50 Book Challenge 2014 Part 3

[Southeastdweller]

Thread 3 of the 50 book challenge. Here are the previous threads...

The idea is to read 50 books in 2014 (or more!)

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/adult_fiction/1951735-50-Book-Challenge-2014

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/adult_fiction/2000991-50-Book-Challenge-2014-Part-2?

Book 43 Prophecy by SJ Parris

Second novel featuring excommunicated Italian monk Giordano Bruno and set in the reign of Elizabeth I. Astrological phenomenon indicate the dawn of a new age, and the murder of a maid of honour at court reveals plots to remove the Queen and replace her with the imprisoned Mary Stuart. It's based around the Throckmorton plot really, with Bruno infiltrating conspiracies emanating from the home of the French ambassador. Very good read, I'm looking forward to getting the next one.

Book 63 - A re-read of, 'Animal Farm.' I didn't like it much before, and I haven't changed my opinion of it.

Sonnet - I quite enjoyed The End Of Mr Y until the last 50 pages or so, when it just stopped making sense (to me).

If you like that sort of thing, I think you would enjoy Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore.

Nessalina - Enjoy your new Kindle

Read Cloud Atlas before you see the movie. I doubt if anyone understands the film on its own.

Chillie - I'm just about to start reading that series. Have bought Heresy, and have Sacrilege (found in a charity shop at the weekend). Just wondering if they need to be read in order, or whether I can get away with reading the ones I have and then look for Prophecy later?

Glad to hear they are good. Haven't come across anyone else reading them. The C J Sansom series seems to be more popular, and I'll give that a go sometime as well.

Agree re End of Mr Y - interesting idea and some really gorgeous writing in places, but ultimately deeply flawed.

Shardlake novels good - much better than the Parris ones, I think.

Duchess I think you could get away with reading Heresy then Sacrilege together and Prophecy later on. Certainly from the extract at the end of Prophecy there is a character link between the first and third books, but I think they stand alone pretty well too. I've been buying them in charity or second hand shops too so will have to keep an eye out for Sacrilege.

I really like the Shardlake novels and would agree with Remus that they are better overall, but Parris is pretty decent too. I've got Sansom's Dominion as well (alternative 20th century history rather than Tudor period) but not got round to reading it yet.

I bought Dominion as well. It's a big heavyweight hardback thumb-breaker. Wish I'd bought it on kindle now .

I've just downloaded a couple of audio books for my holidays - Mr Mercedes and The Blackhouse. Heard good things about both, so hoping they'll get me through my 4hr flight and 3hr coach transfer!! I'm a wimp that gets travel-sick reading

First half of, 'Dominion' good (scary!) but as a whole it didn't work so well for me.

Skinmysunshine here, fancied a name change. Reposting my full list.

1. The Luminaries - Eleanor Catton
2. Norwegian by Night - Derek B Miller
3. Wave: Life & Memories After the Tsunami - Sonali Derganiyagala
4. The Orphan Master's Son - Adam Johnson
5. To the River: A Journey Beneath the Surface - Olivia Laing
6. The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern
7. Death Comes to Pemberly - PD James
8. Under the Banner of Heaven - John Krakauer
9. Stone: A Novel - John Williams

10. Life After Life - Kate Atkinson 11. Irene - Pierre Lemaitre 12. The White Princess - Phillippa Gregory 13. Mrs Hemingway - Naomi Wood 14. Capital - John Lanchester 15. Jeeves & the Wedding Bells - Sebastian Faulks 16. Daphne du Maurier & her Sisters - Jane Dunn 17. Burial Rites - Hannah Kent 18. Persuasion - Jane Austen 19. Crime & Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky 20. Books - Charlie Hill 21. Queen Beens & Wannabees - Rosalind Wiseman 22. The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden - Jonas Jonasson 23. Far from the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy 24. Parenting by Jenny Loveless 25. Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson 26. Chocolat - Joanne Harris 27. Rivals - Jilly Cooper 28. The Lollipop Shoes - Joanne Harris

New
29. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert - hated it. Really despised Emma Bovary and it took me ages to finish it because I really did not enjoy it.

Just about to start Joanne Harris's Blackberry Wine for some light relief and the Book Group have chosen Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

43. Mad about the Boy by Helen Fielding

I needed some light relief after Irène so this delivered on that score but it's really only OK. I was expecting it to be terrible after reading reviews so I suppose OK is a good thing On the other hand, the fact that I avoided reading it at every opportunity is not a good thing.

SPOILER (ish) below

The true love plotline was pretty much identical to the first book. Why bother?

I should go back to We need new names but I don't know if I can face bleak and miserable (going by the 1st chapter)

Chebuludo I am going to read it but don't hold out much hope. I'm reading Blackberry Wine as need some light relief after hated Bovary

Provencal how did you get on with Crime and Punishment?

I've ground to a halt with The Brothers Karamazov I'm afraid. 65% through so I really should finish it but I'm in the middle of my first Terry Pratchett at the moment and enjoying it much more ..

Was C&P an easier read?

highlandcoo I'm afraid that C&P is another one I didn't really enjoy. I prefer Tolstoy. Of the classics I've read recently Far from the Madding Crowd. I absolutely loved it.

I've downloaded but not yet started Les Mis, Anne of Green Gables and Sense & Sensibility.

Oh, I have an ancient copy of Anne of Green Gables which my mum won as a Sunday School prize back in the 1930s. I still remember it really well. A bit reluctant to reread it in case it doesn't measure up to the memories tbh. Having red hair myself I really identified with Anne!

I love Sense and Sensibility - all of JA in fact - and Les Mis is on my to-read list, but I'm not sure I will be tackling Dostoevsky again ..

Just read in the Evening Standard an excellent review of the new book by 'Robert Galbraith'. I must catch up with The Cuckoo's Calling soon.

25. The Labours of Hercules - Agatha Christie
26. One, Two, Buckle My Shoe - Agatha Christie

Not exactly challenging myself, but I was pretty chuffed to pick up two second hand Christies that I hadn't read yet at the market for £1! Enjoyed TLOH more, some very good short stories, 12BMS was a bit dull in the middle. Not enough murder, too much politics

I re-read Anne of Green Gables last year and still loved it Good books never get old. My all time favourite is Watership Down, I must have read that 10 times by now I've got What Katy Did queued up as another nostalgia read. I'm saving the meaty stuff for the pool side

So maybe AOGG is one to start soon?

I also feel the need to tackle 1984 , The Grapes of Wrath and The Sound and the Fury. Any other classics people would recommend?

Classic Sci-Fi that's well worth a read: Day of the Triffids!

The Lord of the Flies? I read it at school, aged 12ish and was traumatised :o I bought myself a copy recently for a re-read, which I plan to do shortly.

Day Of The Triffids - Is that the one with the monstrous plants? I saw a bit of the movie and was and . Does it attempt to explain anywhere in the book how those plants plan attacks without brains and carry them out without muscles?

Provencal - I'd recommend Anna Karenina. It is not a love story.

Here are my numbers 31-40:

31. The journalist and the murderer by Janet Malcolm
32. A curious career by Lynn Barber
33. Maggie and me by Damian Barr
34. Half a yellow sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
35. Levels of life by Julian Barnes
36. A mind of its own by Cordelia Fine
37. Red Love by Maxim Leo
38. Delusions of gender by Cordelia Fine
39. This boy by Alan Johnson
40. My Salinger Year by Joanna Rakoff

Just realised that there's only one and a half works of fiction in there - Half a yellow sun plus the first section of the Julian Barnes book (the second section is about the death of his wife). I'd recommend Half a yellow sun purely for the amount of Nigerian/Biafran history I learnt though it did drag on a bit.

The Cordelia Fine books are great. Wonderful, funny, accessible writer - Delusions of Gender rips into all that neuroscience nonsense about "hardwired" differences between men and women.

Three very good memoirs on the list - Maggie and me, which is beautifully written and also very evocative; This Boy, which is very very touching, though simply written; and My Salinger Year, which has just come out and is an absolute hoot. Joanna Rakoff spent a year when she was 24 working for a New York literary agency that represented JD Salinger. She ended up having lots of dealings with Salinger and answering his fan mail.