We still have a couple of hours of October left, but I'm not going to be finishing any books during that time, so might as well blog my list of October books. I read 10 books this month, which leaves me 15 to read in November and December. Sounds easy, except that I'm going to spend all of November frantically writing a novel of my own, and December is, well, December. So I'm really thinking I may not be able to pull off this 100-books thing. But we'll see.
Here is the list for October:
76. Fire Sale by Sara Paretsky. I used to like Sara Paretsky mysteries but hadn't read one in ages -- and now I don't plan to read another for ages. It was fine, just not very interesting.
77. The Kindly Ones by Anthony Powell. The sixth book in the (12-book) series, this one takes place just as WWII is starting. Terrible title, but one of the better books in the series so far. The next three books are set during WWII, so that will be different. Book 7 is waiting on my bedside table.
78. Blood Lure by Nevada Barr. A reasonably exciting mystery set in Glacier National Park. The nature stuff was great, the mystery less so.
79. Cold Case by Stephen White. A so-so White mystery -- I guessed whodunnit way ahead of time -- but he's still a very good writer.
80. This Book is Overdue: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All by Marilyn Johnson. I waited so long to read this book -- I was on the waiting list for it at the library for 3 months -- and then it was kind of a disappointment. The author says she was motivated to write about librarians because when she was writing her previous book, about obituaries, the most interesting obituaries were those of librarians. Trouble is, the librarians she describes in this book are all online all the time, spending their free time in virtual worlds. I realize that's the life we're all more or less living now, but what will their obituaries say? An interesting book, but not what I wanted it to be.
81. Manner of Death by Stephen White. Another not-his-best White mystery, kind of silly actually, but I do like his writing so it wasn't bad.
82. Kill Me by Stephen White. A very unusual mystery, about a man who signs up with an agency that promises to kill him if he becomes very ill or disabled -- and then he suddenly becomes very ill but isn't ready to die -- and he can't cancel the contract. It was more of a meditation on life and death than a mystery, but quite gripping nonetheless.
83. Ghost by Alan Lightman. OK, I wanted to read some ghost stories because it was almost Halloween, so I got this book and the next one out of the library. What a disappointment! Not a ghost story at all, but a novel about the concept of belief in the supernatural. I didn't like the book at all. It should have had a different title.
84. Lost Boy Lost Girl by Peter Straub. This one at least tries to be a ghost story, but isn't scary at all, or maybe just a tiny bit here and there. Very disappointing. I should have just reread Shirley Jackson.
85. Providence of a Sparrow by Chris Chester. This was one of my birthday books and I'd been reading bits of it since August. Finally I decided to get with it and finish it. A charmingly whacky book about life with a tame house sparrow, then also some finches, then another house sparrow, then some canaries, then two more house sparrows... The writing is baroque, hard to read quickly, which is why it took me so long, but very enjoyable when you put in the effort. And then just now, when I looked on Amazon to see whether Chris Chester had written anything else, I discovered that he died in 2007. Not long after this book was published in 2002, Chester's first sparrow, B, died. Apparently that propelled him into a deep depression and he stopped writing, his marriage broke up, and eventually he developed tongue/throat cancer and died at the age of 54.
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