nomadreader

2010 was a wonderful year of reading. I wanted to be a deliberate reader, and looking back on the books I read this year, I'm quite pleased with the quality of them. I stuck to literary fiction for the most part. I tried to read from the award lists, and I discovered many of these books on the award lists. Without further ado, here are my favorite books of 2010 (when I made my list, there happened to be ten!)  All the books I read in 2010 were eligible regardless of when the books were published. (Clicking on the links will take you to my full, original review. Clicking on the book cover will take you to it's page on Amazon.) 10. Trespass  by Rose Tremain (longlisted for the 2010 Booker Prize) I will remember 2010 as the year I finally read Rose Tremain. This hauntingly beautiful novel has stayed with me. Favorite passage: "Even here, where life went along more slowly than in England, she could sense the restless agitation people felt to make real and tangible to the...

With the end of my graduate school career a mere nine days away , I am setting some lofty reading goals for the month. I hope publicly setting goals will help give me the confidence to actually read these lovely books. (Yes, this list bears a striking resemblance to the mid-November rest of 2010 goals , but I'm starting a monthly list of goals as well as yearly.) Here's what I hope to read this month: The Award Winners The Sentimenalists  by Joanna Skibsruf (winner of the 2010 Giller Prize - the lovely folks at interlibrary loan just put this one in my hands, and I can't wait to read it!) Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon (winner of the 2010 National Book Award for Fiction) The Finkler Question  by Howard Jacobson (winner of the 2010 Booker Prize ) A Spell of Winter by Helen Dunmore (winner of the 1996 Orange Prize ) Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels (1997 Orange Prize winner - I'm reading all the winners) The Award Finalists In Other Rooms, Other W...

As I've started working on my Best of 2010 list (it will be published here on December 31), I've been taking a look back on my reading year. Books read (as of today): 68 I'm quite a bit behind my reading total for 2009, but one of my goals was to read deliberately , and I've done that. I've prioritized reading the major book award finalists. I may be reading less, but I'm reading better, reading more challenging literature and enjoying reading more than I did in 2009. Genres: My reading this year has been predominantly contemporary literary fiction originally written in English.There has been a fair mix of historical and contemporary settings, but my focus on reading the prize winners and finalists has returned me to old favorite genre: literary fiction. When I started blogging, I explored genres outside of my comfort zone, and I enjoyed it. I found, however, that I spent so much time reading what everyone was talking about, I lost myself as a reader. 2010 ha...