10-21-2013, 11:01 AM | #76 |
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And sometimes, one just needs to do a little organizing around the house.
Wladyslaw Szpilman, The Pianist would do nicely for Poland which I still haven't read after trading books with my mom a while ago. |
10-24-2013, 11:08 AM | #77 |
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An updated list. A few route changes. We're rerouting a bit in Africa and removing a bit of Central and South America to fit in some more of the Caribbean and changing a couple of titles. Notably, Romania where I've found In Search of Dracula by Radu Florescu.
This is of course bound to change, but I think I'm happy with 50 countries and about 12,781 pages for my challenge. I do have a potential 21 more countries with available options to extend the journey or to add after the main journey if I'm still feeling worldly. I'm sad to see Belize and Japan go, but I'll obviously read more from Japan in the future and I'm leaving my list with original numbering so I can see where the gaps are for fill ins if I think I'll make way past 50 books over the year. Code:
Canada Thomson Highway, Rez Sisters United States John Steinbeck, The Pearl Mexico Carlos Fuentes, The Death of Artemio Cruz Cuba Leonardo Padura Fuentes, Havana Blue Barbados George Lamming, Water with Berries Dominican Republic Loida Martiza Perez, Geographies of Home Guatemala Rodrigo Rey Rosa; The Beggar's Knife El Salvador Manlio Argueta, One Day of Life Ecuador Jorge Icaza, The Villagers Peru Daniel Alarcon, Lost City Radio Chile Maria Luisa Bombal, House of Mist Argentina Adolpho Bioy-Casares, The Invention of Morel Nigeria Ben Okri, The Famished Road Uruguay Eduardo Galeano, Genesis Brazil Patricia Melo, In Praise of Lies Venezuela Romulo Gallegos, Dona Barbara Trinidad and Tobago Earl Lovelace, The Wine of Astonishment Angola Jose Eduardo Agualusa, The Book of Chameleons Zambia Gaile Parkin, Baking Cakes in Kigali Mozambique Mia Couto, The Tuner of Silences South Africa J M Coetzee, Diary of a Bad Year Australia David Malouf, Remembering Babylon Indonesia Andrea Hirata, The Rainbow Troops Malaysia Preeta Samarasan, Evening is the Whole Day Vietnam Lihn Dihn, Blood and Soap China Mo Yan, Reg Sorghum South Korea Young-ha Kim, Your Republic is Calling You Russia Arkady Strugatsky, Roadside Picnic Kazakhstan Mukhamet Shayakhmetov, The Silent Steppe Uzbekistan Hamid Ismailov, The Railway Afghanistan Atiq Rahimi, Earth and Ashes Pakistan Mohsin Hamid, Moth Smoke India Tabish Khair, The Bus Stopped Tanzania Gabriel Ruhumbika, Village in Uhuru Uganda Doreen Baingana, Tropical Fish Sudan Leila Aboulela, Lyrics Alley Egypt Alaa Al Aswany, The Yacoubian Building Syria Rafik Schami, Damascus Nights Turkey Orhan Pamuk, My Name is Red Bulgaria Georgi Gospodinov, Natural Novel Romania Radu Florescu, In Search of Dracula Ukraine Nella Bieski, The Year is '42 Poland Stanislaw Lem, Return From the Stars Latvia Sandra Kalniete, Song to Kill a Giant Sweden Stieg Larsson, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Finland Maria Peura, At the Edge of Light Norway Matte Newth, The Transformation Germany Jenny Erpenbeck, Visitation France Roland Barthes, Mythologies Switzerland Johanna Spyri - Heidi Last edited by HomeInMyShoes; 10-25-2013 at 12:48 PM. |
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10-25-2013, 12:45 PM | #78 |
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It's almost more work than planning a real itinerary.
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10-25-2013, 01:20 PM | #79 |
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It's fun work though, although sometimes it is frustrating. Some countries are so hard to find anything for. Then there's the new titles for countries that peak my interest that I have to try to fit in to the list of 50. I found a free book for Latvia so how could I not include that in the journey. I removed Columbia because trying to read a 700 page book on this challenge would probably be a mistake.
I know I'll keep this challenge going over more than one year and try to fill in the world better as time goes on, but I think I need to have some level of sanity to the list as to what I can perhaps finish next year. I think I could bump the itinerary to 65, but it would mean no time to read anything else at all including the book clubs which I want to participate in a little more. I think I might swap France and Switzerland around and read a second book from Canada for 51. 51st state and all that kind of rhetoric and how it ties into my limited world view through what I've read. |
04-17-2014, 10:49 AM | #80 |
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Thought I would give a little update on how this year is going.
Code:
Canada Thomson Highway, Rez Sisters United States John Steinbeck, The Pearl Mexico Carlos Fuentes, The Death of Artemio Cruz Guatemala Rodrigo Rey Rosa, The Beggar's Knife Belize Zee Edgell, Beka Lamb Cuba Leonardo Padura Fuentes, Havana Blue Dominican Republic Loida Maritza Perez, Geographies of Home Barbados George Lamming, Water with Berries Nicaragua Sergio Ramirez, A Thousand Deaths Plus One El Salvador Manlio Argueta, One Day of Life Ecuador Sergio Ramirez, Huasipungo: The Villagers Peru Daniel Alarcon, Lost City Radio Chile Maria Luisa Bombal, House of Mist Argentina Adolpho Bioy-Casares, Asleep in the Sun Uruguay Eduardo Galeano, Genesis Brazil Patricia Melo, In Praise of Lies Venezuela Romulo Gallegos, Dona Barbara Trinidad & Tobago Earl Lovelace, The Wine of Astonishment Angola Jose Eduardo Agualusa, The Book of Chameleons Zambia Gaile Parkin, Baking Cakes in Kigali Zimbabwe Petina Gappah, An Elegy for Easterly Mozambique Mia Couto, The Tuner of Silences South Africa J M Coetzee, Summertime New Zealand Bernard Beckett, Genesis Australia David Malouf, Remembering Babylon Indonesia Andrea Hirata, The Rainbow Troops Malaysia Preeta Samarasan, Evening is the Whole Day Vietnam Duong Thu Huong, Novel Without a Name China Mo Yan, Shifu, You'll do Anything for a Laugh South Korea Young-ha Kim, Your Republic is Calling You Japan Ryu Murakami, Audition There were a few changes along the way and my itinerary is standing at trying to get to 70 countries this year. I've hit 31 so far so it looks to be achievable. Last night I started Russia, which according to United Nations categories of world regions means I have now touched the five major regions. Still a ways to go though. |
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05-29-2014, 10:50 AM | #81 |
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I need help! I'm well on my way, now in Sri Lanka, but I've got a couple of troublesome countries and would like a bit more e-book availability if possible.
I'm looking for recommendations from Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine, Romania, and Tunisia. Last edited by HomeInMyShoes; 05-29-2014 at 10:59 AM. |
05-29-2014, 01:27 PM | #82 |
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I have a good friend who emigrated here from Turkey 3 years ago. She turned me on to Orhan Pamuk. I've read My Name is Red and Snow.
I really enjoyed both of them! |
05-29-2014, 02:11 PM | #83 |
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^Nice to know you enjoyed them. I've got My Name as Red penciled in, but it's not available in e-book from my library which is why I'm fishing for more options.
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06-07-2014, 04:55 PM | #84 |
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Off the top of my head:
Yasar Kemal is Turkish, probably not available in ebook though Romania: Bogdan Tiganov or for a nice 2-in-1 you could go for Herta Müller who IIRC was born in Romania but in a German-speaking community Spain: Carlos Ruiz Zafón Italy: Italo Calvino; Umberto Eco I'll have a look through my stuff again and see if I can come up with a few more and something for Ukraine, Tunisia and Greece |
06-07-2014, 06:34 PM | #85 |
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A very impressive challenge!
You might like for Greece: Nikos Kazantzakis - "The Last Temptation of Christ" or "Greek Passion" which both exist as ebook as well as "Zorba the Greek" and if you ever saw the film, the book is much better If you accept Nicholas Gage (who was born in Greece as Nikolaos Gatzoyiannis) as a Greek author you might have a look at his autobiographical book "Eleni" For Germany: Patrick Süskind, Günter Grass and for Germany/Switzerland Hermann Hesse (he was born in Germany, lived and died in Switzerland) Last edited by Elpida; 06-08-2014 at 04:25 AM. |
06-09-2014, 08:10 AM | #86 |
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I have some books by Habib Selmi who is Tunisian. Stumbling blocks: may not be available in English (mine are in French) and e-format is unlikely.
Last edited by Yolina; 06-09-2014 at 08:19 AM. |
06-09-2014, 10:55 AM | #87 |
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Thanks Elpida. Zorba the Greek has been on my radar for a long time and might be the selection from Greece, but my library doesn't have it in eBook and the cost is atrocious ($14).
I've found a lot of Northern and Eastern Africa has very interesting books that are untranslated from French. It's been a serious downer for Western Africa. I dropped French in Grade 11 for Calculus. The Scents of Marie-Claire sounds good, but not available from my library in e-book form. Trawling my library I found the following options available as eBooks: Turkey - Orhan Pamuk - The Museum of Innocence Italy - Umberto Eco - The Prague Cemetary, The Name of the Rose My $20 monthly budget for books doesn't go very far with this challenge. I suppose it's just part of the fun. How to read the world for less than $20CDN a month. I wish the library added more variety than Romance as eBooks, but I understand they stock what the majority of patrons want. Of the last twelve added eBooks, eleven are Romance and one is Ernest Hemingway. Time to give the library some suggestions I think. |
06-09-2014, 11:36 AM | #88 |
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06-09-2014, 12:04 PM | #89 |
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Looking for English books, translations of French books to English.
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06-09-2014, 01:51 PM | #90 |
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I spent quite a bit of time in West Africa several years ago, primarily in Francophone countries; Senegal, Cote D'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Niger and Benin. I had a difficult time finding English books at the time so I'm really no help. However, the Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is quite wonderful. Half of a Yellow Sun and Purple Hibiscus are both excellent books. She's written a more recent novel and a book of short stories, which are apparently good, neither of which I've read.
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