Daily Details: the bedside table

I like details best of all. Here's today's detail. This is my bedside table. Tomorrow it will look different.

Currently playing

Currently playing on my MP3 player:


Michelle Branch - Hotel Paper
Michelle Branch - Spirit Room
Barenaked Ladies - Stunt
Barenaked Ladies - Barenaked Ladies Are Me
Michael Jackon - Number Ones

I have music playing most of the day. Mostly in the kitchen. And I dance to make Elliot smile when no one else is around to see.

What are you listening to?

Interview With the Vampire by Anne Rice

This is the story of Louis, as told in his own words, of his journey through mortal and immortal life. Louis recounts how he became a vampire at the hands of the radiant and sinister Lestat and how he became indoctrinated, unwillingly, into the vampire way of life. His story ebbs and flows through the streets of New Orleans, defining crucial moments such as his discovery of the exquisite lost young child Claudia, wanting not to hurt but to comfort her with the last breaths of humanity he has inside.

This book surprised me. I thought it would be trashier. I've seen the film, but didn't take much from it. Or at least I thought I didn't until I started reading this and ended up with Brad Pitt's voice in my head narrating. I enjoyed the book, but I found Louis's incessant philosophising a little tedious in some parts. Rice explores some interesting themes, and I loved the rich detail of New Orleans but it felt a little flat sometimes. Maybe I've read this book too late and after too much saturation in books and movies about vampires and morality.

Read an interview here with Anne Rice including study questions, if you so wish.

(On other vampire book news, who else is counting down the days until Breaking Dawn is released?!)

This completes the required 10 books to be read for the 1% well-read challenge, but I'm having too much fun to stop now...

Linky love

I'm a bit short on the blogging ideas at the moment, but thankfully you lot out there are not. Here are some of my favourite recent posts:

A Book List Bonanza from Book Chase

What You Can Do to End Genocide in Darfur by Maw Books Blog

The Compulsive Reader is counting down the wait for Breaking Dawn by giving us a month of 'Books that Suck' including this one which I would quite like to read. Check out the others as well though...

Trashionista was the first to inform me of Tim Burton's latest movie offering

A World of Kate discusses book-to-film adaptations and how they can go terribly wrong

The Inside Cover writes a very interesting review including some fun optical illusions

And finally, over at Semicolon, her Sunday Salon lists some great links to fun bookshelves

Oldest's first haircut!

I did it. I finally succumbed to the pressure (internal mostly) and took Oldest for his first hair cut. Oldest was so serious and melancholy during the actual haircut. Wouldn't give any of the hairdressers a smile, whereas Littlest managed to charm them all. When we left, Oldest was all giggles and happiness.

I sent an MMS to N to show him Oldest's new look and he calls me later in the day to say 'you sent me the before photo, but I never got the after' Folks, I'd sent him the after!Oldest 's hair still looks 'moppish' because it's so curly, but honestly, it's quite a few inches shorter. You can tell by these photos. Right? Or is it just me? Do I think I should have had it cut shorter? It was his first haircut in almost THREE years, if I wasn't sentimental about it then it would have happened a lot sooner than this...

To me

It's my birthday today. I am 26. Happy birthday to me.

Lifelong list of goals: food edition

Based mostly around our latest Vegetarian experiment, I thought one of my new lifelong goals should be to grow my own vegetables. It seems like a really 'now' thing to do but it's something I'd been thinking about for awhile.

We have a patch of earth in the corner of our garden where the previous owner had a greenhouse. It is now currently used for nothing and though there isn't THAT much space, I'd love to plant vegetables there. Vegetables that we'd eat quite often. I was thinking possibly carrots, onions, peas, potatoes and sweetcorn. I have no idea how easy or hard that would be, but I'd like to find out sometime. The BBC has a website for such a thing.

This is something that I'd like the boys to be involved in as well (so might be more useful to the family in a few years time). My dad and I planted vegetables once. I don't remember everything we planted, but we had decent looking strawberries and a couple of heads of cauliflower. It was a fun thing to do and I had a great sense of accomplishment afterwards (even though we stopped once green bugs attacked the rest of our vegetable patch). I like the idea of a project that we all do together, giving them good memories.

The next item on my list, is to eat at a really nice restaurant. Just once. I'm talking fancy-nice, one with Michelin stars and everything a la Gordon Ramsay. I'm not much of a foodie and I think I might leave the table still hungry, but I think I'd like that experience anyway. And then I can go back to my mac and cheese fully satisfied.

He's a cheeky one.

Oldest is still sleeping in a cotbed. A bed that he has never climbed out of himself and therefore needs me to lift him in and out of. He'll be getting a big boy bed soon, but for now he calls me when he wakes up in the morning or after a nap. Here's how that went yesterday:

Oldest: MOMMY!
Me: Be right there child.
Oldest: MOMMY!
Me: (sigh)
Oldest: MRS C!
Oldest: MOMMY C-(the rest of our surname)! (really dragging out the syllables)
Me: Oldest, I'll be there in a minute.
(I was feeding Littlest at the time and he only had a little bit left)
This is followed by a few seconds of silence before Oldest pulls out the big guns.
Oldest: 'WEETHEART!

At which I couldn't resist and went into him. He then called me 'cheeky monkey' and raised his arms to be lifted out.

YAY!

A huge thank you goes to Christie from Baby Tea Leaves for sending this lovely package of Bath and Bodyworks products! She's hosting the Summer of Me Weightloss Challenge (because of which I've lost 4.5 pounds)(had a rough couple of weeks there, but I'm back on the wagon!) and I won this wonderful prize. I felt so excited when the postman rang the bell holding a big package for me. And, AND I'll be getting another package in the mail soon containing this t-shirt from One More Mile. Lucky, lucky me.

I love the people I've met via blogging. Aren't we a lucky bunch?

Vegetarian experiment

We're always up for a challenge in the Fluttering Butterfly house, and here's our latest: to go vegetarian for a couple weeks in a row. Not strictly. We had lamb at my mother in law's house the other day and we threw some leftover bacon into some fried rice at the beginning of the week, but other than that, vegetarians. (the kind that eat dairy products as well as fish) It won't be forever, we both love meat too much to give it up entirely.

We both feel a little bad about the treatment of animals that provide us with meat, but that isn't our sole reason for this meat-free weeks. It's the rising cost of everything lately! Not buying meat is saving us money on our shopping bill, and really, every little bit counts, right?

So let's hear it. What do you think about going vegetarian? Eating meat? The treatment of animals? Any tips and advice for me? Recipes? What are your creative ways to beat the credit crunch?

The Book of Illusions by Paul Auster

Vermont professor David Zimmer is a broken man. The protagonist of Paul Auster's 10th novel, The Book of Illusions, hits a period in which life seemed to be working aggressively against him. After his wife and sons are killed in an airplane crash, Zimmer becomes an alcoholic recluse, fond of emptying his bottle of sleeping pills into his palm, contemplating his next move. But one night, while watching a television documentary, Zimmer's attention is caught by the silent-film comedian Hector Mann, who had disappeared without a trace in 1929 and who was considered long-dead. Soon, Zimmer begins work on a book about Mann's newly discovered films (copies of which had been sent, anonymously, to film archives around the world). The spirit of Hector Mann keeps David Zimmer alive for a year. When a letter arrives from someone claiming to be Hector Mann's wife, announcing that Mann had read Zimmer's book and would like to meet him, it is as if fate has tossed Zimmer from one hand to the other: from grief and loss to desire and confusion.

Although film images are technically "illusions," this deft and layered novel is not so much about conscious illusion or trickery as about the traces we leave behind us: words, images, memories. Children are one obvious trace, but in this book, they are not allowed to carry their parents forward. They die early: Hector Mann losing his 3-year-old son to a bee sting just as David Zimmer has lost his two sons in the crash. The second half of The Book of Illusions is given over to a love affair, and to Zimmer's attempt to save something of Hector Mann, and of the others he has loved. In the end, what really survives of us on earth--what flickering immortality we are permitted--is left to the reader to surmise.

I had to read this book slowly, to drag it out over a week. I didn't want this story to end. It invaded my thoughts so much so that it was the first thing I thought of when I woke up and the last thing I thought about when I went to sleep. Auster's writing style, his characters, the bizarre series of events and all the details. The details are what have made The Book of Illusions one of the best books I've read in a very long time. I've read three of Auster's books in as many weeks and each one gets better and better in my mind.

9/10 books completed for the 1% well-read challenge
99/1001 books read of the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die

My beautiful baby

Oh, Littlest, what an easy child you are to look after! I am really very lucky with Littlest. He sleeps through the night, he wakes up with a smile on his face, is endlessly entertained just by watching Oldest run around, hardly cries. What did I do to deserve such a beautiful and happy little boy? And how did 4 months pass so quickly?!

Mr Vertigo by Paul Auster

The story of Walt, an irrepressible orphan from the Mid-West. Under the tutelage of the mesmerising Master Yehudi, Walt is taken back to the mysterious house on the plains to prepare not only for the ability to fly, but also for the stardom that will accompany it.

I think I've found my new favourite author ladies and gentlemen. I loved Mr Vertigo and I can't exactly describe why. The beginning sucked me in so intensely that even though I didn't care much for what happened after the Big Turning Point, the characters and Auster's style of writing carried me through the rest of the book. 'I was 12 years old the first time I walked on water' What an incredible way to start the book, and it was quite a journey following Walt on his path, the choices he makes in life and the weird characters he meets along the way.

Things I've Been Dragging My Feet About Lately:

1. Getting dressed this morning
2. Blogging (obviously)
3. Calling my friend for the number of her mobile hairdresser
4. Making a doctor's appointment
5. Picking out a free t-shirt at OneMoreMile
6. Exercising
7. Studying for my British Citizenship test
8. Applying for Littlest's American citizenship
9. Potty training Oldest
10. Phoning my mother
11. Answering the questions 'what would you like for your birthday?' and 'what would you like to do on your birthday?'

I don't know what's wrong with me lately, but ever since our week of day trips, I can't seem to get focussed or organised lately. Everything seems to be a struggle.

Littlest's room

...Is finally completed! The carpet was fitted yesterday morning! It took awhile, but it's finally finished. I keep going in there to admire our work all over again. I especially love the combination of greens and how well they go together. Now all we need is some furniture in there!

I, Robot by Isaac Asimov

In these stories Isaac Asimov creates the Three Laws of Robotics and ushers in the Robot Age. When Earth is ruled by master-machines, when robots often seem more human than mankind, the Three Laws ensure that humans remain superior and the robots are kept in their rightful place. But an insane telepathic robot results from a production error; a robot assembled in space logically deduces its superiority to non-rational humanity; and when machines serve mankind rather than individual humans, the machine's idea of what is good for society may itself contravene the sacred Three Laws...Amazing and timeless robot stories from the greatest science fiction writer of all time.

I found this book to be really interesting. I had no idea it was a collection of short stories when I began, I don't know much about Asimov's work - but this book really sucked me in from the beginning. I was expecting to be hit over the head with the sci-finess of robots and intergalatic travel and everything that I avoid about the genre, but it wasn't like that at all. It was very accessible to read and the Three Laws and their complications turned many of the stories into mini-mysteries to be solved. I enjoyed the characters and the chronology of robot advancement. I'm left a little confused as to how I, Robot the movie was made, but whatever. It was an enjoyable and fairly quick read that I do not regret.

Will definately have to look out for Asimov's other book on the list, Foundation. Anyone read it and have thoughts about it?

Catching up...

Last week we were on holiday, and as much as I'd love to write a long post filling you in on all the details, it would take far too long. So have a list instead:

This week:

we went to a zoo
went to the Natural History Museum,
where we saw the worst puppet show EVER,
and Oldest held his friend H's hand for such a long time,
the Science Museum
met some great friends
went to Bournemouth beach
where we made at least 10 sandcastles,
and collected a bucketful of rocks and shells
and had a fish and chips lunch with a great view,
went to an aquarium
went to Paulton's theme park
went to a Butterfly House
N and I had a break from the boys and went to London on our own
and saw a live horror show
went to an art exhibition
a modern art exhibition
crashed a movie exhibition
took 592 decent photos
rowed a boat on the roof of a building
crawled around on a membrane on the top of London
had three icecreams each
drank bottles and bottles of squash
rode on 11 trains
I read two books
spent far too much money
drove millions of miles
bought two pairs of shoes for Oldest
bought 4 stuffed animals for Littlest and
ordered carpet and curtains for Littlest's bedroom!

Plus loads more I can't think of! We had a great holiday

Elliot's Big Toddle

A couple weeks ago Elliot participated in his second charity walk - Barnardo's Big Toddle! It was fantastic. He did the half mile walk with two of his friends and they held hands for most of the journey until they all decided to run the rest of the way. He was given a big sticker and a medal which he wore for the next three days. It was a fantastic day and Elliot was so pooped afterwards he fell asleep in his pushchair on the way home!

And best of all, he raised £120 for Barnardo's!

1001 Books Additions/Subtractions

I saw this on someone else's blog. Apparently the original book, 1001 Books To Read Before You Die published in 2006 has been updated. Here are the additions and subtractions. I guess they wanted to make the list more international. I've heard of very few on the list, and as you can see, have read quite a few of the books removed from the list. I am posting this because I find it interesting, but I'm sticking with the original list! No changes, I don't like changes.

ADDITIONS

: Pre 1800 :

0002 : The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter . Anonymous *
0003 : The Tale of Genji . Murasaki Shikibu *
0004 : Romance of the Three Kingdoms . Luó Guànzhong *
0005 : The Water Margin . Shi Nai'an & Luó Guànzhong *
0007 : Tirant lo Blanc . Joanot Martorell *
0008 : La Celestina . Fernando de Rojas *
0009 : Amadis of Gaul . Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo *
0010 : The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes . Anonymous *
0012 : The Lusiad . Luís Vaz de Camões *
0013 : Monkey: A Journey to the West . Wú Chéng'en *
0015 : Thomas of Reading . Thomas Deloney *
0017 : The Travels of Persiles and Sigismunda . Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra *
0018 : The Conquest of New Spain . Bernal Díaz del Castillo *
0019 : The Adventurous Simplicissimus . Hans von Grimmelshausen *
0051 : Anton Reiser . Karl Philipp Moritz *
0054 : A Dream of Red Mansions . Cao Xueqin *
0061 : Jacques the Fatalist . Denis Diderot *

: 1800s :
0065 : Henry of Ofterdingen . Novalis *
0066 : Rameau's Nephew . Denis Diderot *
0068 : Michael Kohlhaas . Heinrich von Kleist *
0077 : The Life and the Opinions of the Tombcat Murr . E.T.A. Hoffmann *
0084 : Eugene Onegin . Alexander Pushkin *
0089 : The Lion of Flanders . Hendrick Conscience *
0092 : Camera Obscura . Hildebrand *
0093 : A Hero of Our Times . Mikhail Yurevich Lermontov *
0098 : Facundo . Domingo Faustino Sarmiento *
0099 : The Devil's Pool . George Sand *
0113 : Green Henry . Gottfried Keller *
0116 : Indian Summer . Adalbert Stifter *
0132 : Last Chronicle of Barset . Anthony Trollope *
0149 : The Enchanted Wanderer . Nicolai Leskov *
0151 : Pepita Jimenéz . Juan Valera *
0152 : The Crime of Father Amado . José Maria Eça de Queirós *
0155 : Martín Fierro . José Hernández *
0167 : The Regent's Wife . Clarín Leopoldo Alas *
0173 : The Quest . Frederik van Eeden *
0175 : The Manors of Ulloa . Emilia Pardo Bazán *
0178 : Under the Yoke . Ivan Vazov *
0179 : The Child of Pleasure . Gabriele D'Annunzio *
0180 : Eline Vere . Louis Couperus *
0184 : Thaïs . Anatole France *
0187 : Down There . Joris-Karl Huysmans *
0194 : The Viceroys . Federico De Roberto *
0202 : Compassion . Benito Pérez Galdós *
0203 : Pharaoh . Boleslaw Prus *
0206 : As a Man Grows Older . Italo Svevo *
0207 : Dom Casmurro . Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis *
0210 : Eclipse of the Crescent Moon . Géza Gárdonyi *

: 1900s :
0212 : Sandokan: The Tigers of Mompracem . Emilio Salgari *
0214 : None but the Brave . Arthur Schnitzler *
0223 : The Call of the Wild . Jack London *
0224 : Memoirs of my Nervous Illness . Daniel P. Schreber *
0225 : The Way of All Flesh . Samuel Butler *
0230 : Solitude . Víctor Català *
0241 : The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge . Rainer Maria Rilke *
0250 : Platero and I . Juan Ramón Jiménez *
0258 : Rashomon . Akutagawa Ryunosuke *
0261 : The Underdogs . Mariano Azuela *
0262 : Pallieter . Felix Timmermans *
0263 : Home and the World . Rabindranath Tagore *
0267 : The Storm of Steel . Ernst Jünger *
0272 : Life of Christ . Giovanni Papini *
0275 : Claudine's House . Colette *
0277 : The Forest of the Hanged . Liviu Rebreanu *
0288 : The New World . Heruy Wäldä-Sellassé *
0295 : Chaka the Zulu . Thomas Mofolo *
0299 : Under Satan's Sun . Geroges Bernanos *
0301 : Alberta and Jacob . Cora Sandel *
0306 : The Case of Sergeant Grischa . Arnold Zweig *
0326 : I Thought of Daisy . Edmund Wilson *
0329 : Look Homeward, Angel . Thomas Wolfe *
0333 : Monica . Saunders Lewis *
0334 : Insatiability . Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz *
0339 : The Return of Philip Latinowicz . Miroslav Krleza *
0341 : The Forbidden Realm . J.J. Slauerhoff *
0344 : Vipers' Tangle . François Mauriac *
0346 : Cheese . Willem Elsschot *
0347 : Man's Fate . André Malraux *
0359 : On the Heights of Despair . Emil Cioran *
0360 : The Bells of Basel . Louis Aragon *
0370 : War with the Newts . Karel Capek *
0376 : Rickshaw Boy . Lao She *
0379 : Ferdydurke . Witold Gombrowicz *
0380 : The Blind Owl . Sadegh Hedayat *
0388 : Alamut . Vladimir Bartol *
0392 : On the Edge of Reason . Miroslav Krleza *
0403 : The Man Who Loved Children . Christina Stead *
0404 : Broad and Alien is the World . Ciro Alegría *
0406 : The Harvesters . Cesare Pavese *
0410 : Chess Story . Stefan Zweig *
0412 : Joseph and His Brothers . Thomas Mann *
0417 : Pippi Longstocking . Astrid Lindgren *
0424 : Bosnian Chronicle . Ivo Andric *
0425 : The Tin Flute . Gabrielle Roy *
0426 : Andrea . Carmen Laforet *
0427 : The Death of Virgil . Hermann Broch *
0429 : Zorba the Greek . Nikos Kazantzakis *
0431 : House in the Uplands . Erskine Caldwell *
0438 : Midaq Alley . Naguib Mahfouz *
0439 : Froth on the Daydream . Boris Vian *
0440 : Journey to the Alcarria . Camilo José Cela *
0441 : Ashes and Diamonds . Jerzy Andrzejewski *
0445 : In the Heart of the Seas . Shmuel Yosef Agnon *
0446 : This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentleman . Tadeusz Borowski *
0457 : A Town Like Alice . Nevil Shute *
0463 : The Guiltless . Hermann Broch *
0464 : Barabbas . Pär Lagerkvist *
0474 : The Hive . Camilo José Cela *
0479 : Excellent Women . Barbara Pym *
0480 : A Thousand Cranes . Yasunari Kawabata *
0485 : The Lost Steps . Alejo Carpentier *
0486 : The Hothouse . Wolfgang Koeppen *
0489 : The Dark Child . Camara Laye *
0490 : A Day in Spring . Ciril Kosmac *
0495 : The Mandarins . Simone de Beauvoir *
0497 : Death in Rome . Wolfgang Koeppen *
0498 : The Sound of Waves . Yukio Mishima *
0499 : The Unknown Soldier . Väinö Linna *
0503 : The Burning Plain . Juan Rulfo *
0506 : The Tree of Man . Patrick White *
0508 : The Devil to Pay in the Backlands . João Guimarães Rosa *
0517 : The Glass Bees . Ernst Jünger *
0521 : The Manila Rope . Veijo Meri *
0522 : The Deadbeats . Ward Ruyslinck *
0528 : The Birds . Tarjei Vesaas *
0532 : Gabriela, Clove and Cinnamon . Jorge Amado *
0536 : The Guide . R.K. Narayan *
0538 : Deep Rivers . José María Arguedas *
0542 : Down Second Avenue . Ezekiel Mphahlele *
0551 : The Magician of Lublin . Isaac Bashevis Singer *
0552 : Halftime . Martin Walser *
0554 : Bebo's Girl . Carlo Cassola *
0555 : God's Bit of Wood . Ousmane Sembène *
0556 : The Shipyard . Juan Carlos Onetti *
0563 : No One Writes to the Colonel . Gabriel García Márquez *
0565 : Memoirs of a Peasant Boy . Xosé Neira Vilas *
0569 : Time of Silence . Luis Martín-Santos *
0574 : The Death of Artemio Cruz . Carlos Fuentes *
0575 : The Time of the Hero . Mario Vargas Llosa *
0576 : The Garden of the Finzi-Continis . Giorgio Bassani *
0578 : The Third Wedding . Costas Taktsis *
0579 : Dog Years . Günter Grass *
0591 : Three Trapped Tigers . Guillermo Cabrera Infante *
0594 : Back to Oegstgeest . Jan Wolkers *
0595 : Closely Watched Trains . Bohumil Hrabal *
0597 : Garden, Ashes . Danilo Kis *
0601 : Death and the Dervish . Mesa Selimovic *
0602 : Silence . Shusaku Endo *
0603 : To Each His Own . Leonardo Sciascia *
0606 : Marks of Identity . Juan Goytisolo *
0612 : Miramar . Naguib Mahfouz *
0613 : Z . Vassilis Vassilikos *
0615 : The Manor . Isaac Bashevis Singer *
0618 : Day of the Dolphin . Robert Merle *
0621 : The Cathedral . Oles Honchar *
0637 : Jacob the Liar . Jurek Becker *
0643 : The Case Worker . György Konrád *
0644 : Moscow Stations . Venedikt Yerofeev *
0645 : Heartbreak Tango . Manuel Puig *
0646 : Seasons of Migrations to the North . Tayeb Salih *
0647 : Here's to You, Jesusa! . Elena Poniatowska *
0648 : Fifth Business . Robertson Davies *
0649 : Play It As It Lays . Joan Didion *
0651 : A World for Julius . Alfredo Bryce Echenique *
0656 : Cataract . Mykhaylo Osadchyl *
0660 : Lives of Girls & Women . Alice Munro *
0666 : The Twilight Years . Sawako Ariyoshi *
0667 : The Optimist's Daughter . Eudora Welty *
0676 : The Dispossessed . Ursula K. Le Guin *
0677 : The Diviners . Margaret Laurence *
0681 : The Port . Antun Soljan *
0683 : The Commandant . Jessica Anderson *
0684 : The Year of the Hare . Arto Paasilinna *
0686 : Woman at Point Zero . Nawal El Saadawi *
0695 : Blaming . Elizabeth Taylor *
0699 : Kiss of the Spider Woman . Manuel Puig *
0700 : Almost Transparent Blue . Ryu Murakami *
0702 : The Engineer of the Human Soul . Josef Skvorecky *
0703 : Quartet in Autumn . Barbara Pym *
0706 : The Wars . Timothy Findley *
0710 : The Beggar Maid . Alice Munro *
0711 : Requiem for a Dream . Hubert Selby Jr. *
0715 : The Back Room . Carmen Martín Gaite *
0720 : So Long a Letter . Mariama Bâ *
0723 : A Dry White Season . André Brink *
0725 : Fool's Gold . Maro Douka *
0727 : Southern Seas . Manuel Vásquez Montalbán *
0729 : Clear Light of Day . Anita Desai *
0732 : Smell of Sadness . Alfred Kossmann *
0733 : Broken April . Ismail Kadare *
0737 : The House with the Blind Glass Windows . Herbjørg Wassmo *
0738 : Leaden Wings . Zhang Jie *
0739 : The War at the End of the World . Mario Vargas Llosa *
0742 : Couples, Passerby . Botho Strauss *
0752 : The Book of Disquiet . Fernando Pessoa *
0753 : Baltasar and Blimunda . José Saramago *
0759 : The Christmas Oratorio . Göran Tunström *
0760 : Fado Alexandrino . António Lobo Antunes *
0761 : The Witness . Juan José Saer *
0765 : Professor Martens' Departure . Jaan Kross *
0767 : Larva: Midsummer Night's Babel . Julián Ríos *
0771 : Democracy . Joan Didion *
0779 : The Young Man . Botho Strauss *
0780 : Love Medicine . Louise Erdrich *
0782 : Half of Man is Woman . Zhang Xianliang *
0787 : Blood Meridian . Cormac McCarthy *
0789 : Simon and the Oaks . Marianne Fredriksson *
0791 : Annie John . Jamaica Kincaid *
0794 : Ancestral Voices . Etienne van Heerden *
0795 : The Beautiful Mrs. Seidenman . Andrzej Szczypiorski *
0800 : Memory of Fire . Eduardo Galeano *
0806 : Ballad for Georg Henig . Viktor Pasokov *
0810 : Of Love and Shadows . Isabel Allende *
0812 : All Souls . Javier Marías *
0814 : Black Box . Amos Oz *
0819 : Kitchen . Banana Yoshimoto *
0823 : The First Garden . Anne Hébert *
0824 : The Last World . Christoph Ransmayr *
0829 : Paradise of the Blind . Duong Thu Huong *
0831 : Gimmick! . Joost Zwagerman *
0832 : Obabakoak . Bernardo Atzaga *
0833 : Inland . Gerald Murnane *
0838 : The Great Indian Novel . Shashi Tharoor *
0846 : The Shadow Lines . Amitav Ghosh *
0853 : The Daughter . Pavlos Matesis *
0856 : The Laws . Connie Palman *
0857 : Faceless Killers . Henning Mankell *
0858 : Astradeni . Eugenia Fakinou *
0865 : Memoirs of Rain . Sunetra Gupta *
0869 : The Dumas Club . Arturo Pérez-Reverte *
0875 : All the Pretty Horses . Cormac McCarthy *
0876 : The Triple Mirror of the Self . Zulfikar Ghose *
0877 : Uncle Petros and Goldbach's Conjecture . Apostolos Doxiadis *
0880 : Before Night Falls . Reinaldo Arenas *
0882 : The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll . Álvaro Mutis *
0883 : Remembering Babylon . David Malouf *
0884 : The Holder of the World . Bharati Mukherjee *
0890 : The Twins . Tessa de Loo *
0894 : Waiting for the Dark, Waiting for the Light . Ivan Klima *
0897 : Deep River . Shusaku Endo *
0904 : Our Lady of the Assassins . Fernando Vallejo *
0907 : Troubling Love . Elena Ferrante *
0908 : The Late-Night News . Petros Markaris *
0913 : Santa Evita . Tomás Martínez *
0923 : A Light Comedy . Eduardo Mendoza *
0924 : Fall on Your Knees . Ann-Marie MacDonald *
0927 : Margot and the Angels . Kristien Hemmerechts *
0929 : Money to Burn . Ricardo Piglia *
0938 : The Heretic . Miguel Deliber *
0941 : Dirty Havana Trilogy . Pedro Juan Gutiérrez *
0942 : Savage Detectives . Roberto Bolaño *
0945 : Pavel's Letters . Monika Moron *
0946 : In Search of Klingsor . Jorge Volpi *
0947 : The Museum of Unconditional Surrender . Dubravka Ugresic *
0948 : Fear and Trembling . Amélie Nothomb

: 2000s :
0949 : Bartleby and Co. . Enrique Vila-Matas *
0958 : The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay . Michael Chabon *
0960 : I'm Not Scared . Niccolò Ammaniti *
0961 : Soldiers of Salamis . Javier Cercas *
0967 : Snow . Orhan Pamuk *
0972 : The Namesake . Jhumpa Lahiri *
0973 : Vernon God Little . DBC Pierre *
0974 : The Successor . Ismail Kadare *
0975 : Lady Number Thirteen . José Carlos Somoza *
0978 : A Tale of Love and Darkness . Amos Oz *
0979 : Your Face Tomorrow . Javier Marías *
0981 : The Swarm . Frank Schätzing *
0982 : Suite Française . Irène Némirovsky *
0985 : The Book about Blanche and Marie . Per Olov Enquist *
0986 : Small Island . Andrea Levy *
0987 : 2666 . Roberto Bolaño *
0988 : The Line of Beauty . Alan Hollinghurst *
0989 : The Accidental . Ali Smith *
0991 : A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian . Marina Lewycka *
0992 : Measuring the World . Daniel Kehlmann *
0993 : Mother's Milk . Edward S. Aubyn *
0994 : Carry Me Down . M.J. Hyland *
0995 : Against the Day . Thomas Pynchon *
0996 : The Inheritance of Loss . Kiran Desai *
0997 : The Kindly Ones . Jonathan Littell *
0998 : Half of a Yellow Sun . Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie *
0999 : The Reluctant Fundamentalist . Mohsin Hamid *
1000 : Falling Man . Don DeLillo *
1001 : Animal's People . Indra Sinha *

SUBTRACTIONS

The Pilgrim’s Progress John Bunyan Pre-1700
Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit John Lyly Pre-1700
Aithiopika Heliodorus Pre-1700
Chaireas and Kallirhoe Chariton Pre-1700
Metamorphoses Ovid Pre-1700
Aesop’s Fables Aesopus Pre-1700
Cecilia Fanny Burney 1700’s
Rameau’s Nephew Denis Diderot 1700’s
Amelia Henry Fielding 1700’s
Roderick Random Tobias George Smollett 1700’s
Roxana Daniel Defoe 1700’s
A Tale of a Tub Jonathan Swift 1700’s
The Turn of the Screw Henry James 1800’s
The Invisible Man H.G. Wells 1800’s
The Real Charlotte Somerville/Ross 1800’s
The Yellow Wallpaper Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1800’s
Born in Exile George Gissing 1800’s
The Master of Ballantrae Robert Louis Stevenson 1800’s
Fortunata and Jacinta Benito Pérez Galdés 1800’s
The Woodlanders Thomas Hardy 1800’s

She H. Rider Haggard 1800’s
The Mayor of Casterbridge Thomas Hardy 1800’s
Kidnapped Robert Louis Stevenson 1800’s
The Brothers Karamazov Fyodor Dostoevsky 1800’s
Return of the Native Thomas Hardy 1800’s
Virgin Soil Ivan Turgenev 1800’s
Daniel Deronda George Eliot 1800’s
The Hand of Ethelberta Thomas Hardy 1800’s
The Temptation of Saint Anthony Gustave Flaubert 1800’s
He Knew He Was Right Anthony Trollope 1800’s
Our Mutual Friend Charles Dickens 1800’s
On the Eve Ivan Turgenev 1800’s
Castle Richmond Anthony Trollope 1800’s
The Marble Faun Nathaniel Hawthorne 1800’s
A Tale of Two Cities Charles Dickens 1800’s
Hard Times Charles Dickens 1800’s
Villette Charlotte Brontë 1800’s
The Blithedale Romance Nathaniel Hawthorne 1800’s
Shirley Charlotte Brontë 1800’s
Mary Barton Elizabeth Gaskell 1800’s

Agnes Grey Anne Brontë 1800’s
La Reine Margot Alexandre Dumas 1800’s
The Purloined Letter Edgar Allan Poe 1800’s
Martin Chuzzlewit Charles Dickens 1800’s
A Christmas Carol Charles Dickens 1800’s
The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby Charles Dickens 1800’s
The Albigenses Charles Robert Maturin 1800’s
The Monastery Sir Walter Scott 1800’s
Northanger Abbey Jane Austen 1800’s Persuasion Jane Austen 1800’s
Ormond Maria Edgeworth 1800’s
The Absentee Maria Edgeworth 1800’s
Timbuktu Paul Auster 1900’s
The Romantics Pankaj Mishra 1900’s
Cryptonomicon Neal Stephenson 1900’s
Everything You Need A.L. Kennedy 1900’s
The Ground Beneath Her Feet Salman Rushdie 1900’s
Sputnik Sweetheart Haruki Murakami 1900’s
Intimacy Hanif Kureishi 1900’s
Amsterdam Ian McEwan 1900’s

Cloudsplitter Russell Banks 1900’s
Tipping the Velvet Sarah Waters 1900’s
Glamorama Bret Easton Ellis 1900’s
Another World Pat Barker 1900’s
Mason & Dixon Thomas Pynchon 1900’s
Memoirs of a Geisha Arthur Golden 1900’s
Great Apes Will Self 1900’s
American Pastoral Philip Roth 1900’s
The Untouchable John Banville 1900’s
Cocaine Nights J.G. Ballard 1900’s
The Information Martin Amis 1900’s
The Moor’s Last Sigh Salman Rushdie 1900’s
Sabbath’s Theater Philip Roth 1900’s
The Rings of Saturn W.G. Sebald 1900’s
Mr. Vertigo Paul Auster 1900’s
The Folding Star Alan Hollinghurst 1900’s
The Master of Petersburg J.M. Coetzee 1900’s
Trainspotting Irvine Welsh 1900’s
Operation Shylock Philip Roth 1900’s
Complicity Iain Banks 1900’s

The House of Doctor Dee Peter Ackroyd 1900’s
The Robber Bride Margaret Atwood 1900’s
The Emigrants W.G. Sebald 1900’s
A Heart So White Javier Marias 1900’s
Jazz Toni Morrison 1900’s
Black Water Joyce Carol Oates 1900’s
The Heather Blazing Colm Tóibín 1900’s
Black Dogs Ian McEwan 1900’s
Time’s Arrow Martin Amis 1900’s
Downriver Iain Sinclair 1900’s
Señor Vivo and the Coca Lord Louis de Bernieres 1900’s
Wise Children Angela Carter 1900’s
Vineland Thomas Pynchon 1900’s
A Home at the End of the World Michael Cunningham 1900’s
Possession A.S. Byatt 1900’s
A Disaffection James Kelman 1900’s
Billy Bathgate E.L. Doctorow 1900’s
The Temple of My Familiar Alice Walker 1900’s
The Book of Evidence John Banville 1900’s
Cat’s Eye Margaret Atwood 1900’s

The Beautiful Room is Empty Edmund White 1900’s
Libra Don DeLillo 1900’s
The Player of Games Iain M. Banks 1900’s
The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul Douglas Adams 1900’s
The Passion Jeanette Winterson 1900’s
The Child in Time Ian McEwan 1900’s
Marya Joyce Carol Oates 1900’s
Foe J.M. Coetzee 1900’s
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit Jeanette Winterson 1900’s
A Maggot John Fowles 1900’s
Less Than Zero Bret Easton Ellis 1900’s
Old Masters Thomas Bernhard 1900’s
Queer William Burroughs 1900’s
Worstward Ho Samuel Beckett 1900’s
Fools of Fortune William Trevor 1900’s
The Diary of Jane Somers Doris Lessing 1900’s
The Newton Letter John Banville 1900’s
Concrete Thomas Bernhard 1900’s
The Names Don DeLillo 1900’s
The Comfort of Strangers Ian McEwan 1900’s

Rites of Passage William Golding 1900’s
City Primeval Elmore Leonard 1900’s
Shikasta Doris Lessing 1900’s
The Safety Net Heinrich Böll 1900’s
The World According to Garp John Irving 1900’s
Yes Thomas Bernhard 1900’s
The Passion of New Eve Angela Carter 1900’s
Petals of Blood Ngugi wa Thiong’o 1900’s
Ratner’s Star Don DeLillo 1900’s
The Public Burning Robert Coover 1900’s
Amateurs Donald Barthelme 1900’s
Grimus Salman Rushdie 1900’s
High Rise J.G. Ballard 1900’s
Dead Babies Martin Amis 1900’s
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy John Le Carré 1900’s
Breakfast of Champions Kurt Vonnegut 1900’s
The Black Prince Iris Murdoch 1900’s
Sula Toni Morrison 1900’s
The Breast Philip Roth 1900’s
The Wild Boys William Burroughs 1900’s

The Driver’s Seat Muriel Spark 1900’s
The Ogre Michael Tournier 1900’s
Goalie’s Anxiety at the Penalty Kick Peter Handke 1900’s
Mercier et Camier Samuel Beckett 1900’s
Troubles J.G. Farrell 1900’s
The Atrocity Exhibition J.G. Ballard 1900’s
The Green Man Kingsley Amis 1900’s
The Nice and the Good Iris Murdoch 1900’s
Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend is Laid Malcolm Lowry 1900’s
Chocky John Wyndham 1900’s
The Cubs and Other Stories Mario Vargas Llosa 1900’s
The Joke Milan Kundera 1900’s
A Man Asleep Georges Perec 1900’s
The Birds Fall Down Rebecca West 1900’s
Trawl B.S. Johnson 1900’s
August is a Wicked Month Edna O’Brien 1900’s
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater Kurt Vonnegut 1900’s
Sometimes a Great Notion Ken Kesey 1900’s
Come Back, Dr. Caligari Donald Bartholme 1900’s
Albert Angelo B.S. Johnson 1900’s

The Collector John Fowles 1900’s
The Drowned World J.G. Ballard 1900’s
The Violent Bear it Away Flannery O’Connor 1900’s
How It Is Samuel Beckett 1900’s
Our Ancestors Italo Calvino 1900’s
Henderson the Rain King Saul Bellow 1900’s
Memento Mori Muriel Spark 1900’s
Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris Paul Gallico 1900’s
The End of the Road John Barth 1900’s
The Wonderful “O” James Thurber 1900’s
Seize the Day Saul Bellow 1900’s
A World of Love Elizabeth Bowen 1900’s
Self Condemned Wyndham Lewis 1900’s
The Unnamable Samuel Beckett 1900’s
Watt Samuel Beckett 1900’s
The Adventures of Augie March Saul Bellow 1900’s
The Killer Inside Me Jim Thompson 1900’s
The Third Man Graham Greene 1900’s
The Heart of the Matter Graham Greene 1900’s
The Victim Saul Bellow 1900’s

Cannery Row John Steinbeck 1900’s
The Pursuit of Love Nancy Mitford 1900’s
Ficciones Jorge Luis Borges 1900’s
Caught Henry Green 1900’s
Go Down, Moses William Faulkner 1900’s
The Poor Mouth Flann O’Brien 1900’s
Hangover Square Patrick Hamilton 1900’s
Between the Acts Virginia Woolf 1900’s
The Hamlet William Faulkner 1900’s
Farewell My Lovely Raymond Chandler 1900’s
Party Going Henry Green 1900’s
Coming Up for Air George Orwell 1900’s
Tropic of Capricorn Henry Miller 1900’s
After the Death of Don Juan Sylvie Townsend Warner 1900’s
The Years Virginia Woolf 1900’s
The Revenge for Love Wyndham Lewis 1900’s
To Have and Have Not Ernest Hemingway 1900’s
Wild Harbour Ian MacPherson 1900’s
The House in Paris Elizabeth Bowen 1900’s
England Made Me Graham Greene 1900’s

Burmese Days George Orwell 1900’s
Threepenny Novel Bertolt Brecht 1900’s
Novel With Cocaine M. Ageyev 1900’s
A Handful of Dust Evelyn Waugh 1900’s
A Scots Quair (Sunset Song) Lewis Grassic Gibbon 1900’s
The Glass Key Dashiell Hammett 1900’s
Cakes and Ale W. Somerset Maugham 1900’s
Vile Bodies Evelyn Waugh 1900’s
Hebdomeros Giorgio de Chirico 1900’s
Red Harvest Dashiell Hammett 1900’s
The Last September Elizabeth Bowen 1900’s
Harriet Hume Rebecca West 1900’s
The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner 1900’s
The Childermass Wyndham Lewis 1900’s
Quartet Jean Rhys 1900’s
The Plumed Serpent D.H. Lawrence 1900’s
Manhattan Transfer John Dos Passos 1900’s
Billy Budd, Foretopman Herman Melville 1900’s
Cane Jean Toomer 1900’s
Antic Hay Aldous Huxley 1900’s

The Garden Party Katherine Mansfield 1900’s
Jacob’s Room Virginia Woolf 1900’s
The Glimpses of the Moon Edith Wharton 1900’s
The Last Days of Humanity Karl Kraus 1900’s
Aaron’s Rod D.H. Lawrence 1900’s
The Fox D.H. Lawrence 1900’s
Night and Day Virginia Woolf 1900’s
The Shadow Line Joseph Conrad 1900’s
Summer Edith Wharton 1900’s
Bunner Sisters Edith Wharton 1900’s
The Voyage Out Virginia Woolf 1900’s
Rosshalde Herman Hesse 1900’s
Three Lives Gertrude Stein 1900’s
Martin Eden Jack London 1900’s
Tono-Bungay H.G. Wells 1900’s
The Iron Heel Jack London 1900’s
Where Angels Fear to Tread E.M. Forster 1900’s
The Golden Bowl Henry James 1900’s
Lord Jim Joseph Conrad 1900’s
Never Let Me Go Kazuo Ishiguro 2000’s

Saturday Ian McEwan 2000’s
On Beauty Zadie Smith 2000’s
Slow Man J.M. Coetzee 2000’s
Adjunct: An Undigest Peter Manson 2000’s
The Red Queen Margaret Drabble 2000’s
Vanishing Point David Markson 2000’s
The Lambs of London Peter Ackroyd 2000’s
Dining on Stones Iain Sinclair 2000’s
Drop City T. Coraghessan Boyle 2000’s
The Colour Rose Tremain 2000’s
Thursbitch Alan Garner 2000’s
The Light of Day Graham Swift 2000’s
Elizabeth Costello J.M. Coetzee 2000’s
London Orbital Iain Sinclair 2000’s
Family Matters Rohinton Mistry 2000’s
Fingersmith Sarah Waters 2000’s
The Double José Saramago 2000’s
Unless Carol Shields 2000’s
The Story of Lucy Gault William Trevor 2000’s
That They May Face the Rising Sun John McGahern 2000’s

In the Forest Edna O’Brien 2000’s
Shroud John Banville 2000’s
Middlesex Jeffrey Eugenides 2000’s
Youth J.M. Coetzee 2000’s
Dead Air Iain Banks 2000’s
The Book of Illusions Paul Auster 2000’s
Gabriel’s Gift Hanif Kureishi 2000’s
Schooling Heather McGowan 2000’s
Don’t Move Margaret Mazzantini 2000’s
The Body Artist Don DeLillo 2000’s
Fury Salman Rushdie 2000’s
At Swim, Two Boys Jamie O’Neill 2000’s
Choke Chuck Palahniuk 2000’s
An Obedient Father Akhil Sharma 2000’s
Ignorance Milan Kundera 2000’s
Nineteen Seventy Seven David Peace 2000’s
City of God E.L. Doctorow 2000’s
How the Dead Live Will Self 2000’s
The Blind Assassin Margaret Atwood 2000’s
After the Quake Haruki Murakami 2000’s

Super-Cannes J.G. Ballard 2000’s
House of Leaves Mark Z. Danielewski 2000’s
Blonde Joyce Carol Oates 2000’s
Pastoralia George Saunders 2000’s

Lifelong list of goals: sports edition

I've been fiddling around with this list of goals for awhile now. First it was called my 'list of things to do before I'm 40' and then it turned into 'before I die' but that sounded too morbid, so now I'm calling it a lifelong challenge. But instead of listing everything all at once, I think I'm going to give it to you in small chunks. That way it'll give me some more time to make a proper list anyway.

For my first installment, I thought I'd go with sports. A fitting theme, seeing as how the Wimbledon women's final was this afternoon, and I've just read a blog post just now about how the Olympic trials are going on in America, and a 41 year old woman, Dana Torres has just qualified for the swim team. (I love swimming, don't even get me started about my family and swimming.)

And so for number 1 on my list: I'd love to go to Wimbledon. Not necessarily for the finals, just anytime will do. We used to live quite close to Wimbledon, but the thing is you can't buy the tickets in advance (that I know of), you just have to queue on the day and hope you get in. Whatever, some day that will be me (and hopefully the boys) queuing up and enjoying the atmosphere. With or without the rain, but definately with the strawberries.

When I was living in America, we used to go to quite a few live sporting events. Mostly university games, but I've been to see NBA basketball games and Major League baseball games a lot. It was one of these things that we did and I have great memories of. So, really - any major sporting event would do... rugby at Twickenham stadium, a football match somewhere. But I kind of have my heart set on the tennis. Just don't expect me to explain any of the rules or anything.

Then there's the Olympics. London 2012, I will be there. Don't care what I see, I just want to be there. And so I shall.

What about you? What's on your list?

The Music of Chance by Paul Auster

Following the death of his father, Jim Nashe takes to the open road. But there he picks up Pozzi, a hitchhiking gambler, and is drawn into a dangerous game of high-stakes poker with two eccentric and reclusive millionaires.

A pretty simplistic summary, but don't be fooled. This is one of the strangest books I've read in years. I loved it. Every page of it, even though I can admit I didn't 'get' all of it. I loved the characters and the odd, odd series of events. The idea of existentialism completely eludes me, but I was still able to really enjoy this book and I was still thinking about it days after I'd turned the last page. It was a lot more dark and sinister than I was expecting but I love surprises. I'll have to pick up another of Auster's books. Recommendations any Auster fans out there?

Books read in June

1. The Rose and the Beast by Francesca Lia Block

2. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

3. The Drowned World by JG Ballard

4. Candide by Voltaire

5. Legend by David Gemmell

6. The Third Man by Graham Greene

7. The Invisble Man by HG Wells

8. The Music of Chance by Paul Auster (review soon)

Also read half of A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway, which I've put aside to finish another day (hopefully in July, but we'll see!)

17 books in May, 8 books in June ... anyone want to hazard a guess as to how many books read in July?!