Apparently Japanese has a word which means a book or pile of books which has remained unread in the corner of your room for a certain length of time.
Back in April, I pulled all my unread books off the shelves and stacked them in a corner of the room. It was supposed to encourage me to read them. Unfortunately, I’m just as capable of ignoring a massive pile of books as I am when they’re all on the shelves.
I think I’ve only reduced it by a handful, and it’s even easier to ignore since adding to my eBook library. I mean, neither of these were in the pile when I read them. Or first gathered the pile.
The Travelling Cat Chronicles, by Hiro Arikawa (trans. Philip Gabriel)
Stray cat Nana is on a road-trip with his adopted owner Satoru. He doesn’t know where they’re going, but he’s happy to be along for the ride.
Told partly from Nana’s perspective, I fell for Nana from the first page. He talks just how I imagine a cat would talk if we understood them. Affectionate stand-offishness, with a bit of snark thrown in. This isn’t a long book – only 256 pages – but having started this as a bed-time read, I didn’t put it down until I got to the end in the early hours of the morning. It was emotionally very exhausting, though.
The Long Divorce, by Edmund Crispin
The inhabitants of the village Cotton Abbas have recently been receiving anonymous letters, airing the sorts of dark secrets and dirty laundry that get whispered about but not openly discussed. With the local police stumped, Gervase Fen is summoned to investigate. And then there’s a suicide, followed by a murder…
I chose this because I enjoyed The Gilded Fly, but The Long Divorce wasn’t as amusing. It felt like there was a lack of Fen, really.
Life Ever Crafting 
I loved the Travelling Cat Chronicle, I cried my eyes out!
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Same!
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Interesting. I have a pile beside my bed and my husband actually commented the other day that it’s gone down a bit – had a bit of a reading fest the last couple of weeks! I spy on your pile The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden – that’s still on my pile. I loved Joanne Harris, The Lollipop Shoes, read that a few years ago. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, sorry to say it wasn’t a great read for me – a good friend loved it though, so not saying don’t read it. Have fun diving into that pile .. oh so many books, so little time eh?
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My pile has been this size since about April – I keep finding books to jump the queue! Definitely too little time.
I’ve had Captain Corelli’s Mandolin on the pile for ages – I have this feeling that I’ll probably have a similar reaction, which is why I haven’t read it yet! It’s one of those I feel I ought to have read.
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It could be like my ‘battle’ with Gone with the Wind many years ago – a book I felt I ‘ought’ to read (though have seen the epic movie). I eventually did get onto the book and I loved it, but I put it off time and time again.
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But you got there in the end (I haven’t read Gone with the Wind. Or seen the film, though). I had that struggle with Lord of the Ring, and only read it because I needed to for a class. I’d probably still be putting it off if I hadn’t.
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