#5OnMyTBR is a bookish meme hosted by E. @ Local Bee Hunter's Nook and you can learn more about it here. It occurs every Monday when participants post about five books on their TBRs.
This week's prompt is "Short Read" which can mean different things to different people. Goodreads has a list of "Great Short Short Books" which includes "fictions of less than 200 pages or 50k words". Other sites push the limit to 250 or even 300 words. One says a "short read" is either a novella or a short story. For me, I call books "quick reads" if I can finish them in less than two days.
While I have a number of books in the Images of America series (which follow a format of a couple of chapters of text and plenty of vintage photos, many with lengthy and informative captions), I have not included any in today's 5 On My TBR. Many of the other short books that I own are classics and have previously been read so they do not qualify, either. Still, I found enough unread shorts in my calibre library to finish this week's meme. I may, in fact, go ahead and read one or two of these by the time you read this blog!
5 Books on My TBR — Short Reads
01. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (published April 6, 1943)
A pilot stranded in the desert awakes one morning to see, standing before him, the most extraordinary little fellow. "Please," asks the stranger, "draw me a sheep." And the pilot realizes that when life's events are too difficult to understand, there is no choice but to succumb to their mysteries. He pulls out pencil and paper… And thus begins this wise and enchanting fable that, in teaching the secret of what is really important in life, has changed forever the world for its readers.
Few stories are as widely read and as universally cherished by children and adults alike as The Little Prince, presented here in a stunning new translation with carefully restored artwork. The definitive edition of a worldwide classic, it will capture the hearts of readers of all ages.
02. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder (published January 1, 1927)
This beautiful new edition features unpublished notes for the novel and other illuminating documentary material, all of which is included in a new Afterword by Tappan Wilder.
On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below. With this celebrated sentence Thornton Wilder begins The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of the towering achievements in American fiction and a novel read throughout the world. By chance, a monk witnesses the tragedy. Brother Juniper then embarks on a quest to prove that it was divine intervention rather than chance that led to the deaths of those who perished in the tragedy. His search leads to his own death -- and to the author's timeless investigation into the nature of love and the meaning of the human condition.
This new edition of Wilder's 1928 Pulitzer Prize winning novel contains a new foreword by Russell Banks.
03. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (published January 1, 1984)
Acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught everywhere from inner-city grade schools to universities across the country, and translated all over the world, The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero.
Told in a series of vignettes – sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous–it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become. Few other books in our time have touched so many readers.
04. The Death of Ivan Ilych by Leo Tolstoy (published January 1, 1886)
Hailed as one of the world's supreme masterpieces on the subject of death and dying, The Death of Ivan Ilyich is the story of a worldly careerist, a high court judge who has never given the inevitability of his dying so much as a passing thought. But one day, death announces itself to him, and to his shocked surprise, he is brought face to face with his own mortality.
How, Tolstoy asks, does an unreflective man confront his one and only moment of truth?
This short novel was an artistic culmination of a profound spiritual crisis in Tolstoy's life, a nine-year period following the publication of Anna Karenina during which he wrote not a word of fiction. A thoroughly absorbing, and, at times, terrifying glimpse into the abyss of death, it is also a strong testament to the possibility of finding spiritual salvation.
05. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (published September 12, 2007)
Bestselling author Sherman Alexie tells the story of Junior, a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Determined to take his future into his own hands, Junior leaves his troubled school on the rez to attend an all-white farm town high school where the only other Indian is the school mascot.
Heartbreaking, funny, and beautifully written, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which is based on the author's own experiences, coupled with poignant drawings by Ellen Forney that reflect the character's art, chronicles the contemporary adolescence of one Native American boy as he attempts to break away from the life he was destined to live.
With a forward by Markus Zusak, interviews with Sherman Alexie and Ellen Forney, and four-color interior art throughout, this edition is perfect for fans and collectors alike.
Have you read any of the books on this list? Did you enjoy them? Please let me know in the comments below.
No comments:
Post a Comment