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Original poster

50 Book Challenge 2016 Part Three

994 replies

southeastdweller · 15/02/2016 22:25

Thread three 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, it's not too late to join, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

First thread of 2016 is here and second thread here.

How're you getting on so far?

OP posts:
RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie · 03/03/2016 22:04

I didn't like Dark Matter either - or, rather, I liked it until all the ghost stuff started.

I suspect that one of the reasons I hate Fanny Price so much is that I was a po-faced little prude at times as a child too. I suspect the Crawfords would have been much more fun to be around, even when children.

Original poster
southeastdweller · 03/03/2016 22:05

Just thought I'd mention that a film of HHhH is out later this year. Rosamund Pike stars.

OP posts:
RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie · 03/03/2016 22:05

The Invisible Library - not worth finishing. It doesn't get any better (I now - I did actually force myself to the end of that one).

Sadik · 03/03/2016 22:12

Now I always felt that Fanny was just terrified of social awkwardness and doing the wrong thing rather than a prude as such. The Crawfords would have ripped me to pieces as a child, whereas Fanny would have been a peaceful, non-stressful friend.

Don't say that about the Invisible Library - I even bought it! (Though admittedly for a couple of quid on ebay.) However I suspect dd will like it just because it's about a library & has overtones of the Dr Who library episodes, so I can pass it to her.

MamaBear13 · 03/03/2016 22:25

Joyless I haven't read it myself as I am total wuss when it comes to any kind of horror but have you read any Joe Hill? I remember hearing about NOS-4R2 and thinking it sounded quite good. Might be worth getting a sample and having a look if you're interested as I thought it sounded like a good creepy book. Just an idea!

FrustratedFrugal · 04/03/2016 06:10

Remus I hated Dragon Tattoo too. I liked some technical aspects of the book - it really hooked the reader so I had to finish it although I loathed it - but there was something sleazy about the book. I didn't find the characters believable. I'm Nordic and I think I read it in Swedish. There are far better Scandi thrillers out there mostly written by women. I binned the sequel.

Still reading three different books at the same time, not finishing any.

FrustratedFrugal · 04/03/2016 06:12

Oh, and I love Persephone books and found Stasiland mesmerizing.

tumbletumble · 04/03/2016 07:09

Another vote here for Pride & Pejudice as my favourite Austen. I loved the Dragon Tattoo trilogy too. Hope you enjoy Flight Behaviour, Satsuki!

bibliomania · 04/03/2016 09:18

Sadik, we have quite similar tastes - Letters from a Faint-Hearted Feminist is one of my favourite comfort reads too.

GrendelsMother23 · 04/03/2016 09:20

southeastdweller YY to Freya! I've got it on my to-read/to-review pile right now. Read the first few pages walking back from the sorting office where all my packages seem to end up and was really drawn in by it. Think it's going to be one of the season's big hitters.

  1. This House Is Not For Sale, by E.C. Osondu. It's marketed as a novel but it really does feel more like a collection of short stories, about a large family house in an unnamed Nigerian city (Lagos?) and the despotic patriarch who dispenses money, jobs, spouses (yes, really) and sometimes death to his extended family. It's very short (read it in a day) but I think it says a lot about the stranglehold of families and of small communities, and, yes, of the patriarchy too. I'm very interested in stories by writers of colour that aren't about race relations (because, let's be honest, white people are not the focus of everyone's lives), and this is a good example of that. Osondu won the Caine Prize for African Writing a few years back; his style is very controlled but evocative. V v good.
bibliomania · 04/03/2016 09:24

For all the Austen fans, I don't know if you're interested in related non-fiction, but John Mullan's book What Matters in Austen and Paula Byrne's Jane Austen: A Life in Things are excellent reads, and I found they added an extra dimension to my understanding. On a totally different note, someone here recommended Bitch in a Bonnet which is excellent fun.

ChessieFL · 04/03/2016 09:32
  1. After You by Jojo Moyes.

This is the sequel to Me Before You. I enjoyed the original, the sequel was ok. I didn't feel that the main character in the sequel followed on from how we had been led to think of her in the original. I didn't like the character of Lily and I thought the ending was predictable. A shame as the original was good.

MamaBear13 · 04/03/2016 09:37

Thanks Biblio I might have to have a look and add them to my list. I also have Jane Austen's Letters to read

whippetwoman · 04/03/2016 10:36

Remus, you're a hard one to please but two books came to mind that you might like. Bel Ami by Guy de Maupassant, though you may well have read it. Greed, excess and a wonderful absence of morals in C19th Paris. I have just started another by him called Strong as Death, or Fort Comme la Mort. Also, I unexpectedly loved My Salinger Year by Joanna Rakoff when I read it last year. It was delightful.

  1. In the Heart of the Country - J.M Coetzee
    Madness, death, racial power struggles and the breakdown of the status quo in an isolated farmhouse in the colonial/postcolonial South African desert. OMG. This is not for the faint hearted, not least because the narrator is so unstable so you never really know what is real or imagined. The time period is ambiguous too. A strange, powerful, complex read.

  2. We Are Called to Rise - Laura McBride
    Fail. Cliched, underdeveloped and implausible novel about the impact of PTS on US veterans of the Iraq war. Not at all good and one to avoid IMHO.

bibliomania · 04/03/2016 10:37

MamaBear, I found Jane Austen's letters quite heavy-going. I think if someone edited them down to the best bits, it might be quite a fun read, but the complete letters are (whisper it) dullish.

BlueEyeshadow · 04/03/2016 11:06

Have Austen fans read Jane Austen's History of England? It's a pastiche of her history textbook showing all her own personal biaises, and very funny.

MuseumOfHam · 04/03/2016 11:10

Sorry to dangle Ordinary Families in front of you when it's not available on kindle. If you ever see it in a charity shop, snap it up; it's - well - lovely.

  1. A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French I would love for my review of this just to be 'it's a tiny bit marvellous' Grin but I think I should say a bit more than that. Very funny. Narrated in turns by a child psychologist and her two very different teenage children. The characters and events are exaggerated and caricatures, but that doesn't matter as this is an unashamedly comedy book. Despite them being caricatures, I cared about the characters and laughed and cringed along with their mistakes and misunderstandings. Narrated absolutely superbly on audible by Dawn French herself.

Have started my next audible book Elizabeth is Missing and finding it a bit pedestrian so far. I do get that some scene setting is required so we understand the extent of the main character's dementia, and get used to the fact that the story will be relayed by someone with an unreliable memory, but 30 mins in and all that's happened is she's bought too many tinned peaches. I'm going to need more than this to sustain me over 11 hours of listening. Does it pick up?

MamaBear13 · 04/03/2016 11:14

Thanks Biblio. Someone gave me a beautiful edition so maybe I'll just leave it looking pretty on the bookshelf a bit longer and bump it down on the reading list...

MamaBear13 · 04/03/2016 11:15

Thanks for the review Museum I might check the dawn french one out!

wiltingfast · 04/03/2016 11:28

Wow, lots of HHhH talk! It really was an excellent book, so glad it has found a following Grin

List so far:-

  1. Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie
  2. The meaning of everything; the story of the OED by Simon Winchester;
  3. An astronauts guide to the universe by Chris Hadfield and
  4. The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro;
  5. The Good Fairies of New York by Martin Millar
  6. The Skeleton Cupboard: The Making of a Clinical Psychologist by Tanya Byron
  7. Golden Son by Pierce Brown
  8. The Hot Zone: The terrifying true story of the origins of the Ebola Virus by Richard Preston

Update:-

  1. The Day Without Yesterday by Stuart Clark ; This is a fictionalised account of Einstein, it's part of a trilogy on famous scientists, the first one follows Kepler, the second one Newton and this on Einstein. They are by no means focussed solely on one scientist, they try to give a glimpse of the life as it might have been experienced at the time while covering very lightly the actual science. You gain an appreciation of the achievements because of the contextual (albeit fictionalised) context. I have enjoyed this series and I would recommend them. I found the book on Eintstein to be the weakest although it has pushed me to mark a proper biography for future reading. I suspect with the much more modern Einstein it is much harder to get away with the fictionalized construct. We are simply too familiar with the wars and so on. It feels flimsy and shallow somehow. Unsatisfying.

  2. Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan ; This was a fun beach read type book. I enjoyed it, follows an American Chinese woman who falls in love with a uber rich scion of a fabulously wealthy family in Singapore. Cue lots of jealousy, nastiness, plots to get rid of her and so on. Think Jilly Cooper type romp but without so much unpc sex Grin I enjoyed it and it was a nice break, would recommend to anyone wanting a quick light read. It's weak in spots (he's not great on the big emotional scenes) but there's lots of side plots and silly action to make this v enjoyable overall.

Currently reading Overlord, D-Day and the Battle for Normandy by Max Hastings, which is very good.

MuseumOfHam · 04/03/2016 11:28

Mama hope you enjoy. I was trying to work out if it was just Dawn French's narration that made it so good, and whether I would have enjoyed just reading it - I decided I would have.

Sadik · 04/03/2016 12:11

Biblio - I'd noticed the overlap in tastes on the small chiildren thread :) Clearly I need to look for your recommendations in particular Grin

tumbletumble · 04/03/2016 12:44

I can also recommend What Matters in Jane Austen, and have just bought Bitch in a Bonnet for 99p Smile

bibliomania · 04/03/2016 12:55

I am with my people!

Stokey · 04/03/2016 13:45

Have you read Staying on by Paul Scott Remus? I think it's quite lovely but also funny, although bit of nostalgia & poignancy in there too. It's by the guy who wrote the Jewel in the Crown, but I think this is better.

I also liked some MM Kaye, especially her old crime books - death on Kashmir & Death in Zanzibar spring to mind.

I just finished 16. Buried Angels by Camilla Lackberg. It's a Scandi thriller, i think the 7th in her series. You don't need to start at the start but the main characters stories progress through the books. We're also watching Trapped so feeling a bit in the middle of Scandi noir. Which other female Nordic writers do you recommend Frugal?