50 Book Challenge 2017 Part Six

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the sixth 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, the fourth one here, and the fifth one here.

What are you reading?

I did the same, shake, glad someone else didn't get it either, thought I was reading a different book to everyone else!

I'm finally going to get round to Grapes and Eden this year. I've read other Steinbecks but have held off on these in anticipation of them being great.

Keith I really rated The Evil Seed as well.

22. The Sellout by Paul Beatty Me is up in the US Supreme Court, facing charges of holding a slave, and racial segregation, following his efforts to re-assert the black identity of his LA neighbourhood. It's very harsh, very funny, and really well written. My only slight criticism is that the actual plot occasionally felt secondary to the jokes and polemic. Great read but I think I need something gentle next.

Have been continuing my 1940s reading with Nella Last's Peace, which is great, but it's a diary, and I'm struggling to feel gripped by it after a long day. So took a break to read
26. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd Agatha Christie
Classic Christie in all senses of the phrase. This was exactly what I wanted. Was blissfully unspoilt as to the ending, which I thought was genius, though I did guess several of the red herrings, which were pretty obvious.

I am Malala by Malala Yousafzai on audiobook. I found this a bit slow to get going as it started with her father as a young man and seemed to go on a bit. However, it was utimately a very interesting read that looks at the wider history and politics of the region and the rise of the Taliban in their specific area. The parts about her shooting and recovery are only a small part of the book. It create a very vivid picture of their lives. I enjoyed it.

Book 64
Oscar Wilde and the Murders at Reading Gaol by Gyles Brandreth
Another Oscar Wilde solving mysteries book. The actual murder story didn’t start until well into the novel, and I guessed the outcome early on. Far better than this was the depiction of Wilde himself and the world of Reading Gaol.

I've read Tigers in Red Weather, Satsuki. It was ok - not massively memorable. Bit Gatsby-esque with lots of cocktail drinking, iirc. I've skimmed through reviews on Amazon and still don't remember much more than the name Helena and mother/son relationship angst.

29. The Outsider - Albert Camus

The protagonist, Mersault refuses to cry at his mother's funeral and thus begins a story about being on the outside of societal norms and refusing to behave as expected. I am not sure if I enjoyed this or not. Every character was utterly unpleasant which got in the way of empathy. But I suspect the point is I am not really supposed to be empathising

tooextra yes it's ok in that the writings ok and obviously a lot of thought gone into the plotting but I'm not enjoying it, not interested in the characters and looking forward to it being over. All style and no substance I think.

Right, 2 more books read quickly in succession.

22 Here's to us Elin Hilderbrand
Second book I've read in the last few months by Elin Hilderbrand, american author whose books are set in Nantucket Massachussets. The previous one had been The Rumour which I hadn't liked much and wrote a negative review here. Here's to us is better. A fun easy read, definitely not high literature, along the lines of authors such as JoJo Moyes etc if you like that kind of thing.

Story is that the death of famous TV chef Deacon brings together his whole family in Nantucket, at the family's summer home, to scatter his ashes. His 3 wives are there, as well as all his children, and the story of Deacon's life (and the life of his family members) unfolds in retrospect. As I said, not bad. Quite summery.

23 Hallucinations by Oliver Sacks
I adore Oliver Sacks (who died quite recently) and this is one of his later books. It explores a wide range of odd neurological and psychological phenomena around the general theme of hallucinations but looks at fascinating things such as sleep paralysis, phantom limbs, doppelgangers, hearing things, altered states, migraines etc, bringing them to life with many clinical examples from his own long career as a neurologist and from others' experiences too. Absolutely fascinating.

I've got Hallucinations to read as I've suffered from a number of those things listed. Glad you found it an enjoyable read, might bump it up a bit.

Just about finished my read through of Ruth Rendell's Inspector Wexford novels. Just one more and a book of short stories left.

63. The Speaker of Mandarin
64. Put on by cunning
65. A sleeping Life
66. Shake Hands Forever
67. Some Lie And Some Die
68. Murder Being Once Done
69. No More Dying Then
70. A Guilty Thing Surprised
71. The Best Man To Die
72. Wolf To The Slaughter
73. A New Lease Of Death All by Ruth Rendell.

Broke off to read East of Eden by John Steinbeck. A sprawling novel about the Salinas Valley in California over a period of about 20 years at the turn of the twentieth century. Themes of good and evil, brotherly love and hatred, the will of man, it had it all going on. I absolutely loved it. It joins Lord of The Flies as my read of the year so far.

More Steinbeck will be on my list.
Bought Homage to Catalonia in the Amazon sale so now reading that alongside the remaining Wexford.

59 Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Absolutely fantastic, one of my best books so far this year. The last remnants of humanity are travelling through space in an ark-ship, looking for planets terraformed & made habitable by a millenia-dead previous human civilisation. They find the perfect planet, but then discover it is already inhabited by an entirely new species, evolved from the seeded earth creatures.

It's really hard to review without spoilers, but it's proper big-themes sci-fi. Alternate chapters are told from the point of view of the would-be settlers, and the existing non-human inhabitants, and the author does an incredibly good job of imagining how a society coming from a completely different starting point might work.

I've just found this thread and I'm ridiculously excited. I do rather fear for my 'to be read' pile though.

My reading last year was very lacklustre - I didn't read much at all and when I did it was mainly Outlander or detective novels. This year I decided to do the Popsugar reading challenge, where there is a list of categories and you read something from each category, in total 52 books. It's been great so far, I have read far more this year already than I managed last year and definitely read outside my comfort zone. I've read a couple of books that don't fit the challenge when I got bored of the structure. The last few weeks I've lost my mojo a bit and not read much of anything, but I'm hoping to catch up again - I have some holiday coming up and am planning to read as much as I can then.

This thread has been great for recommendations and made me excited about what I might read next. Here's what I've read so far this year, with things I really enjoyed in bold. There were a few books that were only OK, but I've been lucky enough not to have any really terrible reads so far this year.

1. We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

1. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
2. A Week in Winter by Maeve Binchy
3. The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Society
4. Our Kind of Traitor by John Le Carre
5. The Woman in Cabin Ten by Ruth Ware

7. Sweetbitter by Stephanie Danler 8. The Martian by Andy Weir 9. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead 10. Disrupted by Dan Lyons 11. The Trespasser by Tana French 12. We are Okay by Nina Lacour 13. Ides of April by Lindsay Davies 14. The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty 15. The Night Manager by John Le Carre 16. 111 Places in New Orleans That You Must Not Miss 17. Celine by Peter Heller 18. The Wrong Side of Goodbye by Michael Connolly 19. The Girls by Emma Cline

Welcome Noodle. The challenge sounds interesting. I have attempts at reading different genres then always end up in my comfor zone (detective series).

Welcoming Noodle. Have just looked up the Popsugar reading challenge. Really interesting. I might give it ago, think I have fulfil a few of the categories already, but it might be good to push me out of my comfort zone with my reading. Nearly always struggle to get on with science fiction and fantasy.
75. The Underground Railroad- Colson Whitehead. A very moving and brutal account of slavery and the journey of a runaway slave. The Underground Railroad is given a physical form rather than being a network of contacts and people. It becomes an underground steam train. I wasn't completely convinced by this at the start but as the novel went on I saw how it was a convenient way for the author to move the story and main character along from place to place without getting caught up in her perilous journey.
The main character is damaged and difficult to emphasise with. This makes it more believable; this is a warts and all portrayal. It explores how getting away is only the first difficulty

Hi noodle, welcome

I do sometimes stray out of my comfort zone but I usually leap back in fairly quickly so I don't think that challenge would work for me. I have a feeling I'd end up avoiding reading like homework I think it's a fun idea though. Mind you I've read some terrible ones that I would have thought were just my thing so it's an inexact science. I find I get more than enough recommendations on here if I'm ever lacking, hope you find so too.

Oh dear, I've started reading back through previous threads; I'm only up to 5th January and I've already added two books to my wishlist and downloaded a podcast!

It looks from the early part of the year as if a couple of others were doing the Popsugar challenge, I'll be interested to find out if they're still working on it.

There is definitely a homework aspect to it and I've found that although I'm reading more than last year, it takes me a bit longer to get started on the next book because of this. But it has led me to read some excellent things that I probably wouldn't otherwise have chosen - for example I also read The Underground Railroad which I don't think I would have picked without the challenge - but it was fabulous. I can't say I loved it because it was such an uncomfortable read, but I finished it a couple of months ago and I still think about it quite often.

I can't remember the last few I posted, but the last 3 I have read are:

Lab Girl by Hope Jahren

The Unseen World by Liz Moore

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

I enjoyed all three and Homegoing is a standout favourite and probably one of my top 10 in last 5 years. I woke up at 5:30am to keep reading and it was worth it. I loved the structure of it - each chapter is the story of one member of the next generation, from 18th century Ghana to present day Ghana and States. Having said that I would have happily read a book based on any one of the characters. Really terrific debut novel.

Next up is Honor by Elif Shafak.

I looked at the popsugar reading challenge Noodle, and I think when I get through my current batch of library books (8 more to go) I will start using that challenge as a guide for rest of the year. Thanks!

33. The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry. Set in Victorian times, newly widowed Cora comes to the Essex coast with her son and her female companion. Interested in fossils and intrigued by rumours of a sea monster tormenting the locals, she strikes up a friendship with the rector.

Thank you to everyone who recommended this - I loved it. I thought the well-drawn characters and the evocation of a particular era were exceptionally good.

Hi noodle - that challenge sounds really interesting. Feel like I've got enough TBR to keep me going for ever without going out and looking for more though. In the event of a siege I'd definitely run out of food before books.

35. Lexicon by Max Barry This novel about the power of words was so packed with action and zipped along at such a pace that I barely had time to think about whether it was genius or deeply silly. Maybe both? It was certainly thought provoking, relevant to current concerns (information sharing, social media, fake news...) and highly enjoyable. For a story whose central concept revolves round the power of language to persuade and co-erce, it features an awful lot of physical persuasion and coercion (aka plain old violence). I don't think the irony of this was lost on the author though.

36. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood So much has already been said about this, I don't think there is much I can add. Listened on audible, mostly on my commute, and at times felt deeply uncomfortable, even though no-one else could hear what I was listening to. I read maybe 10? books a year where I finish and say to myself 'that was a great book' but I can't remember the last time I finished a book and said 'that was an important book'. Should be compulsory reading for everyone, not just those whose worldview it confirms

I read Lexicon" last year I think Museum* - definitely in the pre-Brexit/Trump world, and often think now about the bits where we read the media that confirms our world view. Also loved HMT

Have added Children of Time and Homegoing to wish list. Both sound good.

Sorry bold fail!

Welcome noodle.

28. Significant Others - Armistead Maupin. Fifth in the Tales of the City series, he took a wrong turn half way through the story when most of the action moves away from San Francisco and the sub-plots meander. An entertaining overall but the weakest of the five TOTC books I've read.

29. A Very English Scandal - John Preston. Non-fiction account that mainly focuses on the build up to the Jeremy Thorpe murder plot/scandal that culminated in his trial in 1979. This was quite a page turner, but not so much because of the talents of John Preston, but because of the bizarre and compelling story, which often took a farcical turn, and featured some truly odd characters. His style is quite flat and I had a nagging feeling throughout that pretty much all he did was to assemble material from first hand interviews and many books. So it was all very 'this happened, then that happened' and very few opinions. But the pages turned very quickly and I would recommend it.

30. Frozen In Time: The Fate Of The Franklin Expedition - Owen Beattie

Sir John Franklin's attempt to find the North west Passage ended in disaster in 1848 with the disappearance of the ships Erebus and Terror and the death of all 129 crew. In 1984 Beattie (a forensic pathologist) set out to find traces of the doomed voyage and try to find out why it ended so tragically. He's not the world's best writer but his account is full of fascinating (and sometimes gruesome) details so definitely recommended to those (Remus!) with an interest in exploration/Victorian/medical history.

Lexicon and HMT was an interesting pair of books to have on the go at the same time Stokey . When thinking about how Gilead could have been allowed to happen, why on earth did people go along with it, part of the answer (just part, but certainly not insignificant) is of course the very carefully selected use of language and reporting (see also 1984...and various real life regimes through history).