Bookphilia.com turns 4 today!

It's been a tough one in some ways, but my fourth year of blogging has been filled with a number of truly stellar reads. I've abandoned a feature (the Sarazens Head), lost (hopefully only temporarily) interest in one (I Interview Dead People), and have periodically maintained the most popular (Curious/Creepy). Indeed, a friend of my hubby's recently rejoiced that because I'll soon be commuting to work every day, I must necessarily write more C/C posts. I will try, humbly (and creepily) to fulfill his expectations in this matter.

The best part of the end of the blogging year for me is always compiling my lists of most and least favourite books; here they are:

Favourites! in no particular order, except for the first four, which blew my mind the most:

J.D. Salinger, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction

Hilary Mantel, The Giant, O’Brien

Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall - absolute most favourite!

Dorothy L. Sayers, Gaudy Night

Anthony Trollope, The American Senator

T. Colin Campbell, The China Study

Osamu Dazai, No Longer Human

Ellis Peters, The Rose Rent

China Mieville, The City & The City

Shusaku Endo, Deep River

Ian McEwan, On Chesil Beach

Giuseppe de Lampedusa, The Leopard

Yoko Ogawa, Hotel Iris

David Mitchell, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

William Gibson, Neuromancer

Osamu Dazai, Blue Bamboo and Other Stories

George Eliot, Scenes of Clerical Life

Fred van Lente and Ryan Dunleavy, The More Than Complete Action Philosophers!

Shaun Tan, The Arrival

William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale 

John Ford, 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (I never reviewed this on Bookphilia; it was approx. the 15th time I'd read it; it's still an all-time favourite, in spite of the fact that it figured prominently in my doctoral thesis)

Sadly, year four wasn't a total love-fest. Least favourites:

Orhan Pamuk, The White Castle

Edogawa Rampo, Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination

J.M. Coetzee, Youth 

Miyuki Miyabe, Crossfire

Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger

Andre Gide, The Immoralist 

Emma Donaghue, The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits 

Patrick Ness, The Knife of Never Letting Go

David Almond, Heaven Eyes

Gustave Flaubert, A Sentimental Education

Bram Stoker, The Lair of the White Worm

I don't usually make reading plans, and when I do, I often fail to execute. Nonetheless, I have an ambitious project for Bookphilia 5.0: an overview of Victorian lit, mostly fiction, but with some poetry thrown in for good measure. The list has 40+ books on it, beginning with Dickens's Barnaby Rudge (1841) and ending with Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest (1895). This list was born out of my increasing frustration over the lack of structure in my reading, and the incredible pleasure I've been consistently taking in Victorian novels, even the ones I don't love. I think this will be a safer and more enjoyable bet than French literature en masse. But we'll see. I am notoriously unreliable when it comes to reading lists.

Right now, however, I'm making my way through an entirely non-Victorian fantasy slash soap opera - George R.R. Martin's A Game of Thrones. It's pretty good. But it is a soap opera.

And, of course, I begin work on Monday at my new job. As I will be commuting (about 40 minutes each way), I will certainly be reading a lot. The question is, will I want to sit in front of the computer and blog after spending all day sitting in front of a computer working? I really don't know. I've certainly managed to be employed and blog frequently at the same time before, but I've not spent much of that employment time as a desk jockey. I'm hoping I'll figure it out, but if you don't hear from me for awhile, it's likely because I'm adjusting to a new schedule, etc.

Finally, cheers to all of you who have been reading along all this time! You're the best.