A Challenge...of sorts...

My friend Sara and I love a good challenge. We've challenged one another to learn all the states and their capitals in order of how they came into the union, to learn the continents and oceans and presidents. We've challenged one another to watch movies and listen to music (above or below our usual taste) and we've challenged one another to read books out of comfort zone by creating long lists of books we think every human should read.

Buzzfeed has helped us with our latest challenge:

1. GREAT EXPECTATIONS Charles Dickens
2. THE HOBBIT JRR Tolkien
3. THE BIBLE
4. MOBY DICK Herman Melville
5. THE FOUNTAINHEAD Ayn Rand
6. THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA Ernest Hemingway
7. LOLITA Vladmire Nabakov
8. CATCH-22 Joseph Heller
9. 1984 George Orwell
10. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD Harper Lee
11. WAR AND PEACE Leo Tolstoy
12. TREASURE ISLAND Robert Louis Stevenson
13. MADAME BOVARY Gustave Flaubert
14. THE ODYSSEY Homer
15. ULYSSEUS James Joyce
16. PRIDE AND PREJUDICE Jane Austen
17. JANE EYRE Charlotte Bronte
18. OF MICE AND MEN John Steinbeck
19. THE BELL JAR Sylvia Plath
20. THE CATCHER IN THE RYE JD Salinger
21. THE SCARLET LETTER Ernest Hemingway
22. CRIME AND PUNISHMENT Fyodor Dostoevsky

I'm not going to talk about the ones that I've read, the ones that I've sorta read, the ones that I should read again because...we're going to make sure THAT WE'VE READ THEM ALL!

Starting with...*drum roll please*

Crime and Punishment (a book that neither of us have even pretended to read)

What Buzzfeed says about it:

What you think it’s about: Law and Order SVU set in the 19th century.

Why you should actually read it: Dostoevsky addresses the concept of morality and causes readers to wonder whether the end really does justify the means.

What Goodreads says about the audio version, narrated by Alex Jennings (my fav!):

The talented Alex Jennings creates an atmosphere of gripping psychological tension and brings a variety of characters to life in this new audio edition of a crime classic. When the student Raskolnikov puts his philosophical theory to the ultimate test of murder, a tragic tale of suffering and redemption unfolds in the dismal setting of the slums of czarist, prerevolutionary St. Petersburg. While Jennings's adept repertoire of British accents works to demonstrate the varying classes of characters, it occasionally distracts the listener from the Russian setting. However, Dostoyevsky's rendering of 18th-century Russia emerges unscathed, bringing the dark pathos (such as wretched poverty and rampant suffering) to life. 

Through the story of the brilliant but conflicted young Raskolnikov and the murder he commits, Fyodor Dostoevsky explores the theme of redemption through suffering. Crime and Punishment put Dostoevsky at the forefront of Russian writers when it appeared in 1866 and is now one of the most famous and influential novels in world literature. 

The poverty-stricken Raskolnikov, a talented student, devises a theory about extraordinary men being above the law, since in their brilliance they think “new thoughts” and so contribute to society. He then sets out to prove his theory by murdering a vile, cynical old pawnbroker and her sister. The act brings Raskolnikov into contact with his own buried conscience and with two characters — the deeply religious Sonia, who has endured great suffering, and Porfiry, the intelligent and discerning official who is charged with investigating the murder — both of whom compel Raskolnikov to feel the split in his nature. Dostoevsky provides readers with a suspenseful, penetrating psychological analysis that goes beyond the crime — which in the course of the novel demands drastic punishment — to reveal something about the human condition: The more we intellectualize, the more imprisoned we become.

Our reading schedule

We're starting today, follow along with us here.

If you'd like to join the read with us, find it online for free here.