50 Books Challenge 2024 Part Six

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the sixth 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.

Some of us bring over to the new thread lists of the books we've read so far, but again - this is your choice.

The first thread is here, the second one here , the third one here, the fourth one here and the fifth one here.

What are you reading?

I concur with Remus. I was on board with shagging a man in a kilt but 800 pages was more than enough. I won’t be back for any more.

The Dead Lake, Hamid Ismailov, trans. from Russian by Andrew Bromfield

This is one of the short novellas published by Peirene Press, they specialise in short translated fiction. I read another of their publications a few years ago, so when I came across this I bought it. I assume I bought it from a charity shop, but cannot quite remember.

It is set in Kazakhstan, at some point during the Soviet period as there is a place called the ‘zone’ where nuclear tests are carried out. One day, Yerzhan, the protagonist, wants to impress a girl and jumps into a lake. He is 12. The lake stunts his growth, at the time of the story he is 27 but has not grown since that day. It’s one of those stories where there isn’t a great deal of action. I was moved by this story though and the landscape of the steppe is especially evocative.

Thank you @splothersdog
@Stowickthevast when you follow the link, click on filter and pick all discounts.

I got quite a few!
Orbital
Brooklyn by Colm Toibin
The Penguin Book of Modern Short Stories
A biography of Cary Grant
Affinity by Sarah Waters
Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont
Deacon King Kong
Monsters: What do we do with Great Art by Bad People?

When I follow the link and click on filter the first two books it shows are 5.99 and 10.99

@Stowickthevast same here, just lots of £5+ books showing for me. Was looking forward to a lazy Sunday morning in bed browsing book deals.

I did however spot a few free with Amazon Prime books last night so all is not lost. We begin at the end, Cloud Cuckoo Land and Lovers at the Museum.

A compliment of course 😁

Thanks@ÚlldemoShúl that worked for me.

I got Bewilderment and Rodham.

If anyone is doing the Booker Longlist, There There is in the deals which is the prequel/sequel to Wandering Stars. I thought it was very good.

Since I have happy memories of shagging men in kilts during my misspent youth that review almost makes Outlander seem like a fun nostalgic read.

800 pages @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie! My dedication to either this thread or kilted Scotsmen doesn’t extend that far! Though I did sit next to a very nice Glaswegian on the train yesterday. He was (like many millions) trying to buy Oasis tickets and was no 76,000 in the queue. I got off just as the train went through the Newport tunnel so I hope the loss of signal didn’t affect him.
He didn’t have a kilt on though.

I bought Poor, Once A Monster and The Midnight Hour. Not much else grabbed me. Shiny new Collection set up on Kindle for Autumn too.

Phew!

The deals aren't showing properly for me either, unless Amazon now think that a load of stuff at £6 and above is a deal.

I got a few 'reduced' books but they were reduced by about 10p...

I took The Assistant by Kjell Ole Dahl to Norway but didn't read enough to get round to it so have just read it.

Interesting thriller type thing with two timelines moving forwards - one 1925 and the otehr 1938 with the same characters. Obviously, the 1938 one makes more sense as you read the 1925 one.

Not sure about the depiction of women who are both femme fatales - but the ending is interesting on that.

Involves Nazism, fjords, and bootlegged alcohol. Most Norwegian.

I found a few books on my first late night search, by checking wishlists.

This afternoon I clicked on the Limited Time Deal on a bargain book, then chose books and then Kindle Store, and found a rather dangerous screen full of bargains to scroll through.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/goldbox/?discounts-widget=%2522%257B%255C%2522state%255C%2522%253A%257B%255C%2522refinementFilters%255C%2522%253A%257B%255C%2522departments%255C%2522%253A%255B%255C%2522341678031%255C%2522%255D%257D%257D%252C%255C%2522version%255C%2522%253A1%257D%2522&bubble-id=deals-collection-books

I do have a lot already, but found some more to buy, many 99p and a few £1.99. I'm considering an OUP book on women reading fiction - it is £2.59, but for proper non fiction titles I'm more likely to pay a little more if needs be than for some very mainstream commercial fiction. Having said that I've paid £1.99 for the new Marian Keyes title - My Favourite Mistake is another revisit to one of the Walsh sisters, and I can take the hardback into the library and leave it there. I've also bought 8 Lives of a Century Old Trickster newish books by Mhairi McFarlane and Sophie Kinsella, Queen Macbeth by Val McDermid.

Other books I've bought to mention, at 99p

Monsters: What Do We Do With Great Art By Bad People?
Mary Shelley - Miranda Seymour (big literary bio)
Jeffrey Boakye - I Heard What You Said - a memoir by a black teacher and broadcaster (I hear him on Add to Playlist on Radio 4 quite often) - this was recommended by Carol Atherton in Reading Lessons (a recommendation from here I think which I really enjoyed). I was going to pick up a library copy tomorrow and have been struggling to make space on my library cards

The Road to San Giovanni - Italo Calvino (Penguin Modern Classics
The Group - Mary McCarthy (Virago Modern Classics new reprint) - I have Virago's 2010 version in paperback with an intro by a Sex and the City writer - this has a new intro by Monica Ali - I love this 1963 novel set in the 1930s, as 10 women graduate from a top US women's college and start their lives in NYC - it even has bits on contraception, childbirth, struggling to breastfeed, the political debates on the US left in those days.....

Considering Helen Taylor, Why Do Women Read Fiction: The Stories of Our Lives at £2.59

@elkiedee I read The Group in my grandfather’s house in my late teens. My grandmother had died in her 60s when I was a baby (in 1974) and I was so impressed with how forward thinking she was to read it as an Irish woman of that generation. I must read it again.

I feel quite restrained today.

I bought Orbital, Shuggie Bain, Olive Kitteridge and Brooklyn

I just bought Monsters too. love a good Deal Day

I Partridge by fellow Mumsnetter Alan Partridge is in the sale and one of the funniest books I’ve ever read.

39 The Invisible Library - Genevieve Cogman I got this from BorrowBox on the recommendation from someone on this thread - I’ve also reserved the first book in her other series. The Library is a mysterious organisation which collects books from different alternative universes; it’s not clear what universe, or world, the Library itself inhabits. Irene and her new trainee Kai are sent to a particularly chaotic world full of fairies (or fae), vampires and werewolves to retrieve a book, but the mission turns out to be unusually complicated and incredibly dangerous. It got a bit fan-fictionish in the middle (that feeling where you don’t really know why certain things happen or why people say certain things, then you realise it hasn’t actually been explained properly) but was sufficiently redeemed by the ending that I will probably reserve the next in the series. Kind of a mix between Chronicles of St Mary’s and the Veronica Speedwell series by Deanna Raybourn (some of which I read last year). It does seem very American at times in its explanation of London and England - I was very surprised to discover the author is British!

88. After The Fire by Jane Casey

Maeve Kerrigan #6

Maeve and Derwent investigate a fire in a block of flats where a prominent politician has coincidentally also been killed.

Maeve continues to battle a stalker.

Who am I kidding with my spoils from the deals? My next book will probably be another Jane Casey!

Thank you for that link @elkiedee I have bought Plainsong,Jane and Prudence and The Slow worm's Song by Andrew Miller

Thanks @elkiedee - I am going in!

I don't normally buy anything from the Kindle deals but I caved on the basis of your purchase list @ÚlldemoShúl . I'm a fan of old movies so I bought the Cary Grant bio and Brooklyn as I have Long Island on reserve from the library and didn't realise the two books were connected, so I felt obliged to buy it!

Regarding the kindle deals, I've stopped trawling through, and instead just check my Wish List to see what's changed in price enough for me to buy it. This time round it was just Monsters I think.

The last of my holiday reads were:
41. Piglet by Lottie Hazel. Piglet works in food publishing and outwardly appears to be living the middle class home counties dream. However things begin to fall apart in the run-up to her perfectly planned wedding.

This was decent but not amazing. The stuff about someone struggling to reconcile their working class roots with their middle class present didn't offer much new, but the reflections on the emotional power and symbolism of cooking and eating were thoughtful. I didn't like the author's choice not to reveal the details of a secret shared that becomes a major plot point.

42. Notes on a Execution by Danya Kukafka A serial killer novel from a different angle. We know from the start that Ansel Packer is awaiting the death penalty for murdering multiple women. The narrative moves between three surviving women who have been part of his life - his mother, his wife's sister, and the detective who brought him to justice.

Good but grisly, Kukafka manages to explore some of Packer's formative experiences without ever seeming to seek to explain or excuse his actions. There's a prison escape attempt which felt a bit superfluous, like someone decided that the psychological drama needing beefing up with some actual drama, but otherwise it hung together well, and succeeded in giving life and agency to his victims.

43.Soldier Sailor by Claire Kilroy Ever late to the party I got round to reading this depiction of the challenges of early motherhood. This was pretty intense - the writing's so good I did feel fully immersed back in the days of the grinding unreasonableness of small toddlers. My only criticism is that the husband felt almost too cartoonish in his relentless refusal to even consider that he needed to make some concessions to parenthood.

I had trouble finding the kindle deals today too, but managed to find them on my desktop computer by finding one that was in the deal (Orbital) and then clicking on the red “limited time deals” button.

However there aren’t many on the list that I’m tempted by. There are a few Philippa Gregory’s that I am sometimes partial to. I have already read Olive Kitteridge and Brooklyn. I absolutely loved The Red Tent, which I read years ago so may buy that to re-read. Might try the Emily Henry one, Book Lovers to see what the fuss is about, though I strongly doubt it will be for me.

I will have a look at some of those mentioned by others!