50 Books Challenge 2024 Part Two

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the second 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.

The previous thread is here

Thanks for the new thread @Southeastdweller. I'm happy with the start to my year, a couple of bolds and no real duds.

1. TheTwist of a Knife - Anthony Horowitz
2. Hello Beautiful - Ann Napolitano
3. Verdigris - Michele Mari, translated by Brian Robert Moore
4. The Covenant of Water - Abraham Verghese
5. Big Swiss - Jen Beagin
6. The Memory of Animals - Claire Fuller
7. The School at the Chalet - Elinor M Brent Dyer

Just reread the first Chalet school book as we're planning a trip at Easter to the Bavarian Alps and considering crossing the border so I can fan-girl the original site.

Don't know if any of you were ever on the long-running Chalet school threads a few years back? Suffice to say EBD isn't the best writer and has a weird obsession with multiple births and cornflower blue eyes but I still love these. Was very disappointed as a child how different actual boarding school was!

A new thread, so soon. Thank you, Southeast.

I need to read quicker and update more often. Hopefully will finish a book or two this week. Will add my list later.

I’ve had two false starts on Hags on Audible - was finding it hard to follow in that format so bought it on a 99p Kindle deal and will attempt again soon. I’m not quite the target audience - am a geriatric millennial so on the outer slopes of middle age rather than the perilous downhill plummet, although well aware it’s coming - but think it covers important ground so I’m determined to get through it.

My list of books so far

1. Eye for an eye- MJ Aldridge- initially Df but went back to complete it still not for me.
2. A year of living danishly by Helen Russell

3. It girl- Ruth Ware 4. Blood sweat and tea- Tom Reynolds 5. black cake-Charmaine Wilkerson

So, no bolds just yet but here’s my list

1. Blood Sugar - Sacha Rothschild
2. A Bit of a Stretch - Chris Atkins
3. Confessions of a Barrister- Russell Winnock
4. Beyond the wand - Tom Felton
5. The Housemaid - Frieda Mc Fadden
6. Born a Crime - Trevor Noah
7. The Fell - Sarah Moss

@Stowickthevast glad to see someone else loved Big Swiss. I read it at the end of last year and everyone I’ve spoken to who read it didn’t enjoy it - but I thought it was a hoot!

I must admit, I very nearly put in my review that if you're still in the thick of the baby years that it may be a bit close to the bone.

Carrie Soto is Back is the one TJR I've avoided because a very early review on here said it was too tennis heavy. You've convinced me I'm not missing out.

Thanks @Southeastdweller. Here's my list. It's a bit short but two bolds so far so I'm happy with that.

1 The Road by Cormac McCarthy
2 The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4 by Sue Townsend
3 Here’s Looking At You by Mhairi McFarlane
4 Christmas Pie by Jodi Taylor
5 The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly
6 Last Dance at the Discotheque for Deviants by Paul David Gould

Thank you for the new thread, Southeastdweller! Here's my list so far;

1. The Fancy: Monica Dickens
2. Nettle and Bone: T. Kingfisher
3. Monsieur Ibrahim et les Fleurs du Coran: Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt
4. Lolita: Vladimir* *Nabokov
5. The Messalina of the Suburbs: E.M. Delafield.
6. She and Her Cat: Makoto Shinkai and Naruki Nagakawa trans. Ginny Tapley Takemori.
7. Ruth: Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
8. Death in Venice: Thomas Mann.

I'm making my mind up whether Ruth will be a bold for me or not.

I have started to read God's Old Time by Sebastian Barry* *and I must read the Nicholas Nickleby chapters this week as well.

Yes @Stowickthevast I loved the chalet series as well when I was young and I read one now and again. What strikes me is how very pretty everyone is. If you are plain or plump it's nearly inexcusable! She was an ordinary-looking girl but very kind sort of thing.
Your trip sounds fantastic. I've never been over that direction yet, but I would love to go there.

Thanks for the new thread. I am so impressed with the reading speed on here!

Mine are

1. The Beautiful Ones by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
2. Tell No One by Harlon Coben
3. Whatever Next by Lady Anne Glenconner
4. Weyward by Emilia Heart

The Beautiful Ones was probably my favorite so far, but not a bold. I'm reading Boudica - Dreaming of the Hound, The House of Hunger and Magpie at the moment. Need to add some non-fiction into the mix.

Gosh, still in January and already on thread 2! Thanks south

My list

1. Echo Burning; Lee Child

2. The Mysterious Affair at Styles; Agatha Christie

3. Without Fail; Lee Child

4. Persuader; Lee Child

5. Beg, Borrow or Steal by Susie Tate
   Managed to break my Reacher spiral with this trashy romance. Full of cliches and unbelievable happy ever afters but it finally broke me out of Reacher-verse so for that I'm grateful to it

I'll bring my list over.

1. The Last List of Mabel Beaumont, Laura Pearson 3/5
2. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin 1.5/5
3. The Moonstone, Wilkie Collins 4/5
4. The Pumpkin Spice Cafe, Laurie Gilmore 0/5
5. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo Taylor Jenkins Reid 4/5
6. A Court of Frost and Starlight, Sarah J Mass 2/5
7. The Black Moth, Georgette Heyer 3/5
8. Carrie Soto is Back, Taylor Jenkins Reid 4/5
9. The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas 5/5

I really enjoy the TJR books, they are just so easy to read. They somehow feel like a guilty pleasure but I don't really know why.

Have to say I enjoyed The Count of Monte Cristo far more than I expected and is my first 5 star read for a long while. I thought it was wonderful. I haven't been able to get into anything since, I've got several books from the library and tried them all. Having to take a few days from reading and catching up on Vera on ITVX 😂

@nowanearlyNicemum the foodie book is called The Tuscan Year. It’s by Elizabeth Romer, who’s English but lives in Tuscany. I have no memory of buying it but it’s got an Oxfam sticker on the back so must be one of my many (many) charity-shop acquisitions. Basically she describes in loving detail the incredible food grown and cooked by her neighbour Silvana, month by month. I’m only up to February and it’s already staggering that this woman can expend such mammoth effort on cooking and still have any kind of a life.

@Hellohah I LOVE the Count of Monte Cristo. That and Pride and Prejudice are my ultimate favorite books ever! I am due a re-read of the TCoMC it keeps looking at my from the book shelf. But I have been putting it off as I know its quite a long read and you have to immerse yourself in it to really enjoy it.

Thanks for the new thread!

My list so far
1 Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing - Matthew Perry
2 The Lost Bookshop - Evie Woods
3 TV: Big adventures on the small screen - Peter Kay
4 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie - Muriel Spark
5 My Dark Vanessa - Kate Elizabeth Russell
6 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
7 I invited her in - Adele Parks

@MorriganManor It's great to hear the love for Paper Cup. I can't remember how I stumbled across it but I'll be buying it for several Scottish friends this year. I rated Shuggie Bain but I felt involved in Paper Cup even more closely.

@Passme the crisps (not sure what happened with your name there!) I'm sure we could find some people in common if we chatted for long enough 😊

Another Kirkcudbright story .. when DH was in primary school his teacher was obsessed with the kids learning to spell Kirkcudbright. The theory being if you could spell that you could spell anything (no one in the class lived in Kirkcudbright by the way).
One wee lad just couldn't master it and the teacher made him stand in front of the class every Monday morning and try. Not kind at all. Almost a year of tears and snotters later, he finally got it right.
I wonder if the wee boy ever lived in Kirkcudbright, to make all that effort worthwhile. More likely he never wanted to set foot in the place or hear the word again.

In non-Kirkcudbright related news ..

See Them Run Marion Todd. The first of her crime books, set in St Andrews, with a gripping start to this serial killer hunter mystery. I'll be continuing with this very readable series.

Now reading Road Ends by Mary Lawson and enjoying it. She seems to specialise in families unravelling, with a lot of sympathy for young men in particular trying to cope with challenging home situations. The fourth book of hers I've read and possibly getting a bit similar but still very good.

My small list so far:-

1. Heartstopper vol.5 - Alice Oseman
This is just so lovely, comfort reading.

1. Ikigai - Francesc Morales and Hector Garcia
2. Went to London, Took The Dog - Nina Stibbe
3. How Not To Die - Michael Greger
4. Days at the Morisaki Bookshop - Satoshi Yagisawa

6. The Crossing Places - Elly Griffiths

The Nina Stibbe was almost a bold. I did enjoy it a lot, but it was a quite sad in places, and missed some of the light humour of Love, Nina.

Thanks for the new thread South!

A little list from me

1 Slow Horses (Slough House #1) - Mick Herron
2 The Mysterious Affair at Styles - Agatha Christie
3 Shrines of Gaiety - Kate Atkinson
4 The Ink Black Heart - Robert Galbraith

Finished TIBH yesterday afternoon so in that vulnerable ‘in between books’ state got sucked into bloody doom scrolling and watching complete nonsense on TikTok again - there were references to Book Tube on the last thread - does anyone know if there’s anyone worth following for book content on TikTok at all? I don’t seem to be kicking this particular habit so might try to steer it down a slightly less brain rotting path!

I’ve kind of put off choosing my next book as I want to either get the next in the Slough House story or plough straight onto the next Strike with The Running Grave - my better nature is reminding me that I’m not supposed to be buying new until I’ve at least knocked a couple off my towering tbr pile - and both are more than I’d like to spend on kindle.

Trying again with my list!

1 The Common Years by Jilly Cooper
2 Beyond SW19: World Class Tennis In England Since the 1880s by Kevin Jeffreys
3 Murder on the Dancefloor by Shirley Ballas
4 The Real Deal by Caitlin Devlin
5 Almost Surely Dead by Amina Akhtar
6 Me by Elton John
7 The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
8 Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
9 One Of The Good Guys by Araminta Hall
10 The Messalina of the Suburbs by E M Delafield
11 Provincial Daughter by R M Dashwood
12 Angel by Elizabeth Taylor
13 In Lieu of You by Keith A Pearson
14 Letter From New York: BBC Woman’s Hour Broadcasts by Helene Hanff
15 The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
16 Death Comes to Marlow by Robert Thorogood

Those last two are my latest reads - the third in the series has just come out and I hadn’t read the second yet, so decided to catch up and reread the first as well. For anyone not familiar with theses, they’re very much in the Richard Osman Thursday Murder Club area. I really like the Marlow setting, and the three main characters. I also like the fact that it’s three women doing the investigating. The stories themselves are also good. Let down a bit by the writing style though, with a bit too much telling not showing and some clunky expositional dialogue. I’m still going to continue with the series though so will be reading the third when it comes through from the library.

I’m doing the readalongs of Nicholas Nickleby, Ruth and Year of Wonder, have another Steinbeck on the go and am otherwise reading a very niche book about the Clifton Rocks Railway in Bristol which probably won’t be many people’s cup of tea!

Thank you for the new thread @Southeastdweller
@highlandcoo – I love Marion Todd, huge fan. I’ve pre ordered her latest one.

My list:

1 Enough Cassidy Hutchinson
2 Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow Gabrielle Zevin
3 Kim JiYoung, Born 1982 Cho Nam-Joo trans Jamie Chang
4 The Menopause Reset Dr Mindy Pelz
5 Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day Winifred Wilson
6 Past Lying Val McDermid
7 The Winter List SG MacLean
8 The Seeker SG MacLean
9 Cross Roads Val McDermid

Moving onto Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell.

We had quite a few holidays in Dumfries and Galloway when the DCs were younger and I remember eating particularly good fish & chips in Kirkcudbright. There's a lovely beach just south of there with a shipwreck that you can walk out to at low tide.

Thanks SouthEast thread moving so fast

Thanks as ever, southeast.

1. Femina, Janina Ramirez
2. Lady Sapiens, Thomas Cirotteau
3. Sankofa, Chibunda Omuzu
4. A Thing of Beauty, Peter Fiennes
5. The Ghost of Thomas Kempe Penelope Lively
6. The Sittaford Mystery, Agatha Christie
7. The Running Grave, Robert Galbraith
8. The Britannias, An Island Quest, Alice Albinia
9. The Secret Countess, Eva Ibbotson

And two new reviews:

10. The Theory of Everything, Dan Schrieber
An amiable canter through the strange beliefs held by many (UFOs, hollow earth etc), including a surprising number of Nobel Prize winners. I liked the chapter on strange coincidences in books and the chapter on the tragic habitat loss facing public lice made me laugh out loud. I think teenage me would have loved this book; adult me found it mildly amusing but I'm forgetting it quickly.

11. Third Girl, Agatha Christie
Even by Hercule Poirot's sedentary standards, this is a crime novel lacking in action. It's a late one, written in the sixties, and AC is not at her best, but I rather enjoyed Poirot's (and clearly his creator's) laments about girls these days and how they're not nicely turned out in a twinset and pearls anymore.

So, I finished Gatsby and am also glad I reread it. I have no idea when I first read it (probably a teenager) but it left me very meh then.

I liked it far better this time. I appreciated its style and its gaudy glitter. I appreciated its superficiality is a whole point, and not a flaw. I still prefer detailed fictions and thought it a very good companion piece to the mammoth American Tragedy where the people seem equally vacuous and self absorbed but like the Dreiser better for its weight and scale. I thought Careless People enhanced my appreciation, an the Wordsworth edition has an excellent, erudite introduction.

I have a question if anyone has a non Wordsworth copy to hand to check something.

Sarah Churchwell throughout Careless People refers to Meyer WolfsHIEM. I was confused when reading the book itself that this was printed WolfsHEIM (makes more sense). But then I read the notes at the back of the novel and it's Wolfshiem again. Google has both!!

Can anyone help here? I am inclined to believe it's Wolfshiem. Not because that seems more German (it doesn't- that's how it stuck out to me because the order of the i and e is counterintuitive and I pronounce each differently in my head) but because the ie is used by Churchwell and the editor of the Wordsworth.

@Piggywaspushed ooh, I have a Penguin Modern Classic edition 1982 and just checked and it’s Wolfshiem in that.