Nonfiction Reading Challenge 2018

***Challenge complete. See my wrap-up post HERE.***

Host: Doing Dewey
Dates: January - December 2018

Guidelines:

• Read nonfiction.
• Set your own goals. Read as much as you want from any nonfiction genres.
• Sign up by January 15th.

Set your own goals:

• Read X nonfiction books
• Read X% nonfiction
• Read nonfiction in certain categories
• Read X books from a list, such as buzzfeed’s important nonfiction you should be reading, the winners of the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction, or something from a  Goodreads list.

⁕ I'm going with the first option here, and just reading as much nonfiction as I can. Hope to read at least four books that qualify.

See my original post about the challenge HERE.
See my challenge wrap-up post HERE.
See the challenge announcement/sign-up page HERE.
For review linkup, see the Nonfiction Friday posts HERE.


MY READING LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews/notes):

1. Balthus: Cats and Girls. Sabine Rewald (2013; art/art history; 176 pages)
2. Just Kids. Patti Smith (2010; memoir; 304 pages)

POSSIBILITIES (A) - Books I'd definitely like to read this year.

• Blue Nights. Joan Didion (autobiography/memoir)
• Books. Larry McMurtry (memoir)
• Just Kids. Patti Smith (memoir)
• The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws. Margaret Drabble (autobiography/memoir)
• South and West: From a Notebook. Joan Didion (essays, notes)
• The Year of Magical Thinking. Joan Didion (autobiography/memoir)

POSSIBILITIES (B) - Other books I'm considering; many from my TBR stacks.

• American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White, the Birth of the "It" Girl and the Crime of the Century. Paula Uruburu (history) 
• A Circle of Sisters: Alice Kipling, Georgiana Burne Jones, Agnes Poynter, and Louisa Baldwin. Judith Flanders (history)
• Clover: The Tragic Love Story of Clover and Henry Adams and Their Brilliant Life in America's Gilded Age. Otto Friedrich (biography) 
• Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader. Ann Fadiman (essays)
• A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books. Nicholas A. Basbanes (cultural history)
• The Hemingses of Monticello. Annette Gordon-Reed (history)
• Here at The New Yorker. Brendan Gill (literary history) 
• A History of Reading. Alberto Manguel (history) 
• In Cold Blood. Truman Capote (true crime) 
• The Last Pre-Raphaelite: Edward Burne-Jones and the Victorian Imagination. Fiona MacCarthy (biography, art history)
• The Life of Emily Dickinson. Richard B. Sewall (biography)
• Max Perkins: Editor of Genius. A. Scott Berg (literary history)
• The Mystery of Lewis Carroll: Discovering the Whimsical, Thoughtful, and Sometimes Lonely Man Who Created "Alice in Wonderland". Jenny Woolf (biography)
• The Sisters: Babe Mortimer Paley, Betsy Roosevelt Whitney, Minnie Astor Fosburgh: The Lives and Times of the Fabulous Cushing Sisters. David Grafton (biography, history)
• The Writing Life. Annie Dillard (autobiography/memoir)

...

2016 Nonfiction Reading Challenge

Hosted by: The Introverted Reader

Dates: January 1 - December 31, 2016

Guidelines: (quoted from challenge announcement page) "Read any non-fiction book(s), adult or young adult. That's it. You can choose anything. Memoirs? Yes. History? Yes. Travel? Yes. You get the idea? Absolutely anything that is classified as non-fiction counts for this challenge."

• Crossovers with other challenges are allowed.
• You don't need a blog to participate.
• There will be a link for reviews.
• Sign up anytime during the year.

Levels:

1. Dilettante -- Read 1-5 non-fiction books
2. Explorer -- Read 6-10
3. Seeker -- Read 11-15
4. Master -- Read 16-20 

✹ I'll be signing up at the Dilettante level again this year.

● See my original post about the challenge HERE.
● See the announcement/sign-up post HERE.
● See the page for linking reviews HERE.


MY READING LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews or discussions):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

POSSIBLE  BOOKS:

• American Eve. Paula Uruburu 
• Clover: The Tragic Love Story of Clover and Henry Adams and Their Brilliant Life in America's Gilded Age. Otto Friedrich
• Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader. Anne Fadiman 
• A Gentle Madness. Nicholas A. Basbanes 
• Here at The New Yorker. Brendan Gill 
• Hong Kong. Jan Morris 
• In Cold Blood. Truman Capote 
• Just Kids. Patti Smith 
• The Library at Night. Alberto Manguel 
• Manhattan '45. Jan Morris 
• The Origin of Humankind. Richard E. Leakey 
• The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws. Margaret Drabble 
• Pre-Raphaelites in Love. Gay Daly 
• Sargent's Daughters: The Biography of a Painting. Erica Hirshler 
• Speak, Memory. Vladimir Nabokov 
• A Splendor of Letters. Nicholas A Basbanes 
• Sylvia Beach and the Lost Generation: A History of Literary Paris in the Twenties and Thirties. Noël Riley Fitch 
• Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere. Jan Morris
• Venice. Jan (James) Morris 
• The Years with Ross. James Thurber 

Nonfiction Reading Challenge 2015

***Challenge complete. See my wrap-up post HERE.***

Hosted by: The Introverted Reader

Dates: January 1 - December 31, 2015

Guidelines: (quoted from challenge announcement page) "Read any non-fiction book(s), adult or young adult. That's it. You can choose anything. Memoirs? Yes. History? Yes. Travel? Yes. You get the idea? Absolutely anything that is classified as non-fiction counts for this challenge."

• Crossovers with other challenges are allowed.
• You don't need a blog to participate.
• There will be a link for reviews.
• Sign up anytime during the year.

Levels:

1. Dilettante -- Read 1-5 non-fiction books
2. Explorer -- Read 6-10
3. Seeker -- Read 11-15
4. Master -- Read 16-20 

✹ I'll be signing up at the Dilettante level again this year.

● See my original post about the challenge HERE.
● See the announcement/sign-up post HERE.
● See the page for linking reviews HERE.
● See my wrap-up post HERE.

MY READING LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews or discussions):

1. Last Man Standing: Tales from Tinseltown. Roger Moore
2. 
   

POSSIBILITIES: 

• 1959: The Year Everything Changed. Fred Kaplan (history)
• Books: A Memoir. Larry McMurtry (autobiography) 
• The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America. Erik Larson (history/true crime)
• A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books. Nicholas A. Basbanes (reading/book collecting)
• In Cold Blood. Truman Capote (true crime) 
• Just Kids. Patti Smith (memoir)
• The Library at Night. Alberto Manguel (reading and books)
• Manhattan '45. Jan Morris (history) 
• Old Books, Rare Friends: Two Literary Sleuths and Their Shared Passion. Madeleine B. Stern and Leona Rostenberg (book collecting) 
• The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws. Margaret Drabble (family history) 
• The Perfect Summer: England 1911, Just Before the Storm. Juliet Nicolson (history) 
• The Sisters of Sinai: How Two Lady Adventurers Discovered the Hidden Gospels. Janet Martin Soskice (history)

Nonfiction Reading Challenge 2014

Dates: 1 January - 31 December, 2014
Hosted by: The Introverted Reader

Guidelines: (quoted from challenge announcement page) "Read any non-fiction book(s), adult or young adult. That's it. You can choose anything. Memoirs? Yes. History? Yes. Travel? Yes. You get the idea? Absolutely anything that is classified as non-fiction counts for this challenge."

• Crossovers with other challenges are allowed.
• You don't need a blog to participate.
• There will be a link for reviews.
• Sign up anytime during the year.

Levels:

1. Dilettante -- Read 1-5 non-fiction books
2. Explorer -- Read 6-10
3. Seeker -- Read 11-15
4. Master -- Read 16-20 

 ** I'm signing up at the "Dilettante" level, so I'll be reading 1-5 books.

● See my original post about the challenge HERE.
● See the challenge announcement/sign-up page HERE.
~ See the review link-up page HERE.


MY READING LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

POSSIBILITIES: 

• 1959: The Year Everything Changed. Fred Kaplan (history)
• Books: A Memoir. Larry McMurtry (autobiography) 
• The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America. Erik Larson (history/true crime)
• A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books. Nicholas A. Basbanes (reading/book collecting)
• In Cold Blood. Truman Capote (true crime) 
• Just Kids. Patti Smith (memoir)
• The Library at Night. Alberto Manguel (reading and books)
• Manhattan '45. Jan Morris (history) 
• Old Books, Rare Friends: Two Literary Sleuths and Their Shared Passion. Madeleine B. Stern and Leona Rostenberg (book collecting) 
• The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws. Margaret Drabble (family history) 
• The Perfect Summer: England 1911, Just Before the Storm. Juliet Nicolson (history) 
• The Sisters of Sinai: How Two Lady Adventurers Discovered the Hidden Gospels. Janet Martin Soskice (history)

2013 Nonfiction Reading Challenge

**Challenge complete.  See my wrap-up post HERE.**

Dates: 1 January - 31 December, 2013
Hosted by: The Introverted Reader

Guidelines: (quoted from challenge announcement page) "Read any non-fiction book(s), adult or young adult. That's it. You can choose anything. Memoirs? Yes. History? Yes. Travel? Yes. You get the idea? Absolutely anything that is classified as non-fiction counts for this challenge."

Levels:

1. Dilettante -- Read 1-5 non-fiction books
2. Explorer -- Read 6-10
3. Seeker -- Read 11-15
4. Master -- Read 16-20 

** I'm signing up at the "Dilettante" level, so I'll be reading 1-5 books.

See my original post about the challenge HERE.
See my challenge wrap-up post HERE.  
See the challenge announcement/sign-up page HERE.

MY READING LIST (books read, with links to reviews):

1. Darwin's Ghosts: The Secret History of Evolution. Rebecca Stott