Second paragraph of third chapter:Sunk in the grass of an empty lot on a spring Saturday, I split the stems of milkweed and thought about ants and peach pits and death and where the world went when I closed my eyes. I must have lain long in the grass, for the shadow that was in front of me when I left the house had disappeared when I went back. I ( Read more... )

I found this an unexpectedly brilliant novel. As it starts it seems like simply a fairly plain tale of being black in Michigan. But it opens up into a fascinating voyage for the protagonist, Macon "Milkman" Dead, as he discovers the truth about his own family's past, criss-crossing America to explore both geography and history in a process of self- ( Read more... )

20) The God of Small Things, by Arundhati Roy
21) Beloved, by Toni Morrison

Further to my previous post, these two books turned out to be a pretty effective paired reading, though rather morbid if you are lying in bed trying to forget about feeling ill ( Read more... )

Actually the full list of books I own but haven't read is here. The ten most frequently tagged as "unread" by other Librarything users are:

1. The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky ( ☑)
2. Persuasion, by Jane Austen ( ☑)
3. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy ( ☑)
4. Beloved by Toni Morrison ( ☑)
5. The Prince, by Niccolo Machiavelli ( ☑)
6. The System of the ( Read more... )