~Andrea~

I've recently discovered St Agur cream cheese (it's a hard blue cheese I beleive but I've only tried the soft cheese version) Oh wow - it's amazing!! I can't get enough of the stuff. In light of the other thread on bagels, I'm going to have to try it on a toasted bagel soon. I'm not a huge blue cheese fan, I can eat small quantities on a cracker, but love it when it's in something else like stilton soup, or Harvester's blue cheese dressing. But this stuff is great - really mild and creamy with a gorgeous tang!! Mmmm (can you tell I'm a fan of the stuff lol)

I think that's going to become my problem pickle

When I first started listening to C&P in the car I found it really hard to concentrate and my mind wandered all over the place. However, loving it now. Think I was just really tired at first - I have been doing loads of overtime lately and worked a weekend (working 12 days in a row can really take it out of a girl) but after a few early nights am finally feeling back to myself. I love getting in the car now. I think audio books are going to become my new thing!! On page 975 of Les Mis - nearly there!!

Ditto! I was ill too and unable to watch TV or do anything more taxing. It made me laugh when I realised though - and I'm glad I'm not the only one lol. Have to say I am really starting to enjoy having audiobooks on in the car, and my concentration is getting better. Think I was just having a bad few days!

Since I have a new car (just thought I'd drop that in there ) with a CD player I have decided to dust off my old un-listened to (is that a word?) audio books when driving. I am having awful trouble concentrating though, with my mind wandering all over the place. I think I'm going to have to listen to each disc twice. Still, it's not as bad as the time I accidentally listened to an audiobook on shuffle - now that was confusing!

Started listening to Crime and Punishment audio book today.

haha love this thread. Also love bagels with cream cheese mmmm

Well I've been reading Les Mis for nearly 3 months now . I hope I'll finish it by the end of the month. I'm a little disappointed by my reading efforts last year. I only managed to complete 15 books, although I enjoyed some great reads, and I suppose not all of them were easy - the 2 on quantum physics were certainly no picnic, but very satisfying and another book was in a second language! I also read some great fiction, Pet Semetary and The Seance spring to mind, and discovered new authors noteably Robin Hobb, who I look forward to enjoying a lot more of. Another good thing: my TBR went down by 5 books overall which I am really pleased about. It's nice to finally make a bit of a dent rather than watch it grow year on year. Hopefully this year I'll do even better, get through the backlog and read a lot more!

Authors to try: Anthony Horowitz David Baddiel Anne Tyler Kelley Armstrong Tess Gerritson Sam Hayes Jonathon Coe John Updike H P Lovecraft

The Wish List (will there ever be time?) Ambrose, David - Superstition Beah, Ishmael - Memoirs of a Boy Soldier Bradbury, Ray - Something Wicked this way comes Barker, Clive - Weaveworld Challis, Sarah - Footprints in the sand Chesterton, G K - Orthodoxy Conan Doyle, Arthur - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Conran, Shirley - Savages Coupland, Douglas - Microserfs/JPod Du Maurier, Daphne - Rebecca Du Maurier, Daphne - The House on the Strand L'Engle, Madeleine - A Wrinkle in Time Greene, Grahame - Brighton Rock Greene, Grahame - The Third Man & The Fallen Idol Haugen, Gary (IJM) - Just Courage Highsmith, Patricia - The Talented Mr Ripley Hinton, Susan- Rumble Fish Hodgson, Burnett Frances - The Secret Garden Keyes, Daniel - Flowers for Algernon Koontz, Dean - The Mask Koontz, Dean - From The Corner Of His Eye Koontz, Dean - False Memory Koontz, Dean - Odd Thomas London, Jack - White Fang Neville, Adam - Apartment 16 Milne, A. A. Winnie the Pooh - complete short stories and poems Mitchell, Margaret - Gone With the Wind Niffenegger, Audrey - The Time Travellers Wife Pargeter, Edith - The Heaven Tree Rayner, Jay - The Oyster House Siege Tolkein - LOTR Trueman, Terry - Stuck in neutral Trigell, Jonathan - Boy A Wheatley, Dennis - The Haunting of Toby Jugg Wyndham, John - Chocky Wyndham, John - The Kraken awakes Watson, S J - Before I go to sleep Ruiz Zafon, Carlos - The Shadow Of The Wind Ruiz Zafon, Carlos - The Angel's Game Ryan, Carrie - The Forest Of Hands & Teeth Zusak, Markus - The Book Thief

Unread books on the bookshelf: Acquired pre 2009 1 Minnette Walters - The shape of snakes 2 Minnette Walters - Acid Row 3 Logic - A very short introduction 4 Wilkie Collins The Woman in White 5 Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales (modern translation) 6 From the Holy Mountain - William Dalrymple 7 Alice through the looking glass - Lewis Carrol 8 Joanna Trollope - The men and the girls 10 Damaged - Cathy Glass 11 The Essential tales of Chekhov 12 Othello 13 The Merchant of Venice 14 The face - Dean Koontz 15 Julius Caesar 16 Twelfth night 17 A Winter's tale 18 Oliver Twist (audio) 19 The Mayor of Castorbridge (audio) 20 Frankenstein (audio) 21 Middlemarch (audio) 22 Crime and punishment (audio) 23 The French Leuitenant's woman Begin year size: 23 End year size: 16 Acquired 2009 1 The Soldier's return - Melvyn Bragg 2 The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Coleridge 3 Collected works of Tennyson 4 The Secret of Crickely Hall - James Herbert 5 About Time - Paul Davies 6 It - Stephen King 7 The Great Turning points of British History 8 The Making of Modern Britain - Andrew Marr Begin year size: 8 End year size: 6 Books acquired 2010: 1 Arthur C Clarke - A Fall of moondust (Feb) 2 Tess Gerritson - The Apprentice (4 Dec) 3 The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's (11 Dec) 4 Bywyd Blodwen Jones (11 Dec) 5 Ray Bradbury - The Martian Chronicles (16 Dec) 6 Elizabeth Kostova - The Historian (25 Dec) 7 Donna Tartt - The Little Friend (25 Dec) 8 Why I am Still an Anglican - Caroline Chartres (25 Dec) 9 What the Bible really teaches - Keith Ward 10 Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M. Auel Begin year size: 10 End year size: 4 Books acquired 2011 Clean Code - Robert Martin Why there almost certainly is a God - Keith Ward Shakespeare's Landlord - Charlaine Harris I Partridge - Alan Partridge (audio) To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee/Sissy Spacek (audio) More Than Matter - Keith Ward Hens reunited - Lucy Diamond Search dogs and me - Neil Powell Silver Birches - Adrian Plass Six easy pieces - Richard Feynmann Think, a compelling introduction to philosophy - Simon Blackburn The everlasting man - G K Chesterton The great divorce - C S Lewis Brighton Rock - Grahame Greene (audio) The adventures of Sherlock Holmes volume 1 - Arthur Conan Doyle (audio) Blodwen Jones a'r aderyn prin - Bethan Gwenas (a novel for welsh learners Begin year size: 0 End year size: 15 Total Begin year size: 41 Max size: 41 Min size: 32 Current Size: 41 End year size:41

Books completed in 2011: Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevski (audio book) Les Miserables - Victor Hugo Frankenstein - Mary Shelley (audio book) The Mayor of Castorbridge - Thomas Hardy (audio book) The Face - Dean Koontz What the Bible really teaches - Keith Ward Acid Row - Minnette Walters The little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry It - Stephen King The Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M Auel Bywyd Blodwen Jones Why there almost certainly is a God - Keith Ward The Little Friend - Donna Tartt Oliver Twist (audio) While I'm still an anglican - Caroline Chartres About Time - Paul Davies Royal Assassin - Robin Hobb Currently reading: Clean Code - Robert Martin God of Surprises - Gerard Hughes

I'm on about 665 now. I'm going to wrap up this thread now and continue with Les Mis on my 2011 thread.

Not a bad average books spend Janet! This year I spent very little - certainly under a tenner. I don't read many in a year, and as my TBR is more than I can manage and I get lots of books for Christmas and birthday I have tried to be very restrained.

Still plodding through - on page 775 now. I can't beleive I've been reading this book for almost three months! Roll on the last page!

Oh no! I didn't know he was ill even. He was a really great actor, one of the best. RIP

Struggling a bit with Les Mis. I wish it wasn't so waffly. Just past 600 pages :S

Very shocked at last night's result. Who would have thought?