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?

I did reasonably well but am sadly too ill read today .

I thought 50 Bookers would like to hear I bought DS19 TTOD.

Oh no, @Piggywaspushed - get well soon.
I hope everyone else is carving out some time to read today, whether you celebrate Christmas, or if you'd rather see the back of it. My H got me Eight Months on Ghazzah Street and Mist Over Pendle, and my lovely new boss got me an Amazon voucher as well. I bought H The Prime Ministers We Never Had and will be pickng that up when he's done!

Sorry you're feeling ill, @Piggywaspushed

I got Jane Austen, the Secret Radical and a copy of The White Spider as I've been wanting to re-read it.

Hope everyone is having a good day. We're full of lunch and installed on the sofas with Toy Story and the Quality Street. I think I'm the only person on MN who likes the new paper wrappers.

Piggy and Pepe, sorry you're both ill for Christmas Day .

Just finished 75. A Christmas Carol.

Only one book for me, Weird Mediaeval Guys - a spin-off from a Twitter account dedicated to medieval manuscript marginalia, including this gem:

Oh no @PepeLePew and @Piggywaspushed , that’s just rotten. Hope you feel better soon.

2 ‘novelty’ type book gifts The Button House Chronicles and Brian Bilston’s And So This Is Christmas. I quite like the latter’s poetry as long as I don’t read too many at once. Also got some more National Book Tokens so I’m lounging around, full of roast dinner, filling bookshop online baskets then emptying them again as I think I’d like to go in physical shops with a neatly ordered list never going to happen not organised enough and shop on a whim sans lists .
I might nip upstairs in a minute and see what Black Shuck Books anthologies I have so I can complete the collection but then again I might nip into the kitchen and have some Christmas Cake……it’s all a distant pipe dream at the moment

I hope those of you who are poorly have still managed to have a lovely Christmas. Everyone’s gone home now so I’m curled up under my new wool blanket with books and chocolate and I’m not moving for the rest of the day.

New books plus In Memoriam which I’ve misplaced.

I got The Button House Archives too @BoldFearlessGirl
Plus a Mowgli Cookbook and Sarn Helen A Journey Through Wales, Past, Present and Future by Tom Bullough.

I hope you poorly people are better soon.

@PepeLePew Sorry, missed your post somehow. Hope you feel better soon.

Likewise - All the best to you and yours @PepeLePew

Sending sympathy to those who are poorly.
I got Cleopatra and Frankenstein and Britain's Best Ever Political Cartoons but a good chunk of book vouchers .

Hope the ill people are feeling better soon. Nice haul @TattiePants In Memoriam and Black Butterflies are two of my favourites from this year. I didn’t get any books but have loads of Waterstones vouchers so looking forward to shopping. Settling down now with a glass of wine and Small Things Like These which I’ve been saving for this occasion.

I only remember Complicity has some dodgy sex scenes @TattiePants but it’s absolutely years since I read it.

Sympathies to those feeling poorly today - hope you all feel better soon!

I have been very lucky today! This lot will keep me busy for a while (although some of them I have already read and just wanted copies to keep and reread).

@ChessieFL The Common Years is one of my top 10 books. My original copy fell apart and I have the one you have now. Yes, I have looked up Egliston Road on Street view!

I didn't get any books - I think that people hesitate to give me books because they know I read a lot and worry I'll have already read it (and we tend to do surprises rather than lists here).

Remus - I like the new paper wrappers too!

Hope the poorly people feel better soon.

That's me as well @Tarahumara no one dares!

Can I ask the thread two Harry Potter based questions or should i start a thread?

Ask away @EineReiseDurchDieZeit

So

a) they used the time turner to save Sirius in Prisoner Of Azkaban, why couldn't they do this in Order Of The Phoenix?

b) Harry's established friendship with Mad Eye Moody is based on a lie as he was always Barty Crouch Jnr. So how come they have a friendship later, he should be a stranger to Harry really.

Both things annoy me

I got Gulag and Last Train to Istanbul but the big surprise was a Kindle Paperwhite signature. I mentioned back I June that I was worried my Voyage was getting a bit slow

A) I don’t think Sirius is actually dead in Prisoner, but he is in Order

B) I think it’s more respect than friendship

It's always annoyed me Sirius and his preventable death, had Harry confided in him properly he wouldn't have died

The whole veil thing annoys me because she tricks us into thinking he’s not’Just dead’ as it were.

I did pretty well on the books front:

• Holly by Stephen King
• The Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub
• Step Aside Pops by Kate Beaton (graphic novel)
• The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy (clothbound classic)
• The Outsider by Albert Camus (clothbound classic)

I also got Amazon vouchers (which will go on books) and a Thirsk University T shirt (one for the St Mary's fans 😊)

Just one book here which DP knew I wanted. DD was always my top surprise book buyer, but sadly the combination of her having left home & me reading a lot on kindle / e-library (so DP can't check shelves) means she doesn't have confidence I won't have already read things. However, my library haul plus kindle bargains are keeping me well occupied :)

98. The Lost Rainforests of Britain by Guy Shrubsole
    Lovely book about the fragments of temperate rainforest, remnants of the original wildwood, that remain along the west coast of Britain. Like The Butterfly Year that I read in summer, this is definitely a book to make you slow down & look at the world differently. It was conveniently also the perfect read for a wet December in west Wales, & I'm now planning my holiday walks to visit local woodlands & have dug out lichen & fern identification guides lurking on our bookshelves.

99. Burntcoat by Sarah Hall
    This is told in the first person by sculptor Edith Hall, who knows that she will die shortly from the resurgence of a virus caught during a global pandemic.
    
    Where Hall's previous books The Carhullan Army and The Wolf Border centred the Cumbrian landscape, this is essentially a novel about relationships & art. Short, intense & powerful, it's one that will stay with me (as the other two have).

I'm still hoping to hit 100 this year before doing my top reads.