Reading Projects
Here you can find details of all my current reading projects and challenges. Some are short term goals but others may take years to complete, so I’m keeping track of them all here.
Victorian Literature Challenge – 2011
The Victorian Literature Challenge is organised by Bethany of Subtle Melodrama and runs from 1st January until 31st December 2011. I decided to join in as a way of encouraging myself to clear some of the books from my shelf of classics and in doing so I am discovering some great new (well, new to me) books and authors. In fact, I’ve decided that I’m going to try to make all my reads by different Victorian authors to challenge myself even more. My introductory post is here.
- The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope
- The Diary of a Nobody by George and Weedon Grossmith
- More English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs
- The Warden by Anthony Trollope
- Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens
- The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot
- The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Elizabeth and her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
- Liza of Lambeth by W. Somerset Maugham
- Wessex Tales by Thomas Hardy
- Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
- The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
- Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
- The Professor by Charlotte Bronte
- The Monk and the Hangman’s Daughter by Ambrose Bierce
- Cautionary Tales by Hilaire Belloc
The TBR Pile Lucky Dip
To encourage myself to read more widely within my own library of unread books, each month I’m using a random number generator to select a book for me to read from my unread collection on LibraryThing. With over 700 books awaiting my attention there’s plenty of variety there and this is my way of making sure I remember them all.
- January – Lady’s Maid by Margaret Forster
- February – The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster
- March – Death of a Naturalist by Seamus Heaney
- April – The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- May – The House in Dormer Forest by Mary Webb
- June – The Pleasures of English Food by Alan Davidson
- July – The Beauties of a Cottage Garden by Gertrude Jekyll
- August – NA
- September – NA
- October – The Last and the First by Ivy Compton-Burnett
- November – NA
- December -
Virago Modern Classics
It would seem that I am a born collector: give a series of books numbers and I’ll want to read them all. Not that I wouldn’t want to read all the Virago Modern Classics anyway, I hasten to add. This imprint has already introduced me to some great new authors that I’d never have heard of otherwise, and I’m looking forward to discovering more favourites over the next few years.
- 32. The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West
- 43. The Vet’s Daughter by Barbara Comyns
- 48. The Getting of Wisdom by Henry Handel Richardson
- 50. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
- 51. The House in Dormer Forest by Mary Webb
- 53. Invitation to the Waltz by Rosamond Lehmann
- 65. Anderby Wold by Winifred Holtby
- 73. The Orchid House by Phyllis Shand Allfrey
- 173. Elizabeth and her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
- 186. Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
- 194. Mad Puppetstown by Molly Keane
- 229. The Salzburg Tales by Christina Stead
- 273. South Riding by Winifred Holtby
- 284. Up the Junction by Nell Dunn
- 298. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
- 329. Mrs Miniver by Jan Struther
- 339. Alexander’s Bridge by Willa Cather
- 342. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
- 343. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
- 361. Try Anything Twice by Jan Struther
- 433. Devil by the Sea by Nina Bawden
Persephone Books
Thankfully there are nowhere near as many Persephone books as there are VMCs (yet), but this is another wonderful publisher who has introduced me to some fantastic forgotten authors. My aim is to read through their entire back catalogue so far, after which I’ll be eagerly awaiting their new publications.
- 1. William – An Englishman by Cicely Hamilton
- 6. The Victorian Chaise-Longue by Marghanita Laski
- 21. Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson
- 38. Cheerful Weather for the Wedding by Julia Strachey
- 56. They Were Sisters by Dorothy Whipple
- 81. Miss Buncle’s Book by D. E. Stevenson
- 91. Miss Buncle Married by D. E. Stevenson
- 93. The Sack of Bath by Adam Fergusson