I'm trying to be more of a reader these days. I was a big reader growing up - and when I say big reader, I mean my mom would take me to the library every 2-3 weeks and I would leave with a stack - a stack - of books. I've forgotten a lot of books that I have read.

I take the J-Man to the library every couple of weeks - something I am hoping to change to weekly once story time kicks back up in September. Mr. T is getting a little more into reading at the ripe old age of one too, actually bringing me books from time to time and letting me read at least a page or two before he walks off. But J-Man is the reader - like me. Child heads to the library with an agenda, folks. A subject list, if you will, because we have to hit the juvenile section general to get the books he wants. This week the list included snakes, trains, and monster trucks. Two weeks ago it was reptiles and waterfalls.

Lately when I hit the library and try to look for a book for myself, I feel a little overwhelmed. I realized that I need to be more like the J-Man - I need an agenda. This week I realized that, despite my Spanish major with several Latin American/Spanish lit courses, I have never read Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude (nor Love in the Time of Cholera, which my small-town library also has). So I got it and I am about to start it once I finish this post.

But after that, what? I remembered my AP English teacher giving us a list of books to read; I Googled and found Time's top 100 All-Time Novels. I think I have read the following, so I have a lot of list left to cover:

• Animal Farm, George Orwell - read this sophomore year of high school. Can't really remember liking it. I am sure it's kicking around my folks' house somewhere.
• Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, Judy Blume - I remember this being such a big deal and being underwhelmed when I finally got around the checking it out at the library.
• Catch-22, Joseph Heller - I don't remember a lot about it, but I liked it...
• The Catcher in the Rye, J. D. Salinger - I remember when we read this in high school senior year. A lot of people were bothered by it. I related to it at the time in a big way.
• Gone With The Wind, Margaret Mitchell - it's a romance novel. I'm a little surprised it's on the list. But I liked it. Way more detailed than the movie.
• The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck - I had actually read East of Eden a few years before reading this in AP English. I like Steinbeck and Faulkner - if memory serves me right the writing was a bit more straightfoward.
• The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald - I was not impressed. Lots of folks love it though.
• The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers - I read this when I was about 12 and I don't remember a lot about it. I remember I liked it - need to put this on the re-read list.
• Lord of the Flies, William Golding - no comment
• The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien - out of the three books, I would not say this is the best. There's a lot of "on the road" business that gets old. However, I guess you gotta start with the beginning, and they are good fantasy. I've read them several times. I'm a dork.
• 1984, George Orwell - creepy.
• Slaughterhouse-Five - I think I liked it, but don't remember it.
• To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee - OK, so if Tucker had been a girl, he might have been a Harper. No joke. I love this book. I've read it many, many times and it's probably my all-time favorite.
• Wide Sargasso Sea - the Jane Eyre prequal. It was good, but I think I liked Jane Eyre better.

Anyone got any recommended reading for me? I am going to attempt to plug through this list, and maybe blog about it here.