pedanther

Fiction books
Richard Adams. Watership Down (e)
Charles Dickens. Bleak House (e)
Clark M Gesner, Michael Mayer. You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown
EW Hornung. The Amateur Cracksman (e)
WC Sellar, RJ Yeatman. 1066 and All That (re-read)
Caroline Stevermer. When the King Comes Home (e)
Jodi Taylor. Just One Damned Thing After Another (e)

In progress
Caroline Stevermer. A College of Magics (re-read)

Abandoned
Stephen Fry. Mythos (e)

Non-fiction books
Simon Lamb. Devil in the Mountain: A Search for the Origin of the Andes (e)
Keri Smith. Wreck This Journal Everywhere

In progress
John Green. The Anthropocene Reviewed (e)

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
James P Blaylock. The Last Coin (e)

Fiction books
Douglas Adams, John Lloyd. The Deeper Meaning of Liff
Travis Baldree. Bookshops & Bonedust (e)
Guy Boothby. A Bid for Fortune (e)
Susan Cooper. The Dark Is Rising (re-read)
Susan Cooper. Over Sea, Under Stone (re-read)
Eva Dolan. Long Way Home
Robert Harris. Lustrum (e)
Patrick O'Brian. HMS Surprise
Patrick O'Brian. Master and Commander (re-read)
Patrick O'Brian. Post Captain
Mary Ann Shaffer, Annie Barrows. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Jules Verne, tr. George Towle. Around the World in Eighty Days (e)

Abandoned
Max Allan Collins. The Pearl Harbor Murders
M Ruth Myers. No Game for a Dame (e)

Picture books
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam (re-read)
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam and the Big Jump (re-read)
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam and the Rocket Ride (re-read)
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam at the Rocket Port (re-read)
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam Is Caught (re-read)
Jack Wassermann, Selma Wassermann, George Rohrer. Moonbeam Is Lost (re-read)

Non-fiction books
Leonard Nimoy. I Am Not Spock
Eddy Webb. Watson Is Not an Idiot (e)

In progress
James W Loewen. Lies My Teacher Told Me (e)
Keri Smith. Wreck This Journal Everywhere

Abandoned
Niccolo Machiavelli, tr. George Bull. The Prince

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Andrew Cartmel, Ben Aaronovitch, Lee Sullivan. Cry Fox (e)

. Having finished last week's post by saying I was feeling well-rested and energetic for the first time in a while, I immediately came down with the Dreaded Lurgi, which has been hanging around all week trying out various combinations of coughs, sneezes, and interesting mucus. ( Read more... )


. Consequently of the lurgi, I had to miss the weekly board game meet again this week.

I did, in the brief space on the weekend before the lurgi struck, get to play some board games with friends, including Hellboy: The Board Game. ( Read more... )


. On the plus side, I got a lot of reading done -- which is just as well, because I signed up for an unwise number of reading challenges this year, and had fallen badly behind on several of them. Apart from the progress on the Book Chain, I also caught up on the Buzzwords challenge and made up some ground on the monthly random challenge.

For the September Buzzwords prompt ("Events"), I read Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay, an Australian classic I'd never read with a famous film adaptation I've never seen. ( Read more... )

For the November Buzzwords prompt ("Never"), I read The Man Who Never Was, Ewen Montagu's memoir of his involvement in Operation Mincemeat, a deception operation carried out during the Second World War ( Read more... )

This made me curious enough to check whether there were any more recent and complete accounts available, and Libby had Ben Macintyre's Operation Mincemeat, so I went straight on and read that as well. ( Read more... )

For the October random book selection, I'm reading The Deeper Meaning of Liff, "a dictionary of things there aren't any words for yet, but there ought to be" by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd. ( Read more... )


. I've been vaguely intending for some time to expand my exercise repertoire beyond a brisk walk, and one of the things I've been considering trying out is Zombies, Run!, an app which makes your exercise part of an ongoing story about a small group of humans trying to survive the zombie apocalypse.( Read more... )


. On an evening when I didn't feel like reading, I watched an episode of The Muppet Show -- which turned out to be the one where they have to try and keep the show going without Kermit because he's at home with the flu.

Fiction books
Steven Carroll. Death of a Foreign Gentleman
Uri Orlev, tr. Hillel Halkin. The Island on Bird Street
Mordecai Richler. Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang
Tom Scioli. Godzilla's Monsterpiece Theatre (e)
Arthur Upfield. The New Shoe (e)
Naoki Urasawa, tr. John Werry. Asadora! volume 1
Naoki Urasawa, tr. John Werry. Asadora! volume 2
Jules Verne, tr. FP Walter. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas (e)

In progress
Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit (e)

In hiatus
Cory Doctorow. Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town (e)
William Morris. The Well at the World's End (e)
Julian Rathbone. The Last English King
Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (e)

Picture books
Juliette MacIver, Sarah Davis. The Grizzled Grist Does Not Exist! (e)
Juliette MacIver, Sarah Davis. That's Not a Hippopotamus! (e)
Eve Sutton, Lynley Dodd. My Cat Likes to Hide in Boxes (e) (re-read)

Non-fiction books
Yuval Noah Harari. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (e)
Richard Fidler. Ghost Empire

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Jules Verne, tr. George Towle. Around the World in Eighty Days (e)

Fiction books
Ben Aaronovitch. Stone and Sky (e)
Mary Chase. Harvey
Caroline Stevermer. The Serpent's Egg (e)

In progress
Julian Rathbone. The Last English King
Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (e)

In hiatus
Tanith Lee. The Silver Metal Lover

Abandoned
Fritz Leiber. The Green Millennium
Michael Silverling. The Sterling Inheritance
Janine A. Southard. Queen & Commander (e)

Non-fiction books in progress
Yuval Noah Harari. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (e)

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Cherry Wilder. A Princess of the Chameln

Fiction books
Andrei Baltakmens. A Hangman for Ghosts (e)
Eugene Byrne. Things Unborn
Diana Wynne Jones. House of Many Ways (re-read)
Diana Wynne Jones. Howl's Moving Castle (re-read)

In progress
Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (e)
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, tr. Michael Guybon. The First Circle

Abandoned
CL Moore. Jirel of Joiry (e)

Non-fiction books
Xavier Duff. Noose: True Stories of Australians Who Died at the Gallows

In progress
Isaac Asimov. A Choice of Catastrophes

Abandoned
Raymond Lamont-Brown. John Brown: Queen Victoria's Highland Servant

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Ursula K Le Guin. Always Coming Home (e)

Fiction books
Tove Jansson, tr. David McDuff. The Moomins and the Great Flood
WE Johns. Biggles Forms a Syndicate
Sharon Lee. Sea Wrack and Changewind (e)
KG Lethbridge. The Rout of the Ollafubs (re-read)
Alexander McCall Smith. The Tin Dog
Andy Weir. The Martian (e) (re-read)
Oscar Wilde. Lady Windermere's Fan
Jane Yolen. Sister Light, Sister Dark (e)

In progress
Tove Jansson, tr. Elizabeth Portch. Comet in Moominland
Tim Powers. Down and Out in Purgatory: The Collected Stories of Tim Powers (e)
Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (e)

Abandoned
Martin Cruz Smith. Gorky Park

Non-fiction books
Colin Duriez. The Tolkien and Middle-Earth Handbook
Alan Loy McGinnis. The Friendship Factor

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Agatha Christie. The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Fiction books
Barbara Ninde Byfield. The Man Who Made Gold (re-read)
Philip Reeve. Here Lies Arthur
Arthur Upfield. The Bachelors of Broken Hill (e)
Connie Willis. Inside Job (e)

In progress
Tim Powers. Down and Out in Purgatory: The Collected Stories of Tim Powers (e)

Non-fiction books in progress
Colin Duriez. The Tolkien and Middle-Earth Handbook

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Sebastian Faulks. Devil May Care

Fiction books
(anthology). The Witch Who Came in From the Cold: Season One (e)
Ben Aaronovitch. The Masquerades of Spring (e)
Pamela Freeman. Victor's Quest
Tamora Pierce. Cold Fire (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. The Fire in the Forging (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. The Healing in the Vine (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. The Magic in the Weaving (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. Magic Steps (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. The Power in the Storm (e) (re-read)
Tamora Pierce. Shatterglass (e)
Tamora Pierce. Street Magic (e) (re-read)
Rafael Sabatini. The Sword of Islam
Shelby Van Pelt. Remarkably Bright Creatures (e)
Evangeline Walton. The Island of the Mighty

In progress
Hanan al-Shayk. Women of Sand and Myrrh
Arthur Conan Doyle. The Valley of Fear (e) (re-read)

Abandoned
(anthology). Tremontaine: Season One (e)

Picture books
Lee Fox, Mitch Vane. Jasper McFlea Will Not Eat His Tea
Julia Patton. The Very Very Very Long Dog
Eve Titus, Paul Galdone. Anatole

Non-fiction books
Marc Abrahams. This Is Improbable
Andrew Ford. Try Whistling This: Writings on Music (e)
Patrick Radden Keefe. Say Nothing (e)

Non-fiction books in progress
Rosaleen Love. Reefscape

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Herland

Fiction books
Brian Clevinger, Scott Wegener. Tesladyne Industries Field Guide (re-read)
Arthur Conan Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles (e) (re-read)
Neil Gaiman, Chris Riddell. Fortunately, the Milk (re-read)
David Langford. He Do the Time Police in Different Voices (e)
Claire North. House of Odysseus
Claire North. Ithaca
Claire North. The Last Song of Penelope
Arthur Upfield. The Mountains Have a Secret (e)
Arthur Upfield. The Widows of Broome (e)
Geoffrey Willans, Ronald Searle. Down with Skool!
Timothy Zahn. Cobra

In progress
Hanan al-Shayk. Women of Sand and Myrrh
Arthur Conan Doyle. The Lost World (re-read)

Non-fiction books in progress
Andrew Ford. Try Whistling This: Writings on Music (e)

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Marc Abrahams. This Is Improbable