52 In 52
What is This?
It all started when I stumbled across Heliologue’s blog.
The idea is to read 52 books in 52 weeks. It’s really that simple. By setting the goal, I hope to encourage myself to prioritize reading more than I have recently. (And people who knew me as a child realize just how amazing it is I’m writing that statement.) A few other people, including Jason and Jodi are participating as well. If you feel like joining in, let me know and I’ll throw your name up here too.
So, without further ado, the books.
-K
Book the First - Dies the Fire
Author: S.M. Stirling
Pages: 496
Year Published: 2004
Summary: When a flash of light is spotted over Nantucket, natural laws change rendering combustion and electronics unusable, throwing humanity back to a technological level unseen since the Middle Ages. Two groups of people learn to survive in this new world, even as others begin to organize for the resurrection of a previously extinct social order - feudalism.
Book the Second - Diamonds Are Forever
Author: Ian Flemming
Pages: 240
Year Published: 1956
Summary: In his fourth mission, James Bond takes on the American mafia as he attempts to follow and disrupt a diamond smuggling operation, which runs from West Africa, through London, New York and finally Las Vegas.
Book the Third - Farthing
Author: Jo Walton
Pages: 336
Year Published: 2006
Summary: When the architect of “Peace With Honour” between the United Kingdom and Nazi Germany is murdered, Inspector Carmichael of Scotland Yard is summoned to the ancestral estate of Farthing to solve the crime. What appears to be a simple “country house” mystery rapidly develops into a political thriller more and more of the machinations behind the truce are unravelled.
Book the Fourth - The Brief History of the Dead
Author: Kevin Brockmeier
Pages: 272
Year Published: 2007
Summary: The City is the place where the dead go while they are still remembered by someone on Earth. When the City experiences a population explosion, followed by an equally rapid depopulation, its inhabitants are left wondering what has happened on Earth and what connects them to the City and each other. Meanwhile, Laura Byrd sets out from an Antarctic research station in search of help when she receives nothing but static on the radio and her supplies are running low.
Book the Fifth - An Army at Dawn
Author: Rick Atkinson
Pages: 768
Year Published: 2002
Summary: A history of the Allied armies’ invasion of North Africa and the subsequent campaign against the Germans and their infamous Afrika Korps, An Army at Dawn also tells the story of an untested and untried army coming to grips with its own inexperience from the common dogface to the highest echelons of leadership. What emerges is an army in pursuit of the Germans even as they escape destruction in Tunis and make their way to Sicily.
Book the Sixth - Into the Wild
Author: Jon Krakauer
Pages: 224
Year Published: 1997
Summary: Jon Krakauer’s account of Chris McCandless’ journey to the Alaskan wilderness and subsequent death by starvation is well-written, moving and a good read for anyone who ever felt the urge to just “get away from it all,” if only for a few minutes.
Book the Seventh - The Road
Author: Cormac McCarthy
Pages: 287
Year Published: 2006
Summary: A father and son travel down out of the mountains looking for a better chance of surviving in post-apocalyptic America. As they travel, their encounters test their will to survive and shape their relationship with each other and the world around them.
Book the Eighth - The Real Story: The Gap Into Conflict
Author: Stephen R. Donaldson
Pages: 229
Year Published: 1991
Summary: When the miscreants at Mallory’s first saw the beautiful Morn Hyland with Angus Thermopyle, they were filled with a mixture of envy and revulsion. So when Angus is arrested by Station security and the swashbuckling Nick Succorso manages to “rescue” Morn for himself, all seems to fit neatly into place. Unless, of course, one knew that wasn’t the extent of the real story.
Book the Ninth - Forbidden Knowledge: The Gap Into Vision
Author: Stephen R. Donaldson
Pages: 480
Year Published: 1992
Summary: The story continues as Morn Hyland and Nick Succorso escape ComMine station and Angus Thermopyle, having been captured by the UMCP, learns of their plans for him. Meanwhile, on the edges of human space, the Amnion, and alien race, silently proceed with their own plans for mankind.
Book the Tenth - From Russia With Love
Author: Ian Flemming
Pages: 272
Year Published: 1957
Summary: In his fifth outing, James Bond of Her Majesty’s Secret Service finds himself the target of an assassination plot undertaken by the Soviet Union’s SMERSH in an attempt to deal a blow to the western intelligence agencies.
Book the Eleventh - His Majesty’s Dragon
Author: Naomi Novik
Pages: 384
Year Published: 2006
Summary: A captured dragon egg forever changes the fortunes of William Laurence, Captain in His Majesty’s Navy. When the dragon, Temeraire, bonds himself to Laurence, they quickly find themselves drafted into the Royal Aerial Corps where a vastly different life and new adventures await.
Book the Twelfth - The Big Sleep
Author: Raymond Chandler
Pages: 234
Year Published: 1939
Summary: In Chandler’s debut novel, Phillip Marlowe, Private Investigator, is hired by General Sternwood to find out who is blackmailing his daughter. What seems to be a straightforward case becomes anything but as Marlowe rapidly finds himself drawn into a seedy underworld filled with pornography, deceit and murder.
Book the Thirteenth - Throne of Jade
Author: Naomi Novik
Pages: 432
Year Published: 2006
Summary: Picking up shortly after the end of His Majesty’s Dragon, Captain Will Laurence and his dragon, Temeraire, are confronted with a unique challenge when a Chinese delegation arrives in London and demands Temeraire be returned to the Middle Kingdom.
Book the Fourteenth - The Atrocity Archives
Author: Charles Stross
Pages: 368
Year Published: 2006
Summary: Part Lovecraft, part cyberpunk and part bureaucratic satire, The Atrocity Archives chronicles the tales of Bob Howard, math nerd, hacker and unlikely operative for The Laundry, the occult services branch of Her Majesty’s Secret Service. What begins as a test assignment to determine Howard’s skill at “operations” work rapidly evolves into an extra-dimensional rescue against a Nazi “werewolf” outfit among other things.
