50 Book challenge

Since this is such a nice way of what I have been doing in my free time all year, I decided to keep up this challenge. With a two-hour commute each day it's not much of a challenge, but it's still a nice opportunity to share what I have been reading.

4.

Twilight, by Stephanie Meyer.
Mostly to see what all the fuss is about. A few months ago read the first three pages on Amazon.com after more and more of my teenaged friends had erupted with praise of the book and it was hate at first sight.
After I listened to the audiobook of Eclipse, though, I decided to read the first book, because even though I still dislike Bella, the other characters grow in you. Reading it is like chocolate, and, as one of the girls on a message board summed up so accurately, it is a "McDonald's kind of book" - easy to read, easy to like, and somehow, you just end up liking it. The one thing that makes me wonder is the semi-abusive relationship between Bella and her sweetheart. It is an odd thing to be so attractive to so many teenage girls, even though the way he completely takes all responsibility off her must be attractive to some.

3.

Benachteiligung gleichgeschlechtlich orientierter Personen und Paare, von Hans P. Buba (Autor), Laszlo A. Vaskovics (Autor).
Really interesting study from 2005 with unsurprising conclusions. Much better read than  Sexualitäten. Diskurse und Handlungsmuster im Wandel (Geschlechterforschung) by Heide Funk and Karl Lenz von Juventa, which has a somewhat ...  biased view, and also almost exclusively uses data from the eighties to support their view that homosexuals don't want to be able to marry because it's incompatible with their lifestyle, because most homosexual relationships only last a little longer than one year. It was shocking.

2.

Winnie and Wolf by A. N. Wilson.
A novel about the probably fictitious romance between Winifred Wagner and Adolf Hitler, told from the perspective of another of Winnie's suitors, Philosophy post-grad N., who is writing this book as an "extended meditation or letter" to his daughter, Winifred Hiedler, Winnie's and Wolf's daughter, his adopted daughter.
It's difficult to tell which of the parts Wilson spins together are invented and which are not, but it's an interesting insight into not only into the Wagner Clan, but also into middle-class Germany before and after Hitler's seize of power. What makes me wonder is how much he manages to humanise the kind uncle and opera geek and mass murderer Hitler, and also what the purpose of that might be. Of course, it might either be intended to make him seem more monstrous, or it may be a very interesting depiction of the mechanism that the war-generation used later on to explain their own behaviour and convictions during the war. I am not too sure about it, but as a German, I always get edgy around portrayals of that man.

1.
 

Wicked, by Gregory Maguire.
This is one of my all-time favourite novels and has one of the best female characters I have ever read. A great novel, it is amazing what Maguire can do on the basis of Baum's novel, which I always hated and still hate. His Elphie is unforgettable.