A new challenge--crazier than ever

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There is a non-fiction challenge to compliment the Classics Club!  I must join.

A Non-Fiction Adventure


Michelle, the hostess, says:  Taking the lead from the awesome creators of the Fill in the Gaps: 100 Project and The Classics Club, I have decided to create a similar challenge focusing on non-fiction books.  The fruition of this idea came to me yesterday as I was looking at my shelves of non-fiction books.  In my library of 3000+ books, non-fiction makes up about 1000+ of that total.  I focus so heavily on fiction I never take the time to squeeze in some non-fiction reads which I do love to read.  So I thought, why not follow the lead of those I mentioned above and create this challenge for the non-fiction genre.

Here are the guidelines:
  • choose 50+ non-fiction books; the number is up to you.  Choose 50, 75, 100, 200.  It's entirely your choice
  • Books must be non-fiction--biography, autobiography, history, memoir, cooking, travel, science, etc.
  • list them at your blog (or on Goodreads or another social media site, if you do not have a blog)
  • choose your completion goal date five years in the future and make note of it with your list of titles (like this:  reading goal--50 books  goal dates--March 20, 2012 - March 20, 2017)
  • come back here and post the link to your list in the linky below
  • write a review (or a short summary) on the book when finished and link it to the title in your list (or link to your review on Goodreads, again, if you don't have a blog)
  • there will be pages posted at the top of the blog for you to link your reviews
  • when you have completed the challenge, come add your link to the Completed Challenges page
  • there will be a blog roll in the sidebar where I will list you/your blog linked to your lists
  • grab the button in the right sidebar and link it back to this blog
  • check out this PAGE which contains links to various online sources with lists of reading ideas
  • I might host a read-a-long from time to time.  If you are hosting one, or an event or challenge surrounding a non-fiction title, post about it at this PAGE
A couple more important details:
  • this challenge can be crossed over with any other challenges
  • your link in the linky below must lead to your list, not just your main blog address.  Any links that are blog links only will be deleted
Updates:
*I was asked if the list has to be made in advance.  The idea is to work toward reading non-fiction that you've been wanting to read so the list is mandatory. However, the list does not have to be set in stone. You can change out titles as the mood suits you.


I am about a year late to this party, but I do want to join in--I have lots of big scary non-fiction books I want to read!  Mostly history.  A whole lot of history.  So here is my list, in no particular order--50 non-fiction books, with a goal date of August 14, 2018.  You can check in on my progress at the page.

...Now that I have put them all up there, it's terrifying.  What is it with me and gigantic tomes of history?  This is ridiculous, it will never happen.  But I will give it a good go.

  1. The History of the Renaissance World, by Susan Wise Bauer
  2. Bible and Sword, by Barbara Tuchman
  3. The Gulag Archipelago, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (abridged)
  4. Revolutionary Mothers, by Carol Berkin
  5. Affairs of Honor, by Joanne Freeman
  6. Snakes and Ladders, by Gita Mehta
  7. Eight Pieces of Empire, by Lawrence Scott Sheets
  8. Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes, by E. Randolph Richards
  9. Hitler's Savage Canary, by David Lampe
  10. Roll, Jordan, Roll by Eugene Genovese
  11. The White Man's Burden, by William Russell Easterly
  12. Napoleon's Buttons, by Penny Le Couteur   
  13. Our Oriental Heritage.  
  14. The Life of Greece. 
  15. Caesar and Christ.  
  16. The Age of Faith.  
  17. The Renaissance.  
  18. The Reformation.  
  19. The Age of Reason Begins.  
  20. The Age of Louis XIV. 
  21.  The Age of Voltaire.  
  22. Rousseau and Revolution.  
  23. The Age of Napoleon, by Will and Ariel Durant.
  24. The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin
  25. The Coming of the Third Reich, by Richard J. Evans
  26. Lectures on Russian Literature, by Nabokov
  27. Bloodlands, by Timothy Snyder
  28.  Full Tilt, by Dervla Murphy
  29.  Keynes Hayek, by Nicholas Wapshott
  30.  Elizabeth and Hazel, by David Margolick
  31.  25 Books Every Christian Should Read, by Richard Rohr
  32.  Grand Strategies, by Charles Hill
  33.  In Search of Ancient Ireland, by Carmel McCaffrey
  34.  In Genuine Cowgirl Fashion, by Mary Higginbotham
  35.  Basic Economics, by Thomas Sowell
  36.  The Proud Tower, by Barbara Tuchman
  37.  Beauty in the Word, by Stratford Caldecott
  38.  The Green and Burning Tree, by Eleanor Cameron
  39.  Mimesis, by Erich Auerbach
  40.  The White Goddess, by Robert Graves
  41. Fairy Tale as Myth, by Jack Zipes
  42.  Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion, by Jack Zipes
  43.  Fire in the Bones, by David Wilcox
  44.  The Imitation of Christ, by Thomas a Kempis
  45.  The Obedience of a Christian Man, by Tyndale
  46.  In the Steps of the Master, by H. V. Morton
  47.  Understanding the Book of Mormon, by Grant Hardy
  48. The Golden Bough, by Sir James Frazer
  49.  1491, by Charles Mann
  50.  India: from Midnight to the Millennium, by Shashi Tharoor
  51.  From Dawn to Decadence, by Jacques Barzun
  52.  My Childhood/Apprenticeship/Universities, by Maxim Gorky

Comments

  1. AmyAugust 21, 2013 at 6:22 AM

    For pete's sake, Jean, would you stop tempting me with interesting challenges when I don't have time for more challenges??!! :P

    Now I really have to look at this. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. JeanAugust 21, 2013 at 9:58 AM

    I know, it's awful, isn't it?! Sorry. :D

    ReplyDelete

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