Hi Clubbers! How’s the reading going? Check in with the group below!
Tell us about your project — or you! Introduce yourself. Chat.
Tell us what you’ve read, how you’re feeling about your progress, how much you love the classics or the community — any struggles, a favorite read so far. Really, whatever you feel like sharing!
Some people prefer writing an update at their own blog and linking it here in the comments. That’s fine, too.
Feel free to respond to one another in the comments below — ask questions, visit each other, tell us you are new to the club, planning to join the club — etc. This is a meet and greet.
If you’re having trouble with your list and need encouragement, say that! That’s understandable. We want new classics readers to join us, so there’s nothing wrong with arriving to this thread with all of the newness showing!
(Please also note the “check-in” feature here is entirely voluntarily, intended for those who like weighing in with others in the group, and having a periodic place to reflect upon goals for the club. For some this feature would feel like an unwanted intrusion. Silent participation in this group is of course welcome!)
Thanks for all of your enthusiasm about this project!
New? Introduce yourself to the group on Twitter using hashtag #ccintroductions @ourclassicsclub. You can also introduce yourself here at the blog. 🙂
Twitter hashtag for reading check-ins: #ccreadingupdate
Note that if you’re on Twitter, you can also tweet your latest classic book reviews to the group using hashtag #ccbookreviews.
The Classics Club 
Approaching halfway of An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser. I’m totally captivated, but sort of dreading the end. It does have “Tragedy” right there in the title.
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This is a book I know nothing about beyond the title. Hope I catch your review of it!
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I generally have a number of books on the go at once but only now have I realised I’m currently reading 4 from my classics club list! Right now I’m working through The Sorrows of Young Werther by Goethe, which is the oldest book on my list. I’m also about half way through The Periodic Table by Primo Levi. As a collection of short stories it’s easily read in sections and I’m going slowly. On my kindle I’m reading Rainbow Valley by Lucy M Montgomery. Whilst not as good as the earlier Anne books, I want to have read the full series so I shall persist. It’s nice fare at the end of a long day. And finally I’m reading Confusion By Elizabeth Jane Howard which is a much-loved re-read (and not officially a ‘classic’ as it’s not quite 25 years old yet). I shall feel very virtuous when I can mark all four books as read!
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I’ve just started The Home and the World by Tagore – a readalong with @cirtnecce – still time to join in if you want to 😊
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I’m still in the early stages of Middlemarch, which I’m enjoying more than I anticipated – I’m finding Mary Ann to be hilarious. I keep getting distracted by easier reads and young adult fiction, though, which is not helping my progress.
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I am still plodding along in OUT OF AFRICA. I loved the movie and the books by Beryl Markham written around the same time but I am finding the pace to be rather plodding. Sigh.
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I also had difficulty with that book and with the writing of Isak Dineson in general. I’m not certain what it is, really. I am too old to plod, however, and if I don’t get on with a book after about 50 pages I have a no-fault divorce with it.
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I’m in Paradise with Dante. Much less interesting that the 2 I read just before that, Inferno and Purgatorio. After that, I’ll go with a shorter classic, probably A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin.
only recently did I discover I had turned off email notifications, do I was never receiving the group check-ins and the spins!
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Hello! I am brand new here and my blog is at http://www.gubbinal.com
My classics project is outlined in my blog. Right now I am reading the works of Sinclair Lewis. It’s great to see how he swiftly developed as an author. I often reread poetry and I’ve been blogging about some of my favorite poets: I am not entirely certain when a poet can be called “classic” but these ones are classics to me.
I am looking forward to “The Aspern Papers,” by Henry James, which is a real-along in a Good Reads group. And I just finished the magnificent albeit flawed (to some minds, not mine) “The Good Soldier” by Ford Madox Ford for another reading group.
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I am reading the “Elsie Dinsmore” series. They are considered classics[I am not sure I agree because they are not exactly on a par with the likes of “Little Women”, etc.]. I never read them as a child.
Marilyn
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I read some of those. They are really pretty maudlin and overdone. Not on a par with Little Women, or Anne Shirley at all, are they?
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Slowly working through the Faerie Queene. Got stalled on History of the Franks, but not because I wasn’t enjoying it, so I’m going to get going on that again now that I’ve finished some other books.
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Good for you. The Faerie Queene is great stuff although the first couple of books are more riveting than the rest, if I recall correctly.
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For any readers interested in Jean Rhys, I’ll be co-hosting a Jean Rhys Reading Week from 12-18th September. All participants welcome. There’s some information about it in our announcement post (link below) with further info to follow this weekend. Eric Karl Anderson (of the Lonesome Reader blog) will be co-hosting with me.
https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2016/05/22/announcing-jean-rhys-reading-week-12th-18th-september-2016/
For those of you who use GoodReads, we’ve just set up a group area within the site, link below.
https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/194545-jean-rhys-reading-week
Do join in if you are interested.
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I am currently reading Alexander’s Bridge by Willa Cather. The classic before this was The Little Prince — a re-read back in Feb/March.
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My last classic read was Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne and I’ve just started reading The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexandre Dumas.
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I haven’t read either. I should like to read The Man in the Iron Mask, considering I absolutely love Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo.
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