I shouldn’t really be taking part in the latest Classics Club Spin as I still haven’t managed to finish my book from Spin #19, which was Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens. I did start to read it, but the time just wasn’t right and I got distracted by other books. I will go back to it eventually, but for now I’m going to put it aside and let the Spin choose a different classic for me to read.

If you’re not sure what a Classics Spin is, here’s a reminder:

The rules for Spin #20:

* List any twenty books you have left to read from your Classics Club list.
* Number them from 1 to 20.
* On Monday 22nd April the Classics Club will announce a number.
* This is the book you need to read by 31st May.

And here is my list:

1. Jane and Prudence by Barbara Pym
2. Claudius the God by Robert Graves
3. Moonfleet by John Meade Falkner
4. The Black Sheep by Honoré de Balzac
5. La Reine Margot by Alexandre Dumas
6. Two on a Tower by Thomas Hardy
7. Castle Dor by Daphne du Maurier
8. In a Dark Wood Wandering by Hella S Haasse
9. I Will Repay by Baroness Emmuska Orczy
10. Fire From Heaven by Mary Renault
11. The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson
12. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
13. The White Guard by Mikhail Bulgakov
14. Goodbye Mr Chips by James Hilton
15. The Cloister and the Hearth by Charles Reade
16. Germinal by Emile Zola
17. The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni
18. The Long Ships by Frans G Bengtsson
19. The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter
20. High Rising by Angela Thirkell

Have you read any of the books on my list? Which numbers should I be hoping for on Monday?

I love taking part in the spins hosted by The Classics Club – this is the nineteenth and although I’ve missed one or two I think I’ve managed to participate in most of them. If you’re not sure what the spins involve, here’s a reminder:

The rules for Spin #19:

* List any twenty books you have left to read from your Classics Club list.
* Number them from 1 to 20.
* On Tuesday 27th November the Classics Club will announce a number.
* This is the book you need to read by 31st January 2019.

And here is my list:

1. Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens
2. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
3. La Reine Margot by Alexandre Dumas
4. Daniel Deronda by George Eliot
5. The Duke’s Children by Anthony Trollope
6. The Fountain Overflows by Rebecca West
7. In a Dark Wood Wandering by Hella S Haasse
8. Of Human Bondage by W Somerset Maugham
9. The Pirate by Sir Walter Scott
10. Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens
11. Germinal by Emile Zola
12. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
13. Claudius the God by Robert Graves
14. The Fifth Queen by Ford Madox Ford
15. How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn
16. The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter
17. The Long Ships by Frans G Bengtsson
18. The Cloister and the Hearth by Charles Reade
19. The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni
20. Fire from Heaven by Mary Renault

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We’ve been given more time than usual to read our book for this spin, so I’ve tried to include lots of long books here. I think most of them have over 400 pages, although one or two are slightly shorter. I don’t mind which one I get, as I’ll be reading them all eventually anyway.

Have you read any of these books? Which number do you think I should be hoping for on Tuesday?

The result of the latest Classics Club Spin has been revealed today!

The idea of the Spin was to list twenty books from my Classics Club list, number them 1 to 20, and the number announced today (Wednesday) represents the book I have to read before 31st August 2018. The number that has been selected is…

9

And this means the book I need to read is…

That Lady by Kate O’Brien

From Goodreads: Spain in the years before the Armada, and high passion meets high politics. Ana, Princess of Eboli is a remarkable woman. Married at thirteen and losing an eye in a duel a year later, Ana is also heiress of Spain’s leading family, widow of Philip II’s wisest cousellor and rumoured to be the King’s mistress. Unexpectedly – and unwisely – she falls in love with Don Antonio Perez, dandy, adulterer, skilled politician. With her unusual looks, her aristocratic arrogance and the simplicities of her faith, Ana cannot understand why her private life should become entangled with the affairs of state and, finally, incur the terrible vindictiveness of the King himself…

Kate O’Brien’s understanding and love of Spain enhance the beauty of this passionate and intelligent novel.

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I included this on my Classics Club list as it was first published in 1946 and is a Virago Modern Classic. I’ve never read anything by Kate O’Brien and I know very little about this particular book except that a few other bloggers whose opinion I trust have enjoyed it. The setting sounds appealing, though, and I think it should be my type of book.

Have you read That Lady? Did you take part in the Classics Spin? What will you be reading?

I love taking part in the spins hosted by The Classics Club – this is the eighteenth and although I’ve missed one or two I think I’ve managed to participate in most of them. As I just recently started my second Classics Club list, I have plenty of books to choose from for this spin and I’ll be happy to read any of them.

Here are the rules for Spin #18:

* List any twenty books you have left to read from your Classics Club list.
* Number them from 1 to 20.
* On Wednesday 1st August the Classics Club will announce a number.
* This is the book you need to read by 31st August 2018

And here is my list:

Five 19th century classics

1. Two on a Tower by Thomas Hardy
2. The Cloister and the Hearth by Charles Reade
3. The Duke’s Children by Anthony Trollope
4. Daniel Deronda by George Eliot
5. Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens

Five classic historical fiction novels

6. The Fifth Queen by Ford Madox Ford
7. Claudius the God by Robert Graves
8. The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson
9. That Lady by Kate O’Brien
10. The Turquoise by Anya Seton

Five classics in translation

11. La Reine Margot by Alexandre Dumas
12. In a Dark Wood Wandering by Hella S Haasse
13. Germinal by Emile Zola
14. The White Guard by Mikhail Bulgakov
15. The Black Sheep by Honoré de Balzac

Five 20th century classics

16. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
17. Jane and Prudence by Barbara Pym
18. High Rising by Angela Thirkell
19. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
20. Goodbye Mr Chips by James Hilton

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Have you read any of these books? Which numbers do you think I should be hoping for on Wednesday?

The result of the latest Classics Club Spin has been revealed today – and I’m pleased with the book I’ll be reading. It wasn’t one I was particularly hoping for, but it’s by an author I love and I think I’m going to enjoy it.

The idea of the Spin was to list twenty books from my Classics Club list, number them 1 to 20, and the number announced today (Friday) represents the book I have to read before 30th April 2018. The number that has been selected is…

3

And this means the book I need to read is…

Desperate Remedies by Thomas Hardy

From Goodreads: “Cytherea has taken a position as lady’s maid to the eccentric arch-intriguer Miss Aldclyffe. On discovering that the man she loves, Edward Springrove, is already engaged to his cousin, Cytherea comes under the influence of Miss Aldclyffe’s fascinating, manipulative steward Manston.

Blackmail, murder and romance are among the ingredients of Hardy’s first published novel, and in it he draws blithely on the ‘sensation novel’ perfected by Wilkie Collins. Several perceptive critics praised the author as a novelist with a future when Desperate Remedies appeared anonymously in 1871. In its depiction of country life and insight into psychology and sexuality it already bears the unmistakable imprint of Hardy’s genius.”

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Have you read Desperate Remedies? Did you take part in the Classics Spin? What will you be reading?