A New Century of Books
1920-2020
I am starting anew with a new Century of Books project even though I haven't quite completed my last one. I have enjoyed doing this previously, and am starting this new go-round with new parameters. Since so much time has already passed since the turn of the century, I'm shifting my Century to the range of the 20s to the 20s. I'm looking forward to filling my new Century with books that reflect life in the years referenced. Other than the date range, though, not much else has changed. I'm using the same criteria as last time:
- All Women
- Repeats and Rereads are Fine!
- Only caveat being that the titles I add here can't have been reviewed on my blog in the past -- so rereads okay but only if I've never reviewed them before
1920 - Bliss / Katherine Mansfield
1923 - The Ladies of Lyndon / Margaret Kennedy
1924 - The Home Maker / Dorothy Canfield Fisher
1928 - Quicksand / Nella Larsen
1929 - Harriet Hume / Rebecca West
1931 - Father / Elizabeth von Arnim
1935 - Four Gardens / Margery Sharp
1941 - Babbacombe's/ Susan Scarlett
1944 - Cluny Brown / Margery Sharp
1947 - Night Walk /Elizabeth Daly
1948 - The Lottery & Other Stories / Shirley Jackson
1949 - Her Side of the Story / Alba de Cespedes
1955 - An Episode of Sparrows / Rumer Godden
1957 - The Comforters / Muriel Spark
1963 - The Wall / Marlen Haushofer
1964 - The Fiend / Margaret Millar
1965 - Flight of the Falcon / Daphne du Maurier
1971 - Don't Look Now & other Stories / Daphne Du Maurier
1978 - Bookshop / Penelope Fitzgerald
1980 - Judgement Day / Penelope Lively
1981 - The Goldberg Variations / Nancy Huston
1982 - The House of Spirits / Isabel Allende
1984 - According to Mark / Penelope Lively
1986 - The Well / Elizabeth Jolley
1988 - Thornyhold / Mary Stewart
1993 - The Invisible Man at the Window / Monique Proulx
1994 - Rattlebone / Maxine Clair
2000 - Winter Solstice / Rosamond Pilcher
The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse / Louise Erdrich
2001 - Violets / Kyung Sook-Shin
2002 - Lake of Dead Languages / Carol Goodman
2004 - My Death / Lisa Tuttle
2005 - The Lake / Banana Yoshimoto
2011 - The Buddha in the Attic / Julie Otsuka
2014 - Tokyo Ueno Station / Yu Miri
2018 - The Employees / Olga Ravn
2019 - Dog Park / Sofi Oksanen
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Time to Begin Again with a New Century of Books (ACOB)
I really enjoyed my four-year century which I began in 2014. And I finally, finally finished it in December 2018! So I'm going to set up another Century List to work away on, and this time aim to have it done in only TWO years ;)
I think that the reason it took me so very long last time was that I set myself very stiff parameters: all books by women, with no repeats of any author, and no rereads. It was the no repeating of the same author that really got me. It was hard not to keep reading an author once I found one I really liked. However, this process also meant I found a bunch of brand-new-to-me authors who I can now read more of!
So, my 2019-2020 criteria are much looser:
- All Women
- Repeats and Rereads are Fine!
- Only caveat being that the titles I add here can't have been reviewed on my blog in the past -- so rereads okay but only if I've never reviewed them before
- That's It! Now to get reading
1900- A Gift From the Grave, or, The Touchstone / Edith Wharton
1903- On the Wings of the Wind / Allen Raine
Lady Rose's Daughter/ Mary Augusta Ward
Lady Rose's Daughter/ Mary Augusta Ward
1904- The Adventures of Elizabeth in Rugen / Elizabeth Von Arnim
1912- The Reef / Edith Wharton
1914- The Pastor's Wife / Elizabeth Von Arnim
1916- Trifles / Susan Glaspell
With Her in Ourland / Charlotte Perkins Gilman
1918- What Not / Rose Macaulay
1929- Passing / Nella Larsen
1950- Some Tame Gazelle / Barbara Pym
1959- A Woman of Letters / March Cost
1964- The Stone Angel / Margaret Laurence
The Lion in the Lei Shop / Kaye Starbird
1987- Circles of Deceit / Nina Bawden
News from the City of the Sun / Isabel ColgateCroatian War Nocturnal / Spomenka Stimec
This year heralds a truly challenging challenge! The Century of Books, started and hosted by Simon at Stuck in a Book, is running again for 2014.
I really wanted to challenge myself to read 100 books for this challenge all in this year, but it's just not going to be feasible, so in order to enjoy my century of books I will be taking the 2 year option and splitting my titles over 2014-2015.
My own criteria are that they will all be books by women, and they will be ones that have been on my shelves for some time (except for a few in the pre-copyright years before 1923 which will be downloaded). Oh, and no rereads for this one.
These are my planned reads so far, but I am always open to change. I will add and link the reviews as I go along.
1900 - The Visits of Elizabeth / Elinor Glyn
1901 - My Brilliant Career / Miles Franklin
1902 - Life, the Interpreter / Phyllis Bottome
1903 - Katharine Frensham / Beatrice Harraden
1904 - Freckles / Gene Stratton Porter
1905 - House of Mirth / Edith Wharton
1906 - Spinner in the Sun / Myrtle Reed
1907 - The Enchanted Castle / Edith Nesbit
1908 - Love's Shadow / Ada Leverson
1909 - The Caravaners / Elizabeth von Arnim
1910 - Molly Make-Believe / Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
1911 - Jenny / Sigrid Undset
1912 - House of Windows / Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
1913 - Pollyanna / Eleanor H. Porter
1914 - The Professor's Legacy / Cecily Ullmann Sidgwick
1915 - Herland / Charlotte Perkins Gilman
1916 - The Golden Arrow / Mary Webb
1917 - I, Mary Maclane / Mary Maclane
1918 - Return of the Soldier / Rebecca West
1919 - Aleta Day / Francis Marion Beynon
1920 - Penny Plain / O. Douglas
1921 - The Brimming Cup / Dorothy Canfield
1922 - The Garden Party / Katherine Mansfield
1923 - Uncanny Stories / May Sinclair
1924 - The Rector's Daughter / F.M. Mayor
1925 - Gentlemen Prefer Blondes / Anita Loos
1926 - Lolly Willowes / Sylvia Townsend Warner
- Crewe Train / Rose Macaulay
1927 - The House Without Windows / Barbara Newhall Follett
1928 - Plum Bun / Jessie Redmon Fauset
1929 - The Last September / Elizabeth Bowen
1930 - The Edwardians / Vita Sackville West
- After Leaving Mr. Mackenzie / Jean Rhys
1931 - Beggar's Choice / Patricia Wentworth
1932 - Christmas Pudding / Nancy Mitford
1933 - Diary of a Provincial Lady / E.M. Delafield
1934 - Murder on the Orient Express/ Agatha Christie
1935 - The Young Clementina / D.E. Stevenson
1936 - The Wheel Spins / Ethel Lina White
1937 - The Rising Tide / Molly Keane
1938 - Address Unknown / Kathrine Kressman Taylor
1939 - Mrs Miniver / Jan Struther
1940 - The Heart is a Lonely Hunter / Carson McCullers
1941 - Between the Acts / Virginia Woolf
1942 - Death and the Dancing Footman / Ngaio Marsh
1943 - A Tree Grows in Brooklyn / Betty Smith
1944 - A Fine of Two Hundred Francs / Elsa Triolet
- Gigi / Colette
1945 - The Tin Flute / Gabrielle Roy
1946 - Krane's Cafe / Cora Sandel
1947 - An Avenue of Stone / Pamela Hansford Johnson
1948 - One Foolish Heart / June Wilson
1949 - Olivia / by Olivia (Dorothy Strachey)
1950 - To Love and Be Wise / Josephine Tey
1951 - A Game of Hide and Seek / Elizabeth Taylor
1952 - The Tiger in the Smoke / Margery Allingham
1953 - The Orchid House / Phyllis Shand Allfrey
1954 - The Tortoise and the Hare / Elizabeth Jenkins
1955 - Winds of Heaven / Monica Dickens
1956 - The Keys of My Prison / Frances Shelley Wees
1957 - Those Without Shadows / Francoise Sagan
- Street of Riches / Gabrielle Roy
- An Air That Kills / Margaret Millar
1958 - Greengage Summer / Rumer Godden
- The Silent Rooms / Anne Hébert
1959 - The Vet's Daughter / Barbara Comyns
1960 - The Light in the Piazza / Elizabeth Spencer
1961 - Tete Blanche / Marie Claire Blais
1962 - We Have Always Lived in the Castle / Shirley Jackson
- The Time of the Doves / Merce Rodoreda
1963 - A Favourite of the Gods / Sybille Bedford
1964 - The Garrick Year / Margaret Drabble
1965 - After Julius / Elizabeth Jane Howard
1966 - Les Belles Images / Simone de Beauvoir
1967 - The Stratton Story (or, Mrs. Westerby Changes Course) / Elizabeth Cadell
1968 - Greensleeves / Eloise Jarvis McGraw
1969 - A Bouquet of Barbed Wire / Andrea Newman
1970 - Beyond This Point are Monsters / Margaret Millar
1971 - Lives of Girls and Women / Alice Munro
1972 - The Innocents / Margery Sharp
1973 - Book of Eve / Constance Beresford Howe
1974 - The Diviners / Margaret Laurence
1975 - Taxi / Helen Potrebenko
1976 - Bear / Marian Engel
- Enchanted Summer / Gabrielle Roy
- Legend in Green Velvet / Elizabeth Peters
1977 - Edith's Diary / Patricia Highsmith
-The Girls from the Five Great Valleys / Elizabeth Savage
- Garden in the Wind / Gabrielle Roy
1978 - A Woman of Independent Means / Elizabeth Forsythe Hailey
1979 - Offshore / Penelope Fitzgerald
1980 - Basic Black with Pearls / Helen Weinzweig
1981 - Newspaper of Claremont Street / Elizabeth Jolley
1982 - The Severed Wasp / Madeleine L'Engle
- Mrs. Caliban / Rachel Ingalls
1983 - The Cannibal Galaxy / Cynthia Ozick
1984 - House on Mango Street / Sandra Cisneros
1985 - Home Truths / Mavis Gallant
1986 - Pack of Cards / Penelope Lively
1987 - Bohunk Road / Hope Morritt
1988 - The Bean Trees / Barbara Kingsolver
1989 - Three Legged Horse / Ann Hood
1990 - Symposium / Muriel Spark
1991 - Deathly Delights / Anne Dandurand
1992 - His Mother's House / Marta Morazzoni
1993 - The Women in Black / Madeleine St John
1994 - One Sweet Quarrel / Deirdre McNamer
1995 - Winter Journey / Isabel Colgate
1996 - Fairy Tale / Alice Thomas Ellis
1997 - Aurora Montrealis / Monique Proulx
- My Soul to Keep / Tananarive Due
1998 -The Widows / Suzette Mayr
1999 - The Perfect Woman / Suzanne Harnois
- Memoria / Louise Dupre
2000 - The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly / Sun-Mi Hwang; translated from the Korean by
Chi- Young Kim
Very, very best of luck with it all!
ReplyDeleteOh, this is excellent! (Found you through Twitter because of the classics club event announced yesterday.) :D
ReplyDeleteThat's great! Sounds like such a fun, fun project for the next year. Thanks for stopping by, such a nice way to discover your blog as well
DeleteI would have read The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy for the 1905 entry, The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge for 1946, and The Art Lover by Carole Mose for 1990.
ReplyDeleteBut that's just me.
I've read both of those first ones and agree with you that they are so good! I might have to go back to one. But I haven't read the Carole Maso, so thanks for the tip :)
Deleteargh. Carole Maso, not Mose
ReplyDelete