THE READING PROJECT, PHASE 1

With only two books left in The Reading Project (well ahead of schedule—I’d given myself a whole year), I’m already looking around for a new list of books to assign myself. It’s so silly to give oneself homework, but as someone who loves a good to-do list, I’ve realized I have to play to my strengths. If this motivates me to read a bunch of books I never would have otherwise gotten around to reading, then so be it. I have really enjoyed the Project so far. The English major in me is fulfilled to be reading “classics” again, and the bookworm in me is thrilled that most of the books I’ve read have been highly entertaining.

So I thought I’d make a handy little reference list I can update as I complete things...

THE GOAL: To read all the novels I own but haven't read before.

1. Felix Holt: The Radical, by George Eliot**
2. Peace Like a River, by Leif Enger****
3. Love Medicine, by Louise Erdrich**
4. Tender Is the Night, by F. Scott Fitzgerald***
5. A Passage to India, by E.M. Forster***
6. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey****
7. Women in Love, by D.H. Lawrence*
8. Pnin, by Vladimir Nabokov****
9. Ethan Frome, by Edith Wharton***
10. Nights at the Circus, by Angela Carter**
11. The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot***

* = Didn’t like, didn’t finish
** = OK, but wouldn’t reread
*** = Liked it
**** = Loved it
() = not yet read

I’m contemplating several options for Phase 2 of the Project. Once I finish Mill, I’ll be done with the initial list I set for myself, but I won’t technically have read every work of fiction that I own, because I didn’t include anthologies and omnibuses in the first go-round. There are 13 more unread books that are part of larger books on my shelves, and they’re likely candidates for my next Project. Or perhaps I should take a break from fiction and read all the unread nonfiction books I own? Another thing I’d like to do is to read more, or perhaps the complete works, by writers I’ve liked in the past. For instance, I’ve read every Austen book (even the unfinished novel, Sanditon) except Mansfield Park. And now, after the Project, I’ve read four of George Eliot’s novels—should I read the rest? I like the idea of getting really deeply into one writer’s body of work for a while. So, anyway, I’ll keep you posted on next steps. Most likely, in the meantime, I’ll spend some time goofing off with fluffy library books before embarking on a new phase of the Project.