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?

Or "courageuse" possibly.

😂 @highlandcoo good that they recognised the effort you went to! I’m not sure I could make any useful contribution to a French book group at this stage! My interactions are mostly at the school gate at the moment, and I try to get French DH to deal with difficult phone calls!

[quote highlandcoo]@DuPainDuVinDuFromage, moving to France .. how brilliant! I live for part of the year in France and ventured along to the local book group in the village last year.

Instead of all reading and discussing the same book, the meeting consists of everyone reporting on what they've recently read. Which is quite good for getting ideas for what to read. I attempted a description of Orgueil et Préjugés and they very kindly gave me a round of applause then one lady commented "Ce n'était pas correct mais c'était courageux" [/quote]
That sounds so typically French

I read quite a lot of non-fiction and actually have two by women on the go at the moment:
Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez, on the gaps in data collection and analysis which disadvantage women
Kindred by Rebecca Wragg Sykes, on Neanderthals - but am struggling with the level of detail in this one.

In recent years I’ve also enjoyed books by Mary Beard (Roman history), Sue Black (forensic anthropology), Patricia Wiltshire (pollen forensics - bit of a pattern there), Alice Roberts (human prehistory and anatomy), Suzanne O’Sullivan (neuroscience), and Clare Pollard (Fierce Bad Rabbits, a history of children’s picture books).

Last night finished:
12. Vinegar Girl - Anne Tyler
Loose retelling of The Taming of the Shrew as part of the Hogarth Shakespeare series, and my first Anne Tyler. Kate is a blunt young woman who keeps house for her eccentric scientist father, Dr Battista, who attempts to manoeuvre her into a marriage with his postdoc Pyotr so he can stay in the US. It was gently amusing and a light quick read, but the ending was far too neat and implausible. I think I’d prefer a spiky feminist retelling of TToTS over this romance version . Still, I think this is generally judged one of Anne Tyler’s weaker ones, so I’ll definitely try another - I know my mum rates The Accidental Tourist, any other recommendations?

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

Thanks for the insights.

Oh god @LethargeMarg I hated The Light Perpetual other than the first few pages, which I thought were magnificent. Golden Hill is worth a read though - much more fun.

Yes such a strong start and great concept but just didn't work out. I'll consider giving golden hill a read I've got a sample of it on my kindle

I’ve also got a non-fiction by a women on the go The Golden Thread - Kassia St Clair.

@LadybirdDaphne

I read quite a lot of non-fiction and actually have two by women on the go at the moment: Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez, on the gaps in data collection and analysis which disadvantage women Kindred by Rebecca Wragg Sykes, on Neanderthals - but am struggling with the level of detail in this one.

In recent years I’ve also enjoyed books by Mary Beard (Roman history), Sue Black (forensic anthropology), Patricia Wiltshire (pollen forensics - bit of a pattern there), Alice Roberts (human prehistory and anatomy), Suzanne O’Sullivan (neuroscience), and Clare Pollard (Fierce Bad Rabbits, a history of children’s picture books).

Last night finished:
12. Vinegar Girl - Anne Tyler
Loose retelling of The Taming of the Shrew as part of the Hogarth Shakespeare series, and my first Anne Tyler. Kate is a blunt young woman who keeps house for her eccentric scientist father, Dr Battista, who attempts to manoeuvre her into a marriage with his postdoc Pyotr so he can stay in the US. It was gently amusing and a light quick read, but the ending was far too neat and implausible. I think I’d prefer a spiky feminist retelling of TToTS over this romance version . Still, I think this is generally judged one of Anne Tyler’s weaker ones, so I’ll definitely try another - I know my mum rates The Accidental Tourist, any other recommendations?

I love Anne Tyler. When I worked at a call centre twenty odd years ago I worked my way through most of her books in between calls Breathing lessons I think won the Pulitzer and is fantastic but i also love 'digging to America' and 'the amateur marriage'. In fact the only book of hers I've not adored is a recent one 'a spool of blue thread' .

I'm enjoying Britain's Novel Landscapes on More 4 now. First episode is on Jane Austen's Hampshire.

The discussion of French reading is making me feel like I should try something fairly simple in French and see how I get on. My degree was French (and history) and I also spent some time there on a teaching placement, once upon a time I was fairly fluent but it’s been a lot of years since then and even ‘rusty’ would be generous I think. The audible suggestion is genius - why didn’t I think of that?

Similarly I always want to try reading a novel in Spanish, I am not and was never fluent, but I could manage something not too complex I think, if anyone has good suggestions?

I did a year of reading only women once. I didn’t miss the men. I do try to read at least as many if not more by women still.

I read Golden Hill recently, I didn’t love it but it was enjoyable, and it went places I wasn’t expecting.

I don’t read very much non-fiction at all.

So far this year:

Finished Christmas Chronicles, Nigel Slater, loved it and cooked several things from it.

All the Lonely People, Mike Gayle, enjoyed

Tall Bones, Anna Bailey, loved that, her writing style is great. "It is a small-town sort of night – the last that Whistling Ridge will see for many years to come, although nobody knows this yet – in the kind of town where coyotes chew on stray cigarette butts and packs of boys go howling at the moon."

The Sober Diaries, Clare Pooley, not bad, honest

Currently reading Worst Idea Ever, Jane Fallon, really enjoying. I often explain the plots of the book I'm reading to my teenage sons and they are both interested in hearing how this one plays out too, it features a scenario we can all see getting ourselves into....

@Taswama

7. A Place of Execution, Val McDermid

Wow. Just wow.

Just finished this one. Set in the Peak District in the 60s, its the story of a teenage girl's disappearance and the police's efforts to find out what has happened to her. The main characters are DI George Bennett on his first big case after being fast tracked as a graduate recruit and Tommy Clough, his colleague. The descriptions of the countryside, the police force at the time and the portraits of the mother and others are fantastic. The plot develops slowly, as the police gather evidence to support their (and my) first suspect. But will it be enough to convict and is there more to this than meets the eye?
I have read several Val McDermid's previously but this one is definitely one of the best.

I see this is part of a trilogy, are you going to read the others?

For non-fiction by women if you're interested in science writing I loved Dorothy Hodgkin A Life by Georgina Ferry and DH enjoyed A Computer called Leo by the same author. She's also written a biography of Max Perutz which I've not read but want to.

For something more classic Nancy Mitford wrote a wonderfully readable biography of Madame de Pompadour, and her biography of Louis XIV, The Sun King was a best seller.

Interesting to hear so many saying they’re consciously trying to read more by female authors. I’ve found for the last few years my reading has naturally been about a third male authors and two thirds female authors, so I’m actually trying to read more by men now to redress the balance a bit. I’m definitely not excluding female authors though, I would find a policy to only read one or the other far too restrictive.

1. The Girl With The Louding Voice - Abi Daré I really enjoyed this, listened on audible read by Adjoa Andoh.

Another good female-authored non-fiction: Stiff: the curious lives of human cadavers by Mary Roach. It’s about what happens to dead bodies - very interesting and readable, and not too icky despite the subject matter!

Thanks for all the non fiction suggestions!

It is intended to be an exercise for a year, for the following reasons:

• to make me seek out female non fiction authors as I noticed my non fiction (except autobiographies) was mostly male.

When looking for non fiction ideas most of the top 10 bestsellers and Audible picks are by male authors.

• to make me read some more female fiction authors that I've never read such as Virginia Woolf and Toni Morrison. I did a book quiz for International Women's Day last year and felt I had a lot of gaps.

I also have a personal target to read at least one book in a foreign language (French or German) per month. Just to keep my language up as I don't get to use it at work.

Last year I read 60 books. 30 by men. 28 by women. 2 were short story compilations.
35 fiction. 25 non fiction. 10 in French. 2 in German.

I'm currently listening to Mary Beard and slowly reading a biography of Angela Merkel in German.

@Iamblossom . I didn't know it was part of a trilogy. I'm struggling to see how it could have a sequel.
I won't be actively seeking out the sequel. I don't really buy new books (although I received a dozen that I'd asked for at Christmas/ birthday). I pick them up in charity shops, get them passed on from my mum or MIL or friends and occasionally borrow from the library. I also 'share' an audible subscription with DS1 which is mostly used on non fiction for him (such as the Mary Beard I'm currently listening to).

@AliasGrape .
Agatha Christie is good to read in a foreign language.

Interesting to read your reasons for reading female non-fiction, Taswama. For the past couple of years I've read 50:50 fiction and non-fiction (I just alternate my choices), and like Chessie I find I have to consciously seek out books by male writers, or else my list would be very female-heavy! Maybe I'm naturally drawn to them somehow, or maybe I'm just more interested in the sort of non-fiction that tends to be written by women.....eg social/domestic history and biographies of writers and artists.

"I'm only reading female authors this year, which is no problem for fiction but trickier for non-fiction"

On the contrary, I find non-fiction by female authors a lot more readable than their fiction where the topic tends to be some uninteresting everyday dilemma and the prose whiny and overly focused on everyone's feelings.

Here are some excellent non-fiction books by female authors that I can heartily recommend:

Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed The World by Laura Spinney

The Epigenetics Revolution: How Modern Biology is Rewriting Our Understanding of Genetics, Disease and Inheritance by Nessa Carey

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan

Handel in London by Jane Glover

Peindre et Dire les Passions: La Gestuelle Baroque aux XVIIe et XVIIIe Siècles by Nicole Rouillé

Queens of the Kingdom - The Women of Saudi Arabia Speak by Nicola Sutcliff

LadybirdDaphne I've gotten into Ann Tyler's books in the last year or so but think I've not gotten to her best ones yet going by others' reviews. I'd recommend not bothering with Morgan's Passing, unless you're happy to read about a middle aged man-child who happily cheats on his wife and acts like life owes him something.

12. Death On The Nile - Agatha Christie

February's suggested read for the Read Christie 2022. It's one of her better known Poirot novels and it's a pretty good story, although one that I know really well. It was a fun re-read. DH & I have booked to go and see the new film at the weekend, and I'm looking forward to it. I watched the Peter Ustinov one over Christmas, which was very enjoyable so it will be interesting to see how they compare.

@AliasGrape I'm currently reading a Lucky Luke comic in French. I have a degree in French but I'm rusty so that seems like a good level to start on. I'm 2/3 of the way through.

Ooh, I quite fancy the Kenneth Brannagh Death on the Nile film, LittleDiaries although it's not showing here till next week. I thought they did a good job with the Murder on the Orient Express film previously.

13 Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe

I do love a piece of thoughtful non-fiction written by a New Yorker journalist, and this was a good one. I listened to it on Audible, and it was narrated by the author who did a great job (except for an excruciating mispronunciation of Dulwich when referring to the Picture Gallery, but I'll let him off!).

This is the story of the Sackler family, beneficiaries of the billions of dollars that their pharma company, Purdue Pharma, made from Oxycontin. This is not – for the most part – a scientific narrative and it doesn’t really try to detail the pain and suffering that Oxycontin and other opioids unleashed on communities across North America although the shadow of it looms large in the last half of the book. This is more about the family – how they made their money, how they spent their money (on vast philanthropic gestures – museum wings, medical schools, libraries etc) and how they made sure that the money kept pouring in to Purdue Pharma even as the warning bells rang loud and clear. In his telling there is no question of culpability – they knew that Oxycontin was addictive, and they went to great lengths to ensure that doctors would continue to prescribe it even as the evidence mounted that this was far from the low-danger, addiction-free drug they chose to portray it as. The dynamic between the three brothers – Arthur, Raymond and Mortimer – was particularly interesting. Arthur was the driver behind the initial family dynasty, and although he was a doctor he made a fortune in medical advertising, particularly in pushing Valium to the post-war generation. He used that money to help his brothers buy Purdue, and although he never had any involvement in Purdue, the lessons he learned were clearly taken to heart by the brothers and adopted across the business. It's fascinating on the role that wealth plays in American life and institutions, and the consequences of wealth on people's values and beliefs .

Towards the end, he quotes from The Great Gatsby – “they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made”. And this sums it up – as told in this book these are bad and careless people who didn’t trouble themselves with the little people, or the consequences of their actions.