50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Six

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the sixth 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, the fourth one here and the fifth one: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/what_were_reading/4793238-50-books-challenge-2023-part-five?page=20&reply=126860721

What are you reading?

Definitely not as good as The Bone Clocks. You've reminded me Eine, I knew I had something else to add to my review but it slipped my mind. I found the depictions of the working class and Northern accents (I can't remember what it's called, I know someone mentioned it recently in connection with the Strike books) really irritating. Why is posh Southern always the default?

I don't like the "fact" presented incessantly that there is a direct correlation between being working class and having a poor grasp of English

It enrages me.

Ink Black Heart is doing me in - the chat rooms and the tweets. I don't think I can do it, I'm not even far in.

25 The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak

Set just before and during the Cyprus conflict, the early 2000's and late 2010's. Teenage sweethearts Kostas and Defne have a secret relationship as he is a Greek Christian and she is a Turkish and Muslim. They meet at the Happy Fig a taverna with a fig tree growing in the middle of it, which also narrates at times. To escape the troubles Kostas is sent to live in London where he becomes a botanist. Years later he returns to Cyprus and is reunited with Defne who had lived through the conflict and is an archaeologist working on mass graves. Now living in London, their daughter Ada is 16 and troubled. Defne became an alcoholic and has died and Kostas in uncommunicative with grief but talks to his fig tree (a cutting from the taverna one). They appear to have been rejected by their families, but Defne's sister Meryem visits Kosta and Ada for the first time and tries to teach Ada about the culture of Cyprus and her family. At the end it is revealed that Defne's spirit had transmuted into the fig tree when she died.

Despite this being set at such a dramatic time, I found it felt a bit flat. Things happened and they just got on with it (maybe this is more realistic?) and the 'shocking' outburst by Ada at the beginning of the book that she constantly worries about turns into a non-event by the end. It felt anti-climatic. The characters seemed to me to be like cardboard cut-outs except for the full on Meryem. I'm not sure about the fig tree narrator or whether it was necessary nor the reveal at the end of Defne/fig tree - I was a bit "so what?". I thought I would love this story as it is right up my street, but didn't, however I did quite like it.

The Baker, the Butcher, the Candlestick Maker, Suzanne Portnoy

I read this, so no one else has to!

To be fair, it didn't promise to be high brow literature or even a good story and it satisfied my curiosity. I regularly pass by a rather notorious spa place and an acquaintance told me it was where people go for casual sex and I didn't really believe her so I googled it and came across this sex memoir of said place and other escapades. It is as bad as you might imagine something like this to be.

StColumb I was intrigued to know what the place you pass might be so I looked the book up on Amazon and found the following review:
‘This book should have been called 'I sat on his face and then he went home’.’

Hahaha, that definitely sums it up.

My goal was 26 books this year and that is, in fact, no. 26!

@Mothership4two I felt similarly about the Island of Missing Trees. It felt like the book was over researched, or she tried to shoehorn as much research as possible at the expense of the plot. I don't think I rate her writing.

<lies on floor crying that The Island of Missing Trees was sublime and beautiful> 😂

Budge up and make room for me (although I didn't like the final reveal about the tree / Defne).

35. The Darkness Knows - Arnaldur Indridason
This is a slow burner but the ending tipped it into a bold. When the body of a murder victim turns up on a glacier years after the event, retired detective Konrad is persuaded to investigate a hit and run which may be connected. His failure to solve the original murder case has dogged him for years, not helped by the fact that the main suspect taunted Konrad about his own father's crimes and his motivations to join the police force. The southern Iceland settings are brilliantly evoked, especially the power of the rivers which play a big part at the end. Loved it.

Nearly finished my return journey to Hogwarts. Whilst flawed, the writing is definitely better in the Galbraith books, probably because the world building is interesting even if things are overwritten. Lots of pages on Quidditch definitely better than lots of pages on that twat Matthew.

Just updating a few books. I've been doing a mixture of total heavyweights, complete lightweights and audible - my brain is confused!

51. Plainsong - Kent Haruf. Heralded as a modern classic, this is about a town in deep country Colorado, where we meet a teacher Tom and his two boys Bobby and Ike. Their mother is suffering from depression and rarely gets out of bed. We also meet Victoria, a pregnant schoolgirl who's mother throws her out. And two old bachelor farmers the McPheron brothers. The story alternates perspectives between Tom, the boys and Victoria and builds a picture of small town America. It's quite dark in places but also warm. It's well done but didn't quite do it for me. I feel like the Steinbeck fans would like this.

52. The Cliff House - Christopher Bookmyre. reviewed up thread. Page turner and good closed island thriller

53. Death of a Bookseller - Alice Slater. Reviewed upthread. Too YA for me and not enough plot.

54. Carrie Soto is Back - Taylor Jenkins Reid. Book about tennis champ coming out of retirement to try and win another grand slam. Easy read and good timing with Wimbledon on. Ambitious heroine who won't let love in has been done to death though.

55. Mrs Dalloway - Virginia Woolf. I thought I'd read this years ago but don't think I had. Mrs Dalloway is having a party and the book follows her and the various people she meets throughout the day. I think I got more out of this now nearing Mrs D's age than I would have when I was younger. I liked the reminiscents from Mrs D and her ex Peter Walsh looking back on their youth sand what might have been and how they've changed. The audible helped me get into the pace of it but is weirdly broken up into chapters - none in the original text - and ends so abruptly with an Amazon advert as soon as the last word come out.

I'm moving on to The Hours now to get a modern Woolf take.

should say THAN IN the Galbraith books.

Paper Cup - Karen Campbell
A homeless alcoholic woman finds an engagement ring has been accidentally given to her, so she sets off from Glasgow to try to return it to the owner. She ends up on a famous pilgrimage route as she works her way to a small rural town. As she goes you learn more about her circumstances and the homelessness crisis, plus how the system fails those in dire need of help.

Although this tackles a serious topic, it's quite lightly handled. The author has you rooting for the protagonist straight away. It is present tense and overworked at times, but ultimately it's a very sound piece that I really enjoyed. I've had this knocking around for a few months and I'm disappointed that I've only just made time for it. It's a lot better than much of what I've read in that time.

I loved the fig tree in The Island of Missing Trees and the sense of history the book had. It’s really stayed with me.

39. Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore - Robin Sloan

Having recently been made redundant from a web design company, Clay Jannon takes a job as the front desk clerk on the night shift of a strange bookshop in San Francisco, and soon finds himself drawn into its curious world of historic puzzles, mysterious books and secret societies.

This was a gripping read: not as serious as it sounds but a real page turner, only slightly let down by the very end where it seemed to run out of steam. There was a great twist which I didn't see coming (I rarely do!). Not quite a bold but so so close.

Suspect you live in North London - I used to and know exactly where you mean (in the Kentish Town area?)

I really enjoy Robin Sloan's books, RomanMum! They're all a bit odd, but in a way that somehow grabs my imagination: from memory, Sourdough is about robotics, bread, a sentient sourdough starter and a fictional East European(?) country; and Annabel Scheme has a detective with an AI sidekick a virtual gaming world and a megacorp that looks suspiciously like Google. They're quirky and funny and remind me in a weird way of Marc-Uwe Kling's Qualityland, which I LOVED (unlike the rest of my book group ). Or the Dirk Gently books by Douglas Adams.

I agree how annoying it is when authors lazily assume a Default Southern Accent, although I'm sure that I've read books that point out when a character has a posh southern voice (because the default is northern in some way). It reminds me of the jolt that I got when I first read Rivers of London and characters were described as "a white woman" - and I realised that I shouldn't be assuming that all characters are white unless explicitly told. I hope I'm better at that now!

43. The Years by Annie Ernaux
Not sure what to say about this, although I know it’s been reviewed before. Nobel Prize-winning French writer in her 80s looks back on her life (or is it someone else’s life? there’s a lot of trickery with the “we” in the narrative that makes it unclear who is the narrator and who is the intended audience). It’s a kind of collage of memories and fleeting perceptions, punctuated by photographs of the narrator that are described with impersonal detail. What really struck me was the poverty of her childhood in the aftermath of the second world war, and also how vast, regional and parochial France can be compared with the UK (I know it’s about twice the area for the same population). She also describes how increased prosperity in the 1950s and 1960s meant that they learned to cook and to eat properly - something that is rather at odds with the lazy British stereotype of French peasants turning out gourmet food because they’re so superior to us. Some of the attitudes leave a bit to be desired (especially about north Africans), and the experiences described are necessarily narrow (being mostly those of the educated bourgeoisie), but I found it rather mesmerising.

44. Acts and Omissions by Catherine Fox
45. Unseen Things Above by Catherine Fox
46. Realms of Glory by Catherine Fox
I’m re-reading the first four Lindchester books as a run-up to getting The Company of Heaven. They're a bit more unevenly paced than I remembered, but still very enjoyable. And I really want to go to the pub with Jane and Matt, as I suspect that they would be excellent company!

The more I read, though, the more I wondered whether Freddie has ADHD. He's clever, charming and talented but his impulsivity, disorganisation, skittish brain, incredible urge to self-sabotage and total lack of executive function suggest that he is somewhere on the ND spectrum. I don't know whether Catherine Fox intended this, but it seems like a pretty convincing portrayal of neurodiversity to me.

I think I'm a bit C of E'd out now, so will have a break for something else before I embark on the covid one (which I remember as being not as good as the others anyway). I've put the Steeple Chasing book on the TBR list, however, as I've also got an insatiable appetite for books about churches and the people therein. (Misspent youth.)

Mackerella - I loved QualityLand too when I read it last year (it was a bold) and I see what you mean. Thanks for the recommendation, will be looking up more of his books.

36. Fatal Throne: The Wives of Henry VIII Tell All by Candace Fleming, Stephanie Hemphill, Deborah Hopkinson, M. T. Anderson, Linda Sue Park, Jennifer Donnelly, Lisa Ann Sandell I think this was recommended on here possibly last year? Henry VIII's wives tell their stories from their own perspectives, interspersed with Henry's own account. This was a pretty short read, the different authors meant each wife had a different style which was good. Relatively well researched although there was an alarming amount of historical fiction in the bibliography

36 Jung: the key ideas - Ruth Snowden
’Teach Yourself’ guide to the key ideas in the psychological (and religious/mystical) theories of Carl Jung. Clear and straightforward - but Snowden is perhaps too much of a Jung fangirl.

37 For Thy Great Pain Have Mercy On My Little Pain - Victoria Mackenzie
Needs little introduction as literally everyone else has read this in the last week or so! Moving contrast between the quiet wisdom (but timidity) of Julian of Norwich, and the nutty but brave Margaret Kempe, ending with an intriguing suggestion on how they might have inspired and helped each other. I want to go and read Julian’s writings now (probably not Margaret’s though…)

106. Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim

The daughter of a plantation owner becomes attached to the slave who nurses her.

Whilst engaging and readable this is very basic and simplistic. I imagine I would have loved it at 13, it's a bit YA.

It's also very Slavery : The Family Friendly Version or Slavery : White Saviour Edition

There are follow ons but I'm not going to bother.