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.

37. My Body by Emily Ratajkowski

This was mentioned here and I picked it up in the deals. Read in one sitting. It is styled as an essay collection

Unlike the author, I do not and never have had the sort of body that invites suggestions I should go into modelling.

One of my sisters was what you might call uncommonly pretty and looking back I feel horrified by memories of her being objectified my adult men while still in her teens.

Still, I don't come from the same world as Emily Ratajkowski in any respect and I wondered what would resonate.

Her world seemed so absolutely suffocating. Her mother was obsessed with her beauty from a young age and it clearly became a message for Emily that her beauty defined her value.

Equally, by entering modelling her body became her commodity and again defined her value even sometimes to herself

The commercial modelling world being the seedy den that it is, Emily's "value" (in terms of people cashing in on images and basically using images of her body, sometimes with but mainly without her consent) is often defined by other people.

At the same time, her body is something she is inherently trapped in. It's hers, but due to other people's ideas of ownership doesn't always feel like hers.

Short but thought provoking

(These 99p deals are unhappily addictive)

31. 'The Mother.' By TM Logan

This story centred on a woman who is trying to prove her innocence after being convicted of the murder of her husband. I really enjoyed this and would recommend this to anyone who loves a good thriller. Also, a small thing but I loved that the main character worked in HR (I'm a HR student)

Just started 'All My Love.' By Miranda Dickinson.**

19. Exiles by Jane Harper. Follow up to The Dry featuring detective Aaron Falk. A key witness in the fraud case he's investigating goes missing in the wilderness on a corporate retreat camping trip. This was ok, very pacey but not as good as the first one. It had a bit of a Blair Witch feel to it as the group ended up lost in the bush with limited food and no phones. I know nothing about Australian hiking programmes but I was unconvinced that a group of amateurs would be sent out on a multi-day trip with no means of calling for help or emergency services.

I will get started on some of the Women's Prize longlist now!

Latest Ink Black Heart update.
Have hit 50%.
Essentially, it’s like a butternut squash- a few tasty bits, but fucking hard work and occasionally painful to get to them.

Rather surprised to find I have actually read some of the Women’s Long List: The Marriage Portrait, Trespasses and Stone Blind of which Trespasses would be my top tip. I also have Demon Copperhead on my Kindle.

Latest read was:

18. Faro’s Daughter - Georgette Heyer

Young Viscount Mablethorpe to the horror of his family has fallen madly in love with Deb, who runs the tables at the gaming house he frequents. His older cousin and trustee of Mablethorpe’s fortune, Mr Ravenscar, needs to stop the relationship before Mablethorpe turns 21 and no longer needs his trustee to consent to his marriage. Mr Ravenscar thinks he can buy Deb off but it doesn’t turn out to be that straightforward. An easy read but not as good as some of her others (in my view).

Great to see your Women’s Prize reviews coming through @FortunaMajor. This sounds great - I only read a handful of pages last night but liked the atmosphere very much.

Currently reading Children of Paradise and loving it. Fortuna's review is spot on.

I have a feeling that saying it's not a prize winner is going to come back and bite me. There's something about it. It's on my shortlist so far.

Of the latest 2 I've read, if this is the quality then it's going to be a good year.

This made me laugh 😅

My copy of Hags by Victoria Smith arrived yesterday so I'm reading that intermittently while carrying on with my other book. Only read the introduction so far but like it already.

Finished Children of Paradise. Pungent and hallucinatory. Its shortness was a virtue, concentrating the flavour.

The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith

Everyone else read this years ago so I’m way behind. I really enjoyed it though, not sure why I never got round to this series sooner.

The Ink Black Heart update:
Who the flip has gravy with jacket potatoes?????????????????

So glad you’re enjoying it Remus

28. Snowbound by Blake Crouch

A man whose wife has disappeared and a woman whose sister has disappeared team up to hunt for them. I’ve read a few books by this author, and assumed that this would be along the same lines as those mystery / science fiction books. My own fault for not checking but this was more of a crime book, and a boring, unimaginative, bit of a nasty one at that. But it was mercifully short.

Oh dear, you are not going to be impressed with my meal plan this week!

Loving your updates Remus.

Well not if it's already got beans on it, but otherwise 🤷

I actually lived that Peter Kay sketch when in a chippy down south. Had to stop myself saying "as tha nowt moist?"

We'll leave pey wet for another conversation.

I've hit 62% - (get me!) with skipping all the internet chat and totally agree with your review.

I want to slap Robin & tell her to shag Cormoran quick if she fancies him so much.

I've never had so many years of debate about whether to do the deed or not - usually took me less than a week.

(And sometimes less than an hour!).

I've nearly finished the bloody thing and if it doesn't need with a shag I'll be furious.

In other news, I absolutely refuse to accept that anybody in their right mind would put gravy on a baked potato.

end, not need

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie im sorry to hear you’re almost finished as your updates have been so entertaining!

23 Slouching towards Bethlehem Joan Didion
The first group of essays in this were fabulous - focused on US culture in the 1960s and the seedy underbelly of the counter-culture.
In the second part the writing continued to be beautiful but the topics were less interesting. I listened to this on audio and Diane Keaton’s excellent narration kept me listening until the end.

24 North and South Elizabeth Gaskell
I enjoyed this as another classic story of love and manners in a similar style to Jane Austen. It had a little more meat as it analysed the role of industry, unions and class conflict in a mill town. An interesting and enjoyable read though it dragged on a bit in the last 100 pages or so.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

Please don't tell me if there is a shag or not - it's about all that's keeping me going & I think you are going to finish before me.

22. Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller This one has been hanging around on my kindle for a year or so, from the Women's Prize shortlist 2021.

Claire Fuller is on my auto-read list. I've read all her novels up to this one. I can't say that I love her novels, because they're often rather depressing and deal with some upsetting topics, but there's something about her writing that I do like very much.

This one was about twins, Julius and Jeanie who are still living at home with their mother, Dot, until she dies suddenly, leaving them helpless, and subsequently homeless. It's essentially about desperate rural poverty, and family secrets and the lies their mother told them to keep them at home with her. Poor Jeanie, illiterate through missing so much schooling, and Julius scrabbling around for every possible menial job he can find. Two innocents, ripe for being conned and cheated out of everything they deserved to have.

It was both unrelentingly depressing and a beautiful depiction of ruined lives. So sad and yet completely gripping.

I've finished it.

You know when you eat an entire big bar of Dairy Milk, even when you don't much like Cadbury's chocolate, and then feel a bit sick and dirty and disgusted with yourself?

That.

You know how just a very small bar of something really good can be so much better?

That too.

She could have lost at least half of it and probably 8 characters and it would have been a better book. Do I still care about S&R? Yep. Do I feel a bit cheated and played?

That as well.