Fireflies in the labyrinth

My Fireflies

This is a new link on the sidebar with a list of reading recommendations, which I’ll try to update regularly. For now I’ve put up a list of ten and will make it longer, but argh! it’s so hard to choose!!!!

The List - 2009

1. Misery – Stephen King ***
2. The Night Climbers – Ivo Stourton ***
3. Dead Clever – Scarlett Thomas ***
4. Assassin’s Apprentice – Robin Hobb **
5. Lucky – Alice Sebold ***
6. American Gods – Neil Gaiman ****
7. The Bronze Horseman – Paullina Simons *****
8. The Dressmaker – Rosalie Ham **
9. Oryx and Crake – Margaret Atwood ****
10. In Your Face – Scarlett Thomas ***
11. Butterfly – Sonya Hartnett ***
12. Affinity – Sarah Waters **
13. The House at Midnight – Lucie Whitehouse ***
14. Everything Beautiful – Simmone Howell **
15. An Abundance of Katherines – John Green ****
16. Bright Air – Barry Maitland *
17. Posse – ? *
18. Gossip Girl – Cecily von Ziegesar *
19. Seaside – Scarlett Thomas **
20. Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman ***
21. From Rockaway – Jill Eisenstadt *
22. Blue Angel – Francine Prose ***
23. Paper Towns – John Green *****
24. The Hunger Games – Suzanne Collins *****
25. The Declaration – Gemma Malley *
26. Evernight - Claudia Gray **
27. The Graveyard Book – Neil Gaiman *****
28. Bright Young Things – Scarlett Thomas **
29. Rebecca – Daphne du Maurier *****
30. The Forest of Hands and Teeth – Carrie Ryan *
31. Interview with the Vampire – Anne Rice ****
32. Vile Bodies – Evelyn Waugh **
33. Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy *****
34. The Collector – John Fowles ****
35. Vampire Academy – Richelle Mead *
36. Dangerous Liaisons – Choderlos de Laclos ****
37. The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing: Traitor to the Nation Book One – M. T. Anderson ***
38. Fall – Colin McAdam ***
39. The Chatham School Affair – Thomas Cook *
40. Murder on the Orient Express – Agatha Christie *
41. The Angel Maker – Stefan Brijs ****
42. The Disreputable History of Franki Landou-Banks – E. Lockhart ***
43. The Vampire Lestat – Anne Rice *****
44. The Perks of Being a Wallflower – Stephen Chbosky *****
45. Strange Angels – Lili St. Crow **
46. The Queen of the Damned – Anne Rice ***
47. The Dead Path – Stephen M Irwin *
48. Decline and Fall – Evelyn Waugh **
49. The Gargoyle – Andrew Davidson *
50. Dismantled – Jennifer McMahon **
51. Coraline – Neil Gaiman ***
52. The Cheese Monkeys – Chip Kidd **
53. The Witching Hour – Anne Rice *****
54. Catching Fire – Suzanne Collins *****
55. Liar – Justine Larbalestier **
56. Tipping the Velvet – Sarah Waters ****
57. The Magicians – Lev Grossman ****
58. Taming the Beast – Emily McGuire *
59. The Slap – Christos Tsiolkas ***
60. Her Fearful Symmetry – Audrey Niffenegger ***
61. How I Live Now – Meg Rosoff ****
62. Dead Until Dark – Charlaine Harris *
63. Lasher – Anne Rice *
64. Great Expectations – Charles Dickens **
65. The Castle of Otranto – Horace Walpole *
66. Mathilda Savitch – Victor Lodato ***
67. Invisible – Paul Auster ****

The List - 2008

Started my PhD and hit the books big time. 

1. Disgrace – J. M. Coetzee *
2. The Catcher in the Rye – J. D. Salinger ****
3. American Youth – Phil LaMarche *
4. The Historian – Elizabeth Kostova **
5. What Happens Now – Jeremy Dyson **
6. Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruitz Zafon ****
7. Orphans of the Queen – Ruth Starke ***** (my PhD supervisor, one of the best YA writers and editors I know!)
8. Academia Nuts – Michael Wilding *
9. After Dark – Haruki Murakami ***
10. His Illegal Self – Peter Carey *
11. Joe Cinque’s Consolation – Helen Garner ***
12. The Quakers – Rachel Hennessy *
13. Looking for Alaska – John Green *****
14. One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez ****
15. Of a Boy – Sonya Hartnett ***
16. The Séance – John Harwood *****
17. The Hottest State – Ethan Hawke ***
18. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë *****
19. The Ghost’s Child – Sonya Hartnett *****
20. All My Dangerous Friends – Sonya Hartnett ***
21. Us – Richard Mason **
22. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen ***
23. Let the Right One In – John Ajvide Lindqvist ****
24. The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood ****
25. Norwegian Wood – Haruki Murakami ****
26. Pact of Wolves – Nina Blazon *
27. The Bitch Goddess Notebook – Martha O’Connor **
28. Dracula – Bram Stoker ***
29. Glamorama – Bret Easton Ellis ***
30. Breaking Dawn – Stephenie Meyer **
31. Lucky Jim – Kingsley Amis *
32. Evil – Diane Bell *
33. Hunting and Gathering – Anna Gavalda ***
34. The Book Thief – Markus Zusak ***
35. The Meaning of Night – Michael Cox ***
36. The Republic of Trees – Sam Taylor **
37. Notes From the Teenage Underground – Simmone Howell **
38. Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh *****
39. Quillblade – Benjamin Chandler ***** (another ridiculously talented YA author, and one of my closest friends. His new book Beast Child is out in Sept. so be sure to check it out!)
40. A Good and Happy Child - Justin Evans *
41. Engleby – Sebastian Faulks ****
42. The Host – Stephenie Meyer ***
43. Red Leaves – Paullina Simons *
44. Going Out – Scarlett Thomas ****
45. The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters – G. W. Gahlquist *
46. The Anthology of Colonial Australian Gothic Fiction – Ken Gelder and Rachael Weaver (Eds) ****
47. We Need to Talk About Kevin – Lionel Shriver ****
48. Riddley Walker – Russell Hoban ***
49. PopCo – Scarlett Thomas ****
50. The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne ***

The List - 2007

I was stressed out of my brains doing my Honours on Donna Tartt’s The Secret History this year, but I got my head out of Hampden and stopped daydreaming about Henry Winter long enough to stick my nose in a few other books.

1. The Inheritance of Loss – Kiran Desai *
2. Carry Me Down – M. J. Hyland ****
3. Perfume – Patrick Süskind *****
4. The Basic Eight – Daniel Handler **
5. The First Stone – Helen Garner ***
6. On Chesil Beach – Ian McEwan ***
7. Lighthousekeeping – Jeanette Winterson ***
8. March – Geraldine Brooks **
9. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J. K. Rowling *****
10. Rohypnol – Andrew Hutchinson *
11. I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes – Jaclyn Moriarty ***
12. Less Than Zero – Bret Easton Ellis ***
13. Saturday – Ian McEwan *
14. Black Dogs – Ian McEwan *
15. Watch Your Mouth – Daniel Handler *
16. The Dreamers – Gilbert Adair *
17. Lunar Park – Bret Easton Ellis ***
18. The End of Mr. Y – Scarlett Thomas *****
19. Watchmen – Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons ****
20. Twilight – Stephenie Meyer ***** (yep, outed, I’m a Twihard)
21. The Informers – Bret Easton Ellis ***
22. New Moon – Stephenie Meyer *****
23. Eclipse – Stephenie Meyer *****
24. Nineteen Minutes – Jodi Picoult ***
25. Wuthering Heights – Emily Brontë *****
26. Fingersmith – Sarah Waters *****

YA Recommendations?

My YA to read pile is looking a little small. I LOVE LOVE LOVE John Green (esp. Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns), Jay Asher’s Thirteen Rasons Why, Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Gabrielle Zevin’s Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac, and everything by Sonya Hartnett and Margo Lanagan. Any suggestions about what to read next?