I love Amazon (the book meme)

From daysgoby

Total number of books owned
Approximately 2000 but they're not all mine. Some are, some are MrV's and some are books from remainder sales that MrV thought one of us would like to read.

Last book bought
Pippa Longstocking. Oh, you mean for me? Hmmm good question. I think it was "Bend the Rules Sewing" by Amy Carol, but last weekend it was my birthday and I scored a huge amount of Amazon vouchers so will be going on a bookbuying spree shortly

Last book read
I have three books on the go at present. "A Spot of Bother" by Mark Haddon (who wrote "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time)which is in the livingroom. I've only read a little of it but it looks to be a good, easy read; "Storm Front" by Jim Butcher which is in the loft/study. It is very hard to class this book. When MrV told me about it I thought it sounded a bit Douglas Adams, but having read some of it, it's not at all; and "The Story of Art" by EH Gombrich which I dip into occasionally.

Five Books that Mean a Lot to You
"And God Created the Au Pair" by Pascale Smets and Benedicte Newland. I love this book. It is a series of emails between two sisters, one in London, the other in Canada, about their children, husbands, etc etc and is a fantastic antidote to chicklit

"The Kitchen Diaries: A Year in the Kitchen" by Nigel Slater. I have a huge collection of cookbooks as I'm always on the lookout for THE cookbook, the one with mostly veggie recipes that are healthy, easy to cook, don't use a lot of weird ingredients and would appeal to a very picky four year old. OK perhaps the last bit is asking too much.

"The Story of Art" by EH Gombrich. MrV bought it for me shortly after the Count was born. We were in a little bookshop beside Wandsworth Common and I saw it. I've wanted to know more about the history of art for quite a long time, and being me, have done little about it, so MrV knowing me well bought the book. Four months in and I've reached Chapter 5...

"The Windup Bird Chronicles" by Haruki Murakami. First one of his books I read. I had never couldn't heard of him and bought it because I liked the front cover. Then once I had started reading it I stop and had to find more of his work. This was back in the 90s and there wasn't much of his stuff about. I still love his more surreal stuff and mean to host a Murakami dinner party at some point - the menu to be food mentioned in his books and accompanied by music he mentions too. Oh and the book smells fantastic.

"Charlie Brown's Super Book of Questions and Answers" by Charles M. Schulz . My aunt gave this to me for my birthday when I was about 7 or 8 and I loved it. In fact I loved it so much that when the FB was tinier than he currently is, I ordered a copy of the book off Ebay for him.

Five Books That You Just Don't Get
"Ullyses"by James Joyce. I've tried over and over and nope it just doesn't do it for me.

"Sap Rising" by AA Gill. This is probably the worst book I have ever read. I bought it because the Guardian's review was on the front cover "Do not buy this book" and I wanted to see why. I found out pretty fast why.

Shakespeare. We had to study Shakespeare at school, every year a new play apart from a few years when we did "Midsummer Night's Dream" two years in a row. There is nothing that kills a play more than a bunch of 'can't be bothered" children having to read the parts in class. Hamlet to me is a whole class of 16 year olds chanting "tobeornottobethatisthequestionwhetheritisnoblein....." you get the picture.

Chicklit. I read it but it drives me up the wall. Why do all the heroines have to be slim, beautiful but neurotic? It's junkfood for the brain really.

"Effie Briest" by Theodor Storm. Did this in German at uni and loathed it. I couldn't identify with the main protagonist and frankly after a few pages, wanted to slap her and tell her to grow up.

If you fancy doing this meme consider yourself tagged.