The Lockdown Reading

I had been dreaming of something like this, long days at home with nothing to do except read all the time. So ever since the Lockdown began I have done exactly what I dreamt of except that I did not read all the time. I spent a major part of the day reading, though and have managed to read more than twenty eight books so far from March 23. Here is the list divided into two categories: Books that took me more than a couple of days to finish, and books I read in half a day.

1. ‘Something for the Pain’ by Gerald Murnane
2. ‘Principles of Literary Criticism’ by IA Richards- Boring
3. ‘The Long Firm’ by Jake Arnott
4. ‘Nine Faces of Kenya’ by Elspeth Huxley
5. ‘Our Kind of Traitor’ by John Le Carre
6. ‘The Dirty Life’ by Kristin Kimball
7. ‘Dear Life’ by Alice Munro
8. ‘The Secret Lovers’ by Charles McCarry
9. ‘A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again’ by David Foster Wallace
10. ‘Break, Blow, , Burn’ by Camilla Paglia
11. ‘Under the Dragon’ by Rory Maclean
12. ‘Everywhere I Look’ by Helen Garner
13. ‘The Old Forest and Other Stories’ by Peter Taylor
14. ‘And Why Not’ by Barry Norman
15. ‘Pyada’ by Surendra Mohan Pathan (Hindi)
16. ‘The Plains’ by Gerald Murnane

The Half Day Reads:
Since they were not more than two hundred pages I would sit down after lunch and finish these books before I went to sleep. I got the idea half way through or I would have read only those books I could finish in half a day from the beginning of the Lockdown.

1. ‘Sunday at the Pool in Kigali’ by Gil Courtemanche
2. ‘The Mystic Masseur’ by V.S. Naipaul
3. ‘This Side of Paradise’ by Scott F. Fitzgerald
4. ‘The Root of His Evil’ by James.M. Cain
5. ‘The Search Warrant’ by Patrick Modiano
6. ‘A Man, A Home, and A World’ by Jayakanthan S
7. ‘The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie’ by Muriel Spark
8. ‘Bullitt’ by Robert L. Pike
9. ‘Yakshi’ by Malayatoor Ramakrishnan
10. ‘The Bang Bang Birds’ by Adam Diment
11. ‘Tim’ by Colleen McCullough
12. ‘Samskara’ by U.R. Ananthamurthy

Still Reading
1. ‘Of Human Bondage’ by Somerset Maugham
2. ‘Trapped’ by Narendrapal Singh
3. ‘So Many Books So Little Time’ by Sara Nelson

I am glad I got read so many books. I enjoyed reading all these books except ‘Principles of Literary Criticism’ which was a tough read, and ‘Trapped’ by Narendrapal Singh that I have yet to finish is one of the most stupid books I’ve ever read, and I don’t know why I want to read it until the end. I reckon I will read another half a dozen books before the Lockdown ends here.