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.

243. Fifty Words For Rain - Asha Lemmie Coming of age story of a mixed-race illegitimate child in a minor branch of the Japanese royal family. Her mother's affair with a black American GI is hushed up, and she lives her early life in exile. Later abandoned to her grandmother, she is kept in the attic until her older half brother takes pity on her and broadens her horizons.

This is well written and very readable but at the same time a bit OTT and high on the misery. It's set against the backdrop of a changing post-war Japan which gives another layer of interest.

I abandoned Phil Klay's Missionaries at about 70% and I decided I really didn't care. 4 characters from various backgrounds end up embroiled in the Colombian revolution. Looking at American foreign policy in world affairs and the effect of drug cartels on local communities in South America. This started very strong but petered out for me and I decided not to finish it. It gets rave reviews so it's more likely my mood than the book being at fault.

@FortunaMajor, I was pleasantly surprised by this one, but have seen that people feel he's running out of rope once we get a couple further along the line! I agree about Siobhan, I think she's a great character. Maybe he doesn't feel confident enough to write a woman as his main character, but Malcolm Fox just feels like Rebus with no booze and all the interesting bits taken out.

77. The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah
The first in Sophie Hannah's continuation of Agatha Christie's Poirot series, and definitely not the best. The mystery is OK: a terrified woman runs into a coffee shop where Poirot is a customer, tells him that she fears for her life, but that she deserves to die and won't do anything to prevent her death. She then flees before Poirot can find out more. At the same time, three guests in a hotel on the other side of London die from poisoning, each in a separate room, and each with the same type of monogrammed cufflink having been placed in their mouths by the murderer. The path to solving the crime is suitably twisty, although the solution is ridiculously contorted, and the psychology is lurid and gothic. However, the policeman Edward Catchpool is dense to the point of imbecility, missing the most obvious interpretations of every scene and needing to have everything spelled out with a clarity that would have made Hastings blush. Combined with his extreme squeamishness about death and dead bodies - he leaves the three corpses overnight in the hotel room because he can't bear to deal with them, ffs - it leaves the reader wondering how on earth he has managed to reach the rank of Detective Inspector.

78. Mr Finchley Discovers His England by Victor Canning
Victor Canning was a journalist whose prolific output of thrillers, comedies and children's books was once very popular but who has now been largely forgotten. The publisher Farrago has been reprinting them, and I had this book recommended to me when I bought The Ascent of Rum Doodle, which should give you an idea of its flavour (although Mr Finchley was written 20 years earlier, in 1934).

Mr Edgar Finchley is a middle-aged solicitor's clerk who has never taken a holiday. Ordered by his new boss to take some time off, he books 3 weeks in Margate. However, he never arrives at his destination: in a bizarre sequence of events, he is accidentally abducted by thieves in a stolen car, and finds himself kept captive in their lair while they decide what to do with him. Following his escape, he takes to the road, travelling towards the west country, and the rest of the book describes his picaresque adventures. Along the way, he encounters all the eccentric characters you would expect to meet while "on the road", turns his hand to casual employment, gains and loses a bicycle, gets mixed up in events of dubious legality - and eventually makes it back to London at the end of his three weeks, sunburned, fitter, grubbier and much rejuvenated by his life of "vagabondage".

This is a very gentle book, and the humour is of a very English kind (think PG Wodehouse or Jerome K Jerome). Although Mr Finchley often finds himself in hazardous situations, or with scoundrelly people, you know that his dumb luck, good nature and resourcefulness will get him out unscathed - there's never more than "mild peril" (as the film classifications say). It's also not a crusading book: there's some mild social commentary (Mr Finchley finds himself in the poor house at one point, and frequently ruminates on his good fortune at others), but it's not The Road to Wigan Pier! Rather, his cheerfulness is of the tolerant and all-embracing kind you find in Wodehouse - he is happy to take people as they find them and treats everyone with a kind of human egalitarianism (this also reminded me of Wodehouse). Interspersed with the episodes of adventure, there are rather lovely lyrical descriptions of the English countryside (Mr Finchley is a rather somnolent sort and frequently stops to gaze at the view, ruminate a little on the people he has just met, and have a nap). Overall, I found this book quite a tonic - perhaps too saccharine to read often, but a lovely way to refresh the palate after too much grimness.

The Mr Finchley one sounds good mackerella, I’ve added that to my wish list.

Hope you enjoy it, Chessie!

I've just finished reading Gingerbread by Helen Oyeyemi, but need to pause and gather my thoughts before reviewing it - I can see that it's quite a marmite book, but I was totally wowed by the writing.

I'm recovering with a combination of Shaun Bythell (Confessions of a Bookseller) and Stig Abell (How Britain Really Works) while I decide whether my next fiction book is going to be Started Early, Took My Dog or Spring (probably the former - I think Ali Smith is too similar to Helen Oyeyemi).

Thanks for the new thread, here is my current list:

1. Pet Semetary by Stephen King

2. The Outsider by Albert Camus

1. Somebody's Mother, Somebody's Daughter by Carol Ann Lee

4. Just One Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor 5. Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton 6. 4321 by Paul Auster

1. Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann.
2. The Devil's Teardrop by Jeffrey Deaver.
3. A Symphony of Echoes by Jodi Taylor.

10. What Katy Did by Susan Coolidge 11. A Second Chance by Jodi Taylor 12. A Trail Through Time by Jodi Taylor 13. Elevator Pitch by Linwood Barclay. 14. Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. 15. The Talisman by Stephen King & Peter Straub. 16. Ayoade on Top by Richard Ayoade. 17. Black Ice by Michael Connelly. 18. In the Woods by Tana French. 19. The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. 20. Red Ribbons by Louise Phillips. 21. The Girl He Used to Know by Tracy Garvis Graves. 22. The Other Us by Fiona Harper. 23. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. 24. The Crow Trap by Anne Cleeves. 25. The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King. 26. Guilt by Jussi Adler-Olsen. 27. This is Going to Hurt by Adam Kay. 28. Just One Damn Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor. 29. The Very First Damn Thing by Jodi Taylor. 30. A Symphony of Echoes by Jodi Taylor. 31. When a Child is Born by Jodi Taylor 32. Roman Holiday by Jodi Taylor 33. A Second Chance by Jodi Taylor 34. Christmas Present by Jodi Taylor 35. A Trail Through Time by Jodi Taylor 36. No Time Like the Past by Jodi Taylor 37. The Outcast Dead by Elly Griffiths 38. How to Stop Time by Matt Haig 39. Thinner by Stephen King. 40. What Could Possibly Go Wrong by Jodi Taylor. . 41. Ships and Stings and Wedding Rings by Jodi Taylor. 42. My Name is Markham by Jodi Taylor. 43. Lies, Damned Lies, and History by Jodi Taylor 44. The Great St Mary's Day Out by Jodi Taylor. 45. Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders 46. The Sudden Departure of the Frasers by Louise Candlish. 47. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling. 48. Raven Black by Ann Cleeves. 49. The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King. 50. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling. 51. Skeleton Crew by Stephen King. 52.Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling 53.It by Stephen King 54. Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury 55. East of Hounslow by Khurrum Rahman 56. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire 57. And the Rest is History by Jodi Taylor 58. Someone Out There by Catherine Hunt 59. A Perfect Storm by Jodi Taylor 60. Christmas Past by Jodi Taylor 61. An Argumentation of Historians by Jodi Taylor 62. The Battersea Barricades by Jodi Taylor 63. The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd 64. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling 65. Look For Me by Lisa Gardner 66. The Man Who Fell To Earth by Walter Tevis 67. The Steam Pump Jump by Jodi Taylor 68. And Now for Something Completely Different by Jodi Taylor 69. Hope for the Best by Jodi Taylor 70. When Did You Last See Your Father? By Jodi Taylor 71. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling 72. Enigma by Robert Harris 73. The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson 74. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling 75. Bookworm: A Memoir of Childhood Reading by Lucy Mangan 76. Red Bones by Ann Cleeves 77. Blue Lightning by Ann Cleeves 78. Dead Water by Ann Cleeves 79. Thin Air by Ann Cleeves 80. Sole Survivor by Dean Koontz 81. Three Wishes by Liane Moriarty 82. The Power by Naomi Alderman

mack I went back to find my review of Gingerbread. I was very WTF at the end of it. I concluded that it was trying to be a modern day Alice and that I'd either missed something or needed drugs for the experience. The writing was gorgeous, but the 'plot' if there was one was incomprehensible to me.

Yes, I thought that you'd read it, Fortuna! There was a moment about a third of the way through when I thought "WTF" as well, but I just decided to go with it and it made a kind of sense to me by the end. (No drugs involved...) I'd actually like to go back and re-read it immediately, but there are so many other books still TBR that I'll save that for next year. It's definitely one I'm going to revisit, though (and her other books have gone straight on my TBR list - I think she's hugely talented).

I'd definitely read more of her work for the writing alone, but don't mind admitting that GB was way beyond me.

I ordered a big Lego set from their website today and was thrilled at the little free gift we got. These are usually Xmas-themed at this time of year but think they have outdone themselves with this one

That looks amazing, InTheCludgie! I'm an unashamed AFOL [Adult Fan of Lego] myself, so there are at least 3 people in our household who might be getting sets this year. (I'm definitely going to hijack any free gifts, though, as the person who's actually paying for this all.) Is it just for VIPs?

Love the Lego set InTheCludgie!

I think it is a VIP item mackarella, it's double points weekend atm. Have now earned myself enough points to get £20 off my next purchase (which I'm hoping will be the diner if it comes back into stock before retiring!).

Message for Sophie Kinsella fans - what to start with?

Hello everyone! I've fallen off the thread as I've been horribly busy at work. Hope you're all doing OK . I feel like I have a lot less reading time too at the moment, and on reviewing my list I can see I've definitely won't reach my total from previous years. Here's my list so far with concise reviews from the last 2 books finished.

1. Anatomy of a Scandal – Sarah Vaughan

2. Childhood: The Copenhagen Trilogy 1 – Tove Ditlevsen

3. Persepolis – Marjane Satrapi

4. Animal Farm – George Orwell

5. Hazards of Time Travel – Joyce Carol Oates

6. Ghost Wall – Sarah Moss

7. Florida – Lauren Groff

8. This is Pleasure –Mary Gaitskill

9. Only Killers and Thieves – Paul Howarth

10. Milkman – Anna Burns

11. Ladder of Years – Anne Tyler

12. Youth: The Copenhagen Trilogy 2 – Tove Ditlevsen

13. Motherwell – Deborah Orr

14. The Nickel Boys – Colson Whitehead

15. The Five – Haillie Rubenhold

16. Slack-Tide – Elanor Dymot

17. Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantel

18. To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

19. A Thousand Moons – Sebastian Barry

20. The Garden of Evening Mists – Tan Twan Eng

21. Down and Out in Paris and London – George Orwell

22. Trust Exercise – Susan Choi

23. Amnesty – Aravind Adiga

24. Hurricane Season – Fernanda Melchor

25. The Gathering – Anne Enright

26. Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell

27. Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys – Viv Albertine

28. Lost Children Archive – Valeria Luiselli

29. Slouching Towards Bethlehem – Joan Didion

30. Dependency: The Copenhagen Trilogy 3 – Tove Ditlevsen

31. On Chapel Sands – Laura Cumming

32. Norwegian Wood – Haruki Murakami

33. Invisible Women : Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men – Caroline Criado Perez

34. My Face for the World to See – Alfred Hayes

35. Girl, Woman, Other – Bernadine Evaristo

36. After Midnight – Irmgard Keun

37. Blue in Chicago – Bette Howland

38. Homage to Catalonia – George Orwell

39. The Poet X – Elizabeth Acevedo

40. Shane – Jack Schaefer

41. Saltwater – Jessica Andrews

42. Slaves of New York – Tama Janowitz

43. Segu – Maryse Conde

44. A Luminous Republic – Andres Barba.

45. American Dirt – Jeanine Cummins

46. On the Plain of Snakes: A Mexican Journey – Paul Theroux

47. A Clergyman’s Daughter – George Orwell

48. Nervous Conditions – Tsitsi Dangarembga

49. The Accidental Tourist - Anne Tyler

50. Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency – Olivia Laing

51. The Lying Life of Adults – Elena Ferrante

52. The Road to Wigan Pier – George Orwell

53. How Much of These Hills is Gold – C Pam Zhang

54. Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck

55. Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me – Kate Clanchy

56. Human Acts – Han Kang

57. The Book of Not – Tsitsi Dangarembga

58. The Missionaries – Norman Lewis

An evocative and beautifully written travelogue, this describes the destructive influence of Christian missionaries on indigenous communities. This was both wonderfully descriptive and wholly depressing. Spoiler alert – this doesn’t end well for the indigenous communities described.

I’ve discovered a new interest in travel writing during the lockdown, possibly due to the fact I haven’t left zone 2 since March.

59. The Outrun – Amy Liptrot

I listened to this one and my experience was definitely enhanced by the narrator’s restful voice. Great for bedtime listening. An undemanding and uplifting tale exploring the writer’s journey from addiction to self-love via the Hebrides.

Thanks South for the new thread and apologies to Remus and any other list-haters who have snuck back onto the thread now we've reached page 2 - I haven't posted since the new thread started so here's mine:

1. Lanny, Max Porter

2. Warlight, Michael Ondaatje 3. Airhead, Emily Maitlis

1. Paris Echo, Sebastian Faulks
2. Alchemy, Margaret Mahy
3. My Midsummer Morning: Rediscovering a Life of Adventure , Alastair Humphreys
4. Mrs Everything, Jennifer Weiner
5. Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body, Roxanne Gay
6. The Salt Path, Raynor Winn

10. The Second Sleep, Robert Harris 11. Don’t Go There: From Chernobyl to North Korea—one man’s quest to lose himself and find everyone else in the world’s strangest places, Adam Fletcher 12. Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea, Barbara Demick 13. Punishment, Anne Holt 14. Ma’am Darling: 99 Glimpses of Princess Margaret, Craig Brown 15. Nine Perfect Strangers, Liane Moriaty 16. Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland, Patrick Radden Keefe 17. Mudlark: In Search of London's Past Along the River Thames, Lara Maiklem 18. Dark Fire, CJ Sansom 19. The People at NUmber 9, Felicity Everett 20. Conviction, Denise Mina 21. The Warden, Anthony Trollope 22. Your House Will Pay, Steph Cha 23. Stuffocation, James Wallman 24. Between the Stops: The View of My Life from the Top of the Number 12 Bus, Sandi Toksvig 25. Night Boat to Tangier, Kevin Barry 26. Sex Drive: On the Road to a Pleasure Revolution , STephanie Theobold 27. Queenie, Candace Carty-Williams 28. Slow Horses, Mick Herron 29. Dracula, Bram Stoker 30. Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout 31. Travellers in the Third Reich: The Rise of Fascism Through the Eyes of Everyday People, Julia Boyd 32. Private Papers, Margaret Forster 33. Uncanny Valley, Anna Wiener 34. Not that Kind of Girl, Lena Dunham 35. At Bertram's Hotel, Agatha Christie 36. No-one is Too Small to Make a Difference, Greta Thunberg 37. A Rising Man, Abir Mukherjee 38. The Diary of a Bookseller, Shaun Bythell 39. Heaven, My Home, Attica Locke 40. The Year of Living Danishly: My Twelve Months Unearthing the Secrets of the World's Happiest Country, Helen Russell 41. The Last Hours, Minette Walters 42. The Sustainable(ish) Living Guide: Everything You Need to Know to Make Small Changes That Make a Big Difference, Jen Gale 43. Frankenstein, Mary Shelley 44. Frankisstein: A Love Story, Jeanette Winterson 45. Girl, Woman, Other, Bernadine Evaristo 46. The Dutch House, Ann Patchett 47. Where is the Voice Coming From? Eudora Welty 48. Our Lady of Everything, Susan Finlay 49. The Bell, Iris Murdoch 50. Once Upon a River, Diane Setterfield 51. Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots, Deborah Feldman 52. The Leavers, Lisa Ko 53. The Street, Ann Petry 54. The Most Fun We Ever Had, Claire Lombardo 55. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens 56. The Western Wind, Samantha Harvey 57. Long Bright River, Liz Moore 58. White Fragility: Why it's so hard for white people to talk about racism, Robin DiAngelo 59. That Reminds Me, Derek Owusu 60. The Address Book, Diedre Mask 61. The Stranger Diaries, Elly Griffiths 62. My Dark Vanessa, Kate Elizabeth Russell 63. Swing Time, Zadie Smith 64. Sourdough, Robin Sloan 65. The Natural Health SErvice: What the Great Outdoors Can Do For Your Mind, Isabel Hardman 66. The Great Alone, Kristin Hannah 67. The Wych Elm, Tana French 68. Gillespie and I, Jane Harris 69. A Vast Conspiracy: The Real Story of the Sex Scandal That Nearly Brought Down a President, Jeffrey Toobin 70. Miss Austen, Gill Hornby 71. Afropean, Johnny Pitts 72. A Bit of a Stretch, Chris Atkins 73. Autumn Journal, Louis MacNiece 74. Trust Exercise, Susan Choi 75. Difficult Women, Helen Lewis 76. Missing, Presumed, Susie Steiner 77. The Weekend, Charlotte Wood 78. Brixton Hill, Lottie Moggach 79. Distress Signals, Catherine Ryan Howard 80. Because Internet, Gretchen McCulloch 81. American Pastoral, Philip Roth

82. English Monsters, James Scudamore

Max is a happy 10-year-old boy, dividing his time between his ex-pat parents and his farmer grandparents, who have him for weeks over the summer. His life changes when his upwardly-mobile father decides that he should be sent away to boarding school, where he finds intense friendships, violence and mindless cruelty. Set during the 80s (and incidentally, full of lovely snippets of contemporary culture - the music the boys listen to and the books and games that they love), this is a semi-autobiographical book which explores the many way that childhood abuse can affect us. It covers some similar ground to My Dark Vanessa but is much less graphic in its descriptions, and less lurid in most ways - more buttoned-up, more English (as the title suggests," Englishness" is a sub-theme which runs subtly through the book). Not an easy topic but I found this a really good read.

83. A Thousand Ships, Natalie Haynes

Much reviewed here, a re-telling of the Iliad, picking up and fleshing out the stories of the women. Readable and funny. I have only read short passages of the original so probably missed some good jokes - the ones which I did understand were cleverly done.

Currently reading Shuggie Bain and would recommend it.

167. The Seven Husbands Of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The premise of this reminded me very much of Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale in that similarly a young woman is brought in to write the biography of an aging enigmatic star with a secret.

The similarity between Vida Winter and Evelyn Hugo ends with the premise though, as TSHOEH is set in the Hollywood Glamour Era.

Though Taylor Jenkins Reid books aren't really "big literary titles" like say Mantel or Ali Smith, I loved this, total page turner absolutely drank it in in one gulp and I did the same with Daisy Jones and The Six - one sitting job.

Preferred this to Daisy as I thought the ending to Evelyn Hugo was beautifully done and the ending to Daisy is likely to be an ending I cite for the rest of my life as infuriating!

Spotted the twist here very quickly too.

But this is a lovely, easy read, strongly recommend.

@nowanearlyNicemum

I’d go for one of Kinsella’s standalone books. I quite enjoyed Twenties Girl and Can You Keep a Secret?

The first Shopaholic book was ok, but I found the main character increasingly and maddeningly annoying as the series progressed.

[quote StitchesInTime]@nowanearlyNicemum

I’d go for one of Kinsella’s standalone books. I quite enjoyed Twenties Girl and Can You Keep a Secret?

The first Shopaholic book was ok, but I found the main character increasingly and maddeningly annoying as the series progressed.[/quote]
I'd agree, I felt like I wanted to slap her across the face with a wet fish.

Remember Me and My Not So Perfect Life are also good stand alone Kinsella books. I also do like the Shopaholic series but I can see why others find the main character annoying! If you want to try the Shopaholic series start at the beginning with The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic which has also been published as Confessions of a Shopaholic.

@Indigosalt Amy Liptrot is from Orkney, not the Western Isles.

@Indigosalt I’ve discovered a new interest in travel writing during the lockdown, possibly due to the fact I haven’t left zone 2 since March.

Recommendations would be most welcome, I love travelling and am missing it massively. Looking at my holiday photos just isn't the same.

Perhaps we should have a sub-thread for sharing holiday photos.

Apologies and noted Count Fosco

Bett I would wholeheartedly recommend On the Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux. I really felt as if I 'd been on a grand tour of Mexico. One of my favourite non-fiction reads of the year.

Thank you Indigo, it's now on my wish list.

👆 One of mine too ( On the Plain of Snakes , I mean)