Current reading list

These are the books I am reading and intend to read in the (hopefully!) near future, in no particular order:

• In theory, Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is still open, but I don't know if I will seriously get back to that one.
• Torsten Andreas Hoffmann: Workshop kreative Schwarzweiss-Fotografie, a book about the principles of creative black-and-white photography that I'm reading currently (and which I am too lazy right now to dig out to check for the author and the exact title), a birthday present from ex-colleague Volker. Very interesting, and just what I need, as I am not really satisfied with my own results in this area. (Not with the results in color, either.)
• Walter Kempowski: Alles umsonst ("All for nothing"). Birthday present from my parents. I loved Kempowski's Tadellöser und Wolff and have read a few others. My parents gave me this to learn a bit more about my east prussian heritage from my mother's side.
• Siegfried Lenz: Heimatmuseum (The Heritage). Also from my parents, same idea. Copy signed by the author. I have read this already over 20 years ago, so I can read it again easily. I hope to get to his Deutschstunde (German Lesson) some time, too.
• Rebecca Ore: Time's Child. I read her announcement in February, and was intrigued by the teaser I found somewhere. As I liked her other books a lot, I bought it immediately.
• Péter Esterházy: Donau abwärts ("Danubia downstream"). Birthday present by Eszter and Michah, as always with a hungarian theme (like the accompanying bottle of Tokaji wine and the deer salami).
• Yann Martel: Schiffbruch mit Tiger (Life of Pi). Birthday present by neighbor Burghard. I don't know anything about it, but according to the blurb it has got great reviews and has been a number one best seller according to the SPIEGEL.
• David Mitchell: Cloud Atlas. Birthday present by neighbor Bina. Don't know anything abut this one either, claims great reviews as the other one. We'll see.
• Adam Langer: The Washington Story. Just like the two before, only this is a present from my wife.
• Simon Schama: A History of Britain, volumes 2 and 3. I read the first a year ago on my vacation and found it immensely interesting, but I didn't get to reading the following two volumes yet. But I still hope I'll read them some time, although they are not easy-reading stuff like, probably, most of the other books here. Perhaps on the next vacation, as the one in November was too short to do it.

There are probably a few others lying around somewhere here, and it is quite likely that a few others will jump the queue in between. (In case anyone is interested, I have a wish list at Amazon.com. :-)

Addendum:

• Kurt Dietrich Schmidt: Grundriß der Kirchengeschichte. Ecclesiastical history from a protestant point of view, a book my father read when he studied theology. This is a surprisingly interesting topic, as I found out reading Eco's The Name of the Rose. Recent discussions about the differences between the transsubstantiation in the catholic Eucharist and its equivalents in the lutheran and calvinist churches brought me on this track again.
• Wolfgang Hildesheimer: Mozart. I read this biography of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart before, over 15 years ago, and I found it so interesting that I want to read it again.

Another addendum:

• C. S. Forester's Hornblower series. Yep, the whole one. I read it 20 years ago in German and always wanted to reread it in English, if only to learn the nautical jargon. Now I ordered them from Amazon.com, spending a gift certificate I got for my birthday.