50 Book Challenge 2016 Part Five

[southeastdweller]

Thread five 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.

The first thread of 2016 is here, second thread here, third thread here and fourth thread here.

How're you getting on so far?

Also, Remus, how on earth are you on 74?
Must read more...must find time...

You won't regret it, Monty :) It was one of my favourite reads from a couple of years ago.

Monty I'm just cursed with being a stupidly fast reader. It means I'm always one book away from having nothing to read, and I am impossible to live with when bookless!

Good to know Mermaid!
Have you ever thought of writing your own Remus? I've always thought that great readers have a chance of being great writers, as they absorb so many stories over the years
Let's hope there's never a day where you run out, thank goodness for immediately downloadable ebooks!

94 and 95 Here's To You, Rachel Robinson and Deenie by Judy Blume

More teenage rereads!

96. The Year Of Living Danishly by Helen Russell

I enjoyed this although a few too many statistics at some points! I like the way she structures it month by month and picks a different aspect of life to focus on each month. I love the idea of the Lego company drumming and singing!

97.Those Girls by Chevy Stevens

I'm not sure enjoyed is quite the right word for this. It's about 3 girls who go through a horrible event and have to change their identities. 18 years later something happens to bring it all up again. The descriptions of what happens to them are quite graphic and made uncomfortable reading but I did want to read to the end to see what happened and will try other books of hers.

98. The Secrets We Keep by Jonathan Harvey

This was a funny novel about a man who disappeared, then 5 years later his family find a left luggage ticket and wonder if he's still alive. The story is told by each member of the family in turn, but I didn't find this confusing as they all had very different voices. I had never heard of Harvey before and picked this up in the library on a whim, and I'm glad I did!

99. The Executor by Jesse Kellerman

This was just a load of pretentious twaddle. A mature philosophy student becomes a conversationalist to an old lady. Then her nephew shows up and becomes jealous. It all just felt like an opportunity for the author to show off how much he knew about philosophy, and unfortunately that was at the expense of the story and any sort of characterisation. I have read one Jesse Kellerman that I really enjoyed (The Brutal Art) but have read two others that were total rubbish so not sure I'll bother with any more by him.

100. The Darkest Secret by Alex Marwood

A little girl goes missing. This story is told from two time points - the weekend she went missing and 12 years later. The earlier story is told from the POV of lots of different people but the later story is just from the POV of one of the girl's sisters. There are a lot of echoes of the Madeleine McCann case. None of the characters in the book are particularly likeable but I did enjoy reading it. Not as good as her debut, The Wicked Girls, though.

101. Nod by Adrian Barnes

I didn't enjoy this. I loved the idea- suddenly most of the people round the world can no longer sleep, apart from a few. It starts off reasonably well but then descends into nonsense. It's also never explained why this happens, or why the children that can sleep no longer speak but the adults do. The ending is a let down too, as if the author just got bored writing it and stopped!

28. After me comes the flood - Sarah Perry

Been reviewed up thread, it's a story about a man who finds himself at a country house full of strange people (who were expecting someone else with a similar name) and doesn't feel able to leave. I'm finding it hard to explain this book, mainly because it feels like nothing actually happened, it did feel like it was building up to a dramatic end, then it was over and not all that much had happened, felt a bit "is that it?". I wouldn't recommend it, the whole story feels a bit pointless, like all that tension and weirdness deserved some big twist in the end or big reveal, but nowt.

31. The Summer Book, Tove Jansson.

Written by the creator of the Moomins. A young girl and her elderly grandmother spend the summer on a tiny island off the coast of Finland. They adventure around the land, talking and fighting and playing. The granddaughter is bright, argumentative and churlish, the grandmother, wise and adventurous but struggling with her health. They learn to manage each other's flaws and develop a deep love for one another.
This was an odd one. It's very well reviewed everywhere you look, and it was a beautiful book, but I found some aspects of it really irritating. The child's unnecessary outbursts got quite annoying, and the grandmother's responses to them didn't seem realistic at times. The love between them was well written though, understated and quiet and the descriptions of the island were lovely.

32. Divergent, Veronica Roth. Well-known YA fantasy following Beatrice Prior, a teenager discovering who she is in a dystopian world where everyone is defined by their aptitudes and values and is affiliated with one of five factions. This is perfect easy reading for me: YA, fantasy, post-apocalyptic/dystopian with plenty of fighting and surviving, and a bit of romance when there's time.

33. Insurgent, Veronica Roth. Book 2 of the Divergent series. War is looming as conflict between, and within, the factions grows. Tris and Four are fighting to find out the truth behind the actions of those intent on destroying society as they know it. I didn't enjoy this as much as Divergent, but that's because I always like the first of a series best in fantasy writing. The world-building and getting to know the characters is always the part I enjoy the most. The story continued well though, and I'm glad Roth isn't afraid to kill off characters and be true to the dangerous, unpredictable nature of the world she writes in.

62 Timeless by Gail Carriger. More steampunk comedy victoriana, final book in the Parasol Protectorate series. Good finale to the series with all the various loose ends happily tied up.

63 Stasi Child by David Young.

Thriller/police procedural set in East Germany in the mid 1970s. A bit gory for my taste, but the setting is excellent, and it's well written (it's a debut novel, but I wouldn't have guessed). I liked the lead character, Oberleutnant Karin Mulle of the DDR Kripo, and that it's a cold war thriller written entirely from the perspective of the East.

A good companion to Stasiland, which I'm still listening to on audio.

Haven't updated my list for a while:-

51. The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard. This is the first of the Cazalets series of novels. I had read it a couple of years ago but didn't read any more of them then. Have now decided to press on a read them all this summer so this was a reread to remind me who's who. Really enjoyed it.

52. HHhH by Laurent Binet. Reviewed many times already on here. I liked it, found it interesting, liked Binet's innovative approach to the writing of the book.

53. Grief Is The Thing With Feathers by Max Porter. Listened to this as a audio book, amazing. Recommend this is listened to for the best experience.

54. Marking Time by Elizabeth Jane Howard. The second novel in the Cazalets series. This one focuses on the older children more - the story has moved on to 1941 and they are in the thick of WW2. Still enjoying the series but taking a breather before reading the next one.

Failed to finish reading Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. Got about 70% through it but couldn't bear any more of it. Gave up. Not my cup of tea.

33. Echo Burning by Lee Child

Another Jack Reacher books, and not one of the better ones. I started reading this because it was in my "unread" file but realised towards the end that I had already read it. Ah well.

61. The Long Cosmos by Terry Pratchett & Stephen Baxter

As humans continue to explore the Long Earth (this is sort of the many worlds idea of reality, in this case where a small device enables people to 'Step' between the different worlds) nearly six decades after Step Day, Joshua Valiente takes a last solo journey to the High Meggers. Disaster strikes and he is only saved by a group of trolls. At the same time, the Long Earth receives a signal from the stars, a signal which is picked up by many different forms of life. The message is JOIN US. The Next, the super-intelligent next stage evolution of homo sapiens, detect instrictions within the message on how to develop a massive artificial intelligence but they need help from across the many new worlds of mankind to build it and so go in search of the origins of the signal somewhere deep in the cosmos.

I have liked the Long Earth series, but it's Pratchett writing sci fi (along with Baxter of course) rather than his usual comic fantasy and that's not really my thing. I much prefer the Discworld. But this is the fifth and final book in the series so of course I was going to read it. Baxter says in a foreword that he saw it through the editorial and publishing stages so presumably it was largely complete, with some revisions to be done, before Pratchett died.

book 23 Judging Dev by Diarmaid Ferriter this book was written as a balance to Tim Pat Cogan's Michael Collins. To be honest this book was a bit meh. Eamon de Velera comes across as the lack lustre Post Civil War Irish Prime Minister and latterly President that history has always portrayed him. If you are an Irish History student I would give it a miss

32. Love from Boy - Roald Dahl (edited by Donald Sturrock). Another dud read this year, this is a book of letters Dahl wrote to his mother from when he was nine to his early 50's. A small selection were printed from 600 letters found and it seems that the ones that were chosen present the author as rather saint-like. Also the letters here make little mention of Dahl's personal life so I felt very distanced from him and I hated all the 'derring-do' stuff (he was a pilot in WWII).

Monty I was slightly underwhelmed by The Summer Book too. I thought it could have delivered so much more.

Cote - Born to Run is already on my wish list. Just waiting till the price is right

37. The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin One of those rare books enjoyed (I think) by both Cote and Remus and now by me too. A historical murder mystery set in 1830s Istanbul. The setting and the time period took me out of my comfort zone, with no prior knowledge of the cultural, political and military history background, and I certainly wouldn't have picked this up without the recommendations from this thread - thanks. Fast paced, intelligent (if a little heavy on the unbelievable action and peril to the main protagonist, but I just went with the flow), good fun.

40. In Darkness by Nick Lake. I mostly enjoyed this- it is a YA noble that interweaves a story of Haiti after the 2010 earthquake, with the story of how the island first became free of slavery. It was fascinating as I don't know much about Haiti, and I don't think I have ever read a novel set there, but I wasn't quite as emotionally moved as I might have expected- it might make a good film.

102. Charlotte Bronte: A Life by Claire Harman

I've had this on the go for a while alongside other things. I enjoyed this although it did drag a bit in the middle (although this was possibly because I was reading other stuff as well and just needed to focus on it more). If you're interested in the Brontes it's a good read - although it's obviously mainly about Charlotte there's plenty in there about the others too.

Chessie: I've had that in my hand a few times but never actually travelled to the till with it because I can't see how Juliet Barker's The Brontes could be bettered.

Do you think it would be worth buying? Is there any new information in it?

Museum - I'm glad you liked The Janissary Tree The rest of the series is pretty good, too.

Louisa I've never read any other biographies so I don't know how it compares I'm afraid! I know Harman cites Barker's book as one of her main sources but I don't know to what extent Harman's book differs.

That should say I've never read any other Bronte biographies! I have read biographies of other people!!

I wish the rest of the 'Janissary Tree' series would come down in price. I enjoyed the first, but it definitely felt like £1.99 good, rather than £4.99 good!

I reckon that if Cote and I both like something, everybody else will like it too! :)

A novel must be very special if it unites Cote and I.

33. Prince Caspian - CS Lewis

In which Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy return to Narnia to help the Prince win the throne of Narnia. Not a very eventful book, and the one battle is a bit anticlimactic - looking forward to Voyage Of The Dawn Treader which was my favourite of the series as a child.

I agree, Remus Our tastes in fiction are so diametrically opposite that chances of a novel we both like to be universally appreciated are quite high!