50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Five

[Southeastdweller]

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

What are you reading?

Book #24 Blow Back James Patterson. What happens when the president has a personality disorder and tries to start WW3. Decent fast paced thriller

@nowanearlyNicemum good question - there's a certain number of diagrams, but I feel like it wouldn't make a big difference not to see them, they're more illustrating points he's talking about. I don't know what it would be like to listen to - it's quite a dense book, and I suspect it could be really improved by a good reader, or totally impenetrable with a bad one.

Thanks @Sadik I'll let you know if I give it a go!

40. Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett I picked this up in the library on the strength of the cover / title, & it's an absolutely delightful combination of romance, fairy story & fantasy.
    Set in an alternate early 20thC where faeries are entirely real. Emily Wilde is an academic completing a major work chronicling all the types of 'folk' so far discovered. At the start of the book, she arrives in Ljosland to research the little known 'hidden ones' for the final section of her book. Shortly thereafter her friend and academic rival Wendell Bambleby arrives in the village where she's staying. His motivations are unclear - but he's quite possibly intending to piggyback on Emily's work for his own purposes.
    This is the author's first novel, and it's not perfect - the story takes a while to get going, and the pacing is a bit uneven in places. Overall it's a charming read though, doesn't take itself too seriously and has some very funny scenes. (Un)fortunately the sequel isn't out till 2024 or I'd be tempted to cough up full price for it.

26 The Bronte Cabinet: Three Lives in Nine Objects by Deborah Lutz. This is a biography with each of the nine chapters focusing on an object - not a specific single object, rather a type of object (eg books, embroidery) - and how it relates to the Bronte sisters, and in the process uncovers many details of their lives. I thought this was an interesting idea and well executed. However, it is probably aimed at people who have already read a few Bronte biographies and are looking for something from a different angle (and I think it achieved this), whereas I haven't read one before, despite loving the books of the three sisters. I would probably have done better to start off with a more conventional, chronological biography. Very much my fault, not the book's!

27 West by Carys Davies. Well, this is an odd little book. Widower Cy Bellman, living in Pennsylvania, reads about giant bones being dug up out west and decides that the huge creatures must be alive and makes it his mission to go and discover them. He arranges for his sister to look after his daughter in his absence. This was recommended to me by my mum, and I spent much of the book thinking "but WHY would he do this". Despite this I did enjoy it, due to its originality and an excellent ending.

I'm happy to hear this – I picked it up in the Amazon deals recently but haven't started it yet; I'm slightly worried it will cross the line from 'delightful' to 'twee'!
It sounds good from what you say, though.

30. The Appeal - Janice Hallett

As always, very late to the party. I really enjoyed this book, I was engrossed and it kept me guessing to the last - possibly a bold. A whodunnit set out in the form of emails and occasional other documentary evidence. I liked the cast of characters and having done some community drama in the past (very much on the am side of am-dram) the dynamic of the group was quite familiar. I've heard mixed reviews of The Twyford Code so may not get round to that just yet.

31. 'Twas the Nightshift Before Christmas - Adam Kay

A short dip into AK's diaries round the Christmas period covering several consecutive years, following his days (and nights) in hospital. A mix of funny, sad and frankly baffling stories about the sorts of things that bring people in to be treated at this time of year. If you enjoyed This is Going to Hurt you'll like this.

78. The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty

A while ago now this was mentioned on a YouTube Channel I watch as a hopeful for the Women's Prize list, which it didn't make. I find this quite surprising as it is MILES better than any of the shortlist I've read so far and particularly head and shoulders above I'm A Fan or Children Of Paradise

The hutch of the title is social housing apartments in a small Indiana town and presents the lives of the residents in connected vignettes.
It particularly focuses on 4 young people who have recently "aged out" of foster care; the lonely moderator of an internet website whose choice of edit has repercussions and a young mother who is scared of her baby's eyes.

My only criticism is that of these the author seems to forget about the young mother and rounding her story out but everything else is first rate.

I mean this book is weird as fuck it's really weird but what it does so well I thought is the interior lives of people. Everyone, even minor subplot characters, seem believable in terms of their thoughts and motivations and the prose is remarkable. It's original too, even with its similarity to My Dark Vanessa in one subplot

If I had had the available time this would have been one sitting. I will look out for her future work.

26. Spells For Forgetting by Adrienne Young

Got this reduced to 99p as someone on here had read it.

It's about an island in the Puget Sound and I wish I had it this time last year before I went to Seattle but never mind! The island has some magic and terrible things have happened and a lot of people lied.

I wanted to know what happened so the story kept me turning the pages but even setting aside the magic, the story wasn't believable. And two characters have this great young love that film and TV like to convince us is real but I strongly suspect doesn't occur in real life.

Not sure what's next, got a couple of non-fiction I am reading in the background, but I prefer fiction for going to sleep. But when the book is good, I get distracted reading it all the time and then the non-fictions get abandoned!

@BoldFearlessGirl I really love All Among The Barley, I've bought it as a gift for lots of people.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit thank you for The Rabbit Hutch review! I have it on my kindle and have started a few times but never got into it, I should find the right moment and persevere.

34. Flight Behaviour by Barbara Kingsolver. The lives of Dellarobia, a young mother, and her family are upturned when climate change causes the nation's population of monarch butterflies to migrate to their farm in the Appalachian Mountains for the winter instead of their usual site in Mexico.

Like most of Barbara Kingsolver's novels, this has some beautiful nature writing. I looked up the butterflies she is describing and they are really very striking, her portrayal of them is really vivid. I liked the community that she created and thought all the characters were well developed and believable.

Again like her other books though, this was very long and heavy on the metaphors. I definitely felt a bit hit over the head with messages about climate change and republican politics. I enjoyed it, but it's reinforced that I don't want to rush to read her newest one.

35. Really Good, Actually by Monica Heisy. We follow Maggie over the course of a year as she gets divorced in her late 20s, the same time that most of her friends are just starting to settle down.

In some ways this was quite a formulaic millennial book - young woman experiences difficult event, makes jokes, has supportive friends and eventually discovers therapy. I think it's set apart by the fact that it is really funny (actually), so I flew though it and would definitely recommend it.

19. Wavewalker Suzanne Heywood This memoir reflects on Suzanne's childhood spent with her parents on an ocean going yacht - Wavewalker. * *When she is just 7 years old her dad decides to uproot the whole family on a round the world voyage. In contrast, to most such memoirs this doesn't turn out to be life enriching but mainly boring, isolating and occasionally terrifying. Unfortunately reading about it wasn't that interesting either Her parents come accross as selfish and unpleasant, but we don't really learn much about them or there motivations. Suzanne is a very determined character who eventually makes it to Oxford despite her parents disinterest in her education, but I didn't really feel I got to know her. Overall not terrible, just all seemed a bit flat.

@GrannieMainland

No problem. I admit that it's flawed but there was just much in it I admired that it's a definite bold

Have added The Rabbit Hutch to my wish list Eine.

35. Djinn Patrol on The Purple Line - Deepa Anappara. I think someone recommended this when I was asking for books about India. It's told from the viewpoint of a 9 year old boy Jai who lives in an Indian slum or "basti". Children are disappearing from the slum so Jai and his best friends Pari and Faiz decide to investigate. There was a lot to like about this, the characters and world is brilliantly described and the author obviously understands the issues facing modern India, but it just didn't keep me that enthralled. I think perhaps the child narrator didn't gel with me. It did pick up towards the end, and I raced through the last fifth.

@Stokey

Yes it's the right kind of Strange But I'm Digging It we seem to click on as readers

Just finished The Guilty Ones by Joy Ellis. I'm enjoying the Jackman and Evans partnership. Jackman's sister in law disappears and when her body is found, all the evidence points to her committing suicide. The team are brought in to investigate and find links to a crime committed 20 years ago.

I like the Audible narrator for this series too.

29 Beach Read - Emily Henry This was fine, I guess. A Hallmark movie in book form.

I just got Wavewalker on audible, so hope it works better to listen to - will let you know @Owlbookend

Together Again - Milly Johnson. Not badly written or anything but just not for me. Flat characters and dull storyline.

25 The Map of Salt and Stars by Zeyn Joukhadar

Catching up on my Shelterbox book club reads, this cleverly interweaves the story of Nour, a refugee from modern-day Homs, with the very similar journey undertaken by Rawiya, a 12th century girl who leaves her home in search of Al-Idrisi, the famous map-maker. Both girls travel through the Middle East and North Africa; both for periods have for different reasons to disguise themselves as male. They encounter very different hardships and there is a fantastical element to Rawiya's story, but Joukhadar grounds this by drawing touchpoints from the 12th century into the 21st. Despite lush writing and the mythic strands (both normally no-nos for me), I really enjoyed this. It's a harrowing story but the 12th century part is less so (being so far removed from present day grimness) which sustains you through the more difficult parts. And it is beautifully written.

Have made a note of that Welshwabbit. Sounds good.

35 Afternoons With The Blinds Drawn - Brett Anderson

Follow-up to the excellent Coal Black Mornings which ended just as Suede were on the verge of stardom, this charts the highs and subsequent (very low) lows - though it doesn’t cover their recent reforming and return to brilliant form (maybe that will be a third volume?). Gets a bit more bogged down in songwriting nuts and bolts than the first book but still an engaging listen.

43 Metronome by Tom Watson
This wasn’t on my TBR list but when it was 99p I thought I’d take a punt as I remember it being reviewed on Between the Covers.

Aina and Whitney have been exiled to a croft on a remote island for 12 years for an unknown crime. They can’t escape as they have to take a tablet, dispensed every 8 hours, in order to survive an environmental disaster. Their parole passes and no one comes for them, they haven’t been able to reach the warden by radio in a long time and their supply drops have stopped. Aina begins to suspect that Whitney knows more than he’s letting on and through flash backs we learn more about their relationship, their ‘crime’ and the world they left behind.

This just didn’t quite work for me. I didn’t completely buy into the premise and didn’t find Whitney’s character very believable. Also, I wanted to know more about the world they left behind and the details are left deliberately vague. There’s also an annoyingly ambiguous did it / did it not happen ending.

79. I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy (Audible)

Surely I can't be the only one who has been forced to watch iCarly against my will. Jennette McCurdy played happy go lucky Sam but sadly the truth was a different story.

Yes, this does have a very provocative title but Jennette's mother was far from the average pushy fame parent. She appears to have been profoundly mentally unwell and was emotionally, physically even sexually abusive. She trained Jennette into a childhood eating disorder and Jennette lived like her mothers hostage. And not much was done by anyone to stop it

This has over 10k reviews on Amazon and maintains a five star rating so it has been very popular.

I felt that she read the audio a little badly it's very breathless and manic in a way that starts to irritate after an hour

It works as a doorway into another world and does make you wonder how many professional children who smile for the camera are actually being abused.

But given the misery of the content I would only pursue if particularly interested

36 Cuddy - Benjamin Myers

A more experimental style than Myers’ previous works, with shifting narrative formats and voices covering 1000+ years of history linked by Durham Cathedral and the story of St Cuthbert. For me, it didn’t quite hang together as a whole; some sections worked better than others, and Myers’ overuse of alliteration, whichever voice is being used, makes it harder for the individual voices to ring true. However there’s plenty to enjoy here too.

80. The Aftermath by Rhidian Brook

In Post War Occupied Germany, Colonel Morgan hopes to do some good and is soon to be joined by his less enthusiastic wife and their son. Like all senior troops he is able to requisition the house of a local man and his child, uneasily sharing the property.

The premise is very good but the book gets to 50 then 60% and little has occurred beyond that premise. It's just the waste of a good idea.

I saw the film about four years ago and there are large deviations. I preferred the book ending but the film is a better execution of the story overall.