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.

@LadybirdDaphne, where are you moving from and to? I hope it all goes smoothly for you!

Re Elizabeth George, I read some of them years ago, and I agree, that although the plots are sometimes good, and the writing isn't bad; they are not convicing as golden age type detective fiction (which is, imo, what they are trying to be a version of), or as modern (for the time) Britain, and eventually that annoyed me too much to keep reading.

Tanaqui - from the UK to New Zealand. Our COVID tests have all come through negative now, so fingers crossed we will get there... Flight is scheduled for tomorrow evening.

14. Find Your Voice - Caroline Goyder
My reading might be a bit self-help heavy because of where my life is at the moment, and I won’t review them at length, just include them on my lists. This was a very useful guide from a voice coach on using techniques from the acting world to improve your public speaking. The main take away for me was to translate many of the same techniques I already know from choral singing to workplace speaking.

Morning from the Slow Readers' Club.

6. Robert Harris The Second Sleep
Father Christopher Fairfax is a newly-ordained priest in the West of England, in a highly religious and technologically void time. He is sent out on horseback by the Bishop to a small village to conduct the funeral of the vicar there. Suspicion arises as to whether the vicar’s death was accidental as first appeared. In the vicar’s home he uncovers forbidden documents and artifacts relating to distant history, including hand-held devices used to communicate, marked out with their bitten apple insignia. Father Fairfax uncovers details of the apocalyptic event that created such huge societal change, all the time trying to evade being discovered by the Bishop.

This was fine, but not as good as Munich or Conclave from the same author. I loved the reveal (very early on, so I don’t think it counts as a spoiler), that we’re not in fact in a pre-industrial society, but many years in the future, and the world created was believable all the more unsettling for it. The idea of how reliant we are on technology and how quickly society would unravel if we were somehow cut off from it is worryingly plausible. However like PermanentTempory who reviewed this recently, I found tension built beautifully, as you’d expect with Harris, but fizzled out rather at the end, which was pretty unsatisfactory.

12. Goodnight Mr Tom - Michelle Magorian I first read this when I was 12, it's sustained many re-reads in 35 years! I bought a new copy because my old one fell apart so decided it was time to read again. Beautiful, powerful story about an abused child evacuated to the country to live with an insular old man, dealing with the relationship between the two damaged characters and how they help each other learn to live with joy and love while World War 2 plays out, distant from their rural idyll but not without profound effects on their lives.

Good luck with the move, Ladybird.

I am jealous Ladybird

17. The Official History of Britain - Boris Starling & David Bradbury

Rather disappointing. Based on censuses and other information held by the ONS, but just a random selection of statistics, most of which are already well-known, and written in a ‘light-hearted’ style that got on my nerves.

Well done, Desdemona, and good luck, Ladybird!

Longlist for Walter Scott Prize out:

www.walterscottprize.co.uk/2021-walter-scott-prize-longlist-revealed/

I like the sound of a lot of these.

Good luck with your move Ladybird

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell I imagine there have been many discussions of this already but just to say I was totally immersed from start to finish. Best book I've read so far this year - wonderful.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit

I am jealous Ladybird

Me too, I'd give my right arm to be back there.

Thanks everyone, will keep you posted!

Place marking - still battling the worms and mosquitos.

1. Quantum Theory - A Graphic Guide by J P McEvoy & Oscar Zarate

This was better and more brainhurty than I thought it would be, judging by its graphic novel esthetic and the cute cat on its cover.

I have read and reviewed quite a few books about Quantum Physics and its notable physicists over the years, such as Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You and The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life Of Paul Dirac, Quantum Genius, so this is not my first foray into the bizarre world of Quantum Physics. I picked this book up, thinking it would just refresh my memory about the basics, but I ended up learning a lot about the details of QP and the equations that have shaped our understanding of reality.

Recommended to those who are interested in QP.

My short list

1. Midwinter Murder by Agatha Christie
2. Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman
3. The Familiars by Stacey Halls
4. Three Hours by Rosalind Lipton

1. Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz. I bought this when it was on a 99p Kindle deal a while ago and my resolution this year has been to get round to reading some of these 99p books. It's a strange book this, with a novel within a novel, the concept being that we are reading along with a literary editor as she pores over a new manuscript from her star author. The novel in question is a pastiche of a Christie/Poirot story and is rather enjoyable in a ' I can imagine this being serialised on a Sunday night' sort of way: in fact I'm afraid I enjoyed it rather more than the modern day story woven around it which seemed slightly ridiculous. Worth 99p? Definitely. Worth more? Probably not.

1. Seven Brief Lessons on Physics by Carlo Rovelli. I can't remember who recommended this when it was a 99p special ?Pepe? but thank you, I've enjoyed broadening my horizons with this. I love the author's enthusiasm for his subject- I imagine he would be a terrific lecturer and have gained a tiny insight into a world I left behind after secondary school. Although I always did well at physics I never really understood it and sadly nothing has changed.

Now half way through Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld.

@LadybirdDaphne

Thanks everyone, will keep you posted!

Which region are you moving to?

52. Spanish Steps by Tim Moore

This should have been right up my street - amusing travel memoir - but for some reason I just couldn’t get into this. The author walks the Camino trail in Spain accompanied by a donkey. I didn’t find the trail itself that interesting and after a while ‘donkey refuses to move’ stopped being a novelty.

53. Bodie On The Road by Belinda Jones

A travel memoir I did enjoy! The author drives up the Pacific Coast Highway with her rescue dog. It was a bit too doggy for me but I like American travelogues so I enjoyed that element of it.

54. The Growing Pains Of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend

Just as funny as the first one.

55. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

I loved the concept of this - on the cusp of death you end up in a library where you can experience all the possible lives you could have lived - and mostly I enjoyed what Haig did with the idea, but I did feel the moral point (appreciate the life you have) was a bit heavy handed at times.

56. The Girl I Used To Be by Mary Torjussen

On a night away with work Gemma gets a bit drunk and can’t remember what happens. A month later someone starts sending her photos of that night and threatening her. It was only after if I finished reading this and went to update Goodreads that I discovered I had read it before, in December 2018. I remembered nothing about it at all apart from a vague feeling that I had read a similar storyline before. None of the details rang any bells though. I have been known to start a book and then realise I’ve read it before but I think this is the first time I’ve got all the way through without realising I’ve read it before. That probably reflects that I read a lot of very similar themed books!

Moving away from that type, I’m now reading Miss Benson’s Beetle which I’m enjoying.

Bon voyage Daphne, hope all goes smoothly with the move.

I've got a few to update, but they've either been discussed recently or are several into a series, so I've not got masses to say about them.

24. The Mystery of Mrs Christie - Marie Benedict
    In 1926 Agatha Christie went missing for 11 days, her car found abandoned at the edge of a flooded quarry. When found she was diagnosed with amnesia and she never spoke about what happened. MB writes a fictionalisation of what she thought happened during the time and the reasons why she went missing. I enjoyed this, but I'm also a little unsure about using someone's life like this, although I don't know enough about AC to know how realistic it is.

25. The Warden - Anthony Trollope
    First of the Barsetshire Chronicles.
    The Warden of a church hospital is drawn into a financial dispute over a will that brings disapproval from those around him. While not his fault or of his doing, he agonises about how best to resolve the issue.

This felt incredibly dry at the start and I wasn't sure whether to carry on, but it was marvellous over all. A fascinating look at human nature and society, proving that people fundamentally remain the same regardless of the age they live in.

26. *The Troubadour's Tale (Oxford Medieval #5) - Ann Swinfen
    Very entertaining medieval mystery series although somewhat far fetched. I bloody love these. Only one left though :(

27. The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole - Sue Townsend
    I never read these at the time, despite being of an age for them to be popular. They really didn't appeal. It was mildly amusing, but without any nostalgia I'm not sure I'd bother with the rest.

28. Flowers for Algernon - Daniel Keyes
    Discussed recently upthread. This absolutely broke my heart.

29. *Semper Fidelis (Ruso #5) - Ruth Downie
    Crap Roman mystery series about an army doctor blundering around Roman Britain and falling into scrapes. These are dreadful but make very easy reading and are good for a bit of mindless entertainment.

30 will be The Thirteenth Tale - Diane Setterfield. I'm 50% in and willing it to end.

We’re moving to Otago bett, my DP is from there and I’ve been lucky enough to get residency based on our relationship, our DD also has citizenship. We were always planning to leave at this time so that DD can start school there, but now it of course has the bittersweet benefit of being a place you can live a fairly normal life (bittersweet because I haven’t been able to spend any time with my UK family before we go).

1. Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë

I last read this 20 years ago, and had forgotten how thoroughly unpleasant Heathcliff and Cathy are. I think there was a debate on the first thread about whether you need to like the characters to enjoy a book - this one proves to me that you don't, as long as they are sufficiently interesting. I'd also forgotten that it's told as a story within a story, which seems a bit unnecessary to me, but I suppose that adds the whole "unreliable narrator" aspect - but I've left my English A-level days long behind me so won't try and dissect that thought any further! I wouldn't go as far as saying that I loved this, as it's just all a bit too dark and oppressive, but I have no regrets about reading it.

My book is actually a 3 in 1 Brontë sisters collection, so Jane Eyre is coming up next - once I've got my book club read out the way first. Well be interesting to see how different the writing styles are (or not) between the three sisters.

Books 2021

1. The Midnight Library (reviewed January 2021)
2. Aspire to Die (MS Morris Oxford Murder Mystery)
3. Do no Evil (MS Morris Oxford Murder Mystery)
4. In Love and Murder (MS Morris Oxford Murder Mystery)
5. Killing by Numbers (MS Morris Oxford Murder Mystery)
6. A Darkly Shining Star (MS Morris Oxford Murder Mystery)

I reviewed all of the above in January.

7. The Mermaids Singing (Val mcDiarmid)
8. The distant Echo (Val McDiarmid)
9. The Wire in the Blood (Val McDiarmid)
10. The last Temptation (Val McDiarmid)

I enjoyed the first three books but by the fourth I was hoping the criminals would go free – is that a sign that I no longer like the main protagonists? The move to Berlin was not well conceived and I felt that it was like a series where the cast leave their normal place of residence for a “holiday special” – it never works out well. So I have abandoned Tony Hill – which is a shame as I love psychological thrillers. Perhaps it is because criminal profiling has moved on so much and these books seem stuck in time?

11. Man’s Search for Meaning Victor Frankl
    Reviewed in early February

12. The Vanishing Half – Brit Bennett

A story about 2 sisters in the American South spanning the years 1950’s, 60’s 70’s and 80’s. The language is beautiful and I was transported to a time and place I was unfamiliar with. It is a story about family and three generations of one family. I thoroughly enjoyed the first half of the story and was engrossed in it. I lost my enthusiasm in the story of the third generation of the family – self absorbed teenagers. It really was a story of 2 halves. But I stuck with it. The ending was closer to the dreamy language of the beginning and I found it satisfying.

13. The Appeal

This book was recommended by India Knight in the Sunday Times Style on Sunday and I downloaded it immediately. Oh, it was a joy. I couldn’t bear to put it down. I loved, loved, loved it. Thoroughly modern take on the crime drama genre. It was a superb page turner.

And now, I get to enjoy the latest Ruth Galloway mystery (no.13 in the series) – I just downloaded it, but I have decided to wait until the weekend when I can read it in peace, perhaps a lie-in with a book and a nice cuppa on Saturday? There is nothing to match the anticipation of a good new book.

I have also commenced Falconer and Girl A – so I might get one of these finished before the weekend.

Good luck with the move Ladybird, like many others I'm very jealous!
*
15. Fever of the Bone by Val McDermid*

This is book 6 in the Wire in the Blood series. I found the subject matter a bit difficult as it involves the deaths of children and I guessed the ending about halfway through the book. That said I like the characters and it was nice to read a brief book between Tommyknockers and book 16...

*16. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth
*
Well I FINALLY finished this and it was a beast! It was so sprawling and epic I'm not even sure where to begin to review. I guess this is as much the story of India, only a couple of years after independence, as it is the story of the search for a 'suitable boy' for Lata Mehra. The good: So many vivid and engaging characters (I just adored Mrs Rupa Mehra), lots of detail of the early years of India and stories focusing on tragedies, joyful occasions, poverty, family, class, caste, religion, politics and love. I particularly enjoyed the description of the religious festivals (so very many religious festivals!) and the relationships between Muslims and Hindus and the impact of the Partition that still lingered. I also really liked the ending and the choice Lata makes, it seemed very in keeping with her character to me. The bad: it was just too long, this still could have retained everything that was good about it and still had a few chapters cut out. That said it was funny, sad, shocking, touching and pretty much any other emotion - I loved it.

@LadybirdDaphne

We’re moving to Otago bett, my DP is from there and I’ve been lucky enough to get residency based on our relationship, our DD also has citizenship. We were always planning to leave at this time so that DD can start school there, but now it of course has the bittersweet benefit of being a place you can live a fairly normal life (bittersweet because I haven’t been able to spend any time with my UK family before we go).

I'm not at all envious Canterbury is my bit but Otago is also lovely as you know. Sorry you've not seen your Uk family though

Canterbury is gorgeous

26. The Sandman by Neil Gaiman (Audible)

Technically only Vol 1-3 of the Graphic Novel Series and more to come.

All star dramatisation. (James McAvoy, Kat Dennings, Riz Ahmed, Arthur Darvill, Taron Egerton)

The titular Sandman (also Morpheus and Dream) is imprisoned for 2 lifetimes by a British occultist. Following his escape he tries to rectify the damage done by his absence to the World Of Dream. His sister Death, also gets some chapters.

It's very much non linear vignette, puzzle piece storytelling, which isn't for everyone, but the only drawback to the Audible is that it yells : THE SANDMAAANN accompanied by dramatic music every chapter

It's BRILLIANT though, very well done. Very dark in places, and with such a disregard for PEOPLE'S FEELINGS that it would suit Cote

Would recommend it to ANY of you with an Audible credit, it's such a good listen. Can't wait for Vol. 2