Zoe's 1000s Challenge

006 Special Computer Methods: Understanding Artificial Intelligence
070 News media, journalism & publishing: MWF Seeking BFF

133 Parapsychology & occultism: Ancient Greek Divination
153 Mental processes & intelligence: Predictably Irrational
155 Differential & developmental psychology: Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type
158 Applied psychology: The Power of Habit
171 Systems & Doctrines: Me to We: Finding Meaning in a Material World
177 Ethics of social relations: The Honest Truth About Dishonesty
179 Other Ethical Norms: 365 Thank-Yous

200 Religion: The Belief Instinct
221 Old Testament: The Ancient Near East Volume 1: An Anthology of Texts and Pictures
229 Apocrypha & pseudepigrapha: The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot
230 Christian theology: Mere Christianity
236 Eschatology: The Great Divorce
248 Christian experience, practice, life: The Screwtape Letters
289 Other denominations & sects: Under the Banner of Heaven
299 Other Religions: The Tao of Pooh

303 Social Processes: Fire and Ice by Michael Adams
304 Factors affecting social behaviour: Citizens of Nowhere
305 Social Groups: Nickel and Dimed
306 Culture & Institutions: Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother
307 Communities: Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization
321 Systems of Governments and States: Plato's Republic
322 Relation of State to Organized Groups: Generation Freedom
323 Civil and Political Rights: Race Against Time (Massey Lectures)
327: International Relations: The Snowden Files
330 Economics: Why Your World is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller
331 Labor economics: The XX Factor: How the Rise of Working Women Has Created a Far Less Equal World
332 Financial Economics: The Wealthy Barber
333 Land Economics: Who Turned Out the Lights?
337 International Economics: Fences and Windows
362 Social Welfare Problems & Services: Born on a Blue Day
363 Other Social Problems & Services: Voices from Chernobyl
364 Criminology: Bringing Down the House
370 Education: The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way
371 School management; special education: Three Cups of Tea
372 Elementary education: The Myth of Ability
378 Higher Education: My Freshman Year
381 Internal Commerce: New York's 50 Best Bookstores for Book Lovers
398 Folklore: The Arabian Nights, Vol. 1 (ed. Jack Zipes)

401 Philosophy & theory: How Children Learn Language
418 Standard usage; Applied linguistics: Fluent in Three Months
420 English & Old English: The Mother Tongue
423 English Dictionaries: The Professor and the Madman
428 Standard English Usage: Eats, Shoots and Leaves
438 Standard German Usage: 1001 Pitfalls in German
470 Italic; Latin: Latin Language and Latin Culture by Joseph Farrell
480 Hellenic Languages; Classical Greek: Who Killed Homer?
487 Preclassical & Postclassical Greek: The Decipherment of Linear B
492 Afro-Asiatic languages; Semitic: Empires of the Plain: Henry Rawlinson and the Lost Languages of Babylon
493 Non-Semitic Afro-Asiatic Languages: The Linguist and the Emperor

509 Historical, areas, persons treatment: Early Greek Science: Thales to Aristotle
510 Mathematics: Episodes from the Early History of Mathematics
511 General Principles: Four Colors Suffice
513 Arithmetic: Flatland
523 Specific Celestial Bodies & Phenomena: The Copernican Revolution
526 Mathematical Geography: Longitude
529 Chronology: Time in Antiquity
530 Physics: About Time
576 Genetics and Evolution: The Genius Factory

610 Medical Sciences; Medicine: I Shall Not Hate
612 Human Physiology: The Shallows
613 Promotion of Health: In Defense of Food
616 Diseases: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
618 Gynecology & other medical specialties: The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius
621 Applied Physics: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: Creating Currents of Electricity and Hope
646 Sewing, clothing, personal living: For Better: How the Surprising Science of Happy Couples Can Help Your Marriage Succeed
649 Child rearing & home care of sick: Brain Rules for Baby
658 General Management: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

728 Residential & related buildings: Ca d'Zan: Ringling's Venetian Palace
741 Drawing and Drawings: American Born Chinese
796 Athletic & outdoor sports & games: Born to Run: a Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen

809 Literary History & Criticism: The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh
813 Fiction: The Princess Bride
814 Essays: How to Be a Canadian
818 Miscellaneous Writings: 84 Charing Cross Road
822 English Drama: Twelfth Night
823 English Fiction: Rebecca
833 German Fiction: The Complete Stories of Franz Kafka
842 French Drama: Les Femmes Savantes, Les Precieuses Ridicules
843 French Fiction: Le Petit Prince
853 Italian Fiction: Alexander: Child of a Dream
863 Spanish Fiction: Luminous Cities
880 Hellenic literatures; Classical Greek: Babylon, Memphis, Persepolis: Eastern Contexts of Greek Culture
891 East Indo-European & Celtic: Crime and Punishment
892 Afro-Asiatic literatures Semitic: Dancing Arabs
894 Ural-Altaic, Paleosiberian, Dravidian: The White Castle

901 Philosophy and Theory: Dark Age Ahead
909 World history: The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity
916 Africa: The Caliph's House
917 North America: Inside the Apple
918 South America: The Lost City of Z
930 History of the Ancient World: An Introduction to the Ancient World
933 History of Ancient World; Palestine: The Israelites: An Introduction
935 History of ancient world; Mesopotamia & Iranian Plateau: Mesopotamia: Writing, Reasoning, and the Gods
937 History of Ancient World; Italy and Adjacent Territories: Annals of Imperial Rome
938 History of ancient world; Greece: The Orientalizing Revolution
939 History of ancient world; Other parts of ancient world: A History of the Ancient Near East
940 General History of Europe: Night
941 General History of Europe; British Isles: How the Irish Saved Civilization
949 General history of Europe; Other parts of Europe: John Lydus and the Roman Past
951 General History of Asia; China & Adjacent Areas: Red China Blues
953 General history of Asia; Arabian Peninsula & adjacent areas: Arabia and the Arabs
955 General history of Asia; Iran: Persepolis 2
956 General history of Asia; Middle East (Near East): The Punishment of Gaza
966 General history of Africa; West Africa & offshore islands: A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
967 General history of Africa; Central Africa & offshore islands: Facing the Lion: Growing Up Maasai on the African Savanna
971 General History of North America; Canada: Losing Confidence
976 General history of North America; South central United States: The Good Pirates of the Forgotten Bayous
977 General history of North America; North central United States: The Children's Blizzard
978 General history of North American; Western United States: The Worst Hard Time

Wow, this has made me realize how limited my reading is and how bad I am at finishing books. I have at least 25 books that fall under 938: History of Ancient World; Greece, and I haven't completed a single one.

Thanks for setting this up, Zoe! As you can tell, I'm totally hooked.

You're welcome! Credit should go to Morphidae for thinking of the idea, though. I thought it looked like fun because I love making lists of books and looking at other people's, especially when they're more interesting and obscure.

I just completed the first book that I read for the purposes of this challenge: Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis, for 230 Christian theology (and the touchstones even reloaded, so I could edit my original list!).

I was really surprised by how much I liked the book--I'm not a Christian, so I thought that the 200s would be incredibly difficult. But somehow I found it hard to put down and now want to read more books that Lewis wrote. And luckily, some of them fall into other 200 categories :). I guess I should have expected that Lewis would write good non-fiction too, but I'm still impressed that I could enjoy a book so much despite not believing a lot of what it says.

The Screwtape Letters of C. S. Lewis are fun to read, and I certainly enjoyed his space trilogy (Perelandra etc). Everyone knws about the Narnia stories.

G.K. Chesterton is another Christian I'll recommend for you, then. :) He's both intelligent and notably enjoyable, whimsical and yet brilliant (if once in a while a bit too facile).

Yup, Narnia I've read :). The Screwtape Letters is definitely near the top of my TBR list, despite the fact that I don't own it and have plenty of TBR books that I do own. I also want to read the space trilogy now, except that it unfortunately falls under 823 so won't help with this challenge. Looking through the list of C.S. Lewis' books, I've decided I should read:

248 Christian experience, practice, life: The Screwtape Letters
236 Eschatology: The Great Divorce
231 God: The Problem of Pain
242 Devotional literature: A Grief Observed
370 Education: The Abolition of Man
809 Literary history & criticism: The Discarded Image

and probably more.

Thanks for the recommendation of Chesterton, Eurydice. Is there any particular book of his I should start with?

Looking through my library for intersting titles related to C S Lewis:

408 The Importance of Language by Max Black deals with Owen Barfield and J R R Tolkien (maybe also Chesterton). Barfield was an anthroposophist and linguist and part of the Inklings group.

283 Letters to an American Lady by C S Lewis

201 The World's last night and other essays also by Lewis.

These last two only as gap fillers.

Gap fillers are important too :). It unfortunately looks like The Importance of Language is out of print, but I'll watch for it at used bookstores.

Book #2 is complete: 332 Financial Economics: The Wealthy Barber by David Chilton. It was an easy read, and probably useful.

I picked up The Great Divorce and The Abolition of Man at a used bookstore a couple of days ago. I haven't gotten around to reading them yet, but I have to say that using them for this challenge feels almost like cheating, they're so short. "Almost" being the key word--I still intend to count them.

Well, I just finished The Great Divorce for 236 Eschatology (touchstones irritatingly won't reload right now, so I can't add it to my list). I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as Mere Christianity: it was less accessible and less accepting of different viewpoints. I felt like rather than trying to convince me that he was right, Lewis was just telling me flat out that I was wrong. So the book left me with a feeling of annoyance more than anything else. On the bright side, it was short, though it still took me quite a long time to read considering its length.

I think I'll take a break from the Christianity categories for a while. At least I've made some progress.

(edit: Immediately after I posted this message, I tried editing my first post again and the touchstones did work. I still wish they had more consistency.)

Zoe, I know you're taking a break but two non-Christian books that fall into the 200s you might want to check out:

215 Science and Religion - How We Believe: The search for God in an Age of Science by Michael Shermer
231 God - God: A Biography by Jack Miles

The first can be a little philosophical/technical but was a good read on the subject, though I got the idea that while Shermer was trying to be objective he really has an axe to grind with religion which bothered me a little, but might not you.

The second is basically a character study of God done by treating the biblical stories purely as literature - no doctrine or theology allowed. I thought it was quite well done.

Thanks, I'll definitely keep those two in mind. My break may end up being shorter than I thought :)

Zoe, I am not sure whether or not any of the books will fit classifications you need, but Chesterton is well worth reading. Some of the books are marked confusingly, but check out the reviews on Heretics, and you'll see what I mean. One user very rightly tagged him among 'authors I would marry in a heartbeat'!

I just started his St. Francis of Assisi. While Christian, I'm not Catholic, but it is a brilliant, thoughtful, fascinating book, as yet. He always challenges your thinking while proving fresh, unexpected, often amusing and wise. One need not agree to enjoy and appreciate him.

C.S. Lewis was spottier, in my opinion.

Heretics falls under 824 English essays, which I haven't actually completed yet, so I'll definitely add it to my TBR list. The reviews make it sound very promising.

St. Francis of Assisi is in the same category as Mere Christianity, but if I enjoy Heretics I may pick it up anyway. I can probably let myself read beyond this challenge occasionally ;)

I finally got through Luminous Cities, which the LoC catalogue lists in 864 Spanish Essays. Is it normal for short stories to be included in essay categories? I haven't read anything in 863 Spanish Fiction either, so this book has to count for something no mattter what. For now I'm going to go with what LoC says.

I just read The Myth of Ability in 372 Elementary Education. It's a pretty quick read if you're looking for something in that category. The first part is fascinating--he argues that all students are capable of succeeding in math if you just present the material in a way they can understand, and he has lots of evidence to back up his claim--but the second part, when he actually describes the teaching methods, is pretty dry (but still very readable).

809 Literary History and Criticism: The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh. Let this be a lesson to me about paying attention to the Dewey Decimal classification when considering whether to read a book--I thought this was going to be more historical, since the back cover does claim that it's "an illuminating tale of history as it was written, stolen, lost, and... finally found", but it really is more literary criticism, and the history is pretty weak.

I'm also irritated that the default touchstone for The Buried Book without the subtitle is Some Buried Caesar. Maybe someday they'll try the novel method of matching the whole title, not just one word.

Note to self: add The Buried Book to list above when touchstones are in a better mood.

>19 _Zoe_:
Yikes. The Buried Book has been on my wishlist for quite a while now. Maybe I need to rethink that one if it's not strong on history.

These are the two specific historical complaints that I had (copied from my review). You can judge for yourself whether they're the kind of things that would bother you, or whether I'm just being overly picky:

From a historical viewpoint, I thought the author took a few too many liberties to create a vivid image of the past. At one point, he instructs the reader to "Imagine the king thinking things through after receiving this alarming letter, perhaps reclining at night on a lion-footed couch in his harem, having dismissed his wives so he could think in peace, torches flickering as he pondered the clay tablet in his hand, the broken halves of its clay casing littering the floor." It's only fifteen pages later that he reveals a critical detail: "the king faced one difficulty in studying these reports: he couldn't read. If he pondered Kudurru's alarming letter in his darkened palace at night, the tablet in his hand would have been frustratingly opaque to him." Without this much later clarification, the earlier passage is misleading at best. At worst, it's intentionally so; there's no real reason to think that the tablet itself would have been in the king's possession rather than that of his scribes, since the physical object was useless to him.

Another historical issue that I felt was treated unsatisfactorily was the king's decision about succession. Damrosch tells us that he "made a compromise decision" and that it "proved disastrous. {He} tried to... give the kingdom to his preferred son Ashurbanipal and yet pacify Shamash-shumu-ukin by making him a subsidiary king in Babylon. Sending him south would keep him away from his half brother and ease tensions between them, and giving Babylonia its own king might soften the resentment the southerns continued to feel". While Damrosch goes on to say that the decision was "problematic" and "unheard-of" and "must have seemed dubious", he never manages to show the reader what was so disastrous about it. He says that Ashurbanipal ruled without problem for sixteen years, after which his half-brother did rebel, but that Ashurbanipal "finally subdued Babylon" after about five years, went on in the next two years to destroy the other nation that had participated in the rebellion, and then continued to rule for many more years: his reign lasted forty years in all. That's not quite what I would consider a disaster. It was only after Ashurbanipal's death that the "seriously overextended" Assyrian empire collapsed, which suggests that it was the sheer size of the empire, rather than the specific succession decision, that was the problem. Even before Ashurbanipal's reign, after all, there was resentment in Babylonia.

I may be being too harsh on the book because since I'm not particularly interested in literary criticism, all my hopes were resting on the history. I wouldn't actively discourage you from reading it, but I certainly wouldn't encourage you to move it up the list either. It had actually been on my wishlist for quite a while too.

Edited to remove false touchstone. Braces now represent square brackets.

Oh, and reading the Amazon reviews reminded me of another criticism from the first half of the book that I had forgotten: "its well-meaning political correctness: Damrosch can sometimes seem as condescending to the narrow-minded Victorians as they so often were to "Orientals."" (Washington Post)

Interesting things to think about...this was on my TBR list, too (though, admittedly, not very high up). I do dig literary criticisms, but I also thought this was more about this history of the epic, though not in the same way you did. I thought it was more about the archaeology and translation of it.

If you like literary criticism, you'll probably enjoy it. The first half is about archaeology, though not so much about translation, and even the archaeology sometimes reads like literary criticism. Damrosch likes to point out how the Victorian archaeologists often had "no sense of the irony of {their} own language", and a typical paragraph is as follows:

"As early as the preface of his book, Rassam {an archaeologist} makes his cultural agenda clear: '...to show how easy it is to get on with all the inhabitants of Biblical lands....' He returns to this theme in summing up his experiences at the book's end: (10 line quote, including "the Ottomans are good-natured, courteous, and obliging"). The body of Rassam's book actually describes as many obstructions as kindnesses from the Ottoman officials, who stymied him at several points much as they did George Smith. Yet Rassam's insistence on the officials' 'unremitting kindness' underscores his commitment to countering the common Victorian hostility toward the benighted denizens of the mysterious Orient."

880 Hellenic literatures; Classical Greek: Babylon, Memphis, Persepolis: Eastern Contexts of Greek Culture

It's sad that I haven't completed more books in the 880s. I've read plenty of stuff in the category, just not complete books. Blah.

916 Africa (Geography & Travel): The Caliph's House. I really enjoyed this one, about a man who decided to pack up and move to Morocco with his family.

938 History of ancient world; Greece: The Orientalizing Revolution. I own so many books in this category, it's about time I actually completed one!

509 Historical, areas, persons treatment: Early Greek Science: Thales to Aristotle

I found this a bit dry, especially the parts that covered areas I was already pretty familiar with, but it was still a worthwhile read.

I just read Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type in 155 Differential & developmental psychology. This was an important one for me, since it was my first in the 100s! Now I just need a 600 to have read one in each hundreds category. I recently bought a couple of Oliver Sacks books that fall under 616 Diseases, so I should be able to get there soon... if only I could find the time!

The most significant book I have in the 600 to 609 catgory is: Operating manual for Spaceship Earth by R Buckminster Fuller. It is actually 601.

Wow, that book has some impressively high ratings. Thanks for the suggestion!

Just now got your message on the 888 board about this challenge. It sounds kind of overwhelming! I'll be looking in to see how everyone's doing before I decide to jump in. It looks like you're making good progress!

Thanks! I don't know if I'd quite call it *good* progress, but progress anyway!

I just finished Empires of the Plain: Henry Rawlinson and the Lost Languages of Babylon for 492 Afro-Asiatic languages; Semitic. This is what I wanted when I read The Buried Book. Of course, it wasn't flawless; there was sometimes too much detail (precise dates, addresses, etc.), it dragged a bit toward the end, and Rawlinson seemed almost too perfect. Still, I found this book both more entertaining and more informative than The Buried Book. I really appreciated the fact that the author didn't feel the need to point out her moral superiority to the nineteenth-century British in every other sentence.

I'm going to try to check this book out of the library. (Empires of the Plain.

I hope you enjoy it! Let me know what you think.

171 Systems and Doctrines: Me to We: Finding Meaning in a Material World

I bought this book after hearing Marc Kielburger speak, and I enjoyed it. I felt like a had to be in a certain (positive) frame of mind to read it, so it took me a while to get through, but I'm glad I read in in the end. I particularly liked the stories about various people's personal experiences.

I'm surprised that I ended up reading two 100s this year without even trying.

Hi, Zoe,
I was wondering if you have a suggestion for me. I read a book this year called Momsense by Vicki Marsh Kent. This book is a collection of newspaper articles that she wrote about childrearing and family life -- about her family in particular. This was published as a fundraiser for homeless children. Well, after I read it, I passed it along and I do not have the DD#. I have tried to google her and the book but no luck. The title goes with a more recent different book. How could I find out where to place this book? Since I have read so few books, I do not want to leave this one out. Also, if a book is published without a DD#, do we just try to figure out where to put it? I also have a bibliography of books published a particular publisher, no DD#.

Thanks in advance for any help that you can give me. :)
--BJ

Eee, I don't know what to do when Google fails. Searching for that book, though, it looks like the author may be Vicki Marsh Kabat rather than Kent--at least, it would be a pretty strange coincidence if two separate people with such similar names wrote books called Momsense. That doesn't help with the DD#, though.

I know there are people on this site who could tell you how to classify it yourself, but unfortunately I'm not one of them :(. Maybe try the librarians group?

>39 billiejean:
There's a library in Waco, Texas using the DD# 306.874 for that book. Found it searching Worldcat.

I'm not really familiar with WorldCat--how did you find the DD#? I looked at the WorldCat listing for the book, but didn't see it there. Did you then go to the library's own catalogue? Or (equally likely) am I just blind?

I went to the library's catalog. That particular library doesn't make its MARC display available, but I did double check that 306 was an appropriate DD category.

Zoe and Fleela!!
Thank you so much!! How could I get the name of the author wrong? Yikes. Now that I see it, I do recognize it. Thanks for the DD#, too. Y'all are too wonderful. :)
--BJ

248 Christian experience, practice, life: The Screwtape Letters. I'm always drawn to C.S. Lewis because his books are both famous and short, and because I've enjoyed some of his work. I didn't really enjoy this one, though. At least I'm still making some progress in the 200s.

576 Genetics and Evolution: The Genius Factory, a non-fiction account of one man's attempt to improve the world by starting a sperm bank whose donors were all Nobel prize winners. It looks like this book is split about 50/50 between this category and 362 Social Welfare Problems & Services, but I'm counting it here since I've already read a book in the other category. A lot of the book does deal just with children and mothers searching for donor fathers, but that's the part that I was less interested in anyway.

Apparently New York's 50 Best Bookstores for Book Lovers falls under 381: Internal Commerce. This feels a bit like cheating because the book is so short and not particularly edifying, but hey, it's a book.

#47 Not cheating in my book. That isn't the classification I would have expected - I was thinking of something tied in to the "book" aspect, not the "store" aspect, but I guess it makes sense.

I was just going to ask if you had a recap someplace, but then found it in post #1. Impressive!

*slinks off with arms curled protectively, soothingly, around her entire Dewey reading list of 20 books*

Hey, you're progressing faster than I am! I just recorded everything I can remember reading in my life.

Still, an impressive feat. I wish I could remember that many different books! (Maybe I should have said "another impressive feat"). How many does it add up to?

46: How did you like The Genius Factory? I thought it was fascinating, partly because it's interesting to read about weird things people do and partly because the sperm bank clearly didn't work out the way the founder wanted (which seemed like a really good thing).

I agree, the whole concept was fascinating. I especially liked the parts about the ideas behind the sperm bank; I always enjoy reading about the various debates about intelligence (both The Mismeasure of Man and The Bell Curve are on my TBR list). Once it turned out that it hadn't really worked out, though, I found it less interesting--general human-interest stories aren't really my thing, so the stories of children searching for their parents weren't as exciting for me. I did love the story of Joy and Donor White, though.

I just realized I forgot to list my last book here: Race Against Time (Massey Lectures) in 323 Civil and Political Rights. Copying my review from my other threads....

This is a powerful account of how the world is failing to accomplish the Millennium Development Goals, which aimed to reduce poverty, hunger, AIDS, etc. by a certain amount by 2015. This book really made me want to do something about it, which I think is the ultimate sign of success. I'd recommend this book to anyone.

I have to admit that the fourth chapter dragged a bit--Lewis didn't really convince me that complete equality for women was as important as preventing starvation and death by disease, though he claimed repeatedly that without equality it wouldn't be possible to achieve the rest of the goals--but overall, the book was very readable and the message was certainly worth it.

Apparently, despite being Canadian, I hadn't yet read any books in 971: General History of North America; Canada. That's now been rectified with Losing Confidence: Power, Politics, and the Crisis in Canadian Democracy by Elizabeth May. As the title suggests, it's more about politics than history. May is the leader of the Canadian Green Party.

I think this was a worthwhile read, though it didn't really tell me much that I didn't already know. May raises a lot of important issues and revived the anger that I feel at our whole political system, but she was a bit disappointing when it came to saying what individuals could actually do about it. Basically, she told us what reforms were needed in the system, but she didn't have much to offer about how we could bring about those reforms.

Still, the book was very readable, and I like to read first-hand politicians' ideas about politics.

It's also short, so it would be an easy one for anyone else looking to fill this category.

I just read Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time in 526: Mathematical Geography. I had actually started this book in April, after reading another book by the same author, but put it down because I didn't find the introduction particularly gripping. I picked it up again because I've recently taken up geocaching, and thought it would be interesting to find out about the history of determining where we are on the earth. And I did find that it got a lot more interesting once it really got going.

As the subtitle suggests, this is the story of the man, John Harrison, who came up with a workable method for finding longitude while at sea. He did this by means of a clock, while many other people favoured an astronomical solution, and there's some interesting description of the conflict between the two groups, which was probably increased by the fact that there was a huge monetary prize associated with finding a solution. I enjoyed reading about the eighteenth-century scientific community.

I would have enjoyed reading a bit more about the actual science, too. This is a pretty light and quick read--actually a bit too light for my liking. Sobel mentions various improvements that increased the accuracy of clocks, but I felt like most of the descriptions of the inner workings of clocks were a bit too vague to really give me an understanding of what goes on in there. For example, we learn that "the grasshopper escapement--the part that counted the heartbeats of the clock's pacemaker--took its name from the motion of its crisscrossed components. These kicked like the hind legs of a leaping insect, quietly and without the friction that had bedeviled existing escapement designs." This is all that's said about it, so it wasn't at all clear to me how exactly an escapement worked, and I would have liked to know.

Still, this was a fairly informative book, and probably worth reading, even if it's not anything outstanding. A lot of people will probably be grateful for the fact that Sobel doesn't go into more scientific detail.

That one is on my tbr list as well, actually. That and Galileo's Daughter, which is also by the same author.

I have Galileo's Daughter on my TBR list as well :)

For 330 Economics, I just finished Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller: Oil and the End of Globalization. This was definitely an interesting read, and I found it very accessible. Rubin manages to maintain a conversational tone without sounding condescending. I appreciated the fact that while some parts of the book were disturbing (like the description of how the car companies deliberately destroyed public transit), there's a lot of optimism here too. There are aspects of Rubin's predicted future that certainly seem like an improvement over the present, like an end to long commutes and a transition to locally-produced food. I would actually have liked to see more of his longer-term vision of the future world; while the economics of why our world will get smaller are certainly worth understanding, I think I'm even more interested in the "what next?" aspect. After finding out the economic facts from Rubin, I'm hoping that he or someone else will write a more speculative book that goes into even more depth about the implications for our everyday lives.

58>

After finding out the economic facts from Rubin, I'm hoping that he or someone else will write a more speculative book that goes into even more depth about the implications for our everyday lives.

You might want to request $20 Per Gallon from the current batch of ER books, then, if you haven't already.

Thanks for the suggestion! That's exactly what I was looking for; I'll probably end up reading it even if I don't get it from ER. I had mostly given up looking at the ER listings because of the limited Canadian offerings, but maybe I should start paying more attention.

Two more:

The Good Pirates of the Forgotten Bayous: Fighting to Save a Way of Life in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina in 976: General history of North America; South central United States. This is a very interesting account of some of the people who stayed behind during Hurricane Katrina and how they managed to survive, both during and after the storm. Many of the stories are amazing, or amazingly sad, or both. My only complaint is that there were sometimes too many descriptions of boats for my liking and comprehension (which reminds me of why I'm not devoting much energy to the LC Classification Challenge!)

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier in 966 General history of Africa; West Africa & offshore islands. I just finished this book within the hour and need a bit of time to let it sink in. It's not at all the kind of thing I usually read--too depressing, especially at first when he was just roaming around the country trying to survive. I actually liked it more once he became a soldier, which is probably the wrong attitude to have. Anyway, I think this was a worthwhile read; it made me want to find out more about what went on in Sierra Leone. Despite the fact that this is a memoir and the author was young at the time, I would have liked to know more about the politics behind everything. Pretty much all we learn is that the rebels, while supposedly fighting for freedom, murdered civilians in horrible ways, and it made me wonder how a situation like that could come to be.

I was thinking that I was almost done with the 900 divisions--only 98x (South America), 99x (Australia, Arctic, or extraterrestrial worlds)... and 92x, which is an optional location for biographies. Optional? Has anyone read any books in these categories?

62>

I've read Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China for 92x (920, to be exact). (AIUI 920 and 929 are still used, but 921-928 are no longer used.) And I have books TBR for 982 and 999. I'm still looking for something in the 96x division, hopefully something a little less depressing than your option.

>62 _Zoe_::
The only 98x I've read is an archaeology book that probably wouldn't be of interest, but for 99x I've read Robert Hughes' The Fatal Shore and Greg Dening's Mr. Bligh's Bad Language, both of which are quite readable, although the former can be a bit grim and the latter is rather irritatingly postmodern at times.

It turned out I had read a 921 for college, Ernie Pyle's War. It was a biography of a WWII war correspondent and not something I would have read on my own. I managed to finish it, which is saying something when it comes to college reading, but I can't remember it well enough to recommend it.

I do however have a promising book lined up for 920 (which seems to still be in use). It's Foreskin's Lament, a promising memoir about growing up in a disfunctional ultra-Jewish family. I've been hearing clips of it on This American Life and what I've heard is something of a tragic comedy.

Thanks for all the suggestions. Foreskin's Lament sounded familiar, and when I was trying to figure out why, I realized my aunt had catalogued it. I think she may have recommended it before.

I just had a very pleasant surprise--I had somehow overlooked the fact that The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: Creating Currents of Electricity and Hope falls under 621 Applied Physics. I read this book last week, and loved it--and now there's the added bonus that I've finally read a book from each of the ten classes!

there's the added bonus that I've finally read a book from each of the ten classes!

Congrats! Hooray for milestones!

yay! and that looks like a really fantastic story - the guy was interviewed on The Daily Show and it just sounded amazing. how was the book?

Thanks!

I really liked the book. There was one point where I sort of felt like it had lost its focus, but overall I was very satisfied. A lot of the book is focused on his life before the windmill, but I didn't think that was a problem.

Congratulations on the milestone! (they seem to be few and far between on this challenge, don't they?)

Cool. I'm looking forward to it - I happened to just receive it as an early birthday present!

they seem to be few and far between on this challenge, don't they?

I know, this challenge is just too hard! ;). I think I've only read 9 challenge books this year. Or maybe we just need more members....

>71 GoofyOcean110: That's convenient! I hope you like it too.

#72 Not hard, just long. I'm loving this challenge.

72>

Part of the problem with milestones, at least for me, is that the divisions get fine-grained enough that almost all of the classes have one that's just really tough (and the same applies for sections within divisions). I'm getting a fair number of sections; I just can't seem to string them together into a milestone.

>73 sjmccreary: Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm loving it too!

>74 lorax: That's true. There have been a few occasions when I thought I was close, and then just didn't have any luck with the remaining couple of categories.

Of course, I also haven't really been working toward milestones; I still have enough categories to go that I'm mostly just picking up any books outside of my normal reading and hoping that they fit somewhere.

I'm totally working towards milestones, well personal milestones. I'm trying to even out the reading I do across classes so that I don't get stuck with all of the dog sections at the end. I'd just give up if suddenly I finished everything but the 000's and 400's.

I was initially trying to even out my reading, but I think my tastes are going to continue changing over the course of my life, so I might as well try to read what I want when I want to. Also, I've just had enough of the 200s for now.

The thing is, one of the classes I thought was going to be a thorn in my side turned out to be pretty exciting. After reading that Bertrand Russell book I've been chomping at the bit to read philosophy. I think it appeals to my argumentative nature since I usually disagree with about half of the content of each philosophy book I've picked up. Except Russell. He's my darling. And he's written books in at least three more classes. It's like he was trying to match Asimov in diversity of writing but got distracted by the bomb and stopped.

I've actually been pretty lucky finding books in the dog classes so far, but it will probably get harder.

333 Land Economics: Who Turned Out the Lights?. This is a very easy and accessible read for those who many not think that Land Economics is the most appealing category. I received this from ER, so I include my review below:

This is a basic introduction to the energy crisis, written in an accessible and humorous style. I was initially concerned that the pop-culture references would be a bit too much (both Homer Simpson and Paris Hilton make appearances on the first page), but in the end I actually enjoyed some of them.

The goal of the book is to present possible solutions to America's energy problems in an unbiased way. The pros and cons of each solution (more nuclear power, increased oil drilling, a tax on carbon emissions, etc.) are explained, and the authors try to avoid making judgements about what's best, leaving it for the reader to make up her own mind.

I do think that they succeed in explaining the issues clearly, though ultimately, I can't really say that I learned very much from this book. I suspect that, like me, many of the people who would be inclined to read something like this are already reasonably well-informed.

Still, I think this is a good introduction to the topic. Perhaps the highest indication of its success is the fact that I'm considering reading the authors' previous book, Where Does the Money Go?, about the federal budget crisis. As a Canadian who just recently moved to the United States, that's something that I really know nothing about--making me fit perfectly into the target audience.

So, in brief, Who Turned Out the Lights? is a good introductory book, very accessible and easy to read, but not necessarily for those who are already familiar with the topic.

796 Athletic & outdoor sports & games: Born to Run: a Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen.

I'm glad to have read another 700s category just by chance. If anyone is looking for a 796, I'd definitely recommend this one; it's a quick and easy read while also being interesting and informative.

Here's my longer review from my 75 Book Challenge thread:

I'm not a runner, but the description of this book intrigued me. It's just fun to read about travels to exotic locations in search of isolated peoples who are capable of incredible physical feats. My complete inability to run probably made the whole thing even more awe-inspiring to me; though I'd like to, I can't really imagine myself running a hundred-mile race.

Other highlights of the book included a discussion of how running shoes are actually bad for our feet (one study showed that runners wearing shoes that cost $95 or more had more than twice as many injuries as those whose shoes cost less than $40), because it's pretty shocking that an enormous and profitable industry can be based entirely on false premises.

And there was a fascinating section on the role running played in human evolution, including ideas about why homo sapiens survived when the stronger, bigger-brained Neanderthals disappeared.

Basically, there's probably something for everyone here. While I did feel that the book dragged slightly with the profiles of individual runners near the middle, in general I found that the interesting subject-matter and casual writing style kept me turning the pages quickly. I've come away from the book with a sense that I've learned a lot and with a desire to take up running myself (though I'm not particularly optimistic about my chances of success there!). I'm wavering between 4 and 4.5 stars.

I don't know about the running shoe statistic. I hurt myself on an elliptical in cheap shoes. They just failed at providing any cushion or support leaving my feet vulnerable. I got a nicer pair and it's been worlds better. I suspect the increased injuries may be from the fact that people that run a lot are more prone to running related injury, but also to having the right shoes. Casual runners are less likely to spend much money on good shoes but they aren't putting their feet through as much either.

I hope that the study you reference (one study showed that runners wearing shoes that cost $95 or more had more than twice as many injuries as those whose shoes cost less than $40) controlled for time spent running!

The sample was a group of runners, not random people off the street. There was also plenty of other supporting evidence for the claim, like the observations of a college track coach who switched the shoes of his whole team. To use your own frequent phrasing, lorax, I'm not quite as much of an idiot as you may think.

I'm not sure how the elliptical machine compares to actual running, but the whole point of the book is that people who run a lot don't have to be getting injured all the time.

If you're interested, this seems like a worthwhile article, though I only read parts of it.

I've heard about the claims that running barefoot are better for the feet than wearing shoes - and that barefoot running is becoming more popular. I'm intrigued, but skeptical. I went barefoot at every opportunity as a child, and even into adulthood. Now that I've reached middle age, I find that I need the support of shoes if I'm going to be on my feet for more than the time it takes to fix dinner and clean up. Any longer and my feet definitely feel the strain.

I've already got this book on my wishlist for this section, but I truthfully wasn't very excited about it. Now, I'm looking forward to it. Thanks for the great review, Zoe.

I wasn't saying you're an idiot, just that the people who conducted the study may have been. ;) I'm sorry that I offended you.

>85 sjmccreary: I think a lot of it depends on what you're accustomed to. Part of the argument against shoes is that all the extra support weakens the muscles in your foot, so after years of weakening the muscles it wouldn't be possible to switch suddenly and fully to bare feet.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the book as much as I did.

>86 lorax: No worries :). I tend to react a bit too strongly to suggestions that I may be overly gullible, since it's a characteristic that I particularly dislike.

#84 Interesting article - I'd like to learn more.

85 I've heard about barefoot running too, and it sounds interesting, but I think it's also a very specific sort of running--you don't do it on concrete or asphalt is what I've heard. But most people probably don't have a good unpaved places to go running, and I'd be very reluctant to even walk just any trail barefoot, I'd be afraid of stepping on something sharp or stinky...or sharp and stinky.

Amazingly there seems to be a compromise between barefoot running and expensive running shoes. It's an interesting idea, but I'd be reluctant to spent so much money on a shoe when I have no idea if it would work for me. They're pretty cool looking though.

83 It's not the same, it doesn't have the impact issues you get with running, which really means I shouldn't have gotten hurt. My toes would actually go numb with those shoes because even with the reduced impact there was still too much pressure on the ball of my foot. It was pretty awful.

When I went to replace my un-cushioned shoes I didn't automatically decide to get expensive ones. I went to a couple shoe stores and tried on "cheap" running shoes, but they didn't feel any better than the ones I needed to replace. The right pair of shoes made me feel like I was walking on air and more importantly lessened the severity of my foot's impact. If I found cheap shoes that did that, I'd be happy, maybe those folks did. But around here it seems like cheap running shoes only look like running shoes, they don't act like running shoes.

Who knew running would be such a hot topic in the book group?

It's an interesting idea, but I'd be reluctant to spent so much money on a shoe when I have no idea if it would work for me.

Yeah, I'd be more interested in one that was a bit more like a shoe but still tried to get some of the barefoot benefits, like this. It seems inexpensive enough and normal enough that I could pretty much justify buying it as a regular shoe.

The right pair of shoes made me feel like I was walking on air and more importantly lessened the severity of my foot's impact.

It's interesting, because the article I just read cited one study that found exactly the opposite of this: when you feel that your foot is cushioned, it actually leads you to press down harder. I wonder whether this is about different activities (higher-impact running vs. lower-impact elliptical) or just different people.

Who knew running would be such a hot topic in the book group?

Tell me about it! I can't believe I'm posting this at 1:30 in the morning on a weekday.

That's a neat looking shoe, I like the idea of the greater flexibility in the sole. It reminds me a bit of jazz sneakers, but it takes the idea further.

371 School management; special education: Three Cups of Tea. I'm sure everyone has heard of this book already: unsuccessful mountain climber is taken in by a tiny village in northern Pakistan, and promises to return to build them a school. It's an easy read, while also being interesting and informative (or at least it was for me, since I didn't know much about the region beforehand). I'd recommend it if you're looking to fill 371.

I've fallen behind here. I recently read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks for 616 Diseases, and Facing the Lion: Growing Up Maasai on the African Savanna for 967 General history of Africa; Central Africa & offshore islands. Interesting that there isn't a separate category for East Africa. Anyway, both books are readable and interesting; Facing the Lion is extremely short but still a worthwhile and informative read.

I just finished The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot for 229: Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha. It's not the greatest book I've ever read (it was somewhat repetitive), but it does contain a fair bit of interesting information and is relatively short. Perhaps most importantly, I found it unoffensive as a non-Christian; it's focused on the historical reality behind the religion rather than on promoting Christianity as the truth.

289 Other denominations & sects: Under the Banner of Heaven. I picked this one up for a TIOLI challenge and because I had enjoyed another book by Krakauer earlier this year, and I'm so glad I decided to read it. There was a great discussion about it in the 75 Book Challenge group that really added to the whole reading experience, giving me a lot to think about and making me read the book more critically. This led me to write a fairly long review.

In short, Krakauer is looking here at the connection between violence and religion, particularly Fundamentalist LDS. He combines discussions of particular crimes with a general history of Mormonism (though not an unbiased one). It's a very thought-provoking book, and certainly one that can be read and enjoyed by the non-religious.

I'm impressed that I managed to read two 200 books in a row.

Both of those 200s sound interesting!

Yup, I'm feeling unusually optimistic about the 200s right now!

I happened to read a book for 529 Chronology: Time in Antiquity. It's short and readable if anyone is looking for something in this category.

Copying my comments from my 75 Book Challenge thread:

This is a very short book dealing with topics like calendars and sundials. The general reference to "antiquity" in the title is a bit misleading; this is really a book about Greece and Rome, with the Near East referred to only when relevant for the classical world rather than treated in its own right. So that was a bit disappointing, but there's still a lot of useful information here. The writing is generally quite accessible; I found it particularly helpful that he tended to explain calculations in parentheses, which made processing a lot quicker: "...we find that eight solar years amount to 2,922 days (365 1/4 x 8)", for example. I did have a bit of trouble following some of his discussion about sundials, though. Hannah has written another entire book treating calendars in particular, and I think that probably accounts for why I found the calendar section better than the sundial section.

Overall, I can't say I loved this book, but I found it worth reading. And I'm not aware of other similar books dealing with the same topic, so if you're interested in time in antiquity, this is probably the place to start.

A couple of days ago I finished Mesopotamia: Writing, Reasoning, and the Gods for 935 History of ancient world; Mesopotamia & Iranian Plateau. I enjoyed it and would recommend it for anyone interested in the subject, but I'm not sure it would be the best book to pick up if you're just trying to fill the category.

I'm now halfway done with the 930s, which I'm quite happy about. Now I just need ancient Egypt, China, India, northwestern Europe, and other. I'd really like to get the work details back, because it seems that I've already read a book in the Other category--A History of the Ancient Near East--but I would have expected that to fall under Mesopotamia/Iranian Plateau. I guess there are some other areas covered briefly, but I'm going to check various library listings before counting it anyway.

I'm also hoping to make progress in the 970s this year; a couple of books I'd like to read are 1491 and 1776.

Hmm. The NYPL lists it under 939, so I guess I'll go with that. I'm not sure how I missed it when I read the book originally, but oh well. That makes six of the 930s done :)

I'm a bit behind in updating my list, but here are some books I need to add, most of which I had read in the past and just not noticed should be counted. Here are various updates to be made:

977 General history of North America; North central United States: The Children's Blizzard (actually read this week)
304 Factors affecting social behavior: Citizens of Nowhere
153 Mental processes & intelligence: Predictably Irrational
Reconsider where Voices from Chernobyl goes
Reconsider Flatland
818 Miscellaneous writings: 84, Charing Cross Road
917 North America: Inside the Apple

Also, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly is apparently listed under 782. I'm not currently planning to count picture books, but I'll note it here anyway in case I change my mind in the future.

Maybe the music section's a stretch but I expect most of my 700's to be picture heavy. All the best art books are.

I've been putting off updating this because I really mean to start a new thread, but I'll list a few additions anyway:

179 Other Ethical Norms: 365 Thank-Yous. I feel a bit guilty about listing this one because it's such a light read, but it is classed in that category. Entirely average "how I changed my life" book.

200 Religion: The Belief Instinct--fascinating concept (cognitive science explanation of religion), but a bit lacking in delivery; I wrote a review.

610 Medical Sciences; Medicine: I Shall Not Hate. This is a sort of guilty count too, because this memoir of a Palestinian doctor is really more about Palestine than about medicine. Good read, though.

977 General history of North America; North central United States: The Children's Blizzard. Quick and interesting read, if a bit too imaginative for non-fiction.

I see from my last post that there are a few other books that I failed to add before, but I'll have to come back to those ones.

This may be an obvious question, but I didn't see it addressed in your review; given that The Belief Instinct posits an evolutionary explanation for belief in deities, I'll assume that the tone is at least not overtly theist (that it doesn't assume those beliefs are actually true?)

>105 lorax: Nope, not theist at all. It's certainly a safe bet for anyone wanting non-religious books in the 200s.

I've finally gone back and updated my thread, mostly. I still need to re-check Voices from Chernobyl and Flatland. Now that we finally have the Dewey information back in work details, I should be much more enthusiastic about keeping this thread up to date.

I noticed that Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother counts for 306. I'd definitely recommend this book; I found it fascinating and thought-provoking and it's also a very fast read.

I meant to say, the United States history categories confuse me. Looking at a map never seems to be enough to figure out whether a given region is considered "western" or "north central" or whatever. I've going with the Dewey consensus in listing The Children's Blizzard as 977 and The Worst Hard Time as 978.

I have Worst Hard Time as 978 as well.

I updated my list a while ago, but realized I didn't actually post about the new additions. As far as I can recall, they were:

612 Human Physiology: The Shallows
613 Promotion of Health: In Defense of Food
322 Relation of State to Organized Groups: Generation Freedom
133 Parapsychology & occultism: Ancient Greek Divination

I think I commented about some of them on the wiki, too. I really enjoyed Ancient Greek Divination, though it might depend how interested you are in the subject. In Defense of Food was quick and well-written, on the whole. Generation Freedom was short, and I'd generally have said it was a waste of time, but it does fill this category. The Shallows deals with a thought-provoking issue but is poorly argued.

Oh, and I think I counted 90 categories done. It would be nice to get to 100 by the end of the year, but I think that's almost certainly too ambitious.

We miss you _Zoe_! You must have read something for this challenge in the past year; maybe I'll just need to go find your thread in the 75 Challenge.

Oh, you're right, it's been ages since I posted here! I should be able to add a couple of books, anyway. I really appreciate it that you stopped by, and I'd certainly be happy to see you in my 75 thread as well :)

I'm going to try to list books by year; I've been updating my initial list periodically but not posting about it.

2012
177 Ethics of social relations: The Honest Truth About Dishonesty (quick, readable, relatively informative, but not my favourite of Ariely's books)
307 Communities: Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization (I found this super interesting for its application of research in geography etc. to ancient history, but I suspect that it may not have broad appeal)
649 Child rearing & home care of sick: Brain Rules for Baby (interesting stuff)
918 South America: The Lost City of Z (very readable, but I personally didn't find it particularly memorable)
953 General history of Asia; Arabian Peninsula & adjacent areas: Arabia and the Arabs (good combination of scholarship and accessibility)

2013
070 News media, journalism & publishing: MWF Seeking BFF
370 Education: The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way
401 Philosophy & theory: How Children Learn Language (very interesting, quick, readable)
618 Gynecology & other medical specialties: The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius (highly recommended)
658 General Management: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead (I enjoyed this one)
646 Sewing, clothing, personal living: For Better: How the Surprising Science of Happy Couples Can Help Your Marriage Succeed (very quick and readable, if overly agenda-driven at times)
949 General history of Europe; Other parts of Europe: John Lydus and the Roman Past (I suspect that my enjoyment of this may have been based on my specific interest in the topic; I'm not sure it would have wide appeal)

Surprising progress in the 600s recently, especially considering that I hadn't read a single book in that category when I started this challenge.

ETA: As I worked backwards it turned out I had actually read a different 658 in 2012, but Lean In is better, so I'm sticking with that.

Welcome back, _Zoe_! You have some interesting-looking books there.

"Sewing, clothing, personal living": what a very odd set of things to put together.

Thanks, lorax!

I just finished another book, in 401 Philosophy & theory: How Children Learn Language. I really enjoyed the combination of serious studies with a very accessible writing style.

So what did you think of Lean In? I have a visceral allergy to both self-help and business books, which has made me highly skeptical of it, but perhaps I'm not giving it a fair shake.

I enjoyed it. I had no particular interest in the business elements, but a lot of the points that she made could be applied more broadly, like in academia. I picked it up initially because of a quote that I saw on Twitter, and that was the first I'd heard of it, so I didn't have a real sense of all the controversies going in. But I found the message useful; I do think I need to put myself forward more in my professional life. I'm not sure how it would work for you if you're opposed to self-help books in principle, though; I personally have nothing against them as long as they have some real basis, either in studies or in personal experience.

Some more surprising progress lately:

907 Education, research, related topics: Historiography: An Introduction (readable, but not super-exciting)

361 General social problems (MDS: Charitable): Yes You Can! Your Guide to Becoming an Activist. Not recommended. This was an ER book that took me several years to get through.

365 Penal & related institutions: Escape from Camp 14. Interesting and quick read about the North Korean labour camps; definitely recommended if you're looking for something in this category.

438 Standard German usage: Barron's 1001 Pitfalls in German. This was probably one of the most satisfying categories I've completed, because it's in keeping with my general idea of the challenge as representing a thorough (nineteenth-century) education. So, it's a German grammar book—more readable than most, but still a grammar book. If you have a bit of background in German, I'd recommend it, but I can't imagine it has general appeal.

Note to self: I still need to update the original message to add these in.

I'm not really sure why I read so many more new categories than usual in the past couple of months. Random luck, I guess.

I'm considering switching to the Melville Decimal System names for categories, since whatever old official version of Dewey is listed on wikipedia seems to be out of date, or something. I don't really know the details of the system, but as far as I know the current Dewey labels are copyrighted, and the crowd-sourced MDS seems to be a pretty good substitute.

At that point I'd probably just start a whole new thread, though, and I'm not up for that quite yet.

At some future point I'd also like to go back and add in works that I've read in the Greek and Latin literature categories. In a past life I was really anal and didn't count a work as read if I hadn't read the whole book, including endnotes and everything. This meant that I didn't count classical texts read in editions with extensive commentary, because I wouldn't read the whole commentary. But I've decided not to be so picky; I've read the whole Antigone in Greek, for example, so it seems silly to have the Greek drama category sitting empty. (Another folly of my youth: I refused to read things in translation if I thought I could read them in the original eventually, so I'm actually sadly ignorant of much Greek and Latin literature despite having a master's in Classics.)

Ooh, I also seem to have passed 100 different sections read at some point this year.

Yay for you!

That is a really hardcore stance on notes. I almost never read endnotes. I hate flipping back and forth. If only they were footnotes...

>121 fundevogel: Yeah, that's why I eventually decided it was stupid and will go back and revise. I also found that it just took me forever to read books when I forced myself to read all the notes, and it wasn't even worthwhile much of the time. Lesson learned.

I'm glad to hear you've reconsidered your hardline stance on notes. Hopefully that will let you retroactively fill in some more sections!

Have you read Nothing to Envy? If you have, how do you think Escape from Camp 14 compares?

Oops, sorry for the late reply!

I have read Nothing to Envy, before Escape from Camp 14. There was definitely some overlap in content, which probably had a slightly negative impact on my impression of the latter: I suspect that it would have been an even more powerful read if everything had been brand new to me. I think they're both worth reading, though.

It was a lucky day for me, as I realized that two of the last three books I read fit into new categories. Both are decent picks for their categories, The Smartest Kids in the World for 370: Education and MWF Seeking BFF for 070: Journalism (in the journalism biography section, possibly because the author described these experiences on her blog first? I'm not sure where exactly the line is drawn between journalism biography and a regular memoir).

The Smartest Kids in the World uses the experiences of exchange students to compare the US education system with more successful systems elsewhere in the world. I gave it 4 stars at the time but actually ended up listing it as one of my top 5 books of the year, based on how thought-provoking it was. I'm particularly interested in education policy, but I'd imagine that it could be enjoyable for others as well.

MWF Seeking BFF was not a great book, but at least it's a quick and easy read, if you're looking for something to fill the category. The author describes her experiences trying to find a new best friend in her new city. I gave it 3.5 stars.

And I'm copying my reviews from my 75 Books Challenge thread, in case anyone wants more (possibly too much?) detail. I'll try to do this regularly, I think:



The Smartest Kids in the World by Amanda Ripley. This is the only book I managed to read on my almost two-week trip, and I'm very glad I read it. I've always been interested in education issues, probably since I went through much of my school career as part of the "guinea pig" year for a new curriculum. At first I felt negatively towards the author when she said in the introduction that she had always avoided covering education in her career as a journalist, because it didn't seem exciting enough. But I'm glad I persevered.

On the third page there's a shocking chart showing educational achievement in various developed countries, with Canada near the top and on an upward slope and the United States stagnating near the bottom. It was sort of devastating to consider that I might well end up raising children in this country. I don't think I had realized quite how bad the education system was for many of the students in the US, despite knowing that to a great extent education funding was based on whether you lived in a good neighbourhood or not. (Of course, Canada's results in a recent international test were not exacting encouraging, but that's another topic.)

In examining why US educational outcomes are so bad, Ripley looks at a few of the countries that are excelling in education: Finland, Korea, and Poland. And in order to get a deeper understanding than would be possible for a complete outsider, she focuses specifically on the experiences of three American exchange students, one in each of these countries. There's plenty of discussion about policy too, but the students' story definitely made the book more interesting.

The Korean system, while effective in its way, isn't seen as ideal because of the extreme stress it imposes on everyone. So much in Korea is based on test scores, so there's an enormous after-school education market, and curfews were recently imposed to forbid attending one of these tutoring places after midnight. Students studied so much after school that they would fall asleep in their regular school classes, sometimes bringing along a pillow. The whole thing is pretty messed up, but the students do learn a lot.

Finland is seen as a much better model, because students manage to learn a lot without overdoing it. The key here is largely in teacher quality and prestige: as part of significant education reforms, Finland moved teacher training programs into the top universities (comparable to MIT etc.), so that only the best students can become teachers. The teacher training is long and rigorous, with plenty of practice teaching, so that teachers come out thoroughly prepared to teach. They're paid a decent salary, and given a lot of respect and freedom. Basically, teaching is seen as a high-level job, and it attracts the best candidates, and the whole thing is a virtuous circle.

One interesting point is that in order to enact these reforms, Finland did at some point impose the sort of painful accountability measures that are found in the US today. But while the United States has focused just on punishing teachers who do badly, it hasn't taken the extra steps of producing better-trained teachers who were themselves more academically successful and making the job appealing enough (in pay, prestige, etc.) that those teachers will stick around. In Finland, it actually turned out that all the accountability measures were no longer needed once the teacher selection and training process had been thoroughly revised, but they did play an important role initially.

Ripley also points out that the idea of choosing better-qualified teachers wouldn't necessarily fly in the United States. There's an idea that anyone should be able to become a teacher—that they deserve the opportunity—and a fear of elitism if teacher training programs admitted only students in the top third of their class.

Meanwhile, for Poland, the most striking and shocking idea was just how detrimental streaming is to the students placed into the lower stream. At one point, the Polish government decided to delay streaming by just one year, keeping the academic and vocational students together until they were 16. This meant building thousands of new schools to accommodate the extra students for that extra year, but the consequences were dramatic and average test scores for 15-year-olds shot up. Even more importantly, though, they plummeted the following year for students who were placed in the vocational stream, showing that a lot of the difference was just about expectations. Students in vocational streams just weren't expected to do very well academically, and so they didn't.

This was a particularly significant point to me because I've always been very much in favour of streaming—I was in gifted classes starting in Grade 3, and I definitely noticed the difference in unstreamed high school courses like Civics, where the learning was done at a much lower level. It's tricky to offer extra opportunities to students who are doing well without offering fewer opportunities to the others, but I wonder whether there could be a regular stream and an advanced stream but no below-average stream. I also find it confusing in general that "vocational" often ends up being just less—I feel like there should be plenty of hands-on type stuff that certain types of people excel at, and that I couldn't do at all, but that's just *different*, not a watered-down version of the academic curriculum. Anyway, much to ponder there.

This whole book was very thought-provoking, and I'd definitely recommend it to anyone with an interest in education. I may also look for Ripley's other book, The Unthinkable, on a completely different topic.



MWF Seeking BFF by Rachel Bertsche. This is a non-fiction book with a fun premise: Bertsche finds that she doesn't have any best friends in her new city even after a few years have passed, and so sets out in search of a "BFF". She aims to go on at least 52 "girl-dates" throughout the year, and in the process, gains both new friends and new confidence.

First, the good: Bertsche has a very readable writing style, casual without being annoyingly so. The pages go by quickly. I found it interesting to read about how another woman my age was dealing with basic life issues like moving to a new city.

Then, the bad: I'm not sure I really found it 340-pages interesting. The descriptions of friend-dates got a bit repetitive after a while, even as Bertsche developed her approach. This may have been partially my own fault, trying to get through the book too quickly so that I could return it to the library before leaving for Christmas (I failed, and will owe $2 in fines when I return). But I do think there's at least a bit of repetition built into the concept.

And the fact that, at least initially, Bertsche comes off as extremely judgmental and superficial didn't exactly endear her to me. She reflects, for example, on the thought of being friends with a 40-year-old: "What kind of friendship is really possible with a mom of puberty-crazed children? I'm almost embarrassed—how are we going to look, me and the mom? ... I know, rationally, that it doesn't matter how we 'look', whatever that even means. ... But we're having lunch next door to my office. What if my coworkers see us? I'll have to explain why I ditched them. For a stranger. Who's, like, a grown-up." I know this was written in awareness of her own shortcomings, and I do admire her honestly, but... really? She's worried about how she'll look for having lunch with someone slightly older than her? Maybe I'm being as judgmental as her, but this did detract a bit from my enjoyment of the book.

One interesting point was that she didn't set out to make friends in general, but specifically to find a "BFF", which is a more difficult task, and one that she does realize at the end might have been fundamentally misguided. Her good new friends who stick around for years can eventually develop into BFFs just through their joint history, but it doesn't really work to assess every new acquaintance for their BFF potential.

So, there were some interesting thoughts on friendship, and the book is a quick read, but it's not exactly revelatory. Cautiously recommended, if you're interested in the subject.

125>

I'm not sure where exactly the line is drawn between journalism biography and a regular memoir

If the author's generally known as a journalist, it goes in the journalism category; the same is true for all values of $OCCUPATION, so a lot of people who like biographies more than, say, science find ways to fill science categories by reading biographies of scientists.

>126 lorax: Thanks for clarifying that! Interesting that it applies even to focused memoirs on a specific topic where the author's profession isn't really relevant. I can see how this could be convenient elsewhere in this challenge.

Eek, it's been almost a year since I updated this thread. Hopefully I managed to make some progress just by chance.



331 Labor economics: The XX Factor: How the Rise of Working Women Has Created a Far Less Equal World. This was a pretty disappointing book overall. It was a review copy, so I wrote an extended review that I'm copying here:

At one point I missed my subway stop while engrossed in this book. At another point I set it down for two weeks because it just wasn't holding my attention. I think the reason for this variation is that the book consists more of isolated chapters related to a general theme, rather than building increasingly on the same argument. It's a varied collection, and some of the chapters are more interesting than others. The author mentions at one point that the book started out as an article, and the chapter that was at the heart of that article, about how limited opportunities for women in the past meant that all the smartest women became teachers just because there were no other options, was one of the most compelling.

One of my main problems with some of the other chapters was that Wolf often didn't have anything new to say, but just summarized and quoted other authors. If you've read other books on these topics, you won't find that Wolf has much to add. For example, I enjoyed Marina Adshade's Dollars and Sex, and so I didn't find much that I hadn't heard before in Wolf's chapter on "Sex and the Single Graduate". There's not always a lot of analysis; we encounter statements like "The data don't tell us why.... But the difference is significant and sizeable." I appreciate the academic honesty, but it would have been more interesting if Wolf had been bold enough to offer her own hypothesis about causes.

Even worse, the quick sampling of data from different places led at times to some very strange statements that I felt should have been explained further. At one point, talking about how women can more easily become rich in places where an abundance of cheap labour allows them to hire servants for everything, she says that most of the world's self-made female billionaires are Chinese. She talks a fair bit about China, but also about the developing world in general, and emphasizes the importance of different values than existed when the Western world was developing, especially with regards to female education. And in this discussion, she mentions in passing a woman from Saudi Arabia, "the first woman to head a Middle Eastern bank, and one that she co-founded". The only other mention of women in Saudi Arabia has been that they'll get the vote in 2015 and still aren't allowed to drive, but suddenly they're being presented as an example of how much farther along women are there compared to Britain 200 years ago. And there's no other mention of this country at all. I found it incredibly frustrating to have only these two sentences, because it wasn't nearly enough to get even a remote understanding of what things are like for women in Saudi Arabia.

Finally, when Wolf does present her own thoughts, they often come off as the annoying humble-brags of the overprivileged. She explains at one point how she doesn't have time to tend to her garden, so everyone suggests that she just hire a gardener. But, she laments, good help is so hard to find! It would take just as long to choose a satisfactory gardener as it would to do it herself. Similarly, she recounts a conversation with one of her friends, someone who "managed to combine looking elegant at any time of day or night with three children, an impeccable home and a full-time, ongoing semi-political career." When Wolf said that she looked fabulous, she responded, "Well, I guess I should. The amount I'm paying my colourist, I could fund a preschool programme."

Wolf constantly emphasizes the difference between the top 20% of educated women and "the rest", but I felt like she was actually talking about an even smaller group of elites. She does say at one point that academics are the one exception to the focus on appearance among professional women, but I still found that my experiences were vastly different from hers. She doesn't seem to know anyone who isn't wealthy and successful, and it shows in statements like the one she repeatedly makes about how professional women are less likely to give up their careers because they actually enjoy their work, in apparent contrast to all the traditional women. On average, this might be true, but her dismissive tone suggested that no one at all could derive pleasure from a traditional female position. I wasn't even sure where she was drawing the line here: do the traditional nurturing women's jobs include things like elementary school teachers and nurses? On the one hand, I'd expect those people to have an above-average education, but on the other hand, they aren't exactly the high-fliers that Wolf generally seems to reference in her examples. The contrast between "elite" women and "average" women was less convincing when it wasn't even clear who the "average" woman was supposed to be.

Ultimately, I can't say that I enjoyed this book, despite finding some parts of it compelling. There wasn't always enough clarity; implications were sometimes not sufficiently supported; the analysis didn't go into enough depth; and the author's voice was often irritating. Rather than being eye-opening, I found it mostly discouraging. Surely the difference between success and failure isn't as stark as Wolf makes it out to be; I hope I can still have a good life despite not owning the expensive clothing that Wolf quotes the Financial Times' fashion editor as saying is well worth the price. Perhaps women in the top 5% of the socio-economic spectrum might be reassured to hear about how good their lives are and how different they are from everyone else, but Wolf claims that her book is about the top 20% of educated women. And even though I have the education, I didn't feel that this book was remotely about me.

That was a leftover from 2013, while everything else I'm posting now is from this year.



327 International Relations: The Snowden Files.

Ugh, it really bothers me that this book is listed in this category ("International Relations > Espionage and Subversion"), when I see it as much more of a domestic issue. But I don't actually know anything about Dewey classifications, so maybe this one really is best. Anyway, the book was a quick read, informative and disturbing.



728 Residential & related buildings: Ca d'Zan: Ringling's Venetian Palace.

This is a tiny museum guidebook, but I counted it as a completed book in my 75 Books Challenge, so I'm counting it here as well. I'm interested in this particular building because it's where I'll be getting married in March :).

I enjoyed the first half of the book, where there was more background information about the Ringlings and their activities in Sarasota. Once it got more into the details of the interior furnishings, I often couldn't fully appreciate (or even understand) what was being said, but there were still lots of pretty pictures, so that helped.

The 700s will probably always be a difficult category for me, so I'm happy about this book even if it was really short.



158 Applied Psychology: The Power of Habit.

This was a super-interesting book, but I don't really have a lot to say about it. It's extremely readable and informative, and also very popular, so there are already thousands of reviews. But basically, it's an overview of recent psychological findings about habits, and how they can be applied to us as individuals and also to broader societal issues. Highly recommended.



418 Standard usage; Applied linguistics: Fluent in Three Months

There was a moment when I thought this book should have been called "Language Learning for Extroverts". Lewis points out correctly that actually using whatever language you're learning is extremely important, but he suggests some techniques that I would just never use in a million years. For example, go up to someone in a shopping mall on the pretext of asking where the arcade is, and then use that as the starting point for a longer conversation. Um, no thanks.

Eventually I realized that Lewis was just basically my opposite in personality, preferences, and goals. He was bad at learning languages in school, while I always loved grammar; his focus is on languages for conversation, while reading is much more of a priority for me; and he says at one point that no one really needs to know more than a few languages, while I'm expected to familiarize myself with all the material related to my dissertation topic, even if it's in a language like Italian that I've never studied at all.

That, combined with the fact that this is basically advice derived from personal experience rather than scientific study, made this book somewhat less helpful for me. Lewis seems like a genuinely nice and enthusiastic person who really wants to help others, and he does have some good tips here, but I don't think they necessarily required a book-length treatment (and I've heard that most of the material is available on his website anyway—which was reinforced by the reference to the website at the end of every single chapter). While I was reading this, I often found myself thinking that my time would be better spent actually studying a language.

Basically, this wasn't a great book; I really wanted to like it more than I did. But there are some good tips and encouragement that others might find helpful.



956 General history of Asia; Middle East (Near East): The Punishment of Gaza

I'm Jewish and have always basically been pro-Israel, but recent events in Gaza (and increasing awareness of them thanks to social media) have finally led me to conclude that the Israeli government is just going way too far.

I find it particularly disturbing to look at the death counts and ages. This link from about a week ago lists 1823 Palestinian dead, including plenty of children younger than 5, compared to 66 Israelis, all 18 or older: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/07/gaza-under-seige-naming-dead-20....

I read this particular book, a collection of articles by an Israeli journalist, after reading this 2010 article about him: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/is-gideon-levy-the-most-hate....

He writes in very strong, rhetorical language, and I'm not sure how convincing he would be to someone who wasn't already inclined toward his viewpoint, but I found that it made for very interesting reading.



909 World history: The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity

This is a very helpful book that manages to provide an overview of modern scholarship about a 300-year period in just over 200 pages. Of course, that means there can't be enough detail about everything; I particularly would have liked some more discussion about the various Church councils, because they were initially discussed so briefly that, for all the later mentions of Chalcedonians and anti-Chalcedonians (for example), I couldn't actually remember what the council of Chalcedon had decided. Obviously I'll need to do further reading on this topic. For the most part, though, I really appreciated how much Cameron was able to cover in a short space, and not just as a basic narrative, but with discussion of scholarly developments and debates. This isn't exactly light reading, but I'd recommend it to anyone who wants an overview of the period. I'm reminded once again of why Routledge is my favourite publisher.



955 General history of Asia; Iran: Persepolis 2

Hmm, I'd think that the first of these graphic memoirs would already have filled this category, but I didn't have anything recorded there yet, so I'm listing this one.

This is the story of the author's time in Austria, where she was sent as a teenager to avoid the war at home in Iran, and her struggles to fit in there—alone, without her family—before ultimately returning home. Given that this is a memoir, the author comes across as strangely unlikeable at times, but I still appreciated the book as a whole. And of course, she was in a very difficult situation, so I can't really blame her. Definitely an interesting and quick read.

Something I particularly like about Satrapi's graphic novels is that the pictures aren't too elaborate, so I can look at them and move on with the story instead of wondering how much time I'm supposed to spend on the images.

There are also a few recently-read books that don't have DDCs showing in my catalogue, so when I have a bit more time I may try to hunt those down myself. For now, I'm just happy to see that I have made some progress.

I have been totally absent from this challenge as well. Glad to see you made some progress accidentally!

Welcome back!

Your review of The XX Factor (which sort of makes me feel like I'm glad you read it so I don't have to - anything spending much time talking about hair and clothing isn't for me ;-) ) makes me wonder about something - if it's true that in the past many of the smartest women became teachers because it was harder for them to have other careers, does that imply that the quality of teaching at elementary and high school ages is declining, since there are more opportunities available? Or that since now only people who actually want to teach are teaching, it's improving? I realize it's not the main point of the book by a long shot but I'm annoyed that I could construct equally plausible explanations for a correlation in either direction.

For whatever reason the predominant classification of Persepolis is 741 for graphic novels and the sequel is 955. No idea why, but I have them in the same place. I think 955 is a better fit, rather than the knee-jerk "This has pictures so it goes in 741" reaction.

Congratulations on the upcoming marriage!

My mom (age 65) was a teacher for 40+ years, and she complained a lot about younger teachers who had majored in education because it was an easy major and because they were just looking for something to do until they got married. But she also said that newer alternative certification programs had opened up teaching to really great teachers who came to teaching as a second career because they genuinely wanted to teach, so the answer may not be a simple one.