Books read in 2006

[Roquefort Raider]

As every year, here's the list of books I went through in the past 365 days. If you keep such a list too, please feel free to add it below! (As I recall, some of you read something like five times what I do)!!!

The bloody crown of Conan, by R. E. Howard, the second book in a series re-presenting the original Howard material, without the pastiches, editorial changes and partial re-writes that other writers added in previous editions. (I can't say that I really saw much of a difference between the edited material and the originals, but I guess it's always better to read what the writer originally intended). This book also makes me realize that I'm probably getting older than I'd like: more and more, I tend to re-read stories that I liked as a youngster instead of trying new things... It's scary.

Death and restoration, by Iain Pears, a very entertaining mystery about a murder in a monastery where a painting attributed to Caravaggio has disappeared. Rich in unpretentious but genuine historical and artistic references, this is the kind of book that the culture-seeking general public should read instead of the Da Vinci Code crap.

The shadow of the torturer, by Gene Wolfe. That one came highly recommended, and I liked Wolfe's world building, which reminded me of my beloved Jack Vance. I can't say that I thrilled at the exploits of the protagonist, though, and still have to start book II of the series.

The conquering sword of Conan, by R. E. Howard, third and final book in the original Howard Conan stories. Yes, not only am I old but I'm also a completist. (That's, what, almost three sets of Conan books, now? But I wouldn'T like to part with any of them, especially the French translations with the Philippe Druillet covers).

Short tales by Nicolas Gogol, including the Nevsky prospekt, the nose, and the overcoat. One of my grad students, a Russian literature fan, talked me into it. Good stuff, too; Gogol can be an excellent satirist.

Taras Bulba, by Nicolas Gogol. Rousing and humorous adventures on the plains of Ukraine; I am convinced that part of Taras Bulba made its way into Howard's imagination when he created Conan.

The hound of death and other stories, by R. E. Howard; short tales written to pay the rent but that are nevertheless a lot of fun. Great adventure stuff.

The Peshawar lancers, by J.M. Stirling; an alternate reality story where the British empire still rules a large part of the world and has to face devil-worshipping Russians. Great fantasy fare! It reminded me of the adventures of Luther Arkwright.

Le gorille blanc, by Henri Vernes; a Bob Morane novel I found in a second-hand bookstore. Bob Morane is a classic adventure character in France, and his tales from the 50s and 60s are still sought by collectors. In retrospect most of the stories are pretty naive, and this one about a white gorilla makes no exception; but the exotism of the 1950s Africa still works and the hero's decision not to go through with his plan of shipping the captured albino primate to a European zoo would agree with today's ecological conscience.

1633 by Eric Flint, another alternate history novel in which a modern-day West Virginia town ends up in the 17th century. No nonsense adventure with lots of guns, the best of American values, guns, bravery and ingenuity, guns, likeable characters, and guns.

I read that one on my computer, and I must say that real paper books are in no danger of going away.

The Grantville gazette, edited b y Eric Flint; where many authors tell stories set in the 1632 universe. Entertaining for the most part.

The Normans in European history, by C. H. Haskins. A history book from the 1920s that Barnes and Noble reedited and sells for basically nothing. Pretty good.

The narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, by E. A. Poe. What I loved the most about this book is that it was written before we knew much about Antarctica; accordingly, the geography that Poe relies on is totally wrong! Talk about exotic places.

Hard as nails, by Dan Simmons. Another Joe Kurtz thriller, which reads like a Sin City novel. Always right on the edge of being a parody of the noir genre.

The saga of the confederates, author unknown. That's where I restarted my Icelandic saga addiction.

A place of darkness, by Lauren Haney. A mystery set in ancient Egypt, in which an officer tries to solve a problem of tomb plundering. Not that interesting, I'm afraid.

L'Égypte des pharaons, by J.-M. Brissaud. If nothing else, the Haney book sent me back to re-read this brief history book about ancient Egypt. Nice chapters on the ancient Egyptian religions, where we see how most cities had their independent pantheons and how what we view today as "Egypt's religion" was pretty disconnected back then.

Pastiches et postiches, a collection of funny texts by Umberto Eco.

My gun is quick, by Mickey Spillane. Mike Hammer. Better than Joe Kurtz.

The ancestor's tale, by Richard Dawkins. My favorite book of the year (and one of my favorite books, period). The remarkably knowledgeable Dr Dawkins takes us on a Canterbury tales-type journey back through the ages, stopping at all the points where our species branched from a previous one. Along the way, we cover the history of pretty much all life on Earth. It's a truly fascinating journey (even for a tarined biologist)!

The mysterious flame of Queen Loana, by Umberto Eco. The disappointment of the year. One of my favorite writers tells us about a man who has a kind of stroke, remembers lots of not-that-interesting details about his life as a kid in Italy, and dies. Arrrrgh!!!

The Cassini division, by Ken MacLeod; a SF novel that was... okay. I guess.

Primal waters, by Steve Alten. A third novel about giant albino megalodons! Thrills! Chills! Gruesome kills! But also a lot of good-hearted, mindless fun.

A matter of gravity, by Hal Clement. Beautiful alien world-building; a truly intelligent science-fiction novel. I loved it.

Aniu, by Bernard Voyer. Voyer is a polar explorer from my hometown. In this coffee-table book, he writes about... Ice. All sorts of ice. Polar ice. Sea ice. Glacier ice. Poetic and refreshing (pun intended).

The savage tales of Solomon Kane, by R. E. Howard. A Solomon Kane book was the first one I forced myself to read in English. This was for the memories. More adventures in faraway places.

A canticle for leibowitz, by W.M. Miller. A classic of science-fiction, of course.

The saga of Gisli Sursson, author unknow. More of my saga fix.

The saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-tongue, author unknow. I'm addicted.

The saga of ref the sly, author unknown. I may have to see a doctor.

The Vinland sagas, authors unknown. The Greenlanders, Erik the Red... that visit to America is now legendary.

Bran Mak Morn, by R. E. Howard. More stuff from my youth, which failed to rekindle the excitement of yore. But I've read these stories so many times now...

The tale of Thorstein Staff-struck, author unknown. More Iceland! More brawling farmers!

Olympos, by Dan Simmons. Great SF, incorporating characters from the Illiad and The Tempest. Brilliant stuff, if a bit confusing at times.

The Brendan voyage, by Tim Severin, describing the crossing of the Atlantic on a big curragh, with the intention of showing that St. Brendan's voyages might be a romanticized account of a real journey. A gripping true story!

The God delusion, by Richard Dawkins. In which the authors vents against the evils of religion, blind faith and belief in unproven (and unproveable) things in the tone one would adopt when having a few beers with friends who do not share one's opinions. Very entertaining if you're an atheist, and probably offensive if you're a believer.

Njal's saga, author unknown. Arguably the most famous of generational sagas. Lovely, classic stuff.

Alice's adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll. I still hadn't read that one! Now it's done.

L'escale des dieux, by Peter Randa, a French SF novel I got for fifty cents at a charity sale. Peter Randa (a pseudonym for André Duquesne) was a remarkably prolific writer of popular novels who delved in many genres, from police to horror, science-fiction to thrillers. He wrote very good space operas. (A nice anecdote is that his son, who also became an author, likewise adopted the surname "Randa" in his pseudonym).

The book of Ptath, by A.E. van Vogt. Golden age SF goodness, with more brains than violence.

The Si Fan mysteries, by Sax Rohmer. Okay, the Fu Manchu series can't be taken seriously... but it remains entertaining in small doses.

The history of Middle Earth, book 5, by J.R.R. Tolkien and his son Christopher. This one has a long fragment by Tolkien, "The lost road", presenting something not seen before in another form.

The book of lost tales, part 2, by J.R.R. Tolkien and his son Christopher. (Also known as "the history of Middle Earth, book 2"). Early versions of stories that are found in the Silmarillion. Interesting for completists, but I'm nearing my Tolkien overdose, here.

À quoi songent les psyborgs? by Pierre Barbet. A space explorer investigates a planet where disembodied intelligences rebuilt a destroyed world in the image of Charlemagne's Europe. A little bit SF, alittle bit fantasy, and an altogether enjoyable story without any evil character.

The Iliad, by Homer. Nuff said!

Aaaaaaand that's it for this year.

[SoulOnIce]

I only started keeping a list in August, so this is what I read in half a year. As you can tell I went (and I am still going through) a horror phase.

1. After Midnight – Richard Laymon
2. Night in the Lonesome October – Richard Laymon
3. Afterlife – Douglas Clegg
4. Cell – Stephen King
5. The Descent – Jeff Long
6. The Girl Next Door – Jack Ketchum
7. One-Eyed Jacks – Brad Smith
8. The Big Bam – Leigh Monteville
9. The Ruins – Scott Smith
10. The Traveling Vampire Show – Richard Laymon
11. Off Season – Jack Ketchum
12. The Revelation – Bentley Little
13. The Store – Bentley Little (Finished Oct.2)
14. The Rising – Brian Keene
15. City of the Dead – Brian Keene
16. The Summoning – Bentley Little
17. The Reckoning – Jeff Long
18. The Dark Tower Vol.1: The Gunslinger Stephen King
19. The Backwoods – Edward Lee
20. The Resort – Bentley Little
21. The Dark Tower Vol.2 – The Drawing of the Three – Stephen King
22. The Conqueror Worms – Brian Keene
23. The Policy – Bentley Little
24. Intensity – Dean Koontz
25. Above All, Be Kind – Zoe Weill
26. John – Cynthia Lennon
27. Red – Jack Ketchum
28. World War Z – Max Brooks (Dec.7)
29. The Cellar - Richard Laymon
30. Facing Ali - Stephen Brunt

[Karl J. Barnes]

Laurie R. King's To Play The Fool, the second novel in her Kate Matinelli Mystery series. It wasn't so much a mystery about a crime, but that of a man's soul. Not overly deep, but interesting.

Christopher Moore's Blood Sucking Fiends and Practical Demon Keeping, both sublime and fiendishly funny.

Ian R. MacLeod's The Light Ages, a story set in a Victorian/Dickinsonian type of world.Slow going, but with some interesting characters and comments about class and society.

Mercedes Lackey's The Serpent's Shadow not her best work, but entertaining enough to not be boring.

Benard Cornwell's The Archer's Tale, a fantastic historical novel. You feel for ALL the characters. His believeablity, makes this novel head above most historical novels. The pages just vibrate with life.

Kelley Armstrong's Dime Store Magic had high hopes for this novel, but the characters were just too flakey and the story's end was pretty flat.

Michael A Stackpole's Fortress Draconis and When Dragons Rage is what fine Epic Fantasy should deliver. Intriguing characters and story with enough unexpected twists and turns to make the whole basic premise seem fresh.

Steven Brust's omni-books, The Book of Taltos and The Book of Athyra along with Dragon continue the story of funny,insightful character Vlad Taltos and his world. Totally enjoy Brust's work!

Simon R Green's Nightside series Paths Not Taken the last published Nightside novel though I enjoyed; wasn't on the same par with first four books. I still hope that the story of John Taylor isn't done and await for the next Nightside novel.

[Karl J. Barnes]

The shadow of the torturer, by Gene Wolfe. That one came highly recommended, and I liked Wolfe's world building, which reminded me of my beloved Jack Vance. I can't say that I thrilled at the exploits of the protagonist, though, and still have to start book II of the series.

I saw four books in this series at my local used bookstore a few years ago with Austrailian covers and snatched them all up and read the four books in about a month. LOVED this series, which is more a travelogue of a dying Earth than an out and out adventure story. The situitations that Severin comes upon are alien and strange even to him and Wolfe's writing just compels you to find out about this dying Earth and its societies. A bit dry, but fascinating too.

[Dizzy D]

The shadow of the torturer, by Gene Wolfe. That one came highly recommended, and I liked Wolfe's world building, which reminded me of my beloved Jack Vance. I can't say that I thrilled at the exploits of the protagonist, though, and still have to start book II of the series.

I picked it up probably for the same reason (recommendations thread here, right?) and was disappointed with it as well. Not bad, but not as good as I thought it would be.

Currently reading Reality Dysfunction by Peter Hamilton, recommended in that same thread, but haven't got far enough to form a real opinion.

Other books read this year:

*Anansi Boys: it's usual Gaiman-fair, which is a good thing IMHO.
* Finally started on a Song of Fire and Ice, liked the first book a lot, second one will probably be a Christmas present from family.
* A Song of Stone by Iain Banks... I'm sorry to say I read it a couple of months ago and can't remember much about it.
* "Lab" by Miguel Bulnes, a dutch book about working as a PhD student on a science project and all the backstabbing and politics that go with it. Very funny and sadly very true as well. Highly recommended, but all the people who would be into something like this already read it.
* Der Hexer by Wolfgang Hohlbein (I hope I spelled that correctly); Lovecraftian pulp fiction from my youth collected in new TPBs for $$cheapo!, Not high literature, but entertaining enough.
* Nightwatch by the Russian fellow, Sergei ... (can't recall his name and don't have my copy here). Saw the movie first, but the book is quite different. A good example of "urban fantasy"/"contemporary fantasy" for that other thread BTW. I didn't care much about the characters, but the concepts and setting were good enough to keep me reading on and the whole light/dark =/= good/evil is refreshing in fantasy.

... not 2006 completely, but I think the last half of 2006 for me. Don't remember what I read the first months.

[Aaron Kashtan]

This year I started keeping a list of every book I've read. I wish I'd started doing this many years ago, but ah well.

According to the list, I have now read 122 books this year, including comics in book form. This is subject to change because I expect to finish some more books by the end of the month. I would say that the best book I read this year was either Ulysses or the first three volumes of The Story of the Stone.

Here is the complete list, if anyone's interested:

1-3-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 1
1-5-06 Actus Tragicus & Etgar Keret. Jetlag
1-7-06 Carlos Monsiváis. Mexican Postcards
1-8-06 Voltaire. Candide [third time, but first time in French]
1-15-06 Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda. Sab
1-16-06 Gloria Anzaldúa. Borderlands / La Frontera
1-21-06 Adrienne Kennedy. People Who Led to My Plays
1-25-06 Jeff Smith. Bone: One Volume Edition
1-28-06 Rumiko Takahashi. Maison Ikkoku vol. 3
1-29-06 Clarice Lispector. The Hour of the Star
2-3-06 Max. Peter Pank: ¡Pankdinista!
2-4-06 Adolfo Bioy Casares. La invencíon de Morel [second time]
2-5-06 Jeanette Winterson. The Passion
2-11-06 Shotaro Ishinomori. Cyborg 009 vol. 4
2-13-06 Alberto Blest Gana. Martín Rivas
2-14-06 Nestor García Canclini. Consumers and Citizens
2-18-06 Antonio Tabucchi. The Woman of Porto Pim
2-21-06 Madame de Graffigny. Lettres d’une peruvienne
2-22-06 Jorge Isaacs. María
2-24-06 Paul Virilio. Politics of the Very Worst
2-26-06 Ariel Dorfman & Armand Mattelart. How to Read Donald Duck
3-5-06 Leiji Matsumoto. Galaxy Express 999 vol. 3
3-5-06 Ignacio M. Altamirano. El Zarco
3-6-06 Marc Augé. Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity
3-13-06 Pierre Carlet de Marivaux. Le Jeu de l’amour et du hasard
3-15-06 Eiichiro Oda. One Piece vol. 1: Romance Dawn
3-19-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 2
3-20-06 Sir Thomas Malory. Le Morte Darthur
3-22-06 Chinua Achebe. No Longer at Ease
3-23-06 Naoki Urasawa. Monster vol. 1
3-24-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 3: Doing the Islands with Bacchus
3-27-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 3
4-3-06 Dan Clowes. Ice Haven
4-4-06 Benedict Anderson. Imagined Communities
4-10-06 Eiichiro Oda. One Piece vol. 2: Buggy the Clown
4-13-06 David B. Epileptic
4-17-06 Marjane Satrapi. Persepolis
4-20-06 Honoré de Balzac. Le Colonel Chabert
4-22-06 Lu Xun. The True Story of Ah Q
4-23-06 Omar Cabezas. La montaña es algo más que una inmensa estepa verde
4-29-06 Raja Rao. Kanthapura
4-30-06 Alejo Carpentier. El reino de este mundo
5-2-06 Phoebe Gloeckner. A Child’s Life and Other Stories
5-3-06 Lynda Barry. One! Hundred! Demons!
5-6-06 Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd
5-9-06 Ho Che Anderson. King
5-11-06 Oscar Colchado Lucio. Rosa Cuchillo
5-13-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 4.1
5-15-06 Aaron McGruder, Reginald Hudlin & Kyle Baker. Birth of a Nation
5-17-06 Chinua Achebe. Anthills of the Savannah
5-25-06 Sembène Ousmane. Xala
5-27-06 Mario Vargas Llosa. La fiesta del Chivo
5-29-06 Alicia Partnoy. The Little School
6-3-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 4.2
6-6-06 Alan Moore & Gene Ha. Top Ten: The Forty-Niners
6-7-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 1: The Golden Days [reread]
6-9-06 Eduardo Galeano. Memoria del fuego I. Los nacimientos
6-14-06 Ishmael Reed. Mumbo Jumbo
6-18-06 André Franquin w/Jidehem. Gaston T.1
6-21-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 2: The Crab-Flower Club
6-25-06 Iris Murdoch. Under the Net
6-28-06 Henrik Ibsen. Peer Gynt
6-29-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 7+8: The Eyeball Kid: Double Bill
7-2-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 10: Banged Up
7-4-06 Tirso de Molina. El burlador de Sevilla
7-6-06 Moto Hagio. A, A’ [A, A Prime]
7-14-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 3: The Warning Voice
7-16-06 Jean Giraud & Jean-Michel Charlier. Lieutenant Blueberry, vol. 2: Steelfingers
7-18-06 Cormac McCarthy. Blood Meridian
7-25-06 Steven Brust. The Paths of the Dead
7-28-06 Hergé. Cigars of the Pharaoh
7-29-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 4: The Debt of Tears
8-3-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 5: The Dreamer Wakes
8-8-06 Saki Hiwatari. Please Save My Earth! vol. 6
8-10-06 Dante Alighieri. The Inferno of Dante
8-11-06 Steven Brust. The Lord of Castle Black
8-18-06 Bryan Talbot. The Tale of One Bad Rat
8-19-06 Sigmund Freud. The Interpretation of Dreams
8-22-06 Søren Kierkegaard. The Sickness Unto Death
8-27-06 Erica Sakurazawa. The Aromatic Bitters
8-29-06 Eddie Campbell. The Fate of the Artist
8-31-06 Martin Jay. The Dialogic Imagination: A History of the Frankfurt School 1923-1950
9-2-06 Steven Brust. Sethra Lavode
9-3-06 Kevin Kopelson. Neatness Counts
9-8-06 Roland Barthes. Mythologies
9-10-06 James Joyce. Dubliners [second time]
9-13-06 Lev Manovich. The Language of New Media
9-17-06 Brandon Hanvey. Entanglement
9-20-06 Siegfried Kracauer. The Mass Ornament
9-24-06 Peter Handke. Slow Homecoming
9-25-06 Henry Petroski. The Book on the Bookshelf
9-26-06 Nick Montfort. Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction
9-29-06 Walter Benjamin. Illuminations
9-30-06 Jacques Tardi w/ Leo Malet. Nestor Burma T.1: Brouillard au pont de Tolbiac
10-5-06 James Joyce. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man [second time]
10-6-06 Joann Sfar. Vampire Loves
10-9-06 Gilles Deleuze. Cinema 1. The Time-Image
10-13-06 André Bazin. What is Cinema? vol. 1
10-14-06 Neal Stephenson. In the Beginning… Was the Command Line
10-18-06 Georges Perec. Species of Spaces and Other Pieces
10-20-06 Akira Toriyama. Dragon Ball Z vol. 4
10-24-06 Tom Hart. New Hat Stories: Banks/Eubanks
10-27-06 Walter Benjamin. Reflections
10-30-06 Theodor Adorno. Minima Moralia
11-2-06 Cristina García. Dreaming in Cuban
11-4-06 Matt Madden. 99 Ways to Tell a Story: Exercises in Style
11-7-06 Theodor Adorno. The Culture Industry
11-8-06 Bruce Sterling. Shaping Things
11-8-06 Philippe Dupuy & Charles Berberian. Maybe Later
11-10-06 Dick Hebdige. Subculture: The Meaning of Style
11-11-06 Donald Theall. Beyond the Word: Reconstructing Sense in the Joyce Era
11-15-06 Sean O’Casey. Three Dublin Plays
11-18-06 Yoko Maki. Aishiteruze Baby vol. 1
11-20-06 R.K. Narayan. The Financial Expert
11-23-06 Roland Barthes. S/Z
11-26-06 James Joyce. Ulysses
11-27-06 Harry Blamires. The New Bloomsday Book
11-30-06 George Landow. Hypertext 2.0
12-2-06 Masashi Kishimoto. Naruto vol. 1
12-6-06 Jeet Heer & Kent Worcester, eds. Arguing Comics: Literary Masters on a Popular Medium
12-10-06 Murray Krieger. Ekphrasis: The Illusion of the Natural Sign
12-13-06 Benjamin Franklin. The Autobiography

[Karl J. Barnes]

This year I started keeping a list of every book I've read. I wish I'd started doing this many years ago, but ah well.

According to the list, I have now read 122 books this year, including comics in book form. This is subject to change because I expect to finish some more books by the end of the month. I would say that the best book I read this year was either Ulysses or the first three volumes of The Story of the Stone.

Here is the complete list, if anyone's interested:

1-3-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 1
1-5-06 Actus Tragicus & Etgar Keret. Jetlag
1-7-06 Carlos Monsiváis. Mexican Postcards
1-8-06 Voltaire. Candide [third time, but first time in French]
1-15-06 Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda. Sab
1-16-06 Gloria Anzaldúa. Borderlands / La Frontera
1-21-06 Adrienne Kennedy. People Who Led to My Plays
1-25-06 Jeff Smith. Bone: One Volume Edition
1-28-06 Rumiko Takahashi. Maison Ikkoku vol. 3
1-29-06 Clarice Lispector. The Hour of the Star
2-3-06 Max. Peter Pank: ¡Pankdinista!
2-4-06 Adolfo Bioy Casares. La invencíon de Morel [second time]
2-5-06 Jeanette Winterson. The Passion
2-11-06 Shotaro Ishinomori. Cyborg 009 vol. 4
2-13-06 Alberto Blest Gana. Martín Rivas
2-14-06 Nestor García Canclini. Consumers and Citizens
2-18-06 Antonio Tabucchi. The Woman of Porto Pim
2-21-06 Madame de Graffigny. Lettres d’une peruvienne
2-22-06 Jorge Isaacs. María
2-24-06 Paul Virilio. Politics of the Very Worst
2-26-06 Ariel Dorfman & Armand Mattelart. How to Read Donald Duck
3-5-06 Leiji Matsumoto. Galaxy Express 999 vol. 3
3-5-06 Ignacio M. Altamirano. El Zarco
3-6-06 Marc Augé. Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity
3-13-06 Pierre Carlet de Marivaux. Le Jeu de l’amour et du hasard
3-15-06 Eiichiro Oda. One Piece vol. 1: Romance Dawn
3-19-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 2
3-20-06 Sir Thomas Malory. Le Morte Darthur
3-22-06 Chinua Achebe. No Longer at Ease
3-23-06 Naoki Urasawa. Monster vol. 1
3-24-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 3: Doing the Islands with Bacchus
3-27-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 3
4-3-06 Dan Clowes. Ice Haven
4-4-06 Benedict Anderson. Imagined Communities
4-10-06 Eiichiro Oda. One Piece vol. 2: Buggy the Clown
4-13-06 David B. Epileptic
4-17-06 Marjane Satrapi. Persepolis
4-20-06 Honoré de Balzac. Le Colonel Chabert
4-22-06 Lu Xun. The True Story of Ah Q
4-23-06 Omar Cabezas. La montaña es algo más que una inmensa estepa verde
4-29-06 Raja Rao. Kanthapura
4-30-06 Alejo Carpentier. El reino de este mundo
5-2-06 Phoebe Gloeckner. A Child’s Life and Other Stories
5-3-06 Lynda Barry. One! Hundred! Demons!
5-6-06 Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd
5-9-06 Ho Che Anderson. King
5-11-06 Oscar Colchado Lucio. Rosa Cuchillo
5-13-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 4.1
5-15-06 Aaron McGruder, Reginald Hudlin & Kyle Baker. Birth of a Nation
5-17-06 Chinua Achebe. Anthills of the Savannah
5-25-06 Sembène Ousmane. Xala
5-27-06 Mario Vargas Llosa. La fiesta del Chivo
5-29-06 Alicia Partnoy. The Little School
6-3-06 Makoto Yukimura. Planetes vol. 4.2
6-6-06 Alan Moore & Gene Ha. Top Ten: The Forty-Niners
6-7-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 1: The Golden Days [reread]
6-9-06 Eduardo Galeano. Memoria del fuego I. Los nacimientos
6-14-06 Ishmael Reed. Mumbo Jumbo
6-18-06 André Franquin w/Jidehem. Gaston T.1
6-21-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 2: The Crab-Flower Club
6-25-06 Iris Murdoch. Under the Net
6-28-06 Henrik Ibsen. Peer Gynt
6-29-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 7+8: The Eyeball Kid: Double Bill
7-2-06 Eddie Campbell. Bacchus, vol. 10: Banged Up
7-4-06 Tirso de Molina. El burlador de Sevilla
7-6-06 Moto Hagio. A, A’ [A, A Prime]
7-14-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 3: The Warning Voice
7-16-06 Jean Giraud & Jean-Michel Charlier. Lieutenant Blueberry, vol. 2: Steelfingers
7-18-06 Cormac McCarthy. Blood Meridian
7-25-06 Steven Brust. The Paths of the Dead
7-28-06 Hergé. Cigars of the Pharaoh
7-29-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 4: The Debt of Tears
8-3-06 Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, vol. 5: The Dreamer Wakes
8-8-06 Saki Hiwatari. Please Save My Earth! vol. 6
8-10-06 Dante Alighieri. The Inferno of Dante
8-11-06 Steven Brust. The Lord of Castle Black
8-18-06 Bryan Talbot. The Tale of One Bad Rat
8-19-06 Sigmund Freud. The Interpretation of Dreams
8-22-06 Søren Kierkegaard. The Sickness Unto Death
8-27-06 Erica Sakurazawa. The Aromatic Bitters
8-29-06 Eddie Campbell. The Fate of the Artist
8-31-06 Martin Jay. The Dialogic Imagination: A History of the Frankfurt School 1923-1950
9-2-06 Steven Brust. Sethra Lavode
9-3-06 Kevin Kopelson. Neatness Counts
9-8-06 Roland Barthes. Mythologies
9-10-06 James Joyce. Dubliners [second time]
9-13-06 Lev Manovich. The Language of New Media
9-17-06 Brandon Hanvey. Entanglement
9-20-06 Siegfried Kracauer. The Mass Ornament
9-24-06 Peter Handke. Slow Homecoming
9-25-06 Henry Petroski. The Book on the Bookshelf
9-26-06 Nick Montfort. Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction
9-29-06 Walter Benjamin. Illuminations
9-30-06 Jacques Tardi w/ Leo Malet. Nestor Burma T.1: Brouillard au pont de Tolbiac
10-5-06 James Joyce. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man [second time]
10-6-06 Joann Sfar. Vampire Loves
10-9-06 Gilles Deleuze. Cinema 1. The Time-Image
10-13-06 André Bazin. What is Cinema? vol. 1
10-14-06 Neal Stephenson. In the Beginning… Was the Command Line
10-18-06 Georges Perec. Species of Spaces and Other Pieces
10-20-06 Akira Toriyama. Dragon Ball Z vol. 4
10-24-06 Tom Hart. New Hat Stories: Banks/Eubanks
10-27-06 Walter Benjamin. Reflections
10-30-06 Theodor Adorno. Minima Moralia
11-2-06 Cristina García. Dreaming in Cuban
11-4-06 Matt Madden. 99 Ways to Tell a Story: Exercises in Style
11-7-06 Theodor Adorno. The Culture Industry
11-8-06 Bruce Sterling. Shaping Things
11-8-06 Philippe Dupuy & Charles Berberian. Maybe Later
11-10-06 Dick Hebdige. Subculture: The Meaning of Style
11-11-06 Donald Theall. Beyond the Word: Reconstructing Sense in the Joyce Era
11-15-06 Sean O’Casey. Three Dublin Plays
11-18-06 Yoko Maki. Aishiteruze Baby vol. 1
11-20-06 R.K. Narayan. The Financial Expert
11-23-06 Roland Barthes. S/Z
11-26-06 James Joyce. Ulysses
11-27-06 Harry Blamires. The New Bloomsday Book
11-30-06 George Landow. Hypertext 2.0
12-2-06 Masashi Kishimoto. Naruto vol. 1
12-6-06 Jeet Heer & Kent Worcester, eds. Arguing Comics: Literary Masters on a Popular Medium
12-10-06 Murray Krieger. Ekphrasis: The Illusion of the Natural Sign
12-13-06 Benjamin Franklin. The Autobiography

So '06 was a bit of a slow year,huh?These :James Joyce. Ulysses,Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd,Voltaire. Candide [third time, but first time in French] , are books that would have taken me all year to get through!

[bluetyson]

The List is too long/too hard to paste I think, but :-

http://www.librarything.com/catalog....t=authorunflip

Which is something like 377 novels/novellas, etc., 187 trades/graphic novels, 25 non fiction, and 38 short ficiton pieces found on the internet.

[Roquefort Raider]

Here is the complete list, if anyone's interested:

Well, THAT'S a list I would be proud of!!!

(Is that Brandon Hanvey our Brandon Hanvey?)

[Aaron Kashtan]

Well, THAT'S a list I would be proud of!!!

(Is that Brandon Hanvey our Brandon Hanvey?)

Yes, it's our Brandon Hanvey. There's a review of the book here, which I generally agree with.

[Donald M.]

I have a pile of about 26 books I've read this year sitting on a shelf in my room. I've read at least twice that many this year, but many of the books I've read are paperbacks so destroyed when I'm done with them that I just toss 'em.