50 Book Challenge 2021 Part Six

[southeastdweller]

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

So, we're now almost half way through the year - how's the first half of the year gone for you, reading-wise?

Sorry, that 👆was for Welshwabbit, not Best

102. The Summer Before the War - Helen Simonson Takes place in the summer before the Great War. A young woman gains a post as a Latin teacher in a community reluctant to accept her. Belgian refugees arrive and the young men of the village start to sign up in varying circumstances before being sent to the Front.

Tries to tackle many issues such as women's rights/ attitudes to women, class, rape, homosexuality, racism, refugees and mental health. Twee and overly sentimental. This was my second attempt at this. It's slow to start and then throws far too many issues and characters in to really develop any of them and applies very modern values to historical contexts that makes an East Sussex village far too progressive for its time to be believable.

103. The Last Painting of Sarah de Vos - Dominic Smith Much reviewed recently. Enjoyed.

I've almost finished Mrs Death Misses Death - Salena Godden. It is glorious. I've not finished and I already know I want to read it again. The writing is sublime.

Tiger in the Smoke by Marjery Allingham
I enjoyed this. It's darker than others of hers that I've read, and occasionally lapses into Sayers-esque semi-gibberish, but mostly it was fun. I thought the ending was an anti-climax.

Continuing my belated reviews. Only 6 left after this!

The Vegetarian - Han Kang
A quiet housewife’s decision to become vegetarian upends her and her family’s world in increasingly surreal ways. There’s a lot going on under the surface, from the risks of individualism (especially in women) in a society that punishes it, to how far you’d go to escape from the collectivism to “find” yourself.

Lagoon - Nnedi Okorafor
An alien first contact story, set in Nigeria. I love the take on the aliens and the sense of place. I lost the thread of the story a few times, but Nnedi Okorafor has a way with turns of phrases, where seemingly simple things sneak into you. I read this off the back of hearing and loving her short story “Mother of Invention”, the story of a pregnant woman trapped in a deadly pollen storm with only her smart home to protect her. (Well, technically it’s her boyfriend’s smart home, but the smart home starts to have some opinions about that.) I found it on the “Levar Burton Reads” podcast, a collection of short stories read by Levar Burton and his sublime voice. Definitely worth checking out if you’re a fan of audiobooks and/or short stories.

Some of the best from Tor.com - 2020 edition
Sci Fi and fantasy focused short story collection. Standouts here were Hearts in the Hard Ground by G. V. Anderson, a heartfelt haunted house story (with added zombie seagull) and Maria Dahvana Headley’s The Girlfriend’s Guide to Gods , the terrible men we date, but as Greek gods.

The Survival of Molly Southbourne - Tade Thompson
Sequel to The Murders of Molly Southbourne No less weird, every bit as wonderful.

81. On The Frontline With The Women Who Fight Back by Stacey Dooley

I like Stacey from Glow Up and Strictly, but I've got no idea why I bought and read this because its about women featured in her documentaries, none of which I have seen

I think it was on the deals

The writing is average, but the topics were interesting and I did go on iPlayer to see if any of the documentaries featured were there but they weren't.

Stacey certainly has lived a life, having got a break young and even with some harrowing experiences, I found her lucky to have such insights and opportunities

39. Agent Sonya by Ben Macintyre
I will read anything by BM. This took an unusually long time to get into, but the Cold War section was cracking. He strives to make his spy heroine appealing and just about manages it - she's an extraordinary person and the story is fascinating. It is pretty shocking how completely compromised British security was.

*40. The Other Bennett Sister by Janice Hadlow
Oh I LOVED this. So well done. Really enjoyable and so well written - I think I felt the phrasing was obtrusively wrong only twice in the entire book. Recommended.

68. Zero Day by Ezekiel Boone

Final book in the Hatching trilogy. If you’re scared of spiders, then this is a series to avoid.

Swarms of deadly spiders that can strip a man to the bone within seconds have caused devastation worldwide, and secondary, larger spiders have emerged with the potential to cause even more damage.
The US president, senior government staff and top spider scientists have fled to an aircraft carrier in the Atlantic while they try and figure out a way of surviving the spiders.

This wraps the trilogy up neatly, although it’s all less tense than the previous instalments.
There’s a few big scary spider scenes, but the spiders are generally more in the background. It felt like there was more talking about spiders than seeing spiders. The really massive spiders are just underused. And the way the protagonists tackle the spiders seems rather implausible.

So generally, not the best in the series but still worth reading if you’ve read the previous books.

36. Parrot and Olivier in America - Peter Carey

Peter Carey has written some amazing books, unfortunately this isn't one of them. It wasn't awful but it's long and it dragged a bit.

Parrot is rescued by a french noble (Monsieur) when his father's employer is raided by the authorities on suspicion of forging banknotes and the premises is burnt down, taken from his homeland (Devon) and travels to Australia then France with the status of servant. Olivier is a French aristocrat whose parents were spared the guillotine but living in fear in their Normandy estate. When Olivier is sent to America to investigate and report on their prisons, Monsieur sends Parrot to act as secretary and servant to Olivier for the duration of the American visit. The unlikely pair work and live together for months, eventually learning to like and regard each other as friends.

65. Nomadland, by Jessica Bruder This felt like a genuine insight into a modern subculture - Americans, mostly of retirement age, who take to their RVs and subsist on temporary work contracts. It started off as a magazine piece, and if I'm critical, it does feel a bit padded out to book-length, but I thought it was worth the read.

66. Bloody Women by Helen Fitzgerald
A woman in a prison cell tries to work out if she really did murder her ex-lovers, as charged. I like this author and her wry take on relationships, but it's not her best work - it ends up in rather schlocky thriller territory.

If anyone's interested in Prairie Fires, the Laura Ingalls Wilder biog, it's gone down to £2.99 today. Another I can knock off my wish list!

Thanks Terpsichore - just bought it.

Ooh thanks Terpsichore. Time to charge the kindle for Prairie Fires. I've been reading a fair bit from my library's e-app at the moment, which is taking some getting used to, but at least is free. But there's a lot of things they don't have.

Same here, Permanent - but a really disappointing e-selection offered by my library if you want anything much more specialist than thrillers, detective fiction and Cosy Little Cafe by the Beach-type chicklit, sadly.

Yes, mostly. Random wins like The Other Bennett Sister though - but I had to wait weeks and weeks for it. Need to start physical library visits again.

Mrs Death Misses Death - Salena Godden
It turns out that the grim reaper is actually a working class black woman and she has had enough! Weary of her job she offloads and rants about the circumstances of death.

I can't even think where to start on describing this. It's written in a mix of poetry and prose and is a chaotic meditation on death. There isn't much plot to speak of, but it touches on so many things with a focus on death, but also life and humanity. It's a mix of the plot and also a social commentary on many situations of unjust deaths such as Grenfell. There is a lot of stream of consciousness and it needs the reader to go with the flow and experience it rather than question it. It's odd but glorious. I'd really recommend the audio as it's narrated by the author. A real stand out for me this year although I imagine it will be a quite a marmite book. She's tried something new, it doesn't always work, but the writing is wonderful.

Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North - Stuart Maconie
An ode to the North in all its glory. Realising that he'd gone posh and was losing his roots after exile in the South, the author goes on a tour of the North discussing the history of major places and the psyche of the inhabitants. It's quite witty and tongue in cheek and to my mind he captures the essence of each place well. We're from the same place, that no man's land between Liverpool and Manchester which is difficult in such a tribal place. It is very NW heavy as he hadn't previously crossed the Pennines before writing the book, so he only really pays lip service to Mordor Yorkshire and the North East/ Northumberland which is a bit of a disappointment. Overall a really fun book.

Thanks Terps

Thanks for the Ann Cleeves recommendation @elkiedee

I have just read 54. The Long Call - Ann Cleeves. The first in her new series set in North Devon. The detective is Matthew Venn who was brought up in a kind of sect near there, left when he was 18, but had now moved back with his husband to a house on a beach. I enjoyed this - good characters, building up the police team, and lots of potential for future plot lines, as well as a decent one this time.
55. The Darkest Evening - Ann Cleeves. I followed it with the only Vera I haven't read. I didn't think this was one of her best ones - it's a bit of a Christie pastiche in a way with a murder in a country house, and a feudal society. That said, I still inhaled it and finished it in a day or two.

@stokey, Glad you enjoyed this. I really must get back to the rest of the Shetland books and the whole of the Vera Stanhope series, and I'd also like to watch the TV adaptations.

Before children and when I had a disposable income (or an income of my own), I used to go to lots of crime fiction events and had the pleasure of meeting Ann Cleeves on several occasions. She always seemed lovely, Somehow I bought rather more books at all those events and since then I can ever get round to reading.

A second Matthew Venn book is due in the autumn.

I'm already on my library's waiting list for the new Ann Cleeves book, The Heron's Cry.

62: All Adults Here - Emma Straub

A random 99p deal picked up thanks to my fatal weakness for novels about families in small-town America.

The focus of the book is widowed 60-something Astrid, long-time resident of sleepy Clapham. Astrid's grown-up children have a variety of problems and neuroses: Elliott is an angry over-achiever, Nicky the charming feckless one, sister Porter is having a baby solo while conducting an on-off affair with her married high-school boyfriend. Astrid herself, meanwhile, has been secretly coupled up with a woman for several years. Sent to stay with her grandmother in the sleepy small town of Clapham and make a fresh start at the local school, Nicky's troubled teen daughter Cecelia has her own problems to figure out.

At some points this was eerily similar to The Most Fun We Ever Had in terms of basic plot and territory; it also comes garlanded with comparisons to Anne Tyler and blurbs from Elizabeth Strout and Ann Patchett. Not quite sure about any of that - there are so many 'ishoos' shoehorned in (including a trans sub-plot) that it starts to feel a wee bit unlikely. But it's pretty well-written and occasionally funny so on the whole I was happy enough to spend time with this one.

I'm also on an Ann Cleeves run. What's not to like? Keep you guessing, well- written, beautiful descriptions of nature and wry observation of people. Am in a foul mood (DD having friendship issues and Tiger Mother is sitting on her hands not to get involved)

26 A Long Petal of the Sea. Skimmed last 50 pages. As I've said during my reading of it- basically TL:DR in novel form. Shame, as the subject matter is so very interesting.

27 Telling Tales, Ann Cleeves. My favourite Vera so far.

Have now just started The Glass Room.

@FortunaMajor
Pies and Prejudice is on my top 10 of all time. My copy is battered and scuffed and, like Bill Bryson's, I turn to it for comfort food reading. It's also my north- I'm East Midlands but went to university in Salford, then lived in Manchester before moving to Liverpool. One of my uni friends also had a brother who was learning to levitate at the Transcendental place in Skem (which we found both fascinating and utterly bonkers at the time) (I don't know if he ever managed )

Just love this book and Stuart Maconie's writing in general. One of few writers whose books I buy in proper book form as soon as they come out.

Is there anyone as good as Ann Cleeves writing police procedurals at the moment?

@SOLINVICTUS Fellow Maconie fan here too. I’m always recommending him to people.

Just finished no 7 of the Sandhamn murders. I really must take a break to read something else. There seemed to be a big jump in the timeline of this one almost as if there should have been a book 6.5.

48. Punk 57 - Penelope Douglas

I found Ryen (the girl) difficult to like at first because she comes across as the typical high school bully. In fact it isn't until a good way into the book that we understand her need to be liked, although her actions aren't at all justified because of this. I found this the main point of the book, which being YA presumably, is all the more important. Whilst explaining that bullying behaviour is happening, it almost glosses over the fact to tell the story between Ryen and Mischa, which I have to say I really liked.

I'd not read anything about the book, including reviews, so didn't have any preconceived ideas. The fact it's YA explains a lot about the overall story, although I think the author could have used the opportunity of having a potential young readership, to impress on them the outcome of bullying and maybe have shown Ryen learning from her behaviour much sooner than 18.

I enjoyed the story on the surface, but not the almost glamourisation of bullying. The situation with Delilah reminds me of the example I used to teach my daughter about bullying when she was a child. I'd get her to take a nice smooth blank piece of paper, then crumple it up, throw it on the floor and stamp on it, then pick it up and smooth it out. I'd go on to tell her that the smooth, clean piece of paper was like her friendship before bullying happened, then when she crumpled it up and stamped on it, that was like the bullying. The marks, dirt, crumples, and tears, were the effects that the bullying had, and when I got her to say sorry to it and then smooth it over and straighten it out, i'd ask her if the paper was back to how it was before. She obviously said no, and that's when i'd explain that you may say sorry, but the paper (person) will always carry those scars and will never be the same.

There were graphic sex scenes, so if this type of thing offends then this is is definitely not for you

Punk 57 - Penelope Douglas

I found Ryen (the girl) difficult to like at first because she comes across as the typical high school bully. In fact it isn't until a good way into the book that we understand her need to be liked, although her actions aren't at all justified because of this. I found this the main point of the book, which being YA presumably, is all the more important. Whilst explaining that bullying behaviour is happening, it almost glosses over the fact to tell the story between Ryen and Mischa, which I have to say I really liked.

I'd not read anything about the book, including reviews, so didn't have any preconceived ideas. The fact it's YA explains a lot about the overall story, although I think the author could have used the opportunity of having a potential young readership, to impress on them the outcome of bullying and maybe have shown Ryen learning from her behaviour much sooner than 18.

I enjoyed the story on the surface, but not the almost glamourisation of bullying. The situation with Delilah reminds me of the example I used to teach my daughter about bullying when she was a child. I'd get her to take a nice smooth blank piece of paper, then crumple it up, throw it on the floor and stamp on it, then pick it up and smooth it out. I'd go on to tell her that the smooth, clean piece of paper was like her friendship before bullying happened, then when she crumpled it up and stamped on it, that was like the bullying. The marks, dirt, crumples, and tears, were the effects that the bullying had, and when I got her to say sorry to it and then smooth it over and straighten it out, i'd ask her if the paper was back to how it was before. She obviously said no, and that's when i'd explain that you may say sorry, but the paper (person) will always carry those scars and will never be the same.

There were graphic sex scenes, so if this type of thing offends then this is is definitely not for you

A few books to add:

49. And the Rest is History - Jodi Taylor

Back at St Mary’s with Max and the rest of the time travelling team. This was not the happiest of stories as a number of the team were lost.

50. An Argumentation of Historians - Jodi Taylor

Sticking with St Mary’s this was a happier book as whilst there were the usual calamities, St Mary’s had moved on from the losses in the previous book. I particularly enjoyed this one because of an extended stay at St Mary’s during the reign of Richard II. Normally visits to other times are quite short so it was good to spend longer in another era.

51. Quartet in Autumn - Barbara Pym

This was my first book by this author and read on the basis of recommendations on this thread. The quartet in their autumn years are Letty, Marcia, Edwin and Norman who all work together in routine administrative roles and are all single and approaching retirement. The depiction of the different characters and their foibles was really well done. Recommended.