Reading with Style discussion

While not required, many like to share their reading plans. This is the place to do so.

Reserved

Options - all pub years: (and for the record - 7 mysteries challenge, 2 for my personal 19th century challenge, and another towards being a Faulkner completist)

09 - The Hollow Needle: Further Adventures of Arsène Lupin by Maurice Leblanc OR John Thorndyke's Cases by R. Austin Freeman
18 - The Temptation of Forgiveness by Donna Leon
27 - Mosquitoes by William Faulkner
36 - The Strange Case of Harriet Hall by Moray Dalton
45 - Bedelia by Vera Caspary OR Night Has a Thousand Eyes by Cornell Woolrich
54 - Three Men Out by Rex Stout OR Maigret Goes to School by Georges Simenon
63 - Death in the Wasteland by George Bellairs
72 - Poor Miss Finch by Wilkie Collins OR Under the Greenwood Tree by Thomas Hardy
81 - The House by the Medlar Tree by Giovanni Verga
90 - The Flanders Panel by Arturo Pérez-Reverte OR Where You Once Belonged by Kent Haruf

There are four new-to-me authors, and six or seven titles that I hope will count for the mysteries challenge.

single criterion (publishing date) and numerical finish

√2009 Homer & Langley by E.L. Doctorow
√2018 The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware
1927 Benighted by J.B. Priestley OR Unnatural Death by Dorothy L. Sayers
1936 The Penrose Mystery by R. Austin Freeman
1945 He'd Rather Be Dead by George Bellairs
1954 The Blunderer by Patricia Highsmith
1963 The Game-Players of Titan by Philip K. Dick
1972 An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P.D. James
1981 The Man With a Load of Mischief by Martha Grimes
1990 Gallowglass by Barbara Vine

Well, that took some work! I am going off script and using this as yet another opportunity to keep hacking away at the tower of (owned) books. I did manage to come up with a plan with all owned books, but mixed criteria.

09: True Colors (pub 2009)
18: The Immortalists (pub 2018)
27: The Big Four (pub 1927) >also for mystery challenge
36: The Assassin's Song (336 pgs) or Zero K
45: The Prince of Tides (born 1945) or Clapton: The Autobiography or The End of East
54: Birds Without Wings (554 pgs)
63: The Little Friend (born 1963)
72: The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards (272 pgs) or Half Broke Horses or Monument Rock
81: Twice Shy (pub 1981) >mystery challenge
90: The Cat Who Talked to Ghosts (pub 1990) >mystery challenge

I had some time on my hands, so I came up with another plan. This time with page number as the criterion.

09: The Dark Vineyard >mystery challenge (309 pgs)
18: Human Acts (218 pgs)
27: I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban (327 pgs)
36: The End of Your Life Book Club (336 pgs)
45: The End of East (245 pgs)
54: No Groom at the Inn (154 pgs)
63: Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (263 pgs)
72: Half Broke Horses (272 pgs)
81: Leaving the Atocha Station (181 pgs)
90: A Christmas Beginning (190 pgs)

I'll probably use my number of pages list since I own many of the books.

Publication Year Ideas:
1909-The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart OR
2009-The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe
1918-The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley OR
2018-The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn
1927-Ashenden by W. Somerset Maugham
1936-Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier
1945-The Horizontal Man by Helen Eustis
1954-The Blunderer by Patricia Highsmith
1963-Maigret and the Bum by Georges Simenon
1972-Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya
1981-Death in a Tenured Position by Amanda Cross
1990-Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley

Number of Pages Ideas:
09 Bobcat and Other Stories by Rebecca Lee 209 pages
18 The Haunting of Maddy Clare by Simone St. James 318 pages OR
Loves Music, Loves to Dance by Mary Higgins Clark 318 pages
27 Summer by Edith Wharton 127 pages OR
A Certain Age by Beatriz Williams 327 pages
36 Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History by Erik Larson 336 pages OR
The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers 336 pages
45 The Man in the Picture by Susan Hill 145 pages OR
The Jazz Palace by Mary Morris 245 pages OR
Death of a Kingfisher by M.C. Beaton 245 pages
54 Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah 454 pages OR
One of My Sons by Anna Katharine Green 254 pages
63 Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind 263 pages
72
81 Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith 281 pages OR
Dear Mrs. Bird by A.J. Pearce 281 pages
90 Old Filth by Jane Gardam 290 pages

Single criterion: year published, and reading in order

2009 - Change of Life by Anne Stormont
2018 - Transcription by Kate Atkinson - mystery
1927 - The Crow's Inn Tragedy by Annie Haynes - mystery
1936 - Below the Clock by J.V. Turner - mystery
1945 -
1954 - Contempt by Alberto Moravia
1963 - A God and His Gifts by Ivy Compton-Burnett
1972 -
1981 - The False Inspector Dew by Peter Lovesey - mystery
1990

This will take some planning. I think I’m going to use publication year only as I’ve been looking at publication years when researching books for the mysteries challenge.

xx09
xx18
xx27
xx36
xx45
xx54
xx63
xx72
xx81
xx90

Number of pages

Secrets We Keep - 309pgs
Winter's Mourn - 318pgs
Gray Matter - 327pgs
Sunset and Sawdust - 336pgs
Woodrose Mountain - 345pgs
Treasure Hunt - 354pgs
Hanging by a Thread - 263pgs
Open House - 272pgs
The Ocean at the End of the Lane - 181pgs
All the Good Girls - 290pgs

Birth years:

09 - Eudora Welty, Edgar Allen Poe, Wallace Stegner
18 - Muriel Spark, Philip José Farmer
27 - Robert Ludlum, Mary Higgins Clark, Gunter Grass, Elizabeth Peters
36 - Tom Robbins, Don DeLillo, A.S. Byatt, Marge Piercy, A B Yehoshua
45 - Dean Koontz, August Wilson, Connie Willis, Katherine Dunn
54 - Kazuo Ishiguro, Mary Gaitskill, Emma Bull, Louise Erdrich, Gregory Maguire
63 - Laurell K. Hamilton, Ann Patchett, Alice Sebold, Donna Tartt, Scott Westerfeld (lexiles too low), Michael Chabon, Jacqueline Woodson
72 - N.K. Jemisin, China Miéville, Joe Hill
81 - Karen Russell, Fredrik Backman, Maggie Stiefvater
90 - Julia Armfield, Agatha Christie

Page Numbers:
09: Cloud Atlas, The Family Fang, A Lion Among Men - wrong in list; now 312pp, Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche
18: Ashes in My Mouth, Sand in My Shoes, The Killing Moon, The Thing Around Your Neck
27: The Andromeda Strain, Fair Play, The Farm, Poison Study
36: Tete Blanche, Bellman & Black, Brown Girl Dreaming, The Buried Giant, Flight Behavior, War for the Oaks, Behind the Scenes at the Museum
45: Heavy: An American Memoir, Homeland and Other Stories, Parable of the Sower
54: Smoke Gets in Your Eyes & Other Lessons from the Crematory, Dreams of Joy
63: Self-Help, Jesus Land: A Memoir, The Drawing of the Three
72: More Than This, My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry, The Name of the Wind, Netherland, Tipping the Velvet
81: Stories of Your Life and Others, The True Deceiver, Tulip Fever, Zombie
90: The Queen's Fool, The Constant Princess

My plan: I am going by publication year...due to the mystery challenge.

1909: The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart
1918: The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley
1927: The Big Four by Agatha Christie
1936: Cards on the Table by Agatha Christie
1945: Died in the Wool by Ngaio Marsh
1954: The Toll-Gate by Georgette Heyer
1963: Maigret and the Bum by Georges Simenon
1972: Elephants Can Remember by Agatha Christie
1981: Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith
1990: Gallowglass by Barbara Vine

Birth years

1981 - NoViolet Bulawayo, Cecilia Ahern
1972 - China Miéville, Maggie O'Farrell
1963 - Donna Tartt, Michael Chabon, Yann Martel (author), Stephanie Barron
1954 - Oprah Winfrey, Kazuo Ishiguro, Sandra Cisneros
1945 - Shiva Naipaul, John Banville, Dean Koontz, Annie Dillard
1936 - Stephen Ambrose, Don DeLillom James Lee Burke, Larry McMurtry, A S Byatt, Georges Perec, Jean M. Auel
1927 - Robert Ludlum, Gabriel García Márquez, Mary Higgins Clark, Gunther Grass
1918 - Muriel Spark, Mickey Spillane, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
1909 - Nelson Algren, Eric Ambler, John Fante, Gabrielle Roy
1890 - Agatha Christie, Conrad Richter, Jean Rhysm H. P. Lovecraft
1881 - T. S. Stribling, Ethel M. Dell, Elizabeth Madox Roberts, Rose Macaulay, P. G. Wodehouse
1872 - Paul Laurence Dunbar, Zane Grey, Max Beerbohm, Pío Baroja
1863 - Gene Stratton Porter, Violet Jacob, Henry de Vere Stacpoole, Arthur Machen
1854 - Alice Mona Caird, Oscar Wilde, Francis Marion Crawford, W. C. Morrow, Clara Louise Burnham, Sarah Grand
1845 - Lucy Bethia Walford, Emily Lawless, José Maria de Eça de Queirós
1836 - Emily Sarah Holt, Matilda Betham-Edwards, Bret Harte, Marietta Holley
1827 - Edward Bradley, Johanna Spyri, Lew Wallace
1818 - Ivan Turgenev, Frederick Douglass, Karl Marx
1809 - Edgar Allan Poe, Nikolai Gogol

Pub years

✔️#260 18 - My Year of Rest and Relaxation,
✔️ #129 09 - Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog: The Amazing Adventures of an Ordinary Woman
✔️ 27 - Emily's Quest
✔️ 36The Lady Vanishes
✔️ 45 -Bedelia,
✔️ #866 54 - No Time for Sergeants
✔️ 63 Men in the Sun and Other Palestinian Stories
✔️ 72 - Erewhon
✔️ 81 - When Bad Things Happen to Good People
90 - L.A. Confidential, Brazzaville Beach, The Great God Pan, News from Nowhere, A Bride from the Bush, The Witching Hour Animal Dreams

Page count
427 - The Raw Shark Texts
218 - Musical Chairs
390 - The Lake of Dead Languages
336 - Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative
336 - The Truths We Hold: An American Journey
236 - Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man
254 - Saving CeeCee Honeycutt
309 - Shanghai Girls
190 - Hiwassee: A Novel of the Civil War
272- The Shadow Witch;, Half Broke Horses

Norma wrote: "Number of pages

Secrets We Keep - 309pgs
"

Norma, all of your selections meet your intended criteria except this one, which has an MPE of 334.

Let me know if I can help by generating a list of "09" page counts.

Connie wrote: "I'll probably use my number of pages list since I own many of the books.

Number of Pages Ideas:"

Connie - all of your ideas for number of pages work EXCEPT the 81 option of

The Falls, where the MPE is 512 rather than 481

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Connie wrote: "I'll probably use my number of pages list since I own many of the books.

Number of Pages Ideas:"

Connie - all of your ideas for number of pages work EXCEPT the 81 option of

..."</i>

Thank you for checking the page counts of the books, Elizabeth. It would have been disappointing to read such a long book, and not have it count! I'm substituting [book:Dear Mrs. Bird by A.J. Pearce.

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Norma wrote: "Number of pages

Secrets We Keep - 309pgs
"

Norma, all of your selections meet your intended criteria except this one, which has an MPE of 334.

Let me know if I can ..."

Thank you Elizabeth, a list of '09 page counts would be very helpful.

Here you go, Norma! There are a few mysteries on there, including a Stuart Woods, though that might be a reread for you.

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Here you go, Norma! There are a few mysteries on there, including a Stuart Woods, though that might be a reread for you.

..."

Could you add tabs to that with the other page counts from the database? I'm finding looking up page counts really laborious.

Joanna wrote: "Could you add tabs to that with the other page counts from the database? I'm finding looking up page counts really laborious."

Done. These are the page counts as we carry them in the database at the time the books were read by members. Unless someone reports a change, we're unlikely to update them.

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Here you go, Norma! There are a few mysteries on there, including a Stuart Woods, though that might be a reread for you.

..."

Thank you Elizabeth.

As we are in lockdown and the libraries are closed, I am going with a hodgepodge of books I have on hand.

09. UFO in Her Eyes pub 2009
18. Grey Sister pub 2018
27. The Man Who Loved Children 527 pages
36. Duplicate Death 336 pages
45. Carmen pub 1845
54. To the End of the Land born 1954
63. Future Home of the Living God 263 pages
72. The Mandelbaum Gate 272 pages
81. The Infernal Battalion born 1981
90. The Secret Pilgrim pub 1990

Will do in reverse order

09 could finally read windup girl but dont feel like it
18 Kill the Farm Boy
27 checkout To the Lighthouse
34 checkout online The Ways of White Folks or physically The Nine Tailors
45 checkout online A Bookshop in Berlin or animal farm but might take longer
54 The Broken Sword
63 Way Station
72 The Gods Themselves
81 Downbelow Station
90 can use Thomas the Rhymer pub 1990

Year of publication option:

2009:
Let the Great World Spin
This is Where I Leave You
A Reliable Wife

2018:
Educated
Where the Crawdads Sing
An American Marriage
The Immortalists
The Kiss Quotient

1927:
To the Lighthouse
Unnatural Death
The Gangs of New York

1936:
The A.B.C. Murders
Murder in the Cathedral

1945:
The Great Divorce
The Pursuit of Love
Cannery Row

1954:
Sweet Thursday
A Spy in the House of Love
100 Selected Poems

1963:
Joy in the Morning
Barefoot in the Park

1972:
Watership Down
No Name in the Street
Transparent Things
The Clock Winder

1981:
Cujo
The Hotel New Hampshire
The Door in the Hedge

1990:
The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way
Get Shorty
Age of Iron

Author birth year option:

1809: Alfred, Lord Tennyson
1818: Ivan Turganev, Emily Bronte/1918: Muriel Spark, Madeleine L'Engle
1927: Edward Abbey, Neil Simon, Erma Bombeck
1936: A.S. Byatt
1945: August Wilson
1954: Louise Erdrich
1963: Donna Tartt, Michael Chabon
1972: Maggie O'Farrell, N.K. Jemisin
1981: Karen Russell, NoViolet Bulawayo
1890: Agatha Christie, Karel Capek/1990: Kiran Millwood Hargrave