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?

I once got three pointless answers to the question 'name a novel by Salmon Rushdie'. One of my proudest moments .

A House in the Country by Ruth Adam Recommended on a previous thread, the story of six friends who move to a large but neglected manor house in Kent in the aftermath of the Second World War. It is based on the experiences of the author and charts the realities of post-war life in a large country house. Interesting and fun, but perhaps a touch too whimsical.

This Rare Spirit, A Life of Charlotte Mew by Julia Copus Before reading this I was aware of only a handful of Charlotte Mew's beautiful and haunting poems. A contemporary reviewer described them much more eloquently, writing that "pain is a constant note of the(se) poems; the poet seems unable to disentangle life, or beauty, from pain". This Rare Spirit is a brilliant biography of a complex but private poet whose life was punctuated by difficulty and family tragedy. I can't recommend this highly enough and I have to say that it puts the recent biography of Barbara Pym somewhat in the shade. For anyone unfamiliar with Charlotte Mew's work, here is a link to perhaps her most famous poem, The Farmer's Bride which I hope might be an inspiration to read this marvellous book www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/55324/the-farmers-bride

Oh, I've got a little book of Charlotte Mews poetry which I've not really read. I'll need to get it out and read it now. Her mini biography on that website is heartbreaking.

@JaninaDuszejko

I once got three pointless answers to the question 'name a novel by Salmon Rushdie'. One of my proudest moments .

Are we secret twins?

Nothing makes me puffed up with pride more than a Pointless Hatrick

@JaninaDuszejko

Oh, I've got a little book of Charlotte Mews poetry which I've not really read. I'll need to get it out and read it now. Her mini biography on that website is heartbreaking.

I hadn't realised before that she also wrote short stories, which also sound intriguing.

I should also have added to my review of A House in the Country that it's not all fun and there are moments of tragedy too.

Janina I am seriously impressed!

20. The Madness Of Grief by the Reverend Richard Coles
A memoir on the death of Coles' partner David and its immediate aftermath. David died in December 2019, and although he had long-term health conditions his death was sudden.

I thought this was beautiful. Tragic and yet funny, the absurdity of life after loss is captured brilliantly. As would be expected there are many references to Anglican attitudes and practices around death, but not enough to alienate this atheist.

I love it when they choose literature on Pointless, finally think I'm in with a chance unlike the countless sports ones.

@ShakeItOff2000 I absolutely loved the Broken Earth trilogy, such original writing.

I've read a couple of pretty average books recently, The Cousins by Karen McManus which was a YA about a group of cousins whose parents were disowned by their wealthy mother. I was reading to see if it was appropriate for DD 1 (11), it was and think she'll like it, a little bit thin for me. And then The other passenger - Louise Candlish which was a thriller about a guy who commutes by river boat every day, and one of his commuter friends is murdered. I quite liked the imagery of coming into London by river, but don't think this is one the will stick with me.
I also read Sweet Sorrow - David Nicholls. He's the One Day author. I know that's another divisive book, I'm in the like camp. I was at Edinburgh in the 90s so it all feels rather familiar and nostalgic to me. Sweet Sorrow was another 90s nostalgia fest. It follows Jamie, a depressed 16 year old, who has just finished his GCSEs and has his first summer romance with a girl from a posh school to the background of a play of Romeo & Juliet. I didn't feel much emotional investment in the characters, maybe I would have liked this more if I was nearer the teenage stage, but Jamie was a bit too passive for me.

@Tarahumara

Janina I am seriously impressed!

Considering one of the pointless answers was Midnight's Children I think all it proved was that most people know bugger all about literature.

Oh! I was kind of assuming that one wouldn't be pointless! Still impressive to get three

BoiledEggandToast That poem is so sad. Poor girl. I'd not heard of Charlotte Mew before, so thanks for highlighting her work and for your review of the biography. Have bookmarked her to read more.

30.How to Save a Life by Eva Carter
This starts out reading like a Young Adult book about teenage love at sixth form college but as it followed the main 3 characters through to their mid thirties it it really grew on me. The narrative flowed and it was a great page turner. I can't really cope at the moment with intricate plots and acres of erudite description, so this book really hit the spot. It's set in Brighton which I know very well so that was a nice touch for me. I could see this as a Monday night type drama series about thwarted amabitions and love. I was glad there were no nasty murders or "thriller" element just a bittersweet tale with flawed, human characters.

Have to smile at the Pointless literature fans, we're exactly the same in this house. Booker Prize winners or Golden Age crime fiction would be my ideal final category but they always seem to want bloody sport

Anyway....onwards with 66: Transient Desires - Donna Leon

It seems moments ago that I was reviewing Leon's 25th Commissario Brunetti novel - now here I am with the 30th. Blimey, she doesn't hang about. There have been ups and downs in this series and Leon went through a long period of deep introspection when Brunetti seemed to do very little but read Ancient Greek philosophy and eat Paola's mouthwatering food, with the actual crime-solving very much incidental.

I thought this book was headed the same way but it sort of redeemed itself halfway through, after an extremely leisurely first part, and suddenly revved up into action mode with a genuinely tense finale - albeit crammed into the very last pages and ending so abruptly that I really thought my library e-copy had somehow got chopped off prematurely....but no. On balance I think this was quite a satisfying read, and I'm always happy to spend (virtual) time in Venice, although it's not the Brunetti of yore, when he was more of a hands-on copper than a kind of middle-aged Venetian Alain de Botton on attachment to the Questura.

Thanks for the Charlotte Mew review and link, boiledegg, the poem and the associated biog on the link are fascinating.

a kind of middle-aged Venetian Alain de Botton

I have just finished Andrew Marr's weightyElizabethans, which I am honour bound to report , contains a whole chapter on Mumsnet!

It seems churlish to have criticisms about omissions when it is , largely, over long - but I did feel the book focused largely on male , white, middle class English experiences (with the odd diverting chapter on the likes of Jimmy Reid). Scotland does better than Wales or NI, probably because Marr is a Scot. I think the book is summed up by the fact that women who get full chapters are Elizabeth David and Anita Roddick and Mumsnet, really - which definitely speaks to a certain vision of British woman. Wales is almost entirely overlooked. He obviously likes music and devotes a chapter to the Beatles and Dusty Springfield. He does Ridley Scott's beginnings in advertising whilst not mentioning much about the film industry at all (and missing out Ken Loach form his roll call of directors who began in advertising), apart from a rather unsettling chapter on Diana Dors and soem stuff about Monty Python - and , unless I have forgotten, doesn't mention TV apart from nods towards the BBC. The British film industry is Britain's third largest industry so this is an oversight. He seems in awe of STEM and several times sneers a bit at the 'elite' arts and academic learning (I didn't agree at all with his chapter on education)unless it's architecture or Tracy Emin who he does rather better on. Aside from the Beatles chapter, he rather ignores the power of British pop music. I would say the biggest omission is sport : just a fleeting bit on Beckham and Rashford , and that isn't about their sporting prowess.

I forgave him for his copy errors once I read that he now dictates his books to a machine and the software mistranscribes his words : I don't forgive his copy editor , though, for a Dudley Docker/Bernard Docker error on the same page and changing Khadija Saye's name to Khalida twice. These are glaring. I also winced at his uses of 'sexy hosiery' to describe Pretty Polly tights (presumably for comic effect; I just found it faintly misogynisitc) and he does a similar thing earlier which I can't recall.

However, all in all, it is really interesting and well written and does make one reflect on how British identity (well, mainly English, let's face it, Marr!) has changed and been shaped since 1952. I guess he can't help it that he is a white male from a certain era : but he book (cf Dan Dare) does seems a bit overly dominated by his worldview. It is an interesting reading companion to eg Black Britons or Shuggie Bain.

Quick check-in to keep on the thread, and a couple to update:

72. Variations on a Beehive ed. Trish Nelson
    Starts with a chapter on historical styles of hive, then follows with individual chapters for 25 different types of hive from the standard (National, Langstroth etc) through to the experimental. The chapters are written by beekeepers with experience of the hives in question, which does mean the style / readability is a bit variable, but it's an interesting read.

73. The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin
    Re-read - I'm not sure how immediately relevant Rubin's life is to mine (she's a successful author with small children living in New York!) but I find her books gently charming, & ideal bed-time reading.

*51. Don't Lie to Me - Willow Rose
*
I found it pretty ridiculous with little plot or character building.

Eva, the protagonist, is selfish and pretty unlikeable. First to issues surrounding her family life, before moving on to the rest of the book.

She regularly leaves her kids with her eldest who is a preteen, she forgets anything that is important to her children that she is supposed to go to, school concerts, sports events etc. The kids are coping with their parents separation and being moved away from their home, and whilst the book continuously tells us their dad doesn’t want them, I feel so sorry for them because it certainly looks like their mother can’t be arsed either. They seem to be constantly eating dry cereal, due to running out of milk, so it looks like Eva doesn’t cook for them either. She complains about her mother’s attitude being cold to her as she grew up, but I’d rather that than her blatant neglect, she complains about what her mum cooks for her dad, but at least she bloody does some!

The youngest child Alex sounds like a massive handful for an adult to cope with, let alone his sisters. Eva Rae expects to be told by the teacher they want him to be tested for ADHD, so she has obviously given thought to his challenging behaviour. It’s explained away as him being super intelligent.

In respect to the mystery/murders/cases, I found that her constant rule breaking really undermined the whole thing. She is no longer an FBI agent, but waltzes around with the police as if she has authority, it’s like because she has history with the officers she can just suddenly flout all rules. She punches someone she believes has committed a crime, in error as it turns out, she breaks and enters, and questions witnesses as and where she wants.

And the culprit just seemed chosen to make a shock or twist, there was no indication or even hinting at any past history. Poor character and story development.

I’m not sure if I finished it so quickly because I wanted to know how it all ended, or if I was just wanting to end my suffering.

@CluelessMama

Hushabyelullaby I get nervous about making recommendations but I'll have a think! I saw that you liked Cilka's Journey. I haven't read it - is it historical fiction or non-fiction? What was it that you liked about it?

It's a non fiction book, Cecelia 'Cilka' Klein is one of the secondary characters in The Tattooist of Auschwitz which was based on life of Lale Sokolov. I liked the fact that it showed the strength and resilience of Cilka in such conditions, yes it's emotional and sad, but more than that it shows the strength of human will. Not only did Cilka survive the Gulag camp but she was able to use it as a learning opportunity too. Surviving the camp is astonishing in itself, but the fact Cilka survived in the way she did, using the resources she could gave me so much admiration and respect for her.

I was taught about Nazi concentration camps and atrocities in school, but never about Gulag camps, so for me it was educational too.

39 The Provincial Lady in America by E. M. Delafield

The provincial lady goes to America on a lecture tour, meets lots of Americans and catches up with Mademoiselle. As funny as ever. After all the Charlotte Mew chat I noticed that the Provincial Lady had a flat in Doughty Street where Charlotte Mew had lived in her youth. Clearly the literary world is very small.

55. Casting Off - Elizabeth Jane Howard

The fourth of the Cazalet family chronicles set in the aftermath of the Second World War. Most of the younger generation are now adults and struggling with life and love and the older generation are not doing any better. Happier endings for some than others although some are more responsible for their outcomes than others. I have really enjoyed this series and think the era and characters are depicted very well. As with life, I like some more than others and my sympathies have changed as characters develop. I did struggle with the large age gap relationship given their history (trying to avoid spoilers!). Now have to decide whether to read the fifth in the series which judging by the reviews is not up to the standard of the rest of the books.

That sounds great hushabyelullaby - right up my street. A couple of books I enjoyed for similar reasons...
My book of the year so far is House of Glass by Hadley Freeman. She became interested in the story of her grandmother's family, Jews who lived in Poland and moved to France before WW2, and spent over a decade researching the lives of her family before, during and after the war. This non-fiction book shares the stories of Freeman's relatives but also gives the context of how their experiences fit in with the what was happening more widely. I found the stories of the Glass family compelling and learned a lot about WW2, the experiences of Jews through the 20th Century and broader issues like migration.
For me, House of Glass sparked an interest that I have pursued in other reading choices this year, the best of which has been We Were The Lucky Ones by Georgia Hunter. This book came about in almost the same way - writer became interested in the story of her Jewish relatives who were living in Poland in the early 1900s, and spent over a decade reasearching their stories. However, this is a novel. As far as I can understand, all of the 'characters' and 'plot' are completely based on real individuals and events, but the author chose to write this as fiction so that she could include dialogue which imagines conversations which cannot be 100% factual.
I liked both reads for the same reasons that you liked Cilka's Journey - both taught me about parts of history that I knew little about through the lives of individuals whose extraordinary stories I became invested in and which would seem far-fetched if they were not true. There are tales of survival and luck, incredible resilience and remarkable decisions made in heart breaking situations.

My recent reads...
30. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
A re-read of this novel for me, probably 15+ years since the last time, and it held up well. Fifteen year old Christopher sets out to make sense of what happened to his neighbour's dog and ultimately solves a family mystery and finds strength he didn't know he had. Started listening to this on BorrowBox audio but the narrator's voice made me think of a character much younger than fifteen - much preferred this on paper.
31. The Only Plane in the Sky by Garrett M. Graff
The oral history of 9/11, this has previously received positive reviews on here and I also thought this was an excellent read. I expected this to feel like an important book, to find it powerful and at times emotional, but in addition to all of that I was surprised just how compelling it was which I think is a measure of the author's skill in editing, sequencing and linking together the individual stories into an extraordinary book.
32. A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams
A seasonal, summery novel set in 1930s north east USA. We follow two timelines in alternate chapters. In 1931 Lily is introduced to Nick Greenwald by her friend Budgie and immediately falls for him. In 1938, Lily is on holiday in a Rhode Island coastal resort with her mother, sister and aunt when her estranged friend Budgie arrives with her new husband...Nick Greenwald. What happened between the protagonists in 1931 and what secrets will come to light in 1938? I really liked this, it would absolutely fit the bill as a beach read for me. I figured out one plot twist and think the blurb on the back of the book gives away more than it should, but neither detracted from my enjoyment.
I was halfway through Sixteen Horses on audio when a part of the plot veered uncomfortably close to real life in our household, so it's been on hold for a couple of weeks but I plan to return to it this week. Also enjoying The Giver of Stars on paper.

Some of my latest reads:

A Very Nice Rejection Letter: Diary Of A Novelist by Chris Paling

This is interesting in that it’s a useful insight into what it’s really like trying to make money as an author. A lot of time seems to be spent having meetings with people and sending emails that never seem to come to anything - and unfortunately that’s not all that interesting to actually read about. This picks up a bit in the second half when he talks about his ill health. I enjoyed his book about working in libraries that I read a couple of years ago, but this was a bit disappointing.

A Room Made Of Leaves by Kate Grenville

Someone (sorry, I forget who), read this upthread and wasn’t that impressed, but I quite liked it. It’s the fictionalised diary of one of the real early British settlers in Australia. I do think this makes it all sound easier than it must have really been, and I also agree with the previous poster that the device where the author introduces the story saying these are real diaries found in an old farmhouse and then at the end saying they’re not real I made them up is annoying and pointless. I enjoyed the story though.

A Theatre For Dreamers by Polly Samson

Someone (Stokey?) recommended this to me after I read Charmian Cliff’s memoir of living on Greek islands. This is a novel featuring Erica, a young woman who visits Hydra in 1960 and gets caught up in the lifestyle of Cliff’s family and Leonard Cohen who also lived there at the same time. This is fictional but loosely based on real events and (obviously) some real characters. I enjoyed this and kept having to remind myself that this was a novel not a memoir! The fact that it featured real people who’s memoir I had recently read made me feel this was real too. Thanks to whoever recommended it, I’m glad I read it.