Kell

a) What was Hattie and Min's relationship like? Talk about extreme sibling rivalry! From Hattie's accounts, Min was "normal" till Hattie was born, but we only really have Hattie's say-so on that. Min obviously had problems before that to have reacted in thte extreme way she did. I think that even if she'd remained an only child there would have been problems. Personally, I thought Min should have had a LOT of attention from mental health practitioners from very early on, not just as an adult. I mean, honestly, she tried to kill her sister and it resulted in the death of their father! If that doesn't SCREAM psychotic I don't know what does! What about the other sibling pair, Logan and Thebes? Despite their family problems, Logan and Thebes have what seems to be a far more "normal" relationship - they bicker and niggle at each other but they basically do care about each other. In some ways I'm amazed they have such a good relationship as their family is so messed up, but in other ways I'm not surprised at all as all they really have is each other! c) Why is it important that Hattie and Min's dad was dead, or was it? What about the events surrounding his death? Why do you think Toews went with that line of story? THe lack of father figure obviously affected both the sisters and possibly affected their future relationships with men. Girls often idolise their fathers, moreso when their father dies when they're young as they don't have a constant reminder of how their father actually was, just a rose-tinted memory. If their future relationships don't measure up to the ideal then they're tainted and don't work out. Both sisters are currently single - Min because she's a basket case and drove her other half away, and Hattie, well I'm not sure what exactly when wrong with Marc, but she's incredibly naive when it comes to men and to be honest I wouldn't be surprised if she just really got on his nerves a whole lot - she certainly got on mine! I've no idea why Toews went with that story other than to perhaps give a hint as to why they both have such messed uo relationships with men.

I'm very pleasantly surprised at the amount of folks addicted to Kelley Armstrong. I've just got hold of the 1st 8 Southern Vampire books by Charlaine Harris. I did read the first 4 ages ago, but the 5th one proved stubbornly difficult to get hold of until very recently, so I'm going back and reading them all again then continuing with the series, so I guess that's another series to add to my list - LOL!

You don't have to link to your old one in your new one - you just need to give us the link here so we can close your old one for you.

LOL - I was just joining in with the New Year spirit. As fr being super-organised, I took advantage of a window of time I had when Xander was sleeping and Dale was decorating the tree and thought it might be the only chance I got.

I've already set mine up ready for posting in (currently closed till 1st January) and will be closing my 2009 one at the same time as I open the new one. Looking forward to checking out everyone's New Year reading when they start and seeing what books everyone got for Xmas!

Ooh, there are several series to which I am completely addicted and I get hold of each one as soon after publication as possible. Mostly they tend to come out just before my birthday or just before Xmas, so I get a lot of them for gifts (hurrah!). THe main contenders are: Terry Pratchett's Discworld series Simon Scarrow's Romans series Kelley Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld series Add to that anything written by Christopher Brookmyre, Stuart Macbride and the other books by Kelley Armstrong and you've got the gist of my "permanent collection"!

I was visiting friends who live right near Swindon when I first read The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde. I took it with me specially so I could read it while I was in the area which was its setting. I also read Anne of Green Gables and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan on that same trip. I enjoyed all three books immensely.

Aim: 52 books in 2010 Finished so far: 58 / 52 Abandoned: 8 RATINGS: 1/5 Dire - don't waste your time 2/5 OK, but nothing to write home about 3/5 Very good - well worth a read 4/5 Excellent 5/5 Superb - read it immediately! CHALLENGES: SS - Simon Scarrow Revolutions Series CH - Charlaine Harris Southern Vampires Series BA - Bill Amberg Classics Challenge Blue - Currently Reading FINISHED IN JULY: 29. Lewis Carroll - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - 3/5 30. Terry Pratchett - Unseen Academicals - 2/5 31. Lewis Carroll - Alice Through The Looking Glass - 3/5 32. Kenneth Graham - The Wind In The Willows - 5/5 Kazuo Ishiguro - A Pale View Of Hills - ABANDONED FINISHED IN AUGUST: 33. Donna Jo Napoli - Daughter Of Venice - 3/5 34. Charlaine Harris - Dead in the Family (CH 10) (Book Ring)- 3/5 35. Margaret Mitchell - Gone With The Wind - 5/5 36. Stephen T Hancock - The Synchronicity Factor - 3/5 37. Kelley Armstrong – Men of the Otherworld - 4/5 38. Kelley Armstrong - Angelic - 3/5 39. J M Barrie - Peter Pan - 3/5 FINISHED IN SEPTEMBER: 40. Geraldine McCaughrean and David Wyatt - Peter Pan in Scarlet - 4/5 41. Judah Lee Davis - She Tells All - 3/5 42. Lauren Henderson - Jane Austen's Guide To Dating - 5/5 43. Alison Weir – The Lady Elizabeth - 4/5 44. Kelley Armstrong - Waking The Witch - 4/5 45. Allen Carr - Allen Carr's Easy Weigh To Lose Weight - 3/5 FINISHED IN OCTOBER: 46. Elizabeth Ferretti - Chocolate - 3/5 FINISHED IN NOVEMBER: 47. Pat Brien - Denied - 2/5 48. Edgar Allan Poe - The Pit and the Pendulum - 2/5 49. Edgar Allan Poe - Ligeia - 2/5 50. Lexi Revellian - Remix - 4/5 Jane Austen - Persuasion - ABANDONED Thomas Makepeace Thackeray - Vanity Fair - ABANDONED Raymond Chandler - The Big Sleep - ABANDONED 51. Ben Elton - The First Casualty - 4/5 52. Edgar Allan Poe - The Fall of the House of Usher - 1/5 53. Edgar Allan Poe - Three Short Stories - 2/5 54. Michelle Gorman - Single in the City - 3/5 55. Jake T Forbes & Chris Lie - Return to Labyrinth vol 1 (graphic novel) - 4/5 FINISHED IN DECEMBER: 56. Jake T Forbes & Chris Lie - Return to Labyrinth vol 2 (graphic novel) - 4/5 57. Jake T Forbes & Chris Lie - Return to Labyrinth vol 3 (graphic novel) - 4/5 Anonymous - The Arabian Nights - ABANDONED John Lawrence - The Secret Five and the Stunt Nun Legacy - ABANDONED - 1/5 58. Alison Weir - Innocent Traitor - 4/5 Richard Laymon - No Sanctuary Caro Ramsay - Absolution

RATINGS: 1/5 Dire – don’t waste your time 2/5 OK, but nothing to write home about 3/5 Very good – well worth a read 4/5 Excellent 5/5 Superb – read it immediately! CHALLENGES: SS - Simon Scarrow Revolutions Series CH - Charlaine Harris Southern Vampires Series BA - Bill Amberg Classics Challenge RC - Reading Circle Blue - Currently Reading Red - Abandoned Unfinished FINISHED IN JANUARY: 1. Charlaine Harris - Dead Until Dark (CH1/re-read) - 3/5 2. Charlaine Harris - Living Dead in Dallas (CH2/re-read) - 3/5 3. Charlaine Harris - Club Dead (CH3/re-read) - 4/5 4. Charlaine Harris - Dead to the World (CH4/re-read) - 4/5 5. Charlaine Harris - Dead as a Doornail (CH5) - 3/5 6. Charlaine Harris - Definitely Dead (CH6) - 3/5 7. Charlaine Harris - All Together Dead (CH7) - 4/5 8. Charlaine Harris - From Dead to Worse (CH8) - 4/5 9. Brom - The Child Thief - 5/5 FINISHED IN FEBRUARY: Steig Larsson – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - ABANDONED FINISHED IN MARCH: 10. Christopher Brookmyre - Pandaemonium - 3/5 11. Rolf Harris - Buster Fleabags - 3/5 12. Alison Weir - Traitors of the Tower - 2/5 13. Peter James - The Perfect Murder - 3/5 14. Various - Life's Too Short - 3/5 15. Peter Mottley - The Harlot's Progress: Pt 1: Yorkshire Molly - 3/5 16. Eric L Haney - Inside Delta Force - 4/5 FINISHED IN APRIL: 17. Lynn Shepherd - Murder at Mansfield Park - 3/5 18. J M DeMatteis - Abadazad: The Road to Inconceivable - 3/5 19. J M DeMatteis - Abadazad: The Dream Thief - 3/5 20. G P Taylor - Mariah Mundy: The Midas Box - 2/5 FINISHED IN MAY: 21. Henry Farrell - Whatever Happened To Baby Jane? - 4/5 22. Philippa Gregory - The Other Queen - 3/5 FINISHED IN JUNE: 23. Charlaine Harris - Dead and Gone (CH9) - 3/5 Sharyn McCrumb - Zombies of the Gene Pool - ABANDONED 24. Simon Scarrow - Gladiator (Romans #9) - 4/5 25. Stuart Macbride - Dark Blood (Logan McRae #6) - 3/5 26. Vicki Iovine - The Best Friends' Guide to Motherhood - 3/5 27. Philippa Gregory - The White Queen - 3/5 28. A E Moorat - Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter - 3/5

1. Dead Until Dark (re-read) (2001) 3/5 Sookie Stackhouse is a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. She's quiet, keeps to herself, and doesn't get out much - not because she's not pretty - she's a very cute bubbly blonde - or not interested in a social life. She really is... but Sookie's got a bit of a disability. She can read minds. And that doesn't make her too dateable. And then along comes Bill: he's tall, he's dark and he's handsome - and Sookie can't 'hear' a word he's thinking. He's exactly the type of guy she's been waiting all her life for. But Bill's a vampire. And then one of Sookie's colleagues at the bar is killed, and it's beginning to look like Sookie might be the next victim... 2. Living Dead in Dallas (re-read) (2002) 3/5 Cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse is having a streak of bad luck. First her co-worker is killed, and no one seems to care. Then she comes face-to-face with a beastly creature which gives her a painful and poisonous lashing. Enter the vampires, who graciously suck the poison from her veins (like they didn't enjoy it). The point is: they saved her life. So when one of the bloodsuckers asks for a favour, she obliges - and soon Sookie's in Dallas, using her telepathic skills to search for a missing vampire. She's supposed to interview certain humans involved, but she makes one condition: the vampires must promise to behave, and let the humans go unharmed. But that's easier said than done, and all it takes is one delicious blonde and one small mistake for things to turn deadly. 3. Club Dead (re-read) (2003) - 4/5 There's only one vampire Sookie Stackhouse is involved with - at least voluntarily - and that's Bill. But recently he's been a little distant - in another state distant. His sinister and sexy boss Eric has an idea where to find him, and next thing Sookie knows she's off to Jackson, Mississippi, to mingle with the underworld at Club Dead. It's a dangerous little haunt where the elusive vampire society can go to chill out and suck down some Type O - but when Sookie finally finds Bill caught in an act of serious betrayal she's not sure whether to save him, or to sharpen some stakes. 4. Dead to the World (re-read) (2004) - 4/5 Sookie comes to the rescue of a naked, amnesiac vampire - and ends up in the middle of a war between witches, werewolves and vampires! Sookie Stackhouse is a small-town cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. She's pretty. She does her job well. She keeps to herself - she has only a few close friends, because not everyone appreciates Sookie's gift: she can read minds. That's not exactly every man's idea of date bait - unless they're undead - vampires and the like can be tough to read. And that's just the kind of guy Sookie's been looking for. Maybe that's why, when she comes across a naked vampire on the way home from work, she doesn't just drive on by. He hasn't got a clue who he is, but Sookie has: Eric looks just as scary and sexy - and dead - as the day she met him. But now he has amnesia, he's sweet, vulnerable, and in need of Sookie's help - because whoever took his memory now wants his life. Sookie's investigation into what's going on leads her straight into a dangerous battle between witches, vampires and werewolves. But there could be even greater danger - to Sookie's heart, because the kinder, gentler Eric is very hard to resist. 5. Dead as a Doornail (2005) - 3/5 Sookie's got just a month, before the next full moon, to find out who wants her brother dead - and to stop the fiend! Sookie Stackhouse enjoys her life, mostly. She's a great cocktail waitress in a fun bar; she has a love life, albeit a bit complicated, and most people have come to terms with her telepathy. The problem is, Sookie wants a quiet life - but things just seem to happen to her and her friends. Now her brother Jason's eyes are starting to change: he's about to turn into a were-panther for the first time. She can deal with that, but her normal sisterly concern turns to cold fear when a sniper sets his deadly sights on the local changeling population. She afraid not just because Jason's at risk, but because his new were-brethren suspect Jason may be the shooter. Sookie has until the next full moon to find out who's behind the attacks - unless the killer decides to find her first. 6. Definitely Dead (2006) - 3/5 Sookie doesn't have that many relations, so she hated to lose one - but of all the people to go, she didn't expect it to be her cousin Hadley, a consort of New Orleans' vampire queen - after all, Hadley was technically already dead. But she is gone, beyond recall, and she's left Sookie an inheritance - one that comes with a bit of a risk - not least because someone doesn't want Sookie digging too deep into Hadley's past - or her possessions. Sookie's life is once again on the line, and this time the suspects range from the rogue werewolves who have rejected Sookie as a friend of the pack to her first love, the vampire Bill. Sookie's got a lot to do if she's going to keep herself alive. 7. All Together Dead (2007) - 4/5 Sookie's beginning to get used to being surrounded by all varieties of undead, changeling, shapeshifting and other supernatural beings - but even she has her limits. She'd really like to take a while to get over being betrayed by Bill, her long-time vampire lover, and get used to her new relationship with the sexy shapeshifter Quinn - but instead, she finds herself attending the long-planned vampire summit, the destination of choice for every undead power player around, as a sort-of human 'Geiger counter' for Sophie-Anne Leclerq, vampire queen of Louisiana. But the job is fraught with difficulties. Sophie-Anne's power base has been severely weakened by Hurricane Katrina, and she's about to be put on trial during the event for murdering her king. Sookie knows the queen is innocent, but she's hardly prepared for other shocking murders: it looks like there are some vamps who would like to finish what nature started. With secret alliances and backroom deals the order of the day - and night - Sookie must decide which side she'll stand with, and quickly, for her choice may mean the difference between survival and all-out catastrophe. 8. From Dead to Worse (2008) - 4/5 The supernatural community in Bon Temps, Louisiana is reeling from two hard blows: the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina, and the manmade horror of the explosion at the vampire summit in the up-north city of Rhodes. Sookie Stackhouse is safe but dazed, and she's yearning for things to get back to normal. But that's just not happening. Too many vampires - some friends, some not - were killed or injured, and her were-tiger boyfriend Quinn is among the missing. It's clear that things are changing, whether the weres and vamps like it or not. And Sookie, Friend to the Pack, blood-bonded to the leader of the local vampire community, is caught up in those changes. She's about to find herself facing danger and death and, not for the first time, betrayal by someone she loves. And when the fur has finished flying and the cold blood has stopped flowing, Sookie's world will be forever altered. 9. Dead and Gone (2009) - 3/5 Now it's the turn of the weres and shifters to follow the lead of the undead and reveal their existence to the ordinary world. Sookie Stackhouse already knows about them, of course - her brother turns into a panther at the full moon, she's friend to the local Were pack and Sam, her boss at Merlotte's bar, is a shifter. At first the great Were revelation seems to go well - then the horribly mutilated body of a were-panther is found outside Merlotte's. Though Sookie never cared that much for the victim, no one deserves such a horrible death, so she agrees to use her telepathic talent to track down the murderer. But what Sookie doesn't realise is that there is a far greater danger than this killer threatening Bon Temps: a race of unhuman beings, older, more powerful and far more secretive than the vampires or the werewolves is preparing for war. 10. Dead in the Family(2010) - 3/5 If you think your family relationships are complicated, think again: you haven't seen anything like the ones in Bon Temps, Louisiana. Sookie Stackhouse is dealing with a whole host of family problems, ranging from her own kin (a non-human fairy and a telepathic second cousin) demanding a place in her life, to her lover Eric's vampire sire, an ancient being who arrives with Eric's 'brother' in tow at a most inopportune moment. And Sookie's tracking down a distant relation of her ailing neighbour (and ex), Vampire Bill Compton. In addition to the multitude of family issues complicating her life, the werewolf pack of Shreveport has asked Sookie for a special favour, and since Sookie is an obliging young woman, she agrees. But this favour for the wolves has dire results for Sookie, who is still recovering from the trauma of her abduction during the Fairy War.

Penguin Books brought out a beautiful set of six classic novels bound in leather that retailed at

SIMON SCARROW'S REVOLUTION SERIES CHALLENGE I've had the first three books in this series for a while now and, although I love Scarrow's Romans series, I've never got round to reading these ones, so this year I'm really going to go for it! RATINGS: 1/5 Dire – don’t waste your time 2/5 OK, but nothing to write home about 3/5 Very good – well worth a read 4/5 Excellent 5/5 Superb – read it immediately! Green = Finished Blue = Acquired, but not read Red = Not yet acquired 1. Young Bloods (2006) Europe in the late eighteenth century was a tumultuous place, with war and rebellions breaking out on many fronts. Young Arthur Wesley (later Wellington) and Napoleon Bonaparte grow up worlds apart yet immersed from youth in a culture where a military career is a natural choice for men of ambition. While Wellington is blooded in Ireland and Flanders, Napoleon is caught up in the dramas of the French Revolution and war with Prussia, Britain and Holland. None of this is enough to distract Wellington from his pursuit of Kitty Pakenham or Napoleon from his future bride, Josephine, for these men throw themselves into all aspects of life as enthusiastically as they rush to battle. A wonderful, multi-layered introduction to an epic series. 2. The Generals (2007) The second in this epic quartet of novels focusing on two giants of European history, Wellington and Napoleon It's 1796 as THE GENERALS opens, and both Arthur Wellesly (later Wellington) and Napoleon Bonaparte are making their mark as men of military genius. Wellesley, as commander of the 33rd Regiment of Foot, is sent to India, where his skill and bravery make a remarkable impression on his superiors. Napoleon's role as commander of the Army of Italy leads to success in battle and rapid political progress. By 1804, Napoleon has established himself as Emperor, and has his sights set on conquering all of Europe. The time has come for Wellesly to stand against Napoleon in the confrontation that lies ahead. 3. Fire and Sword (2009) The third in this epic quartet of novels focusing on two giants of European history, Wellington and Napoleon. In the early years of the nineteenth century, Arthur Wellesley (elevated to Viscount Wellington in the course of the novel) and Napoleon Bonaparte are well-established as men of military genius. Wellesley has returned from India, where his skill and bravery made a remarkable impression on his superiors. He faces trials and tribulations on the political scene before becoming embroiled militarily in Copenhagen, then Portugal and finally Spain. Napoleon, established as Emperor, is cementing his control on Europe, intending finally to crush his hated foe across the Channel: Britain. The time is fast approaching when Wellington and Napoleon will come face to face in confrontation and only one man can emerge victorious... 4. The Fields of Death (2010) It's 1810, and both Viscount Wellington and Emperor Napoleon have made great names for themselves as outstanding military commanders. Wellington expands his achievements and enjoys further fame during his years in Spain but knows his most challenging test will be to face Napoleon's mighty army. But when Wellington invades France in 1814 he gains a swift and certain victory. He indulges in a spell of self-congratulation at Vienna -- until news comes of Napoleon's triumphant return. Napoleon, ambitious as ever, embarks on a Russian campaign which ends in disaster and is then defeated at Leipzig in the biggest battle ever fought in Europe. With Napoleon's power waning at long last, Wellington must seize the opportunity to crush the tyrant once and for all -- and so the two giants face each other for the final time, at Waterloo... BILL AMBERG CLASSICS CHALLENGE Penguin Books brought out a beautiful set of six classic novels bound in leather that retailed at £50 a pop (you can get them from Penguin for £20 now though). I aim to read all six of them (although not necessarily the Bill Amberg versions as they're pricey!) I actually now own three of the six novels from the Bill Amberg Collection (yes, the leather-bound ones - they're gorgeous!) as I picked them up very cheaply from The Works. I'm hoping the other three will become available there so I can get those too! I have already read a couple of them, so I'm a few steps ahead of the game as I start this challenge... RATINGS: 1/5 Dire – don’t waste your time 2/5 OK, but nothing to write home about 3/5 Very good – well worth a read 4/5 Excellent 5/5 Superb – read it immediately! Green = Finished Blue = Acquired, but not read Red = Not yet acquired Truman Capote - Breakfast at Tiffany's Holly Golightly, glittering socialite traveller, generally upwards, sometimes sideways and once in a while down. She's up all night drinking cocktails and breaking hearts. She's a shoplifter, a delight, a drifter, a tease. She hasn't got a past.She doesn't want to belong to anything or anyone. Not to 'Rusty' Trawler, the blue-chinned, cuff-shooting millionaire man about women about town. Not to Salvatore 'Sally' Tomato, the Mafia sugar-daddy doing life in Sing Sing. Not to a starving writer. Not even to her one-eyed rag-bag pirate of a cat. One day Holly might find somewhere she belongs. Until then she's travelling. Raymond Chandler - The Big Sleep Los Angeles PI Philip Marlowe is working for the Sternwood family. Old man Sternwood, crippled and wheelchair-bound, is being given the squeeze by a blackmailer and he wants Marlowe to make the problem go away. But with Sternwood’s two wild, devil-may-care daughters prowling LA’s seedy backstreets, Marlowe’s got his work cut out – and that’s before he stumbles over the first corpse … F Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby (read at school) - 4/5 Jay Gatsby is the man who has everything. But one thing will always be out of his reach ... Everybody who is anybody is seen at his glittering parties. Day and night his Long Island mansion buzzes with bright young things drinking, dancing and debating his mysterious character. For Gatsby - young, handsome, fabulously rich - always seems alone in the crowd, watching and waiting, though no one knows what for. Beneath the shimmering surface of his life he is hiding a secret: a silent longing that can never be fulfilled. And soon this destructive obsession will force his world to unravel. E M Forster - A Room With a View (read 2007) - 4/5 A brilliant social comedy about the English middle classes abroad and at home, A ROOM WITH A VIEW is one of E.M. Forster's most popular novels. The medieval beauty of Florence is the setting for the emotional awakening of Lucy Honeychurch, a young woman travelling abroad for the first time with her cousin Charlotte. On her return to England, in her relationships with her cousin, the unconventional Emersons and her supercilious fiance Cecil, Lucy is torn between lingering Victorian proprieties and the spontaneous promptings of her heart. Evelyn Waugh - Brideshead Revisited Charles Ryder, a lonely student at Oxford, is captivated by the outrageous and decadent Sebastian Flyte. Invited to Brideshead, Sebastian's magnificent family home, Charles welcomes the attentions of its eccentric, artistic inhabitants the Marchmains, becoming infatuated with them and the life of privilege they inhabit; in particular, with Sebastian's remote sister, Julia. But, as duty and desire, faith and happiness come into conflict, and the Marchmains struggle to find their place in a changing world, Charles eventually comes to recognize his spiritual and social distance from them. Oscar Wilde - The Picture of Dorian Gray (read in 2007) 4/5 Enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, Dorian Gray exchanges his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Influenced by his friend Lord Henry Wotton, he is drawn into a corrupt double life; indulging his desires in secret while remaining a gentleman inthe eyes of polite society. Only his portrait bears the traces of his decadence. The novel was a succès de scandale and the book was later used as evidence against Wilde at the Old Bailey in 1895. It has lost none of its power to fascinate and disturb.

2006 reading (124 books + 21 short stories) 2007 reading (127 books) 2008 reading (58 books) 2009 reading (52 books) I'm aiming to read one book for every week of the year in 2010. If you look back at previous years of my reading, you'll see I averaged around 125 books per year till I got pregnant in 2008 and then suffered a severe drop-off due to being completely unable to concentrate and then, once Xander was born, not having the time or inclination for much reading. I still have less reading time than I used to, but I get a tiny tad more now that Xander is getting a little older. There are also a couple of book series that I want to read this year, so I'll be checking them off my list as I get to them. JANUARY TO JUNE READING JULY TO DECEMBER READING Reading Challenges: Simon Scarrow's Revolution Series Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Series Bill Amberg Classics Challenge Wish List MOUNT TBR Dan Abnet - Triumff: Her Majesty's Hero Alma Alexander – The Embers of Heaven Kelley Armstrong (and others) – Dates From Hell Jane Austen – Persuasion Jane Austen- Sense and Sensibility Mikkel Birkegaard – The Library of Shadows Anne Bronte – Agnes Grey Margaret Cezair-Thomon - The Pirate's Daughter Elizabeth Chadwick – Shadows and Strongholds Raymond Chandler - The Big Sleep (Bill Amberg Classics Challenge) Bernard Cornwell - Stonehenge Daniel Defoe – Moll Flanders Daniel Defoe – Robinson Crusoe Charles Dickens – Tale of Two Cities Charles Dickens – Bleak House Charles Dickens – Oliver Twist Alexandre Dumas – The Count of Monte Cristo Michel Faber – The Crimson Petal and the White Anne Frank – Anne Fran’s Diary Philippa Gregory – The Favoured Child Thomas Hardy – Jude the Obscure Thomas Hardy – The Mayor of Casterbridge Thomas Hardy – Tess of the D’Urbervilles Robert Harris - Pompeii Katherine Howe – The Lost Book of Salem Victor Hugo – The Hunchback of Notre-Dame Victor Hugo – Les Miserables Vol.1 Victor Hugo – Les Miserables Vol 2 Kazuo Ishiguro – When We Were Orphans Jeanne Kalogridis – The Borgia Bride Raymond Khoury – The Last Templar Barbara Kingslover – The Poisonwood Bible D H Lawrence – Women in Love Doris Lessing - The Golden Notebook Hilary Mantel – Wolf Hall Valerio Massimo Manfredi – The Last Legion Colum McCann - Zoli Herman Melville – Moby Dick Audrey Niffenegger - Her Fearful Symmetry Jean Plaidy – The King’s Secret Matter Caro Ramsay - Absolution Michelle Richmond – No-One You Know M J Rose – The Reincarnationist Simon Scarrow – Young Bloods (Revolution 1) Simon Scarrow – The Generals (Revolution 2) Simon Scarrow – Fire and Sword (Revolution 3) Robert Silverberg - Roma Eterna Nicholas Sparks – The Notebook John Steinbeck – East of Eden Charles Stross - The Atrocity Archives Colm Toibin - Brooklyn William Thackeray – Vanity Fair Leo Tolstoy – Anna Karenina Lew Wallace – Ben Hur Evelyn Waugh - Brideshead Revisited (Bill Amberg Classics Challenge) Alison Weir – Innocent Traitor P G Wodehouse – Thank You, Jeeves Thomas Wolfe – The Bonfire of the Vanities

Oh, that's a WONDERFUL book and it deserves a beautiful bookmark!

1. When auditioning for Romeo and Juliet, we were asked to put down 3 characters we'd like to play, in order of preference. I said Mercutio, Tybalt, Romeo as I'm quite good at fencing and wanted to show off my sword skills. I was told I'd have to put down a female part as they weren't casting women as men in the show. I said, "Oh, OK then, if I really must, I'll go for Juliet". I got the lead. And they cast a girl as Benvolio. 2. When I was at college, I was injured during rehearsals for Romeo and Juliet. I was dropped on my back on steps and was told the damage to my back meant I would never be able to do anything like dance theatre without months and months of physio. Less than 3 weeks later (and without physio!) I began a 2-week stint in a dance show! 3. Half way through the first performance of that dance show, I dislocated my left baby finger. I had to carry on performing that section with my finger dislocated, come off stage at the end of that piece, whack it back into place and continue with the show 4. I hate wapping gifts because my perfectionism gets on my own nerves as it takes forever to get each one just right. 5. I'm terrified of heights - I can't even stand on a chair without feeling a bit sick and dizzy - but I love flying and would really like to go up in a hot air balloon. This from the woman who cried all the way to the top of the London Eye and only calmed down and let go of the railing when we stopped back at the bottom!

That's exactly who I was going to recommend. Start with Cold Granite - excellent stuff.

I'm not a fan of the wizard books myself (especially the 1st two and Eric) but the rest of the books are all brilliant (and most of the wizard books are pretty good too, it's just those three I don't enjoy so much). However, you CAN actually start at other points in the series if you know where to jump in. THere's a handy guide HERE. It only goes up to October 2006, though, so it doesn't include Making Money (Industrial Revolution) or Unseen Academicals (Wizards), but they can be tagged onto the end of their respective threads. My favourites are the Watch novels.

And I third it! I loved that book and had no idea a film had been made of it. I shall have to go looking for it now. Twilight was a way better film than the book, which I found to be incredibly mediocre and not up to the hype surrounding it.

Despite me not thinking much of Hattie, it is quite an interesting read and it's a surprisingly quick read, so if anyone is worrying that it might be a bit much, do give it a go as it's worth a look and doesn't take long to finish, so you can all jump in the discussion.