50 Book Challenge 2021 Part Two

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the second thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2021, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read. Could everyone embolden their titles and/or authors as well, please, as it makes the books talked about easier to track?

The first thread of the year is here.

Finally read Piranesi after ordering from the library. Had initially been excited to see another Susanna Clarke because I loved Jonathan Strange and have reread it twice - oddly a book I could get neither my Mum (a fan of historical fiction, she also enjoyed Patricia Wrede’s Sorcery & Cecilia) nor my brother (a big fantasy reader) to enjoy. Had a quick look in Waterstones and was unconvinced so got A Deadly Education and The Angel of The Crows instead. Anyway I should have trusted my first instinct- Piranesi is hard to define, part fantasy, part mystery but altogether enjoyable. There is something similar at times in the language but really the two books are not similar but both worth a read. May reread before I return as running low on lockdown books until I get a library click and collect.

Book 6: The Crow Trap by Ann Cleeves.

Took a while to get into but I enjoyed it by the end. I probably will read more Vera.

I liked Under the Dome until the end, which I thought was ridiculous - more ridiculous than almost anything he came up with when fuelled by drink and drugs.

I'm with you Remus, I tore through Under the Dome and really enjoyed it but the ending was just ultimate what the fuckery. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but holy shit it was just....I mean I'm sure someone out there could make an argument for it being a fitting ending and I'd love to hear it because it just...wow.

Just wow...indeed!

The Other Bennet Sister - can't remember the writer's name and can't be bothered to look it up

Very boring, very long. Full of stilted and unrealistic conversation, and clumsy sledge-hammering into it of lines from Austen. At half the length and with a better writer, it might have worked.

Essentially, it went like this:
boring girl becomes more boring because her mother is a self-absorbed and nasty bitch and her father is an idle cynic. Boring girl reads a lot of boring books and has some boring conversation s whilst the writer re -hashes most of the plot of Pride and Prejudice, giving a b it of a voice to the previously silent housekeeper in order to give boring girl occasional chances to speak. She has one new dress but feels she doesn't deserve it. Boring girl goes to stay with sister but is too boring to fit in. Boring girl goes to stay with friend, but friend has turned into a jealous witch. Boring girl goes to stay with aunt. She doesn't have any new dresses. Boring girl finally buys some new dresses and talks to a bit about Wordsworth. Boring girl has a few orgasms thinking about boring Wordsworth. Boring girl climbs a mountain and gets rained on, but not before achieving spiritual unity with nature. Boring girl falls out with boy and comes down the mountain. Boring girl is sad and lonely and then she isn't because apparently having orgasms over Wordsworth and buying a new dress is enough to win you a man, even though you are boring. The end.

Oh and speaking of boring, NLMG is in kindle deals! 😂😂

I just came on to mention Never Let Me Go in the daily deals!

Another in the daily deal is Past Caring by Robert Goddard - he’s one of my favourite authors. This is his debut and one of his best. This is one of his historical ones, set around the time of the Suffragettes. It’s a great mystery story and well worth 99p.

I enjoyed The Other Bennet Sister although I did think it was a bit too long. I also quite liked Longbourn although I agree that Death Comes To Pemberley was rubbish. I have never read. A Wide Sargasso Sea - I know it’s one of those I should read but for some reason the storyline has never really appealed.

24. Cook, Eat, Repeat: ingredients, Recipes and Stories by Nigella Lawson

I wouldn’t usually include a cookbook in this list as I would normally just flick through them, but this has so much writing in it you really do have to sit down and read it. I love the way Nigella writes about food and eating, even when she’s talking about something I don’t like!

25. Missee Lee by Arthur Ransome

Continuing my run through the Swallows and Amazons series, this is my least favourite so far. It’s meant to be a story written by the children, so it has them being captured by pirates in China. Miss Lee is one of the pirates - she was educated in England and for some inexplicable reason starts giving all the captives Latin lessons. Maybe Ransome felt that to children making up a story, extra Latin lessons would be one of the worst punishments they could think of! It is all a bit odd though. This book is also very much of its time, with very stereotypical views of the Chinese which makes uncomfortable reading now. Not sure this is one I’ll revisit (I hadn’t read it before).

11 The Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo.

Loved this! Pure escapism with a gritty edge. The conceit of powerful university alumni subtly controlling the world was spun further to include various forms of Magic, which is not always used wisely.
Reminded me of John Connolly’s Charlie Parker series in that it isn’t whimsical and that the presence of the Other is a secret closely guarded by the few. Also a hint of American Gods in there, with ancient magic adapted for modern ends. Liked the way the scholarly explanations of the Houses at the beginning of chapters are followed by diary excerpts showing a less high minded side of the students involved.

The year is young, but this is my favourite so far.

4. Eight Pieces of Silva by Patrice Lawrence YA novel from teen daughter's Christmas book pile. Main character, Beck, is 16-year-old girl. Her 18-year-old stepsister, Silva, goes missing when their parents are away on their honeymoon and Beck finds a box in her room with clues to a hidden part of Silva's life that helps her work out where she might be. Beck also starts a new relationship with a girl in her friendship group and gets back in touch with her biological dad, who's just out of prison. So there's a lot going on. I like YA, and this was a decent, but not brilliant, example of the genre.

The Heart's Invisible Furies would definitely have made my top 10 reads last year. I found it very moving and funny in places - I do enjoy an epic 'autobiography' though.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

Eine I like Matt Smith a lot.

The Other Bennet Sister has managed to make Collins into quite a sympathetic character. It's just a pity it's all so bloody boring.

Matt smith could act the part of a coat stand and I'd still like him instead of the centrepiece of the film.

I haven't caught up on the thread, will just post my latest and then go back and read the thread.

1. The Kind Worth Killing - Peter Swanson. Ted has just found out about his wife's infidelity when he meets Lily on a plane, they start chatting and he confides in her. They decide that his wife deserves to die, and Lily can provide an alibi for Ted as they have no prior connection. Enjoyable thriller.

13: Woman With Birthmark - Håkan Nesser, transl. Laurie Thompson

One of a series - very elegantly translated into English - featuring Detective Van Veeteren and set in the fictional town of Maardam (not explicitly the Netherlands although all the characters have Dutch names). A woman draws up a list of names and sets out to kill. Van Veeteren and his team - and the reader too - must try to work out what's happening with no clues to why these apparently random killings are taking place.

I rather enjoyed this slow-paced, thoughtful whodunnit, which has a deadpan charm. Nesser is Swedish and there's a hefty element of Scandi gloom in Van Veeteren, who spends much of time musing philosophically while gazing out at darkening skies, but it still manages to be quite funny despite the murders taking place. I've got a couple more in the series knocking about so I'll definitely read them at some point.

Matt Smith would be a brilliant coat stand. He'd flirt with all the ladies arriving, make droll remarks about people's coats and probably collapse, pissed, before the party ends.

1. The Evening and the Morning - Ken Follett

This is the prequel to Pillars of the Earth and if you've read any Follett you will know what you are getting. A sweeping historical epic where the goodies are really good and the baddies are really bad and all get their comeuppance for a happy ending. It is a doorstep of a book and I really enjoyed losing myself in the Middle Ages - Follett is good at bringing to life the daily lives of people, how they dressed, what they ate, where they lived. He is also good at a rollicking plot that carries you along, a skill that many historical epic authors struggle with. Not high art but a thoroughly enjoyable read.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

Matt Smith would be a brilliant coat stand. He'd flirt with all the ladies arriving, make droll remarks about people's coats and probably collapse, pissed, before the party ends.

Sounds perfect. Take care of the pitch to him will you please Remus, there's a dear!

I finished Book No. 3 'The Lighthouse Keeper's Daughter' by Hazel Gaynor. I really struggled to finish this book and almost gave up about three quarters of the way through. The last quarter was better - the pace picked up a bit and some loose ends were all tied up. The story shifts between the two main characters - Grace Darling and Matilda Emmerson. It also shifts between 1838 (Grace's story) and 1938 (Matilda's story). Everyone knows the story of Grace Darling and her heroic rescue. Matilda is a 19 year old Irish girl who is unmarried and pregnant. Her disapproving parents send her to stay with a relative (Harriet) - a lighthouse keeper in Newport, Rhode Island, until the baby is born and suitable arrangements can be made. The book starts off with Grace's famous rescue when a paddle steamer is shipwrecked off the coast of Northumberland. We gradually discover that there's a connection between Grace and Matilda which stems from that rescue.

I wasn't altogether convinced by the two main characters. Grace came across as rather dull and worthy. At the start of the book, Matilda was very hot headed and rebellious - I half expected her to sneak off to party with the third party passengers on the ship a la Rose in 'Titanic'. They just seemed a little one dimensional. I think I've been spoilt by the wonderful characterization of Agnes in 'Hamnet' - I did say it would be a hard act to follow.

There were some things I liked about the book. I found it fascinating just how famous Grace became when word of her rescue reached the newspapers. The newspaper readers couldn't get enough of her and artists were sent to the island to paint her portrait so people could see what she looked like. She received huge volumes of letters from the public. Some of the letter writers sent small tokens - books, bibles or silk handkerchiefs. Other people sent requests for a lock of her hair or a piece of fabric from the clothes she wore on the night of the rescue. She even received marriage proposals! Local fisherman ran boat trips to the island, offering passengers the tantalizing prospect of a glimpse of the heroine Grace Darling. The author depicts how Grace (a very private person) struggles with the fame and publicity. We also see how other people exploit Grace and try to profit from her fame.

There are some nice descriptive passages of the sea and skies and nature. I think I just found the setting of the book (particularly Grace's life on the lighthouse) a bit claustrophobic, given the confined lives we're all leading atm. Grace relishes the solitude and peace of the island and the lighthouse but I guess it's one thing if you choose that life and another thing if you have solitude and isolation imposed on you, as we're all experiencing right now. I do quite fancy a holiday in Rhode Island though .

One of the characters (Sarah) settles in Ireland after the shipwreck. As an Irish reader, I couldn't help wondering how Sarah and her family fared in the famine which started in 1845. I wonder if the author considered this at all? There's no mention of it in the book. A minor detail - just idle curiosity on my part.

I think I may have read this book at the wrong time (and too soon after 'Hamnet'). I think it's a book I may go back to in a few years and I may well enjoy it more then.

1. The Wind-up Bird Chronicle - Huraki Murakami

I thought I hadn't read this before, I continued to think so until I started to recognise the build up to the flaying scene. Oh God, the flaying scene! I was telling DH a few months ago about a flaying I'd once read described in horrible detail, I couldn't remember which book or the author. Now I know.

Toru Okada is a normal-seeming 30 year old man living in a normal-seeming suburb of Tokyo with his wife. Their cat goes missing, he starts looking for it in the back yard of a neighbouring vacant house and things just get stranger & stranger from then on. The wife disappears with no warning & in his search for her he encounters various troubling characters who help him learn to disassociate his mind from flesh using the uncomfortable method of sitting at the bottom of a dry well in complete darkness.

A very strange and uncomfortable book, but I enjoyed it. He got the cat back though

Finished book 3, Intuitive Eating, 4th Edition, by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch.

It is a non fiction text about dieting, or no dieting and they are very anti diet.

I was quite sceptical reading parts of it, and was picking it apart a little bit. I also thought, dieting would actually be a lot easier than this. Well, easier to understand at least! But, since reading it, I have noticed that parts of it have really stayed with me. For example, the perception of deprivation which cause you (well me) to overeat, when all you do is plan and think about what diet you are going to do next. Psychologically, if you're always thinking about depriving yourself, you will feel deprived even if you're eating as normal or too much and then you start said diet, which lasts a short time and then you eat the entire contents of your fridge when you fall off the wagon. Made a lot of sense to me. They aren't advocating eating loads of crap either. It is about learning about nutrition and treating your body with some respect. So, pretty good read, although not a page turner.

I have succumbed to the hype and have just started The Thursday Murder Club. So far, a nice, easy read. I love Midsomer Murders and think Midsomer Murders in a book, is a good description. Although, I think Midsomer Murders was a book too, but whatever.

@YolandiFuckinVisser as soon as I saw the title in bold I thought ‘oh no the flaying’. Can’t remember anything else now. I’ve gone off him these days I think.

I am on the library waitlist for Thursday Murder Club, quite intrigued now to see if I will like it!
10) On The Come Up by Angie Thomas. YA by the author of The Hate U Give, which I liked a lot. This was not as good- the narrating character (a 16 year old girl whose father, a rapper, died in a gang shooting and who raps herself) didn't seem fully realised to me; but I am not the target audience! I learnt a bit about rap though, and I will look forward to what she writes next.

3. Cotillion by Georgette Heyer

A reread of one of my favourite Heyer novels.

A rich and cantankerous old man declares that he will leave his fortune to his ward, Kitty, provided that she marries one of his great-nephews. When Kitty’s favourite, Jack, doesn’t turn up to make an offer for Kitty’s hand, Kitty talks one of the other great-nephews, Freddy, into a fake engagement so that Kitty can go see the sights of Regency London. Of course, things all start to get a bit more complicated once they get to London. All good fun.

4. Skitter by Ezekiel Boone

I’ll start off by saying that anyone with a phobia of spiders will probably want to avoid this book series.
Skitter is a sequel to The Hatching, which I read last year. In The Hatching, swarms of spiders all hatch at once and rampage around eating anyone in their path.

At the beginning of this sequel, the original spiders all seem to died off at once. So less action packed than the first book. There’s a lot of characters trying to figure out what’s going on - are the spiders gone for good (it’s clear very early on that the answer to this is no), how are they going to get rid of all the egg sacs that the spiders have left behind, what can they expect next from the spiders, should the President of the USA drop nuclear bombs on the worst affected areas and so on. There’s a few glimpses of the sinister deadly spiders, especially towards the end of the book, but for the most part the spiders themselves are in the background.

It mostly feels like a lengthy set up for the third book in the series. I’m anticipating a return to rampaging spiders eating anything and anyone they can in that.

11. 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World - Elif Shafak
< Trigger Warning child sexual abuse>

This book is wonderful, unusual, emotional, atmospheric, sad, and funny.

The protagonist is Tequila Leila, a murdered prostitute who wound up in Istanbul, her body abandoned in a wheelie bin. We follow Leila's life from child to adult through her memories in the last 10 minutes 38 seconds of her consciousness.

A lot of her life is hard and harrowing, set in Turkey of the 60's and beyond, a patriarchal society with no tolerance of people who are different to the cultural norm, and are suppressed, abused, and disregarded.

Leila's flees her small home town, where she is abused and seen as worthy only for the fact she is female and will marry and have children as soon as possible. She goes to Istanbul with hopes for a new future. Leila finds that new future, but not in any way she would have expected.

She meets 5 wonderful friends, also on the fringes of society due to being different. We hear of her life, although a prostitute, being rich and full, and the wonderful friendships she forges. The compassion, love, and humour between the small group is expressed by Elif Shafak so well, the atmosphere exudes from the pages.

The book is in 2 main parts, the first concentrating on Leila's 10 minutes 38 seconds of consciousness which introduces us to her and her friends. The 2nd half of the book concentrates on her friends lives, how they live and interact with each other, and most of all the love they have for Leila.

Part 3 is a happy, sad, funny and life affirming ending to this book. I have never read a book so different to any other. I enjoyed every bit of it and recommend it to anyone.

Tanaqui interesting the next one isn't great as I just came in here to add:

1. The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas. I'd bought this for Dd1 who's in Y6 but thought I'd better read it first to see if it was suitable. I think she's a couple of years to young for it based on swearing, sexual situations and violence, but thought it was a great book and would definitely encourage her to read it. She's been reading lots of dystopian fiction - Hunger Games, Divergent, Noughts & Crosses - but this is more shocking as it's based on reality.

This thread is moving so fast again, I'm pretty far behind! But here are my recent reads while they're still fresh in my mind, along with my imported mini-list. Have been doing a bit of comfort reading (kids' books) along with adult ones.

1. The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin 5/5
2. A Thousand Moons, Sebastian Barry 4/5

1. Over Sea, Under Stone, by Susan Cooper 3.5/5

The first in the Dark Is Rising series, which I’ve wanted to read for ages. I grew up in the U.S. so I didn’t read this series as a child, but so many of my UK friends have recommended it. Perhaps because of my high expectations, I wasn’t quite as wowed by it as I expected. I think it’s because I’m quite interested in Arthurian and Arthurian-inspired lit, and the Arthurian motifs in this story seem a bit bare-bones. There’s a grail, and there’s a cosmic battle between good and evil, but what’s specifically Arthurian about it? At the same time, the descriptions of the Cornwall village were wonderful, the kids are well-drawn, and the Merlinian uncle is fab. The suspense of the adults chasing after the children gives the story a breathless pace. And it’s amusing to see the scholars in the epilogue pontificating in geeky fashion about what the Grail really is. I’ll carry on with this series later in the year as I gather the Arthurian motifs become even stronger.

1. Mémoire de fille, by Annie Ernaux [A Girl’s Story, trans. by Alison Strayer] 5/5

This was wonderful. I’ve loved Ernaux since reading Les Années (The Years), and am determined to slowly work through everything she wrote (many of her books are short so it’s not such a demanding feat). I didn’t look at the English translation of this, but Strayer’s translation of The Years was brilliant, so I’m sure she did a good job of this one too. Ernaux recounts her first teenage sexual experience from her perspective in 2016, when she was in her 70s. I love the careful forensic analysis she brings to the analysis of her past self, and the compassion and lack of judgement she shows for her teenage double. I wish all of us could be so kind to our past selves.

1. Someday Angeline, by Louis Sachar. 4/5

I know Sachar as the author of Holes and of the very quirky stories of Wayside School. My 9-year-old recommended this book to me enthusiastically, and it was certainly worth the read. The story is told with Sachar’s trademark quirkiness, but it’s very gentle. Angeline is an 8-year-old genius who has skipped school grades, with disastrous social and psychological results. A geeky friend and an open-minded teacher help her feel comfortable in her own skin.

1. Magpie Lane, by Lucy Atkins. 4/5

I devoured this thriller set in Oxford. I’ve seen it positively reviewed on previous threads, and I agree it’s very well done. It gives a persuasive insider’s view of Oxford: how the colleges (especially the older, more prestigious colleges) are torn between wanting a slick newcomer as Master, to modernise the college profile and bring in money from donors, and also wanting a Master who will keep up all the old traditions and not shake things up at all. It’s also quite a moving picture of how clever, interesting people who live in Oxford but AREN’T part of the official University exist on the margins of academic life – it’s really hard to have intellectual aspirations when you live in a city where the university is so competitive and hierarchical. Finally, the novel was packed with local detail and gave me a strong urge to wander around Oxford churchyards.

9. Slade House - David Mitchell
Creepy and magical - I enjoyed in on the whole, but found the ending disappointing.

10. Raylan - Elmore Leonard
For anyone familiar with the TV series Justified, this is the third in Leonard's series featuring stetson-wearing, gun-slinging US Marshal Raylan Givens. My 'inner voice' had to read this with a southern twang to make the dialogue flow, but all-in-all a real treat.

11. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
A re-read for a reading challenge. A bit of a plod this time round, but still a worthy book that gave me all the feels.

12. The Binding - Bridget Collins
I loved the premise of this novel, and really enjoyed parts one and two, but part three was so disappointing. The denouement seemed so rushed, and I thought the characterisation in the final part of the book was really poor.

13. Force of Nature - Jane Harper
A second outing for Australian Federal Agent Aaron Falk. I really enjoy Jane Harper's ability to make such a huge expanse as the Australian outback feel so oppressive and claustrophobic. This was a a great psychological whodunnit.