50 Book Challenge 2019 Part Two

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the second 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, 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.

What are you reading?

Not read it but opinion is very divided on a FB Book group I'm on. It appears to be one of those Marmite books

Normal People by Sally Rooney - well written, well observed. If I were younger I'd have loved it but it's about young people at uni which I'm a few years past. Very enjoyable though.

The Dreams of Bethany Mellmoth by William Boyd - utterly fabulous short stories. I'm not usually a fan of the genre but loved every page of this.

The Diary of a Bookseller by Shaun Blythell - absolutely loved this gentle memoir of a man who bought a second hand book shop in rural Scotland.

The Wild Remedy - How Nature Mends Us, A Remedy by Emma Mitchell I bought this after reading a beautiful excerpt in the papers and it's rather lovely. Makes me want to flee London and move to the middle of nowhere and just get lost in the countryside. Lovely.

The Lie of the Land by Amanda Craig sort of Jilly Cooper-esque with slightly irritating and at times thoroughly unconvincing plot. Fine, reminded me why I hate Devon, but I was glad to finish it.

PS my husband gave up on Milkman. I've had a look at it and can see why.

MrsDOnofrio, I'm still reading (avidly) and wasn't going to mention it until my review, but can't resist your plea for recommendations about exploration - so I'd urge you to find a copy of Barrow's Boys by Fergus Fleming as soon as you can. It's simply tremendous.

The last Franklin expedition is the final chapter in a fantastic narrative of amazing feats by early 19thc explorers, mostly - but not all - Navy men.

I'll come back with a proper review when I've finished it, but so far it's an enthralling read.

I loved Milkman - it moves along quite quickly from halfway, but it doesn’t change if you can’t get on with the style. You have to kind of relax and go along with the flow of it and it comes together. I think if you try too hard to make sense of it as you go it can seem like a sticky read.

I loved Milkman - it was my top fiction read last year. Personally I enjoyed the stream of consciousness style, but I realise that’s not everyone’s cup of tea.

Terpsichore thank you, that sounds perfect. Familiar with Barrow as he featured in Erebus. It may have found itself in my Amazon shopping basket despite my book buying ban. Off to check the library first.

I am listening to Milkman at work on audible and enjoying it, my best friend lives in Northern Ireland and the narrator sounds so much like his mother who died a few years ago that it is quite nostalgic.

Remus I read The Boys in the Boat a few years ago now and really enjoyed it.

7 The Singapore Grip by J.G.Farrell
This is the third of his Empire Trilogy and the longest. It starts just over a year before the Japanese take control of Singapore and concentrates on one family, the Blacketts who are one of the major companies in Singapore. Alongside the Blacketts there are a motley crew of characters all intertwined with the family and intsrespersing this is the military decisions which were made or not made which led do the disastrous campaign over there. At one point there was a reflection by one of the generals that the commanders in Aisia were all deemed second rate and not good enough for the war in Europe. The book ends with the internement of the Europeans.

I read The Siege of Krishnapur and Troubles in my late teens and will be going back to re-read them.

Great book and highly recommend especially if you have an interest in military history as this is also a very factual book.

Will go and peruse the bookshelf for inspiration for book 8

BakewellTarts would be interested to see what you think of Bird Box, as I have just ywatched the film on Netflix.

Finally I finished off Reading Allowed, it got 4 on Goodreads instead of my usual 3.

I'm now reading Cottage by the Sea by Debbie Macomber. It's not my usual kind of book but when I was trying to sort out the Kindle problems I download a free book/99p book to see if it was working or not. I wanted a light read when I couldn't sleep last night so started it and will probably finish it today.

Just finished 10. The God of small things - on audio.

Dear Lord, I thought it was crap & I felt displaced all the time as there was no warning of the jumping about in time. There were occasional snippets of good but I drudged through it & like January, I'm so glad it's over.

Interested in the milkman as I'm in NI but have bought quite a few classics in the audible bogof so may go on to those next. Enjoying 'the examined life' at the mo & trying to get a gentleman in Moscow finished

15. A Dog's Purpose by W. Bruce Cameron A dog keeps being reincarnated until he finds his purpose in life.

I normally wouldn't touch something like this with a bargepole but it's been getting passed round my dog training group for months. Everyone going on about what a heartwarming story it is. It turned out to be the emotionally manipulative tearjerker I suspected it would be and it had me ugly crying for most of the second half about my childhood dog.

I hate books that do this and avoid the cry bait genre like the plague. If you are a dog person and want to torture yourself I'd recommend reading this in one sitting with a big box of tissues.

Thankfully the current pup has figured out her purpose quite quickly (stealing and shredding the tissues mostly).

I read The Milkman last year and found it hard going. I think it is a book that you need to be able to devote significant chunks of time to as the style takes a lot of getting used to. When I had a hour or so to read I would suddenly find the flow but if I was reading 10 mins here and there it was useless.
I appreciated what the author was doing, admired the skill but definitely didn't love it. And I breathed a sign of relief when it was finished.

New joiner, my reading list so far:

1. Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy
2. Feminists don’t wear pink (and other lies) by Scarlett Curtis
3. On death and dying by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
4. Care of the dying: a clinical handbook by Nigel C H Stott
5. Divided by Tim Marshall
6. One of us is lying by Karen McManus
7. We should all be feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Currently reading The Unspeakable: And other subjects of discussion by Megan Daum

Lovely dog Fortuna

I have just been on the kindle monthly deal, managed to contain myself to 7 books

Just joining!
Would love to read 50 books this year I'm just about to start my fourth book - Eve of Man & I think I'm going to get a couple of audio books to listen to at the gym/while crocheting!

So far I've read:

1. This is going to hurt - loved this, as an NHS worked and someone who has witnessed first hand the mental health issues some junior drs have to battle with it hit home and I love that it's out there for others who don't have any experience of behind the scenes in the NHS to have an insight of what it can be like!
2. Blink - I read this in a day as the story utterly gripped me. I'm a re reader but I don't think I'd read it again. (I'm not very good at reviews )
3. Slade house - I really enjoyed this, I've been putting off reading it for months because I wasn't sure I'd like it, I bought it on a bit of a whim and had no idea what it was about. Wasn't really sure about the ending though.

Definitely need to up my game, I find it hard to fit reading in around work/starting a small business & my DS so I think I'm going to try some audio books!

Marking my spot and following your reading suggestions 😊

ChocFreak I enjoyed Bird Box I am a fan of dystopias ever since I read 1984 as a teen. This is an interesting one as we never really get to understand what caused the madness and fall of civilisation. It just happens. I think this is realistic as Joe Public probably wouldn't know what was going on. The focus is on the relationships between the survivors. The paranoia and claustrophobia feels real. I liked the central character too. So I enjoyed it. I don't have Netflix so no idea what they've done with it. Its an easy read (I read it in less than a day). I picked it up on daily deal so only paid 0.99p certainly worth that and I'll probably read the next book the authors writes. What did you think of it?

6. The Long Shadow by Celia Fremlin Imogen is recently widowed, and despite her grieving is determined to remember that her late husband Ivor was also a bit of a bastard. Her bohemian, upper middle class peace is shattered when assorted relatives come "to look after her" in the weeks after Ivor's death.

Worse is to come when a stranger begins pursuing her, convinced she is implicated in her late husband's death. And then odd things start happening in the house, causing Imogen to wonder whether Ivor really has died after all.

This was excellent. It started out as a Mitford-esque comedy of manners, but as the story evolved it was equally successful as a tense thriller. I'd not heard of Fremlin before seeing her recommended on this thread, so many thanks for the tip-off. I will definitely be reading more of her work.

I have now finished:

6. Memory Songs- James Cook. This is a memoir about the music of the 70s, 80s and 90s including the author's own band Flamingoes which had moderate success. This book was mostly enjoyable but dragged a bit at times. I thought the concept of 'memory songs', i.e. particular songs which stick in one's mind and are always associated with a particular time and place, could have been developed more thoroughly.

7. Read All About It- Paul Cuddihy. This is another memoir about reading. I particularly liked the parts of the year when the author's reading had a theme, such as his 'month of trilogies' and when he read the entire Booker Prize shortlist.

8. The Boys are Back- Simon Carr. I've read this at least twice before and I think it's lovely, even though the ending is slightly weak. It's the true story of a man navigating his way through single parenthood after his wife dies of cancer. There are some very funny anecdotes in addition to the sad chapters. Unusually, the film is even more delightful than the book: it is rather different, however, as it is set in Australia instead of New Zealand and Oxford.

As usual, I have several other books on the go, but I'm concentrating most on 'The Revenant' by Michael Punke, which is excellent so far.

I am also eying up the Monthly Deals on the Kindle: I've downloaded several samples, so I'll see what catches my imagination the most. Of the monthly deals I've already read, I would particularly recommend 'Back Story' by David Mitchell and 'Long Road from Jarrow' by Stuart Maconie. If there is anyone who hasn't read 'Eats, Shoots and Leaves' by Lynne Truss that is, of course, a must!

4. Please, Mr Postman - A Memoir by Alan Johnson

This is the second in a series of memoirs by former Labour Home Secretary, Alan Johnson.
I read the first of these, This Boy, when it was released, to much critical acclaim, some years ago. Its sequel, this book, flew under my radar and I picked it up in the library a week ago.
This Boy focuses on Johnson's childhood growing up in west London slums in the 50s and 60s. It's very raw and moving.
Please Mr Postman follows straight on and covers Johnson's marriage, children, move out of London to a council estate in Slough, his early career as a postman and movement towards trade unions and Labour politics.
This isn't as gritty or harrowing
as it's predecessor, Johnson's life improved significantly in his early adulthood. I still found it fascinating and, in some places, quite moving. I enjoyed learning about how the post office worked in the 1960s and 70s, even down to the details about how the mail was hand sorted. I also enjoyed the references to the Britwell estate in Slough where Johnson and his family lived. I myself lived in Slough for a while and I always enjoy books where I am familiar with a place.
It very much reads as the middle of a trilogy though. It's not worth reading, I don't think, if you haven't read the first one, and it ends very abruptly, so now I need to get back to the library to pick up the third one!

1. Confessions of a Barrister by Russell Winnock I think I had this mixed up with The Secret Barrister when I bought it! I didn’t think it’d be up to much when I saw it was part of a “Confessions of [insert profession]” series of books, but it was really enjoyable. The author is a criminal barrister who writes in an accessible and humorous way, recounting several interesting cases including his first murder trial. A page turner which gave an interesting insight into the court system.

Hound I think the third Alan Johnson is on Kindle monthly deals at the moment

Barrow's Boys is excellent. Looking at my exploration helf, I'd also recommend:
The Worst Journey in the World - everyone should read this utterly wonderful book
Into the Silence
Touching the Void
Fatal Passage
Cold by Ranulph Fiennes
Franklin by Andrew Lambert
Shackleton by Roland Huntford
Captain Scott's Marvel about the glorious Birdie Bowers