50 Books I Need to Finish This Year

During good weeks, I can get through 2-3 books a week on the train. Unfortunately, I’ve been spending most of my train time lately listening to music and staring off into space. Like my writing, my reading has been suffering.

It’s time to get back on track.

In preparation for my trip, I’ve compiled a quick list of the 50 books I either need to start reading or need to finish reading this year, roughly in this order (an asterik denotes those books I’m currently in the middle of reading):

1. Romance of the Three Kingdoms(volume 1 of 2)*
2. Shriek by Jeff VanderMeer
3. The Male Body by Susan Bordo*
4. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel by Susanna Clarke
5. The Persian Boy by Mary Renault*
6. Love by Toni Morrison*
7. Ahab’s Wife by Sena Jeter Nasland*
8. War in the Shadows: the Guerilla in History by Robert B. Asprey (in fact, I need to buy this book – I’m accuring a lot of library fees for it)*
9. Orlando by Virginia Woolf*
10. Dreaming by the Book by Elaine Scarry*
11. Secret Life by Jeff VanderMeer
12. Master and Commander by Patrick O’Brien
13. Nightwood by Djuna Barnes
14. Golden States by Michael Cunningham
15. The Histories by Herodotus
16. The Insult by Rupert Thomson
17. Tess of the D’Ubervilles by Thomas Hardy*
18. The Boundaries of Her Body: The Troubling History of Women’s Rights in America by Debran Rowland
19. The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler*
20. The Trumps of Doom by Roger Zelazny
21. Blood of Amber by Roger Zelazny
22. Sign of Chaos by Roger Zelazny
23. Rats and Gargoyles by Mary Gentle
24. On War by Carl Von Clausewitz
25. Gloriana by Michael Moorcock
26. Half the Day is Night by Maureen McHugh
27. The Art of Memory by Frances A. Yates
28. The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu
29. The Crimson Petal and the White by Michael Faber*
30. Iron Council by China Mieville
31. Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews by James Carroll
32. Oriental Mythology by Joseph Campbell
33. Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi
34. Natural History by Justina Robson
35. A Harlot High and Low by Honore de Balzac
36. Lost Illusions by Honore de Balzac
37. Homosexuality and Civilization by Louis Crompton*
38. Fool’s Errand by Robin Hobb
39. Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson (must… fight… through… it)
40. Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
41. A Mind of Its Own: A Cultural History of the Penis by David M. Friedman
42. Solitary Sex: A Cultural History of Masturbation by Thomas W. Laqueur*
43. Bloodtide by Melvin Burgess
44. The Dress Lodger by Sheri Holman*
45. Same-sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe by John Boswell
46. The Comforts of Home: Prostitution in Colonial Naroibi by Luise White
47. Latro in the Mist by Gene Wolfe*
48. Brightness Falls from the Air by James Tiptree Jr.
49. Feminist Social Thought: a reader by various*
50. Moby Dick by Herman Melville.

And yes, for those wondering: all of these books – except two of the Zelazny – are, in fact, actually sitting here in my house.

Our latest book count?

1541

Thus concludes this morning’s procrastination post.

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