This book challenge takes
place twice a year and concentrates on one year and one year only. I call it "Read the Year Club". This
time, 1937 was picked. For more information, see Simon @ Stuck in a Book and Kaggsy @ Kaggsy's Bookish Ramblings (here is Karen's invite and here is Simon's).
If you are looking for inspiration, there are a few books from that year that I read already:
Bristow, Gwen "Plantation Trilogy" (Deep Summer, The Handsome Road, This Side of Glory) - 1937-40
Dinesen, Isak/Blixen, Karen "Out of Africa" - 1937
Hemingway, Ernest "To Have and Have Not" - 1937
Steinbeck, John "Of Mice and Men" - 1937
Tolkien, J.R.R. "The Hobbit" - 1937
I also found some other ideas:
Christie, Agatha "Death on the Nile"
Hergé "The Broken Ear"
Ingalls Wilder, Laura "On the Banks of Plum Creek" (Little House Books)
Kurban, Said "Ali and Nino"
Lovecraft, H.P. "The Thing on the Doorstep"
Marsh, Ngaio "Vintage Murder"
Narayan, R. K. "Malgudi Omnibus" (Trilogy: Swami and Friends, 1935; The Bachelor of Arts, 1937; The English Teacher, 1945)
Neale Hurston, Zora "Their Eyes Were Watching God"
Orwell, George "The Road to Wigan Pier"
Somerset Maugham, W. "Theatre"
Wolf, Virginia "The Years"
Zedong, Mao "On Practice and Contradiction"
There is something here for everyone, children's books, comics, crime stories, non-fiction.
This challenge takes place from 15 to 21 April 2024.
I had this on my TBR pile, therefore I picked:
Orwell, George "The Road to Wigan Pier" - 1937
A LOT of good writing came out of the 30's. Turbulent times tend to do that.... I should be reviewing 'Wigan Pier' in a few weeks.
ReplyDeleteTrue, Kitten. That is probably one of the reasons why there are so many books like that. And then post-war, of course.
DeleteI guess we should expect some good writing now, as well ...
I was actually thinking that the present 'turbulent times' should produce some excellent books going forward. I would prefer excellence *without* the tragedy though...!
DeleteThat was my thought, our times certainly will produce some great classics. But yes, we all could do without the tragedy.
DeleteI've never heard of this challenge, sounds interesting and I will check it oout. So funny you mentioned Wigan Pier as it's a book I read about in another book - V for Victory by Lissa Evans - and I marked it to read!
ReplyDeleteGreat, Tina. It's only twice a year, you have about six months to think about the book you want to read, so easy to put into your schedule. And we've had some good years already. I should probably make a post which lists all the years we read together.
DeleteI have just started Wigan Pier, of course, it's more a non-fiction than a fiction book with lots of numbers of how much people earned etc. which is not so easy to understand nowadays. But it gives you a good insight into how people used to live.
I will have to look into V is for Victory. Thanks, Tina.
Interesting that The Hobbit came out in '37, before WW2. LOTR was strongly inspired by the memories of WW1, so I wonder what would have happened had Tolkien not already established his world.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure The Hobbit was inspired by WWI, and that led to LOTR. I'm not a huge fan of this kind of literature, so only read The Hobbit ages ago. But a very interesting thought, Stephen.
DeleteSome great options there, some which I hadn't come across so thank you for your suggestions! Will look forward to your thoughts on the Orwell. 😊
ReplyDeleteThanks, Kaggsy. I always "shop around" a little before I choose my book, so why not share the finds.
DeleteObviously, I have started the Orwell book. It looks very promising.