Top Ten Tuesday

I finished Mariner's Compass by Earlene Fowler last night (it was great), but it doesn't look like I'm going to get to the review tonight. Maybe tomorrow...

I want to start posting to my blog more often, but it sometimes takes me a little while to digest what I've just finished reading. One of the things I came up with to post in between reviews was a Top Ten Tuesday. Turns out, that's not all that original - see Ten on Tuesday - but I want mine to be a little more literary (or at least bookish, I don't know about lit-er-a-ture). But I might take a more bookish slant on Ten on Tuesday. For example, next week's theme on Ten on Tuesday is "10 Places You’d Love to Travel To (That You Haven’t Gone to Yet)," so maybe I'll do the top ten travel essay books I've been wanting to read, or make a list of books that would fit into my Booking Around the World or States for next week. This week's Ten on Tuesday theme was "10 Superstitions, Traditions, and/or Personality Quirks." Darn, if I'd known that earlier I probably would have done the top ten paranormal books I want to read, or maybe folklore from different countries, or maybe books with strange characters. The possibilities are endless! Oh well, it's getting late so my theme for this Top Ten Tuesday is the top ten books I need to read right now!

Books I need to get to pronto!

To finish up The Book Award Reading Challenge:

1. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez - I've already started this, have about 200 pages to go
2. A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson - I've been reading one chapter at a time. I hate to rush this one. It's one of the best popular science books I've read in a long time. I'm up to chapter 10 and I have the wonderful, fully-illustrated (heavy as a brick, but so worth it) version.
   
3. The Echo Maker by Richard Powers - I really want to read this one, too, it fits in with the science in fiction challenge as well. I LOVE science in fiction! Okay, maybe I just love well written science in any form. Did I mention I was a geek…?
4. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion - A little scared of this one. I'm pretty sure it's gonna make me cry. Started it tonight, though, and all I can say about the first two chapters is...wow. Yep, going after the Kleenex, but can't put it down.
   
5. In America by Susan Sontag - don't know much about this one, except it was a National Book Award Winner and it has something to do with people emigrating to the US from Poland (a topic near and dear to my heart as my husband and his family did this).

Book Club picks:

6. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - May pick. I've agreed to lead this one, too.
7. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen - June pick.

To finish up the Spring Reading Thing 2008 challenge and just because I really like Lois Lowry:

8. Number the Stars by Lois Lowry - although I'm having trouble getting this at the library. Must be on all the kid's reading lists.
   

Last, but not least, I need to read these two to finish the Themed Challenge:

9. Lord of the Fading Lands by C.L. Wilson - this book was written by the wonderful president of my local RWA (Romance Writers of America) chapter. I feel a little guilty (and a LOT out of the loop) for taking this long to get to a book that I've heard is just wonderful!
10. Dead Girls are Easy by Terri Garey - another fellow RWA member. I love funny, quirky paranormal romances (see post about Undead and Unwed by MaryJanice Davidson). See, I was able to stick some paranormal in there!

So what about you? What books do you want to get to right now? Do you have a top ten list? Or do you have any comments on any of the books I'm about to embark on? I'd love to hear about it.

Why don't you join me next week and make a list of book that somehow relates to travel? I'd be thrilled to read them!

Kristi