Although it'll be another four weeks or so before I begin posting my Best of 2014 articles, I've already had to begin laying out some of the parameters for this year's edition. I have made my job easier and harder by deciding to review virtually every 2014 release that I have read. Easier in that I have a ready-made set of links to post for those titles that I discuss in various posts on translated works, disappointing releases, short story collections/anthologies, etc., harder in that I have to have some record of my thoughts on each and every work written before compiling the lists. While I'll whittle down the list of nearly 50 unwritten reviews over the next three weeks or so by writing a series of compilation reviews that'll contain 1-2 paragraph reviews of three dozen or so of those books, I still have to write over a dozen reviews of 800-1200 words each.
In addition, I still have 16 books left to read, including 4 to purchase. The former will not be much of a problem to finish (I should finish 5-6 of them by Sunday), but I'll have to wait until early December to buy those 4 books. So it'll take me until mid-December before I am ready to construct final lists. In the meantime, I think I'll have the categories from last year, only that due to having read a little over 160 books released this year, the majority of which have made some sort of literary or genre list of good/outstanding releases already, I'll do a two-part Top 50 list. This should allow for a bit more exposure for some worthy and entertaining releases.
Now to just "encourage" those loyal rabid Serbian reading squirrels to read and write the rest of this for me...
In addition, I still have 16 books left to read, including 4 to purchase. The former will not be much of a problem to finish (I should finish 5-6 of them by Sunday), but I'll have to wait until early December to buy those 4 books. So it'll take me until mid-December before I am ready to construct final lists. In the meantime, I think I'll have the categories from last year, only that due to having read a little over 160 books released this year, the majority of which have made some sort of literary or genre list of good/outstanding releases already, I'll do a two-part Top 50 list. This should allow for a bit more exposure for some worthy and entertaining releases.
Now to just "encourage" those loyal rabid Serbian reading squirrels to read and write the rest of this for me...
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3 comments:
It's at this point that I think I'm rather glad I can't/don't read as quickly as you, or else compiling my own lists for the end of the year might be some sort of hellish self-torture. It's hard enough to narrow things down (or in some cases, find enough to flesh out a list), and I didn't even get through 100 books this year!
My hat's off to you, good sir, and your squirrel army!
Yes, especially since I planned out which books I would buy in advance, meaning there would be fewer "surprises" of the negative sort. I'd say that I enjoyed over 2/3 of the 2014 releases I read and only disliked maybe 10% or less. Very difficult choices ahead for the squirrels, alas.
Christ. I'm only on 17 books so far this year, and some of them are Graphic Novels. Best so far is A Canticle For Liebowitz-Walter M Millerr Jr.
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