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?

1. Hunting Unicorns by Bella Pollen.

Read for book group. Written almost twenty years ago and it hasn't aged well. Maggie is an American TV journalist sent to the UK to interview members of the aristocracy in their crumbling country houses for a documentary. She clashes with Rory, who runs an agency advising said aristocrats on money-making schemes to help them hang on to their estates. They rub each other up the wrong way, they fall out, they make up, there are amusing incidents, he turns out to be surprisingly (!) closely related to her favourite and amusing posh couple .. the ending is telegraphed a mile away.
This was originally written as a film script and you can really tell. However, there are some good characters and interesting observations among the rather dated corny stuff which show that Bella Pollen could have written something much better.
I'll be passing it on to my friend's elderly mum who will love it.

@GrannieMainland I added The Sanatorium to my wish list the other day as thought it looked interesting but following your review I've just deleted it. I liked the premise but nothing frustrates me more than loose ends in a book so will give it a miss (also not keen on the graphic murder aspect)

1. Eva Luna by Isabel Allende.

Miles better than my previous read. This book is going to be discussed on World Book Club with Harriet Gilbert soon ( I'm finding it difficult to establish the exact date but will track it down via the podcast).

I've come across Isabel Allende quite late, reading and enjoying The House of the Spirits last year. Eva Luna has a very similar feel, possibly lighter on the magic realism which is not a bad thing for me.

Eva is orphaned young and her life is full of adversity; she moves from one eccentric adult to another, her only power lying in her imagination and story-telling ability. Eva's adventures unfold against the backdrop of an unnamed South American country struggling with corruption and a dictatorship which impacts on Eva's life.

This is a novel rich in language and plot .. more happens in one page than in a chapter of most books. If you can suspend your disbelief, you are taken into Isabel Allende's quite amazing world.

I have A Long Petal of the Sea to read .. but I need a break and to read something less intense first.

Loved your Boris description Piggy . Talk about history repeating itself ...

Ooh found you guys. Thanks for the new thread @south I’ve fallen behind but will catch up with the new thread this weekend. My list:

1. Troubled Blood Robert Galbraith.
2. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen.
3. Heartstopper Volume 2 Alice Osemann.
4. Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi.

I’m reading Dracula and The Madness of Grief currently and enjoying both.

@Piggywaspushed that description made me chuckle this morning. Such a similar likeness

@highlandcoo I loved House of the Spirits but wasn't a fan of A Long Petal Of The Sea. I felt like she was trying to cram too much in, it was a bit over researched, and it meant the characters felt a bit flat. I'd like to try Eva Luna.

1. Archangel - Robert Harris. Set in Russia in the mid 90s, this is about an English professor who thinks he has found Stalin's notebook that he kept just before his death in 1953. It's quite a page turner and the descriptions of Russia both the landscapes and the people are well conceived. I was in Romania around the same time and was quite reminiscent of that time. Its also quite interesting given what had happened in the last 20 years and the current posturing on the Ukranian border. It made me want to learn more about Russian history, and was good to read alongside the War And Peace read along.

4. An Invincible Summer by Mariah Stewart This was an Amazon first reads freebie and I seem to remember it was from a month when none of the books particularly appealed so I settled for this one which is not my normal type of book at all. It's still not my type of book. We follow recently-widowed Maggie and her two adult daughters, Grace and Natalie. Maggie returns to her hometown for her 40th high school reunion, which sets off a chain of events where Maggie must face the secrets from her past.

There was a lot of talk about "the worst day of Maggie's life" and I honestly wasn't interested in finding out what happened on this mysterious day. The author uses that lazy writing style where she tells the reader a characters history by having the characters have a completely unbelievable conversation with lots of "as you know" because it's all things the characters would already 100% know and not need to discuss but the author can't find a more subtle way to shoehorn the history in. The dialogue felt too stilted and unnatural throughout and I felt the personalities of the characters weren't differentiated enough and all blurred into one. The ending was also just a bit too neat. I love a happy ending but this was a bit too perfect

Here is my list

1. The Manningtree Witches - A.K. Blakemore
2. Girl A - Abigail Dean
3. Unsettled Ground - Claire Fuller
4. Once There Were Wolves - Charlotte McConahgy

Hi - bit late to the party but can I join?
Surfacing - Kathleen Jamie
The Wild Silence - Raynor Winn
Surfacing was a gem - great writing about Orkney and her experiences on digs.

Now I'm feeling the pressure. Hope you all enjoy Kirstin Lavrandatter as much as I did!

7. The Mitford Scandal - Jessica Fellowes

Second in a series of mysteries loosely based on true events, but fictionalised to feature the Mitford sisters.

This was okay, nothing special. It's classic bedtime reading territory for me - not exciting enough to keep me awake but not so boring as to allow my mind to wander. There is a lot of exposition. If you forget which Mitford sister is which, never fear, Jessica Fellowes will be along any minute with a reminder. The ending can be best described as a duchess ex machina.

11. For richer, for poorer by Victoria Coren. I quite liked this fairly quick memoir of her rise in the world of Poker. I like watching only connect and seeing Victoria Coren Mitchell in QI, so knew she played professional poker and then found out there was a book. Which is good because i don't know anything about poker. I still son't know a huge amount, but definitely got a feel for the poker world. I really like the end of every chapter description of how a hand is played and the psychology of it all

3) The Ghost Tree by Barbara Erskine Physical book from the charity shop. This is about Ruth who has to sort through her estranged father’s possessions as he has died. She finds a diary from her ancestor, Thomas. Ruth is pulled into a story she can’t escape. She is in battle to keep her father’s house with a man called Timothy who has just planted himself there and says he is related. I found this a very drawn out story. Half way through and it is a fairly lengthy book, I thought should I continue. However I had read 300 pages and for that reason decided to read on. I liked the ending and how it all unfolded and on reflection I do think it was a good story, just so drawn out. It seemed to me like a story of cat and mouse though. Having said that I do recommend and give this a 3/5, I am sure Barbara Erskine fans will love this and I will pass this on to my DM who is one.

Have a few on the go at the minute Victorian City Everyday Life in Dicken’s London by Judith Flanders Kindle read, recommended from someone on here but can’t remember who. Will be dipping into this every now and then.

The Hotel, Ghost Stories with a feminist twist by Daisy Johnson audio from the library only 3 hours but perfect before bed

Have also just borrowed The Last Library by Freya Sampson to listen to.

And plan on reading next The Couple at No9 by Claire Douglas decided to treat myself to this just before Christmas so will start this tonight

1. The Christmas chronicles by Nigel Slater

Diary entries from November to February about Christmas. Lovely book with beautiful photographs. I got it out the library several times and when I couldn't this year my husband bought me my own copy. Will definitely return to this in November.

1. Paper towns by John Green

Read for book club. Young adult book about a boy captivated my girl who then goes missing. Really enjoyed the first part and it was giving me sex education vibes but like the boy I was bereft when the interesting girl left taking the fun with her. A very disappointing read.

Next I have Possession to read if I can cope with the small font.

@MamaNewtNewt There are no other books. There is only the Tower.

1. You. Caroline Kepnes
2. The Only Plane in the Sky. Garrett Graff
3. Bill Bryson for the Love Hearts appeal. Audio
4. The Gilded Ones. Namina Forna

Read You on the back of the TV series. Main character is Joe and it’s from his narrative about his obsession with Beck. It was a bit of a drag. In the TV series I liked Joe, however in the book his narrative found it very tediously repetitive and not likeable at all. I preserved though and it got better near the end.

Found the Gilded Ones when looking bf or something else on BorrowBox and glad I did. This is a YA fantasy book. Duka is a 16 year old girl, when girls reach 16 they are cut to check they are pure, those with gold blood are seen as demons and are executed. When Duka is found to be impure she is given the choice, die or fight for the Emperor to rid the kingdom of ‘deathshreakers’, monsters who attack the humans. Really enjoyed this, it was an easy flowing book.

1. The Red House Mystery by A A Milne

An intriguing locked room Mystery, solved neatly by an amateur sleuth and his sidekick friend who happen to arrive on the scene moments after a murder has been committed. It was quite enjoyable. If you like Agatha Christie, and golden age crime mysteries and thrillers in general then you'll probably enjoy this one too.

Goodness these threads move fast!

How are people making a list are you all typing it out each time?

I've got a few ideas from this thread for my TBR

I'm currently on book number 4 which is the fell" Sarah moss*

Plants I keep a word document or similar on my phone and copy it when a I need to. I add the relevant punctuation marks to bold or italicise the books once it's put on here.

24. I Belong Here: A Journey Along the backbone of Britain - Anita Sethi The author explores her sense of belonging in the UK as a brown woman and being from the North. After a racist attack, she connects with the outdoors and decides to walk the Pennine Way as a way of healing She looks at access to the outdoors as a class and race issue and examines what walking can do as a form of therapy. This is really interesting. It isn't as strong on the nature writing as some of a similar genre, but still evokes a strong sense of place.

I DNF The Teller of Secrets - Bisi Adjapon which was a coming of age of a half Ghanaian half Nigerian girl living in Ghana in the 60s at a time of political upheaval. She starts to notice the structural sexism in society and sets out to combat it. I got about 50% in but found it hard going. It's stream of consciousness of a young girl starting from age 9, but feels too adult in outlook. She's also very sexualised, which may indeed have been part of the female experience at the time, but it was written in away that was far too much for this Victorian prude.

@Plantsandpuddlesuits I have a spreadsheet as I'm an excel geek and like to record stats like % kindle/audio/hard copy or male/female author split.

[quote MamaNewtNewt]@Plantsandpuddlesuits I have a spreadsheet as I'm an excel geek and like to record stats like % kindle/audio/hard copy or male/female author split. [/quote]
I'm an old fashioned pen and paper kind of woman i have a special notebook for all reading notes and have done for a few years now

Instead of this being numer three, it's a DNF. Fuzz: When Nature Breaks The Law, by Mary Roach. What happens when animals and nature break the law - a leopard killing a field worker, or a bear breaking into a building and stealing food? This is clearly well researched and fairly interesting, but by the time this had to go back to the library I was only three chapters in and reluctant to continue, so I've given up for now. Might try again another time.

I keep a word document or similar on my phone and copy it when I need to. I add the relevant punctuation marks to bold or italicise the books once it's put on here

I do exactly the same as Fortuna 👆

Hi, I joined one of the 50 books threads in the middle of last year and wasn;t very good at consistent posting though I did try to read posts and respond to some questions or comments on books where I had been reading the same books (and someone else on thread had usually read most of the recent publications and some of the rediscoveries and other older books),

I did post on Thread 1 for this year at New Year but have been a bit distracted since then by other stuff. I have been reading though there will never be a day when I don't wish I'd pages/got through some of the books I've been reading faster - because there are so many other books on my shelves/in boxes/on my Kindle or in the real and digital library collections I borrow from.

I will never catch up or keep up but hope to chip in regularly, and comment on some of the reviews and posts here.