The Reading Life Review February 2016 with a Look Ahead

February 2016 was a decent reading life month.  I read eleven novels and four biographical works.  I am coming to really enjoy literary biographies.  

Blogging wise, I at times am feeling a need for an extended break.  If I ever seem to stop posting I will hopefully be back and will respond to Reading Life related E Mails.  

For the last five years I have devoted March to Irish Short Stories.  In order to maintain continuity I will treat March as Irish Short Story Month but will not focus just on Irish Short Stories as I have done in the past.  My heart is still with the Irish but my energy level is to low to do the kind of event I have done in the past.  

Since inception I have had 3,910,010 page views.  There are 2834 posts on the blog.  The top home countries for visitors last month were, the USA, the Philippines, India, Germany and Canada.  The most viewed posts are on short stories by Filipino authors.

I added a new tracking widget, Flag Counter, on September 10. So far I have collected 112 flags.  

This month I continued reading short stories though I only posted on "Domestic Peace" by Honore de Balzac.  Here are the other stories I read in February, 2016.

1.  "An Island" by David Constantine.  - A Frank O'Connor Prize Winning author

2.  "Strong Enough" by David Constantine.  My third reading of this great story about a man very into the reading life.

3.  "Private Life of a Famous Chinese Film Director" by Simon Van Booy.  

4.  "Fat" by Krys Lee. - author of Drifting House

5.  "Two Colonials" by Hortense Calisher. 

6.   "The Delicate Prey" by Paul Bowles.  Considerd one of his very best set in Morocco works 

7.   "My Own People" by Anzia Yezierska 1921

8.   "How I Found America" by Anzia Yezierska 1920

9.    "Sabine  Women" by Marcel Ayme

10.  "Domestic Peace" by Honore de Balzac 1828

11.  "The Thing in the Forest" by A. S. Byatt.  A very good story about two girls evacuated from London during the Blitz 

12.  "In Dark New England Days" by Sarah Orne Jewett - 1899 

Biographical Works I read in February 

1.  Grouch Marx. The Comedy of Existence by Lee Siegel

2.  The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham by Selina Hastings. Very rate work

3.  Rosamond Lehmann A Life by Selina Hastings  also a first rate biography

4.  Our Crowd The Great Jewish Families of New York by Stephen Birmingham. 

Novels I read in February 

1.  Human Acts by Han Kang. My first venture into Korean Modernism

2.  The Vegetarian by Han Kang.  A very powerful work

3.   Journey by Moonlight by Artal Szerb. His master work, a classic of Hungarian literature

4.  Dusty Answers by Rosamond Lehmann  her first novel

5.  An Invitation to the Waltz. By Rosamond Lehmann a pure delight

6.  My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout.  not bad

7.  Kathleen's Wish by Linda Lappin. Great work on the final years of Katherine Mansfield

8.  The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Jewett. A regional class, set in Maine. For sure worth reading

9.  The Memories of Barry Lyndon by William Thackarey  first read his Vanity Fair

10.  Memoirs of an Anti-Semite by Gregor Von Rezzori. Reread 

11.  La Place de Létoile by Patrick Modiano - part of The Occupation Trilogy 

I offer my great thanks to Max u for the Amazon gift cards.