50 Books Challenge 2026 Part Eight

The Long Winter is my favourite of the little house books.

I really enjoyed Prairie Fires. I also splashed out on a massive hardback copy of Pioneer Girl years ago. The annotations and photos are great. I have a bit of a fascination with LIW. Must have been watching the TV shows on a Sunday morning as a kid. I used watch it and The Waltons with my nan.

@elkiedee- just wanted to send sympathy & to say how shocked I was to read about your friend. I’ve also bought the Alba de Cespedès (an author I hadn’t heard of before joining this group - thanks to you for the tip & her other champions).

@VikingNorthUtsire- I couldn’t resist Prairie Fires. I enjoyed reading the Little House books as a child & enjoyed them even more when reading them to my own DC.

93 . Lord of the Flies by William Golding - I first read this at school & was not inclined to reread this partly as reading about a group of schoolboys had limited appeal to me then and partly because it is a very bleak book. I reread it because I wanted to listen to more Book Club podcasts and it was available on BorrowBox. I completely agree that it is masterpiece. Aside from the very beginning and the end, where the text describes social structures, the book does not feel dated despite its age. The language is beautiful - the parts describing different boys when they are alone on the island have the feel of a David Attenborough documentary even though the book predates that type of programme (& much else on the TV). The guilt and motivations of the characters are also explored so well. I both want to reread it (in light of the podcast discussion) but also don’t want to (as it is so bleak).

94 . The last witness by Denzil Meyrick - a detective in rural Scotland is drawn into a Glasgow crime war. This is the second in the series and I enjoyed it immensely (especially after reading a few literary books).

94 . Dark suits and Sad Songs by Denzil Meyrick - sequel to my last book and it deals with the police corruption issues set up in previous books. Enjoyable, but not as well-plotted as the previous books (although possibly I read it too soon after reading its predecessor). Both books were on BorrowBox & sadly they don’t have the next volumes.

95 . Outback by Patricia Wolf - German tourists go missing in the Australian Outback. This is another BorrowBox detective read. It’s similar to my 2 previous books in its atmospheric description of a harsh landscape and in its plot linked to social problems. Again, I enjoyed this and was disappointed that the sequels weren’t on BorrowBox.

I also loved the Just William books as a child.

I had completely forgotten that I read all the Just William books as a child. This sounds delightful.

Also Last One at the Party by Bethany Clift sounds right up my street and I had missed earlier reviews.

Needless Street is her best imo @LadybirdDaphne . Perhaps matched by her first, Rawblood. I still remember the Ohhhhhhhhhhhh! moment when I realised what was going on. It’s some of the best fictional writing about trauma I’ve read. Her other books are good yarns but you might find yourself looking for the twist from the start (Looking Glass Sound was a bit try hard iirc).

There are loads, @ÚlldemoShúl! She wrote about 40 books for adults, which she considered her main achievement - a good number of them are on kindle for £3.99 each. Definitely worth exploring, and the ones with children (like The Holiday, which features a particularly repellent small boy) make you remember why the William books are such a hoot.

Just popping my head in to say that Prairie Fires is in the Daily Deals today

I didn’t know Richmal Compton had adult novels! I absolutely love the Just William books. My sister and I still have a couple of pieces we quote that cracked us up. Thank you for reviewing this. I’ll be adding to my wishlist straight away!

63 The Last House on Needless Street - Catriona Ward
Bit behind the pack reading this one. In a lakeside American town, someone has been abducting small children. Dee is convinced that Ted is the one who took away her little sister Lulu eleven years previously. Ted is a lonely alcoholic who lives in a boarded up house on the edge of the forest - so far, so stereotyped - and we learn more from his perspective. And his cat Olivia’s - there’s an element of mind-bending surreality underlying the whole thing.

If you love an unreliable narrator (and I definitely do), this could be a hit. Very dark themes of abuse and psychological suffering, and I guessed some elements of the main twist right off, but this keeps you gripped with layers of revelation right to the end. A bold, and I’ll be looking out for more of hers.

85. The Holiday - Richmal Crompton

One of Crompton's many adult novels, and thoroughly enjoyable. It recounts the adventures of the large family (5 children) of Vicar Timothy Cotteril as they decamp to the country for a month in a locum parish in the summer of 1901. I thought there was a definite echo here of the much-loved Fortnight in September, which was published in 1931, only two years earlier than this book - I wonder whether Crompton knew of it?

Anyway, there’s a lot to enjoy here, with each child given a narrative, along with their mother (who'd really love to be staying in a lovely hotel having everything done for her) - and we meet the various locals the family encounters during their stay. In case this all sounds a bit cosy, there are plenty of moments to show that Crompton's writing had a harder edge than you might perhaps expect.

67 The list of suspicious things. Jennie Godfrey. The musings of a young girl caught up in the excitement/trauma of the Yorkshire ripper case and how it impacts on her and those around her as she decides to investigate. This was not for me. I felt little empathy for Miv and her meddling which had such serious consequences for those she accused and others. I felt its social commentary aspects were shoehorned into an unrealistic plot. It made me uneasy that a real life tragedy was used as the backdrop to a ridiculous sequence of fictitious events. However most people seem to have loved it.
68 The Midnight Library. Matt Haig. Turned out I'd read this before, but I barely remembered any of it. A person is trapped between life and death, exploring her options. It's not very memorable. It's nice, light, a happy ending guaranteed, with no peril. It's just not original, gripping, challenging or inspiring. I hoped it would get me thinking about the purpose of life but it didn't.
69 The Blind Assassin. Margaret Atwood. Dnf. Had no idea who anyone was or what was going on and gave up about one third of the way through.
70 Hurry up and Meditate. David Michie. Fine. A bit basic. I preferred The Dalai Lama's Cat. I'm in a reading decline at the moment and really need something gripping.
71 Run. Blake Crouch. This is a less literary version of Cormac Macarthy's The Road on speed. I loved The Road and liked this too. It follows a family escaping an apocalyptic event that causes people to turn on each other. It's gory, the characters are annoying and the plot thin, but somehow it was a page turner.
72 Mad Mabel. Sally Hepworth. Bold. Really enjoyed this touching exploration of child abuse and the power of friendship. Very sad in parts but also uplifting. I didn't like one of the twists but am prepared to put it aside. I'll definitely be reading more by Hepworth.

I DNF Last One at the Party but can’t remember a thing about it now.

Today’s small charity shop haul. The Golden Mole is not only a bit of a beauty, but also signed.

@bibliomania you managed to get tickets to see the Bayeux Tapestry, well done. I’m thinking of visiting the Victorian copy in Reading Museum.

It has divided opinion @TarahumaraI believe Remus hated it too. I took the recommendation from this thread and no longer have any idea whose it was originally but I did really enjoy it

48 Just Ignore Him by Alan Davies. Davies' mother died of leukaemia when he was 6, and then he was sexually abused by his father until he was 13 (he reported his father to the police when he was in his early 50s). Unsurprisingly, this is a terribly sad read.

49 Last One at the Party by Bethany Clift. This is easily the worst book I've read this year. I like dystopian fiction and I like chick lit, but this combination of the two made for a completely unrealistic and far too fluffy apocalyptic scenario. Sorry Eine, I know you liked it, but this one really wasn't for me.

107. Sky Burial by Xinran - read for a challenge prompt requiring an author whose name starts with X, I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it quite a lot. A fictionalised biography of a Chinese woman who went to Tibet in the 1950s to look for her army doctor husband who was reported dead. She ended up staying there for 30 years, most of the time with a nomadic Tibetan family. It was a glimpse into a life so alien from anything I know that I don't quite know how to review it. I came away with a sense of vastness and peace and a life that is rooted in a way modern life can never be. Definitely worth a read.

108. Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo - A totally different proposition but I enjoyed it just as much if not more! Sequel to the YA fantasy Six of Crows, this follows the further exploits of Kaz Brekker and his gang of talented criminal teenagers. It has much darker themes than the first book and we see the characters suffer in physically and emotionally. But they are great characters and my emotions were right there with them. Shame it's only a duology, I will miss Kaz Brekker and his crew.

45) Make Me Famous by Maud Ventura, translated by Gretchen Schmid.

Parisian Cléo has wanted to be a famous singer-songwriter since the moment she started singing to her audience of stuffed animals in early childhood. Armed with meticulous research, dogged determination, and a perfectionist streak, she sets off to New York and eventually makes it big against all the odds. But the music industry is unforgiving and unless she wants to be a one-hit wonder, Cléo must submit to a seemingly endless cycle of tours, interviews, social media engagement to promote her new songs. Now at the pinnacle of her career after several years of hard work and a punishing schedule, Cléo takes a desperately needed break to a remote island with no internet or phone access. As the island's sole inhabitant, Cléo can finally disconnect, work on her upcoming album, and reflect on her ascent to A-list celebrity status. And a disturbing incident that happened six months prior...

This was a quick read and very enjoyable, and had I read it before Ventura's first novel, My Husband (which I loved), I might have considered it a bold. However, while both books feature unlikeable, obsessive women as protagonists, I didn't find Cléo as compelling as the narrator in My Husband. Additionally I didn't see the twist coming when I read My Husband, whereas the end of Make Me Famous was quite predictable.

I would still definitely recommend this book though, as it's possible my expectations were unreasonably high based my enjoyment of on the author's previous work!

Big thank you to those 50 Bookers who have championed The Book Club podcast. I’ve just listened to the episode on Wind In The Willows and loved it. I did do some research (well Wikipedia anyway) after reading WITW but I learnt so much from the podcast.
Now seeking out other episodes on books I have read.

@bibliomania I think it's @TimeforaGandT 😜

I think that might be sensible, @nowanearlyNicemum . At a guess, the romance amounts to less than 10% of the book.

44 - Ugly Dumpling - Elaine Hsieh Yu

Elaine Yu’s resilience in the face of a difficult upbringing is genuinely admirable. Her determination to keep learning and mastering new skills, despite the obstacles in her path, is both humbling and inspiring.

I found her account of her childhood particularly eye-opening, especially the challenges her mother faced in raising three children alone despite coming from a wealthy background in Hong Kong. The contrast with Elaine’s own approach to motherhood, becoming a tiger mother herself, was fascinating.

However, I struggled to connect with the writing, which I found quite basic and, at times, formulaic. Perhaps my expectations were a little misplaced, too. After absolutely adoring Eat Bitter by Lydia Pang earlier this year, I may have been hoping for more food woven into this story. The title certainly had me anticipating dumplings! Note to self: read the blurb more carefully next time. 😂

Ultimately, this is an important and deeply personal story, and I have enormous respect for Elaine’s resilience. Sadly, though, the book itself wasn't quite for me.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

@bibliomania - I have The Spanish Bride sitting on my Kindle and have to say I would rather a Regency romance than a lesson in military history so it's going down the pile!

Mahrzahn, Mon Amour sounds good, @SpunkyKhakiScroller . My library only has it on Borrowbox, which I haven't yet tried, so I'll give it a bash.

132. Time to Burn, Ellery Lloyd
Time travel novel. A private company is running trips back in time for the super-rich. Someone goes missing in the 1940s - was it on purpose and if so, why? Can they be retrieved? Can you go back and make things better? Good fun, lots of page-turning action.

133. The Spanish Bride, Georgette Heyer
I wouldn't have thought that there was a huge overlap between readers of romantic fiction and readers of military history, but here Georgette promises you the first and then bombards you (ha) with the second. It starts off with a romance between a British soldier and a young Spanish girl (married at 14! 14!) but that's the sugar on the porridge, with the vast bulk of the book being a detailed account of Wellington's campaigns during the Peninsular Wars. It reminded me quite a lot of Patrick O'Brian's books, although army rather than navy. I did find it interesting, and I happened to be passing through London shortly after reading this, so I went to see Wellington's former home, Apsley House. I got a lot more out of it due to this book than I would otherwise. So not a bad book, but I imagine there have been some disconcerted readers throughout the years.

134. I'm Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself, Glynnis MacNicol
I think a few people on here have read this - the author is an American woman in her forties who spends a couple of months in Paris when Covid lockdown rules ease. She spends some time with friends, some time contacting men through a casual sex app, and all the time admiring herself and her determination to live a life less ordinary. I do share her view that women can have a happily ever after that doesn't involve a husband and children and I'm totally up for travelling and having a good time. However, I didn't find her exploits quite as ground-breaking as she does.

135. The Bayeux Tapestry, Carola Hicks
Read ahead of my visit to the Tapestry (or embroidery) itself. It did enhance the experience - she discussed who might have commissioned it, where their sympathies lay, what to look out for, including the parts we don't understand very well. She also talks about its survival through the intervening centuries, including the French Revolution and Nazi attempts to seize it. Very readable.

Allison Weir can absolutely be a sloG

ETA Jean Plaidy books on MQoS (histfic) were good