50 Book Challenge 2019 Part Four

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fourth 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, the second one here and the third one here.

How're you getting on so far?

Ok, I am reassured that no gaping void is going to appear in front of me if I fail to post for a bit

exexpat, she loved it so you knocked it out of the park as far as she was concerned. And I didn’t not like it, I just don’t think I was in the right frame of mind. I think our mother would like it too - she likes a story of old women in peril. I think she uses them to measure us against the children in such books and see how we compare.

And no, you’ve not missed my review of Infinite Jest. I’ve just finished the book. Like you, I’m going to have to think about it for a while...I’m trying to make sense of it and resisting the temptation to go straight back to the start.

sadik, I loved (loved!) Henchmen. You promised me fabulously trashy and full of sex and smart women. It delivered on all fronts. Just what I needed, and I really got into it in a big way. I actually dreamed I was the Grand Duchess of Ruritania on Sunday night, and that I had invited people to a book group in my hunting lodge outside Zenda to discuss the Victorian novel.

I once went on holiday with A Vindication of the Rights of Women, a history of dry stone walling and a Jackie Collins, so finishing Moby Dick and pivoting to Henchmen didn’t seem too much of a swerve . I tend to the view that the more eclectic my reading, the more I’m likely to enjoy it.

Yay - thank you Terpsichore!

YesILikeitToo wonderful review of Secret Lives of Colour. It has been one I have picked up and put down a couple of time in Waterstones, putting it on my list now.
Piggy you have described those covers perfectly! I hate them!
I thought my Kindle had died last night !!! Not good. Reset and it seems ok this morning but it has been slow for a while. Anyone have an idea of the average life span of a Kindle Paperwhite? This one has been in continuous service for about 7 years and is pretty stacked with book.

Sadik I haven't started TTOD yet either.
Splother I'm on about 7/8 years too. It had a blip a while ago and I thought it was on the way out but it recovered just after I bought a replacement, obviously it realised it needed to get it's act together.

Splother My kindle paperwhite is a similar age and seems to be doing OK, though occasionally a little slow to respond. But I mainly use it for travelling rather than reading at home so it has probably had lighter-than-average use for its age.

I killed my last one by taking it skiing: I put it in my backpack to read at the mountaintop lodge in after-lunch breaks, and was very upset one day to take it out and find the screen all crazed - no one had warned me that e-ink screens do not like sub-zero temperatures...

Glad you liked it Pepe :)

Another fan of the eclectic mix here. I like swapping between a big non-fiction and some trashy fiction - each makes the other more appealing.

My old kindle is slowing down too. Built in obsolescence I think.

Terpsichore thank you thank you thank you for that link. I can now pronounce Serrailler correctly in my head, which will greatly enhance my enjoyment of the books.

15. Chocolat by Joanne Harris
16. Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky

26. Never Alone Elizabeth Haynes. Standard psycho nutjobbery that, as pps have said, I'll have totally forgotten the plot of by Saturday. I did like the description of the snowy weather in Yorkshire, and it made me think how much I'd love a British winter. Grass being greener etc. (Obviously without the psycho nutjob rampaging through the village though) On finishing it I suddenly thought "hold on, that was all very page turny and at times genuinely creepy, but why was he a nutjob?" There were about 3 lines on the last page that introduced something vaguely probable in his past, but it just seemed like the author ran out of steam after all the nuttiness and cba to explain anything.

I might have a nice Agatha Christie next, The Mirror Crack'd is the next one in my omnibus. Or I might do a number generator as I annoy myself dreadfully by opening what I think I want to read and then changing my mind after a page and flicking aimlessly through the Kindle.

(Richard the Lionheart is still no nearer to Jerusalem and is being a bit of a twat tbh, keeps bringing Gilderoy Lockehart to mind, which I'm sure is not the aim)

Mmmm! Sounds like Kindle might be on the downwards trajectory! I will prepare myself..

I killed my last one by taking it skiing: I put it in my backpack to read at the mountaintop lodge in after-lunch breaks, and was very upset one day to take it out and find the screen all crazed - no one had warned me that e-ink screens do not like sub-zero temperatures...

You might have been unlucky, my survived three weeks in the far north arctic on two occasions in the winter.

I enjoyed #43 Vox. Yes it isn't as good as The Handmaids Tale but still worth a read. I thought a well handled distopia with unusually a happy ending. It was also a real page turner and so my idea of a great commuting read.

Moved onto #44 La Belle Sauvage I loved His Dark Materials and so have been meaning to read this for a while. So far so good.

I'm on my second kindle after the last died an unfortunate death. I'm afraid to say that it looks like your will be needing it's last rights toomuchsplother.

I am also a fan of a wide variety of books and try not to read too much in one genre. Keeps it interesting.

@Piggywaspushed
I second Dear Mrs Bird. I got it as audio book to listen with the kids in car journeys. We loved it! They are only 7,9,12 but it was fine for them.
If I'd read it in print I'd have given up but found it strangely affecting as the story progressed & the central character grew on me.

Definitely Jolly Hockey-sticks type but with a true enough voice throughout I thought.

Recommend for a light-ish read.

Who reads the audio book? Anyone famous?

toomuch I’ve only had mine for less than three years and it suddenly won’t charge, this was after a small crack in the screen appearing despite no accident I could remember. Worth doing a live chat with Amazon if it does fail as they offered me a discount on a new one despite being out of warranty.

floral - maybe I was unlucky, or maybe they have improved the technology - when I googled after the event, there were lots of angry and upset Kindle users from Canada who had left them in their cars... This was quite an old model, from around 2008.

Haven’t been on the thread for ages, but here is my list so far.

1. Insomnia, Stephen King
2. The missing girl, Jenny Quintana
3. The backpacking housewife,
4. Close to home,Cara Hunter
5. The woman who kept everything, Jane gilley
6. The handmaid’s tale, Margaret Atwood
7. Her last day, t r ragan
8. Deadly recall , T R Tagan
9. The unit, Ninni Holmqvist

10. Vox, Christina dalcher 11. Carrie Stephen King 12. The tattooist of Auschwitz heather Morris 13. The Power, Naomi alderman 14. The lido, Libby Page

New thread here!

Fell off the thread, and reading slowly for the usual work/mundane unserious illness/child related reasons. Looking forward to picking up the reading pace over half-term, when we're away. Will try hard to catch up on everyone's reviews later to inspire my holiday reading.

15. The ABC Murders by Agatha Christie
Poirrot's knocking on a bit now, but he's still got it, and works out no just whodunnit, but why they did it, after a series of murders seemingly only linked by the victim's initials.

16. The House on Vesper Sands by Paraic O'Donnell
A number of impoverished young women disappear from Victorian London, and there is a very strange suicide of a seamstress at the house of an Earl.

Gideon Bliss, a Cambridge scholar, is urgently summoned to London by his normally distant uncle and patron Reverend Neuilly, but Neuilly is nowhere to be found. Instead, Bliss bumps into Inspector Cutter, investigating the strange goings-on, and becomes his right-hand man. Also looking for answers is Octavia Hillingdon, a journalist who was brought up in the mysterious Earl's circle.

This was pretty decent, although the resolution of the supernatural mystery fell a bit flat for me. Cutter is a gem of a character - a bit of a Victorian Gene Hunt - and Octavia was strong and fun as well.