50 Book Challenge 2022 Part Two

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the second thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2022, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, it’s not too late to join, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

If possible, please can you embolden your titles (and maybe authors as well) of the books you've read or going to read? It makes it much easier to keep track, especially when the threads move quickly at this time of the year.

The first thread of the year is here.

What are you reading?

For any Michael Connolly/Bosch fans, his latest, The Dark Hours, is one of the Daily Deals today.

So is Great Circle, Maggie Shipstead's novel which was on the Booker shortlist.

Oh yes Great Circle was one of my books of last year, I recommend it!

Sorry, back again

9: The Life Project - Helen Pearson

I started this last year when quite a few people were recommending it, but couldn't really get into it. I'm reluctant to mark things down as a DNF unless they're really terrible and this certainly isn't, so I picked it up again and finished it.

It's very interesting - a history of the cohort studies into babies born in Britain at different periods (roughly 12 years apart, in fact, though with some gaps) starting in 1946. The studies are all still going, the most recent having begun at the millennium. The story of the challenges faced by these unprecedented and epic studies is fascinating in itself (each one has fought against being shut down on a more or less continuous basis as funding waxes and wanes), and the information yielded as they track the minutiae of the lives involved is incredible.

Unfortunately, though, I wasn't really feeling this...maybe I (shallowly) would have welcomed more of the real-life stories sprinkled through the book, of which there weren't many; maybe I just wasn't in the mood. It's undeniably a great subject and well-told so I think this was my fault for not gelling with it, rather than anything else.

@VikingNorthUtsire - I also enjoyed you review of Station Eleven. There is a TV adaptation - I think it's available in the UK on Starz Play this week but I can see BBC2 or CH4 picking it up. It makes quite a few changes to the book e.g. Jeevan and Kirsten are together much longer , the Prophet story is changed but it keeps the same core message. At first I thought it was really pretentiousness and meandering but was blubbing by the last episode (and I have a heart of stone) so if you get the chance I'd watch it.

3. The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honoree Fanonne This is a bestseller in the U.S., beloved by Oprah and being hailed as "The Great American Novel". It tells the story of teenaged Ailey Pearl Garfield growing up between her elite relatives in the city and her summers spent with poor relations in Georgia and the pressure put on her to excel. It has flashback episodes that reveal the genealogical history of her maternal line interspersed with some "song" sections quoting passages of the work of W.E.B. Du Bois (a founder of the NAACP).

It's an absolute brick of a book at over 800 pages and although I'm sure it will sweep the board with awards, make a great TV series and become an instant "classic." I have to say it didn't blow me away. It kind of reminded me of Roots, had elements of The Colour Purple(which it does reference) and Beloved. It had some powerful writing but overalI I found it a slog, overly long, expository and often (dare I whisper it) dull. IMHO like a lot of the fashionable huge tomes these days it could have done with an editor prepared to wield their big red pen! Then it could have been incredible (but I'm sure many people think it's incredible just as it is).

1. The genius of birds by Jennifer Ackerman

On paper this should have been an enjoyable book about an interesting subject, but I wasn’t quite feeling it. There’s interesting snippets of information about how bird brains work and some of the fact about birds’ talents for navigation, memory, innovation and social networking are truly astounding, but I felt there was no real narrative to hold it all together. Plus the description of some of the experiments made me feel a bit queasy. I’m planning to read The Sea is Not Made of Water by Adam Nicolson next, while also still reading Curlew Moon by Mary Cowell, which is a much better example of an engaging, well written book about a natural science subject.

7. The Man in the Brown Suit, by Agatha Christie
On the last thread, I airily talked about how you could start with any AC given her consistency of tone. Well, I was wrong - this is quite different to Miss Marple or Poirot, and we don't sit around pondering with our little grey cells - we leap on trains and get lured into traps (can't see Miss Marple falling for it) and overall it's closer to John Buchan than the standard AC. I'm glad I was warned by others on this thread, so I found it interesting to read something a bit different by her. Wouldn't have a fancied a full series along these lines though.

On the wikipedia page for The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois it says the author's editor encouraged her to expand the novel from its original version which was half the length so we can definitely blame the editor for the length!

Great Circle was one of my favourite reads last year. Not perfect but I enjoyed it more and more as I read. Definitely a bargain at 99p!

Interesting Janina

4.Bad Relations- Cressida Connolly
I devoured this book over 2 days last week when I was laid low with migraine. It was just perfect for my state of mind and impaired capabilities. The story follows two branches of William Gale's family.

Gale is an officer who wins the V.C. in the Crimea campaign in the 1850's but is altered on his return and wants to change his life and divorce his first wife. The story then jumps forward to 1977 and explores the story of an Australian teenager, Stephen, one of Gale's descendants through his first wife when he comes to stay with descendants of Gale's second wife who live in Cornwall. The action jumps forward one last time to the near present as Stephen's sister, now retired visits the Cornish family in search of answers and to take a controversial action. The narrative just flowed and I wasn't sure where it was going to take me. It was a really satisfying read with historical detail, humour and heartbreak and was a nice compact size!

I’m going to have to get Great Circle now I think, despite saying I wasn’t buying anything else.

I’ve slowed right down - I’m on The Moonflower Murders - I enjoyed the Magpie Murders and it was one of the few books I actually managed to finish whilst pregnant with cotton wool for brains. But I’m not getting on with this one so well somehow. I’ve finished this month’s chapters for the Hard Times readalong, and am not really getting anywhere with my audible listen at the moment just because I’m not finding the time to listen much. I’ve got The Man in the Brown Suit from the library staring at me but following the reviews I’m not sure I can be bothered.

What I have been doing is listening to Cranford on BBC sounds - just a chapter or two before bed. I don’t know if I’ll be able to count it in my total this year, I drift in and out of it and often fall asleep before the end of the chapter and have to go back the next night, but it’s lovely and I can’t think why I didn’t like it back when I first read the book years ago - possibly I was just too young to appreciate it.

I'm still plodding on with book 3 Murderous Contagion by Mary Dobson. It's really interesting look at diseases and I've learnt so much but it is a thinky book and I keep having to look up definitions of words (yay for kindle dictionary).

Think it was recommended here a couple of years ago so thanks for the kindle deal heads up back then!

@eitak22

I'm still plodding on with book 3 Murderous Contagion by Mary Dobson. It's really interesting look at diseases and I've learnt so much but it is a thinky book and I keep having to look up definitions of words (yay for kindle dictionary).

Think it was recommended here a couple of years ago so thanks for the kindle deal heads up back then!

I think it was me. Yes, definitely a thinky book and some diseases are more interesting than others!

Remus Lots I hadn't heard of or thought I knew about and was wrong....like TB having more than one type!

It's definitely informative.

I just found my review. Here's my favourite line from it:
"There were too many worms and mosquitoes, and not enough surgery, syphilis or scurvy."

My first DNF.

Londonstani, Gautam Maukani

I actually really like this book. It’s written entirely in ‘rude boy’ vernacular amongst Asian teens in Hounslow around the early 00s. I grew up in East London around similar groups. There is so much toxic masculinity and violence that I stopped. Not so much because of that, I think if I had read it per-kids this would be brilliant, but I have two teen boys and a pre-teen and I just can’t take it so I’ve stopped and I’m actually going to get rid of the book because it’s just made me feel all uneasy.

I've had a second DNF today. I started it last night and wasn't sure. Then today was a definite no.

It's a health and fitness book called The Primal Blueprint by Mark Sisson. The thing is, I agreed with a lot of what he said, but the way he'd made his points was just irksome. He lost me a bit when he started on about how we are all soooooo lazy and wheat is poison blah blah, the worst humans ever. But when he started describing a pretend day with his made up primal man named Grok and how his child doesn't complain about long walks and his partner is a hottie (actual word). 'Like a ballerina and also an ironwoman triathlete in one's or something like that. It was weird and it was the end for me and Mark I'm afraid. But I did then skim read the bits where he told me what to eat and how to exercise and I'm going to try it out, so maybe it's had the desired effect! But I mean really. Grok? Grok's wife is a hottie-ballerina-triathlete? Give over Mark. Give over.

On to better things now I hope with a book recommended on here last year.

1. Up in the attic Pam Ayers

Collection of poems.

A bit of a cheat as it’s short, but I’m trying to read poetry but light poetry! I find that if I’m not ready to sleep but not awake enough for my book I read a couple of poems. It’s a fine collection, what you would expect for Pam.

@SarahJessicaParker3 I’m impressed you got as far as you did! I think I might have thrown that book across the room at ‘hottie’.

8. The Antidote: Happiness for People who Can't Stand Positive Thinking, by Oliver Burkeman
Exploration of Stoicism, Buddhist ideas of non-attachment, Mexican ease with death and how we can become happier by not chasing happiness. Engaging, although it doesn't feel particularly new - maybe because I used to read his columns, or because the book has been around for a decade and others have explored similar ideas (and of course some of the ideas have been around for millennia). I think the principles are pretty mainstream now rather than fighting against the tide. You'll feel better after reading this than you will by repeating self-affirmations and engaging in endless positive visualisation.

22. Crooked Heart - Lissa Evans

My first of hers and will definitely read more, this was great! Set during WW2, lonely child Noel is evacuated to stay with Vera Sedge who pulls him into her money making schemes. Darkly funny with some great characters. I understand there is a sequel so will look that out first.

23. The Trapped Wife by Samantha Hayes

I read one a while ago by this author which was great, so bought a load more of hers. Unfortunately most of them have been rubbish and this was no different. I definitely won’t be buying any more by her but I may still have a couple of unread ones on my kindle (and once I’ve paid I want to at least give them a go).

24. Rachel’s Holiday by Marian Keyes

Reread for about the hundredth time in advance of the sequel coming out in about 3 weeks.

Chessie IIRC there is a sort of prequel - Old Baggage (about how Noel comes to be born) which was written after Crooked Heart and a sequel V for Victory following Vera and Noel a few years on. I'd love to read them all again.

Thanks Sap.

@SapatSea

Chessie IIRC there is a sort of prequel - Old Baggage (about how Noel comes to be born) which was written after Crooked Heart and a sequel V for Victory following Vera and Noel a few years on. I'd love to read them all again.

I read these last year, starting with Old Baggage, which is still my favourite. I hadn't known at the time that it was written after Crooked Heart. I loved Mattie Simpkin, such a wonderful character. In fact I just loved all of them. Thoroughly recommended.

I also read Their Finest Hour and a Half, which is another of Lissa Evans's novels set in WW2, but not connected to the other three. I enjoyed it, but not as much. I watched the film of it recently, which was very good and (I hesitate to say) was better than the book imho