OK, this is my mad attempt to catch up with the threads and make a start on a backlog of books I've read but haven't reviewed yet. Apologies for epic-length post! My uni term starts on Monday so it's now or never...
Bringing my list over just a LITTLE late, ahem:
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The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin
- A Thousand Moons, Sebastian Barry
- Over Sea, Under Stone, Susan Cooper
- Mémoire de fille, Annie Ernaux
- Someday Angeline, Louis Sachar
- Magpie Lane, Lucy Atkins
- Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
- The Discomfort of Evening, Marieke Lucas Rijneveld
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Foreign Affairs, Alison Lurie
10.
Shuggie Bain, Douglas Stuart
11.
A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula Le Guin
12.
The Tombs of Atuan, Ursula Le Guin
13. Burnt Sugar, Avni Doshi
14. The Farthest Shore, Ursula LeGuin
15. Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes
16. Detransition, Baby, Torrey Peters.
17.
Aeneid, Vergil, trans. by Shadi Bartsch
18. The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney, Okechukwu Nzelu
19. Transcendent Kingdom, Yaa Gyasi
20.
Lord of the Flies, William Golding
21.
The Door, Magda Szabo
22. Luster, Raven Leilani
23.
Tehanu, Ursula Le Guin
24.
The Vanishing Half, Brit Bennett
It was fascinating to see what everyone read for their English (and French) A-levels. Just have to say OMG at Viking's comment: DS is in Year 10 at a boys school, currently studying Macbeth, Lord of the Flies, Jekyll and Hyde and the Power and Conflict poetry anthology. Quite the collection of toxic masculinity - I do wish his teachers had chosen one text which wasn't about men/boys killing each other.
My DS is in yr 11 at a state school and has exactly the same syllabus. I hadn't even noticed the toxic masculinity theme until you pointed it out! 
At least he has done a lot on Lady Macbeth and how she has no direct access to power in this all-male society, which is arguably part of why her character is so troubled...
@Mogthesleepycat Very very belated thanks for your kind words on the last thread about garden variety depression. Knowing one’s not alone is always good.
I also loved the discussion on the last thread of Ernaux’s The Years -- great review by Viking. I’m so pleased you’re also are a fan, Boiledeggsandtoast. Like nowanearlynicemum I read a couple of Ernaux’s novels as an undergrad and they didn’t make an impression on me at all. Now that I’m nearing 50, I find her writing incredibly moving, and I want to go back and reread the ones I encountered earlier. It’s funny how reading tastes can change as you age. Also, I’ve realised that much (all?) of Ernaux’s work is autobiographical or semi-autobiographical, so the more of her books you read, the better you get to know her, and the experience of reading feels increasingly intimate. I think The Years is the only book she wrote using the ‘we’ or French ‘on’ form, which does make it feel more sweeping and impersonal than the others.
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Guest House for Young Widows, Azadeh Moaveni 5/5
Read this because of rave reviews on the threads, and wow, I’m in complete agreement. A very measured, intelligent account, based on personal interviews, of some of the young women who travelled from the UK, Germany and Tunisia to join ISIS. Along the way I learned a lot about the bigger picture of how ISIS was formed and why it seemed like a utopian ideal at the beginning to so many Muslims across the world. I also gained a fuller understanding of how the US and other Western countries have supported dodgy/downright violent regimes in other parts of the world. Moaveni recounts the stories of these women without judging them or trying to exculpate them; she leaves it to the reader to draw their own conclusions, which makes the book all the more powerful. I’m so glad I read this.
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Because of You, Dawn French 3/5
On the Women’s Prize longlist. This was a pleasurable read but not really my kind of novel. The characters are too schematic: either extremely good or absurdly villainous (e.g. the Black Tory politician who cares only about success and prestige). And the two mother figures make Amazingly Noble Sacrifices. There is also a character who speaks only in malapropisms, for comic effect.
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No One Is Talking About This, Patricia Lockwood 4/5
On the Women’s Prize longlist. This novel has the quirkiness and strikingly original use of language that are also found in Lockwood’s comic memoir Priestdaddy. In some ways I don’t think I’m the ideal audience for this book, because there is lots of riffing on internet memes and I suspect a lot of that went over my head as I’m not internet-savvy enough. The novel’s style also evokes the internet; it’s written in witty, disconnected short bursts that are simultaneously easy and difficult to digest. In the novel’s second half, the heroine finds herself pulled away from the internet due to a real-life crisis: a child is born with a rare genetic condition. This story is recounted with great gentleness and tenderness, as the protagonist finds her world opening up in a new way. A memorable book and one I may well come back to.