The 2010 Reading List: January to June

Not surprisingly, the big, honkin' reading list on the side of this blog has grown a bit unwieldy. So I've decided to store the January - June entries below and press on in the second half of the year.

It's been fun and interesting for me to compile the list, which is an exercise I've never undertaken before. Not surprisingly, I find that I read a ton of genre fiction. For the most part, this is my late night reading before I go to sleep, so I'm seldom looking for heavy sledding at that hour. I usually try to work my way through a heftier tome about once a month, but I find that I've slacked off that pace this year in favor of more escapist fare. So be it.

I also find that just listing the books tends to ignore the hefty quantities of news, periodical, website, government-related, and work-related reading that happens on a daily basis. Perhaps I'll list those sources in another post to better capture my full reading diet.

Anyway, here's the January-June list for anybody who cares. (Judging from the collective crickets that greet my book reviews when I post them, I'd say that nobody's even made it this far in this post.) Instead of sorting it by category, I'm keeping it in chronological order to reflect the order in which I finished these books:

Finished

--Moving Pictures by Terry Pratchett (Review)

--The Big Four by Agatha Christie (Review)

--And Another Thing by Eoin Colfer (Review)

--Little Lost Girl by Richard Aleas (Review)

--Songs of Innocence by Richard Aleas (Review)

--Pulp Art: Original Cover Paintings for the Great American Pulp Magazines by Robert Lesser (Review)

--The Mystery of the Blue Train by Agatha Christie (Review)

--The Very Best of Fantasy & Science Fiction: 60th Anniversary Anthology, ed. by Gordon Van Gelder (Review)

--Peril at End House by Agatha Christie (Review)

--The Stolen Village by Des Elkin. (Review)

--Pleasure Model by Christopher Rowley, with illustrations by Justin Norman. (Review)

--Murder by the Book by Rex Stout (Review)

--Blackout by Connie Willis. (Review)

--On the Natural History of Destruction by W.G. Sebald (Review)

--Death in the Clouds by Agatha Christie (Review)

--The Black Diamond Detective Agency by Eddie Campbell (Review)

--Kull: The Shadow Kingdom by Arvid Nelson and Will Conrad (Review)

--Death Times Three by Rex Stout (Review)

--The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling (Review)

--Julie & Julia by Julie Powell (Review)

--The Chronicles of Conan, Vol. 18: Isle of the Dead and Other Stories by Bruce Jones, John Buscema, Marc Silvestri, and others. (Review)

--Very Hard Choices by Spider Robinson (Review)

--Money Shot by Christa Faust (Review)

--The Last Coincidence by Robert Goldsborough (Review)

--Captain America #1-#50 (2004-2010) by Ed Brubaker (Review)

--Marvel Secret Wars #1-#12 (1984-1985) by Jim Shooter and Mike Zeck (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison. (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat Returns by Harry Harrison. (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat Saves the World by Harry Harrison. (Review)

--Double Shot by Agatha Christie (Review)

--Charlotte's Story by Charlotte Arpin Niedhauk (Review)

--Triple Jeopardy by Rex Stout

--The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, the Epidemic That Shaped Our History by Molly Caldwell Crosby (Review)

--Spider-Girl #0 - #100 by Tom DeFalco, Pat Oliffe, Ron Frenz, and Sal Buscema (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat Wants You (1979) (Review)

--A Stainless Steel Rat is Born (1985) (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted (1987) (Review)

--The Stainless Steel Rat Sings the Blues (1994) (Review)