Patrick's 2025 TBR Hazard Reduction Operation

[Patrick]

In Australia, we are very familiar with hazard reduction operations performed by our rural fire services, as they help prevent greater damage from the inescapable seasonal bushfires. Likewise, my TBR shelves, frequently laden with book overgrowth, need some selective "backburning" operations to prevent them from collapsing or burning holes in my wallet from the purchase of additional bookshelves.

[Patrick]

This year, I would focus on the following at-risk regions, especially those overgrown with French weed (F). The 2024 eradication program for this noxious weed has completely failed; 6 areas were targeted, but none have actually shown any progress. Two additional areas have been included for 2025:

1. Maldoror - Comte de Lautréamont (F)
2. The Real Charlotte - Somerville & Ross
3. The Garden Where the Brass Band Played - Simon Vestdijk
4. To the North - Elizabeth Bowen
5. Hunger - Knut Hamsun (F)
6. The Sound of Waves - Yukio Mishima (F)
7. Pnin - Vladimir Nabokov
8. Play it as it Lays - Joan Didion
9. A Bend in the River - V.S. Naipaul
10. Chess Story - Stefan Zweig (F)
11. If not Now, When? - Primo Levi (F)
12. Dictionary of the Khazars - Milorad Pavic (F)
13. Half of Man is Woman - Zhang Xianliang
14. Cigarettes - Harry Matthews
15. Inland - Gerald Murnane
16. Wittgenstein's Mistress - David Markson
17. The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje
18. Manon des Sources - Marcel Pagnol (F)
19. The Virgin Suicides - Eugenides
20. Don't Move - Margaret Mazzantini (F)
21. A Boy's Own Story - Edmund White
22. The Gathering - Anne Enright
23. The Sense of an Ending - Julian Barnes
24. Winter - Ali Smith

[Patrick]

January: #4 - To the North - Elizabeth Bowen: read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

February: #14 - Cigarettes - Harry Matthews: read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

March: #12 - The Dictionary of the Khazars: read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

April: #23 - The Sense of an Ending - Julian Barnes: read and reviewed late ->

[Patrick]

May: #17 - The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje: read and reviewed late -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

Swapping the backburning regions

3. The Professor's House (Cather) -> The Garden Where the Brass Band Played (Simon Vestdijk)
5. Watt (Beckett; F) -> Hunger (Knut Hamsun; F)
8. Dusklands (Coetzee) -> Play it as it Lays (Joan Didion)
10. So Long a Letter (Bâ; F) -> Chess Story (Stefan Zweig; F)
18. Troubling Love (Ferrante; F) -> Manon des Sources (Marcel Pagnol; F)
21. Elizabeth Costello (Coetzee) -> A Boy's Own Story (Edmund White)

[Patrick]

June: #13 - Half of Man is Woman - Zhang Xianliang: read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

July: #1 - Maldoror - Comte de Lautréamont (aka Isidore Ducasse): read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

August: #20 - Don't Move - Margaret Mazzantini: read and reviewed - > https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Patrick]

September: #7 - Pnin - Vladimir Nabokov: read and reviewed -> https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...