May 2009 books
This is the latest post in a series I started last year, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially in recent circumstances. If you want to look back at previous entries, they are all tagged under bookblog nostalgia.
I don't seem to have travelled abroad this month, but we did have a family expedition to the megaliths at Wéris, Belgium's biggest megalithic site.
The daily commute meant that I got through 33 books that month.
Non-fiction: 10 (YTD 36)
Fanny Kemble: A Performed Life, by Deirdre David
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books, by Azar Nafisi
The Prisoner Handbook, by Steven Paul Davies
On the Place of Gilbert Chesterton in English Letters, by Hilaire Belloc
The Prisoner, by Alain Carrazé and Hélène Oswald
Rhetorics of Fantasy, by Farah Mendlesohn
Fall Out, by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
EU Accession Dynamics and Conflict Resolution, by Nathalie Tocci
Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded, by John Scalzi
Blue Like Jazz, by Donald Miller
Fiction (non-sf): 5 (YTD 21)
The Story of Tracy Beaker, by Jacqueline Wilson
Double Act, by Jacqueline Wilson
Vicky Angel, by Jacqueline Wilson
The Stories of Elizabeth Spencer
Jewel, by Beverly Jenkins
Scripts: 5 (YTD 19)
The Winter's Tale, by William Shakespeare
Οιδίπους Τύραννος / Oedipus Rex, by Sophocles
The Tempest, by William Shakespeare
Henry VIII, by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher
The Two Noble Kinsmen, by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher
SF (non-Who, including Apuleius): 9 (YTD 36)
The Patriot Witch, by Charles Coleman Finlay
Zoë's Tale, by John Scalzi
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, by J.K. Rowling
The Man in the High Castle, by Philip K. Dick
The Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum
Wicked: the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, by Gregory Maguire
Bard IV: Ravens' Gathering, by Keith Taylor
The Golden Ass, by Apuleius
Elric, by Michael Moorcock
Who: 2 (YTD 14)
Sands of Time, by Justin Richards
K9 and Company, by Terence Dudley
Comics: 2 (YTD 6)
Fables vol 3: Storybook Love, by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham and Steve Leialoha
The Golden Ass, by Milo Manara
Total page count ~8,500 (YTD ~38,700)
11 (YTD 28/132) by women (Nafisi, Tocci, Mendlesohn, David, Oswald, 3x Wilson, Jenkins, Spencer, Rowling)
2 (YTD 7/132) by PoC (Nafisi, Jenkins - not sure if Apuleius counts)
My favourite books this month were Sophocles' ancient play, which you can get here, and Nathalie Tocci's analysis of the EU's failure in Cyprus, which you can get here. Keith Taylor's Celtic misht novel was pretty awful; you can get it here.
I don't seem to have travelled abroad this month, but we did have a family expedition to the megaliths at Wéris, Belgium's biggest megalithic site.
The daily commute meant that I got through 33 books that month.
Non-fiction: 10 (YTD 36)
Fanny Kemble: A Performed Life, by Deirdre David
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books, by Azar Nafisi
The Prisoner Handbook, by Steven Paul Davies
On the Place of Gilbert Chesterton in English Letters, by Hilaire Belloc
The Prisoner, by Alain Carrazé and Hélène Oswald
Rhetorics of Fantasy, by Farah Mendlesohn
Fall Out, by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
EU Accession Dynamics and Conflict Resolution, by Nathalie Tocci
Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded, by John Scalzi
Blue Like Jazz, by Donald Miller
Fiction (non-sf): 5 (YTD 21)
The Story of Tracy Beaker, by Jacqueline Wilson
Double Act, by Jacqueline Wilson
Vicky Angel, by Jacqueline Wilson
The Stories of Elizabeth Spencer
Jewel, by Beverly Jenkins
Scripts: 5 (YTD 19)
The Winter's Tale, by William Shakespeare
Οιδίπους Τύραννος / Oedipus Rex, by Sophocles
The Tempest, by William Shakespeare
Henry VIII, by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher
The Two Noble Kinsmen, by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher
SF (non-Who, including Apuleius): 9 (YTD 36)
The Patriot Witch, by Charles Coleman Finlay
Zoë's Tale, by John Scalzi
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, by J.K. Rowling
The Man in the High Castle, by Philip K. Dick
The Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum
Wicked: the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, by Gregory Maguire
Bard IV: Ravens' Gathering, by Keith Taylor
The Golden Ass, by Apuleius
Elric, by Michael Moorcock
Who: 2 (YTD 14)
Sands of Time, by Justin Richards
K9 and Company, by Terence Dudley
Comics: 2 (YTD 6)
Fables vol 3: Storybook Love, by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham and Steve Leialoha
The Golden Ass, by Milo Manara
Total page count ~8,500 (YTD ~38,700)
11 (YTD 28/132) by women (Nafisi, Tocci, Mendlesohn, David, Oswald, 3x Wilson, Jenkins, Spencer, Rowling)
2 (YTD 7/132) by PoC (Nafisi, Jenkins - not sure if Apuleius counts)
My favourite books this month were Sophocles' ancient play, which you can get here, and Nathalie Tocci's analysis of the EU's failure in Cyprus, which you can get here. Keith Taylor's Celtic misht novel was pretty awful; you can get it here.