50 Book Challenge 2017 Part Three

Ham - stay well away! Cote is going to have a lie down in a darkened room soon to have a good think about why she's wrong - and I am going to read 'Pollyanna' again.

20. Lois on the Loose by Lois Price

Travel writing - she rode a motorbike from Alaska all the way to the southernmost city in Argentina then back up to Brazil. I enjoyed it, although I would have liked to hear more about the USA part of her trip.

You seem to be a bit obsessed with Pollyanna, Cote!

Well, I'm half way through The North Water now - blimey, it's grim!

Condolences to those who have been bereaved.

My most recent were library impulse picks:

1. The Dead House Harry Bingham. I hadn't heard of this author or series but thought I'd give it a try. This is the 5th book in the series so I'm reading out of order which I normally try to avoid. I wasn't sure at the start if the heroine, a police officer with unusual attitudes towards the murder victims, was a character I'd take to, but I got completely drawn into the story. I requested the first one in the series from the library, looking forward to it.
2. Irene Pierre Lemaitre, first of a police procedural trilogy set in France, where a murderer is imitating scenes from crime novels. Fascinating concept and clever book but some of it was just too stomach churningly gory for me, so I won't check out the rest of the trilogy just yet.

Remus thank you for confirming my suspicions about Measuring the World . I had it on my wish list for a while last year, after reading the excellent Humboldt biography The Invention of Nature , but I removed it after looking at it more closely, and getting a whiff off it of exactly those things you did not like. Sorry Cote

10. Only the Innocent by Rachel Abbot Thriller from my Dad's kindle, which I would not have chosen myself. A high profile philanthropist is murdered, by a woman; he wasn't actually that nice, so there are plenty of potential suspects. Started out as what Fortuna would describe as a chewing gum book, but rapidly lost its flavour. Kept promising to deliver sordid secrets, in a breathless Take A Break style. Eventually revealed them, and, yes, they were pretty sordid, but I was past caring by then.

"The Ladybird Book of the Zombie Apocalypse which I enjoyed enormously in the New Year, and which was a million times better than Measuring the World"

Yes, but was it a million times better than Polyanna, to which you gave a glowing review, iirc?

Book 9 - Into Thin Air Jan Krakauer

Well - I read this with my heart in my mouth most of the time - knowing that there was no happy ending looming. It was an enthralling, absorbing read about places and experiences that I will never see or have. I got the sense of a man really doing his best to do justice to an experience and the people involved by telling what he sees as the truth to the very best of his ability. The whole thing has clearly had a huge impact on him as an individual and he lives with the choices and decisions he made in some impossible circumstances. Reading around this and googling its amazing to see the context, the cost of an expedition, the lengths people go to and the cost in terms of life, relationships and health that people go through to achieve these incredible feats of human endurance. What motivates people to climb the hugest mountain in the world...if you need to know - read this! I'd recommend.....

Makes my couch to 5k adventures pale into insignificance.

Just caught up. Condolences to those who have lost loved ones

Just finished book 18 Victoria:A Life - A.N. Wilson A brick of a book about Queen Victoria. Very well written and extremely well researched. Have to say I found tracking all the family very difficult- thank God for the family tree in the front. Would also say the political shenanigans were quite complex - reread many pages many times and still not sure I got there! Was a late at night reading a lot of the time.
Despite having a stack of books by my bed and swearing I wouldn't buy anymore I seem to have acquired a couple of books about the Tudors ! Damn you long waits at airports with on WHSmith for company!

Book 7 Code by Kathy Reichs. 3rd in the series of YA novels by Kathy Reichs starring the great niece of the Temperance Brennan. The Tory Brennan and her friends (the Virals) find a mysterious package and decide to follow the clues leading them into a cat and mouse game where they must beat the clock to save the people they love. It was a good read and carried on the story but must admit it felt very YA in parts, lots of angst and teenage rebellion, love rivarlly and our protagonist taking part in cottillion. Not sure i would recommend to those who haven't read the previous two instalments in the series.

Not sure about book 8 - possibly will start Lolita.

We Go to the Gallery is the best one!

(Sadly my copy wasn't one of the original 1000 - she's since published them properly)

I didn't count it, but I was given for Christmas and would very highly recommend "We Go To The Gallery: A Dung Beetle Learning Guide". (blurb: "The jolly colourful illustrations will enable your child to smoothly internalize all of the debilitating middle class self-hatred contained in each artwork.")

(for anyone who didn't follow the story at the time, the author produced 1000 copies privately printed, Ladybird Books sued her and then brought out their own sanitised spoof books)

Cote If you're counting that, I'm counting (not really but I did read it) The Ladybird Book of the Zombie Apocalypse which I enjoyed enormously in the New Year, and which was a million times better than Measuring the World (just saying).

1. The Ladybird Book Of Mid-Life Crisis

This is short, painfully accurate, and very funny I loved it and I'm counting it, even if it took half an hour to read. Which I feel justified doing, after you lot have been posting glowing reviews for kiddie books such as Polyanna

I'm not talking to you, Remus

boldly I loved Joanna Russ as a teenager - The Female Man (I particularly remember the section with Laura) and also The Adventures of Alyx.

*corporate - not corporal

Just finished the Bhopal book. It isn't particularly well written (or possibly a poor translation) but it is still a shocking catalogue of greed (both corporal and personal), arrogance, callous disregard for human life, ignorance, apathy, sheer-bloody-idleness, cost-cutting and a contempt for safety measures that was horrendous.

No-one was held responsible, the Union Carbide company was fined a derisory sum. (Monsanto has now taken over as exploiter of the world's poor.)

No-one can put a figure on the dead because many of them were just nameless humanity - drought-stricken farmers and their families who had been forced into the slums of Bhopal. Estimates range between 6,000 and 30,000 dead in the disaster itself an the two years following. There is even now an unusual number of tumours and birth defects. It's horrific!

About to start book umpteen (I'd have to check the number). "But You Did Not Come Back" - another Holocaust one. After this I think I'll find something lighter.

Book 17
Measuring the World by Daniel Kehlmann
Oh dear. Oh dear. I did not like this. It is about a natural Scientist and a mathematician (who for the purposes of convenience shall be lumped together as scientists for the purpose of this review, since they are pretty much interchangeable). One likes sex, the other is pretty much asexual but other than that they are essentially the same person, except one likes running around measuring hills and stuff, and the other one does sums. Neither of them has any clue at all about the world, or people or any self-awareness.

I have no idea what this book was TRYING to be, but what it IS is trite, uninspiring, pretty damn boring nonsense. I think it’s supposed to be a bit amusing, in a Teutonic sort of way, but it didn’t make me laugh at all. I knew quite a lot about Humboldt already, and had previously been interested, but this novel has positively murdered any previous interest I had in him.

Sorry Cote but I hated it. The only reason I finished it was to try to find out what on earth you saw in it, but, if anything, I thought it got even worse in the second half. It reminded me of something along the lines of, 'The Thousand Year Old Man who Jumped out of a Window and Wandered about for a Bit' or 'A Short History of Combine Harvesters whilst Salmon Fishing in the Yemen' or other ridiculously 'whimsical' novels of that ilk.

I remember reading How to Suppress Women's Writing by that author, boldly - highly recommended. She makes serious points with great wit.

DrDiva & wippet for your both.

Satsuki my views on Do Not Say We Have Nothing are here - longer than I'd put on here.

Book 8: Straight by Dick Francis. Usual up-to-standard thriller where world of horse racing overlaps with gem trading.
Book 9: The Universe vs Alex Woods by Gavin Extence which I didn't expect to like but really did. Tale of unusual young teenage male (clever, nerdy, naive, principled) who develops a friendship with elderly widowed vietnam vet. Serious topic, but - I felt - beautifully done & not mawkish.

for whippet and diva. So sorry for your loss.

Been a bit slow with my last book even though it's only 213 pages!
13. The Female Man - Joanna Russ
This is a 70's feminist novel reflecting on the role of gender expectations following the lives of women from parallel worlds. The ideas explored in it were interesting and some of it was unfortunately still very relevant. However, the style of writing was very 'stream of consciousness' and in places it was hard to follow who the narrator was. It was hard to just read little bits at a time and I expect I would have got more out of it if I had been able to read it all in one go. It needs an prolonged, immersive read to really understand and appreciate the ideas I think.
That said, it is worth a read if you are interested in feminist ideas on gender roles and can devote a couple of hours to read it all through in one go. Some passages gave me real pause for thought.

Sorry to those who've been bereaved.

Chillie, I agree about the brilliance of Night Watch. Terry Pratchett was unusual in being morally serious without every coming across as po-faced or earnest.

Fortuna, very jealous of your stash of childhood books.

16. Books for Living, Will Schalbe.
Short essays about books that have meant a lot to him. It was all a bit Thought for the Day and didn't give much insight into the actual books. The most memorable chapter harks back to when he was 20, recently out as gay, and AIDS was cutting swathes through the young men he knew.

Still ploughing through Nicholas Pegg's The Complete David Bowie on Kindle, I think the physical book must be a brick because I'm only up to 77% but really enjoying it.
Bought Northwater when it was on the 99p deal yesterday so pleased to see some love for it on here today. Is today's deal Do Not Say We Have Nothing worth buying. I'm getting quite the backlog since signing up to the deal of the day email