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50 Book Challenge 2017 Part Six

993 replies

southeastdweller · 05/06/2017 21:26

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?

OP posts:
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10
TheTurnOfTheScrew · 28/07/2017 08:38

25. The Tidal Zone by Sarah Moss. Story of what happens when Adam and Emma's fifteen year old daughter suddenly stops breathing one day,

I enjoyed this. The writing was beautiful, and I liked how Adam's research in Coventry Cathedral provided a metaphor for rebuilding after a catastrophic event. Wasn't sure about the not-ending ending.

I've just started Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh but am really not feeling it yet. Worth persevering, or should I scrap it?

Tanaqui · 28/07/2017 09:38

Thank you so much Satsuki and Southeast- I think it was Satsukis review I was thinking of. I wish I had read it all in one go as it was really good.

Am currently loving Commonwealth, so thank you all who recommended that on an earlier thread.

StitchesInTime · 28/07/2017 14:16

46. Marrying Harriet by M.C. Beaton

Regency romance. Virtuous Harriet, orphaned daughter of a Methodist minister, is sent to a School for Manners. This is run by the Tribble sisters, with the aim of getting young ladies who seem unmarriagable married off.

An extremely quick, light and predictable read. It's clearly a later book in a series of books, with various random characters popping up hellbent on causing trouble for poorly explained reason.

I've read far more entertaining Regency romances than this. Georgette Heyer's stuff, for example, is far more entertaining and enjoyable. I didn't hate this, but I'd still recommend avoiding this entirely and picking up something by another author instead.

Stokey · 28/07/2017 14:18

I found Eileen quite dull, one of my friends liked it though. It doesn't really change much so if you're not feeling it, I'd call it a day.

Loved Commonwealth.

RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie · 28/07/2017 14:20

Dp liked the beginning of Eileen iirc and then said it didn't really go anywhere.

TheTurnOfTheScrew · 28/07/2017 14:37

Cheers. I'm going to give Eileen a few more pages tonight, but I'll sack it if I'm not enjoying it more after this evening.

DesdemonasHandkerchief · 28/07/2017 16:39

My Family and Other Animals the 99p book of the day today on Kindle Deals, one that's on my tbr list 😊

DesdemonasHandkerchief · 28/07/2017 17:16

Tarahumara totally agree with your review of The Glass Castle, a book that has stayed with me too.

MuseumOfHam · 28/07/2017 21:42

Love My Family and Other Animals , such a comfort book.

  1. The Curious Affair of the Somnambulist and the Psychic Thief by Lisa Tuttle Lisa Tuttle has been quietly writing decent fantasy for years, nay decades, and this was a jolly departure into Victorian melodrama (albeit with a fantasy twist to it). Feisty female heroine, tick, detective agency, tick, somnambulism, mesmerists, mediums, charlatans, seances, ectoplasm. What's not to love? An entertaining and easy read, as good as any of this genre I've read. Looks like she's setting it up to be a series - I'm in.
BestIsWest · 28/07/2017 21:52

I'm not finishing anything at the moment. Can't finish Jane Eyre, Can't finish Homage to Catalonia. Have read a couple of Cathy Kelly books in between. They were a bit light and formulaic but passed the time.

I might down load the map book someone mentioned up thread.

ChessieFL · 28/07/2017 23:01

That might have been me Best - it was Map Addict. I enjoyed it but as I said in my review you have to have an interest in maps! There are a few pictures and photos though so not sure how they will show on a kindle (mine was paperback) - probably ok if you have the tablet Kindle but less good on the basic ereader version I would think.

spinningheart · 28/07/2017 23:02

I listened to Eileen as an audiobook - it was good, not amazing, and different to anything else I have read recently.

Yet again, I can't remember when or what I last posted but I have read a few good ones lately. It continues to be a good reading year overall.

Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri is a book of short stories. My favourite was the first, and eponymously named one about a woman grieving the loss of her mother and trying to figure out how to develop a better relationship with her father who is also coping with his loss. All the stories in the book are quiet in tone, considered, and maybe a bit ordinary(??) in a good way. Although the last book of short stories I remember reading was by George Saunders who writes anything but ordinary.

Commonwealth by Ann Patchett. Really enjoyed this. Not plot heavy but really strong character depiction and sibling relationships. I haven't read anything by Ann Patchett in a long time, am tempted to go for another.

Days Without End by Sebastian Barry. I absolutely loved this, highly recommend especially if you like pioneer/wild west/civil war era. It's about a young Irish man who emigrates to US during the famine, joins the army and fights in the Indian wars and the Civil War. There were so many passages that I wanted to commit to memory, it was beautifully written.

City on Fire - this is 900 pages long. I made it to page 400 and finally quit. Has anyone else read this? The advance for this debut novel was apparently 2 million dollars!!!! They should have paid half of that to an editor and it may have been twice as readable. I simply couldn't finish it.

CoteDAzur · 29/07/2017 00:15

So here are the first few sentences of Madonna In A Fur Coat, as translated in Satsuki's copy, followed by what they really mean to say in the book. Not only is the translation visibly wrong in a number of places (like, saying "dismissed" instead of "offended", "a portrait" instead of "the portrait", and "Even now, after all these years" instead of "Especially now, after all these years") but the 'voice' of the narrator is totally misrepresented, imho. In the original, he comes across as a polite, poignant, elderly gentleman feeling the weight of the years. The English translation is as if written by a teenager Sad

Eng. translation:
Perhaps I should have DISMISSED these artists for presuming they could achieve great height from such little effort. But when I considered the twisted pleasure they might get from being punished and ridiculed, I could only pity them.
Tr original:
Perhaps I should be OFFENDED by these people who attempted to achieve such important things with such little effort. But there was nothing to do but feel sorry for them, upon considering how they willingly accept punishment like continuously being misunderstood and ridiculed with nearly pathological pleasure.

Eng. translation:
EVEN now, after all these years, I cannot describe the torrent that swept through me in that moment.
Tr original:
There is no way to describe my feelings at that moment, ESPECIALLY after all these years.

("the torrent that swept through me"? WTF? That is not at all true to Raif's 'voice' in the book)

Eng. translation:
I only remember standing, transfixed, before the portrait of a woman wearing a fur coat.
Tr original:
I just remember standing there, before the portrait of a woman in a fur coat, as if nailed to the floor.

Eng. translation:
Others pushed past me, impatient to see the rest of the exhibition, but I could not move.
Tr original:
Those who passed from one picture to the other were pushing me to and fro with their bodies, but I could not move from that spot.

RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie · 29/07/2017 00:30

Jane Eyre - the tick is to skip every page that doesn't contain Rochester.

BestIsWest · 29/07/2017 08:18

Lol Remus, I might just do that. I've read it before, many times and was always partial to the miserable school bit and Helen dying but finding it a bit slow going this time.

Thank you Chessie, I do love a map. I've downloaded a sample.

Does anyone else use google maps street view to look up places in books?

noodlezoodle · 29/07/2017 14:52

spinningheart I've just started City on Fire! I'm only about 50 pages in but really enjoying it so far. We'll see how long that lasts...

LunaTheCat · 29/07/2017 15:15

Lovely thread. Too late in the year for fifty books but I may try to get to twenty
some from
this year that I can remember.
-the Island by Victoria Hislop - read it in Crete so specially when vocative

  • both of Henry Marshes books about his life as a neurosurgeon -first book who's nameI had forgotten better
-Paradise City by Elizabeth Day - the story of 4 people living in London
  • the sleep book by Guy Measows.
  • cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese -my favourite book which I read yearly
  • reading the Hangmaidens Tail and about 1/3rd through but it is bleak and only going to get bleaker so I am not sure I can face anymore. Someone tell me to keep persevering!
-" My Brulliant Friend " my Elina Ferante - loved it

And some others can't remember.
Can anyone say what is the best book they have read?

CoteDAzur · 29/07/2017 15:58

Welcome Luna Smile

"reading the Hangmaidens Tail"

A tail? Whose tail??? Grin

CeCeDrake · 29/07/2017 16:01

Oh god.. I've just found this, serial lurker and this is the second post to bring me to surface today - i am EXSHITED

BestIsWest · 29/07/2017 18:18

Welcome Luna and Cece.

SatsukiKusakabe · 29/07/2017 18:28

cote thanks for posting the translations - makes a big difference I can see even in those examples. It goes a little way to explaining the contrasting views, because yes, sentimental teenager navel gazing and gushing about feeeelllings was the overall impression I had and was surprised you liked it Grin

Tarahumara · 29/07/2017 18:50

A couple of fairly mediocre ones to add to my list:

  1. Only When I Laugh by Paul Merton. Not bad; he seemed to be aiming for factual rather than funny. I quite like autobiographies by comedians, and I would rate this as better than Stephen Fry's, not as good as Frank Skinner's, and similar to Dawn French's.

  2. The Girls by Emma Cline. Already reviewed several times on this thread. Of the 'Apple Tree Yard' genre. Does what it says on the tin!

RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie · 29/07/2017 19:08

Book 70
Soul Music - Terry Pratchett
The ones with Death in are my favourites, so I quite liked this. Typical TP jokes and witterings, and it could have used a bit of editing, but all jolly good fun.

southeastdweller · 29/07/2017 21:41
  1. Adele - Sean Smith. Poorly researched biography of the superstar singer, the writing alternated between mediocre and awful.

  2. The Racehorse Who Wouldn't Gallop - Clare Balding. OK horsey kids story.

  3. The Silence Between Breaths - Cath Staincliffe. Thriller set on a busy train to London from Manchester where on board is a Muslim terrorist intent on causing death and destruction at Euston station. This was a very absorbing read, often exciting and occasionally harrowing (at one point I had to put the back down because of how uncomfortable I was feeling). The characters were well drawn, with credible backstories and problems that will resonate with many. The story is obviously very topical and won't be for everyone but for me it's one of the best thrillers I've read for a long time. It's currently just £1.99 on Kindle, by the way. Thanks to Ladydepp for recommending this one.

OP posts:
LunaTheCat · 29/07/2017 22:01

Thanks for the welcome. I am reading " The Handmaidens Tail"

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