ARCs TBR and the ARC Reading Challenge

This is sooooo embarrassing. But they say confession is good for the soul, right? So I'm 'fessing up to this huge backlog of ARCs I've got staring me in the face right now. I actually have books from a couple of years ago that I never got around to reading. For a while I thought "why bother?" – but that's the coward's way out, don't you think? And anyway, I feel I really owe it to the authors and publishers for sending me all those free books. So this year I'm pulling my socks up, putting on my big girl panties (and trotting out any other cliches I can come up with), and taking a real stab at reducing that humiliating stack.


And, apropos, I'm going to sign up for Teddy Rose's ARC Reading Challenge, if it's not too late. I'm signing up at the Bronze Level, which means I have to read and review at least twelve of the books on my list. I'll be starting with the most recent books, and then I'll go back and try to get the older ones read. It's almost certain that I won't get through all of these in a year's time, what with all my other reading commitments, but I'm going to give it my best shot (see - I did manage to find one more nice cliche). I'll be updating my progress throughout the year on my Challenge Blog.

And here's my list of ARCs to be read. More from 2008 than from last year. I did a little better in 2009, for some reason.

• Published in 2008
  Descartes' Bones. Russell Shorto
  The Glister. John Burnside
  The Heretic's Daughter. Kathleen Kent
  One More Year: Stories. Sana Krasikov
  Shadow of Colossus (A Seven Wonders Novel). T.L. Higley
  Stealing Athena. Karen Essex
  Stone Creek. Victoria Lustbader
  The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher. Kate Summerscale
  Tethered. Amy MacKinnon
  
  
• Published in 2009
  Angels of Destruction. Keith Donohue
  The Atlantis Revelation. Thomas Greanias
  The Manual of Detection. Jedediah Berry
  The Rapture. Liz Jensen
  Stone's Fall. Iain Pears
  
  
• Published in 2010
  The Brontes Went to Woolworths. Rachel Ferguson (reading now)
  Heresy. S.J. Parris
  The Swimming Pool. Holly LeCraw