50 Book Challenge 2016 Part Six

[southeastdweller]

Thread six 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, fourth thread here and fifth thread here.

I rather liked Never Let Me Go (though obviously not that much, as I can't remember very much about it at all). I got through Remains of the Day - and I'm a ruthless dumper of books - but agree that it wasn't what you'd call a gripping read.

"the yardstick by which I measure really boring films"
Mine is The Libertine - in fact, how anyone managed to take a film about the Earl of Rochester starring Johnny Depp and make it so spectacularly boring quite impressed me.

Thanks for all the ideas! Amazon account is taking a bit of a beating. Hope dp isn't in when the package arrives

Just googled Meet Joe Black, Satsuki as I wasn't aware of that little gem. Didn't even make it to the end of the Wikipedia entry.

Am slightly worried (but not surprised as have tried to read ishiguro in the past) to see the comments about Never Let Me Go. My rather immature DS has started reading this for his GCSE. They've only read about 20 pages in class and he hates it already.

I am so glad other people don't like Ishiguro- dh raves about him but I find the whole thing over styleized.

But I liked Meet Joe Black- Brad Pitt looked so pretty in it.

Love Heyer Satsuki- TRW isn't one of my favourites, but bits are very funny, I particularly like the younger brothers enthusiasm for setting traps, and the heroine dryly saying something like "well we shall all be mirdered in our beds but I shan't mind at all if it helps catch the bad guys!"

I didn't like Never Let Me Go either. But Remains of the Day (film, not book) is wonderful! I sobbed

Yes, perhaps I would have got through it easier if Brad Pitt was my cup of tea and ignored its slow pace and terrible plot

I saw a funny thing the other day about how Brad Pitt always eats in films, like Tom Cruise always runs. It's true. Maybe he gets bored in his own movies Benjamin Button was also a waste of my life

Wahey, I finished number 7 the other day - which is very good for me!!!
7) Death in the Clouds - Agatha Christie. I usually love love love Christie but this one just didn't do it for me. A woman is found dead during a flight and Poirot investigates which of the passengers is the murderer. I found the plot a bit boring to be honest, along with boring characters and I just wanted to get to the end. Even though I didn't guess the murderer I just didn't really care. A disappointment

I've heard the thing about Brad Pitt eating in films before. Apparently in Ocean's Eleven he is eating in every single scene he appears in!

47. The Holy Thief by William Ryan

I bought this as a Kindle Deal when someone had recommended it on this thread but found it tedious and predictable (apologies to whoever had said she enjoyed it). It was positively boring and there were no surprises anywhere in the book.

Child 44 did this murder-mystery-in-Soviet-Russia thing much better imho.

Mr Penumbra's 24-hour Bookstore is Kindle Deal of the Day, for 99p.

It was OK - light read, sort of interesting. I enjoyed the descriptions of Google work environment as well as the overall story. Don't expect literature, though.

part of me is shouting ok, ok, get on with the organ farming already

Not the kind of thing you find yourself regularly shouting, Museum (I hope).

Welcome twenty. New blood always welcome! (Unfortunate resonance with Museum's enthusiasm for organ harvesting).

93. Lies, Damned Lies and History, Jodi Taylor
I've found myself on a bit of a roll with this series. Historians travel back in time, allowing the author scope for plenty of great set pieces. It's all a bit repetitive, but it's enjoyable escapism.

That's weird tarahumara that he eats in the whole film - I wondered if it was the sort of thing where you could make a compilation of any actor and it would look like they were always eating but perhaps not. His wives/girlfriends always seem particularly thin when they are with him. Maybe they are like Hansel in the cage, trying not to look too edible.

Oh god, there must be something very wrong with me as I really rated Never Let Me Go and cried at the end and everything. I read it last year and thought it was excellent, so understated and somehow innocent and naive.

Either I am right and you are all wrong or....no, I am right
And on the subject of Brad Pitt, he also eats in the Friends episode he's in...

Does Brad Pitt eat in Thelma and Louise? That's not, ahem, the bit I remember.

I read The Buried Giant last year and while I didn't hate it, it didn't leave me keen to read more Ishiguro.

Don't mind them Whippet. I loved it too

AND The Unconsoled, but will admit, that is a tough read

The 24 hour penumbra book imo is awful. Not even worth 99p.

I did buy the Margaret Drabble one though, The Pure Gold Baby...

Wilting you and I have always had a special bond

83. The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch

Fantasy novel focusing on the activities of The Gentlemen Bastards, a gang of thieves and confidence tricksters in the ancient city of Camorr. The Secret Peace is an arrangement between the Duke of the city and the Capa of Camorr, the ruler of the underworld gangs which means that the nobility are off limits as far as theft is concerned. But Locke Lamora and his gang are doing quite nicely out of conning the nobility out of large chunks of their fortune while remaining unsuspected by the Capa and the Spider, a semi-legendary figure who controls the Midnighters, a secret police force. But then a clandestine war breaks out in the underworld - a challenger to the Capa calling himself the Grey King is killing off the leaders of some of the gangs, and Lamora and his Gentlemen Bastards suddenly find themselves struggling to survive.

Not a bad tale, but I didn't really get into it for some reason. The world Lynch creates is pretty good, with its histories, religions and rules of behaviour, but it didn't quite grip me as much as I had hoped it might.

Cote - It was me who liked The Holy Thief. I liked the central character, and I think I read it after a few really crappy reads, so it was just what I needed at the time.

I'll give Child 44 a try.

My awards for most boring films ever go to:
The Piano
Brokeback Mountain

I don't think I've ever seen anything with Brad Pitt in.

Anyone else wondering how GCSE texts are selected after the relevation that unfortunate school children are being forced to study Never Let Me Go?

biblio just a part of me wants to shout about organ harvesting. I keep that part very well under control...usually I invested my whole commute today, and it hasn't really moved on...'but I'll come to that later. I must tell you first about a curious thing that happened around this time concerning a pencil case. I don't know how it was for you with pencil cases...' I'm finding it strangely soothing actually.

Oh God, the Piano. Deathly.

Yes I found brokeback mountain boring, cold mountain also boring.

Should we start a film thread

The Shipping news almost put me to sleep, but the worst movie I ever saw was Glengarry Glen Ross- loads of self important man wankery.

I liked Child 44, definitely worth a read, though I do like a detective story. You may need to suspend disbelief a little, but it wasn't your normal run of the mill type thing.

Brad Pitt also V pretty in the Oceans movies, but the best I've probably seen him act was 12 Monkeys I think.