My Book Year 2025 - Gifted Reads and More!

It's year FIFTEEN of my reading challenge blog, and this year I'm focusing on reading all those books that people have gifted to me that have always gone to the bottom of the pile of unread tomes. No longer will they languish in the gathering dust, but instead, they'll be given the priority they deserve! Oh, and I'm going to try and read more in general after a couple of years of struggling to muster up more than 5-10 minutes at the end of a day. Let's go!

Saturday, 22 January 2011

Week 3: 5 books down, 47 to go!

Yes indeedie, another book tucked under my belt this morning. The 5th book to be completed is Restless, by William Boyd (on audio). This is a gripping tale of a young Franco-Russian women, who is sucked into the life of a wartime secret agent, but who can never really leave the "spy" behind her. The past and present come together when she reveals this other life to her grown up daughter - who then has to question everything she ever thought she knew about her mother. This was a great read - in audio form the narration by Rosamund Pike is pitch-perfect - and gathered pace the further into the book you went, sucking you in so that you just wanted to keep on reading. From the very opening quote from Marcel Proust, your brain starts ticking over and wondering where this book is going to take you. Well worth the journey ... I might have to read more by Mr Boyd!

As a special treat - here's the opening quote from Marcel Proust to get your head round ...

"We may indeed say that the hour of death is uncertain, but when we say this we think of that hour as situated in a vague and remote expanse of time. It does not occur to us that it can have any connection with the day that has already dawned, and can mean that death may occur this very afternoon. So far from uncertain. This afternoon, whose timetable, hour by hour, has been settled in advance. One insists on one's daily outing ,so that in a months time one will have had one's daily ration of fresh air. One has hesitated over which coat to take, which cab man to call. One is in the cab, the whole day lies before one. Short, because one must be back home early as a friend is coming to see one. One hopes it will be as fine again tomorrow, and one has no suspicion that death, which has been advancing within one on another plain, has chosen precisely this particular day to make its appearance in a few minutes time."

The stats bit:

Length - 10 hours 15 mins (Audio); 336 pages (standard print).
Price I paid - £0.00 (free from Audible via a newspaper offer).
Other formats available in - print; audio CD; Ebook (Kindle).

4 comments:

CCC23 January 2011 at 06:23
Been having a little trouble posting today - grrr. Sorry if this appears three times.
What I've been trying to say is; the William Boyd sounds good, might have to try that. Are you going to keep a league table on how much you enjoyed the books? Note, not how good the book is, that's a bit different, especially as the format must have some bearing on the reading experience.
Back on track Munchkin!
Cx
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The Book Munchkin23 January 2011 at 12:24
Good idea about the league table - will investigate how I might do this on the blog (not being hugely technically minded, this may take some kind assistance from others) ... if indeed it is possible within the blog template I'm using!
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CCC25 January 2011 at 23:43
Yay!! League Table! Ask and ye shall receive.
Cx
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Jonathan Read-Bone21 February 2011 at 04:43
Have downloaded Restless from Audible to listen to on our journey to Spain in the summer. Keep the recommendations coming :)
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The STARS list 2018

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6. Life on Air, by David Attenborough (audio)
7. How to save an hour every day, by Michael Heppell (audio)
8. The key to Rebecca, by Ken Follett (ebook)
9. Stonemouth, by Iain Banks (audio)
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The STARS list 2011

***** The Elephant to Hollywood (Audio); Dancing Backwards (Print); Restless (Audio); Sharpe's Fury (Print); Water for Elephants (Audio); The Graveyard Book (Audio); Chocolate Wars (Audio); Getting Sassy (Audio); The Help (Audio); Life and Laughing (Audio); Rivers of London (Audio)
**** One Day (Audio); The Zookeeper's War (Print); The Solitary Man (Ebook); Fup (Ebook); The Girl Who Played With Fire (Print); Tooth and Nail (Print); Mousetrapped (Ebook); Confessions of a GP (Ebook); Mr Toppit (Print); The Last Hero (Print); The Mayor of Casterbridge (Ebook); Sharpe's Battle (Print); Thirteen Little Blue Envelopes (Ebook); Mort (Audio); The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (Print); I am Number Four (Audio); Wading Home (Ebook); The Information Officer (Print); A Fraction of the Whole (Audio); Good as Dead (Print); Mercy (Print); Hard Landing (Ebook); William Walker's First Year of Marriage (Ebook)
*** (and a half!) Airman (Audio); Devil May Care (Print); Labyrinth (Print); Switched (Ebook)
*** Painless (Ebook); Cranford (Ebook); Revelations of Divine Love (Ebook); The Secret Holocaust Diaries (Ebook); Moon Dance (Ebook); Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools (Ebook); Greenmantle (Audio); Ex Machina (Ebook); Little Women (Ebook); The Things We Cherished (Print); Agent Zigzag (Print); Life ... With No Breaks (Ebook)
** The Lady in the Tower (Print); Path of Daggers (Print); Beauty and the Beast (Ebook)
* She's never coming back (Print)