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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The 2018 Reading Challenge
 
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I'm in for 52 books and the booklord. I almost made it last year on my regular reading habits. I hadn't even signed up.

* # ¿ Jan 9, 2018 07:06
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# ¿ May 13, 2024 23:45
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
^^Ugh, Goon Squad is more about middle-aged anglo angst more than anything. I'd even recommend How to Build a Girl by Caitlin Moran over that one, because it actually manages to protray the love there was for that same scene in a way Jennifer Egan totally failed to.

Also Telegraph Avenue by Michael Chabon actually gives you a vivid sense of the music the characters love.

I've already done this challenge with A Pure Solar World: Sun Ra and the Birth of Afrofuturism by Paul Youngquist. I'm not a jazz fan, but I listened to a lot of the Sun Ra albums as they were mentioned in the book, and it turns out to be my kind of weird.

A couple other interesting non-fiction books on music I've read are:

How Music Works by David Byrne
Brian Eno: His Music and the Vertical Color of Sound by Eric Tamm

Maybe I should get around to putting together my reading list and posting it here, since I'm now hitting book 50.

Stuporstar fucked around with this message at 05:35 on Jul 11, 2018

* # ¿ Jul 11, 2018 05:33
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?

MockingQuantum posted:

Don't disagree on Goon Squad, but it's popular so I figured I was just overly picky about it or something.

And drat, how did I forget David Byrne's book?? Good call.

It's one of the many books that made me distrust the Pulitzer as a flag of quality fiction.

Also I was trying to remember the music-based novel I read recently featuring an Alexie Sayle-like character described as English Blokeman and realized it was Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente, so I guess that one counts as well lol

* # ¿ Jul 11, 2018 06:03
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I just finished The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy, which could probably count for the latter because it strongly features the numerous conflicts in Kashmir.

Also, I added my own personal challenge to read more books by Native American authors this year, and The Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King is a good historical and political read.

Edit: I should also ask for a wildcard, since I haven't done that yet.

Stuporstar fucked around with this message at 20:43 on Aug 26, 2018

* # ¿ Aug 26, 2018 17:03
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?

Ben Nevis posted:

This has sat for a few days, so I'll issue one. Umami by Laia Jufresa. It was one of my favorites of last year and judging by your posts in the genre thread it seems like something you might enjoy. If not, well, at least it helps with a few of the challenges.

Thanks, Ben! It looks interesting.

* # ¿ Aug 30, 2018 22:41
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I read The Accusation: Forbidden Stories of North Korea by Bandi for this and the bonus challenge. It's a book of short stories by a pseudonymous author still living (or possibly no longer) in North Korea, about what it's like to live there, whose work was smuggled out of the country into South Korea.

Also the Humble Bundle is offering a bunch for Banned Books Week: https://www.humblebundle.com/books/forbidden-books-2018?hmb_source=navbar&hmb_medium=product_tile&hmb_campaign=tile_index_6

* # ¿ Sep 26, 2018 23:33
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I have Milkman on hold at the library, but it's not in yet and books on order can take months, so I may not get to read it this year. Next year, if this is a challenge, I'm going to try for the Man Booker International prize instead because that's announced in spring.This year it was Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, but unfortunately I didn't get on the library hold list early enough and there's still enough people ahead of me I won't be able to read it this year either. Their selection of Maryse Conde is also nearly non-existent, but that may change with the demand from winning the alternate Nobel—who knows, but it won't happen this year.

So my fallback is The English Patient because it won the Golden Man Booker this year. Even if it's a past prize winner, I haven't read it yet and the fact it won the all-time Man Booker for their favorite in the past 50 years is what prompted me to finally bother reading it, so I figured it counts.

Edit: Also I would like to try for the Shameful book thread challenge but it seems that thread is dead now.

* # ¿ Oct 18, 2018 17:33
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I ended up reading two books about hunger unintentionally. The first was The Devourers by Indra Das, which I picked up randomly at the library because I liked the cover and thought, gay werewolves in India why not (though it was a bit too gorey for my tastes). The second was the one I picked up for another challenge, read a book published the same year you were born. I picked Flounder but Günter Grass, even though it was the pub date for the English translation, because it looked the most interesting. Ended up getting a first edition at the library (not a popular book to take out I guess) so ended up with a book literally as old as I am, which was kinda cool. Anyway, it ended up being about food, food, sex, feminism, and food. It was a seriously good book though. I guess next year I'm gonna have to pick up The Tin Drum.

Also thanks for the rec in the Shameless thread, Guy. Blindness is next on my reading list.

* # ¿ Oct 25, 2018 22:55
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# ¿ May 13, 2024 23:45
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Stuporstar
May 5, 2008

Where do fists come from?
I was doing so well and then tanked out at the end of the year, as I do every year because the dead of winter sucks. Which is also why this post is late and I have no energy to do much in the way of write ups (next year I'll have to be better about posting monthly and then maybe I'll get some write-ups in). But I did complete several added bonus challenges that I made for myself, the most crucial one being to read more fiction from my own country and more native american fiction.

1. Set a goal for number of books or another personal challenge 88/80 I upped my original goal after surpassing it so early.
2. Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by women. [1][3][5][10][11][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][42][43][46][47][48][54][58][59][61][67][68][69][70][72][73][74][77][79][81][84][86][87] 45%
— bonus: Of these make sure half are by authors new to you [5][11][26][27][30][36][42][43][46][47][48][54][59][68][69][70][73][74][77][81][86][87] 22/40
3. Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by someone non-white. [7][9][18][25][26][30][31][33][34][35][38][43][45][46][49][50][56][59][60][63][65][66][67][68][69][70][72][73][74][75][80][81][84][86] 38%
— bonus: Of these make sure half are by authors new to you [7][26][30][36][38][43]
[45][46][49][50][56][59][60][63][68][69][70][73][74][75][81][86] 22/34
— personal bonus: Make at least 10 of these books by (or including) Native American authors [43][56][59][63][66][67][68][72][75][81][84] 11
4. Read at least one book by an LGBT author. [7][23][25][32?][34?][48?][60?][72]
— bonus: Make sure 10% of the books you read this year are by LGBT authors. – I honestly couldn't say because not every LGBT author is out to the public. Next time it might be better to make it about LGBT representation in the books themselves.
— personal bonus: one of these novels is by someone I know [72]
5. Participate in the TBB BotM thread at least once in 2018 (thread stickied each month at the top of the forum). [40][read 6 too early and didn't post in thread][85]
— bonus: Participate in the SHAMEFUL The Greatest Books You've Never Read thread [82]
— personal bonus: catch up on at least 5 past BotMs [2][5][14][17][49][52][64][88]
6. Ask another poster to issue you a wildcard, then read it. [69]
— bonus: Similarly, get a wildcard from another thread in this forum [77] – if you include taking a recommendation that was presented as, "Hey everyone, read this."
— personal bonus: pick up 10 or more wildcard recommendations from the library [46][51][56][59][63][65][66][70][86][87]
7. Get a recommendation from a friend or loved one. [19][57]
— bonus: Read literally the first in-person book recommendation you get in 2018 (solicited or not) [57]
8. Read something written before you were born. [3][5][13][17][19][21][23][36][40][49][51][52][63][64][76][77][78][83]
— bonus: Read a book written/published the exact year you were born [71] - Extra bonus: it turned out to be a first edition as old as I am
9. Read a book published in 2018 (or if you're eager to start early, the latter half of 2017). [29][68][72][73][84][86][87]
— bonus: Read something that wins an award in 2018, but only after it is announced (i.e. don't apply retroactively) [80][86]
10. Read something translated from another language. [49][50][51][52][69][71][82][88]
— bonus: Read something that isn't in your primary language
11. Read something political. [50][56][62][75]
— bonus: Read something political from/about a country you aren't from and don't currently live in [50][62]
12. Read a poetry collection. [76]
— bonus: Read poems by at least 10 different poets [37][49][61][71][76] (I read random poems online but honestly can't say how many
13. Read a collection of short stories. [1][9][12][17][24][25][30][34][43][50][51][58][73][74][81]
— bonus: Read short stories by at least 10 different authors [see above]
— personal bonus: Read 10 short story collections by different authors
14. Read a play. [75][85]
— bonus: Read a play first published in the last 10 years
15. Read something involving history. [2][8][28][40][56][62][80][87][88]
— bonus: Read something about a (nonfictional) war that didn't involve the U.S. [62]
16. Read something biographical. [28][37][41][44][79]
— bonus: Read something biographical about someone you've met/seen in person [41]
17. Read something about religion. [49][74][87][88]
— bonus: Read a major religious text
18. Read something from a non-traditional perspective. [3][33][35][71]
— bonus: Read something narrated in the 2nd person [33][35]
19. Read something that has been banned, censored, or challenged. [50]
— bonus: Read something currently banned, censored, or challenged in its country of origin [50]
20. Read something about music. [29][37]
— bonus: Read something about a genre of music you're explicitly not a fan of [37]
21. Read something that involves Maslow's hierarchy of needs. [50][60][65][71][79][82][83] – probably lots more
— bonus: Read something about hunger [60][71][82]
22. Read something about the future. [13][19][73][74][81] – nearly every other SF?
— bonus: Read something about a future that takes place before the current year [13]
23. Personal challenge: Read at least 10 non-fiction books. [2][8][10][15][22][28][31][37][40][41][44][47][53][56][61][63][64][67][78][79][87]
— bonus: Make sure at least 5 contain science. [2][8][15][22][47][53] (I'm not including the astronaut biographies because that would be too easy.)
24. Personal challenge: Reread something you read more than a decade ago. [13]
25. Personal challenge: Read a novel that's over 500 pages [71]
26. Personal challenge: Read at least 10 books from Canadian authors [27][41][42][56][59][66][67][70][72][75][80][81][86]

1. The Ladies of Grace Adieu, Susanna Clarke (started 2017)
2. Salt: A World History, Mark Kurlansky (started 2017)
3. To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolfe (started 2017)
4. In Calabria, Peter S. Beagle
5. Lud in the Mist, Hope Mirrlees
6. Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders
7. A Taste of Honey, Kai Ashante Wilson
8. Periodic Tales, Hugh Aldersey-Williams
9. Hebrew Punk, Lavie Tidhar
10. Steering the Craft, Ursula K. LeGuin
11. The Power, Naomi Alderman
12. Fresh Complaint, Jeffrey Eugenides
13. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Phillip K. Dick (reread)
14. Gentlemen of the Road, Michael Chabon
15. The Runaway Species, Anthony Brandt & David Eagleman
16. Excession, Iain M. Banks
17. Dubliners, James Joyce
18. The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz
19. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
20. Jennifer Government, Max Barry
21. Concrete Island, J. G. Ballard
22. Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith
23. Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany's
24. The Unreal and the Real: Short Stories, Ursula K. Le Guin
25. Falling in Love with Hominids, Nalo Hopkinson
26. An Excess Male, Maggie Shen King
27. Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel
28. The Right Stuff, Tom Wolfe
29. Space Opera, Catherynne M. Valente
30. Invaders: SF Tales from the Outer Limits of Literature
31. Origin of Others, Toni Morrison
32. Call Me by Your Name, Andre Aciman
33. The Obelisk Gate, N. K. Jemisin
34. The Thing Around Your Neck, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
35. The Stone Sky, N.K. Jemisin
36. The Complete Fiction of Nella Larsen
37. A Pure Solar World: Sun Ra and the Birth of Afrofuturism, Paul Youngquist
38. Dance of the Jakaranda, Peter Kimani
39. Machine Man, Max Barry
40. The Electric Koolaid Acid Test, Tom Wolfe
41. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth, Chris Hadfield
42. Atmospheric Disturbances, Rivka Galchen
43. Mothership: Tales of Afrofuturism and Beyond
44. Endurance: A Year in Space, Scott Kelly
45. Exit West, Mohsin Hamid
46. City of Brass, S. A. Chakraborty
47. Spineless: The Science of Jellyfish and the Art of Growing a Backbone, Juli Berwald
48. All Systems Red, Martha Wells
49. The Conference of Birds, Farid ud-Din Attar
50. The Accusation: Forbidden Stories from Inside North Korea, Bandi
51. Collected Stories, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
52. Invisible Cities, Italo Calvino
53. Time: A Traveler's Guide, Clifford A. Pickover
54. The Goblin Emperor, Katherine Addison
55. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore, Robin Sloan
56. The Inconvenient Indian, Thomas King
57. The 100-year-old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, Jonas Jonasson
58. The Found and the Lost: Novellas, Ursula K. Le Guin
59. Son of a Trickster, Eden Robinson
60. The Devourers, Indra Das
61. Words Are My Matter, Ursula K. Le Guin
62. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, Arundhati Roy
63. Turtle Island: The Story of North America's First People, Eldon Yellowhorn (I didn't realize this was a children's book when I put it on hold at the library. Read it anyway because, what the hell, I might learn something.)
64. The Peregrine, J. A. Baker
65. Private Pleasures: A Modern Egyptian Novel, Hamdy el-Gazzar
66. Green Grass, Running Water, Thomas King
67. The Sasquatch at Home, Eden Robinson
68. Trail of Lightening, Rebecca Roanhorse
69. Umami, Laia Jufresa
70. Floating City, Kerri Sakamoto
71. Flounder, Günter Grass
72. Witchmark, C. L. Polk
73. Ambiguity Machines and Other Stories, Vandana Singh
74. A Mosque Among the Stars (Short SFF)
75. Ernestine Shuswap Gets Her Trout, Highway Thomson
76. Songs of Innocence, and Songs of Experience, William Blake
77. Ice, Anna Kavan
78. Aspects of the Novel, E. M. Forster
79. My Stroke of Inspiration, Jill Bolte Taylor
80. The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje
81. So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Science Fiction and Fantasy
82. Blindness, Jose Saramago
83. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey
84. Trickster Drift, Eden Robinson
85. Arcadia, Tom Stoppard
86. Washington Black, Esi Edugyan
87. How Do We Look, Mary Beard
88. Name of the Rose, Umbero Eco

Flounder by Günter Grass was the one book I probably would have never thought to pick up if it wasn't for this challenge, but it looked like the most interesting published in the year of my birth (just the English translation, but whatever). It turned out to be one of my favorite books of the year and I wish I had more energy to write an essay about it because it was such a great book. And yeah, as mentioned above, the copy I picked up from the library was a first edition, so it had to be as old as I am, which was kind of cool. Seems not to be a popular book, otherwise that copy would have been trashed and replaced by now—especially since the binding glue was turning to dust. I had to be extrememly careful handling it.

Edit: Also found the image I took of the worst book I read in 2018: Private Pleasures by Hamdy el-Gazzar. What does Egyptian sleazefic look like? Something like this:



In its favor, that's after the prostitute sex was broken up by a call to prayer, which I'm pretty sure was intended to be satirical. Also it's a translation, so who knows if the prose was this awful in the original.

Stuporstar fucked around with this message at 21:17 on Jan 6, 2019

* # ¿ Jan 6, 2019 20:56
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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The 2018 Reading Challenge