50 Book Challenge 2019 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 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 and the second one here.

What are you reading?

The Doll’s House was my favourite. Marchpane was a chilling character - “a sickly sweet sticky stuff like almond icing, you can very quickly have enough of it” (from childhood memory, I had the book and audio) - the ending is pure horror really. But before that they do put a lot of work into making the house nice

In This House of Brede is a great read. I'm weirdly fascinated by novels about convents

Funnily enough I have just this minute picked up In this House of Brede to read after recommendations on here I loved A Peacock Spring too.

Keith Tottie was properly strange wasn’t it! The music box was tinkling in my head the whole time I was reading it (and the fixed expressions of the dolls). The book is beautifully written and I really loved the way she sets the pace in each chapter and creates suspense, especially with Marchpane. I was a bit worried that DD would find the end too distrurbing (my niece has never forgiven me!) but she seemed OK. And there was this sort of implication that Birdie was still there.

Tarahara My DD is almost 9, how old is yours? I tried to get her to read them before but she wasn’t interested. There are other books I loved that I still haven’t been able to get her to read (like The Enchanted Wood!). We read Candy Floss tonight and she liked that too (the other doll stories are in the book too so am going to make my/our way through them).

1. Normal people by Sally Rooney

A girl and boy's relationship from school on to university. It's set in Ireland.

I loved this book. Yes there are flaws - one dimensional villain, clunky plot devices where they misunderstand each other. It's so readable and the main characters are drawn well.

Hi all,

Complete newbie to these forums so hope I'm okay to join in.
I set myself a 25 books target at the beginning of the year but so far (early pregnancy fatigue!) I've been too tired to keep up!

Here's my list so far:

1. Small Gods - Terry Pratchett. My favourite PTerry book so was a quick re-read.
2. Mary Poppins Returns - P.L. Travers. I find these a little tedious and hard to get through but I'd like to finish the collection throughout the year.
3. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens. Like a complete madwoman I read this after Christmas but another favourite re-read.
4. The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett. We're currently working our way through buying the new collectors edition Discworld books and I'd like to read as much of the series as I can this year!

Currently reading:
Inkspell - Cornelia Funke. I got bored with this back in January so read some other stuff and now I've come back to it I'm fully engrossed!
Les Miserables - Victor Hugo. My favourite musical of all time, but the book is so long and difficult that I'm reading short bursts between other books. Absolutely love it though!

I have a very long TBR list which is probably going to get even longer as I become intrigued by seeing what everyone else is reading!

16 The Other Side of Silence - Philip Kerr

This is number 11 in the Bernie Gunther series and for some reason I read this way out of order, meant to have read book 5. Bernie is a concierge in a hotel in the South of France happyish working and playing bridge twice a week. An old nemesis of his checks into the hotel and then we are lead into a story of blackmail, KGB spies in the British Government and W.Somerset Maugham taking a central role. Of course there was a woman which he fell in love with very quickly and as usual our man prevails. I found the engine confusing but I think I got the gist of it. Not as enjoyable as the earlier ones but still a decent read.

Hello, mind if I join in?

I've just ordered Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez.

I'm looking forward to it. Anyone else read/reading it?

KeithLeMonde if you're looking for more Rumer Godden, I would recommend The Greengage Summer, beautifully evocative of both France and being young (and especially being young in France!).

Hello Dancingunicorn and Ringsender.

I've just finished #21:
The road to Little Dribbling by Bill Bryson. Thoroughly enjoyed this 'sequel' to the brilliant Notes from a small island.

Bill Bryson sets off on a tour round Britain twenty years after his trip described in Notes. Great stuff. He manages to be educational, amusing and witty all at once. He talks a lot in this book about the beauty of the British landscape and countryside. I no longer live in Britain and I found it heartwarming to read about all the wonderful (well, mostly wonderful) places he visits this time round.

25. Alice’s adventures in wonderland by Lewis Carol

Fancied an easy read for a couple of hours and realised I never read this as a child so picked it up on Amazon for 49p.

I also loved Tottie as a child but DD has never shown much interest. I might have to reread it now!

It’s been a while since I’ve updated:

45. The Stranger by Kate Riordan

I’ve enjoyed others of hers but struggled to get into this one. Not really sure why. This is set in Cornwall during the war - three girls are staying at the local manor working as land girls but one is related to the family living at the manor and another already has a connection to the nearby village. The third girl is determined to uncover all the secrets - and then a body of a young woman is washed up on the beach. I didn’t really engage with any of the characters and found the story rather bitty.

46. Days Without Number by Robert Goddard

This was an audible ‘reread’ of one of my favourite authors. This is a good one. An elderly man has been offered a lot of money to sell his old house, by someone who thinks there could be something valuable hidden there. He refuses to sell, which his children don’t understand. Then the deaths start....

47. The Mennyms by Sylvia Waugh

Children’s book that DD loved so wanted me to read. It’s about a family of rag dolls who live as if they’re almost human but when their elderly relative/creator dies there is a risk they will be discovered. Quite sweet but also a bit odd - but that’s with adult eyes.

48. The Genius of Jane Austen: Her Love Of Theatre and Why She Works In Hollywood by Paula Byrne

Rather heavy going book about Jane’s visits to the theatre, how she used theatrical aspects in her novels, and also a chapter looking at film adaptations. The last chapter about the film adaptations was good. The rest had some interesting ideas but was a bit too dry.

49. I’m Fine And Neither Are You by Camille Pagan

Kindle/prime freebie. Penny reassesses her life and marriage when her seemingly perfect friend has a tragic accident and it turns out things weren’t so perfect after all. Quite predictable, but not as chick-litty as I expected.

50. The Perfect Child by Lucinda Berry

Another kindle/prime freebie about a couple who adopt a six year old girl who has been abused. Gripping story about the difficulties they face with a severely disturbed child but some of the events are quite graphic. Can’t say I enjoyed it due to the subject matter but I really wanted to keep reading to find out what happened.

Currently reading The Beautiful and Damned by F Scott Fitzgerald and working through Vanity Fair on audible.

32. Wide Sargasso Sea - Jean Rhys Inspired by Jane Eyre it covers the early life of Antoinette Cosway, her marriage to Mr Rochester and what led to her becoming 'the madwoman in the attic'.

This adds a thousand layers to JE but is also brilliant in its own right and is fascinating look at Caribbean society after slavery is abolished. Rhys is very different in style to Bronte, like comparing a flash flood to a babbling brook. It is very intense in few words and conveys the atmosphere of oppression for both main characters.

33. Reaper Man - Terry Pratchett (Audiobook) DEATH is fired for having too much personality so has to live as mortal and get a normal job. He is not replaced immediately, leaving a few souls 'undead' and inconveniently wandering around.

I liked this but didn't love it (too much Windle, not enough DEATH). As usual for Pratchett lots of sardonic smiles and laugh out loud moments and some very quotable lines. I found DEATH's chat with the little girl who saw through him absolutely charming and typical of someone who isn't used to talking to children. I shall declare I have new socks every time I want to change the subject from now on.

It is all going rather slowly this year but I have just finished number 9 Mad Blood Stirring by Simon Mayo. Set in 1815 in Dartmoor Prison, it concerns some American POWs , a production of Romeo and Juliet,smallpox, gay love , an extra marital affair, a massacre, and racial segregation. Plus some dastardly Brits. It sounds more exciting than it is and I ended up skimming it. It's worthy but a bit heavy handed and has waaaay too much dialogue for me. Mayo does have a degree in history and politics , so I am sure he has researched. Disappointingly, at the end, it is revealed that the protagonists are fictitious : but a lot is accurate,and remarkably so.

I wouldn't say it's awful. Now there's damning with faint praise!

Fortuna Wide Sargasso Sea is a gem of a book isn't it

fortuna that sounds right up my alley

FiveGoMad It's fantastic. Rich with symbolism and fascinating to watch them both unravel. The part with the parrot as they leave Coulibri was so striking. I had to put it down for a few minutes.

mynameisMrG It gives Jane Eyre a whole new slant. I borrowed it from the library and had the Penguin Student Edition which was filled with a lot of history and setting notes which I found really useful.

13. From Hell - Alan Moore

A companion piece of sorts to my last read, Hawksmoor, this graphic novel (and it's very graphic) take on the Jack The Ripper murders tackles similar ground (the bloody past of London embedded in its history and architecture via arcane rituals and a series of murders against a backdrop of the Hawksmoor churches) in a different way. Not for the faint- hearted, this is dark and brutal and unflinching in its depiction of violence; but although the murders are depicted as deeply mysogynistic, the book itself isn't and in fact deals with the victims with compassion and humanity. It's been described as the greatest graphic novel ever written and I'd find it hard to disagree although it's far from an easy read.

Meg - I loved the film From Hell with Johnny Depp, ordered the graphic novel... and couldn't read it. The drawings was terrible - badly drawn, really unworthy of that great story.

Definitely watch the film if you haven't already.

32. The five - The untold lives of the women killed by Jack the Ripper - Hallie Rubenhold Another crazy week. This one has taken longer to read than others but it was worth it. This was the story of the 5 woman The Ripper killed. It didn't give grizzly details of their deaths beyond the bare minimum. It didn't come up with theories about the killer's identity. It did take each woman in turn and looked at their lives. There was a clear intention to question the assumption that all the women were prostitutes, in fact this was only a certainty in the case of the last victim. It deals systematically with what meant to be a poor and ultimately powerless woman in Victorian Britain. It looked at the lack of choices and double standards woman faced, how their sexual, physical and mental health impacted on their daily lives. The true threads that bind these women together seem to be cruel twists of fate, extreme poverty and sadly, and for various reasons, alcohol abuse.
Recommended.

Spooky that we crossed posts Meg!

I really want to read The Five as well, splother ....I've got so much on my tbr pile at the moment, though! Aaargh

Reaper Man is one of my favourite of TP's.

I loathed Wide Sargasso though - it made me furious, but I'm not a fan of Jane Eyre, except for Rochester, so it was never going to work for me.

Welcome Ringsender2, I haven't read Invisible Women but look for forward to your review of it

Wide Sargasso Sea was beautiful, but I just didn’t buy the depiction of Mr Rochester. He’s too cruel, too much of an cynical arsehole right from the start, at a point when imo he needs to be more naive, more hopeful... He can be a bastard in Jane Eyre, much as it pains me to admit it, since he’s one of my literary crushes, but he’s not that much of a bastard.