Tallulah's New Challenge for 2011 - 20 books will do

After failing last years challenge (with reading 18 books out of a goal of 25), I give me a lower goal of 20 Books of the Shelf! I'll count everybook that entered my Shelves before 1.1.2011. So, I am happy to have received some books last year (which had to wait then) that'll count this year :D




I try to reach the end of the Rainbow :)

Books off the Shelf in 2011:
Jaunary:
1. Mörderische Weihnachten - 17.01.2011
2. Weihnachten mit Hans-Christian Andersen - 18.01.2011

February
3. The Journals of Eleanor Druse - 02.02.2011
4. Bridget Jones's Diary - 09.02.2011
5. Musik - 11.02.2011
6. Journey to the Centre of the Earth - 17.02.2011
7. Schaurige Geschichten - 23.02.2011

March:
8. The Oxford History of Britain - 06.03.2011
9. Das steinerne Herz - 21.03.2011

April:
10. Parzival Band 1 - 11.04.2011
11. Parzival Band 2 - 21.04.2011

May:
-

June:
12. Adventures of a Simpleton - 24.06.2011

July:
13. The Lord of the Rings - 27.07.2011
14. The Rider on the White Horse - 31.07.2011

August:
15. Myst: The Book of Atrus - 07.08.2011
16. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - 21.08.2011
17. Geest - 29.08.2011

September:
18. Johannes Cabal the Necromancer - 11.09.2011

October:
19. Queen of Candesce - 03.10.2011

November:

December:
Lebensbilder - 14.12.2011
Mecklenburgs Volkssagen - 28.12.2011
__________________________

Books added to TBR: ***|*|||**|*|||*|***|****|****

Stats:
Books read this year: 53
Books read from TBR: 21
Books added to TBR: 19
Librarybooks read: 4
New books read: 22
Re-Read: 6
Balance: positive (+2 read)

Nice ticker!

Best of luck this year!

You may not have reached your goal but you definitely did better than me! Even though you reduced your goal, you're still reaching beyond this year's accomplishment. Good stretch!

Thanks for your good wishes. I think I might acually reach the goal because I have to read lots of books I already own to prepare myself for my final exams at uni, so I really hope there is something to reach.

Finished Mörderische Weihnachten (touchstone-system rather problematic lately) which I bought on 1st December last year. Some of this short crime stories were really good and I enjoyed reading it.

I'll update the group-ticker at the end of the month.

second book off the shelf!
Read Weihnachten mit Hans-Christian Andersen, which I already started in 2010. it is a collection of some of his fairytales and letters connected with christmas. i liked some of the fairytales, and it's very interested he imagnied them all by himself. also some of the letters were rather interesting.

Third one done.
The Journals of Eleanor Druse where not exactly what I expected. it started of slowly and got sidetracked by the long and not really relevent story of Eleanor Druse's personal health and how noone believes her. Then in the middle it got a bit exciting, with the strange things going on in Kingdom Hospital but towards the end failed again. No real end. Normal books would start right here, but that's probably duw to the fact, that it is kind of the prequel to the ABC mini series 'Kingdom Hospital'. As I had a look on the setting of the series, I saw it starts around the time when the novel ends... so possible explanation here.

I got this book from BookMooch last year November or Deecember and there it'll go again straight away.

And another book of the shelf!
Bridget Jones's Diary was a fun and light read and made me laugh sometimes (happens rarely with books). The writing style was really interesting and highly enjoyable at times. But (and it's a great but) Bridget really annoyed me sometimes, here self-centered thoughts got me to brink of bearence. Though she never ever could have so unnerving as her mother (and with that mother now wonder she's been the way she is). I like Mark Darcy's saying her: Her mother being 'the most impossible person in the world'. Great. Brought it to the point.

Finished 'Musik' by Thomas Meinecke yesterday night. I had to read that for my class, if it would not have been for that I would have probably skipped it.
It wa snot really bad, but it had no story let alone plot, it was throughing around with musik groups, songs and styles, referring to various feminist theories and people, trying to bring them together in some way. It was not even boring but it was just not what I like.

and balanced my income-outcome of books by this :) Now I've read five this year and brought five home.

6 read, 6 bought. I think that is a fair outcome so far.
Journey to the Centre of the Earth was a nice quick and interesting read. it was fascinating and exciting at points but didn't last too long with unneccessary and unimportant sidestories. it came straight to the point and not time was wasted with telling other things then those necessary. Am glad to finally have read this classic!

Looks like you are doing much better with your challenge than I am doing eith my own. Looks like I need to catch up. (I am only counting books I got before 2010, however).

I am nearly done with half of my goal! If that isn't great, I don't know what is then. I actually think about increasing the goal. Let's see how far I will be at the end of February and decide...

Listened to Schaurige Geschichten which contained stories by Meyrink, Mauspassant, Steven et al. The stories where not really eerie, but I see how they were thought to be when they were written. I liked most of them, because the narrators did a great job and they were not bad either. But nothing I would term eerie or shocking today.

Round-up:
I am feeling it is time to make a short overview of my achievements so far.
Books read from TBR-shelves: 7
Books added to TBR-shelves: 11
Books read in 2011: 12

well, that is not that shining actually. I never actually believed I could read only books from the TBR but I never thought I would be so book addicted, that I'd bring that many books home... Okay well, I'll take it as encouragement for the remaining months (a lot :D )

After more than 1 year I finished reading The Oxford History of Britain, which was very good. I think it took me so long because from school history classes where not my cup of tea and I took that with me. Than I had to read it for one of my exams and now it's finally finished.
It was really good over much of the time. Some chapters were not very much on the point but generally it was a very good overview and a good beginning for a deeper research on the subjects. nevertheless as I am a foreign student of british history, I have not the schoolish backgorund but the authors very much rel on that. so it never became uncomprehensible to me, I had the wish for a bit more introductory notes at parts.

My ninth book of the shelf this year: Das steinerne Herz by Arno Schmidt. Very unusual writing style, kinda stream of consciousness (or maybe it is SOC, I am not sure). but after getting used to it it had a somewhat interesting story. set in 1954 germany it describes the situation between the two germanies and had a small journey to berlin.
but honestly, if it hadn't been for my university reading list I would never have cared to read it...

After quite a long time I finished reading Parzival Band 1 It is an epic german medieval novel and sometimes it i quite entertaining. It has a high status because it gives such a good view into medieval times and virtues. next up is Parzival Band 2 then, to see how the story goes on.

More important: I balanced my income-outcome of books this year so far! I added just as much to the pile as I have read, if that isn't good news!

Congrats on making it half way:-) And you are doing so much better than me, adding about as much as you read, I am closer to adding twice as much myself :-)

*sigh* I was a very bad girl and added again one more book to the TBR... that makes my balance negative again. And even worse: This weekend I will visit the biggest bookshop I've ever seen. I hope my strength will last and I will not buy books *sure ;) *
Nevertheless, making good progress on Parzival Band II. But ther comes anothe problem: this is originally one book (consisting of 16 books, 'chapters' so to say) but now they come as two volumes. what shall I do? Count each of them as BOTS or not. I think I will, since for me it's rather the physical book that is TBR then the content. Otherwise I couldn't have counted Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone last year...

Yeah, good luck on not buying books :-)

If I remeber correctly Parzival is quite a chunk, so I think it's fair to count it as two books if it comes in two volumes. That's what I would do.

"There are two motives for reading a book; one, that you enjoy it; the other, that you can boast about it." — Bertrand Russell

But please, talk dirty and tell us more about this "biggest bookshop I've ever seen." ;)

But don't feel bad. You ought to see my Kindle library: 2,000 works and counting. Sigh. Oh well, you know what they say, 42 steps forward, 2,834 steps back.

BAAAD... Got to books from BookMooch today and in the last weeks aquired two other new books, that means my nice evened out balance is destroyed again. And futhermore I am not making any progress in reading any book...

oh, yes the biggest bookshop. Well, I don't know how big they are where you all come from, but that one had 5 huge floors and a big variety of books, but it did not feel good to be there. it was just kind of sterile in there and I didn't have that cosy feeling. and although they had so much space and the books where not very inspiring. It were the usual suspects so to say. I find a nice book on chinese characters for my boyfriend though.
I was happy when we went out again.

After more then two month I finished my 12th book off the shelf!
Adventures of a Simpleton was quite good satire of the 1600s and in parts still true for today. The whole story was partly a bit unlikely, he was captures way too many times but nevertheless, good stuff and not a complete waste of time.

21 - I agree with you on the big stores. I live in out the middle of the US and IF you can find a bookstore it will be small. I have traveled to both the East and West coasts and visited much hearlded (is that a word?) stores both places. I was so disappointed, not only was the atmosphere very impersonal, so were the employees. I also thought the inventory would be superior but it was pretty much what I would see at home, just more of it. When I travel I like to go to buy a book by a local or regional author that I would probably not have known about otherwise. I couldn't even find that in one of the stores, there was probably something there but I didn't see it and couldn't beat the crowds away for a good look.

23 - yes, the impersonality is quite annoying I think. And with the local authors yopur definitely right. In a very very samll bookshop I found some very good crime novels, but I have never seen anything of this author in any other bookchop (although it was published a well known publishing house). I also made the experience, that smaller bookstores have sometimes the best choice of books, because they have to decide :)
What was most disappointing for me, when I was in this 5-level-bookstore: I though the must have a huge variety on books in foreign languages. well they had a pretty large choice of englisch books in a single room (I live in Germany), but they had just as view frnch, spanish or russian books like my local bookstore and not even some lesser read languages like swedish. I found that very sad.

clue
Alright. I've gotta agree with you on those big chain booksores, though I have to defend the Strand in NYC.

I think the big ones are very good at moving the bestsellers, those books that are currently popular and sell very quickly. Large volumes of them (sorry for the pun); you can't fault their logistics.

Local bookstores, they're more geared to local tastes, thus yours, if you shop there often. Unfortunately, that means that in too many of them, at least half of the shelves are devoted to romance novels--though not so much since the Kindle came out.

well actually, my local bookstores do have quite a good choice on all different kinds of literature. of course they feature local authors (be they popular or not) a bit more, but nevertheless, they've got quite a choice (not halv of the invetory being romance novels ;) )

:) that's because you live in Germany, which has a fine upstanding literary tradition going all the way back to Gutenberg. don't rub it in.

I love the Another Country.

And you have better public transportation. The last few times I went to my favorite independent bookstore, there was no parking. Glad I did, though, because they finally convinced me to read state of wonder. another book on the shelf, but worth it.

'Another Country' looks great!

Ehm, I am sure, the choice of books has nothing to do with whatever literary tradition :) I have been in bad bookstores just as often as in good ones. Fortunately the bad ones are not around my town! :D
Here, you also have a very bad oppotunity for parking, because the inner city is a pedestrian area and you have to park your car a bit outside and have to walk a few hundred metres. :) Or you have to wriggle the car through the very narrow streets and try not to hit any of the many Byciclers or pedestrians/students ;)

Sucks to be you. Over here, we've managed to scare all the pedestrians, bicyclists and other pests off our streets.

To be serious for a moment, I'm pretty sure a city's history has a lot to do with what's being offered in bookstores. Tradition shapes tastes. I've yet to find a bad bookstore in SF, while the ones in LA either look like they're run by Charlie Sheen, are filled with douchebags trying to pick up girls, or extensions of a cafe. The choice being offered by the bookstores has so everything to do with its neighborhood.

For example, (at least in my neighborhood) the ones with lots of romance novels and cookbooks seem to be located near hair salons, dance studios, karate studios or pizza parlors; the ones near the universities carry mostly textbooks, except for the one run by the ordained minister, which specializes exclusively in, um, gardening. For example, psychedelic herbs. Borders and Barnes & Noble are right across the street from each other and are surrounded by other bland, suburban chain retailers.

The only one I can't make any sense of is, I don't know what it was. I assumed it was a bookstore because there were racks and bins filled with book outside (mostly architecture and coffee table books). The door was flanked by a stork carrying Charlie Chaplin with rainbow trailing the wings and on the other side, a monkey riding a purple unicorn. And walked right out after discovering it was packed with people dressed in gothic attire. I would've stayed to peruse their shelves had not the pretty (but extremely pale) girl who flashed me the bright smile not also been waving a snorkel and Krazy Glue in my direction. I just mumbled something and pretended I had really intended to go the place next door. Which turned out to be barber shop for kids. And that was the day I got a harmonica with my Dorothy Hamill haircut.*

* I also bought a fedora and people thought I was a really big fan of Mad Men. I had never watched the show until then.

you've definitely got a taste for adventurous places mate ;)

I updated my balance for this year, and, believe it or not, I am just one book in the negative! That's means, I have just added one more book to the pile than I actually read of it. I am positive to reduce this number further as the year dwells on! *happy*

edit1: somehting has gone a bit wrong with my stats... let's see if I can fix it :)

edit2: everything fixed.

again income and outcome of books is balanced! *yeah*

I read Lord of the Rings. Actually, I read that one some years ago in german already, but last year I bought it in English and read it. SInce it is a different öanguage and a different physical book, I'll count it for the challenge. It was a great experience and although it is quite a huge book I was a bit sad when it ended.

Blutsünde is a german crime novel, set in a city I know and part of my family lives and I liked it very much. It is the third in a series and the author really is good. She touches things in her books, that are usually seen as worn out, becuase talked and written about so often, like the GDR-Stasi and WWII, but she does it in an interesting way and pouints towards things, that usually slip the attention while discussind the aforesaid topics. Really good read!

Have not bought new books for quite a while, I hope this will hold and I really have less unread books on my shelf at the end of the year! ;)

Sounds interesting. Good timing, too. If there's an English translation, Partners & Crime will be sure to have it.

Which brings us back to great independent bookstores. Partners & Crime specializes in mysteries and such.

looks interesting. but even more interesting it is, since they are specializing in mysteries. a thing unthougt of in germany!

I finished yet another book in July: The Rider on the White Horse (dt. Schimmelreiter), which is considered to be a classic, but I did not really get why right now. Maybe a bit more thinking will do it.
Neverthelesss, it was interesting enough to be readable and quite a bit catchy sometimes.

finished yet another book off the shelf. I wondered why I hadn't catalagued it here on LT, but I know, it has been on the shelf for more than a year ;)

Myst: The Book of Atrus is one of three books belonging to the PC video games of the Myst-series. it is set before the series starts with Atrus as a young boy learning how to write worlds and learning about is roots and ancestry. It is highly recommended from me to all players of the Myst-games but also to all people who like Fantasy and think about how worlds are created. The books could still be deeper and more philosophical, but I liked how the characters were presented and that there is no clear good against evil structure. I also liked, that Atrus was not at alls perfect and also made mistakes and could not in the end tell his father, where his faults have been.

16 off the shelf now!

Just read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. It was delightful easy, humorous and catchy. I really enjoyed the read although an adult and I would definetly recommend it to children, especially boys.

Geest started not that badly actually. It became worse though towards the end. All the characters seemed to have extreme problems concerning sexual habits and feelings. The detective was not really interested in the case, but fell in love. and the end was just so confused, that I was a bit repelled.

Johannes Cabal the Necromancer was a light, humorous and kind of unexpected read. the author was playing with convention, idioms, proverbs and so on, what gave the book a underlying ironic tone. the book (or at least the german translation) was well written and the characters have some oddities, that make them the more interesting. The end was not completely unexpected, but was also not foreseeable. It was also a bit creepy....

My stats are saying I am just 2 books away from my goa. Very good! With some strictness towards myself I could probably reach the goal this month. Furthermore it looks like my balance comes to a halt with 7 more books read then added to TBR, because I seem to buy 1 new book for each one I read unconsciously lately. Maybe I oush that balance up a bit higher. If I am to reach my goal, I think I will try to increase it a bit further...

Queen of Candesce was quite good. The author made a brilliant job in thinking and describing the world it was set in: It's the future, some 1000 years or more after today and mankind has done the thing to bring a big balloon (really big!) into the endless universe. In it there are several small wheels, about 2-8sqkm where the people are living. One of those wheels is Spyre and that's were the story is set. The only problem was the story itself. I really liked the world and the nations described but the story was not that good actually. I had the feeling I either missed several explanation or they were just not there so that I sometimes couldn't follow the stream of action and why a character did what he did. I don't know if I will read the prequel and the sequels, I really would like to know more about the world actually.

I finally met my goal! I've read 20 Book off the Shelf this year!
Lebensbilder was a great read. It was a collection of short stories all featuring christian habits and values. but it was not just a book for christian believers (I am none), it was just a great read with great morales and hearttouching stories. Definitely recommended!

YAY YOU! congats :-)

Thank you very much!
I just updated my year-totals and found, that I also added 18 book onto the shelves this year... o.O So all in all, I just cleared 2 :D Well, I'm hoping to do a bit more reading in the Christmas break. I'll be travelling a lot, so possibly quite enough time to read on or two books until the end of the year!

Congratulations, Tallulah_Rose!

Two books down? I am so jealous, I think is started the year with 125 books to read and now have about 160 :-)

We've started a new Group for 2012.
here

I finished my 21st Book off the shelf this year!
Mecklenburgs Volkssagen (engl. probably 'Mecklenburgs legends') is a collection of legends and tales of the old Mecklenburg territory (today part of Mecklenburg-Western Pommerania). Some of the stories really were interesting, lots of them were different. Quite a lote went on about cities or villages sunken and a lake appearing, but it was nice to see the old beliefs. I just felt a bit sorry that I did not know most of the legendary points or that they are quite forgotten nowadays.

My year totals are stated in the first post, but I am glad I read two books more off the shelf than added to it!