Books I read in 2024!
Dec. 31st, 2024 02:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amado1Here it is, the Big List!
January:
-- The Seven-Per-Cent Solution by Nicholas Meyer;
-- October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard by Leslea Newman;
-- Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde by Moises Kaufman;
-- Yes, Daddy by Jonathan Parks-Ramage;
-- Boys Run the Riot Vol. 2 by Keito Gaku;
-- Northranger by Rey Terciero;
-- Renegades: San Francisco: The 1990s by Chloe Sherman;
-- Boys Run the Riot 3 by Keito Gaku;
-- Pinky & Pepper Forever by Eddy Atoms;
-- The Epic of Gilgamesh
-- Ramayana by Valmiki;
-- Read My Lips: Sexual Subversion and the End of Gender by Riki Anne Wilchins;
-- The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz;
-- Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan;
-- Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters by Joan Ryan;
-- Beautiful on the Outside by Adam Rippon;
-- Beowulf;
-- The Popul Vuh;
-- Sunjata by Bamba Suso;
-- Lear: The Great Image of Authority by Harold Bloom;
-- King Lear by William Shakespeare;
-- Star Trek: Warpath by David Mack;
-- Star Trek: Rising Son by S.D. Perry;
-- Star Trek: The Dominion and Ferenginar by Keith R.A. DeCandido.
Wow! No wonder I wasn't writing much in January. I was reading.
February:
-- The Odyssey, trans. T.E. Lawrence;
-- The Odyssey, trans. Stanley Lombardo;
-- Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming by Jonathan Shay;
-- Candide and Related Texts by Voltaire;
-- Lighter than My Shadow by Katie Green;
-- Daodejing by Lao Tzu;
-- The Inferno by Dante Alighieri;
-- Fame by Andy Warhol;
-- If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho trans. Anne Carson;
-- Three Character Classic;
-- Metamorphoses by Ovid;
-- The Rape of the Lock by Alexander Pope;
-- Assassinated Beauty: Photographs of Manic Street Preachers by Kevin Cummins;
-- The Bhagavad-Gita;
-- Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake;
-- This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen by Tadeusz Borowski;
-- Bisclavret by Marie de France;
-- Six Lais d'Amour by Marie de France;
-- On Human Slaughter: Evil, Justice, Mercy by Elizabeth Bruenig;
-- The Analects by Confucius.
Again, no fucking wonder I wasn't writing!
March:
-- Recitatif by Toni Morrison;
-- Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up with Me by Mariko Tamaki;
-- Batman and the Joker: Contested Sexuality in Popular Culture by Chris Richardson;
-- Batman: Preludes to the Wedding by Tim Seeley;
-- No One Else by R. Kikuo Johnson;
-- Batman, Vol. 4: The War of Jokes and Riddles by Tom King;
-- Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371 by M.K. Czerwiec;
-- Batman, Vol. 7: The Wedding by Tom King;
-- Batman: Europa by Matteo Casali;
-- Batman: Three Jokers by Geoff Johns;
-- Knight Terrors: The Joker 1 and 2 by Matthew Rosenberg;
-- Batman and the Joker: The Deadly Duo by Marc Silvestri;
-- Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun;
-- Medea by Euripedes;
-- Not Just Gal Pals by Elizabeth Luly;
-- Gentleman Jack: The Real Anne Lister by Anne Choma;
-- Doomsday Clock by Geoff Johns.
I was writing a LOT during this month, so it looks like I sought out some brain candy during my reading time -- lots of bad comic books and a couple of bad lesbian romances.
April:
-- Herbert West - Reanimator by H.P. Lovecraft;
-- Adversary by Blue Delliquanti;
-- Re-Animator by Jeff Rovin;
-- Kubla Khan: A Pop-Up Version of Coleridge's Classic by Nick Bantock;
-- Faces: Paul Davis Portraits by Paul Davis;
-- The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon;
-- The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating by Fergus Henderson;
-- The Dead by James Joyce;
-- The Diary of a Madman and Other Stories by Lu Xun;
-- Army of Darkness vs. Re-Animator by James Kuhoric;
-- Re-Animator: Death is Just the Beginning by Steven Philip Jones;
-- Re-Animator: Dawn of the Re-Animator by Bill Spangler;
-- The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan;
-- Hamlet by William Shakespeare;
-- The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli;
-- Chartwell Manor by Glenn Head;
-- James Baldwin: The Last Interview;
-- Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens by Kate Bornstein;
-- Herbert West and Other Stories by H.P. Lovecraft;
-- No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics by Justin Hall;
-- A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf;
-- Barn Burning by William Faulkner;
-- The Legacy by Virginia Woolf;
-- The Heart of Thomas by Moto Hagio;
-- Love in a Fallen City by Eileen Chang;
-- Lesbian Lists by Dell Richards.
If you look at my writing log, you'll see I also wrote two Re-Animator fics this month. No surprise.
May:
-- The Inhuman Condition by Clive Barker;
-- Santasploitation by Judith Sonnet;
-- Playground by Aron Beauregard;
-- Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia E. Butler;
-- A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara;
-- Little Deaths by Ellen Datlow;
-- Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield;
-- My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness by Kabi Nagata;
-- Claude Cahun by Francois Leperlier.
Lots of horror, lots of gay shit.
June:
-- The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam by Yahiya Emerick;
-- Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza by Mosab Abu Toha;
-- Encounters with the Paranormal by Kendrick Frazier;
-- Escape from St. Hell by Lewis Hancox;
-- Triads by Poppy Z. Brite;
-- It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror by Joe Vallese;
-- Molecules by Theodre Gray;
-- Reactions by Theodore Gray.
Most books I read this month were either research for my "Evil" fics or pure queer fun.
July:
-- You Like it Darker by Stephen King;
-- You Glow in the Dark by Liliana Colanzi;
-- Queer Little Nightmares by David Ly;
-- The Deer Hunter by Jerrold Mundis;
-- First Love: Essays on Friendship by Lilly Dancyger;
-- Consent: A Memoir by Jill Climent;
-- The Dead Zone by Stephen King;
-- A River Runs Through It and Other Stories by Norman Maclean;
-- The First World War: A Very Short Introduction by Michael Eliot Howard;
-- Dreamers of the Day by Mary Doria Russell;
-- The Devil in Silver by Victor LaValle;
-- T.E. Lawrence By His Friends by A.W. Lawrence (both versions!)
-- Meditations by Marcus Aurelius;
-- Wasteland: The Great War and the Origins of Modern Horror;
-- Poverty, By America by Matthew Desmond;
-- Death's Men: Soldiers of the Great War by Denis Winter.
August:
-- Berlin Garden of Erotic Delights by Granand;
-- Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie;
-- Loverboy by Irwin Hasen;
-- Crash by J.G. Ballard;
-- Rainbow Man by M.J. Engh;
-- It Waits in the Woods by Josh Malerman;
-- Boy by James Hanley;
-- Endless Fall by Mohamed Leftah;
-- Hi Honey, I'm Homo! by Matt Baume;
-- Last Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan;
-- Billy Budd, Sailor by Herman Melville;
-- The Clown by Heinrich Boll;
-- Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad;
-- Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram;
-- The Melting by Lize Spit;
-- White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky;
-- Henry Henry by Allen Bratton;
-- Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto.
Oh, this was definitely my favorite reading month of the year.
September:
-- Olivia by Dorothy Strachey;
-- Yellow Rose by Nobuko Yoshiya;
-- A Passage to India by E.M. Forster;
-- Address Unknown by Kathrine Kressmann Taylor;
-- School for Barbarians by Erika Mann;
-- Time Must Have a Stop by Aldous Huxley;
-- Dubliners by James Joyce.
This was a close second for favorite reading month, I think.
October:
-- Berserk, Vol. 1 by Kentaro Miura;
-- Danny Phantom: A Glitch in Time by Gabriela Epstein;
-- The Enchanter by Vladimir Nabokov;
-- The Trial and Death of Socrates by Plato;
-- Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan;
-- Birth, Sex, and Abuse: Women's Voices Under Nazi Rule by Beverley Chalmers;
-- Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay;
-- Desperate Love Institute by Jessica Carter.
November:
-- How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix;
-- Women Talking by Miriam Toews;
-- Holly by Stephen King;
-- Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay;
-- Ushers by Joe Hill;
-- Batman: White Knight by Sean Gordon Murphy;
-- Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M. Coatzee;
-- The Last Days of Judas Iscariot by Stephen Adly Guirgis;
-- I Told You So: Gore Vidal Talks Politics by Gore Vidal.
December:
-- Madness by Sam Sax;
-- Darkness Visible by William Styron;
-- Dictatorship: It's Easier Than You Think! by Sarah Kendzior;
-- The Long March by William Styron;
-- In the Clap Shack by William Styron;
-- Conclave by Robert Harris;
-- Illustrator II by Clive Barker;
-- The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima;
-- The Beggar Student by Osamu Dazai;
-- The Tale of a Niggun by Elie Wiesel;
-- Train Dreams by Denis Johnson;
-- DK Eyewitness: Vietnam by Stuart Murray;
-- On Killing by Dave Grossman;
-- Kill Anything That Moves by Nick Turse;
-- Casa Valentina by Harvey Fierstein;
-- Vietnam: A Complete Photographic History by Michael Maclear;
-- Going After Cacciato by Tim O'Brien.
General reading themes this year:
In addition ... this is a weird sort of "goal." But if you look at this list, you'll notice that when I like a movie, I always read its tie-ins too, or the novel it was based on; and if I read a good book that has a film adaptation, I watch the movie. But sometimes I go overboard. Reading all those Re-Animator comics did not bring me joy; they absolutely sucked. Similarly, when I read that nonfiction queer analysis of Joker and Batman, I went on a Batman comic reading spree, and none of those comics were particularly good. When I got back into TNG, I read lots of TNG novels and genuinely enjoyed them; when I got into DS9, I only found one book I liked, and the rest were garbage. I guess my goal is to be more discerning when I go on tangents like that, not bog myself down with stuff that neither entertains nor enriches me. But that's a tough goal to set. How can you know if you'll enjoy it before you pick it up?
January:
-- The Seven-Per-Cent Solution by Nicholas Meyer;
-- October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard by Leslea Newman;
-- Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde by Moises Kaufman;
-- Yes, Daddy by Jonathan Parks-Ramage;
-- Boys Run the Riot Vol. 2 by Keito Gaku;
-- Northranger by Rey Terciero;
-- Renegades: San Francisco: The 1990s by Chloe Sherman;
-- Boys Run the Riot 3 by Keito Gaku;
-- Pinky & Pepper Forever by Eddy Atoms;
-- The Epic of Gilgamesh
-- Ramayana by Valmiki;
-- Read My Lips: Sexual Subversion and the End of Gender by Riki Anne Wilchins;
-- The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz;
-- Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan;
-- Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters by Joan Ryan;
-- Beautiful on the Outside by Adam Rippon;
-- Beowulf;
-- The Popul Vuh;
-- Sunjata by Bamba Suso;
-- Lear: The Great Image of Authority by Harold Bloom;
-- King Lear by William Shakespeare;
-- Star Trek: Warpath by David Mack;
-- Star Trek: Rising Son by S.D. Perry;
-- Star Trek: The Dominion and Ferenginar by Keith R.A. DeCandido.
Wow! No wonder I wasn't writing much in January. I was reading.
February:
-- The Odyssey, trans. T.E. Lawrence;
-- The Odyssey, trans. Stanley Lombardo;
-- Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming by Jonathan Shay;
-- Candide and Related Texts by Voltaire;
-- Lighter than My Shadow by Katie Green;
-- Daodejing by Lao Tzu;
-- The Inferno by Dante Alighieri;
-- Fame by Andy Warhol;
-- If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho trans. Anne Carson;
-- Three Character Classic;
-- Metamorphoses by Ovid;
-- The Rape of the Lock by Alexander Pope;
-- Assassinated Beauty: Photographs of Manic Street Preachers by Kevin Cummins;
-- The Bhagavad-Gita;
-- Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake;
-- This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen by Tadeusz Borowski;
-- Bisclavret by Marie de France;
-- Six Lais d'Amour by Marie de France;
-- On Human Slaughter: Evil, Justice, Mercy by Elizabeth Bruenig;
-- The Analects by Confucius.
Again, no fucking wonder I wasn't writing!
March:
-- Recitatif by Toni Morrison;
-- Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up with Me by Mariko Tamaki;
-- Batman and the Joker: Contested Sexuality in Popular Culture by Chris Richardson;
-- Batman: Preludes to the Wedding by Tim Seeley;
-- No One Else by R. Kikuo Johnson;
-- Batman, Vol. 4: The War of Jokes and Riddles by Tom King;
-- Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371 by M.K. Czerwiec;
-- Batman, Vol. 7: The Wedding by Tom King;
-- Batman: Europa by Matteo Casali;
-- Batman: Three Jokers by Geoff Johns;
-- Knight Terrors: The Joker 1 and 2 by Matthew Rosenberg;
-- Batman and the Joker: The Deadly Duo by Marc Silvestri;
-- Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun;
-- Medea by Euripedes;
-- Not Just Gal Pals by Elizabeth Luly;
-- Gentleman Jack: The Real Anne Lister by Anne Choma;
-- Doomsday Clock by Geoff Johns.
I was writing a LOT during this month, so it looks like I sought out some brain candy during my reading time -- lots of bad comic books and a couple of bad lesbian romances.
April:
-- Herbert West - Reanimator by H.P. Lovecraft;
-- Adversary by Blue Delliquanti;
-- Re-Animator by Jeff Rovin;
-- Kubla Khan: A Pop-Up Version of Coleridge's Classic by Nick Bantock;
-- Faces: Paul Davis Portraits by Paul Davis;
-- The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon;
-- The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating by Fergus Henderson;
-- The Dead by James Joyce;
-- The Diary of a Madman and Other Stories by Lu Xun;
-- Army of Darkness vs. Re-Animator by James Kuhoric;
-- Re-Animator: Death is Just the Beginning by Steven Philip Jones;
-- Re-Animator: Dawn of the Re-Animator by Bill Spangler;
-- The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan;
-- Hamlet by William Shakespeare;
-- The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli;
-- Chartwell Manor by Glenn Head;
-- James Baldwin: The Last Interview;
-- Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens by Kate Bornstein;
-- Herbert West and Other Stories by H.P. Lovecraft;
-- No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics by Justin Hall;
-- A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf;
-- Barn Burning by William Faulkner;
-- The Legacy by Virginia Woolf;
-- The Heart of Thomas by Moto Hagio;
-- Love in a Fallen City by Eileen Chang;
-- Lesbian Lists by Dell Richards.
If you look at my writing log, you'll see I also wrote two Re-Animator fics this month. No surprise.
May:
-- The Inhuman Condition by Clive Barker;
-- Santasploitation by Judith Sonnet;
-- Playground by Aron Beauregard;
-- Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia E. Butler;
-- A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara;
-- Little Deaths by Ellen Datlow;
-- Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield;
-- My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness by Kabi Nagata;
-- Claude Cahun by Francois Leperlier.
Lots of horror, lots of gay shit.
June:
-- The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam by Yahiya Emerick;
-- Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza by Mosab Abu Toha;
-- Encounters with the Paranormal by Kendrick Frazier;
-- Escape from St. Hell by Lewis Hancox;
-- Triads by Poppy Z. Brite;
-- It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror by Joe Vallese;
-- Molecules by Theodre Gray;
-- Reactions by Theodore Gray.
Most books I read this month were either research for my "Evil" fics or pure queer fun.
July:
-- You Like it Darker by Stephen King;
-- You Glow in the Dark by Liliana Colanzi;
-- Queer Little Nightmares by David Ly;
-- The Deer Hunter by Jerrold Mundis;
-- First Love: Essays on Friendship by Lilly Dancyger;
-- Consent: A Memoir by Jill Climent;
-- The Dead Zone by Stephen King;
-- A River Runs Through It and Other Stories by Norman Maclean;
-- The First World War: A Very Short Introduction by Michael Eliot Howard;
-- Dreamers of the Day by Mary Doria Russell;
-- The Devil in Silver by Victor LaValle;
-- T.E. Lawrence By His Friends by A.W. Lawrence (both versions!)
-- Meditations by Marcus Aurelius;
-- Wasteland: The Great War and the Origins of Modern Horror;
-- Poverty, By America by Matthew Desmond;
-- Death's Men: Soldiers of the Great War by Denis Winter.
August:
-- Berlin Garden of Erotic Delights by Granand;
-- Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie;
-- Loverboy by Irwin Hasen;
-- Crash by J.G. Ballard;
-- Rainbow Man by M.J. Engh;
-- It Waits in the Woods by Josh Malerman;
-- Boy by James Hanley;
-- Endless Fall by Mohamed Leftah;
-- Hi Honey, I'm Homo! by Matt Baume;
-- Last Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan;
-- Billy Budd, Sailor by Herman Melville;
-- The Clown by Heinrich Boll;
-- Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad;
-- Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram;
-- The Melting by Lize Spit;
-- White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky;
-- Henry Henry by Allen Bratton;
-- Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto.
Oh, this was definitely my favorite reading month of the year.
September:
-- Olivia by Dorothy Strachey;
-- Yellow Rose by Nobuko Yoshiya;
-- A Passage to India by E.M. Forster;
-- Address Unknown by Kathrine Kressmann Taylor;
-- School for Barbarians by Erika Mann;
-- Time Must Have a Stop by Aldous Huxley;
-- Dubliners by James Joyce.
This was a close second for favorite reading month, I think.
October:
-- Berserk, Vol. 1 by Kentaro Miura;
-- Danny Phantom: A Glitch in Time by Gabriela Epstein;
-- The Enchanter by Vladimir Nabokov;
-- The Trial and Death of Socrates by Plato;
-- Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan;
-- Birth, Sex, and Abuse: Women's Voices Under Nazi Rule by Beverley Chalmers;
-- Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay;
-- Desperate Love Institute by Jessica Carter.
November:
-- How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix;
-- Women Talking by Miriam Toews;
-- Holly by Stephen King;
-- Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay;
-- Ushers by Joe Hill;
-- Batman: White Knight by Sean Gordon Murphy;
-- Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M. Coatzee;
-- The Last Days of Judas Iscariot by Stephen Adly Guirgis;
-- I Told You So: Gore Vidal Talks Politics by Gore Vidal.
December:
-- Madness by Sam Sax;
-- Darkness Visible by William Styron;
-- Dictatorship: It's Easier Than You Think! by Sarah Kendzior;
-- The Long March by William Styron;
-- In the Clap Shack by William Styron;
-- Conclave by Robert Harris;
-- Illustrator II by Clive Barker;
-- The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima;
-- The Beggar Student by Osamu Dazai;
-- The Tale of a Niggun by Elie Wiesel;
-- Train Dreams by Denis Johnson;
-- DK Eyewitness: Vietnam by Stuart Murray;
-- On Killing by Dave Grossman;
-- Kill Anything That Moves by Nick Turse;
-- Casa Valentina by Harvey Fierstein;
-- Vietnam: A Complete Photographic History by Michael Maclear;
-- Going After Cacciato by Tim O'Brien.
General reading themes this year:
The two biggest trends imo are "WAR!!" + "Books I read for school" + "Queer shit." With great overlapping pleasure between the three.
How many books did you read this year? Any trends in genre/length/themes/etc?
181 according to Goodreads. Themes-wise, I was really into anti-colonialist novels this year, and books about capitalism. Those are clustered toward the end of the year.
What are your top 3 books that you read this year for the first time?
A Passage to India is way at the top. It shot straight to #1 on my list of favorite books. It's really hard to pick just two from the rest of the list, but I'm going to go with Recitatif by Toni Morrison and Bisclavret by Marie de France. "Passage" was beautifully written, queer, anticolonialist, gripping, perfect. "Recitatif" was short, eviscerating, brilliant, especially for its ending -- an exploration of race that seems solely confined to black-and-white through most of the story, then twists at the end to explore other categories of oppression. "Bisclavret" is a 12th Century poem that totally possessed me and inspired my story, "Strip Club Werewolf."What's a book you enjoyed more than you expected?
"Beowulf." It was a reread from high school, but in high school we only read Part 1. I can NOT fathom why a teacher would choose ONLY the first part! Reading the entire poem had me in fucking tears. Literally devastated. But before I read the whole thing, I *thought* I had (our high school teacher never mentioned that we were only reading an excerpt!) and I thought of "Beowulf" as just an old, uninteresting, flat adventure story with no interesting layers.
Which books most disappointed you this year?
The books I hated, I more or less expected to hate -- Yes, Daddy, The Writing Retreat, A Little Life, Desperate Love Institute. I went into these with low expectations and wasn't surprised. But Holly by Stephen King was a bit of a disappointment -- after reading The Dead Zone for the first time this year, and being pleasantly surprised by You Like It Darker, I expected a bit better from him.Did you reread any books? If so, which one was you favourite?
I reread Dubliners, and God, I can't say how many times I've reread it. Twice this year, probably at least three times before. I also reread Batman: White Knight, lmao. Many of the classics from school were rereads, but very rewarding.
What's the oldest book you read?
I'm guessing The Epic of Gilgamesh. Which was great.
What's the newest book you read?
I actually read quite a few 2024 releases! I don't know which was technically the most recent.
Did you DNF (= did not finish) any books?
There's quite a few I haven't finished yet, but only one that I have no intention of picking back up: Headcheese by Jess Hagemann. It struck me as a very cynical, inauthentic attempt at writing Shock and Gore. No sincerity, no passion.
Did you read any books outside of your usual preferred genre(s)?
Mm... I think I read pretty broadly across all genres, but the two I neglect the most are romance and YA. In March, I read a couple of those, and didn't have much fun. But lesbian romances sometimes surprise me, so I keep trying.
What was your predominant format this year?
I think physical, but probably not by much. I read a lot of Kindle books on the bus.
What's the longest book you read this year?
Looks like it was:
1) Vietnam: A Complete Photographic History (736 pages)
2) Metamorphoses by Ovid (723 pages)
3) A Little Life (720 pages).
Somehow it feels like only "A Little Life" should actually count XD
Did you reach your reading goal for this year (if you had one)?
I don't think I had one!
Any goals for 2025?
Hm. Well, I'm not in any literature classes next semester except for Elizabethan Poetry, so I think I'd like for my reading list to more accurately reflect my tastes. Classics are 100% within my tastes and always have been, but for some reason it feels seedy/almost depressing to see so many on my list and know that they were assigned rather than chosen! I think I'd like to read Death in Venice and Querelle this year, and lots of queer plays. For example, I probably liked Waiting for the Barbarians better than The Clown ... but I was assigned the former, and chose the latter. So I feel a spark of pride when I think of The Clown, and a weird sense of almost-dirtiness when I think of "Barbarians." I wonder if that's some kind of gifted-kid hangup.In addition ... this is a weird sort of "goal." But if you look at this list, you'll notice that when I like a movie, I always read its tie-ins too, or the novel it was based on; and if I read a good book that has a film adaptation, I watch the movie. But sometimes I go overboard. Reading all those Re-Animator comics did not bring me joy; they absolutely sucked. Similarly, when I read that nonfiction queer analysis of Joker and Batman, I went on a Batman comic reading spree, and none of those comics were particularly good. When I got back into TNG, I read lots of TNG novels and genuinely enjoyed them; when I got into DS9, I only found one book I liked, and the rest were garbage. I guess my goal is to be more discerning when I go on tangents like that, not bog myself down with stuff that neither entertains nor enriches me. But that's a tough goal to set. How can you know if you'll enjoy it before you pick it up?
no subject
Date: 2024-12-31 07:36 pm (UTC)Never read Picnic at Hanging Rock but I've seen the movie lots of times and like it a lot. I have a few fan theories about it.
I'm impressed with your list.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-02 11:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-02 11:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-02 11:41 pm (UTC)