Summer reading challenge update

I have gone through my stack and have chosen the books for my summer reading challenge. Seeing the list makes me excited for the reading hours ahead:

The Iliad by Homer

The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (finish...started long ago.)

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez


The Devil Knows Latin: Why America Needs the Classical Tradition by E. Christian Kopff

Norms and Nobility: A Treatise on Education by David Hicks

Who Killed Homer: The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom by Victor Davis Hanson and John Heath


On the Art of Writing by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch.

Not knowing that he edited the Oxford Book of English Verse, I first heard of Quiller-Couch when I read 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff. From the preface to On the Art of Writing:

It amounts to this - Literature is not a mere Science, to be studied; but an Art, to be practised. Great as is our own literature, we must consider it as a legacy to be improved. Any nation that potters with any glory of its past, as a thing dead and done for, is to that extent renegade. If that can be granted, not all our pride in a Shakespeare can excuse the relaxation of an effort - however vain and hopeless - to better him, or some part of him.

Letters to a Diminished Church: Passionate Arguments for the Relevance of Christian Doctrine by Dorothy Sayers


Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis

My other personal challenge is to read two mysteries by authors I haven't read before. I have a list of potential authors, plus my next-door neighbor (aka: Mom) is a mystery junkie. I will find plenty of options at her digs should I need them.

Our American history reading will keep me busy, too, but I am not listing those books here. I wanted to list books I would be sure and read, not those I would be doing as part of my homeschooling job. I'll list those next week when we return from camping.

The biggest challenge will be sticking to the list; I am easily distracted when good suggestions come my way. I will have to plug my ears and stay focused!