50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Four

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fourth 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, the second one here and the third one here.

What are you reading?

I have plumped for both.I am intrigued by the Jeanine Cumins, I didn't look into the backstory so there's a chance it might not be for me, but it's a very different angle on true crime

The true crime one by Jeanine Cummins was A Rip in Heaven and was about the murder of her cousins. I read it a few years ago and thought it was ok. I found the fact she wrote in the third person off putting and I just felt that the fact she was too close to the situation meant she couldn't really do it justice.

Oh God is it 3rd person? Too late now

Yeah. I get why she did it as she wanted to try to tell the story objectively, even though she was involved. I just found that a bit jarring as I knew she was involved. The early section was ok but when she was reporting on the trial I think her (totally understandable) lack of objectivity was a problem.

Eine if it's kindle, you can return if you don't wait too long - I think it's within the first couple of days.

It was 99p, I think I'll give it a whirl

63. The Colony by Audrey Magee (Audible)

A very late one but I was determined to carry on as I only had an hour left.

I had this as a Kindle Deal and read a few pages and thought it was perfect for Audible and paid the bit extra and it really worked.

The story of the visits of Mr Lloyd, an English artist and JP Masson, a French linguist to an Irish speaking island of the West Coast of Ireland is juxtaposed against violent acts occurring as a result of The Troubles

I saw what this was trying to do, but I don't think it entirely worked. It's about "the exploitation of the Irish and really who owns Ireland?" through the lens of politics, language, culture and heritage. I found it a bit heavy handed and unsubtle in that respect. A bit Here Is The Take Home Message On A Neon Sign. I don't know if my own background influenced this impression

I did like the character of James and the voice for him reminded me of Barry Keoghan's performance in The Banshees Of Inisherin, but again for me it was always clear how James's story would conclude.

It was absolutely PERFECT as a before bed listen and I don't know what I'll replace it with

Worth a read - hit and miss

39. Trespasses by Louise Kennedy

Much reviewed, so all I want to say is that I loved it.

With the End In Mind by Kathryn Mannix Dr Mannix is a palliative care consultant who has spent her career working with people at the end of their lives. In this book she describes the physical process of dying, a process which was familiar to all until a few generations ago but which is now hidden and not discussed or acknowledged. A deeply compassionate doctor, she describes the role of palliative care in managing symptoms as well as possible so that patients can live the end of their lives as fully as possible. In a series of case studies we meet people facing the end of their lives and see how they and their families approach it and how their doctors approach their care. The book very much advocates for communication and not being afraid of talking about death - a recurring pattern is that patients and their families are individually aware of the approaching death but not speaking of it in order to protect each other.

I listened to this on borrow box and would recommend it as an audio, as it was comforting to have it delivered by voice. I really enjoyed this book, it was both illuminating and life-affirming in the ‘there are good people in the world’ sense (Mannix adopts one patient’s cat as he has no-one else to ask and cannot otherwise let go) and the patients are always fascinating and often inspiring.

Now read Jessie Burton's Medusa as a complement to Haynes' work. Thsi does pale in comparison. It's a bit heavy, preachy, laboured. But then I didn't realise it was YA and thy do tend to be rather like that! It pushes the themes of beauty, monstrosities, self worth, victimhood and so on in a rather cliched way. I don't remember there being specifically YA books when I was a teen, older Judy Blume aside (oh ow I loved Deenie) , but I'm sure they existed.

There is apparently an illustrated version which I imagine would be a rather beautiful gift.

Btw thanks Tarahumara for the Mannix recommendation, was spot on, belatedly ran a search and see it was you who recommended it to me.

Oh good, glad you enjoyed it CornishLizard.

1 The Guest Cat byTakashi Hiraide
2 A Woman In.Berlin by.Anon
3 All The Broken Places by John Boyne
4The Undiscovered Deaths of Grace McGill by CS Robertson

CS Robertson's Grace McGill is a fascinating character. She works as a cleaner, specialising in cleaning the flats of people who have died. She is shrewd and observant and sees the lives of the deceased through what they leave behind. Loneliness and isolation are movingly portrayed and a whole array of other situations as she moves around Glasgow.
Grace has a quirky hobby - she makes models of the homes she has cleaned, perfect in every detail the articles on the bedside.table the cabinet with medication old photographs that tell a story. And a daisy on one floor. And that is the start of a mystery which Grace must solve.
Quirky and thoroughly enjoyable.

@Tarahumara @CornishLizard

I've had the Mannix for about two years must bump it up.

Old Filth - Jane Gardam I know it’s been much reviewed on here and I probably wouldn’t have picked it up otherwise. It was ok, enjoyable enough if a little sad.

26 Looking Glass Sound by Catriona Ward.

There was a point in this book where I suddenly lost interest a bit. A key change, a discordant note, but Ward being Ward, I knew it wasn’t her writing going off the boil. There are plenty of clues, when I thought back.
Almost impossible to review without spoilers, but there’s a series of murders, a book about the teenagers who find the bodies, intellectual theft, revenge.
It’s about the power of books and anyone who feels that characters live on and wake up afresh every time you read their stories may well have a little cry towards the end. Of course they’re only something someone’s made up…..aren’t they?

Cassandre I've also recently finished Fire Rush and agree it's very worthy of the short list. I really really liked it. It had a very strong voice to it.

I've decided I'm not going to torture myself with the rest of Pod as the reviews on here haven't been favourable and life is too short.

I doubt I'll get my hands on a copy of Black Butterflies in time, so I'll have to my shortlist based in being a book short. It's going to be hard to call this year.

I liked Pod, it's powerful, if a bit out there.

I've done 8 so far and am wondering if I can get either Wandering Souls or Fire Rush in before the shortlist is announced. I'm not keen on the Maggie Farrell, and have heard mixed reviews of Homesick and Black Butterflies. Dog of the North doesn't appeal too much either, so will catch up on those of any of them are shortlisted.

I really liked The Colony @EineReiseDurchDieZeit. I think I preferred it to some of the other Irish books I seem to have read recently - Claire Keegan, Trespasses, Colm Toibin. I just loved the descriptions of the land, the women and the painting.

@Stokey

It was a lovely listen that way. And even the interludes didn't jar me out of it as it was very reminiscent of the Irish Radio Death Announcements which featured in my childhood

29. A Spoonful Of Murder by J M Hall This was rather good cosy crime and the first in a series. I thought, at first, that it was going to be another poor copy of Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club series, but it went off in its own direction. Lots of humour, wit and charm and read brilliantly by Julie Hesmondhalgh. Really enjoyed it, and I've already got the second in the series lined up to read.

30. Trespasses - Louise Kennedy
Can't really add any more to everyone else's reviews of this. I thought it was brilliant. Loved it.

Despite my ever growing list of books on my TBR I may have bought myself 5 books today since it was my birthday.

I may be in my thirties but birthday money still goes in books lol

Happy Birthday

I do the exact same and I am 40s

Happy birthday 😊 definitely a good reason to treat yourself to some books !

64. All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Blind French girl Marie-Laure and German Orphan Werner live through World War II

Amazingly, after 2 DNFs on previous attempts, I have downed this in two sittings.

I was reminded of why I DNFd - I thought it was another ten a penny literary WW2 thing that was not bringing anything new.

I was right about that still. Both wars are so overdone as settings now.

I also thought it was glaringly obvious that Werner and Marie-Laure would collide and I didn't want to trudge through by the numbers coincidences

I was also mostly right about that

That said, I didn't remember it having such snappy chapters or becoming as immersed as I did on this occasion in the prose and the world, so much so I think it's a bold. I particularly enjoyed Werner's story.

In all the talk I've done over the last year on endings, this one took the biscuit for overkill and surplus to requirements chapters dragging it out by the teeth, so much so it nearly lost its bold. None of the update chapters need to be there and it should have ended when the main plot did, in what could have been a concise but deeply affecting way.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit The ending ruined the book imo.