Remember when I told you about The Great American Read?
No? Then check out this post.
On days that I'm extra busy––which is almost everyday––I only vote for my all-time favorite:
However, I've also voted for
and
Additionally, I've now read another book from the list of 100, which brings me to 44 of the books. I don't know why I never read this great book before:
I still hope to read 50 of the books by the time voting ends on Oct. 18. I have my next book picked out. It's by an author I really like, so I should have another update on my reading in a few weeks.
Infinities of love,
Janie Junebug
Aside from the Canadian (Anne with an E) and the British (Alice) I suppose we can claim the books as American classics, though I agree they are all great. Or maybe it's the readers who are the Americans?
ReplyDeleteThe readers are Americans.
DeleteI remember reading The Great Gatsby in 10th grade. It was especially enjoyable because my teacher was probably my most favorite high school teacher. Wonder if he’s still around??
ReplyDeleteI’d like to read Moby Dick again. I actually met a dog named Moby last week, named after the book.
Hey I never read Alice in Wonderland either or Anne of Green Gables.
Thanks for the reminders Janie.
Michele at Angels Bark
I read Anne to both of my kids. We loved it.
DeleteCongrats on 44! I remember reading Moby Dick years ago. It was so witty and better than I expected.
ReplyDeleteI read Moby Dick for two college classes. It was great both times.
DeleteSorry, I spent an entire semester in college freshman English dissecting Moby Dick. Seriously. I hope I never have to delve that deep into a book's intentions ever, ever again. LOL
ReplyDeleteI usually like delving, but certain books? No. I will not delve.
DeleteYou know, Jane, I'm sure I've read every one of those books. I know I must have. The only one I can recall one word of is Great Gatsby, thought I'd have to read Cliff notes to make it all come back in a flash. I must get one of the others out for my next audio book read.
ReplyDeleteThe list has a lot of great books, along with a couple that I didn't like and one that I won't read.
DeleteHave you read Pillars of The Earth? It's huge but I couldn't put it down. There are a lot of great books on that list. I'm partial to Grapes of Wrath and To Kill a Mockingbird and a few more. :)
ReplyDeleteI don't think I've ever heard of Pillars of the Earth. Who wrote it?
DeleteKen Follett. They made a mini series but it couldn't hold a candle to the book and they had to change quite a few things to compact it down. My dear friend, Ruby, told me how she fell into the book and lent it to me many years ago--and I was reading day and night, too. As huge as the book is, I didn't want it to end! :)
DeleteYou are doing so well with reading these many books so far. I remember The Great Gatsby but I loved The Call of the Wild, To Kill a Mockingbird, and And Then There Were None
ReplyDeleteI've never read The Call of the Wild or And Then There Were None, but I'd like to read them.
DeleteMoby-Dick is a hard sell for some people Ken Kesey’s list of the ten best American novels (from The Book of Lists #2) gives Moby-Dick the #1 spot. However, the original Book of Lists includes Moby-Dick as one of “The 15 Most Boring Classics.” Each year the New Bedford Whaling Museum has a marathon reading of the book that takes 25.5 hours. I was a participant back in 2004, and wrote an article for a local newspaper that took up half a page. I posted that entire article as one of my blog's earliest posts. I think I appreciate the book more because I do not analyze the hell out of. I just read it as a straightforward adventure story.
ReplyDeleteOops. Left out the period after "people" in my first sentence.
DeleteI analyzed the hell out of it in two classes and I still love it. I'll never forget my favorite professor reading parts of it aloud.
DeleteA Confederacy of Dunces. I have read it at least a dozen times and re-read chapters all the time. I have 3 copies of the book, a first edition that I never lend and 2 other copies that I loan on a regular basis. When they were in high school all three of my sons used COD as a free read book report when they were in American Lit classes. I love it and cringe every time I read that someone has optioned it for a movie and want to cast someone like Will Ferrell to play Ignatius,
ReplyDeleteThat's one of the books I want to read.
DeleteI'm ashamed to say I haven't read any of these books. I'm a non fiction fan, but I really enjoyed the film "The Color Purple" if that gets me any brownie points. :D
ReplyDeleteThe book is even better than the movie.
DeleteHi Janie - I'm really bad at having read few of the 'great books' - but I enjoyed reading about Lucy Maude Montogomery ... in Rubio's biography of her ... cheers Hilary
ReplyDeleteI enjoy biographies and read them frequently.
DeleteI'm wearing a Green Gables t-shirt from PEI even as I type this.
ReplyDeleteI'm jealous. That's a place I've long wanted to visit.
DeleteLife's too short to read anything that doesn't grab me by the end of the first chapter. That's my motto even though it's not in Latin :)
ReplyDeleteI understand your comment. I feel the same way about movies.
DeleteMy comment didn't really make much sense, did it? What I was thinking was that there were many books on the list that I will never read because I've tried them and they didn't grab me . . . I'm not saying everyone should do what I do, just that that's the way I approach my reading. I'm only in it for the serotonin :D
ReplyDeleteI don't like a couple of the books on the list and only read them because it was required in high school. If I hadn't read them and started now, I'm sure I'd quite after 5 minutes.
DeleteAnne of Green Gables is very popular in Japan. Many Japanese take trip and honeymoons to see the Island.
ReplyDeletecheers, parsnip
Yes, I'd heard that before. I wonder why Anne is so popular in Japan.
DeleteHow did a piece of trash like "Fifty Shades of Grey" even get on the list?
ReplyDeleteThey only surveyed 7200 people to create the list and it sold very well. A lot of people loved it. I've never read it, so I suppose I shouldn't criticize it but when Willy Dunne Wooters told me what it was about I said, No way.
DeleteI shouldn't have used "it" the way I did because it appears to refer to the list. I'm disappointed in myself.
Delete"Great Gatsby" is a super book. I wrote a paper on Fitzgerald, for which I read all of his books, (still have 'em, too!) and it's been so long since I read any of them, I don't even remember which was my favorite. Hmmm, might be time to open 'em up again.
ReplyDeleteI must confess, however, I've never read all of "Moby Dick." I hated it, and it was the ONLY assigned book in high school I never completed. Luckily, I was a good enough student to fake my way through the report. Maybe I need to re-examine THAT book, too...
Lewis Carroll was from another universe, in the best of ways. I'm glad you read that fantastic adventure.
ReplyDeleteLove.