50 Book Challenge 2018 Part Three

[southeastdweller]

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

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2018, 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 and the second one here.

What are you reading?

Thank you Remus, that is such a kind offer, but I would be too worried that something would happen to it or it would be lost in the post and I would never be able to show my face here again! Also I am hopeful that the real library will have it when it reopens. But thank you so much! (And it was a strange feeling being offered something real from a mumsnet thread, a bit like having a book character start to talk to you!).

A bit like having a book character start to talk to you - love this!

Well, if the library can't help you, let me know. I honestly don't mind popping it in the post. It's only a second hand copy anyway.

16. The Trap - Melanie Raabe

Linda seen her sister’s murderer and 12 years later he still hasn’t been caught. Then she sees him on the TV. As a recluse author she writes the story of her sister’s murder and invites the murderer to her home. Will she find out the truth of that day?

This was a slog. Picked randomly from my kindle and I purchased it in July 2016. I just wasn’t all that fussed about what was happening to anyone and it took a while to get me interested.

Ellisisland, something by Joan Didion is high on my to read list after watching the documentary over Christmas.

25 -Hiroshima by John Hersey
This is short, powerful and terrifying. The story of Hiroshima told through six survivors, and originally published as the only story in a special edition of the New Yorker, it's harrowing. And very precisely drawn; he doesn't try to examine the rights and wrongs, just tell the stories, the horror of which speak for themselves.

pepelepew Joan Didion Year of Magical Thinking is on Kindle monthly sale.

Think I might have doing my Shardlake itch scratcher!
40. Sacrilege - S J Parris. Fictional stories based on a real historical character Giordano Bruno. He was an Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, mathematician, poet, and cosmological theorist, in the reign of Elizabeth I . In this series of books he is working for the Queen's spymaster Walsingham. Centred around Canterbury Cathedral its a tale of treason and murder.
No Jack (sign) but kept me reading and I really enjoyed it. According to Goodreads I have read the first two in the series, only have a vague recollection. But I will read the remaining 2 and a novella.
Next on to the first 4 chapters of Bleak House for the read along challenge. But I am not promising to stop if I get hooked!

Eleanor Marx book by Rachael Holmes is £3.99 on Kindle (was about £750 at Xmas)

That's a bargain!

toomuch I intend to only read Bleak House at weekends - a chapter or two a week...did Chapter One today.

A few interesting looking things in the monthly sale. Any views on The Night Circus? Woman On The Edge of Time is on for 99p - well worth a look for any Handmaid's Tale fans who've not read it.

Mind you I'm currently indulging in a bit of teenage nostalgia with two Andre Norton books that were free on Kindle, so don't really need anything else on my TBR pile . . .

Another Heathers fan here - Christian Slater was my teenage crush!

Sadik - I really enjoyed The Night Circus.

I read The Night Circus a few years ago. Very enjoyable, and excellent use of magic in a book.

20: Doctor's Children - Josephine Elder

Barbara Maitland, doctor and mother of 4, has to go it alone and return to a full-time medical career when her artist husband leaves her. This novel, written (pseudonymously) by an ex-GP, was published in 1954 and is set during the early days of the NHS - which isn’t portrayed with wholehearted enthusiasm - as Barbara grapples with the problems of work and family.

An enjoyable period piece, reprinted by Greyladies Press - it could easily have been a Persephone. It’s pretty obvious that Josephine Elder wrote a lot of genre fiction; her main speciality was school stories. But her first-hand experiences of being a doctor lift it a notch above the routine (despite some pretty cringe-making prejudices, very much of the era, which wouldn’t make it into print today). As the title implies, the experiences of all four Maitland children are traced quite satisfyingly, too.

19 Sugar Money by Jane Harris

Reviewed several times on these threads already. Set in 1765 and based in a true story. Told from the perspective of Lucien a 14 year old slave on Martinique who, with his older brother Emile, are instructed by their French monastique owners to return to Grenada, the place of their birth, in an attempt to coerce (read fundamentally steal) the slaves from a hospital and plantation owned by the British and return them to their original French owners.
The book covers a very short time span, and is written a simple journal style that reminded me very much of Huckleberry Finn. It’s not a popular literary device at the moment, which is a shame as it lends itself really well to a derring-do adventure, particularly if you have a teenager as the tale-teller.
As a few newspaper reviews have pointed out the adventure page turning aspect, which really picks up in the last third of the book, rather masks the underlying serious theme of slaves stealing slaves. There are parts where the horrors inflicted to the slaves are mentioned, but any depth for the horrific experience of the plantation workers are rather swept away by the narrative pacing of escape and survival.

I’ve read other criticisms that, given this is based on truth (although in parts is given the eye rolling ITV series fictictionalised mega-drama treatment), is it really Harris' tale to tell, given that she is a British white woman? Really not sure how I feel about this so keen to discuss it further at my book club.

Overall I enjoyed it. She does write well and the story and the manner in which is told, once it gets going, is a genuine adventure story for grown ups. Lucien is a wonderful character and you can really fully involve yourself as a reader in wishing for his success and survival.

I really enjoyed The Night Circus too. Read at Christmas and it was such a perfect festive season read. A really rich, sumptuous, sparkly story.

I really enjoyed the Night Circus.
Scribbly I take your point about the fast paced adventure style in Sugar Money but interestingly a couple of months after reading it, it is the horror that I remember not the style. Also I think there is a distinction to be made between the genuine sick feeling I felt wanting the slaves to escape rather than the almost pleasure seeking thrill of a good page turner.
In terms of is it 'her story to tell', white people were the creators of this history and it is therefore in some sense everyone's story. I think it's important that someone tells it. If someone takes exception to it and wants to retell it all to the good.

It's a good point Splother about the distinction between desperately wanting the slaves to escape vs being pulled along by the page turning style. I kept on being pulled in both directions which made the reading experience quite a strange one. I was mindful of how I was reacting to the story at points which in itself (the realisation that you are being emotionally manipulated by the author) kind of drags you out of the book.

I take your point about it being everyone’s story. I'm still not sure if I have any firm conclusions about cultural misappropriation in fiction. Think I might do some more reading around the subject and see what others think at my book club.

Is it too late for me to join? I thought I had got off to a good start managing a book a week but that seems slow compared with everybody else. I am trying to read a real mix of authors. So far, I have read:

1. A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles - slow to get started but I thought it was well written and really enjoyed it. Will definitely give his other book a go
2. Alone in Berlin - Hans Fallada - loved this - watched the film afterwards which was a real let down in comparison
3. Belgravia by Julian Fellowes - easy read and predictable. Ok.
4. Bel Canto - another good read which I really enjoyed. Wasn’t sure what to expect but great characterisation
5. Curtain Call by Anthony Quinn - lots going on in this: romance, murder. Good on period setting. Better than Belgravia but not as good as my other books this year.
6. Life after Life - Kate Atkinson - my first book by her and loved it after I had got used to the continual re-starting of the story.
7. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott - re-read after television adaptation and found it more enjoyable than I remembered
8. Ghost Moth - Michele Forbes - took me a while to get going with this but it gripped me more as it went on and some lovely writing. Set in Northern Ireland and moves backwards and forwards in Katherine’s life as a young woman with competing suitors to her life with teenage children.

Night Circus bought :) Definitely need to schedule some serious reading time to catch up with my tbr list

Hi timeforagandt welcome to the thread. The reading pace varies a lot across the thread so don’t worry about that

I put down Gentleman in Moscow halfway through but maybe I should have another go at finishing it. I just found it a bit slow, though nicely written. I saw Alone in Berlin in the library, might pick that up.

Hello Satsuki (I need to learn how to bold!). A Gentleman in Moscow is a slow burn of a book but may not be for you.

Just remembered I also read

1. I See You - Clare Mackintosh. Full of tensio but let down by a weak ending. Not as good as I Let You Go.

Asterisk each side of what you want to bold this without the spaces. We try and do it as it makes following different conversations about different books easier when it gets busy

Thank you Satsuki - will bold my titles when I update with my next book

25/26/27/28: Little Women series – Louisa May Alcott
Re-reads but I’m counting them because they still take as long to read! I really like lots about these (hence the re-read) – the characters are vivid and human and I especially like the ‘scrapes’ they get into. The sermonising is irritating and it annoys me that a couple of characters are used to do little more than die in order to teach a moral lesson and another couple are conveniently killed off ‘for the best’. I’ll never truly believe that Laurie really loves Amy and it always makes me cross that Dan doesn’t get a happy ending. I could complain for ages about padding and whole chapters that are little more than lectures, but overall there’s still plenty of enjoyment in these.

Wondering whether I should give The Night Circus a go. I read the sample before but it didn't grab me. Will read it again, and see if I feel any differently now.

I'm not convinced that there can be 'cultural appropriation' in fiction and one person writing about something doesn't mean nobody else ever can. Shakespeare told plenty of stories that weren't 'his' to tell!