50 Book Challenge 2021 Part Four

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fourth 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, the second one here and the third one here.

Thank you @SOLINVICTUS! Unfortunately my review was clumsily done, it’s Tony Parker’s Lighthouse I was raving about, I haven’t got hold of Lamplighters yet!

Lamplighters has been on my Wishlist for a while, but it's £££.

I don’t know if it’s covered in The Golden Thread as it’s lurking as yet unread on my kindle but I found this BBC article on a lost muslin absolutely fascinating Dhaka Muslin

Hi Cornish, welcome!

Welcome Cornish! I love Sara Paretsky and have been reading her for (gulp) decades - there was a spell where everything was a bit formulaic but her last few have been a welcome return to form. I also love how she's handled VI getting older.

Apologies in advance for the threadjack, but I know a lot of 50-bookers have lost someone over the last year, and I found this article in the Guardian expressed something I've been really struggling to articulate. It's hard to read but I found it so valuable. I hope it's helpful to some: www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/27/i-have-grieved-in-a-hidden-limbo-losing-a-loved-one-in-covid-first-wave

8. Paris Echo – Sebastian Faulks This held so much promise for me; the story takes place in Paris, flitting between the present day and the German occupation of WWII. I thought that the unlikely mix of characters worked really well. Tariq, a young lad escaping boredom in Morocco arrives in Paris to find out more about his dead mother’s past and by a chance encounter is taken in by Hannah, an American academic, herself freshly arrived in the city but with more scholarly objectives. The storyline was good but something about the voices didn’t ring true for me at times, whether it was the two main protagonists or Julian the British academic or indeed any of the women Hannah was researching for her work to shed light on the life of ‘ordinary Parisiennes’ during la deuxième guerre mondiale.

@Cornishblues

Thank you *@SOLINVICTUS! Unfortunately my review was clumsily done, it’s Tony Parker’s Lighthouse* I was raving about, I haven’t got hold of Lamplighters yet!

That's what I meant my mistake! Blame Mumsnetting while on the verge of falling asleep!

I agree that what makes a good book is more complex than its literature credentials - I have had far more joy from Heyer and Francis than from most Booker prizewinners, or from the more self consciously literary fic.

30. Nine Folds Make a Paper Swan by Ruth Gilligan. Recommended by @VikingNorthUtsire, I am trying to read more Irish fiction and I enjoyed the writing in this, although I rather wanted the three separate strands to come together more tightly at the end. Fascinating to learn about being an Irish Jew though, something I have literally never considered before!

Viking I'm just coming to the end of The Years and I think your review describes it beautifully. The only thing I would disagree with is that I absolutely love it and think it will be one of my top reads this year. I wonder if that is because, although younger than Annie Ernaux (I will be 60 at the end of this month), I suspect I am a lot older than you and I recognise so much of what she writes about (although not all the specifically French references). For example, I remember as a child sitting round the dinner table while my grandmother (who lived through both World Wars), mother and aunt discussed their lives during the WW2. I think that she is brilliant at capturing the changes in society while at the same time her more personal vignettes really resonated with me. She can also describe trends in society's preoccupations with devastating effect: after a paragraph about identity becoming an overriding concern, she finishes with the killer line "There were women in the world who were veiled from head to toe."

This is my second Annie Ernaux in as many months (I also loved A Girl's Story), and I have just ordered a third!

to all those who are grieving.

I’m not sure I have anything to add to the fascinating snobbery debate, although I note that this is the second history book in a row I’ve read with the title ‘The Birth of ...’. I do remember that my XSIL, who was working in publishing, got terribly fed up with the trend for non-fiction titles in the form ‘Liquorice: the sweet that changed history’; ‘Bollards: how road furniture transformed the world’ etc.

31. The Birth of Modern Britain - Francis Pryor

Pryor is an eminent archaeologist of prehistory; this is the fourth and last in his archaeological surveys of Britain, covering 1550 to the present. The book is a series of snapshots of recent archaeological work, focusing on lesser-known sites/areas of history, such as horse-drawn railways, naval dockyard factories, and on uncovering the reality of people’s lives, such as contraband in an Edinburgh prison. There are also some interesting discussions of relevant ‘Time Team’ digs.

Pryor is sceptical about the ‘revolutions’ of conventional history, and emphasizes some surprising continuities - grass verges originating under the Romans - and also that many transformations were already happening 1550-1750. Despite studying the Tudors at A-level, I don’t think I’d understood quite what a watershed the dissolution of the monasteries were in economic and industrial terms.

I enjoyed this book, and learnt a lot from it, but inevitably it’s not as good as his writing about his main area of expertise: his Britain BC and Seahenge are brilliant and revelatory.

22. Brilliant Customer Service - Debra Stevens
Part of my seemingly never-ending interview prep. Stated the obvious in a useful and succinct way.

23. Celebrating the Southern Seasons: Rituals for Aotearoa - Juliet Batten
A useful book for woo-inclined people like me who have moved to the Upside Down. Because European settlers retained their traditional dates for festivals, these are no longer aligned to their proper season in New Zealand eg Christmas/Yule should be a midwinter festival, but here is still celebrated on 25th December, which is midsummer. Batten suggests when and how the eight major festivals of the Pagan year should be celebrated in NZ to align them with the natural cycle, and also interlinks the European traditions with the Maori lore for each season. This is a useful starting point for getting your head round the ritual year in a southern hemisphere context, but her understanding of European ancient history is seriously dodgy, so it makes me wonder whether you can rely on what she says about Maori traditions either (Batten herself is of European heritage).

Another one down in my Heyer-fest.
The Toll Gate
Love, murder, robbery and another giant hero. What's not to like?!

Not posted for a while and just been catching up on the thread. Here are my recent reads:

16. Devolution. Max Brooks Read following a review on here and thoroughly enjoyed this. A small green living community is cut off when a nearby volcano erupts. Also likely cut off from their usual food supplies are a group of ‘bigfoots’ and so they attack the humans. The book is mostly made up of diary entries of a recently new to the community woman called Kate. I found it kept me gripped and wanting to keep reading, I was worried the ending would be ambiguous (due to it being diary entries) which I hate (hate not knowing what happens) but I think the author finished it really well. Recommend for anyone into these types of books.
17. Remote Control. Andy McNab decided to revisit some of my teenage reading years and go back to Andy McNab (reminds me of holidays which is the only time my Dad would read a book and it was often along these lines). Nick Stone is on an unofficial mission for British Intelligence (or some other department) in Washington when it suddenly gets called off. While waiting for his flight home he decides to visit an old SAS buddy who now has a family and works for the DEA. On arriving at his house he finds all brutally murdered except the 7 year old daughter hiding. He and the 7 year old go on the run while he tries to get to the bottom of it. I remember this being better than it was...it was a bit slow going and not really exciting enough with plenty of holes on the story. I would probably still reread Bravo Two Zero and a few others by him that I remember but avoid the rest, best left in the past with my good memories.
18. The Next Wife. Kaira Rouda. this was a free book from prime, apparently I get one free a month but never knew this until a recent email. John and his ex wife Kate jointly own and run a big company and have a daughter Ashlyn. John left Kate for Tish, his much younger assistant. John does of a heart attack and a power battle starts between the three woman. The characters were very one dimensional and it was really not a good read, I only persisted as it wasn’t overly long and I do hate not finishing books I start.

New Barbara Pym biography coming out, looks interesting
www.theguardian.com/books/2021/apr/08/the-adventures-of-miss-barbara-pym-by-paula-byrne-the-modern-jane-austen

Thought I'd mention it as I know there are some Barbara Pym fans on here

Ooh yes, I saw Paula Byrne tweeting about that, Spa - really looking forward to it.

Following on from the book snobbery chat, I’ve just inhaled my latest in less than a day :

37: Fair Warning: Michael Connelly

A stand-alone thriller, ie not featuring either Bosch or Ballard, although investigative journalist Jack McEvoy has starred in a couple of previous Connelly books. He’s back now, somewhat down on his luck, but scenting a story after an episode from his past ties in with a gruesome crime, and then snowballs into a much bigger deal than he expects at first.

A good page-turner with no literary pretensions whatsoever - in fact, Connelly’s writing can be oddly stilted and his characters often talk to each other in an unconvincingly formal way. Didn’t stop me hoovering it up!

24. The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint - Barry Udall I loved this! Great story, some interesting themes and really well-written. Edgar is run over by a mail truck at age 7, his head is crushed and he is presumed dead at the scene. On arrival at the hospital however, his life is saved and he emerges from a coma virtually unscathed. The rest of the book follows Edgar's life to the age of 16, in which he has a horrific time in a residential school for Native Americans, is almost adopted by a Mormon family and embarks on a single-minded search for the truck driver who ran him over to show he isn't dead.

11) The Saturday Morning Parkrun by Jules Wake and read by Laura Dryden
This wasn’t a bad listen to so I give it a 3/5
It is about two women one young and one old.One is looking for adventure and one is looking for a purpose. The two ladies meet in the park and this is how the idea of setting up a Park Run is born. I went for this as I enjoy running but I will admit I have never run a park run but certainly will be doing as soon as they are up and running again. This was a nice mixture of romance and family drama so definitely worth a read if you like this sort of thing. The story is about Claire, Hilda and Ash. Hilda was a great character and I found her funny. Claire has been signed off work with stress and has time on her hands. Her hippy sister decides to go off travelling and decides that Claire should look after her children whilst she is off gallivanting. Ash is the character that brings the romance into the book, a fling but embarrassingly for Claire he gets involved with the park run too. Overall it is a fun read and I liked the sense of community. I will go for one of Jules Wales books again.

Ok so DS has accidentally smashed the screen on my kindle when he lost his temper and its no longer working. Can screens be fixed on these things or should I just cut my losses and buy a new one with DS's pocket money Its a three year old Fire.

@InTheCludgie

Google for an iPhone/iPad screen repair shop in your area. They'll be able to.

"Despite studying the Tudors at A-level, I don’t think I’d understood quite what a watershed the dissolution of the monasteries were in economic and industrial terms."

@ChannelLightVessel I remember the authors of This Time Is Different which was one of the big books around the 2008 financial crises describing the dissolution of the monasteries as effectively the last time the UK failed to honour its sovereign financial commitments (and hence why we could run a much higher debt / GDP ratio without penurious interest rates resulting when compared to, say, Greece which was in technical default for large chunks of the 20th C)

Sap, I've had the Pym biography on pre-order for a while - a birthday present to myself.

How long do you persevere with a book before giving up? I've been reading a crime book for a couple of days now, an about halfway through but just don't think I care enough. The main character is annoying and the killing are a bit graphic and gory.

Stokey 50 pages. I try and read the kindle sample before I buy these days. Those that have a sample that is all introduction don't get read.

BoiledEgg I am 58 this weekend so not that much age difference. (How did that happen?)

@Stokey

How long do you persevere with a book before giving up? I've been reading a crime book for a couple of days now, an about halfway through but just don't think I care enough. The main character is annoying and the killing are a bit graphic and gory.

Depends on the book. Been struggling with something I will shortly review in the next few days which is viewed as a classic.

Ordinary novels? Not long. Maybe 25%