Wishing and Waiting: The Wishlist (Weekly Geeks 2010-20)

This week, Becky asked Weekly Geeks about the infamous, ever-popular Wishlist:

Is your wishlist as big as your TBR pile? What books are topping your list? Are there any new releases that you are counting down the days for? Share a handful of titles and be sure to share why you want to get your hands on these books! And if another blogger is responsible for that book being on your wishlist, consider sharing a link to their review!

I've only been keeping a physical record of my wish list since last September, after LibraryThing added the "collections" function. Prior to that, I'd been noting books that caught my eye as additions to the list in my Reading Status Reports (now part of my Sunday Salon posts), but that turned out not to be all that helpful, because I didn't have an easy way to reference back to them. Having the Wishlist in LT is much more useful than it was on my blog: it's all in one place, I can update it quickly and easily and include where I first heard about the book, and I can access it on my cell phone via LT's mobile site when I'm at the bookstore! Once I acquire a Wishlist book, I move it to the "To Read" collection in LT and tag it appropriately; I use the Wishlist collection only for books I don't actually have.

If I'd maintained an official Wishlist longer it might rival my TBR collection in volume (no pun intended), but it's currently less than 1/3 the size (a little over 80 books right now, as opposed to 300 in TBR). Here's a sampling of what's on it right now:

Blame: A Novel, by Michelle Huneven

This may be moving off the Wishlist, actually, since I read somewhere that it's due out in paperback soon. It came to my attention late last year, but officially went on my list when Patrick Brown, former blogger for Vroman's Bookstore, picked it as one of his top novels of 2009. The author is Los-Angeles based and was on one of the panels I attended at this year's LA Times Festival of Books.

Devotion: A Memoir, by Dani Shapiro

This was another book from the FoB; I had heard about it earlier, but after hearing this author speak on a different panel, this memoir landed on the list. This falls under the "religious studies" umbrella, which is one of my major nonfiction interests, and it's also a memoir and exploration of personal beliefs, which are two other nonfiction interests.

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women, by Harriet Reisen

My review of Kelly O'Connor McNees' novel The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott mentioned my long-standing interest in the 19th-century writer, and I've been anxious to read this new biography about her for months. As soon as it comes out in paperback, it'll be mine! I'm biding my time...

Red Hook Road, by Ayelet Waldman

The author of Bad Mother returns to fiction later this summer, and I really don't need any more reason to want to read this - I just like Waldman. I submitted a request for a review copy of this one via a Shelf Awareness ad, but those are so unpredictable that I never count on them. I will most likely be waiting - but I won't promise that it will be patiently - for the paperback on this one.

Whistlin' Dixie in a Nor'easter, by Lisa Patton

Again, waiting for the paperback - I've been waiting for it ever since I first heard about this one via Kari at The Five Borough Book Review. The central character in the novel is a transplanted Memphian, and there are a lot of references to places and things identified with Memphis and Tennessee - and the Memphis connection in literature (fact or fiction) almost always connects with me.

Have you read any of these books yet, and should I be envying you right now? What books are you eager to move off your Wishlist and on to your bookshelves?