Everyone else seems to be making lists of their biggest events of the year so I thought I would chime in with my reading list for the year (there are a couple of weeks left in the year and I am in the midst of a couple of more but there is no time like the present to keep me from having to grade a mountain of final exams) and my awards based on only these books.

The books I read this year:

Christopher Buckley   The White House Mess

Christopher Buckley   Wet Work

Christopher Buckley   Thank You for Smoking.

Christopher Buckley   No Way to Treat a First Lady : a Novel

Christopher Buckley   Little Green Men

Christopher Buckley   Boomsday : a Novel

Christopher Buckley   Florence of Arabia : a Novel

Tim Dorsey                    Gator A-go-go

Gordon Edgar                Cheesemonger : A Life on the Wedge

Chris Elliott                    Into Hot Air : Mounting Mount Everest

Jasper Fforde                 Shades of Grey : the Road to High Saffron.

Manny Howard             My Empire of Dirt : How One Man Turned His Big City Backyard into a Farm

A.J. Jacobs                     The Year of Living Biblically

Christopher Moore.      Fool

Grace Pundyk                 The Honey Trail : in Pursuit of Liquid Gold and Vanishing Bees

Holly Robinson             The Gerbil Farmer’s Daughter : a Memoir

Jules Verne                     Voyage to the Center of the Earth

The categories and the winners:

The biggest disappointment goes to Manny Howard.  What a sour book.  I feel sorry for him if that is the way he sees and goes through life.

The silliest goes to Chris Elliot but I knew that before I read the book and I enjoyed it immensely.

The most frustrating goes to Jasper  Fforde because I have to wait for the next installment plus I am waiting for the next Thursday Next book.  Damn you for being so good!

The award for writing the same book many times goes to Christopher Buckley.  There are plot twists in each book that separate them but I kept hoping they would be more unique.  I have a couple more to read before I complete the canon but I haven’t picked one up on a few months.

The award for the book that is so unlike the last couple of movies that used it for a premise goes to Jules Verne.  No, I did not read it in the original French but it is a quick read and most like the Pat Boone movie and least like the recent movies.  I had to read it after watching the horrible movies.  Could it have been that bad?  Nope, it is the movies that are bad, not the book.

The award for the book that everyone should read goes to Grace Pundyk.  If I could give a command that you should all have to follow it would be to read this book.  The title tells you it is about honey but it is so much more.  It is also a memoir, travelogue, and treatise for what we know and don’t know about all our food.  Read this!!  Please.

Those are the awards for this year.  I’m open to suggestions for reading next year.  For now, I’m starting Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean and Kosher Food Nation plus browsing aquarium books for guidance for the new aquarium (what else?).

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