50 Book Challenge 2020 Part Ten

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the tenth (and final?) 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 still not too late to join, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

The previous threads of 2020:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

I've just checked and these threads this year have moved more quickly than any other year since they started back in 2012! We'd never reached ten threads in any other year.

Welcome @Readingandrighting!

Welcome readingandrighting! Yes, we will be here.

Welcome aboard Readingandrighting - this thread has been a quiet lifeline for many of us in 2020, I reckon. And some of the nicest people hang out here

Ah thank you all so much for the warm welcome. What a positive thread!

I like to read a variety (fiction and non-fiction) but I tend to avoid crime fiction as it gets into my head too much! I have mostly been reading self-development books for the past few years but my love of fiction is re-igniting and I’m looking forward to reading books on my bookshelf!

I’m reading The Good Immigrant edited by Nikesh Shikla at the moment and it’s a great read.

Welcome Reading

Welcome reading . What a shit year 2020 has been in so many ways.

Reading Penelope Fitzgerald - The Bookshop and very much enjoying.

Hallo and welcome Readingandrighting.

Welcome back Hound and welcome Reading

The Books section is certainly much better than the Relationships section, this has got to be one of the best areas of Mumsnet. Sorry to hear about your marriage.

@Terpsichoreindeer

Welcome aboard Readingandrighting - this thread has been a quiet lifeline for many of us in 2020, I reckon. And some of the nicest people hang out here

Seconded. I don't know how I'd have got through February/March without this thread at times.

Hi, R&R.

I need to go to a real bookshop and buy some real books, I think. Any recs for children's classics that I might not have read? Think Nesbit-esque, or JoanAiken-esque, or lovely time travel ones etc. Ones that I will want to re-read lots!

Remus, I'm not totally caught up with the thread so you may have read this already, but The Dark Is Rising! I'm almost at the end and was so engrossed in it this morning I hadn't noticed it had started snowing. TDIR fans will understand the significance of that. I am normally not a fan of fantasy, but I have been absolutely transported by this book. Apologies if you've read it already.

Hello,
Would like to join the thread and start with 2021 if ok. Just started an audiobook Ruth Rendell The Face of Trespass. Have just finished One More For Christmas by Sarah Morgan and have Jennifer Worth Farewell to the East End lined up to start reading. Watched the first series of Call the Midwife yonks ago but may try and watch the lot. Excited for 2021 reads and will try and hit 50 books read.

Remus have you read Martin Pippin in the Daisy Field ? It's an absolute classic but not so well known I think.

More modern, but absolutely hit the Aiken-esq spot I'd recommend Frances Hardinge's Fly-by-night or A Face Like Glass (they're her earlier books, her later ones are more 21st-C-child-friendly but personally I don't think so engaging)

Thanks, Nutcracker. Have read it many times, but it's exactly the kind of thing I want.

Sadik - not read any of those, thanks. Have read The Lie Tree but wasn't terribly taken with it.

Yes, I wasn't that impressed by The Lie Tree either - Fly by night is the much better book IMO. It's also rather reminiscent of the later Willoughby Chase books - the heroine Mosca rather reminded me of Dido Twite.

Remus, I assume you’ve read Alan Garner if you like that sort of thing? Weirdstone of Brisingamen is my favourite.
I absolutely love The Dark Is Rising. I woke up early on Christmas Day and listened to the Backlisted crew talk about how good it is.

On the Nesbit theme, have you read the Edward Eager books? Half Magic / The Thyme Garden etc. They were childhood favourites of mine, they're still in print (I think they're much better known in the States), & when I got hold of copies a few years back for dd they definitely stood the test of time.

Welcome @Midnightstar76 and @Readingandrighting

R&R I read a lot of self development books too before and during the break up with (now) exDH. With hindsight, I needed less of those and more having actual fun (probably easier said than done at the moment - but fingers crossed for 2021!)

Sorry, posted a bit soon there! I meant that the self development books probably helped me through a very difficult time, but when I look back, I was trying to make myself into someone that I wasn't really to save the marriage. Once I worked out that that wasn't going to happen, I put myself first for a while and thought about what I wanted to get out of life, what I wanted to do etc. This is going back quite a few years but if I remember any books that helped I'll let you know!

Remus have you read any Lois Duncan books? Stranger With My Face and Locked In Time are my favourites.

Hallo and welcome Midnightstar76

Remus I was also going to suggest Half Magic by Edward Eager. I loved it, as did my 3 boys when they were younger. Also Marianne Dreams by Catherine Storr, which was really quite scary when I read it as a child, (and still quite creepy as an adult).

Marianne Dreams is brilliant

I have been racking my brains and can't help

I remember being roughly 13 and being OBSESSED by a book called Among Friends by Caroline B Cooney

Cynthia Voight?

The Homecoming books and The Callendar Papers ?

Helen Cresswell ?

Moondial ?

Secret World Of Polly Flint?

The one were two kids live in Alton Towers?

The Watchers!

(Alton Towers Vagrancy)

Hi readingandrighting and Midnightstar!

Just finished 99. Breaking and Mending: a junior doctor's stories of compassion & burnout by Joanna Cannon. I know this has been well-reviewed, but it wasn't really for me, perhaps because it was based around the tough emotional reality of being a doctor rather than medical detail and case studies. She speaks about being either a cardigan wearing (people-focused) or white-coat wearing (science-focused) doctor, and if I had it in me to be a doctor, I'd be the latter. It does have an important message about the lack of compassion and emotional care given to junior doctors, which surely only a radical overhaul of medical training could resolve.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit, I loved Among Friends! And the dress series- and their was a lovely Christmas one too. She was an incredibly prolific writer I think, but I don't think everything made it to the UK.

Remus, how about The Family from One End Street, or the Fell Farm books mentioned upthread. Or I loved Maggie Stiefwater's Raven Boys series this year.