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?

@Piggywaspushed

Is your review on this years threads?

I mean, she just shrieked the title and it was the end, I couldn't work out what had actually happened

It'll be back In January I think... will see if I can find it!

This is it . rereading it feels odd, because, eye op aside I cannot remember now any of the things I comment on, which speaks volumes!!

*I have just finished Now We Shall Be Entirely Free which did manage not to entirely fall apart , despite its terrible binding!

I liked this : I liked the evocation of Napoleonic era Scotland and Miller's elegant writing. I also liked the menace of one character although to say more would be too revealing. The central protagonist is interesting. Wasn't sure about the point of the eye operation (which made me feel quite faint whilst reading it in my 'right everyone pretend to read so Mrs Piggy can ' session). Am assuming it's a metaphor.

One thing, though : Miller is very intense and quite hard work. I think he expects his reader to properly concentrate and remember things, like names and details. I had to reread chapter 2 twice when I got near the end of the book! I did feel some bits that seemed important (Phyrro, Thorpe and Medina's fascination with him, if they are the same person, God only knows!)) were just left dangling like Miller had a n idea and then couldn't be bothered.

A rewarding read if you like them slow and richly detailed. But not a star read because I was too confused at times...
I did mean to mention that Sir John Moore of Corunna was considered a hero Former Pupil of my school and that one of my ancestors fought in the Peninsular War under Moore. Not so sure how I feel about these things now! Thanks Andrew Miller!*

Agree with what you said, anything to do with Thorpe was a pointless blind alley. And it had such potential. Sigh.

That's what I thought. Style over substance. But then I thought maybe I just wasn't clever enough!

I have just finished David Crystal's Sounds Appealing which my MIL sent to me (in her ever present belief that I am terribly bored and short of activities!)

I think (again!) I was not concentrating enough to understand all of it (it is pretty academic) and that I thought it would be more about accent snobbery. Written in 2018, it actually already feels a little out of date in some of the examples he draws upon (for example, if eh is right that the British now react instinctively against RP why did the working class North take to him, why do the kids I teach like him, and why do people seem to think he is harmless? Hmm. I think some of that is based upon the tolerance we still exhibit for posh buffoons!)

Worth a read if you are interested in phonetics; the stuff about child language acquisition was interesting. And he said something about Glaswegians now going f fro fink which I thought was just Kevin Bridges, but eh says not. Kevin Bridges next to Billy Connolly really shows a direction of travel in working class Glaswegian accents. (Kevin Bridges isn't actually very working class... shh...)

Whenever a book gives me "am I clever enough" vibes I decide that the author is at fault because if you are following a book and then suddenly you can't, they've gone awry somewhere.

Yes to that! Many books in search of a decent and truthful editor!

Amusingly enough . my random number generator now demands I read a Ben Crystal book next!!

49. Trigger Warning by Neil Gaiman

A collection of short stories. Entertaining on the whole.

29. Slouching Towards Bethlehem - Joan Didion

A re-read. Listened to this on Audible and found my enjoyment much enhanced by the Neflix Documentary The Centre Will Not Hold. Thank you to whoever it was on here who recommended the documentary, which was brilliant.

A collection of essays mainly focused on the west coast of America in the nineteen sixties, a time of great social and economic change, and not all of it positive. I found Joan Didion's long, intricate sentences sentences a pleasure to listen to and well narrated by Diane Keaton.

There wasn't a bad one in this bunch but I felt she kept the best until last with Goodbye to All That. This essay focuses on moving to New York as a young woman and why after many years, she decided to leave New York for Los Angeles.

As someone who moved from up north to London as a young woman, I could relate to everything she described; the feeling of being almost starstruck by the city, and in awe of it, of always being the eternal tourist. More than twenty years later, I am still very much in love with London and cannot imagine ever leaving. Interesting to note that in The Centre Will Not Hold she appears to be living at least for some of the time back in New York.

62 The Unthinkable - Who survives when disaster strikes - and why, by Amanda Ripley
Reviewed upthread by Stitches, this was ideal Audible listening, interesting but not overly taxing. I'm not sure it'll make me respond better in a crisis, but at least as a non-flyer who works outdoors I won't have to deal with some of her most covered threats

62.5 Henchmen of Zenda by KJ Charles, I recommended this to a friend and it prompted a re-read. Very entertaining re-telling of the pulp classic from the point of view of one of the villains.

63 Slow Horses by Mick Herron
Much reviewed on here already - rather slow to get going (hence diverting into 62.5 above) but enjoyable. I'd definitely read more in the series but will probably wait in the hope that they'll come up on Kindle deal.

I've just bought The Tent, the Bucket & Me on Kindle deal, not sure whether I'll find it fun or annoying, but I figured it was worth 99p to try.

@Sadik I really enjoyed The Tent, the Bucket & Me as it reminded me a bit of my childhood (and slightly disastrous) holidays

74. Edward Marston - Inspector Colbeck's Casebook
75. Edward Marston - The Iron Horse

Another two books from the Victorian era Railway Detective series which I am plodding my way through at the DC's bedtime. They are entertaining without being unputdownable, which is what I need.

76. Juno Dawson - Margot & Me

YA fiction - a teenager and her widowed mother move in with her grandmother on a farm in rural Wales to allow her mother time to recuperate from illness. The teenage girl dislikes her grandmother until she finds her wartime diary and begins to realise what happened to make her such a prickly character. TBH I thought this was a bit cheesy when I started it (and don't get me wrong, there were more cheesy moments later) but I really enjoyed it and shed a little tear in a couple of places.

20. A Favourite of the Gods by Sybille Bedford (1963) – This follows three generations of women Anna, her daughter Constanza and granddaughter Flavia. It covers their lives from American Anna’s marriage to a Roman prince somewhere around the late 19th/early 20th century through to Flavia’s girlhood. Definite shades of Henry James here, the American heiress marrying an impoverished European, but less fixated on broader explorations of these issues and more on family and communication or lack of it. Well-written, sharp, stylistically formal and wonderfully detailed in terms of setting, context and so on…But although this started well, ultimately I didn’t find myself as bound up in the story as I was in her autobiographical A Legacy. A Favourite of the Gods is probably the better novel, in terms of structure and flow; but I missed the more developed sense of the historical and cultural pressures surrounding the families in A Legacy. This felt far more narrow in its focus, and at times slightly claustrophobic. I think I’ll delay reading the sequel A Compass Error and come back to it when my mood is better suited to it. I think maybe this was just too subtle/leisurely for my current level of concentration or lack of it…

BTW forgot to add for David Mitchell fans, don’t know if anyone is following Shelf Analysis but next week’s features an interview with David Mitchell about his new novel Utopia Avenue, it’ll be on FB but then added to YouTube later

twitter.com/rickoshea/status/1271382311376953345

On David Mitchell, my favourites are Black Swan Green and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, which was my first purchase on Audible. I’ve read them all (Bone Clocks, Slade House, Cloud Atlas) and look forward to his new book.

27. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.

Yes, loved it! Not going to post any spoilers for those of you on the Dickensalong. After I’d finished reading the book I read the thread - great chat btw (I also picked out the hair and the swinging a cat quote). I’m just not one for staggered reading. Too frustrating!

David Copperfield - full of character, humour and pathos. My favourite characters are Betsey Trotwood, the eccentric aunt, and her companion Mr Dick, a wise pair with some great lines. The evil Murstons and the uncomfortable Uriah Heep, the incorrigible Micawbers, drippy hippy Dora to name but a few. I feel they’ll stay with me for some time. In fact I’ve been struggling to find something to read next. DNF-ing one book after another.

Read on the Kindle and listened to the Richard Armitage Audible version at the same time, which was very well done for the most part, although I didn’t enjoy the voice for Mr Pegotty.

A Great Book!

28. Grey Sister (Book 2 of Book of the Ancestor) by Mark Lawrence.

The second of this fantasy series. Lots to like with the predominantly female cast, action, plot. It’s a bit heavy on the medieval/dark surroundings/always feels like it’s raining but I did like it and will read the third.

I joined this in Jan and haven't added any books.. I can't seem to remember the ones pre-covid, think I read some trashy thrillers which I'll have to find the names of and add, and fabulous the Cows by Dawn O'Porter.

I've read Where the Crawdads Sing, which I loved, in spite of its faults.

Ruby by Cynthia Bond. Another novel set in the US Deep South. A devastating tale, but beautiful and poetic, and brilliant storytelling.

To throw away unopened, Viv Albertine, recommended on here. Absolutely brilliant, raw memoir.

Beneath the streets by Adam McQueen, a fictionalised thriller based on the Jeremy Thorpe scandal. Brilliant and gripping. Brilliant and loved the period setting.

I also read the Swedish Art of Death Cleansing. Does that count? Although it's a decluttering book, her storytelling is what makes it a great read.

Welcome @NeedToKnow101. I've just bought Beneath the Streets as I enjoyed the TV show and book about that scandal so thanks for highlighting it.

Just finished these two:

41. Normal People - Sally Rooney

I have to say I'm in the liked it camp! I found this to be very clear, compelling writing, and the main characters Connell and Marianne felt very real to me, and I genuinely cared what was going to happen to them. I'm not sure if it is a generational thing - I'm a millennial like Connell and Marianne, but I'm about ten years older than the characters are supposed to be (given that they go to university in 2011), so at the opposite end of the millennial range. Connell in particular felt like a very well-drawn portrait of someone who was secure in themselves at school but lost their sense of place in the world when they moved to university. Marianne was perhaps a little more stereotypical, in the poor little rich girl mould. There was also not an awful lot of plot - it was all about their emotional development and relationship with each other, which didn't faze me but wouldn't be for everyone.

42. Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race - Reni Eddo-Lodge

Very strong and cogent account of how structural racism is still very much alive and kicking in the UK. I was particularly stuck by how alienating it must be for the perceived default norm to be a skin colour other than your own. As a feminist, I already understood how 'maleness' is seen as the standard version of humanity, but this book has widened my perception to see that not only is this 'standard human' male, they are white too. The chapter on class was also very strong, with the understanding that all inequality needs to be tackled at once (racism, class inequality, patriarchy), because its all part of the same system with white males sitting at the top. This book does not go into detail about how we move beyond this system (and fair enough, because its aim is in raising awareness not resolving the issues). That is what I am personally struggling with now, especially in relation to current events - short of 'the revolution', how do we bring about real structural change?

16. A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe Self explanatory really. Our narrator decides not to follow the hoards leaving London in 1665 and sticks around to witness how the City and its people manage a pandemic.

This was interesting in its parallels and contrasts with our lockdown today. The general suspicion that the authorities were downplaying the numbers recorded in the bills of deaths struck a chord There were some good anecdotes, particularly the drunkard who passed out in the street and was mistaken for the start of a pile of corpses awaiting the dead cart, on which he found himself when he came round. And the depiction of the vast mass graves needed is really sobering and moving.

However, either Defoe waffly and repetitive, or I'm just not smart enough to enjoy 18th century literature, as I was at times bogged down by the writing, and often wished he'd just cut to the chase.

52. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling. Another audio book which I really enjoyed. The first book in the series where you really know this is a special series of children's books. I found the big reveal towards the end almost as thrilling as I did the first time. (4/5)

53. It by Stephen King. This is one of my favourite Stephen King books and I enjoyed this reread. The two timelines are skilfully interwoven and I found the ending as emotional as ever. There are a couple of moments though that I really don't like, I've always found the way they find their way out when they are children really uncomfortable reading and I've not changed my mind on that. The rest of the book is a brilliant insight into all of the fears from childhood, some that last into adulthood and the bond of friendship. (4/5)

@InMyOwnParticularIdiom I thought Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race was a really interesting read. It was a real eye opener, particularly the history of discrimination and the various stands against it in this country. One thing that really resonated with me was the explanation of white privilege, I'd struggled with that a bit as being a woman from a pretty poor background I never felt particularly privileged, but although I may have faced difficulties due to this I have never faced discrimination because I'm white. I'm the same, I really want to take a stand against structural racism but I have little idea of the practical steps I can take. I'm going to keep listening and learning and will hopefully find my way.

29. Humble Pi by Matt Parker (non-fiction). Light hearted book about what happens when people / companies don’t take maths seriously enough. Including the guy who took Pepsi to court to get his Harrier Jet because he had bought enough Pepsi points. Also contains some tragedies caused by engineering calculations not being done properly. Was actually a present for my 13 year old DS (who likes maths) but too complex for him so I picked it up instead. Sometimes a bit too much detail but pretty readable.

The first three Saint Clare's books -
Didn't really enjoy these. The twins are faceless and characterless, and there's nothing much in them that wasn't in MT as well.

Shakespeare On Toast by Ben Crystal. I haven't got a huge amount to say. I like Ben Crystal; he is very clear and exuberant and enthusiastic and this is a jolly pocket sized book about Shakespeare, most particularly about how Shakespeare wrote with some really helpful stuff on metre. It's very light, deliberately, and so I felt there could be more of it. He has written more stuff since, at which point he stopped pilfering padding from his dad! (or maybe it's the other way round..)

Not posted in ages as having so much going on here, and not had much focus for reading so feel a bit behind in number of books. I think I could have achieved more tbh! Here is my list:

1. Giver of Stars – Jojo Moyes
2. Vinegar Girl – Ann Tyler
3. Me – Elton John
4. First Lady – James Patterson
5. Wakenhyrst – Michelle Paver
6. Bad Spell For The Worst Witch – Jill Murphy
7. Run Away – Harlan Coben
8. Funhouse – Diane Hoh
9. The Five – Hallie Rubenhold

10. Melmoth – Sarah Perry 11. Norse Mythology – Neil Gaiman 12. The Dutch House – Ann Patchett 13. The Dilemma – B A Paris 14. The Girlfriend – R L Stine 15. The Foundling – Stacey Halls 16. The Guest List – Lucy Foley 17. Bring Up The Bodies – Hilary Mantel 18. The Widow’s House – Carol Goodman 19. Cat Among the Pigeons – Agatha Christie 20. Tattooist of Auschwitz – Heather Morris 21. When Will There Be Good News? – Kate Atkinson 22. The Nightshift Before Christmas – Adam Kay 23. The Guest House – Abbie Frost 24. The Family Upstairs – Lisa Jewell

Currently reading Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham, on ebook from the library and Morgan’s Passing by Ann Tyler on audiobook. I love Ann Tyler’s style of writing but will admit the main character is annoying me slightly.