phoenix

I totally agree - I also liked this very much. When I started reading this book I didn't know at all what was expecting me but I soon realised that it was s.th. different. It really took some time until I got an idea about what was meant with donations. First, I was in doubt whether I was really on the right track - and this is what kept me reading on because it was so unusual and so unbelievable. To be honest, my first thought was that I was misinterpreting the sense of donation because I am no native speaker but I soon realised that this wasn't the case. I kind of see the time the plot took for unfolding as a parallel to the time I needed to understand what was going on there. And I think it's was similar for Kathy, Tommy and the others. I am just wondering about the normal people around them. What do they think about the donors and carers? Do they really know what is going on there? Are they in contact with them in one way or another? I mean - they must be as also donors need to go shopping etc. And where are the carers living? In a normal neighbourhood? What do their neighbours know and think about them? There are really so many questions and I'd really like to know the point of view of normal people. I am really glad that this book was voted for here because I don't think I would have read it otherwise. So thanks for that!

As some of you already mentioned where you have been and where you want to travel to, I'd like to add my favourite destinations. I just posted the previous reply to quickly. I love travelling to England. I've been there a couple of times already but there are still so many areas I want to visit. And also Scotland and Wales are on my 'to-go-list'. I just don't know how to get there when I keep returning to England... And Scandinavia would also be great to travel to. I'm not sure yet whether I'd start with Norway, Sweden or Finland. All of the three have their charms and I didn't really think about this yet. I just need more time and more money to go travelling as much as I'd like - not sure though where to get it from...

My hobbies are: cooking and baking , cycling, music (I love going to Heavy Metal and Hard Rock concerts / festivals), And I just started letterboxing and also want to try geocaching as well. That sounds really interesting. Apart from that I just like spending my time outside on my little terrace, the seaside,...), meeting my friends for a beer or for going dancing. I also like board- and card games and writing letters.

1. Thomas Mann: Buddenbrooks. Decline of a Family 2. Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice 3. Terry Pratchett: Discworld Series 4. Agatha Christie: Ten Little Niggers 5. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: The Sorrows of Young Werther

It seems that not many people are taking part in this reading circle or that they stopped reading, as I did. Although I was hoping that the book was becoming more interesting, it did not. I didn't really like all these lengthy descriptions of nature, stars and people and I didn't get much out of the dialogues. All in all, whenever I had stopped reading, I didn't really want to pick the book up again. I wasn't interested at all in reading what is happening next and had to force myself to read some more pages. So this is why I decided not to pick the book up again. What's about you? Are you still reading the book? Will you read it until the end?

It's the same with me. I also try to find the real covers I have at home at library thing

That sounds like a good idea but it's really hard for me to keep on reading because I always fear that I miss some kind of important explanation that gives the text another point of view. What I have done now is kind of a compromise. I have read a chapter, looked up the explanations and only then went on with the next chapter. Yes, that's one of the parts I had difficulties with. I'm no expert on stars and so I don't see any pictures when Hardy is describing the sky though I guess for people who know the stars better this might have been a nice passage. Were readers of Hardy's time more familiar with the stars or is Hardy an exception knowing the stars so well? That's an interesting thought! People used to spend quite a lot of time reading aloud to eachother so I'd say Hardy could have intended to write something for that purpose. I have now restarted and finally came to a point of the book at which I started to enjoy reading it: "In short I was going to ask her if she'd like to be married. " "And were you indeed." "Yes. Because if she would I should be very glad to marry her." [...] Not that her young men ever come here - but Lord, in the nature of women she must have a dozen!" "That's unfortunate," said Farmer Oak contemplating a crack in the stone floor with sorrow. "I#m only an everyday sort of man, and my only chance was in being the first comer... Isn't that brilliantly written? As far as I am concerned, the book could have started here. I didn't really get much out of the beginning.

Let us know if you read one of those and how you liked it.

I'm from Hamburg which is in the North of Germany. I love living here!

With which book did you try it? And what didn't you like? May be we can recommend you another book when we know with what you struggled.

Phew...I have difficulty getting into this books because it starts with so many words with footnotes I never can resist looking up. But I started reading it in the tube so may be that was not the right surrounding. I'll re-read it from the beginning (only managed a few pages so far) in the afternoon with a good cup of coffee and let you know how I get on. How do you deal with words that have explanantions at the end of the book? Do you look them up at all? Immediately or at a later point?

I just looked up this book at Amazon because I don't know it and I wasn't sure what you mean with Tragic Life Stories or Misery Memoirs. From the synopsis at Amazon I still didn't get that these are supposed to be real biographical literature but Wiki helped a bit. But I haven't read anything of this genre yet.

I'd recommend the following: Knut Hamsun: Pan Samuel Becket: Waiting for Godot or Krapps Last Tape Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Chronicle of a Death Foretold Doris Lessing: The fifth Child and as already mentioned: Thomas Mann: Buddenbrooks Please note though that the books listed above are not necessarily the ones which were especially pointed out for the nobel price.

In 1901 one of the greatest German novels was published: Buddenbrooks - The Decline of a Family by Thomas Mann. In 1929, Thomas Mann got the nobel price of literature for the Buddenbrooks. I absolutely love this book because it's so authentic and the characters are brilliantly characterised. Also, one gets a good idea about the life of merchants and citizens of the late 19th century. Many of the characters are said to have citizens of Luebeck, Thomas Mann's home town as a model and most of the people who thought to have found themselves discribed in this novel (although no one has really been mentioned by name) didn't really like it because they weren't described that positively. When Buddenbrooks was sold in Luebeck short after it was published for the first time, there were lists of names handed around on which people could see which character was supposed to be which person in real life.

Similar to reading through the decades is the 'nobel price' challenge. I'm doing this and as I am trying to get most of the books second hand, I never know what comes next - though it will therefore take some time until I'm done with this challenge. My plan is to read at least one book / several poems of each laureate but I sometimes like them and so I read more than only one book. But I do really like this challenge because the books are quite different and so it doesn't get boring.

I also used to keep most of my books but I am running out of space. Though I got some new bookshelves recently, that didn't help much. I could do with an additional room... I've also still quite a lot of the books I used to read when I was a child. I kept them because I loved them so much and because I thought I can give them to my children sometime. But now, we do have the new German spelling since 2006 and I don't know whether I should give books to children when the spelling is 'not correct'. I wouldn't bother about giving these books to teenagers but for younger children who are still learning how to write correctly I'm afraid this might be confusing. I do not have any children yet so I have some time to think about this (though I'm pretty sure that - whatever my decision about handing on these books is - I will always keep my books Ok, back to the beginning of my post... As I am running out of space I started sorting my books. I'm keeping all the books I just loved and all of which I think that friends might like to lend them or guests can read them while staying with us. I also keep books of which I think they are a must have for whatever reason (classics, non-fiction books, because I already have other books of that author and it just looks better when there are more books standing next to eachother...) Books which I didn't enjoy at all have a bookshelf of their own and when this shelf is full I carry them to a second-hand bookshop or a charity shop. I just did so at the beginning of December but there were some books they didn't want and so I carried them back and do not know what to do with them. I can't throw them away! So all in all I have difficulties reducing the number of books because I'm quite good at finding reasons for keeping them or because I do not know how to get rid of them (shouldn't tell this my husband - he wouldn't have any difficulties throwing them away). I guess I also should point out to my husband that I have some books two or even three times just because I liked the cover so much or because one of the books has a great preface...

Yes, you should definitely do this. These books are brilliant! Especially because of many great one-liners and the little imp in the iconograph (one of my favourite discworld characters so far)

I last bought Iron Maiden - Somewhere Back in Time.

I mostly read in the tube - on my way to work and on the way back. And on weekends also in the afternoon.

My all time favourites are: Awakenings Once Upon a Time in the West Little Lord Fauntleroy Dinner For One A Beautiful Mind Rain Man Star Wars Lord of the Rings the old Walt Disneys (Bambi, Jungle Book, The Last Unicorn) old Agatha Christie and Edgar Wallace films