26-ish books for 2023

[Tinkhasflown]

A shiny new thread for 2023. There didn't appear to be one do hope it's ok that I have created it this year.

All welcome and note 26 is just a number. Everyone can set their own target and you are welcome here even if you only read 3 books a year.

I personally count the larger novel style books I read to my children and audio books I listen to. Others don't and there are no rules.

I look forward to all your suggestions again this year.

1)Case Histories by Kate Atkinson
2)Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski
3) My Name Is Why by Lemn Sissay
4) Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhy
5) The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie.
6) The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh
7) The Prison Doctor by Dr Amanda Brown.
8) Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
9) Difficult Women by Helen Lewis: A History of Feminism In 11 Fights.
10) The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson.
11) Crooked House by Agatha Christie. An easy read, fast paced, regular plot twists and good fun - which is what was needed after unsettling Hill House. Although another massive house with many sections again and a cooped up cast. Not sure the police procedural aspects stand up to much scrutiny, or the part about the very major information being with held at the end. I suspected who dunnit but had someone else or 2 as possibles in mind as well, so it wasn't overly obvious. Nice change to have a motive that's a bit different from the norm.

Book 8 Echo of The Dead Alex Gray

This was a good month for me. I managed to read 5 books. In the last week I’ve been read 2 nearly 600 pages books !

6- Counterfeit by Kirstin Chein. Something different and quite good. Mad thinking this is kind of true !
7- One true loves. My first Taylor Jenkins. Book. Really liked it , tho sometimes I was too disappointed with the main character
8- Every summer after - by Carley Fortune. Quite a basic book but easy el read
9 and 10. By Lucy Score Things we never got over and Things we hide from the light. Omg I want to meet the morgan brothers tho I think 570 is quite a lot for this books and parts of it I kind of skipped them because I felt they didn’t add anything to the story.

mu plan was to read 15 by the end of the year and I’m on 10 now so probably I’ll read 26 by the end of the year :)

34 Just One More Question. Q interesting memoir from a neurologist.

35 Disease & History: From ancient times to Covid-19. Fascinating.

Break up for easter tomorrow and the weather looks fairly rubbish so I shall be making full use of my kindle unlimited membership!

1 The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman
2 The Parasites by Daphne du Maurier
3 lessons in Chemistry
4 touch of love by Jonathan Coe
5 The bird in the bamboo cage by Heather Webb
6 The man who died twice by Richard Osman
7 The Glass Blowers by Daphne du Maurier
8 The travelling cat chronicles by Hiro Arkawa. Lovely but sad.
9 Red Birds by Mohammed Hanif.

1. Hungry - Grace Dent.

Oh my goodness! I laughed out loud at times as she could have been describing my childhood and she did it with such honesty and humour. And I wept at the end. The similarities of someone's life, someone who has a life so far from mine, was deeply poignant. I would recommend this to anyone.

Not quite finished yet with
6.Fairy Tale - Stephen King but I read the short
7.Death and Papa Noel -Ian Moore and started on
8.Bad Mormon - Heather Gay
I’m just aiming to read about 2 books a month like last year and I’m on track with that . I have added 4 books to my bedroom book drawer that had just 2 left and I finished one of them the short one already . I started this as conscious effort to read more and stare at screens less . I have worked through my stash in the last year I had for ages .

I think I'm going to abandon my number 12, which I very rarely do. It's Queen of the Tambourine by Jane Gardam. I'm near 70 pages in and really not taking to it but hate giving up. Be interested to hear other views if anyone else has read it.

@Breathmiller I loved Hungry too

Pourmeanotherwine · 31/03/2023 09:19
1 The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman
2 The Parasites by Daphne du Maurier
3 lessons in Chemistry
4 touch of love by Jonathan Coe
5 The bird in the bamboo cage by Heather Webb
6 The man who died twice by Richard Osman
7 The Glass Blowers by Daphne du Maurier
8 The travelling cat chronicles by Hiro Arkawa. Lovely but sad.
9 Red Birds by Mohammed Hanif. Enjoyed I think. Darkly funny.
10 Everyone in this room will someday be dead by Emily Austin.
Read books 8-10 quite quickly as I had a week off work to use up my leave before the end of the leave year and it was a bit rainy.
11 About to start The Helingor Sewing Club by Ella Gyland

36 Dead Serious. Memoirs of a funeral director.

37 Working stiff. Forensic pathologist's biography. Very well written.

Just starting 38 A Matter of Life and Death. Another pathologist book.

37 The radium girls.
It's a re-read but I've not read it for a couple of years.

I heartily recommend the above book if you are interested in miscarriages of justice, and real life stories. It's so sad the way a lot of the dial painters suffered and the way the companies ducked and dived to avoid being responsible for any reparations.

I'm in need of light and fluffy now, though. So
38 is an Ilona Andrews spin-off book The Iron Covenant.

Totally agree with you about Radium Girls. I listened to it last year and it just horrified me how they were treated.

I agree about The Radium Girls too, if anyone mutters to me about "Health and Safety gone mad" I tell them about this book.

12 My Life In Orange by Tim Guest. I wanted to like this memoir about growing up in a cult / commune more, but in truth long passages were just really dull. There were some huge scandals and fair play to Tim for not going to town on the more sensational aspects, but there were too many really boring or repetitive memories for me. I would actually have preferred to know more about things like the corrupt woman's laboratory in the basement full of rats and blood samples and the hit squad, rather than his toys or what field he played in. But then I suppose it was a book about him, rather than the organisation itself. Also, the time line seemed to shift about at points and it was hard to keep track then of what happened when.

10. West with Giraffes - a novel. Lynda Rutledge
    This was beautiful, i kept wishing it would be made into a film as I'd love to see it. A novel based around the true story of 2 giraffes being taken across America in 1938.

Did someone on this thread recommend it? I can't remember. Thank you of you did.

Away to look back at the thread for my next book.

This thread has been so good to help me get back into reading. I ony started in March and have read 10. I've enjoyed every one of them.

Book 39 is more of a novella.
The Lovely Drop by Darynda Jones.

9 The Glass House by Eve Chase

Pretty average but was searching for an easy read and it fulfilled this

8: Death in Heels by Kitty Murphy
Not my usual type of read but the author was a childhood friend of mine. I really enjoyed it, it was fun and fast paced. I did actually guess who the murderer was but not why.

I just finished The last to disappear, and Invisable girl, both of which I really enjoyed. I have just started no. 23, Strange Sally Diamond.

5) Difficult women. A history of feminism in 11 fights. Was promoted to get this off my TBR shelf by someone in here who recommended it. Anyway glad I did. Informative, easy to read, some chapters better than others in that they were more to the point, others drifted away at times I felt.

Now back to some fiction...
6) All the light we cannot see by Anthony Doerr. Heard good things about this, we shall see.

Book 9 No One Home by Tim Weaver

The Perfect Husband , Lisa Gardner. I loved this. I myst read more of hers as I love her style.