50 Book Challenge 2021 Part Five

[southeastdweller]

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

How're you getting on so far?

Reporting in after checking the Kindle Monthly Deals, they look a bit better this month. I've spotted:

Gentleman in Moscow
Messy, Wonderful Us (A friend of a friend so want to read)
Can You Hear Me (Paramedic memoir)
How Women Rise

Seems to be quite a few thrillers and other easy holiday reads.

I’m tempted by quite a lot in the monthly deals. Sophie Hannah’s latest Poirot is in there, and I’ve been meaning to read Michael Palin’s Erebus. Philip and Alexander by Adrian Goldsworthy is a very readable account of the Macedonian kings’ conquests - I have it on library loan at the moment and might get my own copy for 99p. Philip Zimbardo’s The Lucifer Effect is quite old now but had a big impact on me - about the psychology of how ordinary people come to do bad (even evil) things.

The Last House On Needless Street is in the 99p Kindle deals today, it won't be everyone's cup of tea but it is a clever psychological thriller with some unexpected twists, very much in the Stephen King mould.

Snap, noodlezoodle I've just read A Crooked Tree by Una Mannion and like you thought it woukd be a thriller. I liked it too.

The story follows, Libby a 15 year old in the late 70's who has a deprived and chaotic homelife in semi rural Pennsylvania.. She has four siblings, her father is dead and her mother is totally disengaged from family life and has a secret boyfriend who is the father of the youngest child. One evening driving the family back from school Ellen, the twelve year old who looks much younger annoys their mother and she orders her out of the car on a busy highway miles from home and drives on. The events that stem from this act affect the rest of the narrative. It is a coming of age type story, in which Libby reflects on her past whilst dealing with the dramatic events unfolding from Ellen's abandonment. Not every storyline is tied up neatly and sometimes I questioned where the narrative was heading or whether the introduction of a new character and their backstory was really needed. However, I did really enjoy the book and how it evoked a time before mobile phones and the internet and the feelings of being a teenager.

The two I'm most excited by in this month's deals are both historical novels:

Thanks for sharing your picks from the new bunch of Kindle deals - I've bought quite a few as ever - the two I'm most excited by are historical novels that I've been wanting to read since I heard that there was a new book out by the authors:

Emma Donoghue, The Pull of the Stars
Ellen Feldman, The Paris Bookshop - disappointed that they've changed the original US title which I think is better, think Paris Never Leaves You

I enjoyed A Gentleman in Moscow a few years ago but I loved his first novel even more. I had an advance review copy and spotted a mistake - which didn't affect the plot but seemed a bit strange - so I emailed his publishers - US and UK - and got a very grateful email back via the website I reviewed for. I don't suppose he remembers promising to buy some amateur reviewer a drink more than 10 years ago though - still hoping to take him up but I can't afford to travel to book events these days as I did in the past.

52. They do it with Mirrors by Agatha Christie. Surprisingly short Miss Marple - at least I was happily reading along on Overdrive and the end suddenly was there! So possibly a tad unbalanced - I think reading ebooks (particularly Overdrive which doesn't give you a % reading unless you click) gives you a real feel for when books feel like they are supposed to finish, and if they seem to go on too long or stop too soon, that probably isn't a good sign. Otherwise I liked this family-set murder, and I always like it when Miss Marple is in it right from the beginning!

I am not going to even look at the monthly deals - I have so many books waiting to be read, and while lying on the floor of my study pretending to join in a pilates class first thing this morning I realised there are about twenty that I moved there during the first lockdown to a "to be read" shelf and promptly forgot about. #

45 Mr Bowling Buys A Newspaper by Donald Henderson
This was hanging around on the shelf for a while and I pulled it down after hearing Andy Miller praise it to the heavens on an episode of Backlisted. It was entertaining, but not as good as he led me to believe. Mr Bowling is a murderer (not really a spoiler) for reasons that are mostly due to him trying it once and quite liking it, and finding it to be a good way to get rid of people who annoy him. This had shades of Patrick Hamilton (boarding houses, war etc) but with much more humour I really enjoyed the ending - it wasn't where I expected things to end up.

46 More Than A Woman by Caitlin Moran
Viking reviewed this upthread, I think. Largely, she's (Moran, not Viking) settled down into something much less irritating than she used to be - she's more or less accepted that she is now part of the north London media landscape and not an edgy and revolutionary outsider. And actually this was about as well done a study of middle aged womanhood as I've read in terms of physical ageing, parenting, relationships, and female friendships. The sections about her daughter's struggles with an eating disorder and mental health problems were heart breaking, and I thought were done very sensitively (and clearly with the full consent of her daughter). I laughed quite a lot, and cried almost as much. And I almost never cry at books.

46 Howards End Is On The Landing by Susan Hill
I am often disappointed by books about other books. If I haven't read the books the author is writing about then it's hard to relate. If I have, and the author's response is different to mine, I feel frustrated. If they agree with me, I wonder why I bothered. I'll make an exception for The Year of Reading Dangerously, which struck me as more about reading than the books themselves. And may let this one sneak on to my list as well. Susan Hill, who wrote The Woman In Black writes about her year of trying to read only what is already on her shelves. Along the way there were some great literary anecdotes (as a writer, publisher, reviewer and prize judge she wears enough hats to have lots of material to draw on) and plenty to reflect on in terms of reading and how we choose books. I was struck by her comments about reading slowly - as I've read more over the past few years, I've definitely noticed that I read quicker rather than better, and so I'm going to try to slow down a little to see if I get more out of it.

Jumping on the bandwagon I've just finished 13. Diary of an MP's Wife by Sasha Swire. Swire's husband Hugo was an MP for 20 years, a minister in Cameron's government, and very much in the Old Boys' Network typical of that era's politicians.

There is an uncomfortable sense of a certain class believing that they are the elite and born to rule. Swire believes that the reason her husband never makes it to the cabinet is because he's a white Old Etonian, and so discriminated against. She never lets the facts get in the way of her opinions, for example describing the Andrew Mitchell "pleb" business as resulting from the police being "heavily unionised" - the police are of course by law prohibited by law from joining a trade union. However, I was sucked in to all the deliciously bitchy gossiping, although the comments about Michael Gove's willy definitely fall into the Too Much Information bracket.

Glad to read positive reviews of Entangled Life and Who was Changed and Who was Dead by Sadik and Pepe as I have them on my shelf to read. Glad Barnanabas enjoyed Tony Parker’s Lighthouse which I loved too.

22. Agent Running in the Field by Le Carré Quite enjoyed this one. Easier to follow than some of the earlier works I’ve read and easier to empathise with the main character, though there’s a romance built into the plot that I didn’t buy into. A spy who fears he’s about to be pushed out to grass becomes involved with a younger man, a slight misfit character who rails against Brexit. Raises interesting questions about action, inaction, and the boundary between

...compromise and social graces. Enjoyable but on to something escapist next.

It was great, wasn't it SapatSea? I finished it a couple of weeks ago and am still thinking about it.

I am also tempted by some of the deals, and grateful that they were a bit easier to navigate this month! I seem to remember Erebus being very popular on this thread so I may give that a go.

27. Happiness By Design - Paul Dolan

I think I got this from a Dr Rongan Chatterjee podcast and although it was interesting the podcast covers it enough.

He talks about how we focus our attention, making active choices, nudging ourselves to do more of what makes us happy. Interesting but not life changing.

Btw - I have been reading this on and off for a while at the same time as some fiction, I didn't read it in the time since I posted book 26 this morning!

@PepeLePew I found Susan Hill in Howards End is on the Landing interesting but annoying, though I did buy a copy for my mum's husband who really enjoyed it. And I also borrowed the follow up, Jacob's Room is Full of Books, from the library.

I also have mixed feelings about Caitlin Moran - it may be that I know a bit too much as she and her family live on the posh side of the same borough as me (and yes, "over there" really is rather media luvvie land) and I'm sometimes disappointed in her views. I guess I would have preferred her to stay a bit more radical.

I saw a hardback copy of the Sasha Swire book in a charity shop today and was surprised to see how large it is.

I put A Crooked Tree onto my TBR after Noodle 's great review last week, and was glad to see that Sap enjoyed it too. The opening sounds like something that could have happened during my own childhood so I'm interested to see how it develops.

I had a good scan through the deals and found ZERO that I wanted.

Has anyone read 'Elmet' by Fiona Mozley? I'm 2/3 of the way through and I am finding myself entranced and irritated in equal measure. The writing is lyrical but the characterisation and plot are leaving a lot to be desired. It reads like a fairy-table or fable but is firmly rooted in the modern day which doesn't quite work for me. Anyway, sections stand out to me but overall I'm a bit perplexed

Just rattled through The Mysterious Affair at Styles. Agatha Christie apparently wrote it as a bet that a reader would not spot the murderer even when provided with all the clues. I am rather afraid I did, Agatha ! Nonetheless, jolly good escapist fun with only one bit of casual racism, a smattering of anti semitic sentiment and some frequent gentle sexism...

I read elmet as a book club read, from what I remember, I was left with the overall atmosphere and was happy to go along with the storyline, I don't think I gave it that much thought.

Sheesh but I'm having a bad year.

24. Past Caring- Robert Goddard.

What an apt title. Describes me after about a quarter of the way in.
This novel is having an identity crisis, it doesn't know if it's a political "thriller", a family saga, (about an unspeakably unpleasant family) or a love story. Whichever it's supposed to be, it fails miserably.
Page after page of dull historical discussion (I studied this period for A level history and can't say Lloyd George and Asquith have ever seemed to me to be likely protagonists of anything "thrilling") not even livened up by the writer's strange attempt at shoehorning a suffragette or two into the narrative and saved only by being marginally less dull than the (seemingly endless) memoir that half the book is taken up with.
Only three female leads in a sea of grey indistinguishable blokes all speaking like something out of the 1950s rather than the 1970s, and one of them is a laughable caricature of "femme fatale" (whose clothes seem to be the most interesting thing to write about for the author) while another was a wild suffragette who seems to have morphed into a sweet old lady of the type you find in a Rosamund Pilcher.
The utterly ridiculous sex scene should be nominated for one of those worst descriptions in a book prize. Excruciatingly bad.
I've read a couple of RGs which were more recent than this, but I shan't be rushing for any more.

It’s a shame you didn’t enjoy Past Caring Sol. Robert Goddard is one of my favourite authors and that’s one of my favourite of his books. I think it’s a really interesting read and I loved all the historical stuff. I hope others aren’t put off by your review, as I think Goddard is a really underrated author - although I was pleased to see his latest featured on Between the Covers this series.

NotSoLongGoodbye I read Elmet last year, and agree it's an unusual book. Here's my review from last year:

Danny and Cathy are teens living in impoverished rural North Yorkshire in a house built by their father. Daddy is a shady figure, who tries to eke out the family's survival by fair means or foul. The family repeatedly crosses paths with sinister local landowner Mr Price, with awful consequences.

The novel started slowly and built pace, in a series of events that became increasingly gripping. I liked the three main characters, but others were less developed, and Price was almost cartoonishly villainous. There were a few passages interspersed from Danny's current whereabouts that felt too slight to add much. However the writing here was great and the setting very evocative and atmospheric.

@TheTurn0fTheScrew

@TheTurn0fTheScrew sorry pressed the wrong button - I think your review of Elmet from last year is spot on ...

Trafficked Girl by Zoe Patterson This was the book choice for book group. It isn’t a book I would have normally gone for. It was horrific. The writing was good but it was such a difficult read. It is about a young girl Zoe Patterson and her horrendous, abusive upbringing. Zoe then get’s put into a broken down care system that does anything but do the job of protection and care. Was glad to have finished her story but was a very difficult read.

31. Between the Stops by Sandi Toksvig

Thoroughly enjoyable sort-of memoir, loosely based on the route of the no. 12 bus. As you would expect from her somewhat nerdy TV/radio persona, Toksvig flits between facts about the bus route and the history of the areas it passes through and memories from her very interesting life. Sometimes the name dropping gets a bit much, but she is an entertaining writer and I've spent a fair bit of time on the no. 12 route over the years so it was nice to read about some familiar places.