50 Book Challenge 2020 Part Six

[southeastdweller]

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

So, we're now almost half way through the year - how's the first half of the year gone for you, reading-wise?

I always do 'Look Inside' on Kindle and have this weird inbuilt assess-o-meter that tells me straight off whether I'm going to like a book. Usually any fiction written in the continuous present is a no-no (pet hate, don't judge me, although there are notable exceptions eg H Mantel), and I find that weeds a fair number out.

I'm trying to get into the habit of downloading samples and then every so often weeding through and deleting once they start cluttering the place up.

Highlandcoo - maybe write down some of the most ridiculous similes as you read, to entertain us with later.

Shocking about the kindle bug Betts

Just finished Bill Bryson’s Down Under for the umpteenth time. So soothing which I needed this weekend.
I have One Summer America 1927 ready to start but might need something more comforting.

I try never to have more than 2 books "waiting" on my bedside table

@highlandcoo that was me quoting somebody else and not me!

Eine try lowering your voice when you ask her to do something

She has taken recently to farting when I ask her to turn my alarm off.

For those who recently enjoyed The Dutch House, check out a Facebook group called "For The Love of Old Houses". It's US house porn.

38. The Long Call by Ann Cleeves. First in a new series set in Devon- I have seen some of Shetland on TV and read one of the books, so thought I'd give this a go before it gets televised! I thought it was a competent detective story, but it didn't do more than that for me.

@BestIsWest I just started 1927 on Audible today
I love Down Under as well.
Can't beat Bill Bryson for a comfort read (or listen)

41. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
    As part of the read-a-thon, whose thread is now running at about 18 pages so enough has probably been said on there already.
    I did enjoy it though, some great characters.

42. The Alice Network by Kate Quinn
    I really enjoyed this, and would put it up there as one of my top reads so far this year.
    It is a fictionalised story, though some of the characters are based on real people, of the spy network in France in WW1 run mainly by women. It is a story on two timelines - 1947, soon after the end of WWII, a young American woman Charlie is en route to Switzerland with her overbearing French mother to get an abortion. Charlie is preoccupied with the disappearance of her French cousin Rose, who has not been heard of since 1943- not an uncommon occurrence after the Nazi occupation, but Charlie is convinced Rose is still alive. She has made some inquiries and knows Rose's information has crossed the desk of Eve Gardinier, who has done some tracing work for the Red Cross. She has an address for Eve in London, and when their ship docks in Southampton, Charlie gives her mother the slip and heads to London to find Eve, in the hope that Eve can lead her to Rose.

The other timeline is set during WWI, and follows Eve (fictional) who is recruited by Edward Cameron (real) and sent to Lille as part of the Alice Network, run by Alice Dubois (also real), She is sent to work at Le Lethe restaurant frequented by German officers, to eavesdrop on their conversations.

It was certainly a page-turner, kept my interest until the end, and I didn't know know which way it would go until the end. I liked Eve as a character.
I'd certainly recommend it.

43. Rise Up Women: The Extraordinary Lives of the Suffragettes by Diane Atkinson
    As the title suggests a non-fictional account of the lives of the main players in the fight for women's suffrage in the early part of the 20th Century. Some of them are well-known, such as Mrs Pankhurst and her daughters and Emily Davison, who threw herself under the King's racehorse at the Epsom Derby. I was also interested in the stories of the lesser known women (and men) who fought for the right of women to vote, especially the growing numbers of working women, who were taxed like men, but had no say in the running of the country. Some of what happened to these women was horrific - sexual assault by policemen - the police were told to grab the women by the breasts among other things, the endless prison sentences, hunger strikes and
    force-feeding, all the time being ridiculed by the establishment.
    I thought it would be a very dense read, and at some points it was difficult to keep track of the multitude of Marys, Emilys and Margarets, but overall very readable and a very interesting read.

44. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Settlefield
    Listened on Audible, narrated by the very lovely voice of Jenny Agutter.
    An OK story of biographer Margaret Lea, who is commissioned by secretive writer Vida Winter to write her long awaited biography. Over the course of several weeks of interviews, the story of Miss Winter's life is revealed. It is the story of an old house - Angelfield, a brother and sister on the brink of insanity, twin girls, a mysterious fire, a foundling child, unexplained deaths and disappearances.
    Decent enough story to keep me interested, but not amazing.

The Women in Black - Madeleine St John

Not sure where I heard of this - maybe the Guardian. Currently 99p in the Kindle sale. It's set in the ladies' dress floor in a department store, and is sweet and frivolous. I liked it a lot.

Philippe Sands' new book The Ratline is 99p in the Daily Deals today. I've snapped it up after listening to the excellent BBC seriali sation.

remus. I think they have a film version on Netflix at the moment as it rings a bell. Glad you found something that hit the spot.

Thanks, Satsuki. I'll have a look.

Keith the author spoke to Stephen Fry at the Hay Festival this year, the books sounds fascinating.

48. Imperium - Robert Harris

The first in a trilogy charting Cicero's political career, this covers the period from the trial of Verres to Cicero's attainment of the consulship. This was just what I needed to make me feel like myself (my degree is in ancient history and I seriously needed to spend some time immersed in that world). Although I knew the outcome, this was still a page-turner: Harris managed to create enough tension and throw enough perils in Cicero's way to make it seem impossible for him ever to achieve his goal of the consulship.

The narrator is Tiro, Cicero's real-life slave secretary, and this mostly worked, although some daft escapades were needed to allow Tiro to witness significant scenes. I'm also hoping the misogyny was meant to be representative of Roman attitudes: women tended to be introduced with reference to breast size (boobwatch alert!) or past sexual exploits. The focus is political, and while historically accurate and full of political/ legal detail, there is otherwise little in the way of world-building on a societal level.

Regardless, I loved the experience of reading this and will be on to the sequels very soon.

EmGee, I read that Maria Duenas book a couple of years ago and adored it. It had a different title though - The Seamstress

29. Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo. I enjoyed these interwoven stories of black women whose lives span 150 years of history, and whose ages range from teens to 99, far more than recent reviewers Keith and ShakeItOff did. Although I can't argue with Keith's review: Evaristo is guilty of 'telling not showing' in some instances and I did feel like I was being preached at on occasion.
    I listened to much of this on Audible which meant I wasn't presented with the punctuation free text of the novel which I find a bit gimmicky/irritating and could be carried away by the unfolding stories.
    Some stories were more surprising, unsettling or gripping than others but I found all the voices interesting. When finished I was sufficiently invested to draw a spider diagram to see where characters intersected with each other, no doubt I missed a few connections!

30. Love After Love by Ingrid Persaud. A book I picked up thanks to this thread and thoroughly enjoyed. This follows the story of Betty, her son, Solo,and their lodger, Mr Chetan, who becomes like family, a mainstay in both their lives. It's lively, funny and original swapping between their voices and experiences. Another book I read and listened too on Audible. Brilliantly read by the author (my heart sank when I heard she was voicing her own prose, but oh yea of little faith!) who brought the Trinidadian patois to life. Highly recommended.

31. Circe by Madeline Miller
I'm sure this is thoroughly reviewed on here but I deliberately haven't read much about it - I was given it some time ago so always intended to read it. I ended up loving it but it did take some time to get into, probably my mood rather than anything else, also I'm not in fact a huge fan of myth retelling and they're bloody everywhere right now. Once I let the author take over it was fabulous.

32. Cane, Jean Toomer – Classic novel from the 1920s. This has been on my radar for some time but finally took the plunge after registering the references to it in LOTE, particularly Toomer’s influence on work like Virginia Woolf’s The Waves and To the Lighthouse. Like those novels Toomer’s piece is modernist and experimental, and sections were originally published in literary magazines alongside pieces by Woolf. It’s a mixture of poetry and narrative – although a lot of the narrative reads like prose poetry. But unlike Woolf it’s set in a world that’s far more visceral, threatening and immediate. Although Toomer didn’t want to be categorised as a black author, the vignettes in this are centred on aspects of black culture and the impact of living in a racialised/racist society – for example at one point he describes a woman’s braid highlighting her beauty but then undercuts that image by comparing the braiding to a lyncher’s rope.

The stories are filled with scenes of lust, desire, and brutality, lynching, loss, broken dreams, and I found some of them incredibly powerful, particularly the sections set in a small town in Georgia. I thought that Toomer brilliantly conveyed the atmosphere of violence and the fragility of everyday existence for black and mixed-race towns people under Jim Crow, as well as their strength and strategies for overcoming their circumstances. I found it an easy book to get through but a difficult one to connect with at times, some of the prose is overblown, some sections are awkward and archaic, while others are striking and affecting, but it’s also a gripping, convincing, richly-textured portrait of a time and place. It was recently republished here by Penguin Classics but it’s also online, this online version also has an introduction to the work:

scalar.lehigh.edu/jean-toomers-cane-1923/cane

@DesdamonasHandkerchief I saw Bernadine had tweeted a spider diagram if you want to compare

mobile.twitter.com/bernardineevari/status/1208313873473966081?lang=en

It contains spoilers for those that haven’t read.

Wow, thanks Palegreen, that's far more intricate and detailed than mine. (I definitely missed some of the connections!) I could have saved myself some time if I'd known that was out there, great resource for anyone to look at after finishing the novel.

Although comparing my sad little spider diagram with that intricate one I think she's missing a friendship/colleague line between Shirley and Penelope!

And in the comments from that tweet there's also this diagram, laid out more like a tube map:

Oh yes I missed that. I really liked Penelope and Shirley’s changing relationship as Shirley’s teaching career progressed. She’s the character that’s stayed with me longest after 2 reads. I always felt like I wanted more from less characters but I read (maybe here) the author wanted more characters. I definitely need to read more of her work.