It's Monday...and it's Winter!

Whilst browsing twitter this weekend, I spotted a comment from Sarah (@Sarah Reads Too Much) about joining in #20booksofsummer at Cathy @746 Books.

I love these kinds of challenges even though I usually fail them abysmally! 

For instance, I challenged myself to read a selection of cosy autumnal books back in March. I only had 10 books on the list...and sadly, I only read one of them...and that ended up being a DNF! But I still have a week to go before that list officially finishes - perhaps I will knock over one more title in that time (ba ha ha!!)

So why am I drawn to writing up lists and challenges that I so often fail?

Why do I love making a list and a deadline only to watch them go sailing by?

My eagerness to join in Cathy's challenge has got me wondering and thinking.

What is it that makes lists, especially book lists, so attractive to me?

I've decide there are multiple factors at play.

My TBR pile is seriously out of control. Making lists helps me feel virtuous about addressing this problem. I feel a sense of power as I create order out of chaos!

Going through my stacks to compile the lists also helps me to rediscover what lovely surprises are lurking at the bottom. The occasional dead cockroach is not such a lovely surprise though!

I love crossing things off my lists. The sense of accomplishment with each tick is intoxicating. Being able to run a huge line through a completed list is heady stuff indeed (yeah, I know, I probably need to get out more!)

As a lifelong, slightly obsessive listographer it's actually a deeply ingrained habit. Blame my genetics or upbringing...whatever...lists are in my blood!

Finally, book lists have become a very cyber-social thing ever since I started blogging. I love being in a community of fellow bookoholics and listographers. I always end up adding to my wishlist (another list!) with every list challenge I read.

So here I go again with another book list (& a quickly devised Southern Hemisphere badge of moi rugged up for last winter).

Obviously I live on the other side of the world & in a different hemisphere to Cathy and Sarah. So my list has been retitled #20booksofwinter for any fellow Aussie, NZ-er's, Polynesian, South African, South American, Antartican bloggers out there.

Since the main aim of this list is to be practical and do-able. I will start with those books already half-started (or is that half-finished?)

1. Gone With the Wind (for Corinne's readalong)
2. You're Still Hot to Me by Jean Kittson
3. Coming of Age: Growing Up Muslim in Australia (shortlisted for this years CBCA)

Next up are three Vietnamese based books that I've collected since our holiday there at Easter.

4. Man by Kim Thuy
5. A Good Scent From a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler (also a 1993 Pulitzer Prize winner so I can cross this book off two lists!)
6. The Book of Salt by Monique Truong

A few slim volumes and easy reads to keep this list manageable.

7. The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide (in readiness for Dolce Bellezza's Japanese Literature Challenge).
8. The Summer Book by Tove Jansson (to link me to Cathy's original idea :-)
9. Springtime by Michelle de Kretser
10. Remarkably Jane by Jennifer Adams (getting ready for Adam's Austen in August)
11. Miles Off Course by Gentill Sulari (third book in the Rowland Sinclair cosy crime series).

A couple more CBCA shortlisted titles

12. Nona and Me by Clare Atkins
13. The Protected by Claire Zorn

A few new releases

14. The Anchoress by Robyn Cadwallader
15. One Life by Kate Grenville
16. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
17. Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick Dewitt

To finish up, a few classic reads and rereads...

18. Watership Down by Richard Adams
19. Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte (to fit in with Allie's Victorian Celebration)
20. Emma by Jane Austen (a reread also for Austen in August)

On standby are 10 lovely tempting Penguin Little Black Classics, mostly poetry, just in case!

What will you be reading this season?
Do you feel compelled to compile a list?