The thing about my readolutions is that they are never simple. So, yes, there’s this concise list of 12 books, casually distributed across various categories of interest that I declare I must read in 2010. But this tidy list only hints at other lists.

For instance, there are 3 Canlit titles on my Must-Read 2010 List here, each by writers I’d like to explore (two of which will also fit the Women Unbound Reading Challenge that I’ve joined) and their inclusion might lead you to guess, correctly, that I’ve joined the Canlit Reading Challenge as well. And of course each of these Challenges adds substantially to my wider reading list… ::hyperventilates slightly::

…which doesn’t even touch the fact that there will be new Canlit that I won’t have on any list but won’t be able to resist. The new Alice Munro, the new Margaret Atwood, the new Bonnie Burnard, that I wouldn’t have included even had I made a list of Must-Reads for last year: all irresistible, but un-listable. I just know that I read a lot of Canlit. At times I’ve made readolutions so that I don’t read *only* Canlit. (I did that in 2007, which was a good thing: turns out there are writers writing in other languages and countries ALL the time.)

Last month, out of 8 books, 6 were Can-penned. And I have aspirations to be an Igloo that you can read more about here. But what you wouldn’t know from any of the links here is that I’ve also got a list of the Canada Reads 2010 titles for this year as well. You might have guessed this if you happened to spot the category in my Reading Projects pages, but here are another five titles that will distract me in the coming weeks.

Canada Reads 2010:
Nicolas Dickner’s Nikolski (2005) Translated French-English, Lazer Lederhendler (2008)
Marina Endicott’s Good to a Fault (2008)
Ann-Marie MacDonald’s Fall on Your Knees (1996)
Wayson Choy’s The Jade Peony (1995)
Douglas Coupland’s Generation X (1991)

The first two will be fresh reads for me. The last three I’ve read, although I read them when they were first published. After more than five years, I figure a re-read is pretty much starting fresh, so I’m betting that cracking the spine on any of these three will feel like virgin-book-territory to me. I’m even looking forward to Generation X, which I wasn’t particularly fond of at the time, having read a couple of Douglas Coupland novels since. But am I calling them Must-Reads? Nope. Any more than 12 of those would do me in.