Ten books in March

For a total of 26 out of a total of 75 for this year.

1. Memoirs of a Geisha from the BBC list
2. The Da Vinci Code from the BBC list, also the Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge list (I also saw the movie, which was Task 18 of Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge 2016--in case you're curious, the movie was better!)
3. Korean Beauty Secrets: A Practical Guide to Cutting-Edge Skincare and Makeup
4. Lies & the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair & Balanced Look at the Right from the Rory list, also Task 21 of Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge 2016
5. Sacred Time Rory
6. Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers Rory, also Task 2 of Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge 2016
7. Atonement BBC, also Rory
8. The Shining Task 1 of the Read Harder Challenge, Rory
9. A Beautiful Place to Die Task 16 of the Read Harder Challenge 2016
10. Galápagos Rory

Progress so far

From the Rory list:

1] Daughter of Fortune, Isabelle Allende
2] Eleanor Roosevelt, Vol 1, 1884-1933
3] Galápagos, Kurt Vonegut
4] I'm with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie
5] The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
6] The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition, Donald Kagan
7] Quattrocento
8] Sacred Time
9] Tender Is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
10] The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
11] The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age
12] War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy

from the BBC list:

13] The Lord of the Rings, Book 2: The Two Towers, J. R. R. Tolkein
14] Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
15] The Time Traveler's Wife
16] The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck
17] The Kite Runner
18 ] Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernières
19] Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden
20] The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown
21] The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
22] Atonement, Ian McKeon
23] Life of Pi
24] A Suitable Boy
25] The Shadow of the Wind
26] Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
27] The Secret History, Donna Tartt
28] The Lovely Bones

The 2015 Read Harder Challenge:

29] SwitchFlipped (Read a book from an independent press)
30] A Guest Of Honour (Read an author from Africa)
31] Half-Breed (Read an author who is a member of an indigenous people)
32]The Princess Bride (Read a romance novel)
34] Macbeth (Read a retelling of well-known story)
35] Lays of Ancient Rome (Read collection of poems)
36] Imperial Spain, 1469-1716, J. H. Elliott (Read a book recommended by someone)
37] Go Ask Malice: A Slayer's Diary (Read a guilty pleasure)
38] I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence (Read a self-help book)

and 37 other titles to be determined, one of which will be

39] The Color Purple, Alice Walker

And now, to fill out my 75 titles, additions from the 2016 Read Harder Challenge. This is a draft of my early picks, selected because they're either already on my list, or are on the Rory Gilmore reading list:

Task 1: Read a Horror Book
40] The Shining, Steven King (Rory)

Task 2: A non-fiction book about science
41] Stiff (Rory)

Task 3: A collection of essays
42] A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays, Mary McCarthy (Rory)

Task 4: read a book out loud to someone else
TBD

Task 5: Read a middle grade novel
43] Deenie by Judy Blume (Rory)

Task 6: Read a biography
Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette (Rory)
or
2] Eleanor Roosevelt Volume 1 1884-1933 (Rory)

Task 7: Read a dystopian or post-apocalyptic novel
21] The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood (BBC booklist)

Task 8: Read a book originally published in the decade you were born
44] Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg (Rory)

Task 9: Listen to an audiobook that has won an Audie award
45] The Twelve Clues of Christmas: A Royal Spyness Mystery, by Rhys Bowen, read by Katherine Kellgren

Task 10: Read a book over 500 pages long
24] A Suitable Boy (BBC list)

Task 11: Read a book under 100 pages
46] The Year of Magical Thinking: A Play by Joan Didion (Rory)
or
The Art of War, Sun Tzu (Rory)
or
The Little Prince (BBC)

Task 12: Read a book by or about a person who identifies as transgender
47] She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders, Jenner Boylan

Task 13: Read a book that is set in the Middle East
48] Palace Walk: The Cairo Trilogy, Volume 1, Naguib Mahfouz

Task 14: Read a book by an author from Southeast Asia
49] Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Dai Sijie (Rory)

Task 15: Read a book of historical fiction set before 1900
12] War and Peace (Rory)

Task 16: Read the first book in a series by a person of color
50] TBD

Task 17: Read a non-superhero comic that debuted in the past three years
51] TBD

Task 18: Read a book that was adapted into a movie, then watch the movie.
16] The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck (BBC)

or

23] Life of Pi (BBC)

Task 19: Read a non-fiction book about feminism, or deals with feminist themes
52] Backlash, Susan Faludi (Rory)

or

The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir (Rory)

Task 20: Read a book about religion
53] The Gnostic Gospels, Elaine Pagels (Rory)

Task 21: Read a book about politics, in your country or another (fiction or non-fiction)
54] Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken (Rory)

Task 22: Read a food memoir
55] Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain (Rory)

Task 23: Read a play
56] Henry IV Part I (Rory)

Task 24: Read a book about a character who has a mental illness
57} Girl, Interrupted (Rory)

My 2016 Reading Challenge (updated to subtract what I've read this year)

For the fourth year in a row, I'm participating in the GoodReads reading challenge. I'm planning to read 75 books.

My list is a continuation of last year's, where, again, I set a goal of reading 75 books. I selected 75 books from the Rory Gilmore Book List, the BBC Book List, and the Read Harder Challenge.

This was very ambitious of me, because some of the books on my list were Very Heavy Going Indeed. I didn't manage to read the 75 titles from these extremely worthy lists--far from it--there were cozy mysteries that needed reading, too!

For this year, I retained all the books I hadn't read in 2015, so I'm like the U. S. Government--already in debt. I kept the leftovers and added new titles to suit the tasks of the 2016 Read Harder Challenge. Many of the books work for more than one part of the list, which frees up some books for me to pick.

From the Rory list:

1] Daughter of Fortune, Isabelle Allende
2] Eleanor Roosevelt, Vol 1, 1884-1933
3] I'm with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie
4] The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
5] The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition, Donald Kagan
6] Quattrocento
7] The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age
8] War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy

from the BBC list:


9] Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
10] The Time Traveler's Wife
11] The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck
12] Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernières
13] The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
14] Life of Pi
15] A Suitable Boy
16] The Shadow of the Wind
17] Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
28] The Secret History, Donna Tartt
29] The Lovely Bones

The 2015 Read Harder Challenge:

30] SwitchFlipped (Read a book from an independent press)
32] Half-Breed (Read an author who is a member of an indigenous people)
33] Lays of Ancient Rome (Read collection of poems)
34] Imperial Spain, 1469-1716, J. H. Elliott (Read a book recommended by someone)
35] Go Ask Malice: A Slayer's Diary (Read a guilty pleasure)
36] The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck (Read a self-help book)

and 37 other titles to be determined, one of which will be

37] The Color Purple, Alice Walker

And now, to fill out my 75 titles, additions from the 2016 Read Harder Challenge. This is a draft of my early picks, selected because they're either already on my list, or are on the Rory Gilmore reading list:


Task 3: A collection of essays
38] A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays, Mary McCarthy (Rory)

Task 4: read a book out loud to someone else
TBD

Task 7: Read a dystopian or post-apocalyptic novel
The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood (BBC booklist)

Task 8: Read a book originally published in the decade you were born
39] Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg (Rory)


Task 11: Read a book under 100 pages
40] The Year of Magical Thinking: A Play by Joan Didion (Rory)
or
The Art of War, Sun Tzu (Rory)
or
The Little Prince (BBC)

Task 13: Read a book that is set in the Middle East
41] Palace Walk: The Cairo Trilogy, Volume 1, Naguib Mahfouz

Task 14: Read a book by an author from Southeast Asia
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Dai Sijie (Rory)

Task 15: Read a book of historical fiction set before 1900
War and Peace (Rory)


Task 17: Read a non-superhero comic that debuted in the past three years
42] TBD

Task 19: Read a non-fiction book about feminism, or deals with feminist themes
43] Backlash, Susan Faludi (Rory)

or

The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir (Rory)

Task 20: Read a book about religion
44] The Gnostic Gospels, Elaine Pagels (Rory)


Task 23: Read a play
45] Henry IV Part I (Rory)

Task 24: Read a book about a character who has a mental illness
46] Girl, Interrupted (Rory)