50 Book Challenge 2014 Part 4

[Southeastdweller]

Thread four of the 50 Book Challenge.

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

Here are the previous threads...

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

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

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/adult_fiction/2094773-50-Book-Challenge-2014-Part-3?msgid=49151537#49151537

Book 94 Fleshmarket Close by Ian Rankin

Another Rebus. I will have to do a second hand bookshop trawl for the next ones, I'm out!

Rebus' old station St Leonard's has been closed and the officers disbursed. He and Siobhan Clarke find themselves at Gayfields, from where he becomes entangled in the murder of an illegal immigrant in an Edinburgh housing scheme. Clarke, on the other hand, gets drawn into looking for a teenage girl who has disappeared from home when the girl's parents, who Clarke knew from working on the case of their elder daughter's rape (and subsequent suicide). Then the skeletons of a woman and a baby are found buried beneath a concrete cellar of a pub on Fleshmarket Close.

69. The Sea House, Esther Freud

I couldn't actually finish this. The writing and descriptions were excellent but the plot plodded along and didn't engage me, and the characters were too "lightly" written. Overall, a dull read.

108. Joelle Charbonneau "Graduation" The third testing book. Good end to the series

73. Neither Here nor There - Bill Bryson 4*
74. I can make you hate - Charlie Brooker 4*
75. We are all completely beside ourselves - Karen Joy Fowler -5*
76. Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman 4*

70. The Wild, Esther Freud

Nine year old Tess lives in two rented rooms with her mother and brother in a magical, rural house called The Wild. Their landlord, the hippy William, is a single father of three young girls who attend a local Rudolf Steiner school. Tess yearns to fit in with and be accepted by the family but fails daily to do so. When her mother falls pregnant with William's child Tess is ever more hopeful that she'll be accepted as family, but William is a distracted, distant stepfather who's never really liked Tess.

I loved this book and virtually read it in one sitting. The characterisation was strong and I felt so sad for Tess - her eagerness to please and be accepted by adults, her humiliation at the hands of William. I wanted to adopt and love her myself! Freud vividly captures the excitements and fears of a child's life. A heartfelt novel.

Book 123 - 'Full Dark, No Stars' Stephen King - a re-read: it consists of four novellas. I gobbled this up in pretty much one sitting when it came out, and had expected to savour it this time. Actually though, it didn't do a great deal for me.

I thought the first story was fine until the end, which was just a silly schlock-fest, and the second didn't seem as good as I thought it was last time, although I really liked the concept and the central character. The third one was a similar concept to, but nowhere near as god as, an earlier story, 'Wordprocessor of the Gods' which is one of my favourites. The 4th is the one I liked best previously, and remains so.

Now on to his new one! :)

I love this thread for ideas for books to read next. I just finished two Sue Townsend books. I stumbled across them whilst waiting in the library for a lift the other day.

23. The Queen and I
24. Queen Camilla

Both follow the same storyline of the royal family having to live in council housing after the monarchy is done away with following the general election win of a republican political party. I grew quite fond of the Queen.

71. The Heather Blazing, Colm Toibin

Eamon Redmond is a judge in Ireland's High Court. Nearing retirement, he finds himself reflecting upon his life. We learn how he was the only child of a widowed father, a father who was a teacher but also involved in the struggle for Irish independence; of his sexual awakening at fourteen; how he coped with the illnesses of both his father and, later, his wife; of his own politicisation in the Fianna Fáil party; how he struggles, intellectually, with some of his legal cases; how he deals with grief; how he relates to his children... and so on.

This was an engrossing story, written in Toibin's signature economical style, and I was totally immersed in the judge's life. Toibin seems to excel at character-driven stories. It is also impeccably structured, alternating past and present events and themes so that it all reads as a satisfyingly cohesive whole.

Highly recommended.

77. Hearts in Atlantis - Stephen King A collection of a couple of novellas and short stories, not his absolute best but he can't half tell a story. 4*

63. Writing Home - Alan Bennett. His earlier diaries and other writings.

I regret reading this on the Kindle. One of the things I like about autobiographies is looking at the photographs as I read and flicking back an forth. Not possible on a kindle. Also you have no idea of size. I was at 80% on the train this morning thinking I still had a way to go when I found myself at the index and no more book. Had to gaze out of the window for half an hour.

Thanks for the warning there Best . I'm reading it on my kindle and am at 59%. Just checked and it does finish where you say on mine too. Flicked ahead and had a look at the photos. I would prefer to see them interspersed as well.

Will read Untold Stories on kindle as well, although have borrowed my dad's hardback copy to see where pictures are in text - is enormous and would break a bone in my foot if I dropped it

41. The Robber Bride - Atwood
42. American Queen - Sarah Bradford
43. The Hollywood Book Of Death Just about finished 44. The Purchase by Linda Spalding.

This last one is excellent. Set in early 1800s Virginia where a Quaker is forced out of his home town and finds himself buying a slave. Excellent story.

Book 124 - 'Revival' by Stephen King
Afraid I was pretty disappointed by this. It wasn't awful, just not anywhere near his best. It felt like a lot of padding towards a bit of a daft ending, overall. I liked the central character, but King didn't really do much with him, I thought. :(

Book 95 The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi by Mark Hodder

I really couldn't see how Hodder could continue the series after Expedition to the Mountains of the Moon, but since this steampunk/alt-history series has already been playing around with the consequences of time travel and crossing dimensions I shouldn't have been surprised. Burton and Swinburne are back! Very entertaining and well plotted, but you will need to have read the first three in the series to have the faintest idea what's going on.

45. World War II London Blitz Diary by Ruby Alice Side Thompson - real life war diaries. I enjoyed this book although I found it somewhat frustrating, her American children were mentioned in passing and I wanted to know more about that side of her life. More of a tale about an unhappy marriage than a war diary in a way.

I'm late to the party, but can I join? I've just finished The Hundred Year Old Man who Climbed Out of the Window and left me irrationally angry Disappeared. Moving on to some Dickens now.

52.The Ocean At The End Of The Lane - Neil Gaiman

I've been a bit meh about Gaiman in the past, but I absolutely loved this. I would liken it to David Mitchell's Black Swan Green in its evocation of the mystery and weirdness of childhood. A simple but definitely magical story.

72. The South, Colm Toibin

In 1950, Katherine Proctor walks away from her disintegrating marriage and her ten year old son in Ireland to embark on a voyage of self-discovery as a painter in Franco's Spain. She falls in love with an artist, Miguel, who is scarred by his experiences as a revolutionary in the Spanish civil war and bears him a child. As the story unfolds we slowly discover more about Katherine's past as a Protestant in Catholic Ireland during politically turbulent times and her marriage; we begin to understand (though never fully enough) her motives for leaving, and then later returning to, Ireland.

I didn't warm to Katherine at all. I found her too self-absorbed and I found her hard, distant feelings towards her two children difficult to relate to. But I always think that a reader need not like a character to enjoy a story and Toibin wrote this unlikeable character in such a realistic and honest way that I was able to be absorbed by the book.

Welcome Magic :)

50 (yay!!). Tempting Fate by Jane Green. Decent chick lit - just what I needed after Far From the Tree!

Hello Magic.

Thank you

I've started A Tale of Two Cities. What a great opening paragraph!

73. The Road to Lichfield, Penelope Lively

In the late 1970s, middle class, middle-of-the-road, middle-aged, middle England Anne Linton travels out of Berkshire to Lichfield in Staffordshire to tend to the affairs of her ailing father who is now in a care home. There, she meets her father's young friend David Fielding and eases into an unexpected affair; at a similar time she discovers her father had had his own affair and was still financially supporting his mistress' daughter. Her experiences in Lichfield cause her to assess, for the first time, her own monotonous daily life and marriage to distant and distracted Don.

Full of rich detail, with well drawn, believable characters, this novel is a pleasurable and satisfying read.

Updating my latest reads

105. The Children Act - Ian McEwan
106. Dracula - Bram Stoker
107. Writing Home - Alan Bennett

I loved The Children Act. Straight to my favourites list, and most definitely in my top five for the year.

Dracula was great. It's a story I thought I knew, but quickly realised I didn't. It is a little bit over long in places (some of the suspense is dragged out) but in general its a really good read. I had the book on kindle and kept swapping between that and the audio version from Audible. Really enjoyable, even though I'm most definitely not a fan of vampire stories :o

Writing Home has been my dip into book for the last two or three weeks. A pleasure to read, but will take a break to read other things before tackling Untold Stories.

Book 124 - an A level study guide: pretty useless, sadly.