50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Ten

Just got Dune Trilogy for 99p and Demon Copperhead for 1.99.

I have no immediate plans to read Dune but for 99p I couldn't resist.

On the other hand, I will have to be reigning myself in to finish my current book before starting Demon Copperhead.

My plan to read more books than I buy in 2024 is not off to a good start. I have started marking some as read on my kindle to get them out of my library screen. I get too caught up in dragging through stuff that I wanted to read 'one day' and starting it right away even if I am not in the right mood.

First dud of my library haul - I've DNFed Conversations with Friends after 38 pages despite rather enjoying Beautiful World, Where Are You?

I was about to say my objection was the first person narration, but having just read & loved Lucy Barton & Burntcoat perhaps I only notice when it jars.

I’ve spent a lot of time the last few days reading.
157 Winter- Ali Smith
Following on from reading Autumn earlier in the year. This one focuses on the stories of sharp and fairly dislikable Sophia Cleves- a retired successful businesswoman, and her family- sister Iris- a lifelong protestor, son Art- lost in life- and Lux- a girl he pays to pretend to be his (recently split up with) girlfriend Charlotte when spending Christmas with his mother. There’s a lot about divisions in family and society but the love that still abides. This one is also the Brexit novel reflecting those themes. I enjoyed it, but not as much as Autumn

158 A Litter of Bones- JD Kirk
Inlove a police procedural and am always looking out for a good one. This tells the story of the investigation of a missing child- a case very similar to a series of crimes that the investigating officer- DCI Logan- put someone away for ten years previously. I listened to this on audio. It was fast-paced and a decent storyline (though I guessed whodunnit fairly early on) but I didn’t feel Logan stood out enough from the myriad other gruff, rule-breaking maverick detectives out there. I might try another but I’m going to try a few more other possibilities first.

159 Romantic Comedy- Curtis Sittenfeld
I rarely read romance but enjoy one once in a while and have liked other books by this author before. I really enjoyed this. It was a far-fetched Will they- won’t they romance that was a bit too obsessed with Saturday Night Live but I was rooting for the main couple and enjoyed the ride. One reviewer on story graph described it as a good generation X romance- and as an x, I agree.

I’m currently reading Jane Eyre, which I doubt I’ll finish before year’s end, but I will finish my two daily reads- A Poem for the Day 2- some of which I’ve enjoyed and Year of Wonder whic I’ve absolutely adored, so I should finish up at 161 for the year.

I know! I'm never going to look at dolphins in the same way again.

Ooh your copy sounds brilliant!

Yes, agreed on all that. The British denial that they play a hand in propping up slavery - and grew wealthy on it- runs as a thread. All that awful art.

Dickens was an interesting characterisation. I liked the awful Victorian writing that Ainsworth did : the inclusion of the unreadable first chapter that was so nearly Dickensian made me chortle.

My copy is signed and had an interesting essay by ZS at the back.

I'm glad you liked The Fraud, Piggy, I also liked it more than I had expected on the basis of the reviews I'd seen beforehand!

I think maybe it's more enjoyable if you've read a lot of Victorian novels (which I know you have). I was amused by her portrayal of Dickens, and by Ainsworth's petty jealousy of him.

And yes to the many meanings of fraudulence in the novel. Perhaps the biggest instance of fraud was colonialism itself, and the fact that everyday British life was (at least to some degree) shored up by suffering in other parts of the globe.

Gah, nooooo - it was cassandre ! Sorry!!

Cleopatra and Frankenstein- Coco Mellors I loved this!! The story of a couple in early 2000's New York. He older than her. They fall instantly in love but with their own personal demons theirs is a turbulent and at times destructive relationship. The story is told through their interactions and the people around them.
This has the potential to be pretentious- lots of selfish bright things doing selfish and not so bright things but the writing was flawless. Hard to believe this is a debut.
Heading off the the end of year thread to add another standout!

I finished what I expect will be my last (54th) book of 2023 which follows hot on the tail of Chessie deftly reviewing The Fraud for me already! Haven't checked back so apologies if it was not Chessie!)

I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would as it has had so many sniffy reviews. I enjoy Smith's voice and intricacy and cleverness and thought this a far superior historical novel to many I have read.

The title itself is really interesting - who exactly are the frauds? What is fraudulence?

It is indeed a bit too sprawling. The short chapters are for me too a thing which keeps me turning pages, but can also mean I don't concentrate fully. It's probably over long.

I adore White Teeth and have not really ever enjoyed Smith's other novels - but this I did read with considerable relish.

Definitely falling short this year but pleased to have just crept over 40 at least with

A Child’s Christmas In Wales - Dylan Thomas illustrations by Peter Bailey Cheating really to count this very short festive reread but need all the help I can get this year, and this is such a lovely edition, the illustrations are charming.

Also (finally) finished Christmas in the Snow - Gladys Mitchell I like Mrs Bradley our lady sleuth, but honestly found this quite tedious and very difficult to care much about whodunnit or why.

Light Over Liskeard Louis de Bernieres

As some of you will know, I am a LdB die-hard fan, this makes me a terrible critic of his work. I did, predictably enjoy this hopefully dystopian story. It’s set in a not defined near future dominated by tech and screens, people have become lethargic and idle because bots can do most things for them. It’s a not very thinly disguised rant against all of the above. It focussed on Q who is a quantum mathematician helping the government to fight cyber attack. He predicts that an apocalypse of sorts is coming and becomes a bit of a prepper on Bodmin Moor - but it’s more than that, really he is trying to regain some humanity. Parts did make me question my own reliance on convenience vs effort. The characters are all a little eccentric as per most of his books and there are small references to places and people from his other stories, you don’t necessarily like any of them but you don’t hate them either. For me that’s a tricky mix, but I did find them engaging. His writing is till wonderful, this book makes me think I need a point scale between 4-5 stars. This is a solid 4, but then some of the others need to shift to 4.4-4.6 and 5.

I read this in hardcopy and as a mainly Kindle reader for fiction these days it felt wonderful. I’ve had time to be able to just sit with it and drink tea and read though.

142. Saturday Lunch with the Brownings, Penelope Mortimer
Short stories originally published in the New Yorker in the 1950s, showing the dark side of domesticity. Didn't love all the stories, but some were great - I particularly enjoyed one in which she sends up herself and her husband as horrific dinner party bores.

34.The Black Pearl Cynthia Harrod-Eagles. Number 5 in the Morland Dynasty. Charles II returns from exile along with a court of landless lords. Debauchery ensues. Will Annunciata (the beautiful Morland heiress) make a good marriage and discover her true parentage? Quite fun after the dreary battles of the Cromwell era.

Looks like I’ll only make 35 books in 2023, my lowest reading year in years. But a lot of chunksters and I’ve had a fun end to the year with this series so not complaining. I definitely want to get closer to 50 next year though.

Read The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman (very good) and The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley.

I've read some of Lucy Foley's other books and enjoyed them as holiday reads. This was a good Christmas read, sort of a modern Agatha Christie with friends meeting for New Year at a remote hunting lodge in the Highlands. They are then snowed in and one of them goes missing with only a gamekeeper, housekeeper - both of whom are escaping something in their pasts- and odd Icelandic couple around.

My Christmas book haul has included:

Step by Step by Simon Reeve
Antarctica by Claire Keegan
Days at the Morisaki bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa
The Alan Rickman Diaries

From West Yorkshire to East Berlin by Aisla Mellor
My final book for this year. It is a debut novel for the author and will read her next novel when she finishes one. I enjoyed this one and it kept me interested in the story. It is about Jack Jagger following his story from 1919 onwards. His father is a very successful barber but tragedy strikes along with a secret that falls into the wrong hands. This story follows generations across time and you meet all sorts of different characters.

And So This is Christmas. Brian Bilston

Christmassy poems. Not his best work.

@MamaNewtNewt I hated Pod! Made myself finish it but the dolphin assault stuff was brutal!!

My pre-Christmas library haul is continuing to pay off, reminding me both how much more I enjoy fiction on paper, but also how much I appreciate this thread for leading me to books I'd never otherwise pick up.

101. My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout
     Very late to the party on this, but I absolutely loved it & will be seeking out the other books. Short but perfectly formed, and an excellent follow up to Burntcoat with its focus on relationships (particularly the mother/daughter relationship in both) and art.

My Christmas reads were:

87. The Christmas Guest by Peter Swanson. A crime novel told through the diary of an American student, who has been invited to spend Christmas at a friend's country house, but quickly suspects something more sinister is going on. Then there is a big twist and things change, but I found the second part very rushed and it ended abruptly.

88. In a Holidaze by Christina Lauren. A young woman has to re-live Christmas, Groundhog Day style, as she tries to save the family snow cabin and choose the right boy to make out with. Moderately enjoyable festive fluff. It does feature the most insane romantic gesture I've seen in my life - I think if my partner of 48 hours presented me with a charcoal drawing of the two of us happily married in our eighties I'd run for the hills, but who am I to judge.

89. Heartstopper/This Winter/Nick and Charlie by Alice Oseman. Not sure how many books to count these as, not that it matters! I watched the Heartstopper TV series in the run up to Christmas, then skimmed the comics online, and the accompanying novellas (short stories really) were cheap on kindle so I read those too. I am at least 20 years too old but just can't get enough of these impossibly sweet teenagers.

I don't think I'm going to finish any more books this year so here are my final reviews.

150. Pod by Laline Paull

I still can’t decide what I think of this one. There were sections that I loved where I thought "this is a work of genius, the dolphins, they are just like us, but underwater", but there were other sections where I thought “why the hell am I reading about dolphin sex offenders and trans fish?”

151. The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

Woman is convicted of murdering her husband and has not said a word since. Dr who is having marriage issues thinks he can save her. This should have been a DNF. I’m going to be much stricter about not reading rubbish, or if I do then launching it across the room when it’s terrible (unless it is on the kindle of course!)

152. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

The audible version read by Hugh Grant. I loved it.

153. The Shape of Lies by Rachel Abbot

Next in the Tom Douglas series which I normally enjoy. This one was not good, especially as the ending seems to be lifted from one of the earlier books in this series.

I keep looking at 3Tomorrows because everyone is raving about it, but I just cannot muster enough interest. Hopefully it will reappear in deals at another time and I might be tempted.

This sort of thing happens to me often

Been waiting for 3Tomorrows to come down on Kindle. MIL gave it to me for Christmas

Thanks for the heads up on Tomorrow I had it reserved at the library but mine doesn't tell me how many people ahead of me and it had already been two months so 99p is worth it to me!

65. Really Good Actually by Monica Heisey

I wasn't going to bother with this but then Heisey was on Sara and Cariad's Weirdos Bookclub podcast and she was really funny so I went for it at 99p.

The short overview is late 20s woman divorces and struggles, at times in quite an annoying way. I could however relate to some of her moments of trying too hard, and her confusion about how could this be so hard when others in the world had real problems.
I did laugh (or at least snort a bit) in lots of places and I found myself speaking in the style of the writing in my head for a few days. So it's got under my skin a bit.

Oh and a late Happy Christmas! I was away in a cottage and distracted by our friends who are quite extrovert. Now home to put my nose in a book for a couple of days before I venture out again.