Choose - an experiment

[And now, for my next gimmick...]

I'm going on holiday on July 4th for two and a half weeks with some friends - my parents are a little bit envious :) Part of my packing - probably a large part of my packing - will consist of books because I read an awful lot on holiday. Last year on holiday I read:

• Gone With The Wind (1024 pages)
• About half of In Search Of Schrödinger's Cat (started before I went on holiday - say 150 pages)
• From Here To Infinity (322 pages)
• QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter (176 pages)
• The Rich Are Different (704 pages)
• Sins of the Fathers (720 pages)
• The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy (160 pages)
• Northern Lights (416 pages)
• The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (192 pages)
• Life, the Universe and Everything (162 pages)
• So Long,and Thanks for All the Fish (192 pages)
• The Subtle Knife (352 pages)
• The Amber Spyglass (560 pages)
• Mostly Harmless (240 pages)

Grand total of 5,370 pages in two weeks, which is a lot more than I was expecting when I started this entry. But I digress.

The point is that I get through a lot of books when I'm on holiday (although to be fair, my rate of reading was probably increased by the fact that I'd read most of those books before). And although I have a huge number of books that I'm waiting to read to choose from, I am very indecisive about these things. I'm currently reading The Once And Future King because I asked someone for a random number between 1 and 50ish and then went down my list to find the corresponding book. I rely on recommendations.

And that's where you come in.

For the next four weeks I'm going to put it to all of you to choose my holiday reading material for me. Voting from the list, naturally, with a few additional clauses:

1. I'm taking Gone With The Wind. Ever since I read it five times in one year I've limited myself to reading it only once a year, and this has sort of resolved into me reading it on holiday each year.
2. I'm taking Fight Club as well, because I said I would :)
3. It's fairly certain that no one's going to vote for The Serenth Tree or Blade of Serenthis because they're as yet unpublished. Written by a friend and former English teacher of mine. I have them printed out, though, and I'm going to give them one vote each right now.
4. This probably won't come up (and it's a fairly obvious clause anyway), but I won't take a sequel without the first one. So if Children Of Dune makes it into the final results but Dune Messiah doesn't, I'll take both or neither.
5. Vote for as many books as you like, no restrictions, taking into consideration that I'll want at least 12-15 books overall.
6. Recommendations of books not on the list (and hence not in my room) are warmly welcomed - I'm always looking out for new books - but bear in mind that I probably won't get the chance to buy the book in question before I leave.

I think that covers it... I'll also throw in some books that aren't on my books page because although they're not actively waiting to be read I wouldn't object to reading them again next month. And I'm not including No One Told No One by Danny Kodicek or Down And Out In The Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow because I was planning on reading them as downloaded files rather than printing them out (or buying it, in the latter case... I will if I want to reread it, though).

On with the list - oh, and I apologise if you want to check them out on Amazon. Most of them are on my main books page though if you want to look, with links and everything! But it's already taken long enough to put the list together, so in the interest of going to bed this side of midnight, I've decided to leave that little bit of extra legwork to you. Sorry.

*drumroll*

• Spellsinger - Alan Dean Foster
• Foundation - Isaac Asimov
• Look To Windward - Iain M. Banks
• Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
• The Silmarillion - JRR Tolkien
• Titus Groan - Mervyn Peake
• Gormenghast - Mervyn Peake
• Titus Alone - Mervyn Peake
• Dragonflight - Anne McCaffrey
• Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
• Lost In A Good Book - Jasper Fforde
• The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler
• Sleepers - Lorenzo Carcaterra
• The Tombs Of Atuan - Ursula le Guin
• The Farthest Shore - Ursula le Guin
• Tehanu - Ursula le Guin
• The Silence Of The Lambs - Thomas Harris
• Disclosure - Michael Crichton
• L.A. Confidential - James Ellroy
• Primal Fear - William Diehl
• The Godfather - Mario Puzo
• Enigma - Robert Harris
• Animal Farm - George Orwell
• The Serenth Tree - Beverley Hipkin
• Blade Of Serenthis - Beverley Hipkin
• Ghosts - Paul Auster
• The Locked Room - Paul Auster
• Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
• The Illustrated Man - Ray Bradbury
• The Quantity Theory Of Insanity - Will Self
• Les Aéronautes - Terry Pratchett
• The Deeper Meaning Of Liff - Douglas Adams, John Lloyd
• Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman
• McCarthy's Bar - Pete McCarthy
• The Man In The High Castle - Philip K. Dick
• An Equal Music - Vikram Seth
• A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
• 2001: A Space Odyssey - Arthur C. Clarke
• Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick
• The Secret History - Donna Tartt
• Einstein's Dreams - Alan P. Lightman
• Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë
• Dune Messiah - Frank Herbert
• Children Of Dune - Frank Herbert
• The Player Of Games - Iain M. Banks
• The Tesseract - Alex Garland
• Dreamcatcher - Stephen King
• The Dispossessed - Ursula K. le Guin
• Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency - Douglas Adams
• The Long Dark Teatime Of The Soul - Douglas Adams
• Of Mice And Men - John Steinback
• Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
• The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett
• The Light Fantastic - Terry Pratchett
• Equal Rites - Terry Pratchett
• Mort - Terry Pratchett
• Sourcery - Terry Pratchett
• Wyrd Sisters - Terry Pratchett
• Pyramids - Terry Pratchett
• Guards! Guards! - Terry Pratchett
• Eric - Terry Pratchett
• Moving Pictures - Terry Pratchett
• Reaper Man - Terry Pratchett
• Witches Abroad - Terry Pratchett
• Small Gods - Terry Pratchett
• Lords and Ladies - Terry Pratchett
• Men at Arms - Terry Pratchett
• Soul Music - Terry Pratchett
• Interesting Times - Terry Pratchett
• Maskerade - Terry Pratchett
• Feet of Clay - Terry Pratchett
• Hogfather - Terry Pratchett
• Jingo - Terry Pratchett
• The Last Continent - Terry Pratchett
• Carpe Jugulum - Terry Pratchett
• The Fifth Elephant - Terry Pratchett
• The Truth - Terry Pratchett
• Thief Of Time - Terry Pratchett
• The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents - Terry Pratchett
• Night Watch - Terry Pratchett
• The Wee Free Men - Terry Pratchett
• The Alchymist's Cat - Robin Jarvis
• The Oaken Throne - Robin Jarvis
• Thomas - Robin Jarvis
• The Brethren - John Grisham
• Good Omens - Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett
• American Gods - Neil Gaiman
• Wild Swans - Jung Chang
• Northern Lights - Philip Pullman
• The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman
• The Amber Spyglass - Philip Pullman
• The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams
• The Restaurant at the End of the Universe - Douglas Adams
• Life, the Universe and Everything - Douglas Adams
• So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish - Douglas Adams
• Mostly Harmless - Douglas Adams

And remember, I am relying on your votes and suggestions. Given the very large number of books there, I'll need a fairly large number of votes to make it in any way fair. So, this is an appeal: If you comment here regularly or semi-regularly, I want to hear from you. If you read my blog regularly or semi-regularly, I want to hear from you. If you haven't commented here before, make this your first comment! If you've stumbled across my site by accident, cast your vote anyway. You never know, it might be fun to try and influence the life of a complete stranger...

Spread the word, plug it on your own blog, whatever... I'd like as many people as possible to dictate my holiday reading material to me. (Er. That is to say, 'dictating' in the sense of 'issuing orders or commands'. I don't want the whole lot of you standing around and dictating 5,000+ pages of fiction to me.)

It's down to you now!

[Hoping everyone responds... this'll look quite foolish in the archives if I only get two comments!]