Hallo, all!

The New York Times Notable Book Challenge was the brainchild of the brilliant Wendy at caribousmom, who proposed a personal (and later, group) challenge based on the New York Times'* annual list of Notable Books. In 2007, the challenge goes, choose a feasible number of books from the 2006 list that you would like to read over the course of the year (Wendy chose 20, like a champ) .

There is a certain distinctive beauty to this as a group challenge, I think. We are all choosing our challenge books from a relatively limited list, so there is considerable overlap (as well as room for inspiration and temptation to include previous unconsidered books in our annual reading). To take advantage of this, I thought it would be convenient to have a single, group blog where participants in the challenge can cross-post the blog entries and reviews that relate to the challenge, where those who are interested can find all these reviews in a single place, and where a central discussion can be fostered that will be in dialogue with our individual blogs.

If you already are participating in the challenge and would like to join this blog (or if you are new to the challenge but would like to join our illustrious ranks), please leave your email address in a note in the comments on this message, and I will drop you an invitation to become a co-author. If you would prefer not to post your email address publicly, you can leave it for me in a private message on the LibraryThing account I have created for this blog: NYTNotable. Be sure to click the button that says "private."

The LibraryThing account is also helpful because it includes all the books on our "long list," and you can use it to access all kinds of LibraryThing features relating to these books: all the reviews and ratings by fellow Thingers, discussions that mention these books in their forums, publication date, author websites, and a chance to examine what the libraries of those who have read or own these books look like.

To get things rolling, I will now head off to cross post a review of the only book I have read so far for the Challenge (my goal is 12): Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky. When you have joined, pop on over here and introduce yourself. Let us know what your challenge goals are, and be sure to post any reviews or comments you have accumulated over the first two months of the challenge.



* OK - here's a question relating to my ongoing obsession with the plural "'s". Is the possessive of "New York Times" "New York Times' " because the word "times" is plural, or "New York Times's" because the newspaper itself is singular?