Nicholas ([info]nhw) wrote,
@ 2006-09-14 17:53:00
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Entry tags:alice sebold, alice walker, arundhati roy, book memes, charlotte bronte, fyodor dostoevsky, jane austen, library thing, neal stephenson, niccolo machiavelli, st augustine, toni morrison, unread books project

Ten Books on my shelves that I haven't read
Actually the full list of books I own but haven't read is here. The ten most frequently tagged as "unread" by other Librarything users are:

  1. The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky (☑)
  2. Persuasion, by Jane Austen (☑)
  3. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy (☑)
  4. Beloved by Toni Morrison (☑)
  5. The Prince, by Niccolo Machiavelli (☑)
  6. The System of the World, by Neal Stephenson (☑)
  7. The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold (☑)
  8. The Confessions of Saint Augustine (☑)
  9. Villette, by Charlotte Bronte (☑)
  10. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker (☑)
Some of these were reasonably high on the to-read pile; others will get promoted when I get back.

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[info]matgb
2006-09-14 10:24 pm UTC (link)
If you're going to read the Prince, and haven't already read the Discourses, read them as well. They're real Machiavelli, rather than an extended "please don't kill me, gimme a job instead" letter.

Both are actually reasonable, although I'm surprised you haven't. Or am I misreading the above?

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[info]matgb
2008-07-16 07:24 pm UTC (link)
Do please go away you incoherent spammer. Who are you trying to talk to anyway?

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[info]wwhyte
2006-09-15 12:22 am UTC (link)
Dostoevsky's a strange one. Crime and Punishment is still high on my list of Best Books Ever but I got 100 pages into The Devils and abandoned it because nothing had happened yet (I have the same problem with all Conrad).

I loved The Color Purple when I was 18... but I think I'd skip Beloved and The System of The World (Steph couldn't make it through either The Confusion or Quicksilver).

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[info]misshallelujah
2006-09-15 03:47 am UTC (link)
I read "The God Of Small Things" the year it came out; I think I was 14 or 15, somewhere along those lines. I remember not getting it at all. Too many sexual issues that went completely over my head, I'm guessing.

I'm surprised that you haven't read The Prince, though!

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[info]misshallelujah
2008-07-16 05:35 am UTC (link)
...what?

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[info]nhw
2008-07-16 06:13 am UTC (link)
Comment spam of some kind - best to ignore it.

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[info]matgb
2008-07-16 07:25 pm UTC (link)
Oh, so not just me then—this entry got spam harvested by a bot looks like :-(

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[info]ephiriel
2006-09-15 06:05 am UTC (link)
Out of that list of ten I have two. One I have read (Persuasion - loved it) and one I haven't (The God of Small Things - it's waiting patiently) and I almost added The Colour Purple to my shelf but had no cash left.

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[info]davesangel
2006-09-15 08:14 am UTC (link)
I was really disappointed with 'Beloved' when I studied it for the first year of my BA...even our tutors agreed that it was a rather shoddy piece of work. That was about six years ago, however, so I'd quite possibly have a different opinion of it if I were to read it again today.

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[info]dumpsterdiva
2006-09-15 10:58 am UTC (link)
I loved The Lovely Bones as well as The Color Purple. You have quite an eclectic list of books to read. Some nice choices.

Cheers!

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[info]sammywol
2006-09-15 11:41 am UTC (link)
Does half read count as read or unread for Librarything purposes? I have half read six of the ten and properly read two of them. If I were you, I'd start with Persuasion as it is very short and will take very little time and is a delight if you like any other Austen at all.

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[info]nhw
2006-09-15 11:47 am UTC (link)
I have a separate tag for "unfinished" (and I shouild institute another for "do not intend to finish") - if I'd counted them as "unread", then Don Quixote, Ivanhoe and The Last of the Mohicans would have been on the list too!

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[info]sammywol
2006-09-15 12:00 pm UTC (link)
Like the icon! 'Ibid' is almost as pushy as 'Anon' when it comes to getting his name into books.

Almost all the half read ones on that list then (1,3,4,8,9) would be 'do not intend to finish' then by the new system. I became a medievalist partly to never again have to read anything by Dostoevsky (no novels before the Renaissance) and poor number 8 was merely data-mined for work. Actually, now realise I have read all of number 5, it is the Discourses - thankyou [info]matgb - that I never finished.

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[info]raycun
2006-09-15 12:57 pm UTC (link)
Hmmm...
The Brothers Karamazov - is on my shelves, unread. I do fully intend to read it sometime, but I haven't read a complete book in weeks (most unlike me) so it'll be another while yet...
Persuasion - Don't have it, haven't read it. I've read two Austens, which I quite enjoyed without feeling the burning desire for more.
The God of Small Things - the kind of book it's easy to dislike, but I quite enjoyed it.
Beloved - wasn't really my thing
The Prince - maybe I should read the Discourses, because this was interesting, but short and bitty. It read like an abridgement, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't.
The System of the World - read the first. The good bits were too few and far between (and not that good)
The Lovely Bones - not interested
The Confessions of Saint Augustine - not interested
Villette - not interested
The Color Purple - vaguely interested, but I'll probably never get around to buying it, let alone reading it

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