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

Highland - I will give it a look, it has received good reviews from fans.

#6 Raising Steam - Terry Pratchett. Got this for Christmas and have only just got around to reading it. As ever, a masterpiece from the king of fantasy.

Best - I just googled 'Nice Work' as I didn't know your reference, and as I was reading a plot summary I thought it sounded familiar, lo and behold I just found it in my bookcase. I think I read it a few years ago.I don't think I was enamoured with (of?) it last time, but maybe I'll have to give it a reread in the light of having read Shirley. I can see some parallels already...but I think I prefer the latter.

FINALLY! It has taken me a month to finish:

1. The Goldfinch. Disappointing, maybe my hopes were too high, but by god that book felt like it took her 10years to write. Moments of inspiration and the occasionally beautiful descriptive passage just didn't make up for an over long, over written book in which nothing much really happens and no characters really gain any depth. It felt like it was trying to be more epic than it was, or not epic enough. So much repetition and god the last sanctimonious chapter?! I didn't hate it but I did have to force my way through, which I don't normally bother doing.

So I saved my sanity by reading the final Hunger Games book in a day...so

1. Mockingjay....obviously haven't seen the film yet and glad I've read the book before as I wast really able to appreciate the other two due to having the films so strongly in my head. Such a relief to read a book where shit happens really fucking quickly! Loved it - might stick to YA fiction

Oh also I've started a RL alternative book club inspired by this thread - we meet up each month and bring a new book each, talk about all books in the pile, swap them around and drink lots of wine. It was perfection

Book 1 - the Crimson Petal and the White - Michel Faber
Book 2 - The Blackhouse - Peter May
Book 3 - The Universe Versus Alex Woods.
Book 4 - Mad About the Boy
Book 5 - My Life - David Jason
Book 6 - Paper Towns - John Green
Book 7 - We Are Water - Wally Lamb
Book 8 - American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis
Book 9 - What Alice Forgot - Liane Moriarty
Book 10 - The Personal History of Rachel Dupree - AnnWeisgarber
Book 11 - The Garden of Evening Mists - Tan Twan Eng.
Book 12 - The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith
Book 13 - Greyhound of a Girl - Roddy Doyle
Book 14 - Gangsta Granny - David Walliams
Book 15 - The Rosie Project

Sweet book. Last quarter got a bit daft. I was really rooting for the two main characters but wanted it to be resolved a bit smarter than it was somehow.

Oops, The Rosie Project should have been Book 16. I copy and pasted the wrong list.

Riverboat, I re read Nice Work recently and it took me straight back to the 1980s. There are a few references to Shirley in it but I haven't read Shirley for a long time so I may be talking rubbish here. That can go on my list for this year.

I'm not really enjoying The Stand very much. I've nearly got to the end of the kindle sample so will need to decide soon whether to persevere. I think it's the language used.

15 "The Universe vs Alex Woods". Really enjoyed this one and would definitely recommend it!

1. Blue Lightning - Anne Cleeves
2. South Riding - Winifred Holtby
3. Jubilee Lines (poetry) - ed. Carol Ann Duffy
4. Dominion - C J Sansom
5. The Burning Soul - John Connolly

1. Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger. I enjoyed this much more than I expected to, and the characters have stayed with me since. Having visited the two cemeteries at Highgate (and found them fascinating- for anyone interested in history I really recommend taking the tour) for me made the novel all the more atmospheric.

1. The Last Runaway - Tracy Chevalier. Quite an easy read, but I liked this book too. I heard TC speak about it at a literary event last year, and she explained how she'd taken up quilting as part of her research and found herself getting really into it. Having seen 12 Years a Slave recently, I do feel TC has glossed over the horrors of slavery, however the Quaker theme was interestingly explored.

1. Clayhanger - Arnold Bennett. I love Victorian and Edwardian authors and have resolved to read more of them this year. They told long stories, with great characterisation, really straightforwardly, which makes a relaxing change from all the tricksy time-shift stuff around at the moment. This is the first book in his Five Towns series and I'm planning to read the others in the next few months.

1. Swimming Home - Deborah Levy. I had to read this for book group or I wouldn't have bothered. Middle-class people and their angst sitting round a pool in the South of France. An unstable young woman turns up amongst them and trouble ensues. It was OK, with some good descriptive passages, but I did feel I'd read it all before.

10. Longbourn by Jo Baker. A retelling of Pride and Prejudice from the point of view of the servants. I love P&P and am very wary of spin-off novels PD James you should be ashamed of yourself however this is a most engaging book, beautifully written, which stands up on its own quite apart from the original premise. Thoroughly recommended and I've already bought it as a present for a couple of friends.

Book 21 The Rosie Project really loved this book.

Off the back of the last couple of pages of this thread I've just added Longbourn to my Amazon wish list...sounds good.

Best1 please, please, please persevere with The Stand. It is truly magnificent.

11. The Elephant Vanishes - Haruki Murakami I'm not usually a fan of short stories but I enjoyed these.

11. The Fault in Our Stars, John Green

I really liked this sharp, witty young adult novel about a 17 year old girl with terminal cancer. Utterly compelling from start to finish, and felt very fresh and original. I wish it had been a little longer and gone a little deeper and broader, but I guess that would take it out of the YA genre, and also somehow detract from it's message about the futility of looking for depth and meaning in everything...

1. Wizard & Glass (Dark Tower book 4) - Stephen King

This slowed me down a little but it was 840 pages long! I did really enjoy it but not quite as much as the previous two in the series, I thought it was overlong by about 200 pages.

1. Borkmann's Point by Hakan Nesser

God, bloody hell, this is the shortest book I've read this year but it has taken me two weeks to read.
By the time I realised I should give up I'd come so far that I felt like it was wasted time if I binned it.
It is a Scandinavian crime fiction. 270 pages of boredom, followed by a quite well paced and gripping final 30 pages.

Anyway, onwards and upwards.......

Book 19 - Charlotte Sometimes (comfort read)
Book 20 - Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day (ditto)

Right a summary of books so far

1. Me Before You - Jojo Moyes
2. The Husband's Secret - Liane Moriaty
3. The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
4. The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman
5. I Capture the Castle - Dodie Smith
6. The Fault in our Stars - John Green
7. A Possible Life - Sebastian Faulks
8. A Constellation of Vital Phenomena - Anthony Marra

The last is the Feb book club read on the mom advice blog, and what a book! Set in Chechnya during their recent wars, a brilliant story of great characters connected by shared experiences and connections. Fabulous writing - I loved the little glimpses into the future and the story made conflicts that I had heard of, in a distant country, feel very real and human. Really recommended

11. Supermodel Chef by Sue Blackhall (biography about Lorraine Pascale)
    Picked this up from the library as I love Lorraine Pascale's cookery and was intrigued about her history as I had an idea she had a care history because of the charities she is associated with. Discovered some interesting details but did not like the way the book was written at all. There was no personality in there and it read like an essay, with lots of quotations lifted from other sources. Wouldn't recommend.

12. Heidi - Johanna Spyri (audiobook)
    One of my childhood favourites. Listening to this on the way to work had me welling up! A real comfort read.

13. Sisterland. Curtis Sittenfeld.
    Received a free copy from the Mumsnet book club. Unfortunately this wasn't as good as I'd hoped. It was okay - nothing to criticise really- but it just didn't blow me away.

12. Fractured - Dani Atkins

Audio book #5 - Dodger by Terry pratchett, slightly abridged, but still a good listen on the way to and from work.

still only half way through book #21.

Book 1 - the Crimson Petal and the White - Michel Faber
Book 2 - The Blackhouse - Peter May
Book 3 - The Universe Versus Alex Woods.
Book 4 - Mad About the Boy
Book 5 - My Life - David Jason
Book 6 - Paper Towns - John Green
Book 7 - We Are Water - Wally Lamb
Book 8 - American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis
Book 9 - What Alice Forgot - Liane Moriarty
Book 10 - The Personal History of Rachel Dupree - AnnWeisgarber
Book 11 - The Garden of Evening Mists - Tan Twan Eng.
Book 12 - The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith
Book 13 - Greyhound of a Girl - Roddy Doyle
Book 14 - Gangsta Granny - David Walliams
Book 15 - The Rosie Project
Book 16 - 12 Years a Slave
Book 17 - Doctor Sleep - Stephen King

Bloody hell he's good! It's years since I've read The Shining but this works as a stand alone novel in any case. He had a few mediocre years but I think he's back to his true form now. Can't wait to read 11/22/63 but I'm saving it for a long trip I have in April. Officially reconfirmed as my favourite author or all time and number one on my dream dinner party guest list :)

11. Love, Nina by Nina Stibbe. Very funny read. I heard the abridged version on Radio 4 a while back, which I enjoyed and had to read it in full. It didn't disappoint.

If you're looking for something to lift the mood. this should do the trick.

Next up is Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfeld. Long book, so may take some time

13. The Silent Wife, ASA Harrison.

Didn't really take to this one. Found myself plodding dutifully through it rather than urgently wanting to know what happens next. Somewhat amused by the husband's self-deception (simaltaneously screwing over his ex while wondering if she would agree to be his bit on the side). Glib use of childhood trauma to explain adult inadequacies. Wouldn't particularly recommend.

Have flicked through the first chapter of Where'd You Go, Bernadette and So Much for That (Lionel Shriver) before deciding I can't really be bothered. Will drop them back in the library. I have a low tolerance for literary fiction. Need to go back to crime and non-fiction for a bit.