Well, I’ve finished Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest. I tried to read slowly but I ultimately finished it too fast. It was not only the last book in the series but also the last completed book by Larsson. There are rumours that he has an unfinished manuscript of book 4 and sketchy outlines for a further six books but they’re not the same. If anything, they’ll just make it harder. No more Larsson. Boo.

This week’s BTT:

Do you think any current author is of the same caliber as Dickens, Austen, Bronte, or any of the classic authors? If so, who, and why do you think so? If not, why not? What books from this era might be read 100 years from now?

This is a difficult question and I’ve pondered over it during dinner. These are some authors I think will be a classic in the next century:

Margaret Atwood – for her visionary and wonderful writing such as The Handmaid’s Tale, Oryx and Crake, The Blind Assassin and Alias Grace.

J.M. Coetzee – I’ve only read one of his books but it was so wonderful that I think I’ll like the rest of his books. He’s also quite prolific for the quality of his writing and the issues he writes on.

Harper Lee – To Kill a Mockingbird. Enough said.

And of course, the existentialist writers – Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre.

There are so many more authors that I think will pass the test of time: Vonnegut, Nabokov, Toni Morrison, George Orwell, Truman Capote…

Neilbowers has a consolidated list of the top 100 lists from several different countries and has made these top 100 lists into one single top 100.

Those in bold are the ones I have read.

1. Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell

2. The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald

3. The Grapes Of Wrath John Steinbeck

4. The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger

5. Catch-22 Joseph Heller

6. One Hundred Years Of Solitude Gabriel García Márquez

7. Gone with the Wind Margaret Mitchell

8. Ulysses James Joyce

9. On The Road Jack Kerouac

10. The Lord of the Rings J.R.R. Tolkien

11. To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee

12. Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen

13. Wuthering Heights Emily Brontë

14. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis

15. Great Expectations Charles Dickens

16. War and Peace Leo Tolstoy

17. Lolita Vladimir Nabokov

18. Animal Farm George Orwell

19. Crime And Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky

20. Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy

21. Lord Of The Flies William Golding

22. Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh

23. Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie

24. Love In The Time Of Cholera Gabriel García Márquez

25. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams

26. Jane Eyre Charlotte Brontë

27. The Hobbit J.R.R. Tolkien

28. To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf

29. Middlemarch George Eliot

30. Rebecca Daphne du Maurier

31. Dune Frank Herbert

32. Brave New World Aldous Huxley

33. A Prayer For Owen Meany John Irving

34. Watership Down Richard Adams

35. The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner

36. Little Women Louisa May Alcott

37. Invisible Man Ralph Ellison

38. Anne Of Green Gables LM Montgomery

39. Emma Jane Austen

40. Memoirs Of A Geisha Arthur Golden

41. Beloved Toni Morrison

42. Of Mice And Men John Steinbeck

43. The Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad

44. Les Miserables Victor Hugo

45. The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame

46. The Da Vinci Code Dan Brown

47. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles Thomas Hardy

48. Winnie the Pooh A.A. Milne

49. Birdsong Sebastian Faulks

50. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin Louis de Bernieres

51. Slaughterhouse Five Kurt Vonnegut

52. Life of Pi Yann Martel

53. A Clockwork Orange Anthony Burgess

54. The Count Of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas

55. A Passage to India E.M. Forster

56. Moby Dick Herman Melville

57. A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth

58. The Stand Stephen King

59. Possession A.S. Byatt

60. Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert

61. A Tale Of Two Cities Charles Dickens

62. The Trial Franz Kafka

63. I, Claudius Robert Graves

64. The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood

65. The Secret History Donna Tartt

66. His Dark Materials Philip Pullman

67. The Harry Potter Series J.K. Rowling

68. The Brothers Karamazov Fyodor Dostoyevsky

69. Don Quixote Miguel de Cervantes

70. Sons and Lovers D.H. Lawrence

71. The Pillars Of The Earth Ken Follett

72. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man James Joyce

73. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain

74. The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini

75. An American Tragedy Theodore Dreiser

76. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland Lewis Carroll

77. Bleak House Charles Dickens

78. The Time Traveller’s Wife Audrey Niffenegger

79. A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry

80. The Sun Also Rises Ernest Hemmingway

81. Nostromo Joseph Conrad

82. Under the Volcano Malcolm Lowry

83. The Golden Notebook Doris Lessing

84. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers

85. The Stranger Albert Camus

86. Native Son Richard Wright

87. Gravity’s Rainbow Thomas Pynchon

88. The Poisonwood Bible Barbara Kingsolver

89. Perfume Patrick Süskind

90. Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe

91. David Copperfield Charles Dickens

92. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory Roald Dahl

93. Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov

94. Persuasion Jane Austen

95. Atlas Shrugged Ayn Rand

96. The Tin Drum Gunter Grass

97. Vanity Fair William Makepeace Thackeray

98. Atonement Ian McEwan

99. Light in August William Faulkner

100. The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett

33/100 – not too bad I suppose.

This week’s RoM:

Finished:

• The Girl Who Played with Fire - Stieg Larsson. AMAZING! I’m really impressed by this series and it’s such a shame Larsson died before he could see the popularity of his books. And it’s sad that there will never be new material from him but I’m grateful he finished the trilogy before he died.

Seems like a slow week. I started placement work so I’ve been pooped and Girl isn’t exactly a slim volume.

Reading:

• The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest – Stieg Larsson. The final book in the trilogy and recently released. I’m glad I waited until all three were released so I didn’t have to wait! *pat on the back*

And I’m still working my way through The Seance, Emma and The Myth of Sisyphus.

Lined up:

Sadly, no more Girl books. No real strong line up except to finish the four books I’m magically simultaneously reading.

Eighteen percent of the women in Sweden have at one time been threatened by a man.

These statistics about violence and brutality against women sets the tone of the trilogy’s theme and are preludes to each section. In fact, the original Swedish title is Men who Hate Women. The first in the Millennium trilogy, this is one ripper of a book. The two central characters are introduced: Mickael Blomkvist, an independent and high profile journalist who is also co-owner of the Millennium magazine and Lisbeth Salander, a punky, anti-social, rather ruthless and resourceful genius hacker. And yes, it is Salander with the titular dragon tattoo.

Blomkvist and Salander have their own independent storyline until their paths meet much further into the book. Blomkvist finds himself in a disgraced position and takes a sabbatical when he is offered a one year contract by old Henrick Vangar to write a biography on the immensely wealthy and noted Vangar family. This is a cover for Blomkvist who is primarily there to investigate the mysterious disappearance of Harriet Vangar, the beloved granddaughter of the elder Henrik. The case has haunted Henrik for over 35 years since Harriet’s disappearance one eventful day in the 1960s. Henrik is adamant that she had been murdered by one the numerous members of the Vangar family, a mix of eccentrics, manipulative and dangerous people although the body has never been found.

And so Blomkvist moves to the relatively isolated Hedeby Island where the the majority of the Vangar family lives to try and solve the cold case. It is this section of the novel that becomes very reminiscent of Agatha Christie: an improbable murder, very little clues, impossible environment, a huge cast of suspects and an isolated scene of murder.

The twists in the plot are incredible and one can’t help but think if this is the sort of mysteries Agatha Christie would write if she was alive today. I’ll repeat my assessment of the book – “It’s like Agatha Christie on steroids and crystal meth”. The plot is unique but very very disturbing and rather violent and sheds quite a new light on the clean cut image of Sweden. Blomkvist and Salander are two quite unique characters, particularly Salander, although Blomkvist do at times appear to be the typical heroic journalist. One slight criticism of the novel would be that the ending ties up a little too neatly.

Girl with the Dragon Tattoo takes you on one hell of a ride. While I suspect that some things are probably lost in translation, it is still one ripping read. It’s quite a tragedy that Larsson died before he could see the success of his books and also without the opportunity to write more.

This week’s RoM.

Finished:

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. WOWWOWWOW!!! This book is absolutely amazing!! I initially thought it was a book about China when it was released a few years ago. Then I found out it was simply a Swedish crime/detective novel and I thought, ’so what?’ and didn’t really understand why it was so popular. But WOW!! The plot is so amazing. It’s like Agatha Christie on steroids and crystal meth. I highly recommend it. I finished it in one day.

The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. This is re-read since I didn’t really like it when I first read it but I was 16 so I think that played a part. On the latest re-read, the first as an adult, I really did enjoy it.

Unfinished:

The Children’s Book – A.S. Byatt. I’ve sort of given up on this. I’m about 150 pages in but it’s really plodding and I have a pile of other books to read – mainly library books which are pushing me along. I’ve rested it and I might go back to it. It’s good, but just plodding.

Reading:

The Girl who Played with Fire – Stieg Larsson. The second book in the millenium trilogy.

The Seance- John Harwood.

This week’s BTT.

Which do you prefer? Biographies written about someone? Or Autobiographies written by the actual person (and/or ghost-writer)?

I’d much prefer autobiographies written by the actual person. Ghost writing is usually out of the question since I prefer autobiographies of writers! I know they aren’t the most objective insight into an author’s life but I find it much more fascinating. A writer writing about another writing is also pretty interesting. If I’m really interested in an person, I’ll try to read both if they are available.

Firstly, I don’t know what I have to write will add a lot more to what has already been written about this cult classic. It’s simply one of those books one must read in their lifetime.

The story begins when Holden Caufield is expelled from yet another prep school, Pencey. Before he leaves, Holden narrates his school life and some of his fellow students, none of whom he particular likes. Phoniness and superficiality is something that really ticks Holden off and he believes that the majority of people he meets is insincere except himself.

After having some sort of minor mental break down after he writes a composition about his dead younger brother’s baseball glove, which was scribbled all over with poetry, for his roommate he leaves the school to wander around New York and to wait for news of his expulsion to reach his parents. The rest of the story follows his stumbling about New York looking for truth and companionship. Growing up and the changes in adolescence also subconsciously concerns Holden who decides that the one thing he would like to do in life is to be the catcher in the rye. It is an idea he got from hearing a child mis-quote singing a Robert Burns poem, ‘Comin’ through the rye’. Holden would like to place himself on a cliff and be ready to catch any children who falls out through the rye and prevent them from plummeting off the cliff which would save the children from having to go through adolescence and confront the difficulty of growing up and losing the innocence of childhood.

Holden Caulfield is a likeable character and very funny but he is consumed by depression that, while he’ll admit to now and then, he fails to acknowledge. It is startling clear that Holden is desperately lonely. Out of life, he wants nothing but to see genuineness and truth from his fellow human citizens. One of the most endearing characteristics of Holden is his constant noticing of the underdogs or the background characters. In plays, movies, books and in life, the secondary characters always catches Holden’s attention and it’s quite moving. Another particularly endearing trait is his love and kindness to his younger siblings – his younger brother, Allie, with the baseball glove who died of leukemia and a sister, Phoebe, to who he eventually goes home to see. As the story unfolds, it is clear that Allie’s death still affects Holden and is unresolved grief. Another incident towards the end of the story also suggests that he may have been molested at some stage during his time at school which would explain Holden’s insistence of continually getting expelled. Holden’s troubled and repressed feelings eventually catches up with him.

I first read this book when I was 16 and I really didn’t like it. Perhaps choosing a book with such a strong, male, anti-hero protagonist was not really the type of material 16 year old girls naturally gravitate towards not to mention that the historical context was quite unfamiliar to me. On re-reading, I have enjoyed it quite a lot and I think growing up has everything to do with it. I empathise with Holden and understand his contempt for the superficiality of fellow humans. I don’t think of him as a rebel, as most criticism has labelled him as, but one who has precociously seen and desire the truth.

This week’s RoM.

Finished:

I most recently finished Carry Me Down by M.J. Hyland which was amazing. I also finished Bibliotopia by Steven Gilbar which was a fun little read. It’s basically a little book with facts about bookish things but very American centric.

Reading:

The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt. It was a slightly difficult beginning and it’s a hard slog sometimes but everytime I think of giving up, something grabs my attention. It’s a VERY heavy book!

I also started re-reading The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. I didn’t like it when I first read in high school but due to raves of many bibliophiles, I wouldn’t do it justice if I didn’t give it another go. So far, so good.

Lined up:

Nothing really lined up aside from my huge pile of library books and huge piles of new books and huge piles of TBR books. Getting slightly overwhelmed!

New acquisitions, largely due to Border’s 30% off coupons. Who could resist?

• Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
• The Sonnets and ALover’s Complaint – William Shakespeare
• Mansfield Park – Jane Austen
• The Portrait of a Lady – Henry James

Discount coupons are always a great time to pick up classics. The lovely hardcover editions of the Penguins are so beautiful and wonderfully priced. Jane Eyre was part of last year’s batch and I’ve been meaning to get myself a nice little copy of my favourite book. The Sonnets was just recently released.

These are really the most beautiful books and designs. I’m itching to buy more. Little Women is especially pretty except I just bought myself a new copy recently. If you’re interested in the designer, here’s an interview with her after the launch of the first batch. The series is exclusive to Borders, unfortunately.