Task number 29: Read 50 books in 12 months

In this post I will keep track of the books I read each month until I complete the 50-book challenge. I am currently aiming to complete this by the end of December 2009, but according to my rules for this task I can retroactively move the start date if it helps me complete the challenge. So if by the end of 2009 I haven't read quite enough books, I could (for example) move the start date to 1 March 2009, discount the books I read in January and February 2009, and try to read enough to make up the difference by the end of February 2010. However, to stop things from getting too messy, I won't declare a start date that isn't the first of the month.

Books begun the previous month will be shown in brackets (). Books begun in one month and finished in a different month will count as half a book in each month. Therefore, if I get to 49½ books and my year is almost up, I'll have to read another book to at least the half-way point in order to complete the challenge, or else move the start date.

Square brackets [] indicate two books for which I forgot to note down exactly which month I finished them in, so I have allocated them according to my best guess.

2009 (50.5)

January (3.5)

(Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro)
Storm Front – Jim Butcher
The Book of Illusions – Paul Auster
The Tales of Beedle the Bard – J.K. Rowling

February (5)

(Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov)
The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow – Jerome K. Jerome
Lord of Light – Roger Zelazny
The Player of Games – Iain M. Banks
The Sparrow – Mary Doria Russell

March (4)

Night Watch – Sergei Lukyanenko
Use of Weapons – Iain M. Banks
The Time Traveler's Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
The State of the Art – Iain M. Banks

April (5)

The Kindly Ones – Neil Gaiman
The Wake – Neil Gaiman
(These Old Shades – Georgette Heyer)
The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafón
[Excession – Iain M. Banks]

May (4)

[(Selected poems 1923-1958 – E. E. Cummings)]
(Inversions – Iain M. Banks)
Fool Moon – Jim Butcher
Feersum Endjinn – Iain M. Banks

June (5)

Look to Windward – Iain M. Banks
Dali's Mustache – Salvador Dalí and Philippe Halsman
The Masqueraders – Georgette Heyer
The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
The Eye in the Pyramid – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson

July (4)

(Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) – Jerome K. Jerome)
Grave Peril – Jim Butcher
A Canticle for Leibowitz – Walter M. Miller, Jr
Espedair Street – Iain Banks

August (4)

(The Gone-Away World – Nick Harkaway)
Unspeakable Desolation Pouring Down From The Stars – Frank Key
The Golden Apple – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson
Baudolino – Umberto Eco

September (2)

Leviathan – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson
Un Lun Dun – China Miéville

October (3)

Family (Law Basics) – Elaine Sutherland
1066 And All That – W.C. Sellar (Aegrot: Oxon) and R.J.Yeatman (Failed M.A., etc. Oxon)
Don'ts for Husbands – Blanche Ebbutt

November (5)

Pawn of Prophecy – David Eddings
The Last Hero – Terry Pratchett
The Reluctant Fundamentalist – Mohsin Hamid
A Pig at the Wheel – Michael Bland
Queen of Sorcery – David Eddings

December (6)

(Thomas Jefferson: American Humanist – Karl Lehmann)
Magician's Gambit – David Eddings
Contract Law in Scotland – Hector MacQueen and Joe Thomson
Summer Knight – Jim Butcher
Foucault's Pendulum – Umberto Eco
Castle of Wizardry – David Eddings

Challenge complete!