The Big Read

I came across this list on Lori’s site. When I checked the BBC site for the Big Read, there was a disclaimer saying that the page was not being updated…..the list could be about 4 yrs old ..but I see so many nice books on that list..it is going to serve me as a list of “wantareads”. I did not use the list on her blog..I went to Big Read and got the list that is currently displayed on their page

Let’s see how many you have read from this list. This is what you do

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Underline the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list in your own Blog

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher

51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie

I have read 44 of the above…..I THINK I have read the Magician (sl no 89) and The Catcher in the Rye (sl no 15)..but am not too sure…so I guess it would not be fair to include them in my “I have read them” list

Necessity is the mother of Substitution

I know I have a tendency to desire things which are not within reach but the doilies made in finer thread have really fascinated me..and I wanted to make a few of the delicate beauties for myself..

I have piles of #10 thread, mostly the “unbranded, sold by the hank” kind which I had picked up at Lucknow, a couple of tiny balls of #20 and #40 (absolutely no colour choices and not enough for bigger doilies) and nothing in #30.

I know that the Cebelias and Altin Basaks are way beyond my purse, especially once you take into account the Rupee-Dollar conversion ratios and add the obscene amounts of S&H most companies charge.

I was so desperate to make a few lovely doilies in fine thread, I tired the one and only thread shop in Trivandrum, and to my misery I learnt that he did not stock #10, he did not stock anything other than cream and burgundy in Anchor#20 (the staple thread in most shops), he did not stock Anchor#40 (found easily in other states)….

In desperation I started my quest for substitutes….

I remembered that one of my online friends Dora from Greece used three strands of sewing thread for her doilies and she had said that the size you get is very similar to a #30.

And I came up with this doily using three strands of yellow sewing thread, I could do a lot to improve my tension ..but probably that is something that will come with practice.

Needless to say I have absolutely no control when it comes to adding to my stash..so even before I had tried out three strands of sewing thread I bought more ..just in case I came across an irresistible pattern with #30 thread

The one with the red label is the cotton and it has 800 mts to a spool..no yardage on the polyester..but I would guess around 2000mts.

A couple of weeks later I went back to the shop to pick up some of the #20 to add to an exchange puffy..and as he was totaling up the cost, I started questioning him about the different varieties he had on stock and if there was any hope of coming across #30 in India. To my surprise I learnt that he had #30..but not cotton and it was used for sewing upholstery. Unfortunately not many colours, though he has promised to get some of the gaudier (on upholstery) colours for me the next time the supplier visits him. The threads are on a cone and at Rs25/- per cone of 2000 mts very reasonably priced too. Needless to say I picked up most of the colours available.

Certainly not for the purist or the thread snobs….

I tried out a doily using size 30..not too sure if I like the end result..I made the smaller of the doilies called Doily Mat set No 7715 on the celtwich site.

I have received a couple of doilies on exchanges made with #30, the ones made by Barb and James look so delicate and feel great…..this does seem wispier in comparison.

I wanted a doily that had a bit more substance to it…

This time around I tried adding a strand of sewing thread ..and quite like the end result…it is not what I was aiming for, but it is certainly a technique I will be using again in future. The doily is again from the celtwich site – White Note doily.

The difference is visible when you see the doilies side by side, I have also placed the spool of thread that I used in the frame so that the colour variations on adding the sewing thread are more obvious. I love the way the drab colour changes with the addition of sewing thread.