50 Book Challenge Part Five

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fifth thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2017, 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 the year is here, the second one here, the third thread here and the fourth one here.

What are you reading?

15. Bitter Water by Gordon Ferris. Follows directly on from The Hanging Shed, I didn't enjoy it quite as much, but a good solid detective story.

57. The Memory Garden by Rachel Hore

I've enjoyed other books by Hore, but this one was disappointing. It's one of those books where a story in the past links with a story in the present. You know the ones, they're always set in Cornwall and have a picture of a gate on the cover. In this one, the story from the past didn't go into much depth and there was too much focus on the present day story which was a shame as the present day heroine was really annoying and whiny.

30. Restless, William Boyd

Boyd is a brilliant story teller and you know what you're getting with him. This started off seemingly a little unfocused, but he's very clever at pulling the strands together. Perfectly paced (IMHO), this tells the parallel stories of Eva, a young woman recruited as a spy during WW2, and Ruth, her daughter who finds out, during the hot summer of 1976, what her mother has been hiding from her all these years. Ruth is more than just a plot device; she is an interesting character with a story of her own, and while many of the questions raised in Eva's half of the plot are given at least suggested solutions, Ruth is left with some deliberately loose threads which raise questions about the parallels between her mother's story and her own.

Book 44
The Cornish Coast Murder by John Bude
A British Library Crime Classic, which was enjoyable enough but didn’t set the world on fire. It’s one of those crime novels where the victim was, to all accounts, a bit of a bastard, so various people had reasons to kill him. The potential problem, of course, is that the reader then doesn’t care much. It was okay.

Have bought The City and the City and The Pursuit of Love in the monthly Kindle sale.

Hello! Hope it's not too late to join. Here's my list so far. Highlights in bold. Haven't read anything awful so far this year.

1. My Brilliant Friend – Elena Ferrante

2. Days of Abandonment – Elena Ferrante

3. Days Without End – Sebastian Barry

4. Eileen – Ottessa Moshfegh

5. Grief is the thing with feathers – Max Porter

6. A Manual for Cleaning Women – Lucia Berlin

7. Casting Off – Elizabeth Jane Howard

8. The Gustav Sonata – Rose Tremain

9. The Problem with Sheep and Goats – Joanna Cannon

10. All for Nothing – Walter Kempowski

11. Call of the Wild – Jack London

12. Black Beauty – Anna Sewell

13. Everyone Brave is Forgiven – Chris Cleave

14. Amsterdam – Ian McEwan

15. The Invention of Wings – Sue Monk Kidd

16. We are all completely beside ourselves – Karen Joy Fowler

17. All Change – Elizabeth Jane Howard

18. Hagseed – Margaret Atwood

19. LaRose - Louise Erdrich

I'm about 3/4 way through this one and really enjoying it. The story of two Ojibwe families in North Dakota starting in 1999, but encompassing events from family history hundreds of years ago and more recently in the sixties and seventies. Lively and vividly drawn characters and an interesting plot. I particularly like the dialogue; she has a fantastic way of capturing the funny and sad way people interact with each other. Recommended!

46. Just Henry by Michelle magorian
As Stitches and Remus said no* where near as good as Goodnight Mr Tom.* A return to many of the same themes of Mr Tom ; children finding a mentor, discovering of previously unseen gifts, friendships, domestic violence and coming of age. But this book was over long and wasn't balanced by the realism. Too many happy endings made it all just too unbelievable.

Remus snap! Came on to say I'd bought those too

I'm continuing my terrible time. I can't count this one as I've ditched it The Dust That Falls from Dreams by Louis de Bernieres. This really is a lot of research about WW1 disguised as a novel, with dull, interchangeable Edwardian characters that are as flat as my Mum's Yorkshire puddings (seriously: they are like fritters).

I was trundling along thinking it was ok, then I had to wade through pages of supposed "dialogue" that was really an essay on the air war that I could not imagine anyone delivering orally. To make it worse, this was spoken by a young pilot who was telling some assembled young women all sorts of gory stories of the "murders" he'd committed in the name of war, turning rivers red with blood and so forth.

Then a vicar describes a man's death to a young, unmarried, woman, saying "he took a bullet to the face that blew the back of his head off. That sort of thing happened quite a lot". Over biscuits. He says that to her. OH NO HE BLOODY DIDN'T. There is no way any man, in 1918, much less a vicar, would say something so casually brutal in that situation.

Men came back from that war unable to speak of anything they witnessed, much less chit chat about it at afternoon tea for an audience of women. It struck me as so very poor a representation of that time and generation as to be almost insulting. Read All Quiet on the Western Front instead, and weep.

Remus - I would be interested to hear what you think about The City & The City. Given our polar opposite tastes in fiction, you must love it

Did you hate it, Cote? I know nothing at all about it, other than that I seem to remember somebody on here recommending it to me years ago.

Satsuki - Louis de B sure likes to lecture. Captain C's Mandolin would have been a good book, if the writer had understood that sometimes (lots of times), less is more.

I enjoyed Corelli and especially liked his South American trilogy, but was only 17 when I read them so don't know if they would stand up to a reread now. I thought his writing was good previously but the last couple have been turgid in that department too.

I haven’t updated for ages,, but for once it’s for positive reasons rather than the usual no time/unwell/things getting in the way of reading culprits. I got married in March, and in the weeks since I’ve been happily relaxing, reading, gardening and doing all sorts of nice things as a form of home-honeymoon, as our proper honeymoon isn’t until September. I kept up with the thread, but haven’t really been around the digital world much.

Time to jump back in now though, and as there’s a fair few to review I’ll keep each one short.

12. Gangsta Granny, David Walliams. If I remember rightly (was a while ago now)I picked this because I needed a new audiobookfor a journey and some food shopping, but didn’t have much storage space left on my phone, so it had to be really short. Not bad, couple of funny descriptions (helps if you’re in a light-hearted mood when listening to it – I was).

13. Peter Pan, J. M. Barrie. Didn’t get around to this when I was younger so am glad to have read it now. I enjoyed it for the most part but found some sections a tad dull.

14. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury. I hadn’t read anything by Bradbury before – I really liked this. Weird, intense and scarily believable.

15. Feral, George Monbiot. A look at rewilding, how best to achieve it in Britain, how it varies from conservation, and the difficulties associated with it. Made me re-think quite a few values and beliefs I previously held. Informative, well researched, often subjective: Monbiot admits that his views can be a tad extreme, such is his commitment to the topic.

16. The Virgin Gardener, Laetitia Maklouf. A set of lovely ideas for gardening without a garden. I bought this a few years ago when I was living in a flat. We bought our first house last year, and I’ve been doing a lot of gardening recently, so re-read this for inspiration.

17. The River Cottage Handbook No. 4: Veg Patch, Mark Diacono. Guiding my first foray into vegetable gardening, immensely useful, have gone back to it umpteen times.

18. Howards End, E. M. Forster. A lovely novel about the struggle between inner life and outer life, the social and economic changes in the early 1900s, and how different classes interact with one another. Three families: the Schlegels, who value culture, literature and beauty; the Wilcox family, businesslike and focused on money and practicality; and the Basts, a working class family struggling to fund their way and fit in. I’m sure many of you will have read this. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

19. The Snow Spider Trilogy, Jenny Nimmo. A children’s fantasy book (not actually a trilogy of books, it is one book split into three parts). My mum took a detour from the only genre she typically reads (crime) to read this last year, and really enjoyed it, so asked me to read it too so she could share it with me. I can see why, as a first-time reader of anything fantastical, she liked this so much, but as a regular reader of that genre it fell short for me. I’ll get her to read His Dark Materials so she can experience some really wonderful fantasy written for children– I’m envious of her reading it for the first time!

20. Spectacles, Sue Perkins. Liked this – funny, well-paced, not too much focus on any one aspect of her life, as is sometimes the case with autobiographies/memoirs.

21. Howards End is on the Landing, Susan Hill. A book about books. Author Susan Hill decides to spend a year only reading books she already has at home, and combines writing about this with some insight into her reading/writing inspiration and some name-dropping stories of authors she has met. Enjoyed it and took lots of notes, as if my TBR list isn’t long enough.

22. Just One Damned Thing After Another, Jodi Taylor. The first in the St Mary’s Chronicles books about time-travelling historians. Light, silly, funny. Just right for when I want something entertaining and don’t care too much about writing quality.

23. My Roots, Monty Don. Collection of his Observer articles spanning a decade from mid 90s to mid 00s. I love that man, I really do. And his garden. I could read about it all day.

Sorry for the ridiculous length of that! I'll be on top of it from now on.

Cote - Nice to see MN appreciating your Cloud Atlas analysis! www.mumsnet.com/books/marmite-modern-classics

Congratulations, Monty and welcome, Indigo.

Congratulations monty that sounds lovely

Hi Indigo

Apart from Captain C's mandolin I have abandoned every Louis de Bernieres I have tried to read!
Congrats Monty and welcome Indigo.

I've also been shopping in the Kindle sale today; I get quite excited when a new sale starts each month! I chose The Woman In Cabin Ten, We Are Not Ourselves and The Emperor of All Maladies.

I just finished no 41, The Dark Circle by Linda Grant. I enjoyed this historical fiction set mainly in the 1950s. It follows East London teenaged twins, Miriam and Lenny, who upon being diagnosed with tuberculosis are sent for treatment at a sanatorium in Kent as some of the first NHS patients.
An interesting insight into the era and TB's treatment prior to antibiotics widespread use for the usually fatal disease.

I'm also halfway through Capital by John Lanchester, I like this. I'll be starting Commonwealth by Ann Patchett later too: it's due back at the library on Wednesday and while I've no chance of finishing it by then I can at least try to minimise my late fees!

Monty - "Cote - Nice to see MN appreciating your Cloud Atlas analysis!"

Ha, "incredible analysis", they say Finally MNHQ appreciates me

Ooh and hi Indigo, and congratulations Monty ....sorry, I posted before reading the latest posts!

Ada's Algorithm: How Lord Byron's Daughter Ada Lovelace Launched the Digital Age through the Poetry of Numbers is 99p

Ooh congratulations, Monty! I clearly had not read the thread before posting

Hi all.
Finished a couple of books in the past week...
Quiet by Susan Cain - Non-fiction, an exploration of introversion and extroversion, "the power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking". Accessible psychology, this made me think about myself and friends/family and how we react differently in different situations. It was an interesting read as a parent and teacher too, and I'll look out for the follow-up Quiet Power which I think focuses on children and young people.
A History of Britain in 21 Women by Jenni Murray - Listened to this on Audible and really enjoyed it. The selection is entirely subjective, with a feminist slant, with each woman's life story and achievements summarised in their own chapter. I confess, my knowledge of the featured individuals was poor and in many cases non-existent, so the format was a really good introduction to lots of aspects of British history.
I had previously been listening to The Butcher's Hook by Janet Ellis, got about 4 chapters/an hour and a half into it and found I wasn't looking forward to returning to it. Plot and characters seem grim so far. Has anyone read it? Is it worth persevering? I very rarely abandon a book.
Currently reading A Month in the Country which I spied in the library after reading about it on here.

Remus - re The City & The City, I can't say I enjoyed it. I thought it was very disappointing, actually.

I just bought The Worthington Chronicles by Scott Orson Card (who wrote Ender's Game) for 99p in the Monthly Kindle deals. I had never heard of it before but the premise sounds interesting.

I'll save your review until after I've read it, Cote.

No idea what number I'm on now; possibly book 27:

The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain. Reviewed (and recommended) on here so I will be brief. Haven't had much joy with Tremain - read one of her books years ago and was underwhelmed) but I enjoyed this. Reminds me a bit of Ann Tyler, Ann Patchett type books. Well written, convincing, you care about the characters etc etc. It made me rather nostalgic for Switzerland and I could almost smell the fresh Swiss air :) I wouldn't say it has been one of my favourite books so far BUT I suspect it's because I started it as soon as I put down the previous book (Patchett's 'The Magician's Assistant').

I think I need to have a couple of days off and read some non-fiction e.g. Andrew Marr's History of the World or finish Sapiens instead of leaping from one good book to another, and give myself more time to digest what I've read. Does anyone else find this?