Urban Renewal Archives: Books to read in 2008

I love to read. It is probably my favorite hobby and serves so many purposes for me, from getting distraction from my worries to learning about something or someone I am interested in to just being able appreciate an author’s writing style. I read a lot. I read mostly fiction, with some memoirs, nonfiction and autobiographies thrown in. I have a Books to Read list that has over 300 books on it, though I have started using the Amazon Wishlist function for this and have added several dozen additional books there. I know I will never come close to reading everything that I want to read and that makes me sad. However, I am determined to do the best I can and in fact I have considered learning to speed read so that I can fit more in! We'll have to see about that. The hardest thing is that intriguing new books come out all the time, so I am adding way more to my To Read lists than I am actually finishing. I read 29 books in 2007 and I am very proud of that. When I lived in Boston and commuted by subway, I had lots of built in reading time in my daily schedule, up to 90 minutes a day sometimes. I used to fly through books, it was great. When I moved to Las Vegas, suddenly that built in reading time wasn't there anymore since it is a driving city and I found that I wasn't reading at all. Slowly over about 2 years, I learned to work it back in and have read lots of wonderful books. I will post my 2006 and 2007 lists of books read soon. I like to keep track as I am a listmaker and it gives me a great sense of accomplishment. It also allows me to read back over it and remember all of the great books I read, which over time I may slowly forget if I didn't have them written down.

Here are the books I plan on reading in 2008:

All The King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren

The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory (book club) - just finished this and it was wonderful!

Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich (book club)

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky

Song of Susannah: The Dark Tower VI by Stephen King - currently reading this one

The Dark Tower: The Dark Tower VII by Stephen King

The Bourne Supremacy by Robert Ludlum

Angels and Demons by Dan Brown

Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots and the Rise of People-Powered Politics by Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas

Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen