50 Books Challenge 2024 Part Four

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fourth 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 first thread is here, the second one here and the third one here.

What are you reading?

I liked Jonathan Strange but I have a high tolerance for long meandering fantasy

I was just about to put up the alert on this, @Sadik! It was a Radio 4 book of the week recently and I heard a few episodes - interesting enough to have made me buy it, anyway 😊🙏

One more Booktuber recommendation I forgot to mention yesterday - Miranda Mills. She reads and reviews mostly vintage books. She's a collector of vintage children's books and Persephone novels. She lives in a beautiful old manor house in Yorkshire and produces lovely stylish content on both Booktube and Bookstagram, runs a monthly bookclub on Booktube with her mum, which is usually a vintage or classic novel. Her booktube channel is so lovely and cosy and I've picked up so many recommendations from her.

I'm also another one who really misses Lauren Wade. I suspect Jen Campbell will also be producing less content for a while too.

Interested in the Booktube recommendations, thanks. Miranda Mills sounds right up my street.

Nunlit fan here so I have acquired Cloistered.

Chessie, I read the Guard Your Daughters sample and was charmed. It's very I Capture the Castle. The book was a bit more than I wanted to spend but I'll keep an eye out for it. I started reading The Door to Door Bookstore but found it twee and abandoned it.

52. Little Englanders: Britain in the Edwardian Era, Alwyn Turner
Social history, nicely handled - I enjoyed the references to music hall songs and went down a Youtube rabbit hole. The description of the introduction of the old age pension seems a timely reminder. Very readable.

53. Magic Flutes, Eva Ibbotson
Now that I've read a few of her books, the Cinderella formula is very evident - humble young girl, beguilingly urchin-like yet cultured (ballet, opera etc), rich, seductive older man etc etc. But somehow she still makes it work, with an interesting backdrop (here it's Vienna between the wars), sly humour and characters that you really get invested in. I picked up The Morning Gift by the same author in a charity shop, and I'm looking forward to it.

54. A Man Lay Dead and 55. The Nursing Home Murders, Ngaio Marsh
In a particular mood, nothing hits the spot quite like an Agatha Christie, so I thought I'd try another Golden Age Queen of Crime. These are early books of hers and maybe she hadn't quite hit her stride. I found them fairly forgettable and won't be actively seeking out others.

55. Viking Britain, Thomas Williams
Enjoyable history. The author is interested in the way we view history as well as in the history itself, and I enjoyed his side excursions into this. A good read.

56. The Swimmer, Patrick Barkham
A life of Roger Deakin, much of it in his own words (from the papers left unpublished after his death), but with added interjections from those who knew him. This turns into a wonderful polyphony - one person will be talking about how romantic his restored farmhouse is, and another person will cut in with a comment about it being filthy. I love Waterlog and I think this is my favourite read of the year so far. I particularly loved the account of the 1970s "back to the land" era. An absolute delight. It's not a hagiography - he sounds pretty awful to many of the women who loved him - but it evokes an era and the longing for a life less ordinary.

24 Medieval Horizons: why the Middle Ages matter - Ian Mortimer
Social history showcasing the Middle Ages as a period of change and development, rather than some sort of centuries-long, plague-ridden ahistorical slump. Some interesting stuff (increasing access to mirrors leading to increased self-awareness and individualism), some downright tedious (how many mph a horse could manage at various timepoints, in mind-numbing detail). Also self-servingly defined ‘medieval’ as the period 1000 - 1600, sneakily allowing him to include things like printing and Protestantism as medieval inventions.

I don’t think I get on with Ian Mortimer, having previously used the audiobook of The Time Traveller’s Guide to Medieval England as a sleep aid in pregnancy.

52. The Martian by Andy Weir

Following an accident during a manned mission to Mars, Mark Watney is left alone on the Red Planet and presumed dead. There follows a long time alone on the planet as first NASA discovers he's alive and then debates what to do.

When I enthusiastically reviewed Project Hail Mary earlier this year, posters said they preferred The Martian

Having now read both I think it depends on the order you read them because what struck me most was the similarities in terms of tone, style, plot and even how the two protagonists expressed themselves.

I didn't like the preparation diaries tagged on at the end, it was like an attempt at being profound that didn't work. Equally I thought the epilogue fell flat and I much preferred the end scenes of the film whereby his trauma and disconnect were clearly still an issue.

Overall, still preferred PHM but can see why others didn't.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit The Martian was a fabulous film but I’m not rushing to read the book.

Thanks bibliomania, The Swimmer sounds good; duly added to my wishlist.

33. The Bookbinder of Jericho - Pip Williams I adored this book, possibly my favourite book of the year so far. It is about Peggy, a clever and ambitious young woman working as a book binder in the University press in Oxford during WW1.

I loved the characters and their relationships, the story, the time and the setting. I picked this up as a random kindle 99p deal and definitely got my 99ps worth!

I thought Jonathan Strange was great, I was completely immersed in that world. Also preferred the Martian to PHM, but enjoyed both. I tried and tried to get my book club to read the Martian (before it was that well known) but they wouldn't because it had a screaming male astronaut on the cover!

Kinsters, have you read Pip William's first book?

I have just finished David Olusoga's The World's War : Forgotten Soldiers of Empire. Absorbing, troubling, harrowing in places , I almost feel everyone should read this as an antidote to some of the nonsense spewed by the likes of Lawrence Fox. Lord, it's depressing at times, though. It's interesting to read about how different nations responded to the idea of non white soldiers fighting amongst them - and how that would affect their racial ideologies. The French ( a very low bar) come out best, the Americans worst. And the treatment of soldiers after the war , form the upsurge in lynchings in the US ( a horrendous, detailed account near the very end of the book) to the expunging of identities from war graves and works of art - and thus in the memories and commemorations- is troubling.

Much of the book leads us onwards to help explain how the second world war arose from the ideas and experiences of the first.

I recommend this - really felt I learned so much.

@Piggywaspushed I haven't! I only realised after I'd finished The Bookbinder that there's another book set in the same world. I'm looking forward to reading it.

Do read it! I liked both, but the first one is better.

Good to hear that about Cuddy @splothersdog . I've been stuck at 13% through for several weeks so will try again.

Jonathan Strange was far too long. I found it rather boring and am generally not a fan of footnotes in fiction. I loved Piranesi though.

32. Mayflies - Andrew O'Hagan. Much loved on here, this wasn't really my kind of book. I thought it would be more about 80s music but actually they're a bit older than me and there wasn't much crossover other than The Smiths - and some outrageous dissing of Prince. The friendship story was sweet but I'm just not that into non-fiction.

Brotherless Night is in the 99p deals today, so with that and Enter Ghost from the other day I may yet read the shortlist.

Some books I bought in New York (I went to a lot of bookshops but was very restrained):

31. You Again by Kate Goldbeck. Bought at The Ripped Bodice, a shop that specialises in contemporary romance, and is great fun to browse. This is an enjoyable riff on When Harry Met Sally (with some scenes lifted directly, like a New Years Eve dash across the city), following Josh and Ari as they meet over the years, disliking each other at first but then developing a friendship. Lovely setting around the Lower East Side so I liked reading if after I got home.

32. Choose This Now by Nicole Haroutunian. Bought at the lovely Books Are Magic, owned by the author Emma Straub. This is loosely a novel, more a set of interconnected short stories following a group of women through their 20s and 30s after they witness a tragic incident at college. Some were stronger than others.

I too found Jonathan Strange a bit of a struggle to get through, and preferred Piranesi though don’t think either are exceptionally good.

34 Lucifer Book 3 - Mike Carey

Carrying on the graphic novel series, no point going into the plot as it won’t mean anything to non fans but again it’s beautifully drawn and Lucifer is such a great protagonist.

53. Age Of Vice by Deepti Kapoor

In Uttar Pradesh, India, Ajay is sold into slavery as a boy. When he unexpectedly becomes free he earns a name as a hard worker. Enter Sunny Wadia, a millionaire playboy who will drag Ajay into his seedy underworld.

I was quite jubilant about the first third of this, yes it's dark but I felt like I was "reading a proper novel" at last. It was on the bold track. Then it started messing around with POV, and in particular wastes a lot of time on a journalist involved with Sunny as it reverses and retells part of the same timeline from her perspective. It stops being Ajay's story until there is some resolution near the end which I won't discuss due to spoilers.

Overall, it's a solid novel, if a bit muddled.

@Piggywaspushed I saw the TV series associated with that David Olusoga book, good to know the book is good as well. I found his Black and British book really interesting (and bloody depressing) as well. I am quite the David Olusoga fangirl though, he's probably my favourite TV historian.

@SheilaFentiman – ah interesting. I thought I had read all the Ian Rankin books. One to look out for I think. I hadn’t appreciated that the Dubrovnik Book Club was a sequel. I enjoyed it, so I might check out The Collaborator’s’ Daughter. I’m off to see Marion Todd and Lynn McEwan on Friday evening at in Dundee. Looking forward to it 😊Any questions you want me to ask Lynn McEwan?

@ChessieFL – I’m intrigued at the Mitford Murders series. I haven’t come across them before. I have just finished listening to a podcast about Diana, so I might check out the first book. I hadn’t realised until I listened to the podcast that Diana was married when she met Mosley.

@Kinsters – The Bookbinder looks like a great book. Just looking at it and it seems to be a companion piece to The Dictionary of Lost Words. I’m adding them to my TBR!

@Piggywaspushed – I’m also going to add David Olusoga’s book too.

38 Murder Most Royal – SJ Bennett (audio) When am I going to learn? I am hopeless at listening to murder mysteries on Audio. I fall asleep and lose the thread. I seem to spend more time trying to find my place and relistening. Anyway, MMR is the third book in SJ Bennett’s HM The Queen Investigates. A fun, silly romp and I will read the next two, rather than listening.

I got Enter Ghost on Kindle for 99p (thanks to @TattiePants I think. Apologies if not) I’ve just started reading it and I’m hooked!

@Tarragon123 yes I'm really looking forward to The Dictionary of Lost Words. I also got Enter Ghost in the 99p deals so will read that first to avoid breaking my rule of not reading the same author back to back lol.

Another Jonathan Strange hater here- and I usually love wordy fantasy books. I think Clarke worked two hard on mashing together two genres that just didn’t go - it’s put me off reading Piranesi despite all the good reviews.

77 Femina- Janina Ramirez
I must be one of the last to get to this. A history of medieval women who have been overlooked. I was not delighted to see the boastful Margery Kempe in this (I couldn’t stand her POv in For thy Mercy…) but overall I enjoyed this read. I’ve listened to (and loved) some music by Hildegard of Bingen and am particularly interested in learning more about her and Aetherflaed. An interesting introduction.

78 The Hunter- Tana French
This is the follow up to The Searcher. Retired American cop Cal Hooper has now been living in the Irish countryside for over two years and has settled in somewhat to the community. When his teen neighbour Trey’s father comes back on the scene after four years absence, he brings trouble in his wake and Cal is determined to protect Trey no matter what. Like its predecessor, this book is slow-moving but beautifully written. The mystery unfurls and the emphasis is on the effects on relationships and the community. I like these slower paced crime novels better than the twisty fast paced ones. Not quite bold, but not far off it.

79 Foxglove Summer- Ben Aaronovitch
The fourth (or maybe fifth) episode in the Rivers of London series which were recommended to me on here. Witty, pacy and some complicated magical events thrown in. Narrated beautifully again- I only do these on audio as I can’t imagine they’d be half as good without the narration. Entertaining as always.

I am completely mood reading in May and I’m loving it!

The Maiden is 99p on Kindle is it really as bad as you say or worth a punt

45 Bridget Jones - Mad about the Boy - Helen Fielding
14 years after Bridget couples up with Mark Darcy, we find her alone with two children and trying to date in her fifties.

This was bad. No plot, annoying characters, stupid decisions made, way too long and too many character flaws which I assume were supposed to be endearing but made you want to throw the book in the fire. I remember enjoying the original BJ books so when I saw this in the charity shop I thought I’d give it a punt. Safe to say I shall be re-donating it. Quickly.

Oh, I frequently read the same author several times in a row. What's your thought process behind that?

I find it puts me off my reading stride. I get really attached to the characters, world, writing style etc and once I'm done with all I can read in that series then I don't want to read anything else. I need a "palate cleanser" in between I think.

I've had a good run lately and really loved all the books that I chose as palate cleansers in between reading Lord of The Rings (tbh I enjoyed them more than LoTR!)