50 Book Challenge 2019 Part One

[southeastdweller]

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

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2019, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

Who's in for this year?

Happy new year to all 50 Bookers old and new, and thanks to Southeast for the thread!

Just finished:

1. The Thousand Autumns Of Jacob de Zoet - David Mitchell

I was after a chunky, satisfying read for the festive season and this certainly hit the spot. More accessible and straightforward than some of his fiction, this tale of love, politics and deadly secrets in the late 18th century Dutch trading post of Dejima outside Nagasaki was totally gripping and Mitchell's prose as effortlessly perfect as ever.

Hello, checking in for a new year. I read a paltry 21 books last year and want to improve on that if possible. I have yet to reach 50 in a year but 2019 could be the year!

What an inspiring thread! I started Romantic Outlaws a double biography of mother/daughter Mary Shelley and Mary Wolstonecraft in early December and am still working my way through. It’s a gripping account of two fascinating lives but densely packed. Also currently around half way into M.C Beaton’s Hamish Macbeth series (fiction equivalent of comfort food over mid winter) and, on Kindle, a first experience of David Sedaris with Calypso. Just finished Posy Simmonds new graphic novel Cassandra Darke which was a Christmas present. Both illustrations and story made it a great read for this time of year.

I’d love to take the same approach as PristineCondition and read primarily what’s on the bookshelf (both actual and electronic). Perhaps I’ll try to aim for 70% from these. I’m really looking forward to the sequel to Dark Pines by Will Dean which is due out in January so will have to make that the final purchase for a while (unless our local library comes up trumps). I liked the edge-of-your-seat plot with a strong female central character and the remote Swedish setting was atmospheric.

Meg you have reminded me I want to read some more David Mitchell this year. I loved Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks and want to pick up his others. I am now wondering if his stuff is magical realism for grown ups, as I was going to open this first review of the year by saying I haven't read any magical realism for years, but...

1. Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel I haven't read any of this particular brand of South American magical realism for years, and it seems to have fallen out of fashion. Set in Mexico around the turn of the last century, Tita's cruel mother imposes even more restrictions on her than are already made on women by that society, not allowing her to marry her true love, as she is expected to look after her mother for the rest of her life. She throws her passion into cooking, with magical realistic effects. There are recipies. For me the whimsy and fairytale like qualities fell slightly more on the annoying than the charming side, but I am old and grumpy. I didn't hate it and I'm glad I re-read it.

museum There was a line in the Robert Webb memoir I just read where he mentions a girlfriend is reading a novel and says something like “because it was the mid nineties it was one where people suddenly levitate” and it made me laugh as it was obviously referring to the magical realism trend in fiction which I read a lot of at the time and made me realise it had sort of faded out. I’ve had Thousand Autumns on my shelf for ages will be reading it this year. Interesting about Mitchell - I think he writes wonderfully and he does always have an element of the fantastic, but I think I’ve always seen it as a sci fi leaning, but then he was influenced by Murakami who is more on the whimsical side.

And also, tempting review Meg

vanderley yes it is good fun!

Museum, I loved Like Water for Chocolate when I read it in my teens. The whimsical elements appealed to me then.

I still like magical realism now although prefer it with a darker edge. David Mitchel is fantastic. I persevered with Cloud Atlas thanks to these the threads in 2017. Such an amazing book!

I also discovered The Three-Body Problems thanks to people here. You might enjoy those too. Amazing sci-fi series - really made me think.

I'm in! Think I managed about 60 last year - many on audio a only recently updated dates. I've just finished this is going to hurt which I really enjoyed. Also cox on audio which was ok. Started 9 perfect strangers & trying to rush through graham Norton's holding so I can pass back.

@TheTurnOfTheScrew - I have Winter lined up & felt similar to you about Autumn so looking forward to it.

I loved The Three Body Problem too boldly.

David Mitchell is hard to pin down to a genre isn't he? Literary sci-fi magical realism mash up.

Just finished 1. A Spell of Winter by Helen Dunmore - I did start it last year but read most of it in the early hours of new years due to my youngest keeping me up. If, like me, you are keen on lush, descriptive and slow-moving writing and then this will appeal. If you prefer a realistic and fast-moving plot then stand aside. I enjoyed the pre-WW1 setting and the narrow focus of a brother/sister relationship but the book has its flaws and rather loses its way at the end. I gave it 3/5 stars on Goodreads but would have given 3.5 if I was able.

1. Queen of Shadows - Sarah J Maas

The third in a YA fantasy series, not counting prequels. The author wrote the first when she was 16. I'm quite enjoying these as an escapist read - lots of interesting characters and subplots. I've just downloaded the next one, but feel I should probably get my teeth into something I bit more substantial!

1. The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer

I read about 30 pages of this last year and put it aside then on New Years realised I needed to finish it quickly as it had to go back to the library so picked it up again. I quite enjoyed this - it covers a lot of ground and is very of the moment in terms of its discussion of the reach and limits of feminism in the current era, and how women relate to its history. It follows a young woman called Greer who has the opportunity to work with a famous feminist, and how this relationship sheds light on the others in her life. It very cleverly an sometimes wittily looks at the intersection of feminist thinking with the different kinds of relationships within the novel; heterosexual, homosexual, siblings, friends, parents, but ultimately I was unmoved by it, and found it examining all this with a detachment that it passed on to me. I feel I have read a number of contemporary (usually American) novels like this that analyse where we are and what we’re doing with precision, but with no power to make me feel anything about it, so somewhat lacking for me in that regard. I think maybe a 3.5 stars would be right for this too, whippet.

I also need to get Swan Song back to the library so will be starting that soon as well as carrying on with Kevin Kwan on the Kindle.

Book 1 is. The Salt Path by Raynor Winn. I think I must have picked this up on daily deals a while ago. I heard the author talking about it on New Years Eve on the radio and it seemed a good place to start the year. Raynor and her husband Moth lost their house, livelihood and Moth was given a terminal diagnosis all within a week . This is the story of how they decided to walk the South West Coast Path with meagre possessions and an eBay tent. In direct opposition to the doctors advice they walked over 600 miles trying to come to terms with their situation and work out their next move.
This is a humbling book. Full of beautiful descriptions of nature and landscape but also showing the best and worst of human nature. The couple are blessed with some incredible human kindness on their journey but also face the ugly side of the human spirit. One heartbreaking moment is when their last loose change is knocked from Ray's hands by a dog. Instead of apologising for her dog's behaviour the owner sneers at couple desperately trying to retrieve their cash, effectively telling them 'We don't have homeless people here."
A cracking book to start the year and one that will stay with me for a long time. It did leave me feeling guilty about the fact I had bought this cheap on daily deals. I felt I should have given full price for such an incredible story.

1. Bookworm. A Memoir of Childhood Reading by Lucy Mangan

Much reviewed on the 50 book threads last year. Loved it. Perfect festive period/nostalgic reading. Was fascinated at how closely Mangan’s reading history mirrored my own until after CS Lewis at which point I fell down a deep Tolkien hole which I never came out of and she performed a hard swerve on fantasy.
Was getting very twitchy when at 43 minutes left on my kindle there was still no mention of Judy Blume but it’s OK, she’s there. Interesting no mention of the Swallows and Amazons or Little House on the Prairie series which featured heavily in my childhood reading memories.
Have added Tom’s Midnight Garden and Goodnight Mister Tom to my Want to Read shelf in Goodreads following her glowing reviews.
Feel like there is a gaping hole in my teenage reading that is the Sweet Valley High series, have no memory of reading a single volume, but that’s what happens maybe if you are stuck in a Lord of the Rings rereading time loop.

1. Plum Dog by Emma Chichester Clark

Unashamedly reading the graphic novels I gave to the dds for Christmas. Highlights from Clark’s (author of the Blue Kangaroo children’s books) blog about her dog Plum. Some lovely illustrations of dogs messing about in water. I’m a dog lover but am not charmed at all by dogs being taken to dinner parties and art galleries so will be taking a break before picking up Another Year of Plum Dog.

Goodnight Mr Tom is one of my all time favourites. Scribbly.

Thank you for the new thread. My first aim will be to read the books I got for Christmas, plus a few others hanging around on the shelves that I haven't got around to yet. Books for Christmas include Lincoln in the Bardo and Melmoth.

1 Family History by Vita Sackville West
I finished this on New Year's Day - it was nearly the last book for last year. A 40 year old widow falls in love with a 25 year old. She lives a very comfortable life with nothing much to worry about. He is young, and enthusiastic about politics and economics. They have nothing much in common. They start a relationship then it all goes wrong. It was OK, some lovely descriptions, particularly of what is clearly Sissinghurst, her real life home. But overall I didn't care enough about either main character to worry about what happened to them or whether they resolved it or not.

I didn’t read a lot of sweet valley either - was into Tolkien and Pratchett, Diana Wynne Jones or pony books when I wanted a break in the real world so maybe they are divergent paths, Scribbly.

Enjoyed both of those cedar

Finally de-lurking to join this, a bit of a cliché of the moment but my first book is going to be The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle. I got mildly bullied into buying this by a chap in Waterstones a few months back and I'm not going to start 2019 by adding yet another book to my "probably never to be read" pile!

I'm in! One book down, another 49 to go haha.

1. The Snowman, Jo Nesbo

Just started Tombland, CJ Sansom - I love the Matthew Shardlake series, so am looking forward to this.

I adored Bookworm last year, but I didn't read Sweet Valley High and I agree with you Scribbly that Swallows and Amazons and Little House on the Prairie are surprising omissions. I loved Diana Wynne Jones too Satsuki!

1. Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths. I'm not much of a one for reading series (the 53 books I read last year were by 51 different authors), but I feel there is a Ruth Galloway-shaped hole in my life that this series could comfortably fill. I really enjoyed this murder mystery set in the Norfolk marshlands (and I guessed whodunnit!).

toomuchsplother Thank you for that lovely review of The Salt Path - you've now moved it up to my next book to read, I've had it for a while and haven't got round to it. Normally I do non-fiction, fiction, non-fiction but I'll do two NF in a row as I'm reading From source to sea about a walk along the RIver Thames at the moment.