Review: A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

Well, thus ends the first book of the year (disregarding a few re-reads of soulfully satisfying books. Fine, I was re-reading the Anne series).

I think the most notable part of this book was my surprise at how much I enjoyed this. As a reader who has never enjoyed non-fiction, barely passed Physics and is yet to decipher the difference between an AC and DC motor, this book came as quite a refresher. Bill Bryson is in love with science, realizes it is usual to not be in love with science and then does his best to show us why he loves it so. In the process, we get introduced to a world of marvels and mysteries and shocks, from our pillowcases to the stars.


The raison d'etre behind the popularity of this book is obviously the accessibility of its facts. History, science, evolution is made alive to us with anecdotes, ego battles, doomed scientists and rags-to-riches stories. We are at once made inconsequential in front of the universe and then become the greatest story of survival ever written.Men become heroes and then the villains who put the very survival of earth in question. Not all this is unknown. But Bryson's book is rich in fascinating details and though begins to drag a little in the middle, is an easy read if taken in short bursts rather than a long read.

This book is recommended to everyone, from science lovers who will still find a wide variety of information and some biographies they could not have known to people who run away from science, to show them the miracles which humans have achieved for ages.

This book is my first read for the Chunkster Reading Challenge and has 668 pages.
450-550 - 0
551-750- 1
>750- 0

Rating: J'adore!

1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die - A Lifelong Challenge

Aha! A commitment for life. That should definitely not be a cause for panic. Anyway, the goal of this challenge is to finish the 1001 books to read before you die list, which is actually some 1300 books long, so death, wherever you are, please approach as slowly as you can.

I have finished some 53 books in the series, which is not very impressive since it is merely 4.06% (see what I meant by reading like an accountant). However, now there is a list (wherein I shall avoid anything as disturbing as 120 days of Sodom, so take that, 4.06%) and that should serve as both an incentive and a guide.

I shall be using this post as a sort of a Master Post, which will also have links to any reviews I may write. The books I have already read does not contain many reviews since I am a notoriously lazy blogger.

This is where the carrot hangs now:

The books I have completed till now are:

1. Aesop's Fables - Aesop (c.4th BC)
2. The Thousand and One Nights- Anonymous (c. 850)
3. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe (1719)
4. Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift (1726)
5. Sense And Sensibility - Jane Austen (1811)
6. Pride And Prejudice - Jane Austen (1813)
7. Mansfield Park - Jane Austen (1814)
8. Emma - Jane Austen (1816)
9. Persuasion - Jane Austen (1818)
10. Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen (1818)
11. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens (1838)
12. The Fall Of The House of Usher - Edgar Allan Poe (1839)
13. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens (1843)
14. The Count Of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas (1845-6)
15. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte (1847)
16. Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe (1852)
17. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens (1859)
18. The Mill On The Floss - George Eliot (1860)
19. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland - Lewis Carroll (1865)
20. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott (1868)
21. Through The Looking Glass - Lewis Carroll (1871)
22. Around The World In Eighty Days - Jules Verne (1873)
23. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson (1883)
24. King Solomon's Mines - H Rider Haggard (1885)
25. She - H Rider Haggard (1887)
26. The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1892)
27. Diary Of A Nobody - George & Weedon Grossmith (1892)
28. The Invisible Man - H G Wells (1897)
29. The Hound Of The Baskervilles - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1902)
30. Call Of The Wild - Jack London (1903)
31. The Thirty-Nine Steps - John Buchan (1915)
32. Siddhartha - Herman Hesse (1922)
33. The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie (1926)
34. Murder Must Advertise - Dorothy L Sayers (1933)
35. Thank You, Jeeves - P G Wodehouse (1934)
36. The Nine Tailors - Dorothy L Sayers (1934)
37. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell (1936)
38. The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1943)
39. Animal Farm - George Orwell (1945)
40. The Old Man And The Sea - Ernest Hemingway (1952)
41. Breakfast At Tiffany's - Truman Capote (1958)
42. To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee (1960)
43. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (1968)
44. The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams (1979)
45. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie (1980)
46. The Unbearable Lightness Of Being - Milan Kundera (1984)
47. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1985)
48. Watchmen - Alan Moore & David Gibbons (1986)
49. The Great Indian Novel - Shashi Tharoor (1990)
50. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth (1993)
51. Jazz- Toni Morrison (1993)
52. Life of Pi - Yann Martel (2001)
53. Atonement- Ian McEwan (2001)
54. Kafka On The Shore - Haruki Murakami (2002)
55.  The Namesake - Jhumpa Lahiri (2003)
56. The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night Time - Mark Haddon (2003)

Well, here is to a lifetime of reading! Onwards and what ho!

Chunkster Reading Challenge-2013

If nothing, these challenges will at least ensure I review the books I read.

This one is the Chunkster challenge where I want to opt for the third level. Do These Books Make my Butt Look Big? requires you to read SIX Chunksters from the following categories: 2 books which are between 450 - 550 pages in length; 2 books which are 551 - 750 pages in length; 2 books which are GREATER than 750 pages in length.

Back to the Classics-2013

In keeping with the resolutions, I am joining this Challenge, especially since my Classics reading has taken a beating since I stopped being a snobbish school girl.

Here are the categories and the books I am hoping to read for them which might change midway, because of any ensuing boredom.

The Required Categories:

1. A 19th Century Classic: Les Miserables- Because I must read it before I watch the film anyway.
   
2. A 20th Century Classic- Do androids dream of electric sheep
3. A Pre-18th or 18th Century Classic- Vicar of Wakefield? There really was not much of an option.
   
4. A Classic that relates to the African-American Experience - This can be an African-American author, or a book relating to slavery, civil rights, or African-American culture.- Jazz
5. A Classic Adventure- The Three Musketeers- Because, why not?
   
6. A Classic that prominently features an Animal - This can feature animal characters or animals in the title (real or imagined)- Charlotte's Web.

And these are the optional  categories which I will decide later.

Optional Categories:

    A.  Re-read a Classic

   B.  A Russian Classic

   C.  A Classic Non-Fiction title

   D.  A Classic Children's/Young Adult title

   E.  Classic Short Stories - collection must include at least 3 short stories by the same author, or at 
                                              least 3 stories collected together by genre, time period, etc.