50 Book Challenge 2020 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 2020, 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.

How're you getting on so far?

The count of Monte Cristo and The Accidental Tourist are two of my favourites.

Arabella by Georgette Heyer
A Kindle cheapo which I may or may not have read before. Too long, especially in the first half (does that even make sense?) and not an original thought or line in the whole thing. I liked the scenes with the dog, but can't say I found the rest of it particularly enthralling.

44. Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey

A re-read. The first in her Pern series, set in a world filled with fire breathing, teleporting, dragons and their riders fighting the deadly thread that falls from the skies when the Red Star passes.

In this first book, we meet bronze rider F’Lar and Lessa, who bonds with the newborn golden dragon Ramoth to become Weyrwoman. It’s at the end of a 400 year interval since the last time thread fell, and the last Weyr is in decline and in a really bad position as far as saving Pern from thread goes.

It’s been years since I last read any of the Pern books. I mostly enjoyed this re-read, although there’s a lot of outdated attitudes towards relationships and women here that were a bit

The Accidental Tourist is great. This is how I discovered Anne Tyler.
Postcards from the Edge was my one DNF from last year!!

Think I'm going for Queenie, Crooked Heart, The Most Fun We Ever Had and Excellent Women (but am still hesitating over The Course of Love, Abide with Me, Bridge of Clay and A good man in Africa)
Odd - I thought I'd been through the whole list and I definitely didn't see The Year of Living Danishly :(

Have just seen The Silk Roads in the Daily deals today. I'm tempted...

Bridge of Clay is unreadable, imo. I've tried lots of times but it's really, really boring.

World of Trouble, by Ben H Waters
Last part of trilogy

Get. Hit post accidentally. Last part of trilogy. Asteroid about to hit earth in days - one man still has questions he wants answered. Enjoyed this and found it a fitting ending. If crime fiction is reassurance that the grownups are in charge and that someone has the answers, what does that mean in a world about to be destroyed? An intriguing question.

Negative capability, by Michele Roberts
Non-fiction. Although a respected author, she is struggling to get her last book published, and generally feels like a failure. She is trying to stay in the moment to ground herself, and this is derived from her diaries, a closely-detailed account of a single day from each month over a year, some spent in London and some in France. This won't be everyone's cup of tea, and some might find it a bit narcissistic, but I think there's something generous in opening up your life and saying "This is what the texture of my life feels like to me".

24. Flying Finish by Dick Francis
Another reread (I've been sorting out some boxes). Haven't read this for a few years and I'd forgotten what an absolute cracker this is. There's a reason the guy was worth a fortune when he died.

Henry Grey has an unsatisfying loner's life of multiple unconnected strands when a family row forces him to make changes. He gets a new job, falls in love and begins to make connections and for the first time can see a meaningful future, when he stumbles into a nest of what seems to be fairly minor criminality. But there's more to it than meets the eye, and it will take everything he has to save his life and protect the people around him.

@Tanaqui - I think it depends what you like about Heyer. My favourites are the less dramatic ones - the fewer murders or elopements or chases the better for me. So Venetia and A Civil Contract score highly. You might see them differently or they might still seem dull!

Good to know Remus, thanks!

45. Everything Begins With Asking For Help by Kevin Braddock

This is a sort of mix between an account of the author’s recovery from depression and anxiety, and a self help book about the same.

Very readable.

68. Queen Bees by Sian Evans

A biography of 6 UK socialites :

Lady Cunard, Lady Astor, Lady Londonderry, Mrs Greville, Mrs Colefax and Mrs Corrigan

from the early 20th Century to the 2nd World War

How it is possible for someone to take such ripe and promising material and turn it into something as dry and unappealing as a cold piece of burnt toast, I'll never know but Fuck Me, this was trudge.

@einereisedurchdiezeit 'fuck me, this was trudge'

Thanks to those of you who discussed All Quiet On The Western Front a while back. Shamefully I'd never read it and now I have. Heartbreaking, thought-provoking, so very stark.

29. Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

I tell you what, this reading one of Vasari's Lives every night is destroying my other reading. I thought they'd all be about 5 pages long, but many are much longer and one was 40 pages. I mean, I know Brunelleschi was a genius and everything but we're moving from brief snapshot to actual biography here.

As a result, I've taken forever to finish this excellent novel, and it is a testament to the writer that I have in fact finished it, despite work and homeschooling craziness and bloody Vasari.

I know many on here have already read and loved this book. For those who haven't, it is the story of Agnes, who is sentenced to execution for her alleged part in the murder of two men. It is based on actual events, and the author has clearly done a great deal of research, although the book wears it lightly. The setting of the Icelandic rural scene is extremely well done, but for me, the best thing about the book is its characters - obviously Agnes herself, but my favourite was Margret, the matriarch of the farm where Agnes is kept pending her execution. Her slow warming to Agnes is beautifully done, and Kent's portrait of her mental strength combined with physical vulnerability is extraordinarily well-executed in relatively few words. The scene in which Agnes finally opens up to Margret is my favourite part of the book. Highly recommended.

Call for the Dead by John Le Carre - 'In which the quintessential spymaster appears for the first time, pursuing a murder case that leads into his own dark past.' A civil servant kills himself after a routine security check in which he is cleared. Le Carre's first novel. This was brilliant - more of a detective story with spies which might explain why this was easier for me to understand than the other Le Carre books I've read!

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
A young New Yorker attempts to escape her life by sleeping for as much time as possible, aided by a huge amount of prescription drugs. This was hard to get into - it's repetitive and the main character is unsympathetic, however about halfway through I started to find it very moving. I felt a sense of impending doom as the protagonist slipped away from her life but tragedy approached her city in the form of 9/11 - although it isn't a book about that.

Thanks for the Michele Roberts review bibliomania. I really enjoy her fiction and will add to my wishlist.

@StitchesInTime I used to read a lot of fantasy books in the 1980s, including the Pern books. I have thought about re-reading but have suspicions that they may not have dated well. Maybe I should just keep them as a fond memory rather than ruining it.
I am thinking of the Belgariad by David Eddings in particular - I loved those.

Boiled, if you're a fan of her fiction, I think you'll enjoy all the little asides where she explains where she got the idea for various things in her books.

Superior: The Return of Race Science is currently free on Kindle courtesy of the publisher.

Also lithub.com/you-can-download-these-books-about-police-violence-for-free-right-now/

You might consider donating the price you would have paid towards a BLM charity.

@BookWitch I don’t know if the later Pern books would have dated better, IIRC there was a definite shift towards the science fiction end of things as the series went on, compared to Dragonflight which is definitely on the fantasy end of the scale.

But there were quite a lot of bits that had me wincing a bit on the re-read.

Like F’lar’s first meeting with Lessa - she’s been knocked out by Fax, he’s carried her off to his chamber and put her on the bed (presumably to check she’s ok), and then, having noticed she’s younger and prettier than he first thought, we have “Delighted and fascinated by this unexpected luck, F’lar reached out to tear the dress from the unconscious body...”
He doesn’t, because Lessa wakes up then, but seriously? There’s no innocent reason for any dress tearing here, it’s her head that was hit!

Or the way that no one bothers explaining to Lessa exactly what a dragon mating flight means for the riders.

Or the way that F’lar shaking Lessa when he’s angry with her is presented as acceptable behaviour in a relationship.

And all the unsuccessful female candidates brought in on the search seem to stay in the Weyr. I’m wondering if they were asked about that.
Take Kylara, sister of a Lord Holder (so high ranking in Pern’s social structure), and, according to her brother, eagerly awaiting her wedding when taken away on search. She ends up bed-hopping between dragonriders, which apparently suits her temperament, but you’ve got to wonder whether she’d have picked that over going back to her fiancée if she’d been given a free choice the day after Lessa impressed Ramoth. Especially when Kylara’s brother appears in the story about 2-3 years after the Search and comments that they’ve not heard from Kylara since she was taken.

And added to that, while they’re waiting for Ramoth to lay her eggs, the former Weyrleader is opposed to F’lar looking for extra male dragonriders candidates outside the Weyr, as they’ve got 18 youngsters in the Weyr. Presumably there’s also a similar number of girl youngsters around the Weyr, but that didn’t seem to stop them from looking all over the place for female candidates for the queen egg

And also, why does Lessa get the blame for Lady Gemma’s death? She dies in childbirth! And Lessa’s the one who runs (without any dawdling on the way) to get the birthing woman!
She’s already showing signs of early labour before Lessa tries to provoke a fight between Fax and F’lar. Blaming Lessa for Gemma’s death makes no sense at all.

Anyway. Moving on, and reminding myself that Dragonflight was written more than 50 years ago.
I think I’ll give the series a break for now before considering whether to re-read Dragonquest.

I’ve never read anything by David Eddings.

@PermanentTemporary I love Flying Finish- such a good ending. Also really like Rat Race- I wonder if Francis learnt to fly at some point? I tend to like the funny Heyers- The Grand Sophy, False Colours, Frederica, Fridays Child (although I do especially love These Old Shades, the first one I read, aged about 12). To be fair, even a poor Heyer is a lot better than most of the historical fiction I have ever read!

119. The Yellow Bird Sings - Jennifer Rossner Set in Poland during WW2 a woman and her musical prodigy daughter go into hiding from the Nazis. She will do anything to make sure her daughter survives and has to make some difficult decisions along the way.

Based on true stories this is beautifully written although slow going in places.

120. The Uncoupling - Meg Wolitzer A new high school drama teacher decides to stage a production of the classic and comic play Lysistrata, written by Aristophanes, about the women of Greece who decided to withhold sex as a way to end the lengthy Peloponnesian War. In the lead up to the performance an enchantment casts over the town and the women start to ignore or split from their partners.

I always want to like Meg Wolitzer more than I do. She always has really interesting ideas and tends to choose a feminist leaning, however I don't think the quality of writing is quite there. It's pitched as literary but tries and misses the mark for me. I think I'd judge it less harshly if it were marketed differently. She's not a bad writer by a long stretch and I don't dislike her, but come away each time thinking there was a better book in there that didn't quite make it out.

121. Strange Hotel - Eimear McBride
     I have no idea where to start with this. She gives you so little information it's hard to grasp. Essentially a woman visits a series of hotels (you never learn why) while having an existential crisis. Stunning writing as always, but I think I need to read this again as there was so much to unpick. It doesn't feel as immediate or as urgent as her other work but is much slower moving and more reflective. A very different and interesting direction.

122. If Beale Street Could Talk - James Baldwin
     A young couple in the Bronx discover they are expecting, but he is falsely imprisoned for a crime before they can get married. She has to face raising the baby alone while his family do all they can to get him released.

A love story that explores and comments on racial injustice in 70s America. Gorgeous emotional, lyrical writing.

Bookwitch I'd say the Harper Hall trilogy has aged better than the others.

It's a bit like Mercedes Lackey's books - they were great back in the day, but definitely showing their age (though I still re-read Magic's Pawn, and it still gets me every time).

These Old Shades and Devil's Cub are also right up there in the list of alarmingly-dubious-to-modern-eyes books that I still love

After a run of great books (The Five, Hidden Valley Road, and The Heartland) I'm in a slump of failed choices. I got a Cory Doctorow book - Homeland - from the online library, but hadn't appreciated it was YA, (tbf it started excellently with a chapter set in the Burning Man festival which really felt like being there, and I think I would have enjoyed it age 12-13 or so).

I'm having another go at Uncanny Valley but still finding the author deeply irritating (not using emojis doesn't make you a better person, Anna - and if you don't know that online gaming communities exist, that makes you ill-informed, not superior). I've also given up for the moment on Walking to Aldebaran - freebie novella from Adrian Tchaikovsky - which I think I'm just not in the mood for (it's got a proper old-school SF vibe going on which I'd generally like).