50 Book Challenge 2013 -The Sequel!

[CardiffUniversityNetballTeam]

Morning all,

As the old thread here is nearly full, I have created a shiny new one for your delight and delectation.

Sign in and update your progress here!

I'm Cardiff and I've nearly finished book 16, so I'm very behind as to be in track we should be approaching 25 by now. Where is everyone else up to?

23. Alys Always - Harriet Lane

Oh, am I too late to join in this thread?

I have just finished reading The story of beautiful girl

its never too late octo welcome!

we're doing the challenge next year too

Foosyerdos is that your first reading of the Fforde books? They're some of my favourites!!

Yay for doing the challenge next year!

Thanks for the welcome, I'll be sure to join in from the start next time.

70 Crocodile on the Sandbank - Elizabeth Peters. Loved it.

whooo! i've finally reached book 50. It took me about 6 weeks as been a stressful time with house sale so I have struggled to get into books.

Anyway book 50 was The Ice Princess by Camilla Lackburg

42. Trust Unwrapped by Dan Collins and David Thompson
43. The Outcast by Sadie Jones

Congratulations Galaxymum!

63. Ready for Murder - Joe Hill

Atrocious! A ripped off barely disguised re-write of Basic Instinct. I can't believe that it was written by Joe Hill who wrote Horns and The Heart Shaped Box. I think it must be someone else cashing in on his name. There were spelling mistakes and editing mistakes too.

30. A Death in Tuscany by Michele Giuttari

Crime thriller/police procedural about, unsurprisingly, a death in Tuscany!
The author is a retired Italian policeman which gives the story a real sense of authenticity. There are two others featuring the same character so I will keep an eye out for those.

39. Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne I love this story and have fond memories if reading it and it didn't let me down. So pleased I have rediscovered it.

Not sure what no.40 is going to be but I think I clearly need a few short novels if I am to make 50.

Just noticed I haven't updated properly.

38. Honour by Elif Shafak. As previously stated I am a fan.
39. Around the World in Eighty Days - see below for proof I am a fan.

35. Mad About The Boy by Helen Fielding

I'm so behind!

37. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

I reread it for the first time in 25 years and so and am sad to report that it has not aged well. Or my recollection of it from when I read it as a teenager was overly generous. I found it to be badly written, superficial, even slightly silly. Unlike 1984, which I admired more after a recent reread than I did as a teenager.

Now on to Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry for book club. First 7% is pretty dull and disappointing tbh. Is this really a book for grown people about a pensioner walking across the country to find hope to a dying friend?

Getting a march on during week off!
90. Rosie Fiore - Babies In Waiting
91. Monica McInerney - The Alphabet Sisters
92. Cath Staincliffe - Witness
93. Kristin Harmel - The Sweetness of Forgetting
94. Rachael Lucas - Sealed With A Kiss
95. Steena Holmes - Finding Emma
96. Steena Holmes - Emma's Secret

Right, i'm on 46 now (Collected Poems by Rumi) but here's the full breakdown

1. The Red and the Black - Stendhal
2. Tales of the Jazz Age - Fitzgerald
3. The Power of One
4. Putin - the man without a face (highly recommend - amazing, but scary reading. the man's a psychopath)
5. - 8 Little Women etc. series
6. noah's compass (meh)

10. Amerika - Kafka 11. Samurai - the story of Japan's last samurai 12. Why Nations Fail 13. A Fine Balance - MEGA DEPRESSING 14. Burger's daughter by Nadine Gordimer AMAZING 15. Nothing to Envy - real lives in North Korea 16. Gone Girl (loved it) 17. La Liste Hariri 18. Africa - a Crude continent 19. The Conservationist, JM Coetzee 20. Pow! 21. No time like the present 22. Native Son 23. Sharp Objects 24. Dark Places 25. Anne of the Island 26. Anne's House of Dreams 27. Anne of Avonlead (that was fun! It was so retro of me) 28. My week with Marilyn 29. Stalin - in the court of the red tsar 30. Let the Great World Spin - another AMAZING book 31. The Old Man and the Sea 32. Snows of Kilimanjaro 33. July's people 34. Norwegian Wood 35. Memoirs of a Geisha 36. Le Petit Prince 37. Tokyo Tango (rubbish) 38. The Sound of Waves 39. To Kill a Mockingbird 40. Beloved 41. In Cold Blood 42. The Marriage Plot 43. Freedom from Fear - collected writings of Aung Sang Suu Kyi 44. The Blind Assassin 45. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

Oh I really want to read that Putin book.

71 The Witness - Nora Roberts

It's VERY good Meg, read it if you can. It goes into his background (really uninspiring, which makes his rise very suspect, and creepy) and the early years of him in power, dodgy stuff he's allegedly been involved in, such as attacks against Russians and blamed on other people. Really good, but scary. Very scary.

Actually, I have just remembered another one I read but didn't list - so 46, White Teeth

I had to do all the Anne of Green Gables style-y books after all that Gillian Flynn stuff. But I did love the Gillian Flynn books, I think Gone Girl was my favourite (which terrified DH, I was all "this wife is AWESOME"), with Sharp Objects a close second. But a lot of it was cringy to read, and I was also very surprised by who the killer was.

51 A question of identity by Susan Hill

Number 7 in her detective series. I enjoy the way that the characters surrounding her detective, Simon Serrailler, his parents, siblings, friends and work colleagues continue from book to book and the way that events described in the earlier books affect the characters in the present book. After several murders and serial killers the poor things are quite traumatised though!

52 Before I go to sleep by S J Watson

Not great literature but a real page turner about a woman who can only remember the last 24 hours of her life so she relies on her apparently loving husband to tell her what has happened to her over the previous 20 years. Things change when she starts to keep a journal and can record what happens each day.

17. 2312 - Kim Stanley Robinson

Hi Wednesday, I am just getting into Jasper Fforde and I am really enjoying them. I read a couple last year, I keep looking out for the sequel to Shades of Grey but it does not have a release date yet. I just bought the second nursery crimes book so will read that next.

48. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
49. Blackwater Lightship

50! - Florence and Giles!

Phew, I did it.

Congratulations to everyone who has made it to 50 and some of you are much further on too!

51. The Flight - M R Hall. This is the third book I've read by him this year. I was involved as I read it, but when I put it down I didn't think about it at all. Which was odd given the dramatic subject matter. I read it a few weeks ago and forgot to update my list, so dropped off the thread again. My DH was a bit scathing about some of the technical info too, which didn't help.

I've not been reading much as I'm reading something on my kindle that is not grabbing me, but I always feel obliged to finish books, so am ploughing on 10 pages at a time. On the plus side I have listened to a lot of short stories, biographies and drama on iPlayer.