Reading Like Rory

There is a show that has not been on television for six years that still appears regularly on television (as in every single day) and is still quoted, dissected, and obsessed over. Of course I'm talking about the sassy and smart Gilmore Girls, a show about a mother and daughter living in the small Connecticut town of Stars Hollow, along with a crazy cast of characters.
If you've never heard of it, watch it now. But only if you like fast talkers, intelligent writing, and fabulous in-jokes. You need to be well-read to keep up, because where else would you hear tossed-in jokes about Sylvia Plath, Pushkin, and the proper way to pronounce culs-de-sac (yes, that is correct).
I have seen each episode about 1,000 times, and my best friend and I still dream of living in Stars Hollow. I am not embarrassed to say that I even achieved a perfect score on a Gilmore pop quiz.
There have been many recent articles online about Gilmore Girls, due to the rabid fan base the show still has, and because of the fame that three of its stars have achieved since the show went off the air: Lauren Graham (author of a great new book and star on Parenthood), Alexis Bledel (of Traveling Pants fame, and lately featured in a racy cameo on Mad Men), and Melissa McCarthy (all over the place thanks to her show-stealing turn in Bridesmaids).
The best Gilmore posts I've seen include one about the number of calories consumed by the hamburger-and-coffee obsessed Girls (close to 4,000!), and the Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge.
The character of Rory was a girl after my own heart, lugging ungodly amounts of books from stop to stop, and obsessively reading whenever and wherever. And one blogger out there has not only counted every book Rory read (over 300), but has set out on a quest to read them all. That's mind-blowing. I might think about that challenge, but I'm not sure I can subject myself to Proust again. On second thought, I think I've already read more of the books than I realized.
Rory's list contains the expected high school syllabus of required reading, mixed in with biographies of everyone from punks to politicians, as well as terrific tomes by Sue Grafton, Stephen King, JK Rowling, and David Sedaris.
If you're up for it, here is the full list of Rory's books - I put check marks next to the ones I've already read, and highlighted those that are reviewed on this blog. Good luck.

1.) 1984 by George Orwell 
2.) The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain 
3.) Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll 
4.) The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon 
5.) An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser 
6.) Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt 
7.) Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy 
8.) Anne Frank: The Diary of a YoungGirl by Anne Frank ✓
9.) Archidamian War by Donald Kagan
10.) The Art of Fiction by Henry James 
11.) The Art of War by Sun Tzu
12.) As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner 
13.) Atonement by Ian McEwan 
14.) Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy
15.) The Awakening by Kate Chopin 
16.) Babe by Dick King-Smith
17.) Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi 
18.) Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie 
19.) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
20.) The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath 
21.) Beloved by Toni Morrison 
22.) Beowulf: A New Verse Translation by Seamus Heaney (RIP, Mr. Heaney) ✓ 
23.) The Bhagava Gita 
24.) The Bielski Brothers: The True Story of Three Men Who Defied the Nazis, Built a Village in the Forest, and Saved 1,200 Jews by Peter Duffy
25.) Bitch in Praise of Difficult Women by Elizabeth Wurtzel 
26.) A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays by Mary McCarthy 
27.) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley 
28.) Brick Lane by Monica Ali 
29.) Bridgadoon by Alan Jay Lerner
30.) Candide by Voltaire 
31.) The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer 
32.) Carrie by Stephen King 
33.) Catch-22 by Joseph Heller 
34.) The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger 
35.) Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White 
36.) The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman 
37.) Christine by Stephen King 
38.) A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens 
39.) A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess 
40.) The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse 
41.) The Collected Stories by Eudora Welty 
42.) A Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare 
43.) Complete Novels by Dawn Powell
44.) The Complete Poems by Anne Sexton 
45.) Complete Stories by Dorothy Parker (fun in-joke here) 
46.) A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole 
47.) The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas 
48.) Cousin Bette by Honore de Balzac
49.) Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky 
50.) The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber 
51.) The Crucible by Arthur Miller 
52.) Cujo by Stephen King 
53.) The Curious Incident of the Dogin the Night-Time by Mark Haddon ✓
54.) Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
55.) David and Lisa by Dr Theodore Issac Rubin M.D
56.) David Copperfield by Charles Dickens 
57.) The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (Ugh) 
58.) Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol 
59.) Demons by Fyodor Dostoyevsky 
60.) Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller 
61.) Deenie by Judy Blume 
62.) The Devil in the White City:Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson 
63.) The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band by Tommy Lee, Vince Neil, Mick Mars and Nikki Sixx
64.) The Divine Comedy by Dante 
65.) The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells 
66.) Don Quixote by Cervantes 
67.) Driving Miss Daisy by Alfred Uhrv 
68.) Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson 
69.) Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe 
70.) Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook 
71.) The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
72.) Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn
73.) Eloise by Kay Thompson 
74.) Emily the Strange by Roger Reger 
75.) Emma by Jane Austen 
76.) Empire Falls by Richard Russo 
77.) Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol 
78.) Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton 
79.) Ethics by Spinoza
80.) Europe through the Back Door, 2003 by Rick Steves (diff edition) 
81.) Eva Luna by Isabel Allende
82.) Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer 
83.) Extravagance by Gary Krist
84.) Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury 
85.) Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore 
86.) The Fall of the Athenian Empire by Donald Kagan
87.) Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World by Greg Critser
88.) Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
89.) The Fellowship of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien 
90.) Fiddler on the Roof by Joseph Stein 
91.) The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
92.) Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce 
93.) Fletch by Gregory McDonald 
94.) Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes 
95.) The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem
96.) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand 
97.) Frankenstein by Mary Shelley 
98.) Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger 
99.) Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers 
100.) Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
101.) Gender Trouble by Judith Butler
102.) George W. Bushism: The Slate Book of the Accidental Wit and Wisdom of our 43rd President by Jacob Weisberg
103.) Gidget by Fredrick Kohner 
104.) Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen 
105.) The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
106.) The Godfather: Book 1 by Mario Puzo 
107.) The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy 
108.) Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Alvin Granowsky 
109.) Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell 
110.) The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford
111.) The Gospel According to Judy Bloom 
112.) The Graduate by Charles Webb
113.) The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck 
114.) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 
115.) Great Expectations by Charles Dickens 
116.) The Group by Mary McCarthy 
117.) Hamlet by William Shakespeare 
118.) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling 
119.) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling 
120.) A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
121.) Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad 
122.) Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry 
123.) Henry IV, part I by William Shakespeare 
124.) Henry IV, part II by William Shakespeare 
125.) Henry V by William Shakespeare 
126.) High Fidelity by Nick Hornby 
127.) The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon 
128.) Holidays on Ice: Stories by David Sedaris 
129.) The Holy Barbarians by Lawrence Lipton
130.) House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III 
131.) The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
132.) How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer
133.) How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss 
134.) How the Light Gets in by M. J. Highland
135.) Howl by Allen Ginsberg 
136.) The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo 
137.) The Iliad by Homer 
138.) I’m with the Band by Pamela des Barres 
139.) In Cold Blood by Truman Capote 
140.) Inferno by Dante 
141.) Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee 
142.) Iron Weed by William J. Kennedy
143.) It Takes a Village by Hillary Clinton 
144.) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte 
145.) The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan 
146.) Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare 
147.) The Jumping Frog by Mark Twain 
148.) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair 
149.) Just a Couple of Days by Tony Vigorito
150.) The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the Last Tsar by Robert Alexander 
151.) Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain 
152.) The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini 
153.) Lady Chatterleys’ Lover by D. H. Lawrence 
154.) The Last Empire: Essays 1992-2000 by Gore Vidal
155.) Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman 
156.) The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield
157.) Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis 
158.) Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
159.) Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken 
160.) Life of Pi by Yann Martel 
161.) Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens 
162.) The Little Locksmith by Katharine Butler Hathaway
163.) The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen 
164.) Little Women by Louisa May Alcott 
165.) Living History by Hillary Rodham Clinton
166.) Lord of the Flies by William Golding 
167.) The Lottery: And Other Stories by Shirley Jackson 
168.) The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold 
169.) The Love Story by Erich Segal 
170.) Macbeth by William Shakespeare 
171.) Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert 
172.) The Manticore by Robertson Davies
173.) Marathon Man by William Goldman
174.) The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
175.) Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter by Simone de Beauvoir 
176.) Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman
177.) Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris 
178.) The Meaning of Consuelo by Judith Ortiz Cofer
179.) Mencken’s Chrestomathy by H. R. Mencken
180.) The Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare 
181.) The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka 
182.) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides 
183.) The Miracle Worker by William Gibson 
184.) Moby-Dick by Herman Melville 
185.) The Mojo Collection: The Ultimate Music Companion by Jim Irvin 
186.) Moliere: A Biography by Hobart Chatfield Taylor
187.) A Monetary History of the United States by Milton Friedman
188.) Monsieur Proust by Celeste Albaret
189.) A Month Of Sundays: Searching For The Spirit And My Sister by Julie Mars
190.) A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway 
191.) Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf 
192.) Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall 
193.) My Lai 4: A Report on the Massacre and It’s Aftermath by Seymour M. Hersh
194.) My Life as Author and Editor by H. R. Mencken
195.) My Life in Orange: Growing Up with the Guru by Tim Guest
196.) Myra Waldo’s Travel and Motoring Guide to Europe, 1978 by Myra Waldo
197.) My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult
198.) The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer 
199.) The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco 
200.) The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri 
201.) The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin 
202.) Nervous System: Or, Losing My Mind in Literature by Jan Lars Jensen
203.) New Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson
204.) The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay
205.) Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich 
206.) Night by Elie Wiesel 
207.) Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen 
208.) The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism by William E. Cain, Laurie A. Finke, Barbara E. Johnson, John P. McGowan
209.) Novels 1930-1942: Dance Night/Come Back to Sorrento, Turn, Magic Wheel/Angels on Toast/A Time to be Born by Dawn Powell
210.) Notes of a Dirty Old Man by Charles Bukowski
211.) Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck 
212.) Old School by Tobias Wolff 
213.) On the Road by Jack Kerouac 
214.) One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey 
215.) One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez 
216.) The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan
217.) Oracle Night by Paul Auster
218.) Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood 
219.) Othello by Shakespeare 
220.) Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens 
221.) The Outbreak of the Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan
222.) Out of Africa by Isac Dineson 
223.) The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton 
224.) A Passage to India by E.M. Forster 
225.) The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition by Donald Kagan
226.) The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky 
227.) Peyton Place by Grace Metalious 
228.) The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde 
229.) Pigs at the Trough by Arianna Huffington
230.) Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
231.) Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
232.) The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby 
233.) The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker 
234.) The Portable Nietzche by Fredrich Nietzche
235.) The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill by Ron Suskind
236.) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen 
237.) Property by Valerie Martin
238.) Pushkin: A Biography by T. J. Binyon
239.) Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw 
240.) Quattrocento by James Mckean
241.) A Quiet Storm by Rachel Howzell Hall
242.) Rapunzel by Grimm Brothers 
243.) The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe 
244.) The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
245.) Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
246.) Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier 
247.) Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin 
248.) The Red Tent by Anita Diamant 
249.) Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories From a Decade Gone Mad by Virginia Holman 
250.) The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien 
251.) R Is for Ricochet by Sue Grafton 
252.) Rita Hayworth by Stephen King
253.) Robert’s Rules of Order by Henry Robert
254.) Roman Holiday by Edith Wharton 
255.) Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare 
256.) A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf 
257.) A Room with a View by E. M. Forster 
258.) Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin 
259.) The Rough Guide to Europe, 2003 Edition
260.) Sacred Time by Ursula Hegi
261.) Sanctuary by William Faulkner 
262.) Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford 
263.) Say Goodbye to Daisy Miller by Henry James
264.) The Scarecrow of Oz by Frank L. Baum 
265.) The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne 
266.) Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand 
267.) The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
268.) The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd 
269.) Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette by Judith Thurman
270.) Selected Hotels of Europe
271.) Selected Letters of Dawn Powell: 1913-1965 by Dawn Powell
272.) Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen 
273.) A Separate Peace by John Knowles
274.) Several Biographies of Winston Churchill
275.) Sexus by Henry Miller
276.) The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
277.) Shane by Jack Shaefer
278.) The Shining by Stephen King 
279.) Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
280.) S Is for Silence by Sue Grafton 
281.) Slaughter-house Five by Kurt Vonnegut 
282.) Small Island by Andrea Levy
283.) Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway 
284.) Snow White and Rose Red by Grimm Brothers 
285.) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World by Barrington Moore
286.) The Song of Names by Norman Lebrecht
287.) Song of the Simple Truth: The Complete Poems of Julia de Burgos by Julia de Burgos
288.) The Song Reader by Lisa Tucker
289.) Songbook by Nick Hornby 
290.) The Sonnets by William Shakespeare 
291.) Sonnets from the Portuegese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
292.) Sophie’s Choice by William Styron 
293.) The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner 
294.) Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
295.) Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach
296.) The Story of My Life by Helen Keller 
297.) A Streetcar Named Desiree by Tennessee Williams 
298.) Stuart Little by E. B. White 
299.) Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway 
300.) Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
301.) Swimming with Giants: My Encounters with Whales, Dolphins and Seals by Anne Collett
302.) Sybil by Flora Rheta Schreiber 
303.) A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens 
304.) Tender Is The Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald 
305.) Term of Endearment by Larry McMurtry 
306.) Time and Again by Jack Finney
307.) The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger 
308.) To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway 
309.) To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee 
310.) The Tragedy of Richard III by William Shakespeare 
311.) A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith 
312.) The Trial by Franz Kafka
313.) The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters by Elisabeth Robinson
314.) Truth & Beauty: A Friendship by Ann Patchett
315.) Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
316.) Ulysses by James Joyce 
317.) The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath 1950-1962 by Sylvia Plath
318.) Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe 
319.) Unless by Carol Shields
320.) Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann 
321.) The Vanishing Newspaper by Philip Meyers 
322.) Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray 
323.) Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground and Nico (Thirty Three and a Third series) by Joe Harvard 
324.) The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides 
325.) Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett 
326.) Walden by Henry David Thoreau 
327.) Walt Disney’s Bambi by Felix Salten
328.) War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy 
329.) We Owe You Nothing – Punk Planet: The Collected Interviews edited by Daniel Sinker
330.) What Colour is Your Parachute? 2005 by Richard Nelson Bolles
331.) What Happened to Baby Jane by Henry Farrell 
332.) When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka
333.) Who Moved My Cheese? Spencer Johnson (unfortunately) 
334.) Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee 
335.) Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire 
336.) The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum 
337.) Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte 
338.) The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings 
339.) The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion 

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