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Poppyshake's Reading Year 2018


poppyshake

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Books Read 2009

Books Read 2010

Books Read 2011

Books Read 2012

Books Read 2013

Books Read 2014

Books Read 2015

Books Read 2016

 

Total Books Read 2009 ... 49 - incomplete list (39 fiction, 9 non-fiction & 1 audio } male authors: 24 .. female authors: 25)

Total books read in 2010 ... 141 (94 fiction, 9 non-fiction, 4 short stories, 2 plays & 32 audio } male authors: 75 .. female authors: 66)
Total books read in 2011 ... 109 (71 fiction, 26 non-fiction, 1 short story & 11 audio } male authors: 54 .. female authors: 55)
Total books read in 2012 ... 89 (50 fiction, 27 non-fiction, 3 short stories, 1 poem & 8 audio } male authors: 48 .. female authors: 41)

Total books read in 2013 ... 109 (67 fiction, 21 non-fiction, 5 short stories, 1 poem, 1 essay, 1 collection & 13 audio } male authors: 57 .. female authors: 51 plus all those in the short story collection)

Total Books Read 2014 ... 73 (47 fiction, 15 non-fiction, 6 short stories & 5 audio } male authors: 36, female authors: 37)

Total Books Read 2015 ... 113 (83 fiction, 14 non-fiction, 2 short stories & 14 audio } )

Total Books Read 2016 ... 91 (57 fiction,15 non-fiction, 2 poetry books & 17 audio } )

Total Books Read 2017 ... 90

 

I'm going to try and keep it more simple this year. I'm not going to promise (or threaten :lol: ) to write any reviews as we all know how that's panned out over the last few years. Possibly I'll write a few words about books I love and/or hate. 

  

5/5: Loved it!

4/5: Liked it enormously .. would have been a 'loved it' but for .... :lol: 

3/5: Liked it!

2/5: Not really my cup of tea but, you know, tolerable!

1/5 Hated it .. probably abandoned it or SHOULD HAVE!!!

 

January 2018

1. Swimming Lessons - Claire Fuller (audio) 4/5

2. Fated (Alex Verus #1) - Benedict Jacka 4/5

3. Memoirs of a Polar Bear - Yoko Tawada 4/5

4. Sky Song - Abi Elphinstone 4/5

5. My Sweet Revenge - Jane Fallon 2/5

6. Calling Major Tom - David M Barnett 5/5

7. The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight #1)  - Katherine Arden  4/5

8. The New Mrs Clifton -  Elizabeth Buchan 5/5

9. Autumn - Ali Smith  4/5

10. Three Things About Elsie - Joanna Cannon (audio) 4/5

11. The Polar Bear Explorers' Club - Alex Bell 4/5

12. How To Stop Time - Matt Haig

 

February 2018

13. The Screaming Staircase (Lockwood & Co. #1) - Jonathan Stroud 4/5

14. The Very Thought of You  - Rosie Alison 2/5

15. Uncommon Type -  Tom Hanks 5/5

16. The Trouble with Goats and Sheep - Joanna Cannon (audio) 4/5

17. Soul Eater (Chronicles of Darkness #3) - Michelle Paver 3/5

18. Everything I Know About Love  - Dolly Alderton  4/5

19. Nights at the Circus - Angela Carter 4/5

20. Mythos -  Stephen Fry (audio) 5/5

21. The Summer of Impossible Things - Rowan Coleman 3/5

 

March 2018

22. My Grandmothers and I  - Diana Holman Hunt  4/5

23. Five Little Pigs (Hercule Poirot #25) - Agatha Christie 4/5

24. A Skinful of Shadows - Frances Hardinge (audio) 4/5

25. Neither Here, Nor There - Bill Bryson (audio) 4/5

26. The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock - Imogen Hermes Gowar

27. A Red Herring Without Mustard (Flavia de Luce #3) - Alan Bradley 4/5

28. The Rest of Their Lives - Jean-Paul Didierlaurent 4/5

29. The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle -  Stuart Turton (audio) 5/5

30. The Woman in the Window - A.J. Finn (audio) 4/5 

31. Bookworm: A Memoir of Childhood Reading - Lucy Mangan 4/5 

32. Left of the Bang - Claire Lowdon 4/5

 

April 2018 

33. The Power - Naomi Alderton (audio) 3/5

34. After Me Comes the Flood - Sarah Perry 2/5

35. Make More Noise: New Stories in Honour of the 100th Anniversary of Women's Suffrage  - Emma Carroll and others 4/5

36. The Grand Sophy -  Georgette Heyer (audio) 5/5

37. The Witchfinder's Sister - Beth Underdown 4/5

38. The Good People - Hannah Kent 4/5

39. The Pier Falls -  Mark Haddon 5/5

40. Dear Mrs Bird - A.J. Pearce (audio)  4/5

41. Sourdough - Robin Sloane 3/5

42. The Chrysalids - John Wyndham 4/5

Edited by poppyshake
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The Shameful Reckoning of My Books TBR

Progress 3/104  :unsure:

 

Link to Books bought/acquired in 2018

 

Fiction:

Akunin, Boris - Murder on the Leviathan

Akunin, Boris - The Death of Achilles
Atkinson, Kate - Started Early Took My Dog
Atwood, Margaret - The Blind Assassin
Barker, Pat - The Ghost Road

Barker, Pat - Toby's Room

Beauman, Ned - The Teleportation Accident 

Boyd, William - Any Human Heart

Bradley, Alan - A Red Herring Without Mustard (Flavia de Luce 3)

Bradley, Alan - I Am Half Sick of Shadows (Flavia de Luce 4)

Bulgakov, Mikhail - The Master and Margarita
Bullington, Jesse - The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart

Burnett, Frances Hodgson - A Little Princess

Burnett, Frances Hodgson - The Secret Garden

Carey, Peter - Oscar and Lucinda

Carter, Angela - Nights at the Circus
Carter, Angela - The Passion of New Eve

Christie, Agatha - At Bertram's Hotel
Christie, Agatha - Curtain: Poirot's Last Case

Christie, Agatha - Death on the Nile
Christie, Agatha - Dumb Witness

Christie, Agatha - Five Little Pigs 

Christie, Agatha - Hercule Poirot's Christmas

Christie, Agatha - The Murder at the Vicarage

Christie, Agatha - The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Christie, Agatha - Third Girl

Collis, John Stewart - The Worm Forgives the Plough

Connolly, John - Nocturnes

Dennys, Joyce - Henrietta Sees it Through (Bloomsbury)

Drabble, Margaret - The Red Queen

Du Maurier, Daphne - The House on the Strand
Du Maurier, Daphne - Jamaica Inn

Eugenides, Jeffrey - My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead
Ewing, Barbara - The Circus of Ghosts (Mesmerist #2)

Fforde, Jasper - The Big Over Easy
Fforde, Jasper - The Fourth Bear 70

Fforde, Jasper - The Woman Who Died a Lot (Thursday Next #7)
Fitzgerald, F.Scott - The Beautiful and the Damned
Fitzgerald, F. Scott - Tender is the Night

Gardner, Sally - The Red Necklace
Gibbons, Stella - Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm

Gogol, Nikolai - The Collected Tales
Gold, Glen David - Carter Beats the Devil  :lurker: 

Goss, Theodora - The Thorn and The Blossom

Greene, Graham - Brighton Rock

Haddon, Mark - The Red House

Haig, Matt - The Last Family in England

Hall, Louisa - The Carriage House

Harkaway, Nick - Angelmaker
Hay, Sheridan - The Secret of Lost Things

Hugo, Victor - The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Hustvedt, Siri - What I Loved
Install, Deborah - A Robot in the Garden
James, Marlon - A Brief History of Seven Killings

Jonasson, Jonas - The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden 

Joyce, James - Dubliners

Kingsolver, Barbara - The Lacuna

Lakhous, Amara - Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio

Le Carre, John - The Spy who Came in from the Cold

Marquez, Gabriel Garcia - The Autumn of the Patriarch

Marquez, Gabriel Garcia - No One Writes to the Colonel

Morton, Kate - The House at Riverton
Murdoch, Iris - The Black Prince

Nesbit, E - The Railway Children

North, Claire - The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

O'Flynn, Catherine - The News Where You Are

Oksanen, Sofi - Purge
Orwell, George - Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Pratchett, Terry and Baxter, Stephen - The Long Earth

Radcliffe, Ann - The Mysteries of Udolpho
Ransome, Arthur - Winter Holiday

Rodriguez, Deborah - The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul

Sewell, Anna - Black Beauty 

Steinbeck, John - The Grapes of Wrath

Steinbeck, John - The Pearl

Steinbeck, John - The Red Pony

Tartt, Donna - The Little Friend

Taylor, G.P. - Mariah Mundi & the Ghost Diamonds

Toksvig, Sandi - Valentine Grey

Udall, Brady - The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint

Vickers, Sally - Miss Garnet's Angel

Whipple, Dorothy - Someone at a Distance (Persephone)

Williams, Nigel - East of Wimbledon

Williams, Nigel - They Came From SW19

Winterson, Jeanette - Sexing the Cherry

Winton, Tim - Cloudstreet

Wodehouse, PG - Right Ho, Jeeves

 

Non Fiction:

De Waal, Edmund - The Hare with Amber Eyes

Fitzgerald, Penelope - So I Have Thought of You: The Letters of Penelope Fitzgerald

Grove, Valerie - Laurie Lee: The Well Loved Stranger

Hepworth, David - 1971 Never a Dull Moment 

Hodgson, Vere - Few Eggs and No Oranges (Persephone)

Last, Nella - Nella Last's Peace

Light, Alan - What Happened Miss Simone?

Manguel, Alberto - A Reading Diary

McGrath, Alistair E - CS Lewis: A Life

Ozma, Alice - The Reading Promise

Pratt, Jean-Lucey (Edited by Simon Garfield) - A Notable Woman

White, Florence - Good Things in England (Persephone)

Woolf, Virginia - The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol 2

Woolf, Virginia - The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol 3

Woolf, Virginia - The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol 4

Woolf, Virginia - The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol 5

Woolf, Virginia - The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol 6 

Edited by poppyshake
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Poppyshake's English Counties Challenge (the most famous books associated with each English county)

 

For more info visit the English Counties Challenge forum

 

Progress 31/48 (but some of those read will be re-read)

 

Bedfordshire: My Uncle Silas by H. E. Bates
Berkshire: The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
Bristol: The Misses Mallett by E. H. Young
Buckinghamshire: The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper
Cambridgeshire: The Nine Tailors by Dorothy Sayers
Cheshire: Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
City of London: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Cornwall: Jamaica Inn by Daphne Du Maurier (on shelf)
Cumbria: Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
Derbyshire: Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks
Devon: The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
Dorset: Far From The Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
County Durham: Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens
East Riding of Yorkshire: South Riding by Winifred Holtby

East Sussex: Winnie-The-Pooh by A. A. Milne
Essex: The Turn Of The Screw by Henry James
Gloucestershire: Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee
Greater London: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Greater Manchester: North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell

HampshireWatership Down by Richard Adams

Herefordshire: On The Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin
Hertfordshire: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Isle of Wight: The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham
Kent: The Darling Buds of May by H. E. Bates
Lancashire: Oranges are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson
Leicestershire: The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole aged 13¾ by Sue Townsend

Lincolnshire: The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot
Merseyside: An Awfully Big Adventure by Beryl Bainbridge
Norfolk: The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley

North Yorkshire: Dracula by Bram Stoker
Northamptonshire: Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
Northumberland: The Stars Look Down by A. J. Cronin
Nottinghamshire: Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence

Oxfordshire: The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
Rutland: Set In Stone by Robert Goddard
Shropshire: Summer Lightning by P. G. Wodehouse
Somerset: Lorna Doone by R. D. Blackmore

South Yorkshire: A Kestrel For A Knave by Barry Hines
Staffordshire: The Old Wives' Tale by Arnold Bennett
Suffolk: The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald
Surrey: The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

Tyne and Wear: Another World by Pat Barker
Warwickshire: Tom Brown's School Days by Thomas Hughes

West Midlands: Middlemarch by George Eliot
West Sussex: Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
West Yorkshire: Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Wiltshire: Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope
Worcestershire: The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall

Edited by poppyshake
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WISHLIST

Fiction:

The Girl in the Tower - Katherine Arden

Bear Town - Fredrik Backman

Toymakers - Robert Dinsdale

Caraval (Caraval #1) - Stephanie Garber

Fly By Night - Frances Hardinge

Whistle In The Dark - Emma Healey

 

Non Fiction:

Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field - John Lewis-Stempel

The Running Hare: The Secret Life of Farmland - John Lewis-Stempel

The Wood: The Life & Times of Cockshutt Wood - John Lewis-Stempel

Where Poppies Blow - John Lewis-Stempel

Homage to Catalonia - George Orwell

Edited by poppyshake
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Books Bought/Acquired in 2018

 

Progress 21/42

 

Fiction: 

Aaronovitch, Ben - The Hanging Tree (Rivers of London #6)

Arden, Katherine - The Bear and the Nightingale

Barnett, David M. - Calling Major Tom

Bell, Alex - The Polar Bear Explorers' Club

Buchan, Elizabeth - The New Mrs Clifton

Carroll, Emma (and others) - Make More Noise

Didierlaurent, Jean Paul - The Rest of Their Lives

Divry, Sophie - Madame Bovary of the Suburbs

Driver, Sarah - Sky (The Huntress #2)

Fridlund, Emily - History of Wolves

Haddon, Mark - The Pier Falls

Haig, Matt - How To Stop Time

Hermes Gowar, Imogen - The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock

Hogan, Ruth - The Keeper of Lost Things

Jacka, Benedict - Fated (Alex Verus #1)

Kent, Hannah - The Good People

Kidd, Jess - The Hoarder

Lowdon, Claire - Left of the Bang

McCaughgrean, Geraldine - Where the World Ends

Nicholls, Sally - Things a Bright Girl Can Do

Niven, Jennifer - All the Bright Places

Paul, Laline - The Ice

Paver, Michelle - Oath Breaker (Chronicles of Ancient Darkness #5)

Perry, Sarah - After Me Comes the Flood

Pratchett, Terry - A Hatful of Sky

Rooney, Sally - Conversations with Friends

Smith, Ali - Autumn

Stroud, Jonathan - The Screaming Staircase (Lockwood & co #1)

Stroud, Jonathan - The Whispering Skull (Lockwood & co #2)

Sukegawa, Durian - Sweet Bean Paste

Sund, Erik Axl - The Crow Girl

Tawada, Yoko - Memoirs of a Polar Bear

Udall, Tor - A Thousand Paper Birds

White, Frank - There Was a Time

 

Non-Fiction

Alderton, Dolly - Everything I Know About Love

Clark, Dodie - Secrets for the Mad

Ellis, Samantha - Take Courage: Anne Bronte and the Art of Life

Hanks, Tom - Uncommon Type

Holman-Hunt, Diana - My Grandmothers and I

Mangan, Lucy - Bookworm: A Memoir of Childhood Reading

Nunn, Emily - The Comfort Food Diaries

Patterson, Sylvia - I'm Not with the Band

Edited by poppyshake
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  • 4 weeks later...
18 hours ago, Janet said:

Is your thread open?  If not, let me know and I'll delete.  :)

 

I just wanted to say what a lovely time I had with you guys and Claire yesterday.  The time flew by! 

It IS open Janet :D It's not entirely tidy and the books are strewn all over the floor but you're very welcome indeed :hug:

 

It was wonderful to see you and Claire, the best day I've had in ages .. here's to the next one! :kiss: 

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  • 1 month later...
On 2/22/2018 at 9:50 AM, Athena said:

I wish you a wonderful year of reading in 2018, Kay :cows:!

 

On 2/25/2018 at 7:35 PM, karen.d said:

Have a great reading year!

 

On 3/3/2018 at 8:28 PM, bobblybear said:

Have a great reading year in 2018, Kay! 

Thank you all :hug: 

 

I've been shockingly remiss about updating this blog :blush: I could make lots of excuses but I won't .. I'll just try and do better. Usually I tail off towards the end of the year but this year I've started off badly .. perhaps I'll improve .. it'll be the reverse of all other years :lol:

 

My reading is still going relatively well so that's a positive. These are always the good reading months for me though .. when the days are still cold etc. Nothing much to distract, no days or trips out, no holidays (and I hardly ever read on holiday .. unless it's sitting on a beach weather .. which it hardly ever is :lol: ) no long walks in the sunshine. I love winter reading and I still count it as winter and will until the weather positively warms up. Today I did go out for a walk without a coat mind you so it can't be long now. 

 

Hope you're all having a good reading year so far :clapping: xx <3 xx  

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I'm glad your reading is going well at least :). For myself I don't think I read more in certain seasons compared with other ones. But I've only been tracking it a few years now, so who knows what hidden statistic could be there..

 

I hope you'll get some warmer weather soon :). Today here it's still cold right now but it is sunny and should warm up soon to a nice temperature :).

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Very very late to say this to you, poppyshake, but I wish you the most amazing reading year in 2018! :smile2:  I see you've read 34 books already?!? Bloody hell! :lol:  Guns ablaze! 

 

I saw on Goodreads that you'd already read Left of the Bang :o  And you'd given it quite a good rating!! :o I'm very pleased if you liked it! :smile2:

 

I've finally finished the Manson book I was reading for months and months. I'll be starting the Eleanor book this weekend! :smile2: I honestly cannot wait! The Manson book was non-fiction and it took me ages, and the book before that was a re-read, I think, so I'm ever so much looking forward to reading some new fiction!! :smile2:

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 4/6/2018 at 8:19 AM, Athena said:

I'm glad your reading is going well at least :). For myself I don't think I read more in certain seasons compared with other ones. But I've only been tracking it a few years now, so who knows what hidden statistic could be there..

 

I hope you'll get some warmer weather soon :). Today here it's still cold right now but it is sunny and should warm up soon to a nice temperature :).

Thanks Gaia :) We did have some lovely warm weather last week .. but it's drizzly and cold again now :D Good job that reading is a hot and cold weather pursuit ! :lol: 

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On 4/6/2018 at 10:43 PM, frankie said:

Very very late to say this to you, poppyshake, but I wish you the most amazing reading year in 2018! :smile2:  I see you've read 34 books already?!? Bloody hell! :lol:  Guns ablaze! 

 

I saw on Goodreads that you'd already read Left of the Bang :o  And you'd given it quite a good rating!! :o I'm very pleased if you liked it! :smile2:

 

I've finally finished the Manson book I was reading for months and months. I'll be starting the Eleanor book this weekend! :smile2: I honestly cannot wait! The Manson book was non-fiction and it took me ages, and the book before that was a re-read, I think, so I'm ever so much looking forward to reading some new fiction!! :smile2:

Thank you my lovely .. I hope you have an amazing year too :hug:

I have indeed read Left of the Bang already and really enjoyed it .. thank you so much :hug:  You know how it is, a day turned up which seemed just the right day to begin it .. so I did :D

I hope you get on alright with Eleanor ... fingers crossed :clapping:

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20 hours ago, poppyshake said:

Thanks Gaia :) We did have some lovely warm weather last week .. but it's drizzly and cold again now :D Good job that reading is a hot and cold weather pursuit ! :lol: 

 

That's very true :lol:!!

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