50 Book Challenge 2019 Part Five

[southeastdweller]

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

^ stocking up!

bibliomania I think I might be drummed out as I’m really struggling with This Thing of Darkness. I’m not quite half way through despite starting over a week - possibly two - ago, but I am getting far more interested now so hoping the second half is easier going.

I blame myself entirely (I want to like it so much because it’s about such interesting things - I’m just discovering I am really not that interested in descriptions of storms, and having the hardest time keeping all the different sailors, officers, crew etc straight and remembering who anyone is apart from Fitzroy, Darwin and the Fuegians).

I was quite pleased with the Kindle sale - I must be the last person on earth who hasn't read Longitude, and have wanted to read The Hot Zone and the Alexander McQueen book for a while now, so am pleased with those. But so many books on my TBR pile - they are backing up faster than I can get through them.

Book 63 was Chernobyl by Serhii Plokhy. I'm too tired to do this justice after a very difficult couple of weeks but it deserves the praise it has had. The story of the explosion is gripping, and each of the people involved is vividly drawn and their personality and behaviour brought to life, but more than that, the account of the Soviet management of the crisis and the impact it had is exceptionally well done. I had no idea just how close to absolute catastrophe the plant came on more than one occasion afterwards, as if the explosion itself wasn't bad enough. I'd highly recommend this if you have any interest at all in environmentalism, science, the Soviet Union or how people cope in the face of crisis.

Hello everyone,
I've been missing in action since the end of March. Haven't been near the threads and my reading has nose-dived.

Been trying to get on track and have read a few good'uns this month:

Mountains of the Mind by Robert McFarlane. It wasn't the most relaxing of reads but I've enjoyed mountaineering books before, and this was all about.....mountains. With a healthy dose of geology thrown in (well really, the history of geology). The book looks at the history of mountaineering through the last four centuries and how it has come to be a 'sport' or rather, hobby, that fascinates so many.

A Tree grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. Brilliant. An American 'classic' written in the 1950s about a poor immigrant American family living in poverty in the early 1900s. Absolutely fascinating and so contemporary. Not depressing like Angela's Ashes.

Let the Great World spin by Colum McCann. Superb story of a variety of New Yorkers on the day in 1974 when a funambulist walks on wire between the Twin Towers. This book is quite spectacular. I wish I could write a review deserving of it but I've literally just finished it, and don't have the energy. I thoroughly recommend it though!

Hope all is ok EmGee. The last two books on your list are amongst some of my all-time favourites.

I haven't read all of Colum McCann's others but Transatlantic is also v good.

@KeithLeMonde Thanks for the heads up re: Natives, I'll take a look.

Mammoth update:

91. Three Things You Need To Know About Rockets by Jessica Fox

I got this after reading Diary of a Bookseller last year - this is the memoir of how Shaun and Jessica met - she’s American but had an urge to work in a Scottish bookshop, so randomly selected Shaun’s shop on the internet, emailed him and asked if she could come to stay. He said yes and they ended up falling in love. It’s rather confusing because in his book he uses his real name but calls her Anna, and in her book she uses her real name but calls him Euan. While I really enjoyed Diary of a Bookseller, this isn’t very good - the author comes across as rather whiny and spoilt. It was interesting to tie the two books together but I wouldn’t recommend beyond that.

92. A Book of Book Lists by Alex Johnson

Just as it says. Lists of books from Osama Bin Laden’s library, every book read on Friends, the top 10 books left behind on Virgin aircraft in 2011 and so on. Better just to dip into rather than read straight through. I did like this, but it’s not really one to get book recommendations from as lots are out of print.

93. Stone Mothers by Erin Kelly

Psychological thriller set around an old Victorian asylum which is now derelict. Something happened to Marianne in that building when she was younger, and events are now catching up with her. I like Kelly’s writing and enjoyed this, especially the descriptive setting.

94. East of Croydon by Sue Perkins

Part memoir, part travelogue, this covers Sue’s trips round South East Asia making her TV programmes, and also covers her father’s illness and death. I recommend this. It’s funny and also heartbreaking. I listened to this on Audible, read by Sue, and having her read her story to me added to the emotions.

95. Anna of Kleve: Queen of Secrets by Alison Weir

Latest in her Six Wives series. I liked reading more about Anne who is often overlooked, despite being the only one to come out of marriage with Henry VIII rather well. However, as this is fiction Weir imagines various events, which were interesting but will annoy historical purists.

96. The Other Wife by Michael Robotham

Passed on to me by FIL, turned out to be 9th in a series featuring a psychologist but I don’t think it really mattered that I hadn’t read any of the others. In this, the psychologist’s father has an accident and at his bedside they discover he had another wife - and a lot more secrets besides. Not bad - don’t think I would rush to read more but might pick one up cheap in a charity shop.

97. The Chalk Pit by Elly Griffiths

Another one passed on from FIL that is number 9 in a series! Boiled bones are discovered in a passage under Norwich. I whipped through this in a day and did enjoy it. I think I have another waiting on my kindle that I got in a deal ages ago so will dig that out soon.

98. The Narnia Code by Michael Ward

Theory that as well as the Christian allegory, the Narnia books are also based around the medieval idea of the ‘seven heavens’ (planets), with TLTWATW being Jupiter, Prince Caspian being Mars and so on. Not sure whether I buy it but will add an extra dimension to the books next time I reread them.

99. It Shouldn’t Happen To A Rep by Cy Flood

Apparently, not much does happen to a rep. Don’t bother.

100. One Red Paperclip by Kyle Macdonald

The author starts with a paper lip and aims to keep trading it for something better until he ends up with a house. Along the way he gets a snowmobile, a recording contract, a movie role and an afternoon with Alice Cooper. It’s a good story, but he isn’t really a good writer and it was all dragged out a bit.

31. The Burning by Laura Bates. YA novel about bullying and witch craft. I can’t really remember this despite finishing quite recently.

32. what Alice Forgot by Lianne Moriarty. Very chick lit basic but it was a good audio book. The main character looses 10 years of memory and still thinks Brad and gwyneth are together and can’t remember anything about her own life (inc 3 children). There was a few odd homophobic moments that I think may have been the author trying to show how attitudes had evolved between 1997 and 2007 but it didn’t work as no one reacted.

33. Still Me JoJo Moyes. Third in the trilogy for this kind of manic pixie dream girl (with a mundane twist). Alright.

34. How Not To Be A Boy by Robert Webb. Memoir of working class Lincolnshire bloke who ends up going to Cambridge. Dealing with masculinity and childhood trauma. I read a fair amount of feminist literature and this keeps up. I want the men in my life to read it.

As an aside I really enjoyed the scenes where is dad cooked home grown marrow and mince daily as it’s my dads favourite dish.

Ken Follett Kingsbridge and Century trilogies on the 99p kindle offer today. As I'm the last person on earth not to have read the former and the latter sounds like rollicking KF storytelling, I've bought the lot.

A tree grows in Brooklyn has been sitting on my shelf for about three years. Thanks for the review Emgee! Angela's Ashes, despite later revelations that apparently not much of his poverty tales were true, remains one of the books that I sat up to finish, howling along the way.

Could someone link to the June Kindle books please? If I search "kindle monthly deals" I get about 10 books at £3.99 each, all by the same author.

@The if you search daily deals the monthly come up below the daily.

Just bought the Ken Follett’s too as am currently reading Fall of Giants and loving it.

Thank you! Back I go!

Humph.
I get about 10 free books on container gardening showing up, followed by stuff that's no cheaper than a usual Kindle book.
How odd. I've tried both app and website. Christopher Hitchens really wants me to buy him.

Does this work?
www.amazon.co.uk/kindle-monthly-deals-books/b/ref=nodl_?node=4363389031&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&ie=UTF8

You have to scroll down to get the start of the full list then go through various pages to see them all. No idea why they make it so difficult. Maybe they just really like container gardening!

Ha! Google took me to the list.
Longitude duly downloaded.

16. Five on a Treasure Island – Enid Blyton

A five star review from me purely for the escapism, nostalgia and the pleasure of an adventure seen through a child's eyes.

I was quite pleased with the Kindle sale - I must be the last person on earth who hasn't read Longitude

@Pepelepew no, there are at least two of us.

Disappointed about the Ken Follett 99p books because I paid much more than that. I urge you all to read them though.

I have also bought books two and three from Ken Follett's Kingsbridge trilogy.

My DH just said to me "well at least if you read them on kindle you won't take as much damage when you fall asleep and it hits you in the face" He knows me so well!!

He's got a point

I used to fall asleep with the kindle hitting my nose.

I must be the last person on earth who hasn't read Longitude

Pepelepew no, there are at least two of us.

Make it three

whispers

alias, I think iirc that This Thing does pick up and I can attest that the only characters I can remotely remember are Darwin, Fitzroy and the Fuegians. I would like to pretend that I remember others, but nope! There's another chap I rather admired but his name is lost to me. And the turtle. I remember the Giant Turtle.

I can't get into This Thing.....

Don't say that about This Thing!!!!! I bought it on the back of these threads and the seemingly universal love for it!

But I haven't got round to actually reading it yet.....