In anticipation of the 25th anniversary of my bookblogging, which will come in late 2028, I’m reposting my monthly summaries since November 2003 when I started. (I already did this in 2019-2023, but this gives me a chance to consolidate all the posts and links to this WordPress site rather than my old Livejournal.) Everything will be linked under the bookblog nostalgia tag.
Some notable blog posts from this month: I visited Berlin and followed the Wall. and also had a lovely trip along the Karpass Peninsula in Cyprus. In Brussels, F and I explored the Coudenberg.
I also committed to increase my reading of books by PoC, with success and consequent enlightenment.
Non-fiction: 5 (YTD 21)
Search for a New Somali Identity, by Hussein Ali Dualeh
The Power of Speech, by Graham Watson
The Cyprus Conflict: Looking Ahead, edited by Ahmet Sözen
Elizabeth’s London, by Liza Picard
The New Penguin Russian Course, by Nicholas J. Brown
Fiction (non-sf): 5 (YTD 11)
Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown – I am particularly proud of this review
Resurrection, by Leo Tolstoy
The New Hennessy Book of Irish Fiction
The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Dead Man’s Brother, by Roger Zelazny
Scripts: 3 (YTD 10)
King Lear, by William Shakespeare
Macbeth, by William Shakespeare
Antony and Cleopatra, by William Shakespeare
SF (non-Who, but including Homer): 8 (YTD 22)
Jennie, by Paul Gallico
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, by J.K. Rowling
Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein
The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells
The Iliad, by Homer
Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood
Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow
A Million Open Doors, by John Barnes
Doctor Who: 2 (YTD 10)
The Shadow of Weng-Chiang, by David A. McIntee
The Resurrection Casket, by Justin Richards
Comics: 1 (YTD 3)
Persepolis 2: the Story of a Return, by Marjane Satrapi
Total page count ~7,600 (YTD ~22,500)
4/24 (YTD 14/77) by women (Picard, Rowling, Atwood, Satrapi)
2/24 (YTD 3/77) by PoC (Dualeh, Satrapi)
On reflection, much though I appreciate both Shakespeare and Wells, my top book for this month is the second half of Marjane Satrapi’s autobiographical Persepolis. You can get it here. The worst by far was Angels and Demons; again, I’m very proud of my review, but you can get it here.
