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[Ally]

I am making massive summer to do lists so that I don't let my summer run out without doing all of the things I stayed up at night this school year telling myself that I would do. This is Part 1 of my Summer Plan.

I suggest you do the same.

I will edit this post to contain a short review with a rating of how much I enjoyed a book once I've finished - you can do this too but maybe you don't want to? I don't know.

FOR SCHOOL:

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe [required]
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain [required]
On the Road by Jack Kerouac [on a list] (I started this and lost the book and never finished it)
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry [on a list] (I started this last summer but school came before I could finish)
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler [on a list]
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner [on a list]

Last year's required reading was The Life of Pi and Cat's Cradle, both of which were perfect summer books. I only have to read one of the books on the list but I might as well read all of the ones I've been meaning to read.

FOR ALLY:

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
White Oleander by Janet Fitch
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
Paradise Lost by John Milton
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling (I plan to read it, so I might as well list it)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
The Neverending Story by Michael Ende (again) (I love this book)

This list will expand until my summer officially starts on the 21st.

This is your chance to read all of those things you've always told yourself you would! Next school year is going to be hectic so I'm making the most out of my summer. I'm nailing a ton of the classics and a few things that people keep suggesting. I jacked a lot of these from Jenny's list and made her recommend me more.

[Inlander]

Well, I don't have a seasonal reading list. However I have a reading project which I'm currently being very slack about. Having been raised in a completely secular household, I thought it was about time that I started trying to get to grips with this whole "religion" thing, to try and understand the world a little better. To that end, I set out to read the major texts in what I deemed to be the most significant global religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, and Hinduism. (My brother recently suggested I add Confucianism, which I think is a good idea).

However at the moment I'm pretty much stalled at the starting grid: the Bible is not an easy read. In fact it's an incredibly tedious read. And it's 1800 pages long! So far I've almost made it to the end of Leviticus. (I'm reading the King James version, for historical reasons.)

[Johnny C]

I'm going to try and read more books by Michael Chabon and Jonathan Lethem. I need to read some more Mordecai Richler, re-acquaint myself with Tolstoy, finish reading Steinbeck's works, go through a couple of novels that a friend of mine lent me and go through the new Palhaniuk.

[SilentJ]

Ally-

The new HP book sounds promising, I, too am awairing its release eagerly.

Catch-22, or what I read of it, was just a great read.  Very entertaining.

However, Pride and Prejudice was one of the worst books I have ever read.  It is second worst, only being not-quite-so-bad as Wuthering Heights was.  Good Lord that book was terrible.

[Storm Rider]

Catch-22 is one of my favorite books of ever. So good.

[Inlander]

However, Pride and Prejudice was one of the worst books I have ever read.

To offer a countering opinion: Pride and Prejudice is sublime, and Jane Austen is wonderful.

[St. Ides]

Heh...
I remember reading Lolita in the summer between my freshman and sophmore years of high school.
It wasn't until the third read-through that I actually finished it, and I actually had to run down to the library to check out a copy of the abridged edition just to get half of the damn references. I loved it.
Nabokov is a brilliant author, if you can stomach him.

[Ben yayayayayayayay]

However, Pride and Prejudice was one of the worst books I have ever read.

To offer a countering opinion: Pride and Prejudice is sublime, and Jane Austen is wonderful.

To add nothing, I haven't read this book.

[Dimmukane]

Providing I find the time for it, the entire Cthulu Mythos, Conan Saga, and all of Norse Mythology.  And reread Good Omens, find the other three Halo novels, and the new HP.

[KharBevNor]

However, Pride and Prejudice was one of the worst books I have ever read.

To offer a countering opinion: Pride and Prejudice is sublime, and Jane Austen is wonderful.

(But Wuthering Heights is better)

[Will]

Ally, Unbearable Lightness Of Being is an absolutely wonderful book. Just to forewarn you if you aren't already aware of this, the first chapter or so deals pretty heavily with discussing Nietzsche and his philosophies as they relate to the story that Kundera wrote, and it can be kind of dry at spots. Just don't let that cause your interest to wane, because the story really is quite a treat.

On the subject of Nietzsche, I've had a copy of "The Birth Of Tragedy" in my library for about a year or so and never got around to reading it. I'm going to try to force myself to have the discipline to go through that.

Partial List (to be added to later):

"Heavy" reading
The Birth Of Tragedy - Friedrich Nietzsche
Discipline & Punish: The Birth Of the Prison - Michel Foucalt
The One-Dimensional Man - Herbert Marcuse

"Light" reading
You Shall Know Our Velocity - David Eggers
Rant - Chuck Palahniuk
Dirty Job - Christopher Moore
The Dead MC Scrolls - Saul Williams
plus any other books of poetry that I can find that will inspire me.

[mberan42]

I agree with Will on The Unbearable Lightness of Being. On your list, Ally, I've read A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, The Metamorphosis and Love in the Time of Cholera and loved all three (for completely separate reasons). Metamophosis is difficult to read, and I was required to read it for a university class, but it was fantastic.

I also don't have a seasonal list, but what I have right now:
It's Not News, it's FARK - How Mass Media Tries to Pass Off Crap As News by Drew Curtis
The Assault on Reason by Al Gore
Earth in the Balance by Al Gore

That's about it. Nothing is coming out anytime soon that I have to pick up.

[Johnny C]

Oh right, I still need to read my copy of Plato's Republic the whole way through.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

my list thus far is this:

God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian by Kurt Vonnegut
new Harry Potter book
Battle Royale by Koushan Takami (sp?)

so far that's it, i think. but there will be more as i discover them.

[Will]

Matt, when you get around to reading Drew's book, can you let me know how it is? I'm kind of curious about it...

[Mnementh]

No seasonal reading list, I just read things as they come to me.  En queue right now:

Dreadnought: Britain, Germany, and The Coming of the Great War by Robert K. Massie
If Upon A Winter's Night Traveler... by Italo Calvino
Underworld by Don Delillo

[ThePQ4]

My only goal this summer to is re-read the entire Harry Potter series. Before July 21st. ...I should probably get started. It will take me a least a week to muddle my way through the fourth. Ack.

[TheFuriousWombat]

My own personal list of books I want to read this summer is as follows:

100 Years of Solitude- Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Unbearble Lightness of Being- Milan Kundera
The new Harry Potter (obviously)
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay- Michael Chabon
1984- George Orwell
Special Topics in Calamity Physics- Marisha Pessl
The Name of the Rose- Umberto Eco
Thus Spoke Zarathustra- Nietzsche

Yeah, I'd figure I'd go for some light reading this summer. I think I'll be able to get through them all.

[Ally]

Oh, I read Special Topics in Calamity Physics last summer. It is pretty good until the end which really disappointed me. Cute read, though.

I have such awesome plansss. I hope I can get through most of these books. I didn't read too much last summer (it was mostly what I consider trashy reading, but if I tell you what I consider trashy reading you'll make fun of me because most people consider it normal reading) but the summer before I read like 30 books. We'll see!

[Joseph]

Ally, that's an excellent list, I have to say.  I'll chime in with Inlander here, and say that Pride And Prejudice is fantastic.  The rest of the list is pretty much all stuff I've found good or been meaning to read myself.

I've yet to sort out a real reading list for myself yet, but I plan on reading a bunch more Alice Munro, John Updike, Nicholson Baker, Tolstoy, and Nabokov.

[Scytale]

The Name of the Rose- Umberto Eco
Thus Spoke Zarathustra- Nietzsche

Both of those books are excellent choices.

My Last Exam is Friday heading back to see my parents over the weekend I plan on pinching my Sisters copy of Utopia I'll read that over the weekend beyond that I've got a few books of chess puzzles and things I'll probably read.

[SilentJ]

I've got many a book to read this summer.

I'm starting with a re-read of the Halo series,
then all of the HP books by July 21st,
and then, in no particular order:

Catch-22 (never finished)
probably re-reading Youth in Revolt and Revolting Youth (both are freakin' brilliant)
finish Slaughterhouse Five
read these Dickens novels I got for Christmas (ToTC, ACC, etc.)
maybe re-read the Alex Rider series if the mood strikes
probably re-read LoTR since I haven't in a while

and, just maybe, re-read some Dan Brown because it's funny to read.

[imapiratearg]

I have to read the first five chapters of this big ass book called Sarum.  For my British Lit. class.

I'm in the middle of reading Stephen King's The Tommyknockers, and a book called Drawing Down the Moon, which is an overview of Paganism and Wicca and a couple others, Druidism i think being one, and their histories, the histories of their movements and such.  It's pretty interesting.  Huge book though.

And everybody should read Christopher Moore books.  I bought You Suck!: A Vampire Romance for my girlfriend on her birthday.  She loved it.  I read some of it.  It's pretty great.  Apparently it's the sequel to Bloodsucking Fiends.  So she won't let me read any further.

I'm starting with a re-read of the Halo series

Ghosts of Onyx was awesome!  I almost cried at the end.  If I had a choice between reading the books and playing the games.  I'd choose the books hands down.

[celticgeek]

Drawing Down The Moon is a pretty thorough and accurate history of the various pagan groups in America.

Worth the 600 plus pages.

Blessed be!

[imapiratearg]

^.^  It's a heavy read for me.  I haven't picked it up in a long time.  I kind of feel bad for doing so.  Not to mention, it's an overdue library book, that apparently wasn't recorded.  So I got a free book.  I also go the Pagan Book of Days for free from my library as well, since they didn't give me anything about them.

[Misereatur]

My list:

• Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
• The Kreutzer Sonata by L.N. Tolstoy (translated to hebrew)
• Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck
• The Photograph as Contemporary Art by Charlotte Cotton
• God Emperor of Dune by Frank Herbert (translated to hebrew)

• Falconer by John Cheever (translated to hebrew)
• Trilogy: Molly, Malone Dies and The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett
• The Last Tycoon by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The Unvanquished by William Faulkner (translated to hebrew)
• A Distant Mirror by Barbara W. Tuchman
• Black Coffee Blues by Henry Rollins
• Naked Lunch by William Burroughs (I've started it and stopped several times, but I need to start reading it all over again)

I have a lot of books to read. I'm currently reading two at once.[/list]

[Joseph]

I just finished rereading Naked Lunch.  That is one insane book, but I absolutely loved it; as much as one can love a journey into nigh-indecipherable madness.

[Will]

Mis: I am almost finished with Black Coffee Blues. I'd say it's probably some of my favorite work by Rollins. By all means, read it first, but if you'd like a copy of the audiobook version, let me know and I can arrange for you to have it.

[tomselleck69]

(all reading is for personal enjoyment/edification, done through audiobooks while drawing, walking and driving)

READ:
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The Stranger
On the Road
The Great Gatsby

READING:
The Brothers Karamazov

TO READ:
Les Miserables
and a bunch more so long as bittorrent is never outlawed by the government

[jimbunny]

I'm reading Inversions right now, and I think I just might continue on an Iain Banks trajectory for the near future.

I might also re-read all of William Gibson's books...kind of a summer tradition. Just finished Count Zero.

I also just finished Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. Good airplane reading, overall not such a great book. Someone get this guy an editor worth their salt, stat. Snow Crash remains good, but...his particular brand of humor wears thin after page 800...

[SilentJ]

Oh, I just remembered.

I've heard alot about this Bored of the Rings book, so I'm gonna check that out as well.

Has anybody read this?  Thoughts?

[Ally]

Guys life is too short to reread books unless they are REALLY REALLY GOOD.

[Joseph]

So, I just returned from a used bookstore with my mother, where we spent a fair sum, and between that excursion and some things from the shelves at home, I have my summer reading.  Here's a selection:

Matin Amis - Time's Arrow/Visiting Mrs. Navokov and Other Excursions
Ann Patchett - Bel Canto
Ian McEwan - Atonement/Enduring Love
Franz Kafka - The Trial
Joastein Gaarder - Sophie's World
V.S. Naipaul - The Enigma Of Arrival
Marilynne Robinson - Gilead
Philip Roth - American Pastoral/Our Gang
Don DeLillo - White Noise
John Kennedy Toole - The Neon Bible
James McBride - The Color Of Water
Pat Barker - Regeneration/The Eye In The Door/The Ghost Road
Dostoevsky - Crime And Punishment
Nicholson Baker - The Size Of Thoughts
Vladimir Nabokov - Pale Fire/Pnin
John Updike - Bech: A Book
Zadie Smith - White Teeth
Alice Munro - Something I've Been Meaning To Tell You
Halldor Laxness - Independent People

[Scytale]

I've heard alot about this Bored of the Rings book, so I'm gonna check that out as well.

Has anybody read this?  Thoughts?

I read that years ago it was pretty amusing, but I was a lot younger when I read it. It's pretty much what it sounds like a parody of Lord of the Rings. All that really stands out now is they re-named Tom Bombadil Tom Benzo-drill and he was basically a hippy always ranting on about Methadone (or Methadinny as he called it) I found it pretty amusing as a kid.  I think if I read it today it would just give me the shits.

[Misereatur]

I just finished rereading Naked Lunch.  That is one insane book, but I absolutely loved it; as much as one can love a journey into nigh-indecipherable madness.

I started reading it earlier this year and stopped because I already had all of the insanity I could handle, and reading about talking ass holes was not what I needed. I started it again later on but stopped due to business.

if you'd like a copy of the audiobook version, let me know and I can arrange for you to have it.

That would be awsome. PM me?

Also

Joastein Gaarder - Sophie's World

I stopped reading that book when I hit page 150. It's a very interesting subject but I got really bored with the story line for some reason. I should to start reading it again.

[jimbunny]

I stopped reading that book when I hit page 150. It's a very interesting subject but I got really bored with the story line for some reason. I should to start reading it again.

Pick up where you left off. The ending's pretty wild.

[Cartilage Head]

 For school and Cory - Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Johnathan Safran Foer, and To Kill a Mockingbird by That Fella.

[Tyler]

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe [required]
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain [required]
On the Road by Jack Kerouac [on a list] (I started this and lost the book and never finished it)
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry [on a list] (I started this last summer but school came before I could finish)
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler [on a list]
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner [on a list]
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
White Oleander by Janet Fitch
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
Paradise Lost by John Milton
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling (I plan to read it, so I might as well list it)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
The Neverending Story by Michael Ende (again) (I love this book)

check.


I am so awesome.

[Storm Rider]

I'm interested to hear how you managed to read a Harry Potter book that isn't available yet.

[Tyler]

Not going to lie to you there. I really cannot explain it, however, my own ability to admit fault is overcome by my ego.

[Will]

Storm, Tyler can read whatever the hell he wants to whenever the hell he wants to. It's because he has secret awesome powers hidden away inside his cheekpouch.

And because he's better than you.

[IronOxide]

1984 - George Orwell (For School)
Fundamentals of Musical Composition - A. Schoenberg (For Fun)

And the new Harry Potter book

[RallyMonkey]

As I Lay Dying
The Contortionist's Handbook
Of Mice and Men
Huckleberry Finn (For school)
A book or two on screenwriting.

Then I am about halfway through The Complete Works of Chekhov, and Welcome to the Monkey House.

Plus... I have to memorize The Dangers of Tobacco (Chekhov) and the part of Master Page in Merry Wives of Windsor for theater next year.

[TheFuriousWombat]

Rally, As I LAy Dying is brilliant. I loved it.
I have to add 'On Natural Selection' by Darwin and 'The Metamorphosis' by Kafka to my list for school reading.

[Liz]

Right now I'm in the middle of The Prestige, which is amazing.

A couple of days ago I checked out If On a Winter's Night a Traveler, A Case of Need, and The House of Leaves from my college's library. Two are from the reccomendations threads here, the other is because I loooove Michael Crichton books.

I have a huge, two page list of books recommended by you people that I want to read this summer. We shall see how far I get.

[fozmo]

• The Awakening - Kate Chopin (Required)
• A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway (Required)
• Tess of the D'urbervilles - Thomas Hardy (Required)
• Blood of the Albatross - Ridley Pearson
• Undercurrents - Ridley Pearson
• The Angel Maker - Ridley Pearson
• Harry Potter and the Deathley Hallows - J.K. Rowling
• Black House - Stephen King
• Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
• 1984 - Eric Arthur Blair
• Others that catch my eye in the next ten weeks or so

[RallyMonkey]

I really enjoyed The Prestige. Not really for the actual content of the book, but it just made me trust in Christopher Nolan's skills even more so that he was able to take a pretty good book, and then meld it into an amazing movie. The end though, I was disappointed by (In the book)

I'm really enjoying As I Lay Dying. Same with The Contortionists' Handbook.

[Oli]

I don't have a list as such but books that I have recently bought and intend on reading at some point soon are:

The beach - Alex Garland(Which I am in the middle of)
The Acid House - Irvine Welsh
Whit and Song of Stone - Iain Banks
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller (This is a popular one)

Once I have finished them I will crack on with any other books I've picked up in charity shops (that is where I get most of my books. I only use amazon/a proper book shop if I have a specific book in mind)

I've been getting pretty lax with my reading lately. I go through spots of reading for hours a day and then not reading for days. It's very annoying.

[Will]

House of Leaves [/b]

It's a fantastic book. Might I recommend that once you start this book, eliminate all other reading materials from your daily existence until you've finished. Trust me, House Of Leaves is an utter and absolute mindfuck of a book, and you have to try to keep track of a thousand things at once as it is...it gets too confusing when you're also trying to keep other information from other books straight in your head.

[Liz]

Don't worry, I only read multiple books at once if I've read them before.