Reading Challenges 2011: The Book Lists!

I never abide by the book lists I set for myself when beginning a reading challenge, but goodness I love making lists of books.  Below are listed the potential reads for several of my challenges I'm participating in next year.

To Be Read Challenge:

Goal:  to read 12 books off my TBR list in 2011.  I've comprised a list of 24 titles as we are allowed to have alternates; when possible, I kept my alternates to the same author.  Once this list is in place it cannot be changed!

1. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (alternate: A Place of Greater Safety)
2. Excellent Women by Barbara Pym (alternate: Quartet in Autumn)
3. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters  (alternate: The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt)
4. No Name by Wilkie Collins (alternate:  The Dead Secret)
5. The Red Queenby Philippa Gregory DONE! (alternate: The Other Boleyn Girl)
6. The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox  (alternate: The Alienist by Caleb Carr)
7. In this House of Bredeby Rumer Godden DONE! (alternate: Father Melancholy's Daughter by Gail Godwin)
8. The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes DONE!by Janet Malcolm   (alternate:  The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath)
9. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood  (alternate: The Year of the Flood)
10. Alice I Have Been DONE! by Melanie Benjamin  (alternate: The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton)
11. The Professor by Charlotte Bronte  (alternate: Shirley)
12. Little Dorrit  DONE! by Charles Dickens (alternate Our Mutual Friend)

Vintage Mystery Challenge:

Goal: Read 4-6 vintage mysteries

1. The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie DONE!
2. Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey
3. Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers DONE!
4. Mystery Mile by Margery Allingham
5. Footsteps in the Dark by Georgette Heyer
6. The Leavenworth Case by Anna Katherine Green
7. The Hound of Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Man Booker Challenge:

Goal:  Read 12 of the winning, short-listed, or long-listed titles.

1. Room by Emma Donoghue  DONE!
2. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters
3. The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt
4. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
5. Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym
6. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
7. Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller
8. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
9. The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch
10. Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie
11. England, England by Julian Barnes
12. Life of Pi by Yann Martel

What's in a Name Challenge 4

1. Read 1 book with a number in the title:  The Eight by Karen Neville
2. Read one book with jewelry or gem in the title:  The Ruby in the Smoke by Philip Pullman
3. Read one book with size in the title:  Little Dorrit DONE!by Charles Dickens
4. Read one book with travel or movement in the title:  The Lost Traveller by Antonia White DONE!
5. Read one book with evil in the title:  The Bad Seedby William March DONE!
6. Read one book with a life stage in the title:  The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt

The First in a Series Challenge:

Goal:  Read three books that are the first in any series.

1. The Queen's Man by Sharon Kay Penman DONE!
2. The Wreath by Sigrid Undset
3. The Ruby in the Smoke by Phillip Pullman
4. The Greatest Knight by Elizabeth Chadwick
5. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Seconds Challenge:

Goal:  read 12 books that are the second in a series or the second time I’ve read the author.

1. The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory DONE!
2. Hugh and Bess by Susan Higginbotham
3. The Lost Traveller by Antonia White  DONE!
4. Elizabeth Gaskell
5. Stella Gibbons
6. Kate Morton
7. Margery Allingham
8. Georgette Heyer
9. Sharon Kay Penman DONE!
10. Dorothy Whipple DONE!
11. Ivy Compton-Burnett
12. Elizabeth Taylor

Chivalrous Deeds Historical Challenge:  

Goal:  Read seven historical fiction books

1. Katherine by Anya Seton
2. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
3. The Red Queen by Phillipa Gregory DONE!
4. The Greatest Knight by Elizabeth Chadwick
5. Hugh and Bess by Susan Higginbotham
6. When Christ and his Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman
7. Victoria Victorious by Jean Plaidy
8. Mary Queen of Scots and the Isles by Margaret George
9. I, Elizabeth by Rosalind Miles
10. The Queen of Last Hopes by Susan Higginbotham
11. Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
12. Memoirs of Cleopatra by Margaret George
13. Elizabeth I: A Novel by Margaret George DONE!

Dystopia Challenge :

Goal:  Read five Dystopian novels

1. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
2. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
3. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
4. Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood
5. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
6. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan
7. V for Vendetta by Alan Moore

Japanese Literature Challenge 5

Goal:  Read one Haruki Murakami novel







Read 4-7 spooky books, watch 3 spooky films, and complete the Fragile Things and Gaskell's Gothic Tales read-along.

• At Bertram’s Hotel by Agatha Christie
• Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier
• The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters
• The Dead Secret by Wilkie Collins
• The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox
• The Alienist by Caleb Carr
• The Ruby in the Smoke by Philip Pullman
• The Haunted Doll’s House by M R James
• Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs
• The Bad Seed by William March
• Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
• The Woman in Black by Susan Hill (re-read)
• Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
• Gothic Tales by Elizabeth Gaskell