Today's prompt is Five Favorite Winter Reads, taken from our reading last winter. I feel like I'm getting repetitive with my book mentions though so instead I'm going to share five of my favorite chunksters. Chunksters (which I consider to be books near or over 600 pages long) are the type of book I love reading when all of the hustle and bustle of the holidays is done, there's nothing to entice me out of the house into the frigid air, and the evenings are long and dark.
So, in increasing order of pages ...
Starting at 695 pages,
The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox
Up to 781,
The Quincunx by Charles Palliser
A nudge to 782,
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
A jump to 1024,
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
Finally, a pair to top it off at 1168 pages,
Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis
Do you like reading chunksters in the winter? Which is your all time favorite?
Upping the stakes,
K
This is a good twist on this category. (Favorite reads from last winter? Huh?) Strange&Norrell and David Copperfield are two of my favorite chunksters too. I would add The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies and The Once and Future King by T.H. White. Sort of cheating, because each is made up of multiple books, but I do have one-volume editions of both of them.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how I haven't heard of The Deptford Trilogy but I need to read those books!
DeleteI love this idea - winter is a great time for chunksters! I haven't read any of these, so I need to check them out. I also have a "Time to Kill" recommendation list on my blog...focusing on chunksters.
ReplyDeleteThere's just something about a story that lasts longer than a couple of hours reading time ...
DeleteI really need to get to Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell! And the Connie Willis book looks interesting.
ReplyDeleteI read Jonathan Strange right when it came out so I'm rereading it this winter before the miniseries comes out. I barely remember anything about the plot but I vividly remember the feelings of being amazed and enthralled!
DeleteI haven't read any chunksters this year. I just haven't had the attention span.
ReplyDeleteI took a break from them for a couple of years (read: Z's toddler and preschool years) and then found I missed them!
DeleteLike you and Sarah I tend to link Winter and chunksters but I'm not a big fan of them :( I always have several books on the go so chunksters have difficulties to find a place in my schedule and I can spend months on one while reading a lot of books in the same time (2666 by Robert Bolaño is still on my mind).
ReplyDeleteI've intended to read David Copperfield since years. Now that I know the number of pages in English (books are always thicker in French), I want to faint ;)
Yes, chunksters don't work as well if you're not a monogamous reader.But David Copperfield is just so good that it's worth the time that you would put in!
DeleteI keep meaning to reading the Strange/Norell book but it is, as you say, a chunkster!
ReplyDeleteI know there is a two-volume set where they split the book up. That might work better for many readers!
DeleteI do like the idea of chunksters in the winter! Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell has been on my shelf for WAY too long. I'm reading/listening to Bag of Bones by King now (think 700+ pages?) and then will jump to the 4th Outlander (probably 1000+) and then maybe Jonathon Strange. ;)
ReplyDeleteI would read-along Strange with you ...
DeleteI'm loving the twist on today's topic - and I have to admit that I've been intimidated by Blackout/All Clear for quite a while. I do want to read the pair though.
ReplyDeleteTanya Patrice
Girlxoxo.com
They are intimidating once you realize that you have to read them together. But the story is so compelling that you can really speed through them. Dang. Now I want to reread all of these books but it would take me most of next year!
DeleteQuincunx is great. I'll always remember that book, partially because how much I enjoyed the book, but partially because, book lovers that we were, this is one I took with me and read on my honeymoon. LOL.
ReplyDeleteI prefer to read shorter books in the winter, because the cold weather has me so hungry for science fiction that I want to get through as many of the tempting books as I can.
My honeymoon read was an Amelia Peabody mystery. :) And I do need to break up the chunkster reading with some nice short reads too.
DeleteLove chunksters! Those first two are two of my all-time favorites. Copperfield, not so much because they made us read it; perhaps I should re-read? JS & MrN keeps slipping to the bottom of my list--Ill get to it someday. Don't know Willis.
ReplyDeleteYes, required reading is sometimes enough to ruin even the best books. :(
DeleteI STILL haven't read Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell! It's been on my radar for years. Blargh!
ReplyDeleteI am thinking about scheduling a read-along. More people need to read this one!
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