Books this year update

I read a few plays and poetry as a bit of a cheat they are not in any particular order:

1 20 Fragments of a Raveous Youth - Xiaolu Guo. 20 chapter translation of a girl who goes to Beijing to find her fortune.

2 A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary For Lovers - Xiaolu Guo. Written as if the author is learning English getting better as the novel progresses, nice thoughts on what it must be like to live in an entirely new place not knowing the language, was built on a bit of a shoddy premise though.

3 Pygmalion - George Bernard Shaw. A lot more harsh than the musical adaptation.

4 The City of Dreaming Books - Walter Moers. A fabulous world of literary dinosaurs and strange one eyed cave dwellers intent on learning a particular authors complete works, great adventure.

5 Breakfast at Tiffany's - Truman Capote.

6 Look We Have Coming to Dover! - Daljit Nagra. Good poetry mainly about being Asian in Britain and getting on with life

7 The Colossus - Sylvia Plath. Very dark but I identified with what I could understand.

8 By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept - Elizabeth Smart. Beautiful poetic prose about an affair and what it meant to the author very depressing at times, she wanted to en her life an awful lot, I sympathised greatly.

9 On Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan. The story of the wedding night and each partners anxieties of what was about to happen, set in an odd time I thought 1962 seemingly between eras, probably just me.

10 Atonement - Ian McEwan. Beautifully written story of two sisters and a young man who's' life was changed by the juvenile jealousy of the younger sister.

11 The Bedroom Secrets of the Master Chefs - Irvine Welsh. Two opposite men one super confident the other shy and geeky end up swapping bodies trying to ruin eachothers lives

12 If You Liked School You'll Love Work - Irvine Welsh

13 Come On In: New Poems - Charles Bukowski. My first exposure to Bukowski, was very impressed with the realism and flow of the work

14 20 Love Poems and a Song of Despair - Pablo Neruda. Bought for the song of despair, but that's just me. Very simple so easy to translate and even so very evocative of the feelings of love.

15 Rapture - Carol Ann Duffy. Beautiful collection by Duffy also very simple and evocative.

16 The Good Soul of Szechuan - Bertolt Brecht

17 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf - Edward Albee. Didn't get a lot of the dark humour or the older couples relationship at first, grasped it towards the end though, very good.

18 Rumo - Walter Moers. Adventure about a dog cum deer trying to find then save his love and find his place in the world.

19 Crime - Irvine Welsh. Great book about a cop on holiday in Florida who comes across these guys attempting to kidnap a kid to abuse her. all this after cracking a similar case back home.

20 The Outsiders -S.E. Hinton. Amazing, wish I'd read it as a teen

21 The Vortex - Noel Coward*

22 London's Forgotten Children - Gillian Pugh*

23 The Slow train to Milan - Lisa St Aubin de Terán. Still don't know why this book is so good but is a great escape. About a girl who runs off with these guys all over Italy and France just seemingly going with the flow.

24 The 13 and a half Lives of Captain Bluebear - Walter Moers. Another great Moers Fantasy in which a blue bear writes his demi-autobiography some great adventures.

25 The Captain's Verses - Pablo Neruda. More great poetry from Neruda, published anonymously for a few years before deciding to put his name to it all about the same girl I think.

26 For You A libretto - Ian McEwan

27 Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

28 Prozac Nation - Elizabeth Wurtzel. Stopped reading halfway through as I empathised way too much with Elizabeth. Finished eventually was glad of a brighter ending.

29 New Moon - Stephenie Meyer*

*reading at the mo.