50 Book Challenge 2016 Part One

[southeastdweller]

Thread one of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2016, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

Who's in for this year?

I loved the Poisonwood Bible but agree that the last bit dwindled off.

I read the Poisonwood Bible last year. I found the change of pace quite abrupt 'post major incident' (to avoid spoilers). I sobbed buckets and felt that was almost an ending. But I did enjoy the 'after' too once I got into it. I sometimes comment that sequels feel like one book stretched out. It felt almost like this was two books compressed. The 'what it did to us' really interested me.

4. Princess Read it because it was mentioned on a Saudi Arabia thread here. if even half of it is true, it is shocking. quite depressing actually.

5. Thirteen Ways of Looking by Colum McCann. One novella and 3 other stories. It is interesting but I just don't get Colum McCann-have tried most of them and his storytelling doesn't appeal to me and his language/style doesn't strike me as particularly beautiful.

Is anyone else a serial non-finisher? I have half a dozen books going, and I'm still tempted by others!

Book 2 - An astronauts guide to life by Chris Hadfield I found this book completely fascinating, a real eye opener into what's involved in becoming an astronaut as well as what it's like to travel to the ISS (and land on earth afterwards). I couldn't help feeling inherently sad that he'd missed so much of his children's childhoods though. He had to commit his life to becoming an astronaut which felt like he sacrificed everything else. But overall just a brilliant read about space travel, and a really positive and uplifting book.

1. The Lady in the Van by Alan Bennett. I haven't seen the film but DD gave me this for Christmas. It's only 100 pages and tells the rather sad and remarkable tale of how Mr Bennnet first meets Miss S and her van and how she ends up living on Alan Bennett's drive. I wasn't expecting the book to also be about "the writer in the house" in that it describes thier relationship and her impact on him. This made it a better read IMHO

Haven't had much time but have finished #2 The Picture of Dorian Gray

I think pretty much everyone knows the story so don't need to go there. Beautifully written though and an interesting way to look at sin and how without consequence to yourself you become worse. I think the blurb on the back cover sums it up well - ' the story self consciously experiments with the notion of sin as an element of design'.

Interesting characters too, although I found Lord Henry Wotton to be the most irritating, Dorian had his charms and was pretty much created.

Loved the ending.

Not sure what to read next, considering something with a touch of humour so will be between Don Quixote by Cervantes Or My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrel which I picked up after seeing lots of mumsnetters saying how they loved it and laughed lots!

1. The Screwtape Letters - C. S. Lewis
2. The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde

I am currently trying to read book number 3

*The Good Girl by Mary Kubica

Has anyone else read this? Really struggling and getting lost don't know if it's the book or me and my head full of stress!!

Juggling Dickens' autobiography and Pygmalion, quite enjoying both now. Keep thinking they're going to break into My Fair Lady songs what with all the Cockney banter, guv'noring all over the place... But no. It is quite amusing, Eliza necessarily screechy, other roles played by the wonderful Geoffrey Palmer and Anton Lesser.

Am also a serial stopper - I've given up on Bone Clocks, sadly. I can see that it could be a great read, but I find it too complex to follow atm as I listen with 3/4 attention while doing other stuff around the house. Easy-listening such as the 2 above are a better fit for this. I just couldn't follow where I was and who was who in BC. I may revisit from a future sun lounger, who knows.

The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington. I'd actually read about half of this last year, then misplaced it - it turned up while I was having a clear out ready for a bookswap.

I'm not sure I can describe this novella; perhaps if Diana Athill re-wrote her memoirs of old age after drinking too much mushroom tea it might come close. It's rather wonderful, though, and there's a story-within-a-story which I liked even better than the main part of the book.

Can I join in? I used to read all the time, and still do professionally, but reading for pleasure has slipped as I keep thinking about all the books I ought to be reading instead of the ones I want to...

1. Enemies at Home by Lyndsey Davis - second book in the series about Flavia Alba, adopted daughter of Falco, her Roman investigator. Fun, easy reading over the New Year, but deals a lot with the issue of slavery in ancient Rome, and the life/morality/ethics of slave ownership etc. too. I still think she has a tendency to try and gloss it into something more acceptable to modern ways of thinking, but this was interesting all the same. I'm not sure if her writing has slipped over the years, or my standards have got higher though - lots of little things annoyed me about it.

2. Georgette Heyer's Regency World by Jennifer Kloester - lots of background detail on Regency costume, manners, food etc. I've wanted to read this for ages, and dutifully ploughed through even though it's really more of a dipper-inner. Some interesting details and bits of trivia, but a bit heavy going and the author has a tendency to repeat herself.

Weighing up what to start next, probably Tregian's Ground by Anne Cuneo, translated by Roland Glasser and Louise Rogers Lalaurie. Another book that's been on my wishlist since it came out.

Still ploughing on with The Book of Strange New Things - I really like the concept, but boy the writing is slow.

Am also reading and not loving Stephen King's The Bizarre of Bad Dreams - have only read one story so far that I've really enjoyed, and am more than half way through.

Yes please can I join. I would like to be more adventurous in my book choices. At the moment I need a detective in all my book choices so a change would do me good.

Blueeyeshadow I rather enjoyed the falco plays on radio 4. I hadn't thought of the books, must add to my list

1. Revival by Stephen King. Not one of my favourite King novels - and I've read and re-read most of them. He's brilliant at grabbing your attention but this was a lot more horrifying than a lot of his work because there was no redemption at the end. The outlook was unremittingly bleak. It's the story of a preacher who loses his faith after the death of his family and turns to terrible forces in his quest to find out if there is an afterlife. It's clearly King's riff on Frankenstein, much as Salem's Lot was based on Dracula, and it's quite similar, I think, in the terrible damage done to the surviving characters. Give me something relatively cheery like It or The Tommyknockers any day!

Is Room (Emma Donoghue) worth a read?

I liked Room. Less depressing than the subject matter suggests. And a large part is after the Room.

I've just given up on Versions of Us. I found the writing turgid, and I couldn't get past it and believe in the characters. They said things that people don't say. Too much figurative language and all terrible. "She felt boredom rise in her like a stifled yawn" - original. Boredom. Like a yawn, eh?

There may be a good story in there somewhere but I haven't the patience to find it.

My dh brought me God in Ruins the other day, was going to leave a gap between Atkinsons but might start it tomorrow, at least she's a safe pair of hands

I liked the first half of Room but really wasn't impressed with the second half. Essentially then, I liked the part in the room!

Revival really disappointed me. It reminded me of Audrey Time Traveller's Wife N's version of Frankenstein (the one with the twins / something to do with symmetry iirc) - some interesting enough ideas but descending into abject stupidity by the end.

I haven't yet read Room but saw the film last year at a preview and it's excellent. Out in the U.K on Friday.

Remus, yup, the ruined city with the giant ants did it for me with Revival. Meh. Whether there's a heaven or not, I'm pretty sure the afterlife doesn't involve giant ants whipping people. I'm also not a fan of Her Fearful Symmetry - I'm a twin and Niffenegger's whole concept of twins annoyed the fuck out of me in that book. It was like Sweet Valley High twin switches all over again. I was more annoyed because I loved The Time-Traveller's Wife.

"The Book of Strange New Things - I really like the concept, but boy the writing is slow."

After Crimson Petal And The White, who would have thought?

I was flipping through Room in Waterstones the other day and was disturbed by the bit I happened to open it at, but I appreciate I may have been unlucky there and really it was only because it involved vomit and I am a bit phobic. I would like to read it but I also really want to see the film and I think book before film is probably usually a good idea, and i don't have time to read it before I see the film

Waawo good news about your kindle!

I agree with Libraries about The Poisonwood Bible - I thought the second half was just as good as the first half in a very different way. It was really interesting to find out about the wider political context outside the family.

I read Room for my book group (which has since faded away) and we had a really interesting discussion - it was one of our best sessions.

3 A Boy Called Christmas by Matt Haig

Read this with my DS7 and DD 9. We all really enjoyed this although DS is just transitioning into longer chapter books and his concentration wavered at times. Premise is a boy called Nikolas who goes off to look for his father who has gone with other baddies to see if Elfhelm really exists. This is the start of how Father Christmas came to be. We all found it funny, at times laugh out loud, and at times thoughtful. There are some very funny and quite unexpected one liners, good people who become bad then good again and learning how reindeers fly. Well worth it for a read aloud book before Christmas this year. Illustrations were also great.