50 Book Challenge 2019 Part Five

Pepe, my DD is only two so I think Philippa Perry will still have some mileage for me. I agree that she doesn't have a lot to say about raising teenagers.

Piggy I had never heard of the story at all! Fascinating stuff!

In case anyone else fancies it, The River by Peter Heller is 99p on Kindle today. It was on my Amazon wishlist and I can't remember whether that's because it was recommended here or elsewhere - either way, his book Celine was one of my reading highlights of the last couple of years so I can't wait to get started with this.

I also vaguely remember Oranges being on TV, but also never read the book- will remedy that!

Sorry about thr breast/beast confusion! Have a new multilingual keyboard with a mind of its own.
40) Ghosts of the Shadow Market by Cassandrs Clare and others. This short story collection is really only for fans of the main series- some bits really don’t make sense as standalones. Not quite sure why I read it!

The Rapture is on my tbr pile : it is set in my town!

Piggy Oranges is an amazing book. You might enjoy The Rapture - Claire McGlasson . It is just out and has lots in common with Oranges . I reviewed it on the blog a few weeks ago. Link here if you are interested. bookbound.blog/2019/05/21/review-the-rapture-by-claire/
Just popping on to say that Common People - An anthology of writing by Working Class Writer's edited by Kit de Waal is 99p on Kindle. No idea how long for. This is getting a lot of love on Twitter at the moment.

@Indigosalt I've been eyeing up All the Lives We Never Lived recently and I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'm going to give it a go in the next few weeks. I saw someone recommend it in The Guardian books recently and thought it looked excellent.

Part two of my update...was interrupted by DS who was "starving" so we've had lunch and are back on track!
24. The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane
Thank you to whoever recommended this when it was on offer on Audible. Beautifully written. Interspersed with birdsong and nature sounds the 'spells' are very well narrated - Guy Garvey, Cerys Matthews and Edith Bowman are all great to listen to. This feels good for the soul and I keep going back to it again and again. Recommended.

High hopes that July will be a good month for reading. I'm halfway through Sense and Sensibility on Audible and still going with Mad Girl on the Kindle App. I've got time off work coming up too so looking forward to having more time and brain capacity for reading :)

Welcome ladypenelope - great username btw

Is there room on the broom thread for another?
I have just finished reading Invisible Girl by Jill Childs which is about a woman who gave her daughter for adoption and then ends up living near her.

a long Way from Verona - this was a favourite of mine aged about 11 onwards & I consider it a companion piece to When Hitler Stole pink rabbit by the late Judith Kerr.
re Jane Fallon - quite competent chic lit but I read a couple which basically had the same plot so gave up after that. I have also found out since that she is the partner of Ricky Gervais & so I have irrationally turned against her for that reason.
Penelope Lively - the Photograph - strangely dated considered it was published in 2000odd and self-indulgent stuff. Reminiscent of Margaret Drabble.
John Banville - Ancient Light - this has the usual toadying reviews on the cover e.g. "Brilliant - Guardian" but I am struggling with it and think it will be a DNF. A 60year old actor looks back on his adolescence & an affair with his best friend's mother. I am cringing ready for the bad sex descriptions & have already come across his juvenile efforts in the cinema with an amenable girl who let him "cup in his palm one of her surprisingly chilly but excitably pliable, soft little breasts". Worse than that, though, is a description of his friend's mother's underwear whilst bike-riding as "scantlings" - which I find is a noun of something scanty or small or something to do with ship-building. Bad. I was also under the misapprehension that he was married to Iris Murdoch (and her fringe cut by a toddler with a grudge) & prepared to cut him a bit of slack but that was John Bayley. However, I do like his Quirke novels written as Benjamin Black which are very evocative of 50s Dublin. Better get the new Kate Atkinson on order at the library.

I am up to about 65 now but can't locate my list ...

Just finished two good ones, hopefully I'm on a roll going into summer...

39.Signs Preceding the End of the World – Yuri Herrera

More of a novella than a novel at around 100 pages, I sped through this is a day and enjoyed it very much.

Makina makes the dangerous journey from Mexico to the USA to deliver two messages; one to her brother and one to a Mexican drug cartel. The premise is a simple one, but powerfully delivered through punchy and uncompromising prose. I though the translator Lisa Dillman did a fantastic job on this one.

A sinister, foreboding tone is set right at the beginning when Makina describes narrowly avoiding being swallowed up the sudden appearance of sink hole. The underworld, both actual and metaphorical is a recurrent theme in this novel. This is a very timely read with the Mexican/USA border appearing in the news again this week following the tragic death of a Father and his daughter trying to cross the Rio Grande. Overall a great read with a fabulously strong female lead and moments of sometimes surreal comedy making it a stand out for me.

40. All the Lives We Never Lived – Anuradha Roy

I’ve been meaning to read this since it was published (last year I think?) and can report it was well worth the wait. My first book by this author, it will not be my last.

This is an epic and sweeping novel centred on a small Indian village just before the Second World War. The narrator Myshkin now in his sixties, looks back at the life changing events of 1937 when his Mother Gayatri “runs off with an Englishman”. The story unfolds slowly with great attention to detail and beautiful descriptions of the physical environment, the emotions and conflicts within the household which led to Gayatri’s explosive disappearance and the consequences for her then 10 year old only child.

The second half of the book focuses on Gayatri’s story, which is told through a parcel of letters sent to her friend Lisa during her exile in Bali, and gifted to Myshkin on Lisa’s death. Global events come into play, with the advent of the Second World War.

This novel combined the small scale story of family tragedy brilliantly with events on the world stage to very good effect; I thought this was an intelligent and enjoyable example of very good historical fiction.

Placemarking because the watching button seems to be broken

Piggy I've had the audiobook of Oranges for an age and never listened to it...might get to it over the summer after reading your positive review.
June has been a slow month for reading...
22. Dare to Tri by Louise Minchin
Written by the BBC Breakfast presenter who took up triathlon in her 40s as a working mum of two and went on to represent GB in European and World age group triathlon events. If you are interested in triathlon and starting out in competing yourself there are practical tips that could be helpful in here. Otherwise, not one I'd recommend.
23. Back When We Were Grown Ups by Anne Tyler
"One morning, Rebecca wakes up and realises she has turned into the wrong person. Is she really this joyous and outgoing organiser of parties, the put-upon heart of her dead husband's extended family? What happened to her quiet and serious nineteen-year-old self, and what would have happened if she'd married her college sweetheart? Can someone ever recover the person they've left behind?" It took me a while to get into this. I was reading in tiny chunks before falling asleep which is never a good way to read a novel, and we are introduced to a large cast of characters with unusual names at the start which confused my addled, sleepy brain. I've read a couple of Anne Tyler books and they are somehow not the quick reads I was expecting. I grew to enjoy this and found the themes it revolved around interesting - how reliable are the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and how our lives have taken the turns they have. Without meaning to, we all see our own histories from a limited perspective and with unreliable memories. I liked it. My favourite character was the elderly man who was constantly eating sweets...reminded me of my Grandpa :)

I have no idea why I have got to this ripe old age (excuse pun!) and not read Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit but I have now righted the wrong. I remember seeing it in bookshops when it was published but I think I was devouring Hardy at the time, perhaps. It certainly was not mentioned at school (lesbians!).My (male) English teachers did encourage reading but it was mainly classics and Scottish literature. My DM loved taking me book shopping and would have though the book very right on (lesbians!) in her way but it bypassed me. I have vague memories of the TV series but missed that, too.

I thought it was a great book. Really well written and funnier than expected. I love Mrs Arkwright with her vermin shop and Jeanette's silent father. I liked the fairytale bits, especially when I go to the end and realised the thread (pun for those of you who have read it!) that holds it all together.

I have known some strange religious people in my day, but it almost seems unbelievable that such a sect should exist in such an ordinary Northern town.

If you too have somehow missed out on Oranges, I highly recommend you pick it up : as bonus it's a really quick read at only 220 largeish typeface pages.

70 Zazie in the Metro by Raymond Queneau

This is a cult classic in France. Foul-mouthed Zazie comes to Paris to stay with her uncle and ride the metro but a strike means she and an eccentric cast of characters end up roaming Paris above ground getting into scrapes. This was cleverly translated (my French is nowhere near good enough to cope with the original which relies heavily on slang and word play) and Zazie was great. But there wasn’t enough Zazie - she kept falling asleep and then it was a little dull.

InMyOwnParticularIdiom, how old are your children? I read the Philippa Perry and thought it was probably a book for parents of younger children or even the parent-to-be. I’d been hoping for practical tips on teens but perhaps should have paid more attention to the blurb.

35: Monarchy: England and Her Rulers from the Tudors to the Windsors by David Starkey

I know David Starkey is a bit unpopular, but I enjoyed his Monarchy series on TV. I listened on Audible and quite like his narration, but as a popular history writer I prefer Alison Weir or Mark Morris.
I know my British Kings and Queens (with the 17th century being a bit hazy) but Starkey's account of Charles II-James II was quite confusing, mainly because he kept jumping back and forth and I was never entirely clear which one he was talking about.
I enjoyed the earlier part on the Tudors much more, but as that is Starkey's area of expertise, I would probably expect that.
As a book that claims to take the story of the Monarchy from the Tudors to the present day, I would expect more on the few lines of the 1936 Abdication and the reign of Elizabeth II (currently running at 65 years +)

Article in the ST today that suggests they are eventually going to get round to making the long awaited adaptation of A Suitable Boy. In six parts. Wow!

God, I hope it's better than Beecham House...

In the last week I've finished:

41. Bernard Who? - Bernard Cribbins
    Autobiography covering the actor's wide-ranging career. Fairly obviously ghost-written, but Mr Cribbins has done so many different jobs (from paratrooper to novelty record singer to Wombles-narrator) that it was still an interesting and enjoyable read.

42. The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read (and your children will be glad that you did) - Philippa Perry
    The psychotherapist gives her views on the best ways of parenting, with an emphasis on promoting future mental health by validating children's emotions and following a collaborative (rather than authoritarian) approach to problem-solving. This isn't always easy reading, as it requires a lot of self-examination and willingness to change default patterns of behaviour. Personally, it will be very helpful in my ongoing mission to parent DD differently from the emotion-dismissing, dogmatic approach my progenitors favoured; in other words, it does what it says on the tin.

Agree re Schindler's Ark, Fran, the book tells an extraordinary story in a lifeless way and I didn't like the way the author didn't like to commit to facts. I realise it's difficult to be unequivocal about events you didn't actually witness but I felt there was a lot of prevarication that halted the flow of the narrative and stopped you becoming emotionally involved. The Spielberg film, on the other hand, whilst difficult to watch, is harrowing and moving.

95. Uncommon People- David Hepworth This is a book about rock stars. Hepworth takes one rock star or band for every year from 1955 to 1994 and recounts an important event in their life (I particularly enjoyed the chapter on Spinal Tap!). At the end of each chapter, Hepworth also lists some important singles and albums of that year. Over the years, I have enjoyed Hepworth’s writing in the music press, from Smash Hits to Word magazine and beyond, and this book was also of a high calibre. I have ordered a couple of his other rock books from the library.

96. The Bookseller of Kabul- Asne Seierstad Recommended on these threads when it was 99p on the Kindle, this was an interesting, true account of one Afghan family’s life, with plenty of local colour. It was a little like a Khaled Hosseini novel with most of the action removed. I would have liked there to be more about the actual bookshops!

97. Schindler’s List/Ark- Thomas Keneally The audiobook is called ‘Schindler’s List’, like the film, but is should really be called ‘Schindler’s Ark’. This took me a couple of weeks to get through on audiobook, partly because of the harrowing subject matter, but also because many sections were really quite dull and I wasn’t that keen on the narrator. This is one instance where the film is far superior to the book.

98. Why Catholics Can’t Sing- Thomas Day I had often wondered why Catholic congregations often refuse to sing, while Anglicans usually join in hymns with great gusto. This book, though American and 20 years old, has some interesting thoughts on this and related subjects, and is even quite droll in places.

99. Faking Friends- Jane Fallon I had read and enjoyed a couple of Jane Fallon’s other books, and this audiobook really drew me in. It is quite cleverly plotted, with a few twists and turns, but the ending felt a little flat.

100. A Town Like Alice- Neville Shute As someone who loves both Australia and Malaysia, I have no idea why I hadn’t read this before. It is a wonderful novel, as you probably already know.

101. The End We Start From- Megan Hunter I enjoyed this tale (also 99p on the Kindle recently) of a woman bringing up her young baby after an apocalyptic flood, although it was far too short. Her husband/boyfriend was useless- not what you need when the world is in crisis!

102. Greek Mythology- Hourly History I’ve got Stephen Fry’s ‘Mythos’ waiting for me on BorrowBox and thought I’d read this short introduction first. I’ve read several Hourly Histories now and I’ve never been disappointed.

25. Clothes Music Boys by Viv Albertine. A very enjoyable memoir/romp through the punk era and beyond that has been well documented on the threads. I felt it fell off a bit towards the end when she was trying to resurrect her musical career, it did get a little repetitive and she kept banging on about how insecure she was in her musical ability, but generally a good read and I will be seeking out the follow up at some point.

    26. The Passenger by Lisa Lutz a thriller/crime fiction novel recommended by a friend. We are introduced to Tanya, who is living under a pseudonym, upon finding her husband dead following a drunken fall she decides inexplicably to flee rather than contact the authorities. Her past and reason for living under the radar are slowly pieced together through flashbacks and correspondence. Meanwhile her life on the run becomes ever more ludicrous as she gets involved in several homicides and unlikely scenarios. Not my usual genre, it was mildly diverting but I wouldn't recommend.

    27. Floret Farm’s Cut Flower Garden by Erin Benzakein too late for this year but bought and read in the hope that I will get my act together on a beautifully productive cut flower patch next year. Some good advice and suggestions that I will no doubt ignore and continue in my haphazard way.

Tanaqui at beasts. Yes I’ve realised mine are lazy.

Is My Sister the Serial Killer worth a punt?

I’m away for the weekend and reading and enjoying Ordinary People and Brazzaville Beach

To answer my own question there's far too few books for a Summer sale but one of the books that's been on my wish list for a while is listed so I'm not complaining.