I always like to pause at the half-way marks of the year to think where I am, and where I am going. Often I have copied Paddy Ashdown’s habit of writing a letter to himself describing what he wanted to accomplish, personally and professionally, in the next six months. If I do that again I’m not posting it here; but I have done a big rearrangement of the bookshelves, besically centralising all the unread books in the shelf nearest the bed. One side effect of this is that I have come across another two dozen books which I would like to read, so the “unread” list has jumped from 125 to 149. Thanks to the magic of LibraryThing, I can reveal the covers of most of them (some aren’t on Amazon so it won’t work for them):

And the full list (alphabetical by author, at least as far as LibraryThing records the author), is
Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction,
What Ifs? Of American History: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been,
More Real Than Reality: The Fantastic in Irish Literature and the Arts (Contributions to the Study of Science Fiction an,
The Stories of Hans Christian Andersen,
Μακεδονία (Macedonia): A Greek Name in Modern Usage,
Hotel Rwanda: Bringing the True Story of an African Hero to Film,
The Year’s Best Science Fiction Twenty-Second Annual Collection,
“Interzone”: Anthology: 5th,
Talkback: The Unofficial and Unauthorised “Doctor Who” Interview Book: Sixties v. 1,
The Desert Fathers: Sayings of the Early Christian Monks (Penguin Classics S.),
Tales of Human Waste,
Irish Tales of Terror: Twenty-Two Bewitching Tales of Irish Mystery and Magic,
Trillion year spree : the history of science fiction, Aldiss, Brian Wilson
Darkness Audible, Andrews, Graham
Sunrise Alley, Asaro, Catherine
Earth is Room Enough, Asimov, Isaac
Abarat, Barker, Clive
On the place of Gilbert Chesterton in English letters, Belloc, Hilaire
The Medieval Cookbook, Black, Maggie
Sorcerer’s Apprentice (Doctor Who Missing Adventures), Bulis, Christopher
Doctor Who: City at World’s End (Doctor Who), Bulis, Christopher
The Conquest of Gaul, Caesar, Julius
Rethinking Europe’s Future (Century Foundation Book), Calleo, David P.
Analog 6, Campbell, John W (editor)
Oscar and Lucinda, Carey, Peter
Summerland., Chabon, Michael
The Faded Sun Trilogy, Cherryh, C. J.
Pussey!, Clowes, Dan
Appleseed, Clute, John
Shadowkings, Cobley, Michael
Forbidden Acts, Collins, Nancy A.
The Prince of Tides, Conroy, Pat
The Road from Coorain, Conway, Jill Ker
Letter from America : 1946-2004, Cooke, Alistair
Astra and Flondrix, Cullen, Seamus
From the Holy Mountain: A Journey in the Shadow of Byzantium, Dalrymple, William
The megalith builders of Western Europe, Daniel, Glyn Edmund
The Ill-Made Mute, Dart-Thornton, Cecilia
Dhalgren, Delany, Samuel R.
Doctor Who-Caves of Androzani, Dicks, Terrance
Doctor Who and the Deadly Assassin, Dicks, Terrance
Doctor Who and the Planet of the Spiders, Dicks, Terrance
Vellum, Duncan, Hal
Teranesia, Egan, Greg
Fatal Attraction, Fara, Patricia
The Nobel Prize: A History of Genius, Controversy and Prestige, Feldman, Burton
Between the Woods and the Water : On Foot to Constantinople from the Hook of Holland – The Middle Danube to the Iron Gat, Fermor, Patrick Leigh
Something Rotten, Fforde, Jasper
Doctor Who and the Leisure Hive, Fisher, David
Most Ancient Song, Flint, Kenneth C.
The Enchanted Isles, Flynn, K.C.
Fortunata and Jacinta, Galdos, Benito Perez
Jennie, Gallico, Paul
The Owl Service, Garner, Alan
Faith in Europe?: The Cardinal’s Lectures (Cardinals Lectures), Geldof, Bob
White Crow, Gentle, Mary
Rocks of Ages, Gould, Stephen Jay
Sacred Visions, Greeley, Andrew M.
Seasons of Plenty, Greenland, Colin
Mother of Plenty, Greenland, Colin
Misspent Youth, Hamilton, Peter F.
The go-between, Hartley, L. P.
Visions of Wonder: The Science Fiction Research Association Reading Anthology, Hartwell, David G.
The Space Opera Renaissance, Hartwell, David G.
Daughters of Britannia: The Lives and Times of Diplomatic Wives, Hickman, Katie
So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Visions of the Future, Hopkinson, Nalo
L. Ron Hubbard presents Writers of the future, Hubbard, L. Ron
Vicious Circles and Infinity: An Anthology of Paradoxes, Hughes, Patrick
The Making of Doctor Who, Hulke, Malcolm
Half-life of a Zealot, Hunt, Swanee
Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945, Judt, Tony
The Successor, Kadare, Ismail
The Prisoner of Chillon, Kelly, James Patrick
Athens-Skopje: An Uneasy Symbiosis, Kofos, Evangelos
Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Lawrence, T. E.
City of Illusions, Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Great Tradition (Pelican S.), Leavis, F.R.
Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century, Leonard, Mark
The pilgrim’s regress, Lewis, C. S
Red Branch, Llywelyn, Morgan
King Solomon’s ring: new light on animal ways, Lorenz, Conrad Z.
No great mischief, MacLeod, Alistair
Back Home, Magorian, Michelle
The Mind of Mr. Soames, Maine, Charles Eric
Endgame in Ireland, Mallie, Eamonn
Earth Logic, Marks, Laurie J.
Radical Islams Rules: The Worldwide Spread of Extreme Sharia Law, Marshall, Paul
The Kalahari typing school for men, McCall Smith, Alexander
The full cupboard of life, McCall Smith, Alexander
Brasyl, Mcdonald, Ian
Irish tales of terror, McGarry, Jim
Harpist in the Wind, McKillip, Patricia A
The Bessarabian Question in Communist Historiography, Meurs, Wim P. Van
Three to see the king, Mills, Magnus
Once in a Blue Moon, Mills, Magnus
The provinces of the Roman Empire, from Caesar to Diocletian, Mommsen, Theodor
The Cornelius Quartet: The Final Program, A Cure for Cancer, The English Assassin, The Condition of Muzak, Moorcock, Michael
George and Sam, Moore, Charlotte
Thunderbirds Bumper Storybook: “The Uninvited”, “Brink of Disaster”, “Sun Probe”, “Atlantic Inferno”, Morris, Dave
Cities of salt, Munif, Abd al-Rahman
Dreams of the Compass Rose [Extended Excerpt], Nazarian, Vera
“Star Trek”: The Next Generation Companion, Nemecek, Larry
Bel Canto, Patchett, Ann
Not Quite the Diplomat: Home Truths About World Affairs, Patten, Christopher
Democratisation in Southeast Europe: An Introduction to Election Issues, Pavlovic, Dusan
The English: A Portrait of a People, Paxman, Jeremy
Kosova Express, Pettifer, James
The Republic, Plato
Expiration Date, Powers, Tim
In Search of Lost Time: Guermantes Way, Proust, Marcel
Science Fiction and Postmodern Fiction: A Genre Study, Puschmann-Nalenz, Barbara
Vineland, Pynchon, Thomas
The Duke And I, Quinn, Julia
Blind Voices, Reamy, Tom
Quidditch through the ages, Rowling, J. K.
The Child Garden, Ryman, Geoff
The Shore of Women, Sargent, Pamela
The embarrassment of riches an interpretation of Dutch culture in the golden age, Schama, Simon
The Two Faces of Islam: Saudi Fundamentalism and Its Role in Terrorism, Schwartz, Stephen
Sarajevo Rose: A Balkan Jewish Notebook, Schwartz, Stephen
England’s Troubles : Seventeenth-Century English Political Instability in European Context, Scott, Jonathan
Wilt In Nowhere, Sharpe, Tom
First Lensman, Smith, E. E. Doc
Second Stage Lensmen, Smith, E.E. ‘Doc’
The Superpower Myth: The Use and Misuse of American Might, Soderberg, Nancy
The Stories of Elizabeth Spencer, Spencer, Elizabeth
The Atrocity Archives, Stross, Charles
Satires and personal writings, Swift, Jonathan
Laserlicht, Teng, Tais
The lost heart of Asia, Thubron, Colin
Resurrection, Tolstoy, Leo
Music & silence, Tremain, Rose
Faith, Trollope, Joanna
Great War Breakthroughs, Turtledove, Harry
The Devil’s Highway : A True Story, Urrea, Luis Alberto
Peter Abelard, Waddell, Helen
Desert Fathers, The, Waddell, Helen
The Discovery of the Germ, Waller, John
God’s Politics : Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It, Wallis, Jim
Liberal Democracy and Globalisation, Watson, Graham
National Lampoon’s Doon, Weiner, Ellis
The Happy Prince and Other Tales, Wilde, Oscar
Sunset at Blandings, Wodehouse, P. G.
Peace, Wolfe, Gene
The Wizard Knight, Wolfe, Gene
The Phoenix Exultant, Wright, John C.
The Golden Transcendence, Wright, John C.
The seeds of time, Wyndham, John

Of the 143 books that were on my “unread” list at the end of last year, I have read 32 (among the 123 books read so far this year). With the summer break coming up, I should be able to get through the same number off this list in the second half of this year.

My classic literature reading resolution was to either i) finish Don Quixote, and read Catcher in the Rye and The Tin Drum, or ii) to read In Search of Lost Time. I’m on the way to achieving both arms of this, being two volumes into Proust, and having read both the Salinger and the Grass.

I’m a bit behind on my classic sf resolution, to read three of A Princess of Mars, Tau Zero, Grey Lensman, Again, Dangerous Visions, The Female Man, Last and First Men, Deathbird, and Dhalgren, in that I have read only the Anderson.

My main comics resolution was to find a new master list, and I did.