Man Asian Awards

Man Asian Official Site

2012 Winner to be announced March 14, 2013

2012 Shortlist announced Jan.9, 2013:

Between Clay and Dust by Musharraf Ali Farooqi (Pakistan)
The Briefcase by Hiromi Kawakami (Japan
Silent House by Orhan Pamuk (Turkey) 
The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng (Malaysia) 
Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil (India)                    

Completed:

The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng (Malaysia)****
Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil (India)****+
Ru, Kim Thúy by (Vietnam)***+ (longlist)

2012 Longlist
  
Tbr: 
The Bathing Women by Tie Ning (China)
Silent House by Orhan Pamuk (Turkey)
Thinner Than Skin by Uzma Aslam Khan (Pakistan)
Honour by Elif Shafak (Turkey)

Unavailable to me at present:

Goat Days by Benyamin (India)
Between Clay and Dust by Musharraf Ali Farooqi (Pakistan)
Another Country by Anjali Joseph (India)
The Briefcase by Hiromi Kawakami (Japan)
Black Flower by Young-Ha Kim (South Korea)
Island of a Thousand Mirrors by Nayomi Munaweera (Sri Lanka)
Northern Girls by Sheng Keyi (China)
The Road To Urbino by Roma Tearne (Sri Lanka /UK)

2011 Awards:

Shortlist

Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin (South Korea) WINNER
The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad (Pakistan)
River of Smoke by Anitav Ghosh (India)
Rebirth by Jahnavi Barua (India)
The Sly Company of People Who Care by Rahul Bhattacharya (India)
Dream of Ding Village by Yan Lianke (China)
The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto (Japan)
 
Longlist

Comments, recommendations and links to reviews are always welcomed.

Top Ten Tuesday Jan 2013

Hosted by Jamie at The Broke and the Bookish.

Top Ten Bookish Goals For 2013 (Jan.8)

1.Read more of my own books from my personal library.

2.Update my LibraryThing and Goodreads accounts.

3.Sort and shelve the 400 books I've Bookmooched and traded.

4.Read the books I've resolved to instead of going by mood as I usually do. To wit:

5.Top Ten Books I Resolve To Read In 2013:

  1. The Bathing Women by Tie Ning (China) Man Asian Award longlist 2013
  2. The Painted Girls by Catharine Marie Buchanan (Canada) Jan.10 release
  3. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria) Feb. 19 release
  4. And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini (Afghanistan/US) May 10 release
  5. To Kill a MockingBird by Harper Lee (US)
  6. The Lifeboat by Charlotte Rogan (US)
  7. The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad (Pakistan)
  8. The Cook by Wyne Macauly (AUS)
  9. See Now Then by Jamaica Kincaid (Antigua/US) Feb. 5 release
10. So Long A Letter - Mariama Ba (Senegal)

6.Translation Challenge:

  1.Red Sorghum by Mo Yan (China)
  2.The Bathing Women Tie Ning (China)
  3.So Long a Letter by Mariama Ba (Senegal)
  4.Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Russia)
  5.Kokoro by Natsume Soseki (Japan)
  6.Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz (Hungary)
  7.Raised from the Ground by Jose Saramago (Portugal)
  8.Climates by  André Maurois (France)
  9.The Elephant Keepers' Children by Peter Høeg (Denmark)
  10.Hostage by Elie Wiesel (France)
  12.The Secret History of Costaguana by Juan Gabriel Va´squez (Columbia)
  13.From the Mouth of the Whale by Sjon (Iceland)

7.Tbr Challenge:

  1.Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner (US)
  2.So Long A Letter by Mariama Ba (Senegal)
  3.Paradise by Toni Morrison (US)
  4.To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (US)
  5.The Red and the Green by Iris Murdoch (UK)
  6.Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria)
  7.Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Russia)
  8.Sarah Thornhill by Kate Grenville (Australia)
  9.The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad (Pakistan)
11.Jazz by Toni Morrison (US)
12.The Fable by William Faulkner (US)

8.Update my blog, layout etc.

9.Try to post at least once a week. Posting has become difficult for me and I've just been tweeting my reading recommendations for several months now. 

10.Keep all literary book awards up to date. I currently follow about 15 and find most of my best reading experiences there, as well as books I wouldn't otherwise hear about. The heading at the top under Awards is linked to a page that list them all.

Which of your bookish goals is important to you?

Costa Award Reading Challenge

An ongoing project to read the Costa Prize fiction winners from1971 when the prize (then called the Whitbread) was established to the present. I will be reading all of the fiction and first novel winners and any shortlist nominees that appeal to me. There are no longlists provided for this prize and shortlists contain only four nominees. 

2012 Winners announced Jan.3, 2013:

2012 Costa Novel Award shortlist:

Hilary Mantel - Bring up the Bodies (Winner!)
Stephen May - Life! Death! Prizes!
James Meek - The Heart Broke In
Joff Winterhart - Days of the Bagnold Summer

2012 Costa First Novel Award shortlist

J. W. Ironmonger - The Notable Brain of Maximilian Ponder
Jess Richards - Snake Ropes
Francesca Segal - The Innocents (Winner!)
Benjamin Wood - The Bellwether Revivals 

Official Costa Award Site
________________________

Costa Novel Award 2011

• Pure**** by Andrew Miller (Winner)
• The Sense of an Ending**** by Julian Barnes
• A Summer of Drowning by John Burnside
• My Dear I Wanted to Tell You by Louisa Young     

Costa First Novel Award 2011

• Tiny Sunbirds Far Away****+ by Christie Watson (Winner)
• City of Bohane by Kevin Barry
• The Last Hundred Days by Patrick McGuinness
• Pao by Kerry Young

Winners read:

2010 Pure**** by Andrew Miller  
2010 Tiny Sunbirds Far Away****+ by Christie Watson

2010 The Hand That First Held Mine**** by Maggie O'Farrell 
2008 The Secret Scripture***** by Sebastian Barry
2008 The Outcast**** by Sadie Jones
2007 What Was Lost***** by Catherine O'Flynn
2007 Day**** by A L Kennedy
2006 The Tenderness of Wolves****+ by Stef Penney
1985 Hawksmoor***** by Peter Ackroyd (read twice)
1972 The Bird of Night**** by  Susan Hill 

Also read, from the shortlists:

2010 The Sense of an Ending**** by Julian Barnes 
2009 The Elephant Keeper****+by Christpher Nicholson (reviewed)
2009 The Music Room**** by William Fiennes (Biography)
2008 The Other Hand***** by Chris Cleave (Little Bee in US) reviewed
2008 Trauma***** by Patrick McGrath
2008 The Behaviour of Moths**** by Poppy Adams
(The Sister in US)
2007 Death of a Murderer***** by Rupert Thomson  reviewed
1983 Flying to Nowhere**** by John Fuller

On my shelves tbr:

2005 The Silk Factory by Tash Aw
2003 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
2000 White Teeth by Zadie Smith
1978 Picture Palace by Paul Theroux
1974 The Sacred & Profane Love Machine by Iris Murdoch

Which have you read and can recommend? Comments, requests for brief reviews or links to reviews are always welcome. 

Also working her way through Costa Book Award winners:
Rose City Reader.

Top Ten Tuesday Jan 2013

Hosted by Jamie at The Broke and the Bookish.

Top Ten Books I Resolve To Read In 2013:

                                    

 1. The Bathing Women by Tie Ning (China) Man Asian Award longlist 2013
  2. The Painted Girls by Catharine Marie Buchanan (Canada) Jan.10    release
  3. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria) Feb. 19    release
  4. And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini (Afghanistan/US) May 10 release (cover  unavailable at this time)
  5. To Kill a MockingBird by Harper Lee (US)
  6. The Lifeboat by Charlotte Rogan (US)
  7. The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad (Pakistan)
  8. The Cook by Wyne Macauly (AUS)
  9. See Now Then by Jamaica Kincaid (Antigua/US) Feb. 5 release
10. So Long A Letter - Mariama Ba (Senegal)

Next week: Top Ten Bookish Goals For 2013.

Comments, reading suggestions, links to reviews, or requests for brief reviews are always welcomed.

Translation Challenge 2013

Hosted by Ellie at Curiosity Killed the Bookworm.

Read one translated book a month.

Tbr in 2013:

Red Sorghum by Mo Yan (China)
The Bathing Women Tie Ning (China)
So Long a Letter by Mariama Ba (Senegal)
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Russia)
Kokoro by Natsume Soseki (Japan)
Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz (Hungary)
Raised from the Ground by Jose Saramago (Portugal)
Climates by  André Maurois (France)
The Elephant Keepers' Children by Peter Høeg (Denmark)
Hostage by Elie Wiesel (France)
The Secret History of Costaguana by Juan Gabriel Vásquez (Columbia)
From the Mouth of the Whale by Sjon (Iceland)

Comments, reading suggestions, links to reviews, or requests for brief reviews are always welcomed.

TBR Pile Challenge 2013

Hosted by Adam at Roof Beam Reader

Read 12 books that have been on your bookshelf or your tbr list for AT LEAST one full year.

I plan to read in 2013:

Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner
So Long A Letter by Mariama Ba
Paradise by Toni Morrison
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Red and the Green by Iris Murdoch
Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Sarah Thornhill by Kate Grenville
The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad
Red Sorghum by Mo Yan
Jazz by Toni Morrison
The Fable by William Faulkner

Comments, reading suggestions, links to reviews, or requests for brief reviews are always welcomed.

Library Loot 14 - 20 November

 

A weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and this week by Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. Write up your post-feel free to use the button and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries.

Completed recently...
 
The Upright Piano Player 2010 by David Abbott
Author's first novel after retiring.
Involves the death of a child, highly recommended.
Enjoyed as much as Ian McEwan's The Child in Time****+

 

 

What Happened to My Sister by Elizabeth Flock 2012
Sequel to Emma & Me (2005), which was astoundingly good*****
Much of that happened in Emma & Me was altered for this second book-she should have left well enough alone. Emotional sop for the reader only reason for this sequel.
Don't miss reading Me & Emma, whether or not you read this one.

 



Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan 2012 UK
1970s espionage, much better than expected given the subject, recommended.
My 11th by this author, enjoyed all immensely except Solar***
Favourite: Saturday****

 

 



The Painted Bridge***** by Wendy Wallace 2012 UK
Award winning journalist's first novel after 2 books of nonfiction, and short stories
1850s women's "insane asylum" story
A pox on all 19th century doctors and husbands.
Couldn't read it fast enough!

 

Currently reading...

The Mirrored World by Debra Dean 2012

Also recommend highly: The Madonnas of Leningrad****+ by Debra Dean

Hostage by Elie Wiesel 2012

for Jewish Book Month, I enjoy all of his books

Altered Light by John Banville 2012

Loved The Sea and The Book of Evidence but this one is not my cuppa.

May not finish...

The Coward's Tale by Vanessa Gebbie
After 52 pages it's not ringing any bells for me...
Have you read it? Does it redeem itself eventually?

In the queue...

The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers
A Lady Cyclist's Guide to Kashgar by Suzanne Joinson
Sarah Thornhill by Kate Grenville
The Forrests by Emily Perkins
Winter Journal by Paul Auster
and new books by Michael Chabon, Barbara Kingsolver, Patrick Somerville, Edeet Ravel, Rose Tremain, Matthew Dicks, Joanne Harris, Peter Hoeg, Tan Twan Eng et al.

Leave thoughts or links to any you've read or reviewed, I'd love to read them.