I have had Kate Horsley’s novel Confessions of a Pagan Nun for so long that I did a search of my blog to see when I first mentioned it. I don’t know when I bought it, but I planned to read it as long ago as the summer of 2005. I seem to remember buying with a birthday gift card, so it may be that I didn’t have it yet that summer; it was on my wish list for a while before I bought it. In any case, it has been sitting on my bookshelf for too long, and I really have wanted to read it for a long time, so it’s my current work in progress. However, I have decided my choice to wait until now to read this book is well-timed: I can include it as part of the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge. To complete the challenge, I must read six historical fiction novels in six months. I plan to read the following as part of the challenge:

• Confessions of a Pagan Nun by Kate Horsley: Sixth-century Ireland as Christianity supplants paganism.
• Nothing Like the Sun by Anthony Burgess: Sixteenth-century England, the story of William Shakespeare’s love life.
• Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke: Nineteenth-century England, rival magicians change history. This one feels a bit like cheating because I put it aside as part of another challenge, but I never finished it. I really want to finish it, and maybe a challenge will help me.
• Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys: Nineteenth-century Caribbean, the mad woman in the attic tells her side of the story.
• The Known World by Edward P. Jones: 1840’s Virginia, the story of black slaveowners in the antebellum South.
• Run with the Horsemen by Ferrol Sams: 1930’s Georgia, Porter Osborne grows up on a farm during the Depression.

I have many books like Confessions of a Pagan Nun that I bought some time ago and haven’t read yet. And I try to tell myself that when I’m in the bookstore, but I don’t often listen.

On an unrelated note, I have added a new feature to the sidebar. Random quotes about books and reading will appear. If you have one you want to share, feel free to leave it in the comments; maybe I will add it to my collection.