50 Books Challenge 2025 Part Three

Gs are always hard in Ancient Greek e.g.the Gorgon Medusa not the Jorjon Medusa.

I need to catch up on reading the thread from mid week onwards, but in the meantime:

15. What You are Looking for is in the Library - Michiko Aoyama trans. Alison Watts

A book of five chapters, each focusing on a different person in a neighbourhood of Tokyo. Ms Komachi, the librarian of the small community library, is able to sense exactly what book her visitor needs, whether it’s related to their initial enquiry or not, and from her recommendation the various characters find what they need to achieve their dreams.

I liked that the stories intertwined in very subtle ways. A comforting read and a bit of escapism: not demanding, just a lovely literary hug.

Yes

Gell on

As in girl?

Yes guh not juh

Soft g?

Ah, right. I was alternating so much in my head I was irritating myself!

I HAVE listened to it and can't remember so I went back to check it's Gel - on with gel rhyming with well. It's read in an Irish accent by the author also.

Has anyone listened to Glorious Exploits? How is Gelon pronounced? Books annoy me when I don't know how to say character names!

The Daughter by T M Logan

Lauren goes to collect her daughter from university but finds she dropped out several weeks ago and hasn’t been seen since. Standard thriller, quick read, was fine.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie I LOVED The Handmaid's Tale - the TV series actually helped my enjoyment, which wasn't what I expected.

I'm now more than halfway through 41. James by Percival Everett - I'm enjoying this so far and can see why it's so popular. I'm waiting for something 'big' to happen, though.

I have eventually got round to reading the much loved Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak. I knew some details of Cyprus' traumatic past but not a huge amount and found this aspect absorbing. I liked but didn't love the book. I thought some of the descriptions of people were a bit clichéd . But I read it rapidly enough.

11 The Sibyl in her Grave by Sarah Caudwell

The fourth and last in Sarah Caudwell's quartet about genderless sleuthing law professor Hilary Tamar and their coterie of young barristers, as Caudwell sadly died prior to publication. This one is much harder to find than the first three, which I read on Kindle a few years ago. Perhaps that's because it has less sparkle; it's primarily an epistolary novel and pretty ponderous in places. The story is also quite involved - insider trading which results in deaths. For both reasons it took me a while to get absorbed, but I did enjoy it in the end. Caudwell has a very deft way with character and she was also ahead of her time in the way she dealt with same sex attraction and relationships, which are thrown in casually with no fanfare. The thing I liked most about this was the depiction of Julia's aunt's social circle; an unconventional grouping in very conventional Sussex, all looking out for each other like family. I think - and hope - Caudwell must have had some good friends, to be able to write that so convincingly.

Yes, The Prisoner and The Fugitive are often bundled up into one volume, which sort of makes sense as it’s essentially the whole story of Marcel's crazed obsession love-affair with Albertine, but that also makes it a very hard slog as these are the toughest parts, without question! And actually, they are in the same volume in the latest Penguin edition I’m reading, but as they definitely are two books, I decided to count them separately.

For the first time in ages I don’t feel overly inspired by the Woman’s fiction prize. I’ve read The Safekeep (and enjoyed very much) and will ask for Dream Count as a birthday present. Fundamentally is the only other one that appeals. The non-fiction prize had loads that caught my eye but my library only has one in stock. May have to buy some or hope that the shortlist means they may decide to order some in.

Damascus Station - David McCloskey
Apart from the inevitable romance between handler and agent which is a trope I hate in spy fiction this was an excellent debut.

Sam Joseph is a CIA agent who is tasked with going to Paris to recruit Miriam, an insider of the Assad regime, after the capture and murder of a fellow CIA officer in Syria. The author is ex-CIA which gave the tradecraft in the book an authenticity I liked and the plot moves swiftly with the twists and turns you’d expect in a spy thriller. Damascus was evoked really well and I got a really sense of the chaos and fear caused by the Syrian civil war to its inhabitants on all sides of the conflict.

I would definitely read the other two books McCloskey has written since this one was published. He also presents The Rest is Classifed podcast which is also great listening if podcasts are your thing.

My second Women’s Prize read. I listened to this one on audio.

30 Crooked Seed by Karen Jennings
The opening of this is not for the faint-hearted- the writing is graphic and anyone who finds it hard to read about bodily functions might want to give it a swerve. Set in a near future South Africa where constant fire and drought are a problem, this book tells the story of Deidre, an amputee living in difficult circumstances and her memories of the past once the police find a number of bodies in the garden of her old home. There are brief interludes from her mother Trudy’s POV. Deidre is bitter, angry, selfish, filthy and repugnant. We come to understand why she is like that to a degree. The mystery is never fully solved. I think this may have been allegorical about South Africa itself. I didn’t enjoy this book very much but I can see it has some merit and understand why it was included.

@Terpsichore thanks for the Proust companion recommendation. I’ll definitely get that as I do mix up exactly the examples you gave! I’m heading into volume 4 later this year and my translation only has 6 so I’m not sure where it compresses them, The Fugitive may be 5 for me. Anyway, it doesn’t sound like our narrator is improving his character at all 🤣* *

Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall

Set in the 1950s and 1960s, a love triangle leads to a murder and a court case. I really liked the writing here, and the descriptions of the farm setting, but it didn’t really ring true why the main character was so wonderful that two men were so in love with her that they would do the things they do here. I would definitely read more by this author though.

20. The Fugitive - Marcel Proust

The penultimate volume of À la recherche du temps perdu ticked off and it’s on to the final furlong. Narrator Marcel has been dealt a devastating blow when Albertine, whom he’s kept virtually imprisoned in his apartment and stalked with the zeal of a first-class coercive controller, makes good her escape. This volume sees Marcel struggle to come to terms with her disappearance and, by the end, more shocks have assailed him. I won’t say more (parce que spoilers) but I’m mighty glad to have finished the two most difficult and problematic volumes (this seems to be a generally-shared view, from reading round). Onwards and - hopefully - upwards to the end.

Incidentally, for the others who are Prousting at the moment, I keep meaning to add a very strong recommendation for the excellent Marcel Proust's Search for Lost Time: A Reader's Guide to Remembrance of Things Past by Patrick Alexander. It’s a really invaluable and extremely interesting compendium of characters, the history behind the writing of the books, Proust's life, plot lines, even the geography of Proust's Paris. It’s a lifesaver when you can’t remember who the Marquise de Cambremer is, or how the Princesse de Guermantes and the Duchesse de Guermantes are related. It's complicated….but Alexander is there to ease your path.

I'm really behind with my reviews again! Problem being that I then forget what I did/ didn't like/characters names etc
But here we go.

49. Artificial Agent. J.W Jarvis
    This was almost a bold. An ex navy SEAL (I think) is patched up using AI technology. And then war stuff happened. It was really good. But I have a terrible memory!

50. A Portion of Malice. Lloyd Jeffries
    Part one of a series based on Cain from the old Testament. His punishment was to have to live forever. So naturally he tries to take over the world. I really liked this, it's got 5*s on Amazon, but wasn't a bold for me because some of the language was really annoying. One character always says non instead of not, or no. But other than that it was fascinating. It was set in various time periods, including BC, the crucifixion and the modern day. Obviously heavy on the biblical stuff, but actually makes God seem like a bit of a bad guy.

51. Because You Asked. A.E Bennett
    Part of the Serrulata Saga. This book centres on 2 women who realise they are lesbians in a world where that isnt allowed. They are also performing illegal abortions in the basement. A quick little read.

52. Gone in the Storm. B.R Spangler
    This is book 12 in a series, and the only reason it wasn't a bold is because I haven't read the previous 11 and feel like I missed some back story. Other than that it was a fantastic crime thriller.
    A bunch of teenage girls are showing up dead. Police are convinced it's the boyfriend of one of them, but Detective Casey White is sure they are wrong.

53. Lost Soul. Theresa Van Spankeren
    Honestly can't remember what this was about, but I know I only rated it 3*

54. The Curlews Scream. Annette Leigh
    Another crime novel. Ex cop turned Novelist, Andy Yates is living in paradise. Until she hears that her ex has disappeared after being accused of stealing millions from his company.

55. Edith's Story. Edith Velmans
    I applied for this on NetGalley, and then realised it was a republication of a book I'd read 20 odd years ago. It's the true story of Edith Velmans, a young Jewish girl from The Netherlands who went into hiding, and survived the Holocaust. She was a similar age to Anne Frank, and kept a diary. A bold for me.

56. Mother Of The Bride. Quinn Avery
    This is listed as a standalone, but it's the 3rd book about detective Jo Kelly.
    15 years ago, Melody was found covered in blood, her husband dead on the floor. She somehow escaped prosecution, claiming she was sleep walking. In the present day, Melody's daughter is getting married. A dead body once again turns up, and Melody has no idea where she was that night. Plenty of twists, and the case wasn't as cut and dried as it seemed. Really enjoyed this.

57. A Measure Of Rhyme. Lloyd Jeffries
    Part 2 of the same series as A Portion of Malice. Time periods for this one include 1945 and the present day. Another almost bold but not quite.

58. The Hunt for The Peggy C. John Winn Miller
    The Peggy C is a tramp steamer in the 1940s. The crew is a random assortment of men, who navigate around collecting and delivering contraband and selling it to the highest bidder. They end up smuggling a Jewish family out of Amsterdam and promise to take them to Palestine, although there's no guarantee they will be allowed in. The captain of a German U-boat chases them around.
    I've made that sound so boring and it wasn't! I don't particularly like boats, but it was really good!

12. The List of Suspicious Things by Jennie Godfrey

I raced through this one. It is about a girl and her friend trying to catch the Yorkshire Ripper back in the day. It evokes the late 70s well, and covers domestic violence, racism, sexual abuse and the way the world was changing. It is very Yorkshire, so would probably particularly resonate with anyone from that part of the country.

It is deceptively simple but deeper than it looks - I'm not giving it a bold because it was pretty formulaic and everything was neatly tied in a bow at the end, which I hate.

But an interesting enough read.

And having just said that about completely opposing views, I spy a review for that other thread divider Station 11 hated it absolutely hated it LOL

42. The God Of The Woods by Liz Moore (Spotify)

Someone on here recently said this was rubbish and I thought hey great that's on my TBR!

I tested this out as a freebie on Spotify and really liked the chosen narrator and so decided to go that way with it.

The Van Laar family are wealthy landowners whose property is used for a children's summer camp. In 1975, the Van Laar's daughter Barbara attends the camp and then goes missing

Adding to the mystery she is not the first Van Laar child to go missing her brother Bear has not been seen since 1961 and no one knows what happened to him.

The narrative/POV is split between the children's mother Alice, camp counsellor Louise, and Judyta the investigator amongst others,

I really enjoyed this and really looked forward to listening to it every night. I didn't solve it myself either so the mystery side of it worked for me. This is probably a bold, funny how two people can read the same book and have completely opposing views isn't it?

15 The House of Fortune - Jessie Burton The sequel to The Miniaturist, set 18 years later and following the same characters as they battle money worries and the judgement of fellow Amsterdam citizens - the same themes as the original book but with a very different story. I liked The Miniaturist but I absolutely loved The House of Fortune - it flowed beautifully, the characters felt so real, and I really cared about the outcome. Only my second bold of the year! I have another book by Burton waiting for me on BorrowBox and I’m very happy to dive straight into it.

13 Annie Bot - Sierra Greer
Much reviewed on here already. I took my time reading this (mainly due to having to make an elaborate world book day costume for the youngest this week) but also because it’s uncomfortable in places. Enjoyed isn’t the right word but I certainly will remember it