50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Ten

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the tenth and final thread of the 50 Books Challenge for this year.

The challenge was to read fifty books (or more!) in 2023, though reading fifty wasn'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, the sixth one here, the seventh one here, eighth one here and the ninth one here

How have you got on this year?

Merry Christmas @LadybirdDaphne!
Is the turkey in the oven yet? Great presents 📚

Just finishing No.66 which I'll review after Christmas. Merry Christmas one and all.

Merry Christmas, you wonderful bookers.

Our Hideous Progeny is on my wish list, so I look forward to the review.

Merry Christmas one and all. Here’s to a good book haul. Raising a large G&T to you
all.

Merry Christmas everyone! Enjoy the holidays 🎅🌲🎁📚

Happy Christmas everyone!

62 Just One Damned Thing After Another - Jodi Taylor Well this was not quite what I was expecting. I thought it would involve lots of time travel by academic types and I suppose that’s what I got, but it was crazy, all-over-the-place, suspend your disbelief sort of time travel instead of the measured, gentle, Miss Marple-style historical investigation which, for some reason, I thought it would be. Lots of fun as long as you don’t let your brain ask too many questions, and as long as you are ok with plot trumping character. I’ll definitely read the next in the series.

Now I absolutely have to sleep before the kids bounce out of bed ready for stockings…

Merry Christmas everyone! Here’s hoping for lots of books under Christmas trees today. Looking forward to see what everyone gets!

Happy Christmas 50 bookers!

Happy Christmas - I know I mainly lurk, but I L O V E this thread. Nicest place on the internet.

Merry Christmas everyone, hope everyone gets lots of lovely new books.

Happy Christmas all!

I'm DNFing The Thursday Murder Club (can't be arsed section). Maybe if I gave it another chapter I would be into it, but as it is, it reads like a clunky selection of old cliches bolted together. Replacing it with British Railway Disasters, my present from dp ❤

Merry Xmas to you all - hears hoping for lots of books for everyone. Looking forward to seeing everyone's treasures !

Merry Christmas to all 50 bookers

Merry Christmas 50 Bookers!

Merry Christmas everyone! Dh went out on a limb for my stocking this year and bought me 4 of the Never After books. We'll see what I make of them. Off to the in-laws for lunch later and they are normally pretty good at picking some books from my wishlist so hoping for some good presents

@MamaNewtNewt storygraph gives you all sorts of stats on your reading, I love it

MERRY CHRISTMAS GANG

Happy Christmas all! Wishing you all lovely piles of books and the time to read them 🎁🌲⭐

My holiday reading has kicked off very nicely with Burntcoat and the Lost rainforests of Britain - reviews to follow when I'm not on my phone.

Merry Christmas guys.

I see some book shaped things under the tree, I’m reading in bed with a tea and my husband’s just suggested a trip to my fave book shop in Alfriston in between Christmas and New Year. Bliss. Although I’ve not mentioned I’m on book 5 of 32 of the Moorland Dynasty so unlikely to actually read anything else for a while.

Hope there’s plenty of books and reading for you all today. X

Happy Xmas 50.bookers! Thanks for making this thread the nicest place on the Internet 😊

Merry Christmas, 50 Book friends.
All our plans cancelled as both DD and I tested positive for COVID so we are hunkering down and enjoying some quiet and gentle family time. I've been up since 7am on the sofa with a mug of tea reading and drifting off occasionally. At some point I will go and wake the DC and we will spend the day eating and reading and watching Taskmaster.
I have a backlog of reviews to catch up on which I will do tomorrow and will post on the round up thread but I'm glad I waited for that as I've just finished what may well be my fiction book of the year.

The Secret River by Kate Grenville
I bought this when it was first published around 15 years ago because I thought I should read it and never got round to it. I've been trying to read some of those books on my shelf that have been making me feel slightly guilty over the past few months and this was next. And I'm so glad it was although it was an immensely uncomfortable read.

Will Thornhill - a boatman on the Thames - and his family are sent to Sydney after he is caught stealing. He earns his freedom after five years and moves to a plot of land on the Hawkesbury River where he falls in love with the landscape even as he and the other British colonialists find themselves drawn into uneasy and often horrifyingly violent encounters with people who've lived on the land for centuries before they arrived.

There's so much beauty in this book, and the story unfolds gently like the rivers it's set on. But there is also horror and hatred in abundance. People who believe themselves to be good make bad choices and have to live or die with them as a result and Thornhill in particular is a character we can't help being both attracted to and repulsed by.

I was born in New South Wales and my parents moved here when I was three. I don't feel Australian and don't have much to tie me to there but this story - based on Greenville's own ancestors - left me feeling extremely troubled by the history of the region. And guilty that I've never really given it much thought. My mother's family made money from trade and mining in the 1800s along the Murray River and in the outback and the issue of whose land it was never came up in the stories of her family. I will pass this on to her and see what she makes of it - her father was an advocate for the rights of Indigenous Australians decades before that was something anyone thought hard about and I will be interested to hear her thoughts on it.

Merry Christmas you lovely lot - thank you for another year making this the best corner of the internet.

I suspect there are some books for me under the tree, looking forward to seeing everyone's book hauls.

@Sadik I have just bought the Lost Rainforests book - looks fabulous.

Pepe I hope you don't feel too poorly and you and DH recover quickly.

Merry Christmas to my online book friends!

I hope you all have the most wonderful day and I look forward to seeing your book hauls!

Have a lovely Christmas-as a child my favourite part of Christmas were the new books and the Xmas annuals

Merry Christmas lovely book people.

Happy Christmas, everyone 🎅🎄

Merry Christmas fellow 50 bookers! 🎄🎅 looking forward to seeing the book hauls @PepeLePew hope you and DD feel better soon