There are just way too many books out there that are flashing big bright “Read Me!” signs. I have dedicated myself to going back for those classics and well-received contemporary books that have escaped my reading lists (or disappeared under a covering of dust and forgetfulness). But then I hear about a new and exciting title and my urgency juices start to flow causing Henry James and Émile Zola to slide back behind Clarissa and The Good Soldier Svejk.
Is there a computer algorithm available which calculates the value of literature against the estimated time remaining and generates the optimal prioritized reading list?
Last month I published a suggested book to read every day: some of them I had read; others I truly intended to read; many would soon slide behind Henry James and Émile Zola. The stack grows higher … backwards.
Just to recognize the suggestions I made in May, suggestions that in some way might reflect the tedium of the lock-down, I here-bye present them as a single list (wish list?).
05-01-20 – Giving the Devil His Due — Michael Shermer
05-02-20 – The Big Red Book — Rumi
05-03-20 – Olive, Again — Elizabeth Strout
05-04-20 – The Thirty Years War — C. V. Wedgwood
05-05-20 – Polite Society — Mahesh Rao
05-06-20 – Falstaff — Harold Bloom
05-07-20 – War Is a Racket — Smedley Darlington Butler
05-08-20 – Family Record — Patrick Modiano
05-09-22 – Cleanness — Garth Greenwell
05-10-20 – Crime In Progress — Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch
05-11-20 – A Midsummer Night’s Steampunk — Scott E.Tarbet
05-12-20 – That’s Not English — Erin Moore
05-13-20 – No Fascist USA! — Hilary Moore and James Tracy
05-14-20 – Some Assembly Required: Decoding Four Billion Years of Life, from Ancient Fossils to DNA — Neil Shubin
05-15-20 – Abigail — Magda Szabo
05-16-20 – House of Stone — Novuyo Rosa Tshuma
05-17-20 – Oligarchy — Scarlett Thomas
05-18-20 – The Great Indian Novel — Shashi Tharoor
05-19-20 – The Giant Rat of Sumatra — Richard L. Boyer
05-20-20 – Kafka’s Last Trial — Benjamin Balint
05-21-20 – A Doll For Throwing — Mary Jo Bang
05-22-20 – A Long Petal of the Sea — Isabel Allende
05-23-20 – Me & Mr. Cigar — Gibby Haynes
05-24-20 – Wonderland — Matthew Dickman
05-25-20 – Shakespeare’s Style — Maurice Charney
05-26-20 – The Plot to Hack America — Malcolm Nance
05-27-20 – The Stone Collection — Kateri Akiwenzi-Damm
05-28-20 – Serious Noticing: Selected Essays 1997-2010 — James Wood
05-29-20 – Hiding In Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America — Sarah Kendzior
05-30-20 – AC/DC: Maximum Rock & Roll: The Ultimate Story of the World’s Greatest Rock-And-Roll Band — Murray Engleheart
05-31-20 – The theory of almost everything: the Standard Model, the unsung triumph of modern physics — Robert Oerter
I only read two of these titles? One wasn’t too good and the other was a contemporary riff on Sherlock Holmes. Sad.
A Celebration of Reading 