50 Book Challenge 2014

[juneybean]

Hopefully nobody minds me starting this thread.

The idea is to read 50 books in 2014 (or more as many people have achieved this year!)

Please also check out our group on Goodreads if you're stuck for ideas of what books to read!

www.goodreads.com/group/show/59438-the-book-vipers

1. A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway. Wonderful. I want to read all of Hemingway this year, I hadn't read anything by him until last year when I read The Paris Wife which really piqued my interest.

1. The Old Wives Tale by Arnold Bennett - once I got past the first few chapters I loved this; I will definitely read more by Arnold Bennett this year

1. Eurydice Street: A Place in Athens by Sofka Zinovieff - if I'm honest this didn't really grab me though I can appreciate that it was well written and researched

1. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman - I wanted to love this but just found it so-so; there didn't seem to be any real depth to it

Forgot to mention

7. The King's Grave: the Search for Richard III, by Michael Jones and Philippa Langley.

Tbh, if you saw the documentary, I'm not sure this adds much. Every second chapter is the story of the modern search (lots of detail about how to get permits from the City Council etc) and then the history of Richard. I don't know huge amounts about the history so I did learn a few things, but it's not that enticingly written.

1. Bloodfire - Helen Harper

A nice easy fantasy novel about shape shifters living in Cornwall. I enjoyed it, the main character Mack is likeable and tough as nails.

Book 7 - The Casebook of Newbury and Hobbes by George Mann.

A collection of short stories based around the steampunk world created by Mann. Sir Maurice Newbury is an agent of Queen Victoria, who has outlived her years through artifical means, while Miss Veronica Hobbes is Newbury's assistant and a Crown agent in her own right. Good stories which bring together other creations of Mann and include a tale written by Dr John Watson, but it is a little disappointing not to see more of Hobbes. I would have liked her to have had a tale of her own - she's very much a bit-part here.

1. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

Really liked this, reserved at library after seeing a recommendation somewhere. I have read some of Neil Gaiman's other books but a long, long time ago - going to re-read some after enjoying this so much -best description I can give is a fairy tale for grownups. Not as long as the other books of his I've read...

Still listening to 'I capture the castle' and have Dance with Dragons by George Martin to get stuck into now - am really enjoying this challenge, the most I have read in years! :)

Woohoo! Finally finished #2 Mansfield Park.

It was... alright. Not sure I'll be rushing to read another Austen for a bit but it hasn't put me off completely .

'Mad About The Boy' next - I've earned my dose of light and fluffy!

Finished #4, Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch
I enjoyed it. The supernatural elements are brilliantly written, and not fluffy or sterilised at all. I love how the fantasy just slips so easily in next to very realist description of London, or the narrators flippant humour.

I'm really looking forward to my next, the second book of the Chaos Walking Trilogy

DumSpiroSpero Mansfield Park was my least favourite Austen, I think it has to do with Fanny and Edmund being rather boring, so I'm glad you weren't put off Austen completely..... things can only get better

Finished no.1 at the weekend, A Pirate of Exquisite Mind, a life of the buccaneer/explorer/navigator William Dampier. Very readable and informative about someone I'd never heard of before, who was interestingly influential in literature and development of the English language, as he was in exploration. Started no.2, The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox yesterday and can't imagine why it was untouched on my TBR for so long.... riveting!

I will say it again - the Crawfords are brilliant. The Crawfords and Willoughby from Sense & Sensibility are just awesome.

I started Mansfield Park yesterday, on audio book. So far, it's only just been ok. I hope it gets better, because it's a long book, and long way to go yet.

I loved Pride & Prejudice - read it several times, and Persuasion which I think is my favourite. Will wait and see.

I love Mansfield Park, but I do think it's a much more challenging book than P&P, S&S, etc. My current way of thinking about it is to see both Fanny Price and Mary Crawford as girls brought up in abusive family set-ups (both brought up without their parents in a deeply unpleasant family), trying to work out how to respond to this. They're both real people-pleasers, in their own way.

Mansfield Park was my first Austen. I liked it at the time, but it definitely pales in comparison to her other books. Fanny (while nice enough) is rather dull compared to Austen's other heroines

'MP' is my least favourite Austen too. I like it as an exercise in symbolism, and of course some of the writing is exquisite but ultimately Fanny just bores me to tears, and I far prefer the Crawfords.

Please don't let it put you off Austen though. She is amazing and her other novels are much more fun. :)

Just don't give up on Austen before trying Persuasion

Book 7 completed last night. Haven't chosen book 8 yet. "The Accidental Time Traveller" by Sharon Griffiths.

www.amazon.co.uk/Accidental-Time-Traveller-Sharon-Griffiths-ebook/dp/B002S5NOWG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1390159229&sr=8-2&keywords=the+accidental+time+traveller

Described as "life on mars" meets "the time travellers wife". I really enjoyed it.

Book 2: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken - read because I loved it as a child, DD is reading the series, and I needed some light relief from
Book 3: Accordion Crimes by E. Annie Proulx. A guilt read because a friend loaned me it ages ago. Really wanted to like it - I loved The Shipping News and her short stories - but it was a real struggle to get to the end. It's 8 completely separate novellas, the only link between them being an accordion which appears in each story, and the fact that each story is about the experience of different immigrant communities in the USA. But I found the writing so dense - she throws in so many facts, so many lists of names, places, types of music, whatever - felt like being bludgeoned by words. And almost everyone in the book comes to a miserable end, after a miserable life. The only good thing is that something unexpected and positive happens, on the very last page. But if it wasn't for this challenge I would have given up on this book long ago.

Now onto Book 3: Apple Tree Yard!

Thursdaylast - completely agree that Persuasion is a must read.

Persuasion is just gorgeous. That speech towards the end from Captain Wentworth is the best. But then you'd know that wouldn't you AnneWentworth

I have downloaded Persuasion as there are so many recommendations on here and it's a freebie. The blurb does sound quite good.

About a third of The way through Mad About The Boy at the moment, which had just reduced me to tears.

Wasn't expecting that of Bridget Jones .

Finished Prodigal Summer early in the New Year, but not counting that as started it way back before Christmas .. life got busy! An excellent book - lots of thought-provoking ecological stuff but also great characterisation and an involving story. Thoroughly recommend.

So on to 2014:

1. Blue Lightning - Ann Cleeves.

The fourth novel in her Shetland crime series. I've really enjoyed these. I haven't been to Shetland, but have visited Orkney, and rightly or wrongly am picturing them as similar places. Anyone who likes Peter May would also enjoy these books I think. Great portrayal of life in an island community and a likeable central detective figure.

1. South Riding - Winifred Holt.

I've wanted to read this since watching the TV series last year.. although I found myself just re-running the TV adaptation in my head while reading. Always better to tackle the book first! Very good though. Interesting on the ramifications of local government and the challenges of running a school .. also being an ambitious unmarried woman at a time when that was seen as peculiar.

1. Jubilee Lines - edited by Carol Ann Duffy.

Collection of poetry; one poem for each year of the Queen's reign. Different authors tackling a range of subjects including the miner's strike, punk rock, fashion, death, birth. Some dealt with events I recalled; some I liked and some not so much.

1. Dominion - CJ Sansom.

I've read and enjoyed CJ S's Shardlake series so had high hopes of this book but found it took ages to get into it. Something about the writing style seemed rather plodding. A very interesting concept though .. life in England under an insidious Nazi authoritarian rule in an alternate version of history where Britain has sought for peace in 1940. Really good plotting and I did become absorbed by the story but still feel it was a good book which somehow missed out on being excellent.

1. The Burning Soul - John Connolly.

For my crime book club. An American crime thriller. Fine but not amazing. Wouldn't rush to read another of his books.

Now moving on to Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger, my next book group read.

At this rate I'll manage 90 books this year but am aiming for 100, so need to speed up a little bit!

highland, we have some similar tastes. I love Ann Cleeves, especially the Shetland series. I spent time in Shetland as a child so it's pinging stuff at the edge of memory for me, which adds a frisson to the experience.

I also found Dominion very difficult to get into, and in the end I gave up on it. (froglet, I hate having guilt reads sitting reproachfully on my shelves. One reason I'm not in a book club. Amazing how you can love doing something and then suddenly resent it because you "have to").

Just finished Liane Moriarty, What Alice Forgot. I really enjoyed it. I like the humour, and I think this dramatises very well what it's like to wake up on the cusp of early middle age and wonder how you became this person and ended up living this life.

1. I Capture the Castle - Dodie Smith (audiobook)

First, really liked the book, a great growing up story. Read a lot of classics when I was younger and surprised I never got to this one previously - but had seen that Hampshire library were lending free audiobooks and wanted to try for car journies and when I saw this book on the list it seemed like a good first choice. Will definitely be borrowing more audiobooks over this year, much more pleasant way of sitting in traffic jams!

I love that book Abgirl! I fantasised about growing up in a crumbling castle...