened to the next three in audio format. Sadly, for this book, they changed the narrator. By the end of the book, I'd gotten used to the new narrator, but I still prefer the first one. This narrator tries to give a different voice to each character but it often results in a character sounding particularly dopey. This was especially unfortunate when she was speaking for Landon, who returns in this book after his absence in Book 3.
Overall, these books are just a touch too self-congratulatorily clever. Still, I find them wonderfully inventive and enjoy the literary references most of the time. This book (unlike Book 3) contained very little time in the book world. I'm glad to have read the two back to back because that provided the right balance between book world antics and real (i.e., fantasy England) world plots.
I'm looking forward to continuing the series, but perhaps will go back to hard copies since they seem to continue with the new narrator.
+20 Task (Cheshire cat, various fictional book people, 6 ft. tall hedgehog, talking gorilla)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.2, 10.8)
Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 1005
15.4 Pick n MixB 3 pub. 1969
The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles
+15 pts - Task
Grand Total - 1410 (I think)
15.10 A6 Australia/etcSet in Australia:
Theft: A Love Story (2006) by Peter Carey (Hardcover, 272 pages)
+30 Task
+ 100 points = Completion bonus
Task Total: 30 + 100 = 130
Grand Total: 780 + 130 = 910
15.1 E1 sci-fi/fantasy/graphic novelOld Mars (2013) edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois (Hardcover, 512 pages)
Grand Total: 910 + 15 = 925
15.2 E3 short stories/poetryShort Stories
All Set About With Fever Trees and Other Stories (1985) by Pam Durban (Hardcover, 211 pages)
Grand Total: 925 + 15 = 940
15.3 C2 100-200 pagesBrain Wave (1954) by Poul Anderson (Mass Market Paperback, 164 pages)
Grand Total: 940 + 15 = 955
10.4 Prize-worthyFicciones by Jorge Luis Borges
+10 Task (Cervantes)
+10 Canon
+15 Combo (10.2, 10.6, 20.2)
+10 Non-western
Post Total: 45
Season Total: 1525
20.3 Belle EpoqueMiddlemarch by George Eliot
+20 Task
+5 Combo 10.6
+10 Canon
+20 Jumbo (904 pages)
Post Total: 55
Season Total: 1580
10.3 Conjunction JunctionFathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev
+10 Task
+5 Combo (10.6)
+10 Non-western
+10 Canon
Post Total: 35
Season Total: 1615
20.5 Artist in LiteratureThe Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
+20 Task
+10 Combo (10.6, 20.2)
+10 Jumbo (776 pages)
Task Total: 40
RwS Finish: 100
Mega Finish: 200
Post Total: 340
Season Total: 1955
Kate S wrote: "20.5 Artist in LiteratureThe Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
+20 Task
+10 Combo (10.6, 20.2)
+10 Jumbo (776 pages)
Task Total: 40
RwS Finish: 100
Mega Finis..."
Kate, I started this once but only got through the first couple of chapters. Did you like it? Did you think it is worth giving another try at it? I read and liked the book Irving Stone wrote about Van Gogh.
20.1 - French OriginalGerminal by Émile Zola
I am always drawn in by the plight of the poor and Germinal took me into the world of the miners in France. It was one of the more intense descriptions of the downtrodden that I have read. It surprises me that this is my first Zola, but also makes me happy to have discovered a new classic author that I really enjoy. The writing style is straightforward and the characters are interesting plus the plot carries the reader along into this desperate world of the families striking and starving in order to improve their living conditions. I am disappointed that my library system doesn't have a better Zola collection, because I want to read more! The next ones on my list are Therese Raquin and/or Pot Luck which is the prequel to The Ladies Paradise which I am watching on Masterpiece Theater right now (titled just Paradise). I was almost late to work this morning finishing up the gripping ending to Germinal!
+20 Task
+10 Combo: 10.6 - In honor of All Saints Day (died 1902) / 20.3 - Belle Epoque #37
+10 Review
+10 Canon
+ 5 Jumbo (592 pages)
Task Total: 55
Grand Total: 1810
20.5 - One of the major themes of In Search of Lost Time is the role of art in society. From the linked list, read a novel about an artist or an autobiography/memoir/biography about a visual artist (potter, painter,sculptor, photographer, filmmaker, architect).Swann's Way by Marcel Proust 11/22/13
This book is based on the the author's life and is included in the linked list.
Review:
I just finished Swann’s Way (Remembrance of Things Past #1) and now know why so many people love Proust! The story in this book is of Proust as a young boy, his family, and a family friend, Charles Swann. While the tale is lovely, it is the use of eloquent language that really drew me in. If only I could write as well, I’d be in heaven! Adding to my enjoyment was the wonderful narration of the audiobook by Neville Jason, who had read War and Peace to me a couple of years ago. I had the Kindle/Audiobook Whispersync combo, so I was able to read as well as listen. He’s recorded all seven volumes of this series, and I already have #2 in my audiobook library.
Combos:
10.6 - Proust died in 1922.
20.1 - The originally written in French by an author born in France.
20.2 - Proust lived from 1871 to 1922.
20.3 - This book is #2 in the top Belle Epoque book list.
20.4 - This book is on the list of autobiographical novels.
+20 task
+10 Canon
+10 review
+25 combo (10.6, 20.21 20.2, 20.3, 20.4)
Task Total: 65 points
RwS Total to date: 1115
Pick 'n' Mix Total to date: 200
Pick 'n' Mix Completion Bonus: 100
RwS Completion Bonus 100
Mega Finish Bonus 200
Grand Total to date: 1715
Books in Canon: 13
20.2 - author alive between 1909 and 1922The Nursing Home Murder by Ngaio Marsh (1895-1982)
+20 Task
+5 Combo (10.6)
Task total=25
Grand total=700
15.2 - C2 (100-200 pages)More Baths, Less Talking by Nick Hornby (135 pages)
Task total=15
Grand total=715
Pick'n'Mix Round 215.2 - A1 - set in North America
The Moth Diaries by Rachel Klein
+15 points
Grand Total: 1400 points
10.3 - Conjunction JunctionCall for the Dead by John le Carré
+10 Task
Task Total: 10 points
Grand Total: 1410
20.2 - author alive 1909-22Gone to Earth by Mary Webb
+20 Task (lived 1881-1927)
+ 5 Combo (10.6)
Task Total: 25 points
Grand Total: 1435
20.8 - non-human characterWounded by Stephen Cole
+20 Task (main character is a werewolf)
Task Total: 20 points
RwS finish: 100 points
Mega finish: 200 points
Grand Total: 1755
Congratulations, Rosemary and all the other mega finishers!
20.8 Stephen KingTempt the Stars by Karen Chance
Review: I’ve been waiting to read the sixth book in Karen Chance’s Cassandra Palmer series for over a year, and while it didn’t disappoint, it wasn’t exactly satisfying either. Chance has a penchant for cliffhangers, a big one of which ended the last book. Luckily, this one addressed that issue head on, but unluckily, it was not fully resolved.
The biggest issue I have with this series is that it’s basically all action, action, action. Cassie goes from one situation to another with barely a chance to eat, which leaves her little time to actually think. She’s gotten better about thinking before she leaps and/or bringing backup, but the entire series has comprised maybe a few months in her world, and it makes it a little frustrating when following it not only for the action, but for her character and personal life development. I anxiously await the next one, which is likely to be just as frustrating as this one was.
+20 Task (major characters include gods, goddesses, ghosts, vampires, and demons)
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 1475
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Reading with Style
Books mentioned in this topic
Gunnerkrigg Court, Volume 4: Materia (other topics)The Piper's Son (other topics)
The Name of the Rose (other topics)
The Name of the Rose (other topics)
The Blue Mountain (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Thomas Siddell (other topics)Melina Marchetta (other topics)
Umberto Eco (other topics)
Umberto Eco (other topics)
Meir Shalev (other topics)
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Add them together, please.