50 Book Challenge 2021 Part Three

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the third 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 and the second one here.

Thanks for the new thread!

Thanks for the new thread South.

Place marking and bringing my titchy list over:

1. The Trouble with Peace – Joe Abercrombie
2. How to Break Up With Your Phone: The 30-Day Plan to Take Back Your Life – Catherine Price
3. Tea By The Nursery Fire: A Children's Nanny at the Turn of the Century – Noel Streatfield

The dreaded list (thanks southeast )

1. Schindler’s List by Thomas Keneally 2. Behind The Scenes At The Museum by Kate Atkinson 3. Thinking About It Only Makes It Worse by David Mitchell 4. The Duke and I by Julia Quinn 5. Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner 6. Dishonesty Is The Second Best Policy by David Mitchell 7. Annie Dunne by Sebastian Barry 8. Aquarium by David Vann 9. The Enchantment Of Lily Dahl by Siri Hustvedt 10. La’s Orchestra Saves The World by Alexander McCall Smith 11. Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh 12. Tangerine by Christine Mangan 13. Five Rivers Met On A Wooded Plain by Barney Norris 14. The Inheritors by William Golding 15. Around The World In Eighty Days by Jules Verne 16. The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell 17. Falling Angels by Tracy Chevalier 18. A History Of Britain Vol 1 : 3000 BC-1605 AD by Simon Schama 19. Arthur and George by Julian Barnes 20. Dinner With Edward by Isabel Vincent

Currently reading The Woman In White by Wilkie Collins

@JaninaDuszejko thanks for your Brazzaville Beach recommendation - it is one of the ones I've already got and others have said it's good too. I read in purchase order and am trying to intersperse with my hard copy books at the moment so it may be a while til I get to it, but I can look forward to it now!

Thanks for the new thread @southeastdweller!

Bringing my list over:

1. In the Shadow of Power – Viveca Sten
2. Our Endless Numbered Days - Claire Fuller
3. The Truants - Kate Weinberg
4. Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Strout
5. Olive, Again – Elizabeth Strout
6. The Winter Book – Tove Jansson
7. Waiting for Sunrise – William Boyd

Thanks, *south, for the new thread. 😊

ritzbiscuits, I also love The Neopolitan Novels and can see myself re-reading them in the future.

My books so far:

1. Fates and Furies by Lauren Geoff.
2. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo.
3. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke.

4. Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe.

1. The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne.
2. The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante.

7. To Throw Away Unopened by Viv Albertine. 8. Other Minds: The Octopus and the Evolution of Intelligent Life by Peter Godfrey-Smith.

Other Minds is a fascinating look at evolutionary biology and philosophy with the central question of trying to find the evolutionary origins of subjective experiences. I never realised that octopuses were such intriguing creatures and now I’ve been Googling and watching YouTube videos about them, sharing all with my DH and DSs. Absolutely fascinating.

Agreed BookShark. It’s hard not to get competitive with yourself over book numbers. I think some of us have stopped counting altogether and feel better for it. I am toying with tackling Anna Karenina but it will probably take me an entire month!

Book 8 Dark Fire by C J Sansom another 're read now onto Sovereign

Thank you Southeast

1. Born Lippy: How to do female, Jo Brand.
2. How to be a woman, Caitlin Moran.
3. Love will tear us apart, Holly Seddon.
4. I looked away, Jane Corry.
5. Deliver Me, Karen Cole
6. Now you see her, Heidi Perks
7. Break In, Dick Francis
8. Bill Bailey's Remarkable Guide to Happiness
9. What she saw, Wendy Clarke

10. Away with the Penguins, Hazel Prior 11. Ellie and the harpmaker, Hazel Prior. 2/5 12. The silent ones, KL Slater 4/5

Thank you so much @southeastdwelller

1. The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides
2. The Diving Bell by Jean-Dominique Bauby
3. Kitchen Confidential Anthony Bourdain
4. Wundersmith by Jessica Townsend

I’m finding very little tim for reading with my new job starting at the same time as home schooling. Enjoying all the discussions though and have snapped up The Mermaid of Black Conch after @headnorth’s review.

Thank you for new thread @southeastdweller
Here's my list:

1. Christmas Chronicles Nigel Slater (he gets a bold despite being a bit precious
2. Merry Midwinter by some dreadful woman that shouldn't have. Can't remember her name, not going to look it up, Gillian something
3. Twas the Nightshift before Christmas- Adam I'm not as funny as I think and a misogynist twat to boot Kaye
4. Bridget Jones' Diary
5. Rupture- Ragnar Jonasson
6. Murder Mile Lynda La Plante
7. Bone China Laura Purcell
8. No-one is too small to make a difference- Greta Thunberg

DNF- Whiteout Ken Follett. I am putting this here so none of you have to read about wet women (literally wet) when they look into the eyes of old rich blokes.

Thanks for the new thread @southeastdweller

List as below.

1. The Three Mrs Wrights - Linda Keir

2.Holly's Christmas Countdown - Suzie Tullett 3.Butterfly Kisses - Patrick Logan 4.The Push - Ashley Audrain

1. The Last Thing To Burn - Will Dean

6.The Silent Treatment - Abbie Greaves 7.How to Disappear - Gillian McAllister

Really only one stand out book so far. Currently reading Contacts - Mark Watson.

1. Doctor Frigo by Eric Ambler

This was OK but not exceptional. The author wants to be Frederick Forsyth but just isn't as good a story teller.

A doctor who is exiled from his South American country for decades after his politician father was assassinated, reluctantly finds himself embroiled in the plans for a coup d'état to get rid of his country's government.

The story was interesting enough and I did find the characters and their angling for power quite engaging if not chillingly realistic, but the book was so mind-numbingly slow that I hesitate to recommend it here.

And bringing my list over:

1. The Atrocity Exhibition (Laundry Files #1) by Charles Stross
2. Transfer of Power (Mitch Rapp #1) by Vince Flynn
3. Anna Magdalena Bach. Fanny Hensel. Clara Schumann - Three Female Musicians in the Spotlight
4. Circe by Madeline Miller
5. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Thanks for the new thread. Can’t believe how many people have read already!
Here’s my list

1. Career of Evil - Robert Galbraith
2. What Lies Between Us - John Marrs
3. Who Killed Ruby - Camilla Way
4. The Casual Vacancy- JK Rowling
5. In an Instant - Suzanne Redfearn
6. Girl A - Abigail Dean

Girl A seemed to be quite hyped. It’s told from the point of view of an adult survivor of childhood abuse - who managed to escape “The house of horrors”.

On paper, this is my type of book, but I found I couldn’t massively connect with the story. The timeline jumps from present day - where Girl A is now an adult and her mother has just died in prison - back to the reveal of what happened in the childhood - and it felt a bit confused at times.

Themes seemed to come out but go nowhere. That said - I read it fairly quickly - and would maybe say about a 3.5 out of 5 for me.

Thanks for the new thread! Here's my list:

1. Virginia Woolf - Hermione Lee
2. A Whole Life - Robert Seethaler
3. My Wild and Sleepless Nights - Clover Stroud
4. Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me - Kate Clanchy
5. Other Minds: The Octopus and the Evolution of Intelligent Life - Peter Godfrey-Smith
6. Somebody I Used to Know - Wendy Mitchell
7. Such A Fun Age - Kiley Reid
8. The Kind Worth Killing - Peter Swanson
9. Three Hours - Rosamund Lupton

Thanks for the new thread Southeast List below - much more fiction than is normal for me so far this year. I keep not buying books because I've got lots of purchases of my dad's on my kindle library, but none of them are quite what I want to read. Time for some book buying of my own I think!

1 Patrick Hennessey: The Junior Officers Reading Club
2 Martha Wells: Rogue Protocol
3 Martha Wells: Exit Strategy
4 Nella Larsen: Passing
5 VE Schwab: The Invisible Life of Addie la Rue
6 Matthew Kneale: Pilgrims
7 Susanna Clarke: Piranesi
8 Jon Gower : The Story of Wales
9 Ben Aaronovitch: Tales from the Folly
10 Norman Collins: London Belongs to Me
11 Compton Mackenzie: Figure of Eight

Oh me of little faith, I said on the last thread I wouldn't finish Book Three by the end of January and I just have! Nothing like a goal to spur one on.

I have no idea why it took me so long to get round to reading Small Island because it is exactly the type of book I love. It has been languishing , unloved, on a shelf, browning and curling at the edges, for at least 10 years. It would appear I got as far as Chapter Seven the first time I tried reading it and then I gave up.

Silly me. It's a fabulous book : I love the different voices Levy creates : I could genuinely hear each character in my head : even Queenie's Lincolnshire accent earlier in the book.

It's an interesting exploration of black (and white) experiences of war and Windrush. And just a charming book.

I was pondering whether DS (aged 16 ) would like it as he studies history and,as ever, at schol this period is overlooked in terms of black experience (although he does study the 1940s and 50s and also does sociology) but I am not sure about handing a book over with those sex scenes in it...The rest I am fine with!

Thanks for the new thread. Just marking place.

Thanks for the new thread @southeastdweller. It's going so quickly still! & Great review of The Mermaid of the Black Conch on the last thread @headnorth. Sounds really good.

Bringing over my list.

1. Ramble Book - Adam Buxton
2. The Darkness - Ragnar Jonasson
3. Burnt Sugar - Avni Doshi
4. Fleishman is in Trouble - Taffy Brodesser Anker
5. The Raven Tower - Ann Leckie
6. Feersum Endjinn - Iain M Banks
7. The City of Brass - S A Chakraborty
8. Inversions - Iain M Banks
9. The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas

10. Look to Windward - Iain M Banks

Thank you @southeastdweller, just peacemaking! (That was my auto correct from placemarking, hope it doesn't mean a bun fight is on the way!).

Thanks for the new thread Southeast, can’t believe we’ve started thread three before the end of January!

30. The Country Life by Rachel Cusk

This reminded me of Cold Comfort Farm. Stella goes to become a sort of au pair for the odd Madden family at their farm in Sussex. Not much really happens, but this is written in the style of those overwrought 18thc novels where even the most mundane events are viewed with huge significance. It’s not laugh out loud funny, but the amusement comes from the satire of this type of novel. I’ve never read any books by Cusk before but will probably look out another.

31. Seven Days Of Us by Francesca Hornak

This was written before the pandemic. A family has to spend a week quarantining together after the eldest daughter returns from Liberia where she’s been helping treat sufferers of the fictional Haag virus (presumably based on Ebola). Given the current situation this should have resonated but the quarantining thing was never really brought out - it was just a family spending Christmas together and discovering each others’ secrets. Ok as a quick read though.

Agree with previous posters’ comments about the numbers - mine are high but most of the books I’ve read have been quite short. I’m trying to clear down my kindle which is full of 99p psychological thrillers so while my quantity is currently quite high the quality is less so!

Thanks for the new thread @southeastdweller

Here is my current list:

1. Eleanor the Secret Queen: The Woman Who put Richard III on the Throne by John Ashdown-Hill
2. 52 Times Britain was a Bellend: The History You Didn’t Get Taught At School by James Felton
3. A Double Life by Flynn Berry
4. The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule
5. Tall Tales and Wee Stories: The Best of Billy Connolly by Billy Connolly
6. A Million Dreams by Dani Atkins
7. The Never Game by Jeffery Deaver

8. Misery by Stephen King

1. The Crooked House by Agatha Christie

10. Pied Piper by Nevil Shute 11. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 12. Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell 13. The Stubborn Lives of Hart Tanner by Shawn Inmon

I'm currently reading The Tommyknockers by Stephen King in book form, A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth and listening to Becoming by Michelle Obama so I think it will be a while before I'm back with any reviews! Got to say I'm really enjoying reading a lot more this year, not sure why but even the books i don't like don't seem to be much of a slog.

Thanks for new thread southeast can't believe how many books people have read so far.

1. Little Fires Everywhere - Celeste Ng

Read this after enjoying the Prime TV series. I enjoyed the book but think this was one of the very rare occasions where I actually preferred the changes they had made in the TV series. Would recommend both the series and book to anyone who hasn't come across them yet.

4.Lord Edgware Dies by Agatha Christie
One of the few Agatha Christie books that I haven't read before. I think I must have seen a TV adaptation of this one though as I thought the solution was blatantly obvious from the very start - so obvious that I was expecting there to be a big twist.

Reading another Agatha Christie now...

Bringing over my latest list:

1. All at Sea - Decca Aitkenhead
2. The Black Flamingo - Dean Atta
3. The Move - Felicity Everett
4. Apple of My Eye - Helene Hanff

I think next up is the Gabriel Byrne memoir that was raved about by a few of you towards the end of last year.

Thank you southeast.
Read so far:
1. The Girl With The Louding Voice by Abi Daré
2. One Two Three Four: The Beatles in Time by Craig Brown
3. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
4. My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell
5. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
And now:

1. The Last Thing To Burn by Will Dean. This was brought to my attention by a PP, its expensive on Kindle so I used an Audible credit to listen to it instead.

The idea that people may be treated like slaves in this country has probably only entered my consciousness in the last five years or so, and this book did make me think about the many people who are living miserable lives in the U.K. in fear of deportation, (or maybe praying for it) in hock to traffickers, without papers, rights and agency. It's a claustrophobic thriller that looks at human trafficking and modern slavery from the POV of a Vietnamese woman who has been smuggled into England in a shipping container and then enslaved on a Norfolk farm by a psychopath. It's been compared to Room (with a smidgeon of Misery thrown in) which should give you an idea if it will be your bag or not, definitely a pot boiler but it moved along at a lick and kept my interest. There was a point late on that made me roll my eyes 🙄 obviously done to drive a plot development but the equivalent of the teenagers deciding to split up and explore the haunted house!

Thanks for the new thread southeast.

Bringing my list over:

1. Sweet Pea by C J Skuse
2. Dracul by Dacre Stoker and J. D. Barker
3. Cotillion by Georgette Heyer
4. Skitter by Ezekiel Boone
5. Dragonquest by Anne McCaffrey

Thanks, South. I'm reading The Shift by Sam Baker. I used to really like her/Red magazine, but this, like magazines, is very repetitive and a bit of a one trick pony. I liked the beginning of it, but now I'm bored.