Recently in Books Category
Despite the fact that 2007 was a year of significant events and adjusting to a nomadic life, I faithfully kept up with my reading list. English-language books are predictably hard to find! I'm lucky to find even a bookshelf's worth of them in the towns around here, and even then half of the shelf is Harry Potter books, which just isn't my style! To top it all off, the books are expensive: 8 Euros or more for paperbacks, and if you factor in the current exchange rate for the dollar, well....
As usual, I read a lot in a variety of genres. My recommendations are the titles with bold comments, and if you have any questions or comments about a particular book, please feel free to ask!
- Year Zero, Jeff Long Good book
- Hitler's Children, Gerald Posner
- A Simple Act of Murder, Mark Fuhrman
- Death Watch, John Sandford
- Judge & Jury, James Patterson
- Arthur & George, Julian Barnes
- Blackbird House, Alice Hoffman Beautifully written
- The Probable Future, Alice Hoffman
- The United States of Arugula, David Kamp
- Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt
- Dispatches from the Edge, Anderson Cooper
- Mirrors of the Unseen: Journeys in Iraq, Jason Elliott
- Dark Horse, Tami Hoag
- Local Girls, Alice Hoffman
- The Return of Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle
- His Last Bow, Arthur Conan Doyle
- The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan Sheds light on the Organic movement--the back story--as well as how food ends up in our plates. Informative.
- Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats, Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08,No Child's Behind Left, and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War, Greg Palast
- The Book of Fate, Brad Meltzer
- The Collectors, David Baldacci
- Ice Cream: The Delicious History, Marilyn Powell
- Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home, Nando Parrado with Vince Rause
- You'll Never Nanny in This Town Again, Suzanne Hansen
- The Power Broker, Stephen Frey
- The Passion of Artemisia, Susan Vreeland
- Chocolate: A Bittersweet Saga of Dark and Light, Mort Rosenblum If you're a chocophile, it's worth reading.
- A Year in the World, Frances Mayes
- Joan: The Mysterious Life of the Heretic who Became a Saint, Donald Spoto
- Taken, Chris Jordan
- Next, Michael Crichton. Book takes an absurd but also realistic look at genetic engineering.
- Leading with My Chin, Jay Leno
- False Impression, Jeffrey Archer
- Imperium, Robert Harris
- The Alexandria Link, Steve Berry
- Happy at 100, John Robbins Highly recommended
- Step on a Crack, James Patterson
- The Romanov Prophecy, Steve Berry
- An Englishman à la Campagne, Michael Sadler
- Of Paupers and Peers, Sherri Cobb South
- The Last Empress, Anchee Min
- The Expected One, Kathleen McGowan
- Queen of Fashion, Caroline Weber
- The Qur'an, Bruce Lawrence
- Hannibal Rising, Thomas Harris
- The Inheritance of Loss, Kiran Desai
- The Interpretation of Murder, Jed Rubenfeld
- My Dog Skip, Willie Morris
- Forcing God's Hand: Why Millions Pray for a Quick Rapture—And Destruction of Planet Earth, Grace Halsell
- Ten Days to Die, Michael Musmanno Interesting and disturbing look into the last days of a madman
- Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, Daniel Jonah Goldhagen
- A Place Called Here, Cecilia Ahern
- The Historian, Elizabeth Kostova Excellent, excellent book
- Hour Game, David Baldacci
- Wicked, Gregory Maguire
- The Swarm, Frank Schätzing Great start, disappointing ending
I read some excellent books this year; in fact, I was quite happy with the last one I read, Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale and Salman Rushdie's Shalimar the Clown.
2006 Book List
Just trying to clear my About page. I should've done this last year!
I got the idea for this 52 Books in 52 Weeks meme from Large Hearted Boy, who did this last year.
- A Map of the World, Jane Hamilton ** Fiction
- Smilla's Sense of Snow, Peter Høeg *** Fiction
- Contact, Carl Sagan *** Science Fiction
- A Fire upon the Deep, Vernor Vinge *** Science Fiction
- A Deepness in the Sky, Vernor Vinge
- Dune: The Battle of Corrin, Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson
- Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman
- The Secret History, Donna Tartt
- The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Michael Chabon ** Fiction
- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell, Susanna Clarke
- How I Live Now, Meg Rosoff
- The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown ** Fiction
- The Shadow of the Wind, Carlos Luis Zafón *** Fiction
- The Final Solution, Michael Chabon
- Battle Royale, Koushun Takami ** Fiction
- The Broker, John Grisham
- Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier
- A Density of Souls, Christoper Rice
- The Other Side of the Story, Marian Keyes
- London Bridges, James Patterson
- I, Claudius, Robert Graves
- A Winter Haunting, Dan Simmons
- A Ladder of Years, Anne Tyler
- The Twentieth Wife, Indu Sundaresan
- Orlando, Virginia Woolf
- The Ivy Chronicles, Karen Quinn
- Leap of Faith, Queen Noor of Jordan ** Non-Fiction
- 3rd Degree, James Patterson
- How To Be Famous, Alison Bond
- Gaudí: An Introduction to His Architecture, Juan-Eduardo Cirlot
- Salt: A World History, Mark Kurlansky
- Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling, Ross King
- The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, Oscar Hijuelos
- State of Fear, Michael Crichton
- The Manchurian Candidate, Richard Condon
- The Fourth K, Mario Puzo
- Matchbook, Samantha Daniels
- Women About Town, Laura Jacobs
- Don Quixote, Miguel de Cervantes
- Grecian Holiday, Kate Cann
- Loose Lips, Claire Berlinski
- In The Flesh, Emma Holly
- The Nerd Who Loved Me, Vicki Lewis Thompson
- High Country, Nevada Barr * Fiction
- Empty Cradle, Karen Harper
- Deep Freeze, Lisa Jackson
- For My Daughters, Barbara Delinsky
- The Good, The Bad, and The Undead, Kim Harrison
- Ain't She Sweet?, Susan Elizabeth Phillips
- Just The Way You Are, Christina Dodd
- Almost Like Being In Love, Christina Dodd
- Close To You, Christina Dodd
- Life of Pi, Yann Martel *** Fiction
- Eats, Shoots & Leaves, Lynne Truss
- The Last Knight: The Twilight of the Middle Ages and the Birth of the Modern Era, Norman Cantor
- Stradivari's Genius: Five Violins, One Cello, and Three Centuries of Enduring Perfection, Toby Faber
- Animal Dreams, Barbara Kingsolver
- The Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios, Yann Martel * Fiction
- A Very Good Year, Mike Weiss * Documentary
- A Time of Angels, Patricia Schonstein
- Hidden Prey, John Sandford
- Traditional Knitting: Aran, Fair Isle and fisher ganseys, Michael Person
- Lucrezia Borgia, Sarah Bradford
- Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America and American in Iran, Azadeh Moaveni
- The Road to Dune, Frank Herbert, Brian Herbert, and Kevin J. Anderson
- The Essence of Style: How the French Invented High Fashion, Fine Food, Chic Cafes, Style, Sophistication, and Glamour, Joan DeJean
- Don't Eat This Book: Fast Food and the Supersizing of America, Morgan Spurlock
- The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape, James Howard Kunstler
- The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini *** Fiction
- Honeymoon, James Patterson and Howard Roughan
- Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman, Yvon Chouinard *** Non-Fiction
- The Snow Garden, Christopher Rice
- Gilgamesh, English translation by Stephen Mitchell Not in my top 20, but a beautifully formatted book.
- The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of the Oil Age, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-first Century, James Howard Kunstler *** Non-Fiction
- Confessions of an Heiress: A Tongue-in-Chic Peek Behind the Pose, Paris Hilton, et al.
- The Limits of Enchantment, Graham Joyce
- The Memory Keeper's Daughter, Kim Edwards
- The Birth of Venus, Sarah Dunant
- Magic Street, Orson Scott Card
- A Slight Trick of the Mind, Mitch Cullin
- Being Mrs. Alcott, Nancy Geary
- The Turquoise Ring, Grace Tiffany
- Chromosome 6, Robin Cook










