What books are in your pile of shame (i.e. purchased but not yet read)? What books are on your wish list (i.e. not yet purchased)? What books have you recently managed to banish from your pile of shame?

Currently Reading: Iron Gold by Pierce Brown

Pile of Shame:

- The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay
- Red Sparrow by Jason Mathews
- A Marvelous Light by Freya Marske
- Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
- The Dance Tree by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Wish list:

- Dark Age by Pierce Brown
- Circe by Madeline Miller
- The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake
- Ariadne by Jennifer Saint
- The House in the Cerulean Sea by Travis Klune
- The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang
- Jade City by Fonda Lee
- The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu
- Wild and Wicked Things by Francesca May
- The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
- Uprooted by Naomi Novik
- The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins
- The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North
- The Golem and the Djinni by Helene Wecker

Recent Reads (i.e. 2022):

- Red Rising trilogy by Pierce Brown. Feudalistic Roman Empire in space, where the children of the elite must take place in death games to earn the right to rule. Follows Darrow, a member of the underclass who infiltrates the elite and ends up in their death games. Fast paced page turners. Not the most elegant writing but servicable, and the action keeps you on the edge of your seat. Strong recommend. There is a sequel trilogy which I have just started, of which the final book comes out later this year.

- A Deadly Education and The Last Graduate by Naomi Novik. Dark academia trilogy set in a extra-dimensional Hogwarts where half of the students die. Follows El, a sorceress whose magic can level cities but can't clean her floor, and who is constantly having to scrape and save her mana (urgh) because she's poor. Protagonist is marmite; I quite enjoyed her. But the big problem with this series is the incredibly tell-heavy writing style, which makes you feel like you're reading a summary of a story rather than the actual story, and which is constantly interrupting moments of action and tension with exposition. Tentative recommend, depending on your ability to tolerate the writing style. I will probably be getting the last book of the trilogy, coming out in September.

- The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Story of a fantastical circus set in the late Victorian era. Primarily a romance, but to be honest you never really get a strong feel for the personalities of the primary characters or feel chemistry between them - the writing style is too distant and you never really feel the thrill of romance. The true subject of the story is not the romance but the magical circus itself. This is depicted with a great sense of atmosphere but I felt it frequently fell down in the detail, which failed to convey the sense of wonder it wanted to. The magic is never really front and centre but what little we do see, I enjoyed a lot. Quite arcane/abstract, would fit well with HP magic. I wouldn't say this book is bad, but there are a lot of other books you'd be better off reading first.

- Dune. Enough said.

 

I'm replying late to this thread because my shame is... excessive.

Let's begin with the most shameful part of all. Approximately three years ago I made a very similar thread and have still not read 10/15 entries on it. Yikes.

As nobody else is posting in the thread I'll abstain from writing reviews for everything in this list, though will add that in for any titles anybody expresses interest in.

Currently reading:

Mordew by Alex Pheby
The Shadow of the Gods by John Gwynne

Unfinished series (number read/total owned):

The Expanse (4/8)
Terra Ignota (1.5/3) - probably abandoned. This is awful but I bought the whole thing at once because I loved the covers.
The Black Iron Legacy (1/3)
Shadows of the Apt (7/10)
Stormlight Archives (2/3)
Daggerspell (5/10)
The Memoirs of Lady Trent (3/5)
The Three Body problem (0/2)
Dogs of War (1/2)
Dragons of Terra (2/3)
Books of Babel (3/4)

Standalones (or I just own book 1 of a series):

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
City of Lies by Sam Hawke
The Unspoken Name by A.K. Larkwood
The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu
Skullsworn by Brian Staveley
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
The Pariah by Anthony Ryan
The Sword of Kaigen by M.L. Wang

And then for the important part: PRE-ORDERS

The Hand of the Sun King by J.T. Greathouse, 26 May 22
Priest of Crowns (War for the Rose Throne book 4) by Peter McLean, 04 August 22
The Golden Enclaves (The Scholomance book 2) by Naomi Novik, 27 September 22
Ashes of Man (Sun Eater book 5) by Christopher Ruocchio, 06 December 22

Also reading a bunch of ongoing manga and manhwa but that probably counts as negative reading.

Of everything here, the one I'd rec above all else is The Scholomance (book one is A Deadly Education). Not that it's the best book here. It's not, definitely not. But it's something exactly to the tastes of folks around here. Others in @Taure 's wishlist which are excellent are Circe and Jade City.

- The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins
- The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North

These two I intend to pick up at some point, they've been on my radar for a while.

 

The Seattle Public Library is one of the best in the world and I have a branch down the street, so I rarely buy books.

Here is the list of books I am waiting for from the library:
- Gods of Jade and Shadow by Moreno-Garcia, Silvia
- The Once and Future Witches by Harrow, Alix E.

As for the books on my shame list... I have 169 on my to-read list in Good Reads. I really need to read more.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/93141735?shelf=to-read

In 2022, I have read 9 books so far.
- The four Immortal books by Tamora Pierce.

Simple YA books that are great on long flights when you are exhausted. ​

- The first two River of London books by Ben Aaronovitch.

Fun Dresden like books that make you feel as if you are in London. Needs more magic though. ​

- The Scholomance Series (first two books) by Naomi Novik.

Unlike @Otters and @Taure above me, I was not a fan of the series. I went into the series thinking it would be a darker Harry Potter with the main character being on the verge of going insane or dark. Instead the books felt more YA than later HP books and the main character has a saving people thing that makes Harry look selfish. While I love the setting of the books, it premise didn't live up to the actual story. ​

 

I started reading All the King's Men forever ago and now it's just lying there in the corner. I'll probably get to it eventually.

I also got halfway through the Overlord light novels. Meaning to read that when I'm in that kind of mood again.

Recently binged through the first few ptge books. Honestly pretty okay. It has a consistent story quality. But the writing itself is bad and occasionally it becomes painfully obvious a lot of the characters are self inserts.

Still haven't read ward. Been lukewarm on it for some time, it's not as well endorsed as worm, but do still want to make my own opinion. Eventually.

 

Cool thread! I’m a re-reader equally as much as a new stuff reader so with that in mind:

What I’m reading:

-Brave New World (it’s not hitting me in the way I know it’s supposed to, might be the author’s style. Slow progress.)
-Philosopher’s Stone (1000nd-ish readthrough. Comfort food.)
-Deathly Hallows (30th-ish readthrough. Ditto.)
-Ulysses (my ‘summer book’ for the past couple of years, I’ve got a real chance at finishing it this summer. Mainly reading it for bragging rights, although unfortunately I only have one or two friends who care about classics. Might brag to the cat, he usually listens.)
-David Bowie An Oral History (I want to say exactly what it sounds like, but I have inadvertently learnt a lot about the music industry in the 70’s as well as common sexual practices of the era.)
-Lamb (no idea where I’m at. The problem when good friends recommend books, but you have very different tastes. They proceed to buy you their favourite book of all time and you want to do the polite thing.)
-Macca’s The Lyrics (Very interesting in small doses.)
-The Big Sleep (Boring. Can’t remember where I left off.)
-Howards End
-Been on a poetry binge again lately, not sure how to count them since I don’t have physical copies of most. But lots of British WWI poets as well as Edith Södergran. Seems to be my era

TBR (that’s already in my bookshelf, we’ll ignore the rest):

-Reread all Evelyn Waugh. It’s the era.
-Reread Goodbye to All That as well as Goodbye to Berlin. (Can’t remember which is which…)
-Naked Lunch
-Hundraettåringen (Prequel good)
-Face It (Debbie Harry, lots of pictures)
-Life (Keith Richards)
-Reread Death on the Nile (10ish times but it’s been a while)
-The old Man and the Sea (I fucking hate the way Hemingway writes characters, but I’ve promised myself to give him one more go)
-Sons and Lovers, maybe reread Lady Chatterley (can’t remember the writing style, but could do more Lawrence if it’s appealing)
-Reread Animal Farm (Embarrassing to still have it on my list. I was a child when I read it, and I’ve had to reread most of the things I read then to get perspective on things. For some reason I’ve not managed to reread this one even though it’s short and right there in my bookshelf. Love Orwell in general, might ditch Brave New World to reread some of his essays.)
-Reread Emma, the one I liked
-Reread Lolita (read it too young, but I only have the Swe translation atm.)
-Maybe try to reread LotR (also too young to remember them properly, same language problem. I seem to have both the pocket and the hardback series and both in Swedish.)
-Might reread some Salinger, he's in the comfort category for me along with Christie and Rowling.
-Bill Bryson Neither Here nor There (friend gave it to me, have to read it. Probably funny, please be funny.)
-Try some more Pratchett
-A Little Life (friend recommended it, hope it’s not too cringe. I’ve been promised it’s not too cringe)
-The God Word, The Satanic Verses, Between the Acts, The Handmaid's Tale, The Book Thief, Den amerikanska flickan, Underbara kvinnor vid vatten, Århundradets kärlekssaga, Den svavelgula himlen, Kalevala (in Sw),
-Try to get hold of the rest of Stephen Fry's autobiographies. Also the book that came after Mythos.

Recently finished:
-All the Mumin books (might reappear as comfort)
-It and Pet Sematery
-Skagboys
-Drakarna över Helsingfors
-Vem dödade Bambi?
-Reread most of Dubliners to make sure I actually like Joyce, despite my struggles with Ulysses

 

Quoting my post from a similar thread back in 2019. On the one hand, I've ticked off (and therefore removed) around 35 entries from the various sections, and read various things that weren't on there originally; on the other hand, I have naturally bought a whole load of other things that I've not read...