On My Bookshelf
These are the books I physically have in my house. Ideally, I’ll be doing most of my reading from this list–there’s certainly enough here to keep me busy! As I read these books, I’ll be adding them to my books read list and linking to any reviews that I write.
- Acedia and Me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer’s Life by Kathleen Norris
- Adeline Mowbray by Amelia Alderson Opie
- Agnes Grey by Emily Bronte
- An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
- Angel by Elizabeth Taylor
- Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger
- Auralia’s Colors by Jeffrey Overstreet
- Becoming a Tiger: How Baby Animals Learn to Live in the Wild by Susan McCarthy
- Before the Fact by Frances Iles
- The Belgariad (Books 1 and 2) by David Eddings
- Be Near Me by Andrew O’Hagan
- Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner
- Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel
- The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
- Black Ships by Jo Graham
- The Body and Society by Peter Brown
- Book Crush by Nancy Perl
- The Book of Love by Sarah Bower
- The Case of the Late Pig by Margery Allingham
- Casting the Runes and Other Ghost Stories by M.R. James
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- The Chalet Girl by Kate Lace
- The Children of Hurin by JRR Tolkein
- The Children of Men by PD James
- The Children’s Book by AS Byatt
- The China Governess by Margery Allingham
- The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
- A Civil Contract by Georgette Heyer
- Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
- Coroner’s Pidgin by Margery Allingham
- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas
- A Country Doctor by Sarah Orne Jewett
- Creed or Chaos by Dorothy L. Sayers
- The Crucified God by Jurgen Moltmann
- Custom of the Country by Edith Wharton
- Danse Macabre by Stephen King
- The Dark Half by Stephen King
- The Day the Falls Stood Still by Cathy Marie Buchanan
- The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries by Marilyn Johnson
- Dear American Airlines by Jonathan Miles
- Death of a Ghost by Margery Allingham
- Defiance by Nechama Tec
- Devotion by Howard Norman
- Different Seasons by Stephen King
- Do You Speak American? by Robert MacNeil and William Cran
- The Dud Avocado by Elaine Dundy
- Ekaterinberg: The Last Days of the Romanovs by Helen Rappaport
- Empires of the World: A Language History of the World by Nicholas Ostler
- Falling for You by Jill Mansell
- Family Roundabout by Richmal Crompton
- The Fat Girl’s Guide to Life by Wendy Shankar
- The Finovar Tapestry (Books 1-3) by Guy Gavriel Key
- Floater by Calvin Trillin
- Four Past Midnight by Stephen King
- Frost in May by Antonia White
- Gatsby’s Girl by Caroline Preston
- The Genius Factory by David Plotz
- Girl in a Blue Dress by Gaynor Arnold
- The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls
- The Glass Cell by Patricia Highsmith
- The Goddess Revival by Aida Besancon Spencer, Donna FG Hailson, Catherine Clark Kroeger, and William David Spencer
- God’s Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible by Adam Nicolson
- The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread by Don Robertson
- The Great Starvation Experiment: The Heroic Men Who Starved So That Millions Could Live by Todd Tucker
- The Gyrth Chalice Mystery by Margery Allingham
- The Guynd: A Scottish Journal by Belinda Rathbone
- The Harrowing by Robert Dinsdale
- Heartburn by Nora Ephron
- Hide My Eyes by Margery Allingham
- Holy Cows and Hog Heaven: The Food Buyer’s Guide to Farm Friendly Food by Joel Salatin
- The Hot Zone by Richard Preston
- Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner
- Hotel World by Ali Smith
- House-Bound by Winifred Peck
- Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
- How to Paint a Dead Man by Sarah Hall
- I Claudius by Robert Graves
- If You Lived Here, I’d Know Your Name by Heather Lende
- The Imposter’s Daughter by Laurie Sendell
- In Search of England by H.V. Morton
- An Interrupted Life: The Diaries of Etty Hillesum
- The Ivy Tree by Mary Stewart
- Jack and Rochelle: A Holocaust Story of Love and Resistance by Jack and Rochelle Sutin
- Journey Into Fear by Eric Ambler
- The Killling Doll by Ruth Rendell
- Kim by Rudyard Kipling
- The Laodicean: A Story of Today by Thomas Hardy
- The Language of Bees by Laurie R. King
- Lapsing by Jill Paton Walsh
- The Last Single Woman in America by Cindy Guidry
- Light in August by William Faulkner
- Little Children by Tom Perrotta
- Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression by Mildred Armstrong Kalish
- London: The Novel by Edward Rutherford
- The Lost Continent by Bill Bryson
- Love and Hate in Jamestown by David A. Price
- Love and Summer by William Trevor
- Love Falls by Esther Freud
- Margorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk
- Mariana by Monica Dickens
- The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the OED by Simon Winchester
- The Memory Game by Nicci French
- Memoirs of Emma Courtney by Mary Hays
- Misery by Stephen King
- Moo by Jane Smiley
- The Moon of Gomrath by Alan Garner
- More Work for the Undertaker by Margery Allingham
- The Mortician’s Daughter by Elizabeth Bloom
- My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier
- The Mysteries of Glass by Sue Gee
- The Myth of Certainty: The Reflective Christian and the Rise of Commitment by Daniel Taylor
- Neuromancer by William Gibson
- Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women by Geraldine Brooks
- The Night Watch by Sarah Waters
- Notes from a Big Country by Bill Bryson
- The Odd Women by George Gissing
- Once Upon a Time in England by Helen Walsh
- One Hundred and One Dalmations by Dodie Smith
- The Oracles: My Filipino Grandparents in America by Pati Navalta Pobleze
- Otherland (Books 1-4) by Tad Williams
- Out of the Blackout by Robert Barnard
- Paul: A Novel by Walter Wangerin
- People Who Knock on the Door by Patricia Highsmith
- Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver
- Police at the Funeral by Margery Allingham
- Polly by Freya North
- The Post-Birthday World by Lionel Shriver
- Powder and Patch by Georgette Heyer
- The Professor by Charlotte Bronte
- The Promise of Paradox by Parker Palmer
- Prydain Chronicles (Books 1-5) by Lloyd Alexander
- Rabbit Run by John Updike
- Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose
- Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
- Religious Literacy by Stephen Prothero
- The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe
- The Romeo Flag by Carolyn Hougan
- Roots of Evil by Sarah Rayne
- Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin
- A Secret Alchemy by Emma Darwin
- Shirley by Charlotte Bronte
- Shooting in the Dark by Carolyn Hougan
- The Singing Bird by Roisin McAuley
- Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog by Kitty Burns Florey
- Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
- Someone at a Distance by Dorothy Whipple
- The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather
- The Sonnets by Warwick Collins
- Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder
- Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You by Sam Gosling
- Spinster by Sylvia Ashton-Warner
- The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
- Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham
- Tales from the Town of Widows by James Canon
- The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte
- Testament by Alis Hawkins
- The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
- The Tiger in the Smoke by Margery Allingham
- The Tulip and the Pope by Deborah Larsen
- Tom Bedlam by George Hagen
- To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis
- Traitor’s Purse by Margery Allingham
- Triangle by Katharine Weber
- The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy
- Under a Clear Sky by Sally Hinchcliffe
- Under the Greenwood Tree by Thomas Hardy
- Under the Skin by Michel Faber
- The Various Haunts of Men by Susan Hill
- The Village by Marghanita Laski
- Vindication by Frances Sherwood
- Waiting for My Cats to Die: A Morbid Memoir by Stacy Horn
- Waiting on God by Simone Weil
- A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
- Watching the English by Kate Fox
- The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner
- The Well Beloved by Thomas Hardy
- What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller
- When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
- The Wild Boy of Aveyron by Harlan Lane
- The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
- Winter’s End by Jean-Claude Mourlevat
- A Woman in Berlin by Anonymous
- World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
- Writings from The New Yorker: 1927–1976 by E.B. White
- Your Call Is Important to Us: The Truth About Bullshit by Laura Penny
Wish List: Some of the other books I’d like to read are listed here.
Upcoming Book Club Reads
- November: The English Major by Jim Harrison
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Excluding books I already own, I think you should read The Mysteries of Glass by Sue Gee. Of books I do own and LOVE, I’d suggest The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, The Wind in the Willows or Catch 22.
I think you should read World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks. It sounds really good!
Rattlesnake2021 AT aol DOT com
My vote is for Holy Cows and Hog Heaven: The Food Buyer’s Guide to Farm Friendly Food by Joel Salatin.
II recomend The Finovar Tapestry (Books 1-3) by Guy Gavriel Key :)
acrisalves AT gmail DOT com
I vote for My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier. I’ve heard good things about this, and I’ve not read anything by her except Rebecca.
Read the Count of Monte Cristo! I finished The Three Musketeers recently and loved it!
Becoming a Tiger: How Baby Animals Learn to Live in the Wild by Susan McCarthy would be my choice =)
Since “Cakes and Ales” is no longer on the list, per your email, here is my second selection–it was just a sliver behind “Cakes and Ales” anyway :)
“God’s Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible” by Adam Nicolson
I love books like this. They provide an indepth look at significant aspects of history that never seem to get covered in the survey books. I put this in the same category as “The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary,” “Longitude,” and “The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology,” all of which I loved.
This book has been on my own TBR for awhile, but not to the extent that I actually have it on my shelf yet.
The reviews look good as do Nicolson’s credentials. I say give it go and let us know how you like it!
I’d vote for Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Have been meaning to read it for years now but never got around to it!
What a great idea! I vote for Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson.
I’ll suggest “Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar,” if for nothing else than the title! :)
I suggest Devotion by Howard Norman. I’ve read two of his books and enjoyed them both, The Museum Guard and The Bird Artist. I’d love to read Devotion too. Thank you for entering me.
The Finovar Tapestry (Books 1-3) by Guy Gavriel Key
I have always heard great things about this fantasy series :D
A friend swears by it
TALES FROM THE TOWN OF WIDOWS by James Canon comes highly recommended by several friends and two reading groups, plus it has won a few awards in France (and I trust French people’s taste in books!)