50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Three

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the third thread of the 50 Books Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2023, 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.

The first thread of the year is here and the second one here.

I preferred CCL to All The Light. I liked the latter but have read many books like it. CCL is much more unique .

I remember loving About Grace but didn’t get on with ATLWCS. Everyone seemed to love it but I just felt like it was another WW2 book. Some books just don’t work at the time you read them.

I walked into the city centre this morning to pick up my library card and have logged into Borrowbox and added a few books to my reading list. On the way back home I popped into a couple of charity shops and picked up Cloud Cuckoo Land so I’ll see what I make of it. I really enjoyed All the Light …. (apart from the ending).

I've not reviewed book 8 - My Son the Fanatic by Hanif Kureishi yet despite finishing it ages ago. This is one of those teeny tiny Faber Shorts which I got on kindle for 49p as a taster of his writing, having had my interest piqued by the publicity around his recent awful health issues. A London taxi driver worries about his son's changing behaviour and discovers that far from sex or drugs he's found religion and is judging his father's embracing of what he now sees as Western licentiousness. I enjoyed this enough to keep an eye out for his books on kindle deals, but thought his writing of female characters wasn't great. That might have just been this story though and this character.

Book 9 - Frenchman's Creek by Daphne Du Maurier. I rather liked this book although it was much more breathlessly romantic than I usually read nowadays and took me right back to my teenage readings of things like Forever Amber and Virginia Andrews. Set in restoration England, a wealthy woman leaves her decadent life in London and takes her children to her husband's country house in Cornwall. She proceeds to discover a French gentleman pirate whose ship is hidden at the edge of her land. They a quite taken with each other, become soulmates and so on and so forth. I don't think I'll be bolding it, but I'll definitely be reading more books by Du Maurier.

Book #10 Sankofu by Chibundu Onuzo difficult not to give away the plot but ibroadly it's the story of a middle aged woman on the brink of divorce who goes on a journey to find her black African father after her white Welsh mother's death. It tackles some of the complexities of colonial politics and the fight for African independence and growing up as a black child with a, perhaps naive, white mother in 70s/80s Britain. It also touches on how youth and revolutionary ideals progress with age and the complexity of governance. Definitely interesting and well written and I would recommend it but isn't a happy homecoming type story for the most part

@MegBusset so sorry to hear about your MIL, hope you're ok.

Thanks for the new thread @Southeastdweller , here is my list so far:

1. Halloween Party – Agatha Christie
2. Silver Bay – Jojo Moyes
3. Troubled Blood – Robert Galbraith
4. Wizards and Warriors – F X Nine
5. Lethal Wihte – Robert Galbraith

1. The Cuckoo’s Calling – Robert Galbraith

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – J K Rowling 8. The Silkworm – Robert Galbraith 9. Career of Evil – Robert Galbraith 10. Sugar Men – Ray Kingfisher

Have become a bit Strike-obsessed and have re-read all the books while I wait for The Ink Black Heart from the library. I'm now second in the queue so hopefully not too long to wait! I saw a tweet earlier which suggested that J K Rowling has finished the seventh book in the series, so hoping it may be out by the end of the year with any luck.

That should of course read Sankofa

💐@MegBusset Sorry for your loss. Bryson is also one of my comfort reads in times of trouble.

@MegBusset sorry to hear about your MIL. My comfort reads are probably the Anne of Green Gables books or the Little House on the Prairie books. Or maybe the Chalet School books. Funny how you go back to the books from your childhood.

Black Narcissus by Rumer Godden

Very late with this 'rather dated' book of the month. I took what seemed an age to read it and didn't really get into it until the ending, I think I admired rather than loved it and not being religious spend a lot of the time thinking 'So...?' about the plot and the nuns getting worked up about their passions. I did enjoy the discussion on the rather dated thread though. But I prefer the more worldly and tolerant nuns of 'Call the Midwife'.

@MegBusset sorry for your loss.

I've finished Penshaw - LJ Ross - enjoyed this book with its twists and turns. It is the 13th book in the DCI Ryan series and starts with the miners' strike of the 80s and suspicions that a worm is tipping off the police with the movements of the flying pickets. In the current day, Ryan is tasked with ongoing investigations and uncovering corruption in his own team, even if one of the characters nearly drove me to despair with their naivety.

I've also finished Never Greener - Ruth Jones - I was looking forward to this one, expecting well rounded characters and humour with a good storyline. I hated the two main characters and the storyline seemed to revolve around them constantly having affair sex.

Now to consider my next read.

1. Humankind, Rutger Bregman

This is another choice from Borrowbox. It popped up when I was browsing. The subtitle 'a hopeful history' caught my eye. This is my first nonfiction of the year and I think it illustrates perfectly why I don't read many of them (or at least not of this type of popular science/social science). What makes it good is essentially also its failing. Bregman sets out with the thesis that humans are essentially hard wired to be good, kind and co-operative. He opposes veneer theory - the idea that we are self serving and violent in nature and need to be tamed or controlled by society/civilisation. To support this he presents a heady mix of anthropology, psychology, biology and anecdote. The first two thirds are an engaging, undemanding read. There are lots of bits i found interesting. He revisits classic psychological studies and shows how the conclusions are influenced by the context in which science is done and publicised. I also enjoyed the discussion of the anthropology of Easter Island. His thesis is an attractive proposition and he tells a good story. But therein lies the problem. Is it just a good story? There are a lot of statements that are not fully evidenced. There is also heavy critique of evidence that challenges his thesis whereas supportive evidence gets off much more lightly. Part of the reason for this is that a critical analysis of empirical evidence isn't that enticing to read. If it was we'd all be sitting down reading academic journals of an evening. The final third where he talks about how we can build on his arguments to build a better society was the weakest. He just seems to hop about all over the place and where societies have implemented ideas based on trusting others it is always presented as an unmitigated sucess. I started to loose interest in these final sections. I also found the section relating to the holocaust problematic, but won't go into that or this will turn into an essay. In short I'm glad I read it & I hope he's right, but this is a book with quite a few issues.

Great to read that so many people are beginning to use Borrowbox, it’s great.

The Affair - Danielle Steel

A book about an affair, the couple and family’s relationship and how various family members’ lives may not be as it seems.

I just wanted an easy read after a couple of ‘heavy’ topics.

The women in these stories seem to have everything together, including bodies bouncing back immediately after birth.

It was an easy read but felt like a waste of my time but I light pick another easy read soon, if so feel like some of the books are too heavy again.

Good review @Owlbookend. I've read another of Rutger Bregman's books, Utopia for Realists, and I do agree with you that he has good ideas but tends to focus more on the evidence that agrees with his theories.

Place marking

with the other apps people ghave been talking about like libby? is that something anyone can do or do you have to go with the one your specific library is part of which for me is borrowbox. the content is very hit and miss. our library choice is shocking.

i love going to danielle steel.shes a talent.

Just finished 'The Best Days of Our Lives.' by Lucy Diamond, and thought it was a great read, considering it was about a family trying to get on with life after the untimely death of a loved one. I've read all her books and they just keep getting better.

Now starting on 'We Never Asked For Wings.' by Venessa Diffenbaugh. I read her first book, 'The Language of Flowers.' Last year, and really enjoyed it, so am hoping that this one will be just as great. 🙂❤️

oh lucy diamond. her books have my heart 😍

8 An Immense World - Ed Yong

Exploration of the sensory worlds of animals, and how our perceptions of their inner lives are skewed by our limited human view: lacking echolocation or the capacity to see ultraviolet light or sense electric fields, how can we start to imagine what being an animal with these skills would be like? There was lots of interesting stuff in here, but it took me literally months to get through the 14 hours on Audible - I think Yong made a mistake reading it himself and a professional actor might have been more engaging.

9 Head First: a psychiatrist's stories of mind and body - Alastair Santhouse

The main thesis of this psychiatrist's memoir is that western medicine focuses too much on specific physical diagnoses, and lacks a holistic approach which takes into account the patient's psychological state. Even in diseases with a clear physical basis, like heart disease and diabetes, outcomes are worsened if the patient is suffering from depression, but often only the physical element receives treatment. I'm fully behind this anti-dualist way of thinking, but Santhouse came across as paternalistic and disingenuous, harking back to the good old days when patients just did what they were told, and didn't bother the doctor with their own theories about what their diagnoses might be. I think this is particularly unhelpful in psychiatry, given that the patient is the only person who can give an account of their subjective mental state. Also seems to be blaming patients for the expanding number of psychiatric diseases in the diagnostic manuals, rather than, you know, the pharma industry who have an interest in manufacturing diseases so they can tout pills to treat them. Overall, it got on my tits.

Your library chooses which service to use. Some offer both. Your library website will tell you.

It's one of those things that they are unlikely to improve if people don't use it. If they have good stats they can justify sending more money on it. It's also year end for budgets which doesn't help.

Thank you all. Sounds like I should keep an open mind on Cloud Cuckoo Land

12. Joe Country - Mick Herron

This is part of the Slough House series. My problem is that I leave long gaps between reading them and then can’t remember what’s happened to whom in previous books. In this book, Louisa is responsible for embroiling the slow horses in a hostile situation. It’s the usual mix of politics at The Park, backchat and bullying at Slough House and action in the field with a humorous touch. As ever, highly enjoyable.

I like the Overdrive app which one of my local library service uses, I prefer it to Borrowbox as you can choose to 'defer' your loan and then be next in the queue to borrow it whereas Borrowbox doesn't offer this. However, the library are going to be moving to Libby soon and getting rid of Overdrive, am a bit worried that Libby will be crap in comparison.

I haven't checked recently, but the Libby app didn't used to be available from the Amazon App Store (may still not be there), but I could get the Overdrive one, which still allowed me to log into the library's online books and read them on my Kindle Fire. Removing Overdrive would mean any readers using a Kindle Fire to read on would no longer be able to do that.

All this chat about library apps made me take a wee look at our local provision. Turns out my area offers Libby and Borrowbox both on apps or using a web based system. They had a good range across the different apps with their “top
reads of 2022” being very much like a list from this group I have to say!

I might be tempted by the audio offering as I do baulk at the cost of some audiobooks. I do like the Whispersync feature on the kindle though