50 Book Challenge 2019 Part Five

I love Maconie too Canterbury. I recommended him to a colleague this week, can’t wait to hear what he thinks.

Daisy Jones is fiction isn't it? Just read this review on Amazon:

Taylor Jenkins Reid manages to deliver the bigger picture through the details of the bands day to day life, and of course as the interviews are carried out nearly 40 years after the events not everyones version of the truth is the same.

DecumusScotti thanks for the tip off about Priory of the Orange Tree - I just had to take it back to the library without even managing to start it (and it's ENORMOUS!) so it's much less stressful to snap it up on kindle to read at my leisure.

Thanks also to Cherrypi - have also bought Daisy Jones - I've been really wanting to read that and am surprised it's gone to 99p when it's getting such a lot of buzz. Hope it's as good as everyone says!

I too value the breadth of reference on here - although, for e.g., I wouldn't ever pick up a fantasy novel, I do just like hearing what other people think, expressed in witty and interesting ways.

And in that spirit, there are probably plenty of you who wouldn't want to go anywhere near my latest read, which nevertheless is probably my top book of the year so far:

34: Waterloo: The Aftermath - Paul O'Keeffe

This is simply fantastic. It's been on my wish list since it came out, in the run-up to the bicentenary of the Battle of Waterloo. O'Keeffe draws on a huge range of eyewitness accounts of the battle, but more importantly the days and months immediately afterwards. The sheer visceral horror of hand-to-hand combat and the appalling injuries (he includes testimony from battlefield doctors and surgeons) is gut-wrenching, and the story of the French retreat and the terrible fate of the wounded - both men and animals - comes vividly to life.

Just as fascinating is what happened to Napoleon once defeated...I didn't know that he'd attempted suicide by poisoning (an antidote was administered) or that he'd hoped to be allowed to settle in America or even England (!), before being exiled against his will to St. Helena. For anyone interested in history this is a superb read, and written in brilliantly readable style.

(Just on a personal note - I couldn't help finding the fate of the poor horses particularly distressing, but I've discovered that a local landowner actually bought a number of wounded Waterloo horses and had them shipped home to England, where he nursed them back to health and let them live out their days on his estate, which is now a park I pass by most days. There's something very heartwarming about this...)

not, not now!

40. The Shepherd's Life by James Rebanks

James Rebanks is the Lake District farmer who took A levels at night school and went to Oxford - but this book isn't really about that at all. It is a celebration of the way in which Rebanks' family have farmed sheep on the fells for generations. It is now a wholly unfamiliar way of life to me, as I grew up in a rural farming community. I enjoyed the writing and some of it brought back childhood memories. Rebanks is a blunt, uncompromising sort- at least that's how he comes across - and I enjoyed that in book form although I suspect it might be less endearing in real life. Nothing earth shattering but a pleasant read which brought back some childhood memories.

I bloody love Stuart Maconie. I must re-read Hope and Glory, I've re-read Pies and Prejudice (we were hanging around Manchester and Liverpool at the same time in the 80s/90s though obviously never met I always get a frisson when he talks about certain clubs on certain nights of the week and I think "I was there" Cider with Roadies also very good. Both he and Bryson are my comfort food writers.

All genres and posting styles welcome on this thread! I'm aware that my reviews are mainly rather factual and boring (probably because my educational background is STEM rather than literature), but I find that reflecting on the book after I've finished it, in order to write my review here, adds to my enjoyment of the book. As well as the pleasure of reading other posters' brilliant reviews of course

41. Hope And Glory - Stuart Maconie re-read of this. He takes a day from each decade of the 20the century eg, the 1926 National Strike or The 1953 ascent of Everest and writes around it, examines the history, visits the places etc. A bit like a British Bill Bryson with a heavy dose of socialist history.

42, 43, 44 3 books by Fern Britton which I can’t remember the names of. All set in Cornwall, they were ok.

45 Everywoman - Jess Phillips Adored this, inspiring no nonsense from Jess. I admire her hugely and will be buying a copy for my DD.

Thanks Pepe it's all my own insecurities.

I'm currently reading *The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin, so far it's a recommended read - I'm about 1/2 way through. It's a about a widowed book shop owner in his 30s/40s who is rather set in his ways and comes across as old beyond his years - I had him down as a near pensioner at first but that soon changed. A woman leaves a child in his shop with a note and the story develops from there - I won't post a spoiler.

Not ruined in the least, scribbly. I am just happily listening along with fond memories of my year 8 history project on monasteries.

And floraloctopus, please keep posting (and reading!). I read all the reviews and particularly appreciate the ones that are of books I wouldn't necessarily read without any prompting. I have found some real gems that way.

Spaceplustime- welcome. I love this thread, though only joined in January.

I must get round to Pillars of the Earth. Especially now I hear Stephen and Maude are dicking around in it! (Autocorrect changed that to fucking...hmm) After Sharon Penman I felt like I knew S&M intimately!

Fivegomad- I wouldn't necessarily read Lynleys in order, some of the early ones are really laughably American. Lynley and Helen and the whole aristocrat thing reads like EG just imagined how she thought the British upper classes would speak and behave and at times you feel you're reading a parody of Tommy and Tuppence. They get much better as she goes on. I used to like the TV series and have loads of these.

(Best crime writer to TV adaptations is Dalziel and Pascoe writer, whose name escapes me- they are excellent, wonderfully literary and complicated)

Thanks Cherrypi Daisy is getting a lot of love.

Hot damn, thanks, Cherrypi. Bought. It’s supposed to be excellent. Hopefully, the transcript format will work on Kindle.

Daisy Jones and the six is 99p on kindle today if anyone was waiting for that to drop.

Reporting in on The Thirty Nine Steps one of my bucket list books on my TBR pile. This one was on it because it is a Scottish writer and a classic thriller.

I did not realise this was so short (112 pages in my rather stylish 'Polygon Authorised Edition'). I also did not realise it does not end at Big Ben, so influenced was I by the 1970s film!

It took all of about 4 hours to read and moves at a rollicking pace. It's rather non PC and I found the ending anti-climactic but each chapter certainly races along and provides a cliffhanger : the touches of humour I liked . My favourite bit was 'the men who knew that he knew what he knew had found him'. Brilliant!

Scribbly Spot on. However, somehow I've found myself reading athe whole KIngsbridge saga over the years. They are very flawed and very cheesy in parts but they do roll along and I find them an easy read when not in the head space for something more complex.

The thread moves quickly so although I don't always respond to reviews and comments posted I do really enjoy reading the thread and putting books on my wishlist. Don't feel that you have reviewed a load of books and no one noticed, I did and I bet a load of others did too, but the thread had rolled on before I could read and reply.

I'm the same Theknack I think my reading style is too limited for this thread, either that or my posting style doesn't suit (reflection on me, not the thread which I find interesting to read)

Feel quite daunted by how much and genres of books read on this thread. Bravo!

I need to get back into the habit of reading ... hopefully this thread will give me the nudge I need

Fortuna will be interested to hear if it continues too

I hope I haven’t spoiled anything for you Pepe for all its faults I did enjoy revisiting the book again. The plot, characters and writing are certainly not sophisticated, and I ended up fast forwarding through all the rape scenes as they were beyond awful, but all in all I liked just bumbling along with it over the last month. It's big but easy and I haven’t allowed myself to relax into a book like that for a while. He does write action scenes well and I loved it when he goes into full on geek architecture or monastic organisation mode.

approx. 58 The Road to Lichfield - Penelope Lively following the Lively memoir love up-thread, I tried to get hold of the Jacaranda one without success so ended up with this 1977 effort from the library. A so-called Penguin Essential but the type was tiny & blurry; for several chapters, the "i's" had the dots missing and there were no question marks after questions. The cover was nice though. In a nutshell, boring and dated. I had to smile at the protaganist's dull solicitor husband, however - she has to visit her dying father in Lichfield. One evening, the husband doesn't ring her because "it's fifteen pence for three minutes & it doesn't seem worth it unless you have something to say". He was also baulking at paying 80p to get in a stately home. Ring a bell with anyone's childhood memories?

Ian McEwan - Machines like me - in the top ten at the library. In a fictional 1980s setting, shiftless Charlie buys a top of the range android/robot & you know it is not going to end well. I can appreciate the quality of McEwan's writing (especially when you compare with the recent tide of so-called psycho thrillers) but don't really like him and think there is something of the self-conscious adolescent in his style. This one has "another Film4 script" written all over it.

Great review, Scribbly I've resisted the urge to read any Follett thus far, and thanks to you I don't feel I need to pick up any of his books now.

scribbly, I love the review. I'm about two hours into the audio book and can confirm that women do indeed have breasts.

And Fortuna, that book nearly killed me. All that dicking around with butterflies and beautiful sexy jaguars and why for the love of God why did they all have the same name? I persisted, but it was a grim battle to the death.

Ooh, the fantasy standalone epic The Priory of the Orange Tree is currently 1.89 on Kindle. It looks great. I wish I could say it is great, but as with so many of the books I own, I haven’t got around to reading it yet. 🙄 At that price I’d snaffle it up though.