50 Book Challenge 2018 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 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, the second one here, the third one here, the fourth one here, and the fifth one here.

How're you getting on so far?

Dottie love the comparison of a Seinfeld episode to Bach . I'm going to have to think hard now about which Goldberg variation is most like The Pez Dispenser (my fave episode). Have you read Seinfeldia: How a Show About Nothing Changed Everything? It's an interesting read. I loved all the bits about how the various side characters lives (The Soup Nazi and the real Kramer for example) have been changed by the series. We as a family have just finished watching all nine seasons (one per night). Hugely proud moment when at a recent party dd2 deadpanned “These pretzels are making me thirsty.” I agree so sad about Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Terps I've been looking for a book about Princess Margaret to read (since finishing The Crown). That sounds fab!! Lucky you getting it for 99p. Didn't Jeremy Thorpe say (in real life) something like 'What a shame, I'd like to marry one and shag the other' on hearing that PM was engaged to A-J!!

51. Albert Camus - The Myth of Sisyphus

Another short one, this is an essay inspired by the myth which is an argument for the value of life in a world without religious meaning. To tell the truth, I don't think I got his argument about the absurd which starts the whole thing and so wasn't quite following it, but it was still very interesting. A look on Wikipedia since finishing helped - basically the absurd condition is that life is meaningless and nonsensical but that humans continue to look for meaning. Camus is setting out to answer the question of whether the realisation of the absurdity of life necessitates suicide, and he argues that embracing the absurd gives freedom to embrace life in all its fullness because there is no hope or expectation of anything to follow after it.

EmGee, Yes indeed, and that immortal line is quoted

Do try and get hold of the book, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. It's extremely funny (but also rather poignant, ultimately).

17. Johann Sebastian Bach, His Life, Art, And Work by Johann Nikolaus Forkel

This is J S Bach's first biography, published in 1802 (52 years after Bach's death). It is widely credited with reviving interest in Bach's music, which was all but forgotten a mere half century after his passing.

Forkel didn't know as much about Bach as we do now and he didn't have access to all his music that we have, but he had first-hand accounts (notably through his son C P E Bach) and some pieces by Bach that are no longer extant, so his book is still very interesting. Still, many of the details in it are incorrect, as explained at length in footnotes.

Real life has been an utter bastard for the last few weeks but I'm still here, still reading this thread, and still reading. Haven't been up to posting, hence bit of a backlog to review:

26. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters After reading a couple of disappointing (e.g The Paying Guests) novels by SW, I was so relieved to enjoy this atmospheric tale of the decline of an English country house and its eccentric and private occupants, all seen through the eyes of their increasingly emotionally and practically invested family doctor. Trying to work out whether this was a 'straight' ghost story or a case of (an) unreliable narrator(s), and if so who, added to the mounting tension. Brilliantly done.

27. The Sober Diaries by Clare Pooley Subtitled 'how one woman stopped drinking and started living', this does what it says in a jolly and persuasive manner. I do a dry month every now and then, and usually preface that by reading Allen Carr's book, but am rather sick of him, and being aware of a growing body of works by authors who I might find more relatable, ordered this one from the library. This originated from a blog, but hangs together better than the usual book cobbled together to cash in on successful blog posts.

28. The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu The author was the translator of books 1 and 3 (the best ones) of The Three Body Problem, so I was interested in reading his own work. This is classic epic fantasy, and as such ticked many of the boxes of what can be tiresome about that genre: too long, too pompous, too many characters, too bloodthirsty, set on a world whose geography is conveniently scaled to depict on the fly leaves and whose technology and (misogynistic) social structures are kind of medievalish, with a few made up things thrown in. If you accept those parameters are part of the deal, it was well written, with some interesting characters, and readable enough. There is a follow up, but I'm not that invested.

29. My First Summer in the Sierra by John Muir I'm a bit of a John Muir groupie, despite his appearance being, according to Robert MacFarlane's introduction to this book, 'half Victorian patriarch, half geological extrusion.' This is pure and joyful nature writing that is good for the soul. Apparently JM didn't enjoy writing. It doesn't show here.

30. How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish I don't read many mainstream parenting books, as I've always felt DS needed a specialist manual (and is indeed now finally on the pathway to autism assessment). However, this made a lot of sense and was an easy and enjoyable read.

18. Daughter of Eden (Dark Eden #3) by Chris Beckett

This was excellent! 3rd book in the series continues with the story of the descendants of the astronauts that landed on the inhospitable, dark, and cold planet of "Eden". It is now hundreds of years after the start of the first book, and people are firmly entranced in their own tribes and their own "stories" - i.e. their version of history.

This is a fascinating and well-written book, and not only from a SF story perspective. It has a lot to say about us humans as a race, our strengths and weaknesses, the mistakes we repeat across generations. It also features some of the best worldbuilding in print. I heartily recommend this book.

19. No Man's Land (John Puller #4) by David Baldacci

Another great beach read in the style of a more intelligent, technology-friendly Jack Reacher who travels with a change of clothes and deodorant. In this book, Puller solves the mystery of his mum who disappeared when he was a child.

I'm really sad to see that the series ends with this book. I was looking forward to chain reading them this summer on the beach

Hi Cote - I'd been wondering (rather hypocritically, as I hadn't been posting either) where the hell you'd got to. I loved Daughter of Eden too. If you've gone off Reacher, I'll have him, dubious hygiene and all.

54. A High Wind In Jamaica by Richard Hughes This was reviewed by Panda upthread and I liked the sound of it - would say it is a somewhat baffling book to categorise though! The style is like a Victorian children's book - very like "What Katy Did", but some of the content is not a children's book at all! It is also weirdly balanced- some parts are slow and detailed; others, important things happen in a page or two! And characters are nicely developed, and then have barely any part to play. But overall worth reading.

86. Written in Blood, Caroline Graham.

Another Midsomer Murder book - not the best of the three I've read so far! The murderer seemed highly far-fetched - it's not very well done when you guess by process of elimination who the murderer is, but when their motive is revealed you go eh? where did that come from?

15. The ghost fields by Elly Griffiths This is the seventh in the Ruth Galloway series and was a great one. A world war 2 plane is found buried in a field with a body in it. This one centres round a rich family in a country house. Archaeologists Ruth is brought in to help the police investigate. I love returning to these familiar characters. The only thing niggling me is she doesn’t really eat much for someone who is often commented on being overweight. She mostly seems to be digging for hours or escaping villains.

Bringing my list over. I've been a bit slow this month. Recommended reads in bold.

1. A Dangerous Crossing by Rachel Rhys.
2. The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan.
3. Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough.
4. Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng.
5. Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng.
6. The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne.
7. The Fact of a Body by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich.
8. The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry.
9. Into the Water by Paula Hawkins.

10. Three Things About Elsie by Joanna Cannon. 11. Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman. 12. The Woman at 72 Derry Lane by Carmel Harrington. 13. Almost Love by Louise O'Neill. 14. How to Stop Time by Matt Haig. 15. Anything is Possible by Elizabeth Strout. 16: The Dry by Jane Harper. 17. The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn. 18. Amy and Isabelle, by Elizabeth Strout. 19. The Burgess Boys, by Elizabeth Strout. 20. The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock, by Imogen Hermes Gower. 21. He Said/She Said by Erin Kelly.

22. The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin. This novel follows four siblings in the aftermath of a visit to a fortune teller, who gives each of them their date of death. The book is divided into four sections, one for each sibling, and ordered chronologically. The novel is interested in exploring the idea of living - if you know how long you have on this earth, do you live like there's no tomorrow, embracing everything on offer? Or do you carefully preserve your life, and focus on cultivating a legacy for those left behind?

I think I missed the boat on this one - I remember it being discussed in previous threads. I liked it well enough. I thought Daniel was poorly drawn, and the conclusion to his story was too abrupt and not really rooted in any real character development. Also, Varya's story was interesting, but she was so dry for much of her section, it was a bit of a struggle for the final section, where you expect to see the emotional pay off. Actually, the emotional stuff came very early on - I know that was a deliberate strategy, given the book's theme (living vs surviving), but it was odd to have a book start fast and loose and then slow right down as it did. I thought she could have done more with the children question, given her interest in futurity and legacy, what you leave the world with and so on. But yeah, it was a good enough read, I thought.

Gosh, poor proofreading there. Varya's story was interesting, but she was so dry, it was a bit of a struggle as the final section, I meant.

AliasGrape, I also did not like Brooklyn at all. I'm not a massive Tóibín fan in general, though his short stories are good. This was particularly grating I thought. Way too nostalgic and sentimental, and Eilis was a very poor narrator - totally lacking in backbone, and not in a way that the author really interrogates in characterisation. The film was even worse, ugh. I teach this book every year, and students LOVE it though. Go figure.

Tanaqui I am glad you liked High Wind in Jamaica. I agree with everything you said. The style of the writing makes the shocking even more shocking I think!

I am on the other side re Brooklyn, I really enjoyed it, however I remember I read it in a day when my 10 year old son was in hospital a couple of years ago. I have fond memories of it because it transported me away from a terrible situation I think (my son is fine now!). I love how we all bring our personal situations into our reading - I wonder how much this colours our opinions, and could this be why so often people love or hate a book in equal measure (not rehashing any titles here ....)

30. Still Life by Louise Penny This series starring Inspector Armand Gamache was on my to read list for a while. No idea how it got on there, but if it is there I trust it! Set in Quebec it is the first of a series of cozy murder mysteries starring the same investigative police team. Think Midsomer Murders in Canada. I did think the setting was lovely, and could easily become a familiar blanket if you became a regular reader. The mystery is more personality driven than plot driven, and at times I could not find the will to go on because it was so slow. But I got there in the end and I enjoyed it enough. I would read another as a holiday read but would not seek it out outside of that. Three out of five from me.

Now I am on to Bleak House as part of Katie's Victorian-style Dickens read along. I'm a bit behind - I couldn't face another large tome after Woman in White!

*20. They Shoot Horses, Don't They? - Horace McCoy
*
I picked this up in the library, having a vague awareness of the film, but not having seen it. The plot centres around a marathon dance contest and the narrator's relationship with his dance partner, Gloria.
The book is very short and it feels like we only know the characters very briefly. I found it managed to be an easy but thought provoking read.

I haven’t read They Shoot Horses, Don't They? but the film is wonderful, and freely available to watch on YouTube.

50 England Half English by Colin MacInnes

I picked this up after listening to the episode of Backlisted podcast on Absolute Beginners, which is a favourite book of mine. It's a selection of CM's essays, first published in 1961 but mainly written in the 50s for various magazines. Those that stand up best I think are (unsurprisingly) those about daily life in 50s London, but there was also a long essay about a visit to Nigeria which was very enjoyable, and one about Pevsner which made me want to seek out his books about London.

It's difficult not to be reminded of George Orwell's essays, just by the range & nature of the subjects - MacInnes isn't Orwell, clearly (who is), but a good read overall, though I skimmed a few of the essays that dealt with now long-forgotten writers. (I now need to re-read both Absolute Beginners, and Orwell's Collected Essays )

Ham - Hope you're okay and that you're coming out on the other side of whatever bastard stuff real life has been throwing at you recently.

67: The Terror – Dan Simmons
This was spectacularly long, but, I must admit, for most of the novel, it didn’t seem to be too long. This might be because, as regular readers will know, I’m a bit of an obsessive about exploration in cold, miserable and very dangerous conditions, and this had that in pages (946 to be precise) full! It’s based on the true story of Sir John Franklin’s doomed expedition to find the North Sea Passage. That in itself should have been cold, miserable and dangerous enough (and indeed was) but Simmons isn’t satisfied with just that, so he shoves a weird scary beast into the plot, which keeps eating and/or tearing apart crew members.

To be honest, the beast was hardly needed, as just the trek and the interactions between the men were interesting enough in themselves. For about 800 pages or so, it all goes swimmingly – sure, it’s a bit long-winded, but there’s plenty to keep up interest levels and the writing is pretty good, with well-realised characters, some pretty interesting back stories and lots of rum, sodomy and the occasional lash.

Unfortunately it all goes a bit crazy towards the end. We have a long, weird and pretty clumsy diversion into Inuit mythology or something, and some weird poetry, and then a very odd and not very credible thing with a character being ‘resurrected’. And the beast sort of gets lost a bit, so by the end it’s unclear what kind of story Simmons was actually trying to write. A shame, because lots of it was very readable indeed.

26. The Spire - William Golding

Was first recommended this by my English teacher at school 25 years ago, and tried to read it then but found it a struggle; only just got back round to it. Anyway, it's an (I guess thinly) allegorical tale of the dean of a fictional cathedral in medieval times who has a vision of constructing a spire taller than any which has gone before; but the cathedral is built on shaky foundations and things start to go predictably wrong. Written with an astonishing intensity, this novel takes in faith, pride, lust and most of the rest of the sins and deserves its place as a classic.

ScribblyGum that’s wonderful, love the idea of a new generation spreading the word. Love ‘The Betrayal’ (the one that runs backwards), also ‘The Chinese Restaurant’, ‘The Dinner Party’ (with the black and white cookie), the Mr Pitt episodes, I find it so hard to choose just one, ‘The Pilot’ is the only really awful one, it’s amazing the series carried on after that. I haven’t read the book you mentioned but will look out for it now. Clearly yours is an exemplary household as far as comedy is concerned: I saw you had Blithe Spirit on your book list, I’ve watched the film with Margaret Rutherford more times than I care to admit, not to mention Brief Encounter and This Happy Breed.

38 Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien – brilliantly realised novel, a mix of contemporary and historical saga, covering China after the takeover by Mao’s regime. Already reviewed by ShakeItOff which is why I picked it, my reading experience was enhanced by a soundtrack as suggested by ScribblyGum. Thank you both, I would never have tried this without recommendations, I’ve been disappointed by similar-sounding novels in the past, I thought this was excellent, well-researched, intelligent, moving but not sentimental, dramatic without lapsing into melodrama. I thought the story really took off from the section where Marie visits Hong Kong and the parallel China story looks back to the beginnings of the Cultural Revolution. As well as revisiting history and its impact on individual lives, the narrative raises issues that relate to China now as well as the future of Hong Kong. I also thought that many of the concerns raised were relevant to the present state of affairs in the West

39 The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories by Joan Aiken – Written for children these originally appeared scattered here and there in collections of Aiken’s stories, first appearing in the 1950s through to the 1980s. I was always so pleased, as a child, when I found one. Virago has collected them all together with a new introduction and some stories I haven’t read before. For those who haven’t had the pleasure of meeting them Mr and Mrs Armitage, and their children Mark and Harriet, are a very ordinary family who live in a small village. The village just happens to be a little bit magical inhabited by witches, unicorns and tiny disgruntled people. As Aiken’s introduction explains Mr and Mrs Armitage wanted to have a little adventure in their family life and through a quirk of fate got what they wished for – although being a very sensible pair they took great care to ensure that the most magical things were confined to Mondays. But when they do have encounters these can range from ghostly governesses to angry Furies. Although Mr Armitage’s inclination is to deal with most incidents by writing to The Times often more direct action is required. The earliest stories are a little sketchy – Aiken was 17 when she wrote the first one – but they got better and better as Aiken added to them over her long writing career. Although the very last three stories are not quite as strong. I wasn’t that keen on fairy tales or fantasy as a child but loved these - they’re quite droll, written in the style of a girls’ school story with a deadpan delivery - which is perhaps why I still enjoy them. Brilliant light relief/comfort reading, Now I’m tempted to read the Dido Twite series again.

23. Together by Julie Cohen. This novel follows the life-long relationship between Robbie and Emily, but backwards, beginning when the couple are elderly and unfolding back through time to when they first met. At the centre of their relationship is a secret, which gradually reveals itself as the story returns to its beginnings.

This was a book club read. It was ok. I wasn't overly keen on the backwards narrative thing; it seemed very gimmicky, though when the secret was revealed in the final pages, I can see why she structured it that way. But it still felt more trick than true. It also prevented us really getting to know any of the peripheral characters, and I don't think Robbie and Emily themselves were particularly interesting or strong as anchor characters. Actually, the most interesting part for me was the first section, when they are trying to deal with Robbie's worsening dementia or Alzheimer's, it's never clarified which - I really think this could have structured the whole book, to be honest, since those diseases have a non-linear relationship with the past as a symptom. It's an ok beach read, but I don't think I'd recommend it particularly.

40. Under a Pole Star by Steff Penney. I think this was reviewed a while ago and the comment was made about how much sex there was in the book! (I can concur there is quite a lot of action...)

I've read Penney's two previous novels and enjoyed them, in particular The Invisible Ones. I quite liked this too although it didn't 'grab' me as much as I thought it would. I felt quite distanced from the main characters Flora and Jakob - normally a book like this would have me bawling my eyes out. It's the story of Flora Athlone, who has had an unconventional childhood accompanying her father, the Captain of a whaling ship, to the Arctic. As an adult, she becomes a meteorologist and longs to get back to the Arctic and her Inuit friends. In a parallel narrative, Jakob is geologist who is fascinated by glaciers and is part of the American expeditions to the Arctic. There is a secondary story line, set in 1948, which sees Flora return to the Pole as an old woman.

Museum - I've missed this thread, too It's just that this year I have gone down the deep end of music practice, with theory lessons and choral rehearsals that take up several evenings of the week, as well as about 3 hours every day on the piano + harpsichord. That is pretty much all the time I have left from work and daily chores/admin, so I have had little time to read and no time for MN.

Remus - Give Carrion Comfort a go and let us know what you think.