For someone who studied English, I have a pretty long list of books I've never read. Although, I also have a long list of books I have read that you've probably never heard of, and I would not recommend them for light reading. Last year I made a list of books that I needed to read that year, and never got around to it. Some of them you would probably see and say, "But, Melissa, didn't you have to read that in high school?" There were a lot of books I was suppose to read. Suppose to. But, thanks to
Cliff Hillegass and his trusty notes, I graduated high school and rarely read a whole novel. So here I am, six years later, with a degree in English and plans to get a Master's in the subject, yet there is a whole pile of books that have been left unopened.
So, using my list from last year, I have created the Canon of 2011 Reading Material. This list currently contains 40 books. That's basically one book every .975 weeks or 6.8 days. It sounds reasonable, but I am a horribly slow reader; I just never got the hang of speed reading. Here are a few books on my list. (Once again, a lot of them are books I should have read years ago, but never did.) Needless to say, I have a lot of work ahead of me.
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I had a really bad experience with Steinbeck in high school and never wanted to read him again. I am, however, taking my sister's word that he is America's greatest novelist and giving him another try.
