Buying books and reading books are two of my favourite things. I buy a lot of books, but I do read most of them. This is not a book blog, no reviews here, this is to keep me up to date on books I am reading this year, some projects and books I think might be interesting to buy in the future of which I am keeping a list.
I also have a fascination with Japanese literature, but no idea why. However, I often wonder if I am missing something by not understanding the culture or language enough and seriously considered giving up, usually when I read a book and end up disappointed. However, I have decided that I am going to learn more about Japan and see if this is the issue. I have some podcasts in mind and also a couple of anthologies of Japanese Literature.
Other genres of interest include anything with trains, gothic horror / weird, early 20th Century female writers and translated fiction.
This year I am planning to continue reading the George Smiley novels in order and also read all of the Romance of the Three Kingdom books (the next reading challenge after Outlaws of the Marsh). I am also going to try again to learn more about Japan and Japanese literature and to reread some books that I remember enjoying.
Books planned for this month include the first in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms - which will probably take most of the month actually.
This month I am planning to make a start on my goals and am going to read Tinker Tailor Solder Spy. I have also started the year reading Shadowlands by Matthew Green which I have had for three years and I am readying The Roman Republic (a very short introduction) and reareading Daventry Past. For a change I haven't actually planned the other books I am going to read this month. After finishing Tinker Tailor I picked up one of my Book Flood presents - Mystery in White. It seemed right to be reading it as it was cold and frosty and it is about a murder on a train caught in the snow. After that I have started Tom Cox's Everything Will Swallow You. I had paid for this through Unbound, which went bust twice and didn't pay it's authors. So I bought it at the local bookshop and it is therefore probably one of the most expensive novels I have bought. I find his writing sort of odd, but not, because other than the actual subject matter, the style is very much like talking to Intellectual Husband. I finished Shadowlands so moved on to reading Summit by Ed Conway about the Bretton Woods agreement, or more precisely the actual summit and the people involved. I quite enjoyed Shadowlands but it wasn't quite what I thought it would be (I will probably never learn to read the blurb properly) and found some chapters a bit repetitive and longer than they needed to be - particularly the last few which were twentieth century abandoned villages.