Monday, March 7, 2011

The 2011 book quest.

Two and a half years ago, on the 24th of august, I moved to this city. 
Three days later I began studying history at the local university. Now I have always been an ... Well let's just call it an enthusiastic reader, I basically read everything I could get my hands on. And so even though the older students told us there would be so much to read that we would never be able to read it all, I tried to do just that. 


I read all the required pages and then some, I read the suggested reading and asked for more, but even though I loved reading I started to loathe reading about history, so I stopped. The thing is, I was never a very good student. I love learning, but on my own terms. So when reading about history started to bore me, I just stopped. I still made it through my classes okay, and I still to this day love history, but studying it did something to me, something horrible. It killed my joy in reading. 


I didn't stop reading, but I got really bad at it. Stopping halfway through a book too start another, telling myself I would finish the first one once I was done with this new exiting one, then stopping halfway through that to begin a new book, and so on.

I have been a very naughty reader and it needs to stop! 



Last week I thought of a way to hopefully save my love of reading from certain oblivion, and so this is my plan:

1) I shall read a book for every week in the year 2011.
2) They must all be works of fiction.
3) I do not have to read a book every week but I must have read 52 books by midnight on the 31st of December 2011.

Those are the three simple rules. Seeing as we are already in march I was already behind when I started, by 6 books nonetheless. But over the weekend I managed to finish an old one and read one aloud to my girlfriend. So by the start of this week I was only 5 behind.


The books I have read so far are:


1) Lewis Wallace: Ben Hur


2) Agatha Christie: Murder on the Nile


3) Dan Brown: The Lost Symbol


4) Rudyard Kipling: The Jungle book


5) Jostein Gaarder: Sophie's World





The only one I have read before was the Gaarder one, but that was 10 years ago. It was still the same, very heavy in the beginning and hard to get in to, but after a while i couldn't let go of it. And all that hard work of making it through the history of philosophy is rewarded in the end when you make it to the philosophic garden party with all it's sidesplitting sillyness.


The Kipling disappointed me, I had thought it to be more clever and witty, but I was left with an easy to read bedtime story for my girlfriend (Whose name I shall not mention, but let's just call her A for now cos this whole " my girlfriend" thing is just silly), which, don't get me wrong, is fine, but when you expect greatness and find *meh* disappointment is inevitable. 


The Brown was amazing, not because it was any different than the other ones in the series, but because I shelled out the double amount of money for a copy that had colour pictures, maps and all sorts of neat details. It really helped bring the story to life. Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code were easier for me to relate to, because I have been to Rome and Paris, but I have never been to Washington and so the pictures made it seem like I was getting a guided tour of the city.


The Christie was, like any Christie, well thought out. It was the only of the five books that I read in english. I love reading books in english, especially if they were originally written that way. It adds something to the voice of the book, but since I'm not exactly rich and I love owning my books, I often buy them at second hand stores and there the amount of books in english are limited. 


And lastly the Wallace, I get why it's a classic. It was well written, had action and drama. I enjoyed it quite a lot, maybe a little too much in A's opinion. She had a hard time getting me away from it for long periods of time.
So on to new books, stories and adventures.

Right now I'm reading Robin Hood. Next up on my list is A Farewell to Arms. 


I plan to read, as I've always done, a little in a lot of genres and for a long time I've wanted to read some of the old classics that I've never gotten around to. Thus the Ben Hur and Robin Hood. 

Well I'm of to read about Robert of locksley and all his merry men, toodles.

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