Becky's Twenty—Ahem—Eighteen-Book Challenge 2018

A couple of years ago, I read an article about a 100-book challenge, and I decided to create my own challenge. Knowing I couldn't possibly finish 100 books in one year, I set the bar a little lower and challenged myself to read twenty books.

The first year, I read twenty-one books. The following year, however, I only read eighteen, causing a severe dip in my reading self-esteem. I started this year off strong, challenging myself to read twenty books once again but revised that number in December when I realized I was setting myself up for failure again.

So . . . my twenty-book challenge morphed into an eighteen-book challenge. I am happy to report that I did, in fact, complete eighteen reads even if I did finish the last page of the eighteenth book on December 31, 2018.

It still totally counts.

Becky's 2018 Twenty—Ahem—Eighteen-Book Challenge

JANUARY
1. Girls by Emma Cline
Notes and Favorites: On the surface, this book is about a Manson-esque Family cult in 1969. But it also brilliantly tells a coming-of-age story: the societal expectations and oppression females experience, the strange competitive dynamics and intimate connection between females, the insecurities in adolescence. All of this against the creepy backdrop of one of the most notorious true crime narratives in modern history, yet still feeling very current during this era of #metoo.

2. Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters
Notes and Favorites: I listened to this book, performed on Audible by several voices, while running in the winter on our Greenbelt. It was the perfect setting. Both my maternal and paternal family hailed from central and southern Illinois, and I felt a certain kinship to it. "What is this I hear of sorrow and weariness,/ Anger, discontent and dropping hopes?/ Degenerate sons and daughters,/ Life is too strong for you—/ It takes life to love Life."

FEBRUARY
3. The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
Notes and Favorites: "And if there come the singers and the dancers and the flute players,—buy of their gifts also. For they too are gatherers of fruit and frankincense, and that which they bring, though fashioned of dreams, is raiment and food for your soul."

4. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
Notes and Favorites: I have had this on my reading list for a long time (and not just because I share my name with title). I was not disappointed, twists and turns and surprises galore. No wonder Hitchcock took this one on.

APRIL
5. Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter
Notes and Favorites: I read this on the road trips we took to see Hamilton . . . twice . . . in less than a month. Once in Portland, once in SLC. Yes, we were like Deadheads for Hamilton this year. And we would probably see it again if given the chance.

MAY
6. Girl in a Band by Kim Gordon
Notes and Favorites: I especially enjoyed Gordon’s take on the various music scenes, underground, No Wave, punk, Grunge, during the '80s and '90s and the musicians she collaborated with and encountered throughout the years.

7. The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
Notes and Favorites: Is it morbid that I wanted more serial killer, less World's Fair? Don't get me wrong, I liked the Fair and its characters as a historical backdrop. I just expected the focus to be mostly on H.H. Holmes.

JUNE
8. A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis
Notes and Favorites: "For in grief nothing 'stays put.' One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats."

9. The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
Notes and Favorites: This book reminded me of A Christmas Carol, especially after he meets his "teacher," George MacDonald. Interesting allegory regarding heaven and hell.

JULY
10. Little Men by Louisa May Alcott
Notes and Favorites: I enjoyed this iteration of the Little Women series. I know a lot of people think these sequels don’t live up to the original, and the original is one of my favorite books of all time. But as a teacher, I loved this snapshot of an unconventional, experimental boarding school, a reflection of Alcott's upbringing around some of the greatest transcendentalist intellectuals in American history.

11. The Other Alcott by Elise Hooper
Notes and Favorites: This book (the reason I read Little Men and Jo's Boys this summer, having reread Little Women last summer) was not only an interesting snapshot of the quirky Alcott family but was also about the rise of women artists in the late 1800s, a historical phenomenon I was not familiar with.

AUGUST
12. A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Notes and Favorites: "But once you began admitting explanations in terms of purpose—well, you didn’t know what the result might be. It was the sort of idea that might easily decondition the more unsettled minds among the higher castes . . . that the purpose of life was not the maintenance of well-being, but some intensification and refining of consciousness, some enlargement of knowledge." (p. 177)

13. Jo’s Boys by Louisa May Alcott
Notes and Favorites: The subtitle to this sequel of Little Women and Little Men is "and How They Turned Out." It was, indeed, a lot of fun to revisit these characters and a little sad to say goodbye to the March family for good.

SEPTEMBER
14. Riverside by Miriam Poe Ryan
Notes and Favorites: We toured this house during our trip to Montana this summer, and I found this book in the gift shop. It calls itself a "historical novel," but I wouldn't go that far.

OCTOBER
15. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Notes and Favorites: I watched the HBO version of this recently and felt something was amiss. After reading the book, I realized the (very relevant to our modern society) themes were not developed, which is kind of the point in this riveting novel about technology addiction and authoritarianism squashing people’s ability to think. Also, how can you preserve the musicality and rhythmic drive of Bradbury’s use of language in a television show? Apparently, not well.

DECEMBER
16. Mary Poppins by PL Travers
Notes and Favorites: I read this book because my school will be performing the musical in the spring. In the book, the title character is quite vain and slightly rude to the children, not quite as compassionate as Julie Andrews’ version. But the Banks children love Mary regardless. Also, Jane and Michael aren’t the only Banks children in the first book. They also have twin infant siblings, John and Barbara.

17. "The Story of the Other Wiseman" by Henry Van Dyke
Notes and Favorites: My Christmas Day read this year . . . I highly recommend it.

18. 1984 by George Orwell
Notes and Favorites: This quotation seemed especially relevant during this build-the-wall era. "If he were allowed contact with foreigners he would discover that they are creatures similar to himself and that most of what he has been told about them is lies. The sealed world in which he lives would be broken, and the fear, hatred and self-righteousness on which his morale depends might evaporate." (p. 201)

Whew! 1984! What a way to end 2018. Until next year, happy reading!

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