A Little Non-Fiction anyone?

I'm very partial to the non-fiction genre but will admit I don't often read as many as I once used to. So when Joy of "Thoughts of Joy" spoke of hosting a "NON-FICTION FIVE CHALLENGE", I couldn't resist (thank you, Joy!). From what I know the challenge will be held from July-September and in that period all you need to do is read 5 non-fiction books. Easy? More details to follow.

Speaking of non-fiction, Sanjay of Karmic Musings has an excellent review of the book "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11" by Lawrence Wright (writer for "The New Yorker").

I've also enjoyed reading Jenclair's impressions on Suketu Mehta's "Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found". She has a great review and several updates as she read along.

I am excited about having to pick 5 non-fiction titles for the challenge - knowing me, it will probably include some biographies, travelogues and science history. I am going to start combing book blogs for suggestions.

pic. courtesy: nilgravity.com

TBR 2007 and Chunkster Challenge

Tired of those TBR piles threatening to collapse? Fed up with having your view obstructed by huge mounds of books? Miz Books has the solution. She has set up a challenge which asks the participant to read 12 books (one a month) for the year 2007. Imagine, taking 12 books off your TBR by the time 2008 rolls along. Along with the TBR 2007 challenge I will also be doing booklogged's "Classics Challenge" and bookfool's "Chunkster Challenge".

But first, come with me on a virtual journey through the TBR 2007 Challenge:

In January I plan to leave the Canadian winter behind and travel to the villages of China where I will make friends with a farmer and his family in 1. "The Good Earth" by Pearl S. Buck. This book fits in neatly with my Classics Challenge as well.
I cannot dream of returning to Canada in the coldest month of the year so I travel from China onto Singapore (so that I can visit Bibliobibuli in Malaysia) where I intend learning about a young man's coming of age during the fall of Singapore in World War II in Vyvyane Loh's 2. "Breaking The Tongue"

From Singapore and Malaysia I will travel to Sri Lanka, where I'll have the opportunity to meet this really sweet boy who everyone calls 3."Funny Boy", I'll tell you why after I meet him. After Sri Lanka I will have to stop in India or my mom won't forgive me.
In India I am going to encourage Australian gangster-turned-author Gregory Roberts or 4. "Shantaram" to tell me how he happend to end up in an Indian jail and what happened to him after he was released.

Whilst in India I know I won't be able to resist visiting Kerala to see and meet a Kathakali dancer in Anita Nair's 5. "Mistress".

It will be sad to leave India, but I have to head back to Canada. Enroute, I know Africa will beckon so I'll stop for a while in Somalia to meet 6. "Aman:Story of a Somali Girl" who will tell me what it's like to be young woman in 20th-century Somalia.

Africa is a huge continent and I see myself wanting to visit another country before I head for Europe, so I'll probably travel for Cairo to meet three generations of an Egyptian family in Naguib Mahfouz's 7. "Palace Walk" from the" Cairo Trilogy".

I've booked my trip on Air Iberia so my plane will stop in Spain; whilst there I might as well learn some flamenco dancing with Jason Webster in 8. "Duende; A Journey into the Heart of Flamenco".

It's impossible to be so close to France and not visit - I find the French fascinating and I'm going to learn all I can about them with the aid of Jean-Benoit Nadeau's 9. "Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't be Wrong:Why we Love France but not the French".


Just before I leave Europe altogether I will make a quick visit to the country of my birth (UK) to meet Najwa in Leila Aboulela's 10. "Minaret" who is in exile in London due to a political coup in Sudan which forced her family to move away. I want to ask her how her life has changed, if at all.

Before I touch Canada, I'd like to make a quick trip to New York where I will meet Barak Obama and his family in 11. "Dreams From My Father". I find Barack Obama to be such a fascinating person, I can't wait to find out more about him.

I hope to be back in Canada for Christmas and I'm going to celebrate it with the doyenne of Canadian literature, Margaret Atwood and her latest novel 12."Moral Disorders"

So, there you have it, my 12 TBR reads for the TBR 2007 Challenge.

For bookfool's beautiful and flexible" Chunkster Challenge" I have picked 5 books of which I hope to read atleast 3 (please follow the link to Bookfool's blog for the guidelines)

Naghoub Mafouz's "Palace Walk" (512 pages)

Gregory David Robert's "Shantaram" (944 pages)
(recommended by Holly Dolly Books)

Suketu Mehta's "Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found (560 pages)
(How could I resist reading about the city I grew up in?)

Zusak's "The Book Thief" (560 pages)
(Led by Les, Bookfool and Booklogged, this book has been raved about by every book blogger that has read it)

Jared Diamond's "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" (592 pages)

Booklogged's "Winter Classics Challenge"

I cannot wait to get started on Booklogged's, from the wonderful "A Reader's Journal", Winter Classics Challenge. The rules are simple - all you need to do is to read 5 classics in the months of January and February.

In keeping with the theme (World and South-Asian Literature) of this blog, I've decided to pick 5 Classics from different parts of the World. I will also be doing Miz Books' TBR 2007 and Bookfool's "Chunkster Challenge" and as a result some of my book choices may overlap.

For now, here's my list of books for the Winter Classics Challenge:

1."The Good Earth" by Pearl S. Buck. 1932 Pulitzer Prize winning novel (American)
(overlaps with the TBR 2007 Jan Read)


2. "Palace Walk" by Naguib Mahfouz (1957) . Book one of "The Cairo Trilogy" . A Landmark of postcolonial Arabic literature that traces three generations of a family in 20th-century Cairo in vivid, realistic detail. At 512 pages it qualifies as a tome so this will be on my Chunkster Challenge as well.(Egypt)


3. "Kim" by Rudyard Kipling (1901). Set in India, this book is about the adventures of an Irish orphan who passes with ease as an Indian native. (Britain)


4."Some Prefer Nettles" by Junichiro Tanizaki (1928-29), exploring conflicts in everyday life between Japanese tradition and Western modernity. (Japan)


5. Umrao Jaan Ada by Mirza Hadi Ruswa(1905). An integral part of Urdu literature, Mirza Haadi Ruswa's 'Umrao Jaan Ada' is an Urdu classic not to be missed. (India)

Based on the 19th century Lucknow Nawab culture, this is the story of a courtesan who was kidnapped by the village baddie during her childhood and sold to the ladies at the kotha. The innocent Ameeran (Umrao) grows up to relish and admire the power she possesses to control men's hearts with her beautiful voice and her dances. This is the story of the loss of innocence as a child turns into a woman and then a courtesan.


Bonus:

"Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe (1958). A classic work of postcolonial African Literature that vivdly portrays traditional Nigerian culture and the destructiveness on that culture by colonialism. (Nigeria)



THis is my list for now - I may change titles as I go along, depending upon the availability of the books (for instance, Umrao Jaan is being ordered from India) and my mood, ofcourse!

Stacks Winter Challenge

A big thank you to booklogged from "A Reader's Journal" for alerting me to this challenge and another big thank you to Overdue Books for hosting the "Stacks Winter Challenge".

According to Michelle from Overdue Books, this is how the challenge will work:

For this challenge we would be reading 5 books that we have already purchased, have been meaning to get to, have been sitting on the nightstand and haven't read before. No going out and buying new books. No getting sidetracked by the lure of the holiday bookstore displays.

The bonus would be that we would finally get to some of those titles (you know you picked them for a reason!) and we wouldn't be spending any extra money over the holidays.

The time frame would be Nov. 1st until Jan. 30 and there will be some small, fun prizes awarded to random participants and/or those with clever review posts. There will be one random drawing for a prize to those who submit their list of books in the comment section by Nov. 15th but feel free to join any time. There will be another random drawing for those who submit five reviews by Jan. 30 for a small gift certificate to Amazon.

Here is a list of 5 books that I plan to get to from my stacks:

"The Inheritance of Loss" Kiran Desai (read)

"Daaku" by Ranj Dhaliwal (read)

"The Penelopiad" Margaret Atwood (read)

"In The Country of Men" Hisham Mattar (lost my copy)

"Beasts of No Nation" Uzodinma Iweala

"Poets and Pahlevans " Marcello Di Cintio (reading)

(Wish me luck!!!)

And can I tempt someone to join me in this challenge? Such a great incentive to start attacking those monstrous TBR piles!

An update: I'm so happy so many of you want to do the challenge - don't forget to sign up with Michelle at Overdue books, there are over 30 of us participating - it's going to be great fun!

I've replaced the "Maisie Dobbs' with "Daaku" by Ranj Dhaliwal ( I just felt it was more timely, besides, I wasn't quite getting into Maisie Dobbs).