50 Books Challenge 2023 Part Eight

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the seventh thread of the 50 Books Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2023, though reading fifty isn'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 and the seventh one here

Just finished Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The story centres Ifemelu, her childhood in Nigeria, then her move to the US to study and work. There are so many themes that intertwine throughout: enduring love, identity, infatuation, integrity, race and culture. Ifemelu eventually returns to her home country to face the fundamental decisIons about who she will be now and what she wants. It’s a true epic and so rich, just as I expected and more. Highly recommend.

The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith JKR

Loved this. Yes it’s too long but it held my interest all the way through. It’s ages since I’ve read a book that I didn’t want to put down and really looked forward to picking up again (probably Troubled Blood and The Ink Black Heart that I read earlier this year!). I don’t pick up on all the things that the rest of you criticise. I only really notice bad writing when it pulls me out of the story and that never happens with JKR. Anyway I loved going back to Strike and Robin’s story and really enjoyed the case they’re working on. Won’t say any more as I know lots are still to read it.

The Ghost Tree by Christina Henry

Two friends grow up exploring the woods near their home. One day two unknown girls are found, gruesomely murdered, and a mysterious power is thought to be residing in the small town of Smiths Hollow. A brooding ghost tree is referenced and we are led to believe that an evil presence might be connected to it. What could it be??

I picked this up on the back of some others written by Christina Henry getting good reviews. I wanted something atmospheric, dark and spooky.
This emphatically wasn’t it. Written in such a business like way, there is zero sense of unease or creepiness. You get girls discussing boyfriends, then a horrible dismembered body arrives. Some characters wonder if anything might be amiss? Or if they should just get some fries and meet their friends back in the woods. The ending was so ludicrous it made me laugh! Disappointing.

I find Christina Henry’s books extremely variable, @PowerTulle .

This is my first one, I think maybe I chose a blooper to start!

@SoIinvictus 😂

@FuzzyCaoraDhubh
Henceforth, I will ask my pupils to use, ‘Poor deceived numpty’ in their analysis of the tragic hero who loved not wisely but too well.

I prefer her short stories, she seems to lose her way a bit given a full run at a novel.
AG / Angela Slatter is much better imo, for the dark folklore and fairy tale stuff.

That brings joy to my heart, most excellent Remus.

Hello 50 bookers fell off the thread last year but have dived back in recently and love reading all your recommendations and reviews. I thought you might like to know that it looks like all the Strike books, including The Running Grave, seem to be included on the Spotify Premium deal!
Kind of wish I hadn't used an Audible credit now - but did think it was a bloody good listen and streets ahead of IBH.

As it will to theirs.

Hi @DesdamonasHandkerchief good to hear from you!

I understand your username properly now that I've read Othello. In the Tracy Chevalier book, this would be 'DeesPencilCase' which really doesn't have the same ring to it :)

Hi Fuzzy - at least I have a clever alternate name now 🤣

54 The Running Grave by oh come on, you know

I'm with you @ChessieFL. Thoroughly enjoyed this despite its frankly absurd length. I do love JKR. I even loved The Casual Vacancy. She's sort of the opposite of Agatha Christie in many ways (soooo looooong) but I feel that in others they are kindred spirits.

A few quick reads to add:

70. A Man with One of Those Faces -Caimh McDonnell

Recommended by a reading acquaintance - I offered Mick Herron’s Slough House series in return. Crime story set in Dublin with Bunny McGarry being the lead policeman. He has quite a lot in common with Jackson Lamb (Mick Herron) as he is overweight, has poor personal hygiene, drinks a lot and doesn’t mind how he gets results. This book is full of humour as Paul and Brigid try to avoid getting killed and to find out why someone wants them dead. Once it got going I really enjoyed this but can see it might polarise views!

71. Bloody Christmas and Dog Day Afternoon - Caimh McDonnell

These are a novella and a short story following Bunny McGarry on his continued quests for justice. If you like them they’re quite moreish.

72. Lord Edgware Dies - Agatha Christie

I read this for the Agatha Christie challenge - it was the alternative to Murder on the Orient Express which I know too well. Poirot is on form as he tries to work out who killed Lord Edgware. I read this years ago and could remember the murderer but not the ins and outs. Not bad.

Enjoying all the Strike chat. I still haven’t read IBH so I am way behind.

Vincent Banecroft in the Stranger Times books by Caimh / CK McDonnell is a newspaper editor version of Bunny McGarry and by extension Jackson Lamb @TimeforaGandT . That series is growing on me, as it gets less self-consciously silly with each book.

Another one crossing the finish line :

133. The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith (Audible)

Robin joins a cult. Strike goes on a diet, I don't want to post spoilers so I will just say...

The usual problems are there, the edit, the classism, the too many names to care about. Robin being perfect.

But I loved it, maybe it's because it feels like a return to form after IBH, which it definitely is, but ultimately these audiobooks have become comfort food to me now.

Was it perfect? No they are all deeply flawed. Did the end leave me dying for the next? Yes!

DNF Milkman by Anna Burns I struggled through the first third of it and gave up. It's a rambling, almost stream of consciousness, mess. Set in Northern Ireland in the 1970s about an 18 year old who becomes the subject of gossip. No names, only nicknames. Very dense writing with long paragraphs. Not one of my book club readers finished it either - that's a first - all giving up at different points in the book. We had a very brief discussion this session! It is a Booker Prize winner - what were they thinking?

Another DNF - Kala by Colin Walsh. Everyone else on this thread seems to have loved it but I got a third of the way through and was finding it really boring. There’s three different viewpoints and I kept forgetting whose chapter it was. I found myself not wanting to pick it back up so have given up.

68 When The Dust Settles by Lucy Easthope
I liked the professional but informal tone of this book and it was interesting to learn more about the work of disaster management, with the emphasis on the aftermath of all kinds of incidents. I’d be reassured if Lucy Easthope was involved in anything huge that affected me or my loved ones and I’m glad organisations like Kenyon etc exist to take charge of what they can and try and inform governments of best practice.

Just tested positive for Covid (feels like a particularly nasty cold so not too worried). Is it bad of me that my first thought was my TBR pile……

@FuzzyCaoraDhubh I loved your Othello review. It was one of my A-level set texts, we used to giggle about the old black ram tupping the white ewe. Iago is a great character: "Jealousy... is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on". I saw a really disappointing production at the National Theatre last year with no chemistry between Othello and Desdemona, and Iago portrayed as a wife-beater.
It also made me smile to see @DesdamonasHandkerchief pop up just after your review.

@Mothership4two I absolutely loved Milkman. I have family in Belfast and could just hear the voice so clearly as I was reading it. I thought it was really original and everything I want from a Booker book, but can also understand why people find it a difficult read.

I absolutely loved Milkman too. I do like stream of consciousness books though.

I've got Milkman downloaded to read at some point. I'll need to remember that's it's ok to try it and DNF. I'm usually a bit of a completing.

54. Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman

This book spoke to my heart. It's only a few months since I read Productivity Ninja which I thought had useful tips but I have failed to adequately implement at work, however Oliver Burkeman helpfully points out we'll never actually get all the work completed. Emails will never stop coming in. Houses will always need further decluttering/repainting and as a newbie gardener I am learning my garden will never be 'finished' either.

He doesn't mean this to be dispiriting. He wants us to bet set free from striving for unattainable goals and just get on with what we want to do, which might be bigger things like political activism or a smaller thing like caring for family (that's worldwide scales, I don't mean caring for family is small!).

A lot of his points resonated with me and many of them confirmed approaches I already try and take. As a mid life orphan, I have spent a great deal of time considering what is the point of life if we all die anyway and how to live in that knowledge and how to spend my time in light of all that. So I did enjoy a bit of validation that I might be getting some things right. It's ok to let some things go and focus on just a few priorities knowing that the to do list will never get done and the obligations never all fulfilled.

I'll be thinking about this for some time.

22. Baroque Music Today: Music as Speech by Nikolaus Harnoncourt

This was an excellent collection of essays by Harnoncourt, the legendary Austrian conductor who was so influential in freeing Baroque music for the clutches of the metronome and modern classical instruments. With a deep understanding of early music and its practice based on 17th Century texts, he unfolds the soul of this music and its practice with examples and explanations, and shows exactly why it should not be performed in the classical tradition - large philharmonic orchestras, pianos and other modern instruments, equal tuning, opera singers with continuous vibrato...

Essential reading for any musician practicing this repertoire and others who enjoy listening to it. Highly recommended.