50 Books Challenge 2024 Part One

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the first thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2024, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

If possible, please can you embolden your titles and maybe authors as well of books you've read or going to read? It makes it much easier to keep track, especially when the threads move quickly at this time of the year.

Who's in for this year?

I've started on 5. The Great Post Office Scandal - Nick Wallace after seeing it recommended on here. Very engaging and shocking so far. I also downloaded an audible book as a free trial Ultra Processed People - Chris van Tulleken. I'm sure many on here have read it. Audio books are a new one for me and as I only listen 20 minutes a day whilst exercising I think this'll take me a while to get through. It's narrated by the author and his voice is easy to listen to.

I loved American Marriage
Now on with 3) City of Bohane, which was recommended to me as I love Irvine Welsh. Currently I’m hating it. I’m finding the slang hard work to follow (and I liked Clockwork Orange) and it feels a bit try hard. May be my first DNF of the year…

@YnysMonCrone24 would love to speak Welsh with you! I’m on year 2 of Mynediad and right at the other end of the country from Ynys Môn (Abertawe) so there’ll be a few differences!

I've had a really slow start to the year and I've been terrible at updating everywhere. I've been reading a few recommendations I've picked up on here.

They have all been recently discussed and were well received by me.
A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf
When the Dust Settles - Lucy Easthope
Cuddy - Benjamin Myers
For Thy Great Pain Have Mercy on My Little Pain - Victoria Mackenzie

I started the year with Emily Wilson's new translation of The Iliad. I think she's done an excellent job, but ultimately I am very bored of that beach.`Not her fault, but I need to be more selective with the current Greek retelling bandwagon that's leapt up in recent years as I'm a sucker for those and have clearly overdone it.

Nottingham - Nathan Makaryk
Robin Hood origin story. It's 25.5 hours I'm not getting back. Should have been a DNF, but I was curious at how much worse it could get. If you like that sort of thing, just rewatch Prince of Thieves and do something more productive with the rest of the time.

The River at Night - Erica Ferencik
Book club read. Four 30 somethings go on a rafting trip in the wilderness with an inexperienced guide and everything goes horribly wrong.
Much liked by my IRL group. Four very defined characters, and there was a lot to discuss in it.

I've also just DNF Dazzling - Chikodili Emelumadu at 40%. It's a magical realism/ W African mythology coming of age story. It did nothing for me and I found it a bit dull.

I cant remember Gatsby at all, I ready it while taking a road trip from Vegas to SFS via the Grand-Canyon while pregnant with my first. I think the trip and the pregnancy may have fried my brain. Though I do remember reading it by the pool in an odd motel on the edge of the Napa Valley drinking fizzy water while my husband tried the wine.

I just finished no. 4 Weyward by Emilia Heart. I LOVED this book. Its the story of three women from the same line of Weyward or Weird women. Altha is being tried for as a witch in the 1600s, Violet is the daughter of a strict and heartless aristocrat in the 1940s and Kate is running from her violet partner in the present. Each tells their story of growing into themselves learning their strengths, being who they want to be rather than hiding away to conform. As the later generations learn more about the earlier women in their line they gain strength and independence. I really enjoyed it. Not sure I would read again so its not quite a bold but thoroughly enjoyed my time in these women's company. I'll look out for more by Emilia Heart.

After reading the review above I'm going to try Rory Stewards book as soon as I can get to the library. He impressed me during the leadership contest, id be interested to hear more from him.

Despite promising myself that I AM NOT going to pre-read for the Women's Prize this year, I've found this list quite intriguing with a lot of great sounding books on it. I've already read 8 of the top 20. There may now be a spreadsheet involved.

www.goodreads.com/list/show/194993.Women_s_Prize_for_Fiction_2024_Eligible_Books

The Linda Grant book won't be out in time to be eligible for this year.

Soldier Sailor is getting a lot of buzz about it.

I got DH the Rory Stewart book for Christmas after the recommendations on here. He loves a political book and I thought this might be a middle ground for us.
Anyway, he hasn't read it yet, and if he doesn't hurry up, I'm going to pick it up first! A bit rude for a present maybe but he has had a chance.

Had a big career decision happening this week, so I really needed some comfort reading, hence my additions below.

4 Impossible Creatures by Katherine Rundell

Much read and recommended on here, also by my 11 year old and my husband so thought I'd give it a whirl. Christopher discovers his family's role as guardians of the entrance to the Archipelago, where the old magic still exists and fantastic creatures roam. He meets Mal, a girl who can fly, and slowly they uncover together the reason why the magic is fading and creatures are dying. It is a very lovely book, beautifully written with sympathetic main characters and a lot of humour as well. It has very definite echoes of a number of other children's books, particularly, for me, Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising series, with parallels between the former's glimourie and the latter's gift of gramarye as well as some of the creatures. The latter was actually the only real niggle for me - Susan Cooper's Welsh is great and almost all the Welsh language and pronunciation in her books is spot on. Rundell has a section on the wild boar of Arthurian legend - the twrch trwyth, but whilst her pronunciation accords with the correct Welsh spelling, she spells it twrch tryth throughout, which annoyed me to an unreasonable extent! Otherwise, however, as lovely as everyone says.

This and the need for comfort reading drove me back to a full re-read of the Dark is Rising sequence, only without the actual The Dark Is Rising book because I read that before Christmas as I always do. So, cheating a bit, but:

5 Over Sea Under Stone by Susan Cooper
6 Greenwitch by Susan Cooper
7 The Grey King by Susan Cooper

These really do stand up to re-reading. Over Sea Under Stone is, as I have read elsewhere, a bit "Five go to Cornwall" but that does it an injustice as it is still beautifully written with wonderful evocations of the landscape. Greenwitch has never been my favourite of the books, but on re-reading I liked its focus on the feminine which is rather absent from the others. Arguably, The Grey King is the best of the lot; it has a real sense of menace and threat and there is a heartbreakingly sad section in the middle which always catches me out. It's set around the area where I grew up which makes it extra special for me.

in an odd motel
on the edge of the Napa Valley
drinking fizzy water
while my husband tried the wine

I love this. It’s like song lyrics! Imagining it sung by Blondie or Justine from Elastica or Louise Wener from Sleeper.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie I'm imaging Joni Mitchell

Arriving late to the Great Gatsby discussion - I’ve never read it, but I did like Tender Is The Night, although after more than 20 years I only have vague impressions of glamour and sadness. And also the phantom taste of Sainsburys value custard creams, which is pretty much all I ate in the first term at uni, when I read the book - quite a weird association to have! 😄 It’s still on my shelf (well, actually in a box as we move house next week) and I feel like a re-read might be in order.

3 A heart that works - Rob Delaney

I just made the mistake of finishing listening to this during my lunch break. I am red-eyed and blotchy and bowled over by how very beautifully Delaney told this heartbreaking and personal story of the loss of his baby boy.

No words.

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie thanks for making me a lyricist! Much appreciated 😂

Love this 😁

7 Time After Time by Chris Atkins
I liked A Bit Of A Stretch but this bored the arse off me. I was about to DNF it when it reached the Conclusions section at the end and I realised the rest of the book was the linked footnotes, so I carried on. Actually, the Conclusions were quite interesting and I do agree with all his points. The journey to get there was just tedious though, with a distasteful air of almost admiration for some of the ex offenders he writes about. Rather like Adam Kay, Atkins seems to be spreading one period of his life into book after book and I found it incredibly dull. Annoying too, in places, mainly when he hangs around court rooms just to get an anecdote out of it, based on the supremely unreliable pov of the men on trial. He seems largely uninterested in female experiences, unless he’s pestering the teenage victim of a dangerous stalker for ‘her side of the story’
I think his heart’s in the right place but also that he needs to move on from “When I was in Wandsworth”.

@FortunaMajor that looks like an interesting list. I’ve read a few of them and have got some sitting on my tbr pile! I enjoyed Chlorine by Jade Song, it was a good odd read. And I’ve just picked up Soldier Sailor from the library. I’ll definitely try the Mona Awad one because I enjoyed her other book Bunny.

I loved Gatsby, I’ve read this a couple of times of the years and always remember the quote " They were careless people. . . They smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money . . . and let other people clean up the mess they had made. . ." I sadly often seen that play out even now.

Started the year with Love after Love by Ingrid Persaud which was fine. It follows three people in Trinidad and New York as they navigate their love lives and their ups and downs. A nice enough read

Hotel Silence by Audur Ava Olafsdottir – a book that won the Icelandic literature prize and is only just over 200 pages. A man living in Iceland decides to commit suicide but doesn’t want his daughter to find him so he decides to travel to a recently war torn country to do it. He ends up helping out around the hotel and making friends with the staff and fellow guests. This really reminded me of a gentleman in Moscow (there was even an identical plot point at one point) and unfortunately this one wasn’t nearly as good and I kept comparing the two books throughout.

Two DNFs – Old babes in the Wood by Margaret Attwood, set of short stories that bored me to tears.

The Wrath to come: Gone with the wind and the lies America tells by Sarah Churchwell. This one should have been right up my street as it examines Gone with the Wind (book and film) and how this built into the Southern myth and the distortions (e.g. people claiming slavery was not a factor in the American civil war). Unfortunately this seemed all over the place and I had difficulty trying to work out the point.

@nowanearlyNicemum I finished listening to it yesterday. I was walking through London Bridge station during the rush hour with tears pouring down my cheeks. Absolutely heartbreaking. His "this is what you don't do or say to someone who has lost a child" really made me realise how inadequate my responses have been in similar situations with friends who have found themselves in that position of unimaginable horror.

6 Berserker - Adrian Edmondson

Reviewed by many on here recently. A mix of the gently amusing and poignant, which I enjoyed on Audible, though perhaps would have preferred more on his adult life (a sure sign that I’ve read too many celebrity autobiographies and tend to find the childhood stuff a little tedious!)

That’s an interesting list. I’ve only read two, A History of Burning which was a bold for me and Penance was very nearly a DNF. I’ve got In Memoriam lined up which I’m looking forward to.

Thanks for linking the Women's Prize possible @FortunaMajor . I've read quite a few as there's a bit of crossover with the Booker.

Agree there's a lot of buzz around Sailor Soldier - Bookstagram seemed upset it wasn't nominated for the Booker - and I'd expect to see Zadie Smith on it. Also Lauren Groff, they often longlist previous winners, and I guess by that standard Naomi Alderman.

I'll probably try and read The Fraud and Vaster Wilds before the longlist comes out but no real desire to read Naomi as didn't really rate the Power.

Thanks for that list @FortunaMajor
I’ve read 4, own another 4 that I plan to read, and another 3 had caught my eye previously. I must move the 4 I own up my TBR list to give me a head start in March!

Thanks from me too, Fortuna! I've read 7 on that list. Some of the 7 I read were very good, but none were bolds for me.

I'm very tempted now to seek out more titles on the list, but I'm going to resist for awhile, because my physical TBR pile is so big right now already! And I know once the longlist comes out I'll cave immediately and start placing library reservations like a madwoman.

Oops, I may just have reserved Soldier, Sailor! So much for resolutions, ha.

I think it's a very interesting list and a good gauge of what's popular in women's contemporary fiction. However, don't put too much faith in the list being reflective of what will actually be nominated. There's always a lot of new authors in the mix.

This is the best looking potential list I've seen for a few years though and I'm looking forward to working through it.