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.

I've had Gideon the Ninth sitting by my bed for ages & not got past the first few pages Tanaqui - I gave it to dd for Christmas, & she liked it & suggested I might too. I'll have another go at it!

RazerstormUnicorn I love the idea of writing to your parents! Storing that one away for myself (my parents are alive but my dad is 84 and not in great health, who knows what lies ahead). I hope it brings you peace

42. Great Northern? by Arthur Ransome

Last in the Swallows and Amazons series and sadly one of the weaker ones. It does feature all three groups of children, the Swallows, Amazons and Ds, but the storyline isn’t the most interesting. They’re all on holiday in Scotland together with Captain Flint, when they find a rare bird nesting and then have to protect it from egg collectors. I’m glad I’ve listened to this series (did them all on Audible) - some I had read before but some were completely new and it’s been nice to lose myself in a more carefree time.

Ken Follett is a strange one (for me). In lots of ways the prose is really lumpen, the sex scenes are abysmal, there is a pattern in each Kingsbridge book- a dastardly Bishop, a beautiful rich noble girl (who has perky breats but usually gets raped by a stupid rich bloke) and a talented but poor boy who falls for the "princess." I find myself asking "why am I reading this sh*te?" but just keep turning the pages and reading on in a weird addicted way. (It was the same with his Century triology). It baffles me.

1. Beloved by Toni Morriston- I first read this about 15 years ago and understood very little really but was left with the atmosphere really. This time round I got alot more from the text and was a much more rewarding read. Definately will not be my last read of Beloved.

1. The sea, the sea by Iris Murdoch - enjoyed this alot more than I thought I would. A man (who's a dickhead really) sets up home by the sea where he bumps into an old childhood girlfriend. I found this quite funny but think I might be the only one who does.

1. The left hand of darkness by Ursula k. LE Guin - this isn't my usual thing at all, I thought it was OK but didn't make me want to suddenly read more scifi

1. Winter by Ali Smith - this has the plot of the a typical chick lit for the most part. A man gets dumped by his girlfriend just before Christmas. He doesn't want to turn up to his mums without her so pays a random woman to pretend to be his girlfriend. When they turn up his mums in abit of a state so invites her estranged sister.

I loved this, Ali Smith won't be for everyone but her writing combined with the above plot was a winner for me.

Agree the narrator in The Sea, The Sea is an arse. But I agree it is intended to be funny, it rather takes the piss out of all those 'old rich white man looks back on his life and first love' type books that always use to win the Booker.

I read The Sea, The Sea years ago but I am sure we are meant to consider him unreliable (and highly dodgy) narrator. His self delusion is quite an achievement in itself.

I hadn't thought about Winter as having a chick lit plot, BadSpella, but I see what you mean! I might read more chick lit if it contained threatening, anthropomorphised rocks, disembodied phantom heads and revenge blogging, though .

@Sadik, I found the first couple of chapters unengaging, and didn't get a clear sense of place, but once it got going I really liked it- parts are a little overlong maybe, but YA sf os sometimes a bit more "explainy" than adult sf, presumably because you can't assume so much contextual knowledge.

@highlandcoo thanks so much for recommending the World Book podcast, I wasn't aware of it and love Harriet Gilbert. I've never read Bill Bryson and want to after listening.

11 The School at the Chalet by Elinor M Brent Dyer

This kicks off with the most implausible scenario - 24 year old in need of funds decides to leave England, sell her furniture and open a school in Austria. Because...why wouldn't you? On the other hand, if Madge Bettany hadn't, we'd have been denied the joy of years of cream cakes like featherbeds, runaways coming to near grief on mountain tops in storms, terrible terrible plays that always sound as if they would reduce the audience to tears, and the extremely irritating Joey who really is only (in my view) endured by everyone around her through gritted teeth.

It is a much easier read than some of the later ones. Some of Brent-Dyer's more irritating tropes and turns of phrase aren't there - there seems to be less astonishment at seemingly innocuous statements (one of the things that really grates in the later books - someone says "oh, it's raining" and everyone falls about in amazement). Not great literature, but a diverting comfort re-read.

12 At Freddie's by Penelope Fitzgerald

Freddie runs a stage school in Covent Garden in the 1960s. It's seen better days but continues to supply child actors to West End productions, supported by a tiny team of underpaid and slightly underwhelming staff.

The child actors are precocious and the older actors are exactly as you'd expect. You can almost smell the greasepaint and the sense of division between the glamour of the front of house and the held-together-with-string backstage is really well done. I had a soft spot for it because the staging of King John is integral to the plot (and the very odd ending) and I probably know more about that Shakespeare play than any of his other ones, having studied it for A-Level and seen it staged an oddly large number of times given its obscurity.

I'm not 100% sure I'd recommend this. I'm still mulling it over. It was certainly different - not something I would usually pick up and I don't know how representative of Fitzgerald it is.

Bear Head is 99p today.

@Tanaqui I think that might have been me - I loved, loved, loved Gideon. Harrow the Ninth is equally brilliant but very different - and you have to not mind being massively confused for at least the first half of the book.

Having trouble reading anything at the moment. Can't commit. TBR as long as my arm as well. If I list possibles can someone point out a good un?

Go for it @EineReiseDurchDieZeit, I need something to try and keep busy.

20: Gone to Ground - Marie Jalowicz-Simon trans. Anthea Bell

Back to non-fiction for this. Marie Jalowicz was a pretty, lively, very well-educated twenty-something Jewish woman, born and brought up in Berlin. She lost her mother to cancer in 1938 and 3 years later Marie found herself suddenly alone when her father also died. For a while she was part of a forced labour unit in a factory but, realising that being 'sent to the east' would be a death sentence - and the inevitable next step as the Nazis implemented their horrific plans - she decided to simply drop out of circulation and disappear, without papers or ration cards. For the next four years she lived a life of incredible danger and privation, dodging from place to place in an increasingly war-torn city, sheltered by a succession of courageous anti-Nazis but - surprisingly - also encountering many ordinary Germans who knew or guessed her secret but didn't betray her.

It was hard to read this without being in a state of constant dread as Marie constantly came close to arrest or discovery - it's truly incredible that she managed to survive (starvation was a very real threat, let alone arrest and transportation to the camps), but she was blessed with extraordinary resilience and seemingly unquenchable spirit. The book came about only because, in later life, she agreed to record her wartime experiences for her son - who'd been unaware of exactly what had happened to her during the war. An inspiring and sobering book.

So this is a small percent of my unread paperback/hardback list :

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle
How To Be Both by Ali Smith
An Unsuitable Job For A Woman by PD James
The Clan Of The Cave Bear by Jean M Auel
The Loney by Andrew Micheal Hurley
Stuart : A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters
We, The Drowned by Carsten Jensen

Eine - I liked The Historian but I read it a very long time ago on a sun bed in Greece, which may have helped shape my enjoyment somewhat.

I was unimpressed by The Loney but my dp really liked it.

Not read the others.

I found The Loney a total waste of time. The Historian is good - I agree with Remus. Very atmospheric. It’s been years since I read it - would go back for another read for sure. I think I should like Ali Smith. But I don’t. Make of that what you will.

@PepeLePew

I ended up with this Ali Smith involuntarily

I have only read one which I HATED and swore she would never get a second chance

I read The Accidental but can't remember much about it and it didn't make me want to read any more of hers.

The only one of your list that I've read is How to be Both which I got in a library lucky-dip (literally, you took a ticket & they gave you a book to read). I don't generally read litfic, 'shortlisted for the booker' makes me put something straight back on the shelf, but I really enjoyed it.

[quote ritzbiscuits]@highlandcoo thanks so much for recommending the World Book podcast, I wasn't aware of it and love Harriet Gilbert. I've never read Bill Bryson and want to after listening. [/quote]
I'm glad you enjoyed it ritz and now you have hundreds to catch up on

As I have extra free time in lockdown, I thought I might start reading the WBC books in advance and, if I can get my brain in gear, post a question for future episodes.

I'm a big HG fan. Her presenting style is a great mix of intelligence and humour.

Eine I agree that The Loney was a very indifferent read. I kept waiting for the plot to develop .. and then it ended.

I also have The Historian and How To Be Both on my TBR pile. Just this afternoon I was listening to Ali Smith in conversation with Nihal Arthanayake who was full of praise for the book. (Mind you, Nihal is fairly fawning over most of his guests IMO). I really liked what she had to say, and it did make me wonder about getting HTBB off the shelf and giving it a go.

Otherwise, from your list I have only read the PD James and I remember it being absolutely fine as a detective novel, although it was a long time ago.

Another vote for The Historian. I read it ages ago but I remember it was a fun read. I think it would be good if you just need to rattle through something to get back into the groove.