50 books challenge - 2023 round up

[Tarahumara]

Hello 50 bookers! Here's a separate thread to gather together our top recommendations from the year. Please post your final lists, or just your bolds if you prefer. I'll come back later with mine...

Good idea! I'll post my bolds up rather than the whole list.

Can we also add a "really don't bother" list too? Although I don't have many of those.

Good plan! Back later with my list

Placemarking for when I've done it. Fab idea.

Placemarking for later

STATS THREAD!

Be back later with mine!

Thanks @Tarahumara. I'll post my list later.

Thank you, I will post a list on here at the end of the year.

BOLDS - NON FICTION

Surprisingly thin on the ground this year even though I've read over 20 memoirs I think

Difficult Women by Helen Lewis

I really enjoyed this history of feminism in 11 fights

Hags by Victoria Smith

This had mixed reviews on the thread but I thought it was a real call to arms

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

A memoir with a bit of a difference as one woman tries to find herself on the Pacific Coast Trail. Well written and engaging.

Me by Elton John

This Sleb autobiography was genuinely entertaining and a cut above the average

Fiction is going to take much longer.

Oo! Going to enjoy this !

Oh - I like the quick-fire reviews with the bolding @EineReiseDurchDieZeit - that's a very nice extra

BOLDS - FICTION

Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley

A young woman with no support network takes drastic decisions. This was grim but so well written

Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez

A young nurse uncovers the mistreatment of black Americans in medical care. Becoming embroiled with one family will she do more harm than good?

Build Your House Around My Body by Violet Kupersmith

This, about a young woman who travels to Vietnam to teach English was very weird but oddly wonderful

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Absorbing family saga set in Japan but within the Korean community

Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield

A woman is left helpless when her wife returns altered from a deep sea mission.

Hazards Of Time Travel by Joyce Carol Oates

A woman living in a totalitarian regime receives an odd punishment - this was elevated by a discreet twist I spotted when I was reflecting on it.

Stay With Me by Ayobami Adebayo

A happily married woman buckles when the pressure to conceive becomes overwhelming. I loved this, I think it's my book of the year.

Burntcoat by Sarah Hall

An artist lives through a pandemic. Very sparingly done but excellent prose

Woman, Eating by Claire Kohda

A young vampire strikes out alone for the first time.

Sankofa by Chibundu Onuzo

A woman searches for her father and her ancestral roots. Will she like what she finds.

A Terrible Kindness by Jo Browning Wroe

A troubled young undertaker helps out during the Aberfab disaster with the book then going on to tell his story.

Old Filth by Jane Gardam

A retired judge looks back upon his life.

All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Despite both the terrible ending and the terrible Netflix adaptation - this, about blind French girl Marie-Laure and young German Werner Pfennig in WW2 is well worth your time.

Among Friends by Caroline B Cooney

Nostalgia for my youth

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler

I raced through this fictionalised account of the siblings of John Wilkes Booth

The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty

An assortment of strange things happen to a group of people in a housing project

Really Good Actually by Monica Heisey

A woman unravels in the wake of her divorce. Very funny in parts.

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

I mean, who doesn't know about it?

The Storied Life Of AJ Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin

A nice book about a remote bookshop and its owners.

Sixteen Horses by Greg Buchanan

Realistically this is a rather generic mindless crime book, but I was super into it at the time.

Kala by Colin Walsh

A group of adults are forced to confront the untimely death of their childhood friend

In Memoriam by Alice Winn

A gay love story told via the tragedies of World War I

Phew!

I don't want to post too early as I'm 15 off a lovely round number and I think I can make it by the skin of my teeth.

I'm not bothered if I don't make it, but I'm close enough to try.

I also need a bit of time to reassess my bolds.

So for a list of 150 titles 26 get bolds which is 17% which isn't great really. Really need quality over quantity next year, excited to see other lists!

Thanks @Tarahumara , great idea! I’ll post my list at the end of the year 😊

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit your bolds list is longer than my entire list!

My top reads of the year are as follows:

South Riding by Winifred Holtby. A panoramic look at a 1930s Yorkshire community that was just perfect. My book of the year.

Childhood, Youth, Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen. Translated by Tiina Nunnally and Michael Favala Goldman. A three part memoir of a Copenhagen working class childhood in the 1930s, followed by literary success and drug addiction. The last part (Dependancy) is heartbreaking.

Alberta and Jacob by Cora Sandel. Translated by Elizabeth Rokkan. This one considered one of Norway's finest coming of age novels and follows the teenage Alberta through a year in Tromsø in the early 20th century.

Plus Persuasion by Jane Austen but that's probably stating the obvious.

Thanks for the thread @Tarahumara

Nice list @EineReiseDurchDieZeit I've read 10 of yours, 6 this year. I think Demon Copperhead, In Memoriam, Kala and Burntcoat may well all make my best list too. ( And the Violet Kuipersmith and Nightcrawling were on last year's list).

I did like The Storied Life but it was probably a bit slight to be a hit for me. And I wasn't a f fan of Woman, Eating.

I read A spell of Good Things which I didn't love so don't know whether to give Stay With Me a go.

I've still got quite a few books that I'm hoping to get through this month so will wait to do my list. Am on 110 so not likely to finish on a round number!

I will be back!

All nonfiction for me this year which is unusual but I can’t think of any fiction that stood out.

*A woman of No Importance - Sonia Purnell
Politics on the Edge - Rory Stewart
A Small Light - Miep Gies
*A Heart That Works - Rob Delaney
The Full English - Stuart Maconie
When The Dust Settles - Lucy Easthope
Into The Silence - Wade Davies

Very excited. I LOVE the end of year round up and stats! I'll be back with my info soon.

I'm hoping to finish a few more before the end of the year, but my bolds have been:

Pod by Laline Paull - this might actually be my standout, it's the one my thoughts keep returning to and the one I keep recommending to people. Even though they look at me funny because it's a book for adults from the POV of a dolphin.

Lolly Willowes - Sylvia Townsend Walker
Riddley Walker - Russell Hoban
The Dangerous Kingdom of Love - Neil Blackmore
Woman, Eating - Claire Kohda
Trespasses - Louise Kennedy
Fire Rush - Jacqueline Crooks
The Marriage Portrait - Maggie O'Farrell
For Thy Great Pain, Have Mercy on My Little Pain - Victoria Mackenzie and The Book of Margery Kempe itself
Wintersmith - Terry Pratchett
Where I End - Sophie White
The Patriarchs - Angela Saini
Unsettled Ground - Claire Fuller

I love some stats and it's quite useful to see the books that a lot of people consider a top read.

My best reads:
Too Late To Turn Back by Barbara Greene
Adventure travel from another time

Stay With Me By Ayobami Adebayo
Family life with depth

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
Mine and DH crossover book of the year. Well told Sci Fi with memorable characters

Daisy Jones and the six by TJR
Such a good story of a band I had to double check it wasn't based on a true story

Terry Pratchett, a life in footnotes by Rob Wilkins
Biography from his personal assistant

And my two reads that only got two stars
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Love some of his (Dogs of War is fab!) but I couldn't wait for this to end.
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. Just not my thing.

Thanks for setting this up @Tarahumara, I'll be back at the end of the year with the full list.

Place marking for the end of the year. Loving the lists already posted.

I'm still optimistic that I'll get some more good reads under my belt over the next three weeks, but here are my top reads so far:

Non-fiction
The Dark Queens, Shelley Puhak
The Secret Rooms, by Catherine Bailey

Fiction
What Hetty Did, J L Carr
Children of Paradise, Camilla Grudova
Pied Piper, Neville Shute
The Bandit Queens, Parini Shroff
The Third Miss Symons, F M Mayor

And a tip of the hat to three books which, while not top-notch in themselves, seem to represent the end of series that I have enjoyed over the last few years (I say "seem" as you can never be quite sure whether the author might feel inspired to wheel their characters out one more time):

The Last Remains, Elly Griffith
The Company of Heaven, Catherine Fox
The Good, the Bad and the History, by Jodi Taylor