Books Ive Read So Far This Year 2003
Explore my 2003 reading journey with this curated list of books I've read this year. Discover top picks, hidden gems, and must-read titles from my personal collection.
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Oliver Twist
by Charles Dickens
A gripping portrayal of London's dark criminal underbelly, published in Penguin Classics with an introduction by Philip Horne. The story of Oliver Twist - orphaned, and set upon by evil and adversity from his first breath - shocked readers when it was published. After running away from the workhouse and pompous beadle Mr Bumble, Oliver finds himself lured into a den of thieves peopled by vivid and memorable characters - the Artful Dodger, vicious burglar Bill Sikes, his dog Bull's Eye, and prostitute Nancy, all watched over by cunning master-thief Fagin. Combining elements of Gothic Romance, the Newgate Novel and popular melodrama, Dickens created an entirely new kind of fiction, scathing in its indictment of a cruel society, and pervaded by an unforgettable sense of threat and mystery. This Penguin Classics edition of Oliver Twist is the first critical edition to faithfully reproduce the text as its earliest readers would have encountered it from its serialisation in Bentley's Miscellany, and includes an introduction by Philip Horne, a glossary of Victorian thieves' slang, a chronology of Dickens's life, a map of contemporary London and all of George Cruikshank's original illustrations. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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Robinson Crusoe
by Daniel Defoe
On a desolate tropical island, a shipwrecked British seaman tries to master his hostile environment and remain civilized.
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His Dark Materials Trade Paper Boxed Set (Golden Compass, Subtle Knife, Amber Spyglass)
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Tropic of Cancer
by Henry Miller
The account of a young writer and his friends in free-wheeling Paris.
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Tropic of Capricorn
by Henry Miller
A vicious social commentary of the times and culture of the 1920's New York City.
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The Castle
by Franz Kafka
From the author of The Metamorphosis and The Trial—one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century—the haunting tale of K.’s relentless, unavailing struggle with an inscrutable authority in order to gain access to the Castle. Translated and with a preface by Mark Harman. Arriving in a village to take up the position of land surveyor for the mysterious lord of a castle, the character known as K. finds himself in a bitter and baffling struggle to contact his new employer and go about his duties. The Castle's original manuscript was left unfinished by Kafka in 1922 and not published until 1926, two years after his death. Scrupulously following the fluidity and breathlessness of the sparsely punctuated original manuscript, Mark Harman’s new translation reveals levels of comedy, energy, and visual power previously unknown to English language readers.
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The Journey to the East
by Hermann Hesse
In simple, mesmersizing prose, Hesse tells of a journey both geographic and spiritual, as various historical figures travel together, encountering everything from Noah's Ark to Don Quixote.
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The Idiot
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Revealing Dostoevsky's acute artistic sense and penetrating psychological insight, this new translation is meticulously faithful to the original.
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The Once and Future King
by T. H. White
T. H. White’s masterful retelling of the saga of King Arthur is a fantasy classic as legendary as Excalibur and Camelot, and a poignant story of adventure, romance, and magic that has enchanted readers for generations. Once upon a time, a young boy called “Wart” was tutored by a magician named Merlyn in preparation for a future he couldn’t possibly imagine. A future in which he would ally himself with the greatest knights, love a legendary queen and unite a country dedicated to chivalrous values. A future that would see him crowned and known for all time as Arthur, King of the Britons. During Arthur’s reign, the kingdom of Camelot was founded to cast enlightenment on the Dark Ages, while the knights of the Round Table embarked on many a noble quest. But Merlyn foresaw the treachery that awaited his liege: the forbidden love between Queen Guenever and Lancelot, the wicked plots of Arthur’s half-sister Morgause and the hatred she fostered in Mordred that would bring an end to the king’s dreams for Britain—and to the king himself. “[The Once and Future King] mingles wisdom, wonderful, laugh-out-loud humor and deep sorrow—while telling one of the great tales of the Western world.”—Guy Gavriel Kay
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The Sea Wolf
by Jack London
The Sea Wolf is Jack London’s powerful and gripping saga of Humphrey Van Weyden, captured by a seal-hunting ship and now an unwilling sailor under its dreaded captain, Wolf Larsen. The men who sailed with Larsen were treacherous outcasts, but the captain himself was the legendary Sea Wolf–a violent brute of a man. Jack London was a worshipper of the strong and virtuous hero, and a firm believer in the inevitable triumph of good. The master storyteller nowhere demonstrates this theme more vividly than in this classic American tale of peril and adventure, good and evil.
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The Sins of the Fathers
by Lawrence Block
The pretty young prostitute is dead. Her alleged murderer—a minister's son—hanged himself in his jail cell. The case is closed. But the dead girl's fatherhas come to Matthew Scudder for answers, sending the unlicensed private investigator in search of terrible truths about a life that was lived and lost in a sordid world of perversion and pleasures.
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Eight Million Ways to Die
by Lawrence Block
Nobody knows better than Matthew Scudder how far down a person can sink in this city. A young prostitute named Kim knew it also—and she wanted out. Maybe Kim didn't deserve the life fate had dealt her. She surely didn't deserve her death. The alcoholic ex-cop turned p.i. was supposed to protect her, but someone slashed her to ribbons on a crumbling New York City waterfront pier. Now finding Kim's killer will be Scudder's penance. But there are lethal secrets hiding in the slain hooker's past that are far dirtier than her trade. And there are many ways of dying in this cruel and dangerous town—some quick and brutal ... and some agonizingly slow.
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