50 Books Challenge 2026 Part Six

67. The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim - A very sweet, fable-like novel. Four women who don't know each other decide to split costs and take a month long holiday to an Italian castle. I don't think it's really about Italy or even the castle, but about what happens when people step outside the routines and responsibilities that have quietly trapped them into unhappy ways of living and thinking.

I found myself reflecting a lot on the idea that you need space away from emotional and physical labour to be able to know and love yourself. That felt very relevant.

The characters are intentionally a little one-note, almost archetypes, which suits the fairy-tale feel.

I suspect this is a book I'll revisit. Not because I expect to notice hidden details, but because its central message is one that probably needs relearning at different stages of life.

U is for Undertow - Sue Grafton

Continuing my way through the Kinsey Millhone alphabet books. This was one of the better ones, although still with far too much pointless description and details of all the food Kinsey eats. A man comes to see her and says he’s suddenly remembered something that links to a kidnapping 21 years ago. That turns out to be a red herring but tenacious Kinsey keeps digging and of course manages to solve the kidnapping.

The Stephen King book?

That’s weird. Have they done a new version of the audiobook or something like that?

I noticed some copies of The Talisman with a new cover in Asda last week. I think there’s another sequel due to be published later this year?

Weird thing just happened. I had The Talisman audiobook on my Wish List and I just went to buy it and it basically no longer exists. Where’s it gone?

Rachel’s Holiday by Marian Keyes Rachel is living a glamorous lifestyle in New York - complete with parties and strictly recreational drug taking. So when her friends and family fly her back to Ireland and book her into a rehab clinic, they are totally overreacting. This is readable, witty, and very insightful into Rachel’s world.

Same! I enjoy reading the Booker longlist but I'm hoping I've already read at least one or two on the longlist. Too many books, too little time as the saying goes...

I picked up Vigil from the library yesterday, mixed feelings about it so far but I'm only about 35 pages in.

I'm off on holiday today and have Whistler in my bag. I've also read Palm House, Departures, Transcription and Vigil + Women's Prize ones. I wasn't that into any of them apart from Gloria Don't Speak but did really like the Rebecca Parry.

I've got Deborah Levy to read on holiday too, but missed the Wimmy Road one. There's one called Fruit Fly too that I've got that I've seen a couple of times. Let's see. Fully expecting there to be nothing I've read.

The only ones I’ve read of those are the Strout as well (which I liked) and the women’s prize books (which I liked apart from A Guardian and a Thief) though I have a few of the others on my kindle that I picked up in 99p deals along the way,
including the Rebecca Perry which I must get around to reading. I also picked up Wimmy Road Boys a couple of days ago on kindle daily deal which book tuber Ben Reads Good predicted.

I don't think I read any Trebizon books as a girl. Looks like there are quite a few on the internet archive for anyone who's looking.

It seems you can get the first 6 in paperback for just under £20 from Amazon, and all 14 are available on Kindle for £4.25 each - I bought the first 5 (for Kindle) for slightly less and read them a few years ago.

I think Son of Nobody is getting the love because Mary Beard is the chair. It's a tricky year as so many past short listees or winners have got books out, which means they get an automatic entry.

Possible crossover from the woman's prize of Dominion, Gloria Don't Speak or A Guardian and A Thief.
May We Feed The King by Rebecca Parry which just won the Waterstones debut
The Palm House by Gwendoline Riley
Departures - Julian Barnes final book
Lost Lambs but it didn't feel very Booker to me
New Strout, Ann Patchett, George Saunders, Rachel Cusk, Deborah Levy and Emily St Mandel.
I've only read the Strout which I really liked and Saunders which I didn't, but have Levy and Patchett waiting.

oh and Hernan Diaz, Marlon James, Sebastian Barry and Dave Eggers - it really is a bumper year for past authors.

@InTheCludgie
I’ve heard a few other possibles mentioned including:
Son of Nobody by Yann Martel (I’ve read and wasn’t impressed)
Keshed by Stu Hannigan
Uprising by Tahmima Anam
Said the Dead by Doireann Ni Griofa
This is where the Serpent Lives by Daniyal Mueenuddin
Land by Maggie O’Farrell (it took me a while to warm to this one but I really liked it in the end)

I am very behind with reviews!

Natural Disaster - Lisa Owens

A day in the life of a mother to a baby and a toddler, where she plans the perfect last day of maternity leave but unfortunately the kids have other ideas. I really enjoyed the first half, but less so the second half.

Service - Lauren Mooney

When her relationship breaks down Danielle goes to housesit at her boss’s country estate, but strange things start to happen there. I enjoyed most of this but the ending was too inconclusive for my liking.

Emotionally Weird - Kate Atkinson

I didn’t like this much when I first read it, but I enjoyed it much more this time around. Effie tells her mother Nora all about her life at university in Dundee, and Nora tells Effie not very much at all really. It’s the usual Atkinson stories where random odd things happen but it all just seems to work somehow.

The Woman In The Hall - G B Stern

Part of The British Library’s republishing of some older books. This is about Lorna who goes round posh people’s houses begging for money with various sob stories. It sounded really interesting but unfortunately did not deliver.

Receipts from the Bookshop - Katie Clapham

A year of working in a bookshop. Nothing much happens, but it’s still an enjoyable read hearing about all the different customers etc.

John Grebble Is Gone -Peter James

Short story about a man who suddenly finds he’s been declared dead, and what he does about it. I enjoyed this and thought it could have been fleshed out more into a novella.

Return to Kirrin - Neil Howlett

It’s 1979 and Julian, Dick, Anne and George, now all in their 40s, are returning to Kirrin Island which Julian is turning into some sort of themed resort. This is a funny adult revisiting of the Famous Five series and I enjoyed it.

The Night Stairs - Erin Kelly

Dual timeline story set in a Catholic girls’ boarding school where in both timelines the girls suddenly start suffering from unexplained vertigo. I really enjoyed this - Kelly is a good writer and I liked the school setting.

Emma’s Baby - Abbie Taylor

This wasn’t bad for a book I found abandoned on a train. Emma’s baby is kidnapped on the London Underground, but nobody believes her so she has to try and find him herself.

Born In A Burial Gown - M W Craven

Written before the Washington Poe series, this features detective Avison Fluke who is quite similar to Poe, and the story is all set around Cumbria like many of the Poe books. I enjoyed this so it’s a bit of a shame there’s only two books featuring Fluke.

2 more books finished
Careless People by Sarah Winn-Williams
I’m late coming to this one- the tell-all of a high ranking executive at Facebook. Most of what she reveals here has been well publicised in the papers etc before Facebook completely shut her down- which was what made me pick up the book in the first place. Tbh I was equally as shocked at US corporate culture - I didn’t realise Succession was so accurate - as I was at the Facebook specific stuff. At the start, I couldn’t stop reading, but it became repetitive after a while and I couldn’t help but question why she stayed there so long

Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka
RWYO- I’ve had it on my kindle for ages and recent reviews on here made me move it up my TBR. It’s a well written story of the women whose lives were impacted by a serial killer- his victims, their families and his family. This was engrossing and tragic, in more ways than one. A page turner for sure.

Hurrah!

We won, it’s been “paused”!

‘See more’ is very Facebook, isn’t it?

I am reading Land, slowly and carefully, because it is utterly beautiful.

Another one here loathing the 'see more' feature.

55. Grief Work as Autotheory - Meg Jensen

A bit of a left-field one for me as this is a publication by an academic who works in the field of memoir/life-writing and trauma. However, despite the somewhat opaque title I found this compelling - an account of her own mental health struggles in coping with the lifelong impacts of a wildly dysfunctional upbringing as a severely-neglected child in a large family, and - most crucially - the suicide of her beloved older sister Mary. Despite the undeniable bleakness of the material Jensen makes this a gripping and often dynamic narrative which reads with all the pace of a novel.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit I've been debating over spending an Audible credit on Project Hail Mary and you've now made my mind up for me

@elspethmcgillicudddy I love the Game of Thrones book series but am a bit frustrated that it'll probably never be completed. I think it's best to leave reading the others in order to avoid that frustration too!

Less than a fortnight until the Booker longlist announcement. Anyone have any thoughts on what might be on it? Douglas Stuart's John of John seems to be a favourite, along with Transcription by Ben Lerner, I have both on reserve from the library.

Also now finished Laura Bates' Fix the System Not the Women. Obviously now feeling very angry and need to go and sit in a quite corner for a while.

Caledonian Road is £1.29 on daily deals today

Just finished Ian McEwan's What We Can Know. You need to be patient with this one - it's in two parts , in two time frames : a future ravaged by climate change and the present. The second bit is better but the first bit is essential in that it revisits and revises the first part. As with all McEwan it is very clever. As with much McEwan this can leave it rather cold. McEwan has a central male figure who is pedantic, literary and patronising. At times, I wish McEwan would be less wordy and literary.

1. Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively
2. The Blank Wall by Elizabeth Sanxay Holding
3. Old Baggage by Lissa Evans
4. Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix
5. Atlas of unidentified flying objects by Andy McGrillen
6. Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobson
7. Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck
8. The Vegetarian by Han Kang
9. Rushing to Paradice by J.G. Ballard

36. Anne of Green Gables
    I never read this as a child which is a shame as I know I would have love this. My and my son listened via audio book on our commute to work/college and my son did love this. For context my son goes to a special needs college so his maturity is much younger than his age. Certain plot points of the book really captured his imagination which he enjoyed talking about and he now wants to watch the Netflix series.

37. Agent Zigzag by Ben MacIntyre
    Very late to the party, a fun read which sounds made up.

38. The Safekeep by Yael van der Woulden
    This was ok I think. I didn’t really understand the main character or really understood why she acted the way she did a lot of the time, it made for an interesting book club discussion though.

39. Land by Maggie O’Farrell
    On the face of it this is another Irish immigrant story but there is an added richness to the land and history which the characters and future generations will take with them. The land itself is described as deep, boggy, wet, green, familiar, dense and mythical which you are either going to connect with or find the writing too dense.

40. Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke
    Read via audio. This would make a great book club or holiday read, I enjoyed this for what is was and found myself thinking about the themes.

20 Smoke - Dan Vyleta
Victorian boarding school boys team up with a teenage girl to save the world during their Christmas holidays. Sounds pretty dull stuff, but the formula is shaken up by the unusual world in which they exist. In this universe, everybody is preoccupied by Smoke, which is emitted by all humans leaving a residue of Soot, indicating their emotional state. Posh kids at boarding school are instructed in techniques for the suppression and control of Smoke, which is a social indicator and their control denotes their superiority over the ordinary folk. A school trip to London is a massive eye-opener for the boys who get the opportunity to view the hideous pall of Smoke and Soot-sullied streets of the capital of Vice.

Thomas is a bit of a maverick character, befriended by the likeable Charlie and bullied by the odious Julius who is outwardly pure and Smokeless and therefore admired by teachers and schoolboys alike. The boys are invited to spend Christmas with Thomas's rich relatives, where they meet uptight Livia; things go awry when they discover Livia's mother's laboratory, along with "sweets" and "cigarettes" - tools for the wealthy with which to control personal Smoke. The threesome are intercepted in their bid to flee and the adventure begins.

I enjoyed this, it's very well written and at no point could I guess where the story was going next. It feels rather like the author didn't really know where it was going either, and the ending feels like it kind of petered out because he ran out of steam. Not a bold, but an interesting read.