From the Basement

Note: I've cross-posted this from my "regular" blog where I frequently participate in Thursday Thirteen. Come visit me there too!


When we built our house almost thirteen years ago, we had just one small daughter. At that point our house seemed quite large, especially coming from apartment living. Now we've got three ever-growing children, and the house is somehow a lot smaller. We need to create a bedroom or two in our unfinished basement space, but the problem is that we've been using it for storage for thirteen years! Even if I clean out one box every day or two, it's going to take ages to clean out the whole basement. But I guess I have to start somewhere!

Thirteen Books in the Basement
That I Need to Read and/or Give Away

1. A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley
   I think this is a Pulitzer Prize winner, so maybe I can add it to my Book Awards Reading Challenge list.


2. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
   My "classics aversion" has kept me from this one in the past. Maybe it's time?


3. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
   Ditto.


4. Three-in-One Edition (Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, An American Childhood, and The Writing Life) by Annie Dillard
   Pilgrim is another Pulitzer Prize winner.


5. Cat's Eye by Margaret Atwood
   I liked Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale so much that I've been hesitant to read any of her others for fear they'll suffer in comparison.


6. Three-in-One Edition (A Room with a View, Howards End, and Maurice) by E. M. Forster
   I've not seen the Oscar-winning movie version of A Room with a View either.


7. The Women's Room by Marilyn French
   I really ought to read this classic feminist novel, published in 1977.


8. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
   I think my mom sent me this one after my gallbladder surgery - but with a two-month-old baby, I just really didn't have the luxury of a restful recovery.


9. Conversations with Eudora Welty edited by Peggy Whitman Prenshaw
   A birthday gift from my mom in 1991 (same year as that gallbladder surgery).


10. Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell
    


11. Mr. Bridge by Evan S. Connell
    Published ten years after Mrs. Bridge.


12. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
    Yes, more "classic aversion"!


13. Life 101: Everything We Wish We Had Learned About Life in School - But Didn't by John-Roger & Peter McWilliams
    Maybe there's something here for the next time I have to give a motivational or inspirational thought at a meeting.