50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Seven

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the seventh 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, the fifth one here, and the sixth one here

I have been reading a book about the history of Berlin for what seems like years it's very good but so dense. so I bought some Agatha Christie and will be reading one of those next

@BaruFisher that must be a shock to the system. My mum is over from Oz at the moment and hasn't taken her fleece off since she arrived...

Just read Claire Keegan's short story collection Antarctica. This was her first book. Some of the stories are set in the US and some in Ireland. There are a couple that have stayed with me but it's not at the same level as Foster which I think will be one of my books of the year.

Jamilia by Chingiz Aïtmatov. Translated by James Riordan

Recommended on here recently. A love story set in 1940's Soviet Kyrgyzstan. Jamilia's husband is away fighting the Germans. She works the farm with her teenage brother in law Seit and an injured soldier Daniyar. Seit narrates as he watches Jamilia and Daniyar fall in love. This is simply but beautifully written and I loved it. It's less than 100 pages and it fills your head with the landscapes of Kyrgyzstan. Fabulous.

Placemarking. I've nearly finished a book after > 2 months..

Finished 27 Bodies of Light - Sarah Moss

This was one of a few Kindle Unlimited titles I was mulling over finishing before cancelling the subscription so thank you to those who recommended choosing this one from that list.

It's well written as you'd expect from Moss although different to the more recent work of hers I've read. It tells Ally's story as she grows up in the Victorian era, the daughter of reforming zealot of a mother whose unwavering commitment to bettering the lives of poor, abused and exploited women and children is admirable but whose cruelty and abuse of her own daughter(s) is not. The novel actually starts with the mother, Elizabeth, and we see how she's a product of her own upbringing and the damage done to her too. It's juxtaposed with the initially more appealing, artistic world of Ally's father - a softer presence initially but increasingly absent and ultimately ineffective at protecting his daughters. Ally goes on to be one of the first women allowed to study medicine and qualify as a doctor, and the novel ends on a more hopeful note for her although it's still rather ominous and you can't help feel the damage has been done.

I found it a brilliant but fairly grim look at what so many women suffered in the not too distant past, and the child cruelty in particular was upsetting enough to make me put it down for a week or so in the middle. I do want to read Signs for Lost Children now though to see the continuation of Ally's story. I already have Night Waking on my Kindle too.

Thanks for the new through south

My list

1. What You Did; Claire McGowan
2. Me; Elton John
3. She Lies in Wait; Gytha Lodge
4. Watching From the Dark; Gytha Lodge
5. Lie Beside Me; Gytha Lodge
6. Little Sister; Gytha Lodge
7. Broken Summer; J. M. Lee
8. Secrets of the Sea House; Elisabeth Gifford
9. The Mysterious Affair at Styles; Agatha Christie
10. Gallows Court; Martin Edwards
11. Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family; Omid Scobie & Carolyn Durand
12. Stealing the Crown; T. P. Fielden
13. City Dark; Roger F. Canaff
14. An Eye for an Eye; Carol Wyer
15. The Housewarming; S. E. Lynes
16. Return to Fourwinds; Elisabeth Gifford
17. The Duchess; Amanda Foreman
18. The Importance of Being Kennedy; Laurie Graham
19. Habits of the House; Fay Weldon
20. Long Live the King; Fay Weldon
21. The New Countess; Fay Weldon
22. Her Last Holiday; C. L. Taylor
23. No Home for Killers; E. A. Aymar
24. Twilight; Stephanie Meyer
25. Midnight Sun; Stephanie Meyer
26. New Moon; Stephanie Meyer
27. Eclipse; Stephanie Meyer
28. Breaking Dawn; Stephanie Meyer
29. Mortmain Hall; Martin Edwards
30. The Stroke of Winter; Wendy Webb
31. The Wheel of Fortune; Susan Howatch
32. Take Six Girl: The Lives of the Mitford Sisters; Laura Thompson
33. The Lies We Tell; Meg Carter
34. The Magnificent Spilsbury and the Case of the Brides in the Bath; Jane Robins
35. The Memory of Lost Senses; Judith Kinghorn
36. Fatal Throne: The Wives of Henry VIII Tell All; Lisa Ann Sandell, Stephanie Hemphill, Candace Fleming, Deborah Hopkinson, Jennifer Donnelly, M. T. Anderson, Linda Sue Park
37. The Last Summer; Karen Swan

@JaninaDuszejko glad you liked Jamilia. It has stayed with me.

Eine - The Ink-Black Heart is uniquely unsuited to the audiobook medium. You can't have appreciated or even understood the online chats unless you read them written out, especially since many took place simultaneously. Also, I can't imagine how they were acted out in an audiobook when the reader/listener isn't supposed to know if certain characters are male or female.

Having said that, if you are in the trenches with Remus, I'm not surprised that our tastes in fiction differ

31. Vera Elizabeth von Arnim This is another rather odd book. I seem to be reading a lot of them this year. Published in 1920, this follows the courtship and marriage of Wemyss and Lucy. It opens with Lucy, a naive 22-year-old, in the garden with her recently deceased father being prepared for burial inside. A chance meeting with Wemyss, who is over 20 years her senior, leads to a courtship and eventually marriage. Wemyss himself has recently lost his wife, the eponymous Vera, with the inquest recording an open verdict. Suicide could not be ruled out.
    This is supposed to be a dark novel, something I have no objection to, but the lack of either character or plot development meant it didnt work for me. Although Lucy doesn't realise it, it is apparent to the reader that Wemyss is unpleasant (to put it mildly) from the opening chapters. His bullying and narcissistic behaviour is magnified by the constant references to him viewing Lucy as a child. For example, early on he compares her to Vera "And here was Lucy only 22 anyhow, and looking like 12. The contrast never ceased to delight him, to fill him with pride.... He adored her bobbed hair that gave her the appearance of a child or a very young boy". He constantly infantilises her with baby talk and odd paternalistic behaviour. His pride in what he considers her childlike appearance is grim. It is supposed to be, but it is fairly relentless reading. Lucy is painted as a simple, trusting innocent infatuated with him. They are both very one dimensional. Lucy's aunt (the only other character featured) is a little more interesting.
    It does shine a light on controlling and abusive relationships and there are well drawn scenes in the second half after they are married, but overall as a novel i found it quite flat and uninteresting. There are lots positive reviews online and von arnim considered it her greatest work so maybe it is just me

Enjoyed your review of Bodies of Light @AliasGrape I've enjoyed Sarah Moss in the past and it is a nudge to look some more out.

"Jamilia by Chingiz Aïtmatov"

I was just wondering if people here have noticed that Chingiz is the name Genghis, as in Ghengis Khan.

It is still a name in many Turkic nations, and while its meaning of the word is disputed, it probably meant Warrior or Right, true, universal.

In the case of Genghis Khan, it was a honorific title. His real name was Timüjin, which is also still a name in Turkic countries to this day.

Also, I can't imagine how they were acted out in an audiobook when the reader/listener isn't supposed to know if certain characters are male or female

They weren't- same voice used as for prose narration, different voices used on occasions referenced but not for the chats which was odd

Forgot to add, no one not even Perfect Robin and certainly not someone with PTSD would stay in a job where they have been repeatedly placed in dramatically dangerous scenarios

Lastly, the YouTube sketch with the anti Semitism... yes it is meant to be offensive but it's quite spectacularly so. There was no need to go that far. That won't make the TV show for sure

Which one are you reading?

I read every word of the online chats in book form. I didn't appreciate or understand them either!

I did follow them well enough to follow the plot, but they all just merged into :

The Twats From Drek's Game

For me and I sighed every time I heard a Private Channel Has Opened

There was Anomie and then everyone else could have been any of them, no distinguishable personalities

Thank you for the new thread southeast!

My list:

1: EC Bateman - Death at the Auction
2: Sophie Irwin - A Lady's Guide to Fortune-Hunting
3: Deanna Raybourn - Night of a Thousand Stars
4: Lynn Messina - A Brazen Curiosity
5: Lynn Messina - A Scandalous Deception
6: Lynn Messina - An Infamous Betrayal
7: Lynn Messina - A Nefarious Engagement
8: Richard Armitage - Geneva (audiobook)
9: Hazel Holt - Death of a Dean
10: Richard Osman - The Bullet That Missed
11: Anthony Horowitz - Stormbreaker
12: Rosie Talbot - Sixteen Souls
13: Jonathan Stroud - The Notorious Scarlett & Browne
14: Rory Clements - Corpus
15: Rory Clements - Nucleus
16: Sophie Hannah - Closed Casket
17: Karen M McManus - Nothing More to Tell
18: M C Beaton - Devil's Delight
19: Alexandra Benedict - Murder on the Christmas Express
20: M A Bennett - S.T.A.G.S.
21: M A Bennett - D.O.G.S.
22: M A Bennett - F.O.X.E.S.
23: M A Bennett - T.I.G.E.R.S.
24: M A Bennett - H.A.W.K.S.
25: Sophie Hannah - The Monogram Murders
26: Sophie Hannah - The Mystery of Three Quarters
27: Joanna Lowell - Artfully Yours
28: Joanna Lowell - The Runaway Duchess
29: Caroline O'Donoghue - All Our Hidden Gifts
30: Caroline O'Donoghue - The Gifts That Bind Us
31: Emily Brightwell - Mrs Jeffries weeds the plot
32: Rhys Bowen - The Last Mrs Summers
33: Rhys Bowen - God Rest Ye, Royal Gentlemen
34: Rhys Bowen - Four funerals & maybe a wedding
35: Michelle Salter - Death at Crookham Hall
36: Deanna Raybourn - Killers of a Certain Age
37: Lesley Cookman - Murder on the Run
38: Lesley Cookman - Murder at Mallowan Manor
39: Scott Allan - Do the Hard Things First
40: Helena Dixon - Murder at the Country Club
41: Helena Dixon - Murder on Board
42: Helena Dixon - Murder at the Charity Ball
43: Beverley Watts - Grace
44: Beverley Watts - Temperance
45: Beverley Watts - Faith
46: Rachel McLean - The Blue Pool Murders
47: Lynn Messina - A Treacherous Performance
48: Lynn Messina - A Sinister Establishment
49: Maureen Johnson - The Box in the Woods
50. Robert Muchamore - The Recruit
51. Hazel Holt - Murder on Campus
52. Lesley Cookman - Murder at the Manor
53. Jodi Taylor - About Time
54. Linda Davidsson - The Ikigai Book
55. JM Hall - A Pen Dipped in Poison
56. Hannah Dolby - No Life for a Lady
57. Hannah Beckerman - The Forgetting
58. Rachel McLean - The Lochside Murder
59. Rachel McLean - The Lighthouse Murder
60. Helena Dixon - Murder at the Beauty Pageant
61. John Marrs - The Good Samaritan
62. Lesley Cookman - Murder out of Tune
63. Enid Blyton - The Enchanted Wood
64. Enid Blyton - The Magic Faraway Tree
65. Enid Blyton - The Folk of the Faraway Tree
66. Enid Blyton - The Adventures of the Wishing Chair
67. Enid Blyton - The Wishing Chair again
68. JM Hall - A Spoonful of Murder (audiobook)
69. Maureen Johnson - Nine Liars
70. Tracy Whitwell - The Accidental Medium
71. Caroline O'Donoghue - Every Gift a Curse
72. Charlotte Leonard - Afterwards
73. Shalini Boland - The Silent Bride
74. CK McDonnell - Love Will Tear Us Apart
75. SG MacLean - Seeker
76. Various authors - Marple
77. Mary Stewart - Madam, Will You Talk?
78. Terry Pratchett - Guards! Guards!
79. Charlotte Plain - Happy planning - plan your way through anything
80. Ashley Poston - The Dead Romantics
81. Jodi Taylor - Saving Time
82. Hazel Holt - The Cruellest Month
83. MRC Kasasian - The Horror of Haglin House
84. Tracy Rees - The Elopement
85. Alison Uttley - A Traveller in Time

86. Ruth Ware - The Death of Mrs Westaway

Orphan Harriet unexpectedly comes into a large inheritance - she knows it can't be hers as she has no family but claims it anyway, given her dire financial circumstances. Entertaining but really dragged out the conclusion, which even I saw coming!

87. Georgette Heyer - The Black Moth

Her first novel I think? Love of a good woman reforms a highwayman - I liked this although was slightly hazy on why exactly the highwayman had found it necessary to become one in the first place...

88. Grace Friedman & Sarah Cheyette - Winning with ADHD

DTS1 has a lot of ADHD tendencies - I'm trying to get ahead of the game by learning about teenagers and young people with ADHD and strategies which can help!

89. MC Beaton - Agatha Raisin & the Deadly Dance (audiobook)

Ah, I love an Agatha Raisin audiobook, soothingly and excellently read by Penelope Keith. If only I sounded like Penelope Keith but am more like Keith Lemon - anyhow, one of the better early Agatha Raisin stories, and doesn't require much concentration to follow which suits me nowadays.

90. Jodi Taylor - The Good, The Bad & The History

The latest St Marys novel - I'm not sure if there will be any more as we seem to have reached full circle between this and the Time Police series (I think @MamaNewtNewt felt the same?) but TBH I enjoy the Time Police more nowadays as I find the St Marys plots so convoluted still, very entertaining, well worth a read.

91. Heather Fawcett - Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries

I think much reviewed on here already... I enjoyed this a lot except frankly <BUGBEAR ALERT> if you are American/ Canadian and writing as an English person then do get someone English to check it over and make sure you haven't left any jarring words or phrases in there...

92. Enid Blyton - More Wishing Chair Stories

Read with DTS1 - he loves these far more than I expected!

93. SG MacLean - Destroying Angel
94. SG MacLean - The Bear Pit

The third and fourth books in the Seeker series - like Shardlake but with more action! - I raced through these and am waiting for the last from the library. Set during the Commonwealth, which isn't a period I know a lot about despite having a History degree

95. Cynthia Murphy - The Last to Die

YA horror - think along the lines of Point Horror - a quick read.

96. Jonathan Stroud - The Screaming Staircase
97. Jonathan Stroud - The Whispering Skull
98. Jonathan Stroud - The Hollow Boy
99. Jonathan Stroud - The Creeping Shadow
100. Jonathan Stroud - The Empty Grave

Gosh I love the Lockwood books, despite being a lot slightly older than the target YA audience. Still sad that the series has been cancelled by Netflix too! Just excellent books, great premise, lots of humour and scary in places.

DNF: Janice Hallett - The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels

Thought I'd really enjoy this, as I enjoyed The Appeal - didn't, couldn't get into it at all. Bah. I did find The Twyford Code absolute twaddle (though readable twaddle, to be fair) so perhaps should have expected it.

@FortunaMajor I liked the tripfiction site although my town has a very famous book set there and it wasn't included, so I'm not sure of their criteria!

I remember thinking the Kate Mosse books were great @TimeforaGandT but am not sure I'd have the time/ patience for them now, as my brain has been fried by small DC and the perimenopause

In sadder news, my BorrowBox app seems to have given up?! It won't work at all with my Kindle Fire, the Kindle keeps saying that the app is outdated - I'm waiting to hear back from BorrowBox about what I can do! In the meantime I've paid the extortionate £9.49 for a month of Kindle Unlimited, as I have a stack of books I'm waiting to read on there...

Does The Ink Black Heart work on kindle? I’m working my way through the series and have that one on kindle but I’m wondering if it might be better to borrow the hardback from my mum. Not sure if the formatting of the online chats works OK on kindle.

It's pretty hideous on Kindle, but I think the chats would be hideous even in book format tbh.

"different voices used on occasions referenced but not for the chats which was odd"

Not just odd but also impossible to portray chats taking place simultaneously on an audiobook - at some point of the group chat, two people break off to chat in private while continuing the chat with the others, in windows side by side on the computer screen... just like it happens in RL. This was an important part of the book and you would have missed out on a lot while listening BV to the audiobook narration.

"Forgot to add, no one not even Perfect Robin and certainly not someone with PTSD would stay in a job where they have been repeatedly placed in dramatically dangerous scenarios"

I think you are underestimating the power of determination. A woman determined to succeed and prove to the world that her very unpopular life choice was correct will push ahead even when it's giving her panic attacks at times. I didn't find that part of the book unrealistic.

What is doing my head in with these Strike books is the Robin - Strike love angle which I honestly couldn't care less about, and the "stump" that understandably hurts rather often but which I just don't want to read about anymore.

Chessie - Chats worked OK for me on the Kindle. I clicked on the chat pictures and blew them up a bit but the fonts were quite small.

I didn't realise that, so thanks for pointing it out, that's interesting. I did notice some editions spelt his name differently so had wondered about the pronunciation of the first syllable.

@StColumbofNavron I think Jamilia will be one of my books of the year, it's got into my head in a way that hasn't happened for a while. Thank you so much for recommending it.

@ChessieFL, I think it depends on what kind of Kindle. I have a paperwhite and couldn’t enlarge the font at all. I found it really, really difficult to read and may have skipped some of it.
I’m only in it in the hope Strike and Robin get together.

Whether or not there's ever going to be a shag is the only reason I'm still invested in it.

Thanks all - think I’ll borrow the hardback! Sounds like that will be the easiest/best way to read it.

Word.