Share-a-Tea 2018 Reading Challenge

The Summary

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challenge post on Becky's Book Reviews

1 January – 31 December 2018

My Teatime Reads of the Year

December has arrived and there isn’t much left of 2018. Since these happen to be the busiest days of the year, I reckon that I won’t be able to add any more books to this list for Becky’s Share-a-Tea 2018 Reading Challenge before we start the new cycle of months. It’s true that every day I’m having tea – kukicha from Japan, Longjing from China, occasionally infusions of rooibos, of fruit blends, or of medicinal herbs to treat some ailment –, but now I prefer to experience it with all my senses much in the zen way. A book would only be a distraction, however much I use to enjoy reading in general.

In the end, I compiled the following list of twelve books that I read for the greater part with a pot of hot tea or infusion on the table by my side. I discussed most of them here on Edith’s Miscellany during the course of the year, but I also put on my list a novel by my Italian writer friend Marina Di Domenico, an Austrian classic that I’d like to present one day, and the French classic by Voltaire that served David Allan Cates as model for X Out of Wonderland that I reviewed.

• Maria Àngels Anglada: The Auschwitz Violin (1994), original Catalan title: El violí d’Auschwitz
• Marina Di Domenico: La bibliotecaria (2018)
• Jeannie Ebner: Der Königstiger (1959)
• Jenny Erpenbeck: Go, Went, Gone (2015), original German title: Gehen, ging, gegangen
• Elisabeth von Heyking: The Letters Which Never Reached Him (1903), original German title: Briefe, die ihn nicht erreichten
• Rolf Lappert: The Islands of the Dying Light (2010), original German title: Auf den Inseln des letzten Lichts
• Robert Ludlum: The Road to Gandolfo (1975)
• François Mauriac: Vipers’ Tangle (1932), original French title: Le Nœud de vipères
• Nicholas Monsarrat: The Kappillan of Malta (1973)
• Mazo de la Roche: Jalna (1927)
• Rabindranath Tagore: The Home and the World (1916), original Bengali title: ঘরে বাইরে
• Voltaire: Candide ou l’optimisme (1759)