50 Books Challenge 2024 Part Nine

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the ninth and final thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year, possibly the shortest thread in the twelve years the other 50 Books Challenge threads have been going.

The challenge was 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 , the fifth one here , the sixth one here , the seventh one here and the eighth one here .

Bravo, Sheila.

A young girl by name Fanny Price
Was terribly boring, though nice
Her devout sermonising
was not as inspiring
as the Crawfords and all of their vice

Poets galore! 👏👏👏

😂

the kingdom of sweets is an unexpected hit here, I finished it in two days.

Amazing @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie @SheilaFentiman @EineReiseDurchDieZeit @Sadik @ÚlldemoShúl

How hilarious!!!! I think my next read may take a while 😜

Ahh found you! 😁

So my present of Reader for Hire,
Attempted to provoke desire,
Alas proved too French,
Too ‘women, by men’;
Left me wanting... to set it on fire.

Just missed italicisation for being SO committed to the skeeviness I actually found it quite funny in its v. short (novella) length, and for one standout character: the octagenarian widow of a French general, formerly a Hungarian countess and eternally an ardent Marxist-Leninist.

OTOH, the Victorian female detectives book is proving fascinating (by Sara Lodge) and likely to be a bold - although it keeps sending me down rabbit holes I probably won't finish it this year. Other holiday reads have been middling so far so I'll try to post (non-doggerel) reviews of this year's unreviewed bolds first.

85. The Inn at the Edge of the World: Alice Thomas Ellis

'There were once five lonely strange misfits
Who wanted to go away and dodge Christmas.
They had a terrible time in an inn that was grim
They drank whisky and gin and ate things out of tins.
They couldn't get out of it quick enough'.

More blood than you've ever seen
When the French invented the guillotine
Plotting , double crossing and lots of shagging
And a fairly unpleasant bathtub stabbing

Welcome @Sodascreams

@nowanearlyNicemum – I enjoy Jenny Colgan, especially when the book is on a Scottish Island!

@BarbaraBuncle that sounds hard. I'm sorry 💐

@LuckyMauveReader – welcome! I’d recommend The Chaser series by SG Maclean. I’m currently enjoying The Seven Husband’s of Evelyn Hugo by TJR, but I didn’t realise it was part of a series. This is a recurring theme with me! Also, Slow Horses series by Mick Heron.

You all are so clever! I cant string two lines together lol

My list carried over.

1. I Have To Save Them. Ellie Midwood

1. P.S Jane. Jessica Julien

1. Mrs. Quinns Rise to Fame. Olivia Ford

4. The Villa. Jess Ryder

5. Artificial Wisdom. Thomas Weaver

1. The Paris Spy's Girl. Amanda Lees

1. Twisting Time: Forbidden City of Gold. D.F Jones

1. The Liberation of Bella McCaa. Catherine Aitken

9. The Quelling. C.L Lauder

10. Munich Wolf. Rory Clements

11. Sam Time. Donna Balon

12. A Most Malicious Messenger. Katherine Black

13. Taken to the Hills. S.J Richards

14. Blood On The Tracks. Guy Hale

15. Black Money. S.J Richards

16. The German Child. Catherine Hokin

17. Phoenix Rising. Celia and Ephie Risho

18. The Bakers Secret. Lelita Baldock

19. The Vermillion Ribbon. Hayley Price

20. Inheritance. Philip Tyler

21. Nicole's War. Andrée Rushton

22. Aria and Liam: The Druids Secret. Coline Monsarrat

23. Dark Arts. Karen Taylor

24. Vermilion Sunrise. Lydia P. Brownlow

25. Opaque. Calix Leigh-Reign

26. Knights, Witches and Murder. R.M Schultz

27. The Advocate. Theresa Burrell

28. Queen of Secrets. E.J Tanda

29. The Lost Child. Kathleen McGurl

30. Blood Sapphires Revenge. Bruce Farmer

31. New Dreams at Polkerran Point. Cass Grafton

32. Highly Flawed Individual. T.C Roberts

33. Tale of Two Curses. Theresa Biehle

34. Right Across the Bay. Quinn Avery

35. How Boys Learn. Jeff Kirchick

36. The False Men. Mhairead MacLeod

37. Evermarked. A.J Eversley

38. Truth Sister. Phil Gilvin

39. Crodor The Ancient. Celia and Ephie Risho

40. The Whispering Palms. Annette Leigh

41. Good Girl Deprogramming. Michelle Minnikin

42. When The Moon Was White. Jeff Probst

43. Split Adam. Calix Leigh-Reign

44. The Wartime Book Club. Kate Thompson

45. House of Dreams. Mark Stibbe

46. Humebeasts. Lisa Munoz

47. Island In The Sun. Kate Fforde

48. Shooters. Julia Boggio

49. Escape to Polkerran Point. Cass Grafton

50. Knights, Necromancers and Murder. R.M Schultz

51. The Secrets of Blythwood Square. Sara Sheridan

52. Chasing the Light. Julia Boggio

53. Another Side of the Heart. C.H Lazarovich

54. Exodus. Steve Catto

55. My Perfect Family. Melanie Price

56. Fog Of Silence. S.J Richards

57. Daughters of Warsaw. Maria Frances

58. Olympia. Eva Grace

59. Mannigan. L. Ross Coulter

60. Pink Camouflage. Gemma Morgan

61. Hear her Scream. Dylan H Jones

62. Cursed by Slumber. Michelle Moras

63. The Clark's Factory Girls at War. May Ellis

64. An Elf With No Name. Mortimer Langford

65. Memory Road. Sarah Edghill

66. What we Thought We Knew. Claire Dyer

67. Moral Injuries. Christie Watson

68. A Woman Of Pleasure. Kiyoko Murata. Translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter.

69. All The World's A Stage. Guy Hale

70. Orson the Great. Colm McElwain

71. The Giveaway Girl. Chrissie Bradshaw

72. Knights, Witches and The Missing. R.M Schultz

73. Naked Truth. Vicki Rebecca

74. Into the Darkness. Steve Catto

75. Gathering of the Four. A.E Bennett

76. A Tale of Something New. D.S McColgan

77. Specular. Calix Leigh-Reign

78. Maybe It's About Time. Neil Boss

79. The Godfather of Dance. Andrea Barton

80. Dark Shadow. Simon Dinsdale

81. The Keeper of Secrets. Maria McDonald

82. Crown of Confessions. E.J Tanda

83. The Grief of Godless Games. J.T Audesley

84. The Magical Journey of John and Adele. Ancius M. Murray

85. Liddle Deaths. Morgan Christie

86. What Would Aimee Dean Do? Y.M Miller

87. 17 Alma Road. Ian Gouge

88. Chapel Field. Paula Hillman

89. Jesse's Triumph. Amra Pajalic.

90. The Pact. Lisa Darcy

91. Then There Were Giants. Nicky Heymans

92. Wolf's Keep. K.E Turner

93. Hindsight. Mary Turner Thomson

94. Awaken the Dawn. Ellis K. Popa

95. Knights, Witches and The Vanished City. R.M Schultz

96. Sweetness In The Skin. Ishi Robinson

97. Blackwolf. Phil Gilvin

98. The Journalist. John Reid Young

99. Death Under a Little Sky. Stig Abell

100. The Pictish Princess. Dolan Cummings

101. My Mystical Path. Donna Shin-Ward

102. Three Brave Hearts. Liz Middleton

103. Jericho Caine, Vampire Slayer, Love, Lust and Blood. Dee Rose

104. Love Lottie. Mel Higgins

105. The Orphans of Berlin. Jina Bacarr

106. Hard Times For The East End Library Girls. Patricia McBride

107. Leap. O.C Heaton

108. Death Walks In Mowhall. Benjamin Hanna

109. Corpse In The Chard. Anna A. Armstrong

110. Green Ray. O.C Heaton

111. The Weight of What Was. Pip Landers-Lett

112. Aria and Liam: The Baker Street Mystery. Coline Monsarrat

113. Let Me In. Claire McGowan

114. Through Blood and Dragons. R.M Schultz

115. Earth Protectors. Samuel Lawson

116. The Palladium. Thorsten Brandl

117. Birth of the Tiptons. Philip Davidson

118. Good Things. Kate MacDougall

119. Mask of the Gods. Karen Furk

120. The Rutland Connection. Michael Dane

121. Murder On The Isle. Anna. A. Armstrong

122. Fall From Grace. Alan Feldberg

123. The Photograph. Diane Clarke

124. Wolf's Prize. K.E Turner

125. Courting The Sun. Peggy Joque Williams

126. The Time That Never Was. Steve Fallon

127. Atom Inc. O.C Heaton

128. Them Old Bones. Astor Y Teller

129. Black Mark. Paul Spencer

130. The Nine. Gwen Strauss

131. Amateurs. Gill Oliver

132. The Hedge Witch. Colleen Delaney

133. Turkish Delight. Anjelica Søndergaard

134. Out Of Her Mind. Sally Hart

135. Miracle Number Four. Paul Marriner

136. The Advocates Betrayal. Teresa Burrell

137. Catch Me Twice. Catherine Yaffe

138. Conditions Are Different After Dark. Owen W. Knight

139. Broken Shadows. Sorrel Pitts

140. Make the Dark Night Shine. Alan Lessik

141. Accidental Dragons. Astor Y Teller

142. Catalog of Desire and Disappearance. Ana Cruz

143. Husbands. Mo Fanning

144. Knife River. Justine Champine

145. 8ish. Luing Andrews and Jack East

146. Truestory. Catherine Simpson

147. The Flower Queen. Kay Freeman

148. Secrets Dark and Wicked. Jessica Julien & Juliet Stevens

149. The Guardians Light. Oliver Crane

150. A Simple Foundation. Larry Heitz

151. How Soon is Now? Paul Carnahan

152. Murder on Stage. F. L. Everett

153. Murmurations. Sarah Thompson

154. Sun of Endless Days. L.G Jenkins

155. The Days of Our Birth. Charlie Laidlaw

156. The Florence Letter. Anita Chapman

157. The Game of War. Glen Dahlgren

158. Under her Roof. A.A Chaudhuri

159. Remedy. Emily Bridget Taylor

160. One Month's Notice. Katie Lou

161. The Second Life of Jonathan Sendel. Jeffrey Ashkin.

162. Second Glance. AE Bennett

163. Allison Consents. D. Accord

164. Be More Octopus. Suzanne Lissaman

165. Halfmoon Lane. Paula Hillman

166. The Diary at the Last House Before the Sea. Liz Eeles

167. Gallows Wood. Louisa Scarr

168. The Swan's Nest. Laura McNeal

169. Killing Nan and other crime short stories. Keith Wright.

170. The Croaking Raven. Guy Hale

171. Catalyst. Cameron Phoenix

172. Destiny of a Free Spirit. Stephen Ford

173. All in Monte Carlo. Anna Shilling

174. Seven Summers. Paige Toon

175. The Consciousness Company. M.N Rosen

176. About Last Night. Laura Henry

177. The Bite. Jim X Dodge

178. Searchlight, The Rock. Ann Bryant

179. The Walk. Emma Marns

180. Vengeance Day. Simon Dinsdale

181. Serabelle. Tavi Taylor Black

182. War Bunny. Christopher St. John

183. Descended. Ingrid J. Adams

184. If I Can Save One Child. Amanda Lees

185. Sweet Delusions. Bea Miller

186. The Broken Pieces of Us. Celia Tandy

187. Infinite Stranger. Wendy Skorupski

188. Walking Out of This World. Stephen Ford

189. All The Light We Cannot See. Anthony Doerr

190. Vengeance Street. Louise Sharland

191. When The World Went Silent. Ellie Midwood

192. The Cage. Danielle Bannister

193. Love and Other Sins. Emilia Ares

194. Season For Murder. Anna A Armstrong

195. Here Lies A Vengeful Bitch. Codie Crowley

196. Benidorm, Actually. Jo Lyons

197. Spencer Edwards: Emperor of the Galaxy. Alex Prior

198. The Library Girls of the East End. Patricia McBride

199. The Self-Education Manual. Gary Dean Peterson

200. Eighth Moon Bridge. Angus Peter Cambell

201. The Safehouse. Danielle Bannister

202. The Codebreaker Girl. Gosia Nealon

203. The Orphan List. Ann Bennett

204. The Last Bird of Paradise. Clifford Garstang

205. When The Sky Falls. B.R Spangler

206. The Boy Behind the Glass Screen. Ian Siragher

207. Summer at Pine Lake. Alyssa Delle Palme

208. The Physics of Relationships. Chas Halpern

209. A Promise to my Sister. S.E Rutledge

210. Elite Sauna. Craig Lowe.

211. The Swaddling: Search for the Healing Cloth. P.H Bray

212. Istanbul Crossing. Timothy Jay Smith

213. Soul Love. DF Jones

214. Christmas at Polkerran Point. Cass Grafton

215. The Officer. Michael E Bistrica

216. Wartime Wishes for the Land Girls. Ellie Curzon

217. A Seaside Murder. Alice Castle

218. The Human Trial. Audrey Gale

219. Love And Other Cages. Emilia Ares

220. Her Secret Soldier. Julie Hartley

221. Rising Shadows.

222. The Telegram. Debbie Rix

223. The File. Gary Born

224. Journey of A Radiant Heart. Niomi Nicci

225. The Harlan Artefact. Greg Marchand

226. Blue Heart. Nicola Davies

227. The Orphan With No Name. Shirley Dickson

228. The Woman Of Blythe Manor. Miriam Wade

229. Their Little Lies. Quinn Avery

230. Before She Fell. Natalie Sammons

231. Michel's Destiny. Roberta Kagan

232. One Night Only. G.P. Ritchie

233. Just One Weekend. Catherine Aitken

234. A Family Shattered. Roberta Kagan

235. A Killer of Influence. J.D Kirk

236. The Ballerina of Auschwitz. Edith Eger

237. Wolf Boy. David Fitzpatrick

238. Bring Back Time. Julia Sutton.

239. In The Shadows of Love. Awais Khan

240. Susanne: Anne Frank's Forgotten Friend. Sloane Ballou

241. Summerday. Christopher St John

242. The Enlightenment Club. Chris West

243. Ghost Talker. Byrd Nash

244. Death in the Sunshine. Steph Broadribb

245. Mother. Hristina Bloomfield.

246. Watch Over My Child. Roberta Kagan

247. Witch Wife. Lumen Reese

248. The Paris Inheritance. Natalie Meg Evans

249. The Asymmetric Man. Alex Rushton

250. Eden's Comfort Kitchen. Tilly Tennant

251. Moral Code. Lois and Ross Melbourne

252. The Twins on the Train. Suzanne Goldring

253. The Jack O'Lantern Men. Lee Allen.

254. The Angel's Gate. G.P Ritchie

255. Through Fire and Shadow. R.M Schultz

256. Nowhere Man. Deborah Stone.

257. The Night Counsellor. L.K Pang

258. The Witch of White Lady Hollow. C. David Belt

259. Selena Flowers and the Cursed Ruby. Ella English

260. The Other Couple. Tríona Walsh.

261. The Witch and the Devourer of Souls. C.David Belt

262. Another Breath Another Sunrise. Roberta Kagan.

263. Mona Lisa's Daughter. Belle Ami

264. The Irish Family Secret. Daisy O'Shea

265. Cemetery Lodge. Paula Hillman

266. The Last Agent in Paris. Sharon Maas

267. The Christmas Party. Mikayla Davids

268. The Family Secret. Mikayla Davids

269. All Mine Enemies. C. C Gilmartin

270. Flora and Busby's First Christmas. Anna A Armstrong

271. Wait For It. A.L. Glennon

272. Winter Wishes in the Scottish Highlands. Donna Ashcroft.

273. What The Nanny Saw. Kaira Rouda

274. The Ranch at the End of the World. Emma Bettridge

275. Earth Hagiography. Sfarda L. Gül

276. The Witch, The Warlock and The Damned. C. David Belt

277. Catbird. Julia Marie Davis

278. A Safe Place. Stephanie Carty.

279. The Good Witch of Abbotsford. Alaisdair Hutton.

280. Bewitching Rosemary. Colleen Delaney

281. Sailing For Grace. Joseph Bauer

282. Why are you sick? Benjamin L. Smith

283. The Michalmas Daisy. Paul Marriner.

284. The Stolen Sisters. Ann Bennett

285. Scream If You Wanna Go Faster. Wade Beauchamp.

286. The Girl With The Irish Secret. Susanne O’Leary.

287. The Photographer's Secret. Ellie Midwood.

288. Zero Risk. Simon Hayes

289. Earthlings. Ray Star

290. Murder At the Harmony Hollows Resort. Gina Kirkham

291. Double Takedown. Kevin G Chapman

292. The Santa Secret. D Thrush

Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte

There was once a book about Jane
which many people often regaled
It took an absolute age
to get to the last page
It was that dull slow and mundane.

71 Why You Should Read Children’s Books, Even Though You Are So Old and Wise - Katherine Rundell

Rundell makes you read children’s books,
Says don’t worry about how it looks.
Kids’ books can be fun,
But she’s better with Donne,
Not sneaking with wizards in nooks.

Despite poncing round on the moors
The Brontes were still total bores
But Rochester's hot
if you like a despot
And the missionary gives you the snores

It teaches you how to say St John
Is so much better than Bridgerton
Bertha is quite mad
Rochester's a cad
And yet, Dear Reader, I married him.

Catching up @BarbaraBuncle and glad books (and this thread) have been a comfort.

Frankly I'll be quite glad to see the back of this year, and hoping the next will be a bit easier. Trying to cheer myself up with forthcoming books lists - like others here I plan to read Adichie and Moss. Sarah Hall and Catherine Chidgey too - I never quite know what to expect from either, but usually enjoy finding out. Also expecting to enjoy Joe Abercrombie's new series, Anthony Horowitz's return to Susan Ryeland and the next Strike (surely?) And hopefully Ali Smith's Glyph will help me better appreciate Gliff (one of my middling holiday reads).

Nonfic: another bibliomemoir from Lucy Mangan, graphic memoir from Alison Bechdel, and Hallie Rubenhold on Dr Crippen's women.

Much to look forward to in translation, especially from Japanese, including recent litfic and classics (as well as plenty of puzzle mysteries and iyashikei too, for fans of those). Particularly Sisters in Yellow by Mieko Kawakami and Sympathy Tower Tokyo by Rie Qudan (controversial Akutagawa prize-winner that includes AI passages).
I'd also like to read more Korean women: already preordered Han Kang but am curious about Hunger by Choi Jin-young which has been compared to The Vegetarian and Counterattack at Thirty by Sohn Won-pyung, which sounds fun if potentially too personally relevant (even though I had ISSUES with Almond).

...why is chatting and making lists of books more appealing than reviewing even the ones I really liked 🤔

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

Mr Rivers may have been inspired
but his piety and his moods were tired
there was no comparison
with the devilment and passion
that Jane and Eddy more than desired

These are wonderful, I have no talent in this area - but I will be rereading Jane Austen this year to
celebrate her 250th birthday and plan to start with Mansfield Park or Northanger Abbey, as I always start with the ones I love normally.

Thread’s gone mad.

101. Diary of a Wartime Affair - Doreen Bates

Their love was forbidden and yet
They were at it each time that they met.
War made things much worse
And his wife was a curse
Would they end up with twins? Yup, you bet.

I'm being very unfair with my glib limerick but the urge to write one won out against giving a serious review 😬

Here's the proper review. This 1930s/40s diary was credited by Clare Chambers as one of her sources in the acknowledgments after Small Pleasures, and it was kept by Doreen Bates, a 30-something woman who lived with her parents and sister and worked for HMRC as a tax inspector. Her affair with the older, married 'E' (a colleague) lasted for almost a decade and her diary chronicles her abject lows and delirious highs as she struggles to reconcile their feelings for each other - well, hers for him, at any rate - with his constant evasiveness around any kind of resolution to the situation. She writes with huge fluency, humour and intelligence and while I fear she'd get a rough ride in some quarters (I've seen reviews of the book that harrumph about 'adultery'), my instinctive sympathies were always with Doreen - especially after she decides she must give up on E and strikes up tentative new relationships, only for E to react with what seems to me pretty much like jealousy and muscles back in to put a stop to them - not even once, but twice, effectively resulting in most of her 20s being spent with a secret double life that was never going to have a happy ending.

Her yearning for a baby eventually becomes overwhelming and - quite incredibly for a single woman in wartime - she finally does get pregnant despite E's constant prevarications, and unexpectedly gives birth to twins, though E never left his wife. I was happy to learn from the afterword that she went on to have a very successful career and a contented family life with her two children. Hurrah for Doreen, I say.

It's pre new year new thread excitement

@LuckyMauveReader

Jane Eyre is by far the worst Brontë of the main three in my controversial opinion

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit It wasn't that bad I suppose. The limericks could have portrayed it in a better light.

Which book did you find the better one?

I was comparing it to Pride and Prejudice by Austen which I have read a number of times despite me finding the writing of this period challenging.

Catch up bold review:
let me go on - Paul Griffiths
A very late sequel (2023) to let me tell you (from 2009) and likewise written using only the 481 words Ophelia speaks in Hamlet. LMTY was a retelling of Hamlet from Ophelia’s perspective, clever but clinical; LMGO was much more inventive, playful and moving, as it follows ‘O’ after her final exit, going on an Alice-In-Wonderland-ish adventure, encountering various other Shakespearean characters, in search of a mysterious ‘Master’ who seems to be pulling the strings in this brave new world.

The who’s who guessing game aspect was fun (there’s even an answer key at the back), but the real joy was PG’s ingenuity with those 481 words. Lacking some surprisingly basic ones, he often puts them together in a modern chatty way (let’s give it a go, are you with me?, good call, etc.) while weaving in fables, riddles played by ‘O’ with her “other-me” ‘O-fie’ (the Ofelia from a very different edition of Hamlet, who has a distinct set of words), and even an alternative system of rhyming slang (in a London tavern run by Mistress ‘they call me Heaven and Hell’ = Nell Quickly). Virtuosity aside, it has plenty of heart as well, and I was particularly surprised to find much more sensitive than Enter Ghost (which I'd read shortly before) to the specifically misogynistic dimension of O's experiences, both in Hamlet and elsewhere.

Sampling recommended, even if Oulipian wank games aren't usually your thing - they're not mine either, but I'm so glad the beautiful book design (so dainty, such prettily embossed thick paper!) made me pull it from the library shelf. I don't think it's just for Shakespeare geeks either, based on a sample size of DP (with just vague memories of napping through R&J and Othello in high school) who really enjoyed it for the 'mathsy SFnal cleverness,' apparently. Which is how I learned that Griffiths is also a librettist, and originally a biochemist by education (MSc from Oxford) - bloody Renaissance man.

@BarbaraBuncle all my sympathy to you and your family. I'm also glad that reading has brought you some solace.

OMG the limericks! the thread has exploded. You lot are irrepressible. 😂

Welcome to the newbies; you won't be sorry you've come on board these threads!

I'm finally down to my last reviews of the year, the books I read in December. Phew.

85. Intermezzo, Sally Rooney 4/5
    This is my favourite of Rooney’s novels so far, along with Normal People. Rooney depicts the mental angst of her characters with her customary perceptiveness and intensity. I especially liked the romance of the geeky younger brother Ivan and the older woman Margaret. I felt less sympathy for the older brother Peter, who is caught between two beautiful women who both adore him (poor love!). But the depiction of sibling rivalry between the two brothers is very convincing. Not quite a bold for me in the end, because the character of Sylvia (an academic who is disabled due to a car accident) irked me a bit; she was too saint-like for my taste and not as well fleshed out as the other characters.

86. Orbital, Samantha Harvey 3/5
    There are some beautiful passages in this novel, but I really am a reader who is hopelessly addicted to plot, apparently. Or at least to character development. It took me ages to finish this, short as it is, and I confess to frequent bouts of boredom as I mentally rotated round the earth with the astronauts. However, I realised that I’ve read another Harvey novel in the past - Dear Thief, which is inspired by the Leonard Cohen song ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ - and thought it was great. So maybe it’s just this particular Harvey novel that I’ve failed to appreciate properly!

87. Held, Anne Michaels 3/5
    Another Booker Prize shortlisted novel which I admired on the level of poetic language, but found lacking on the level of plot. Basically it was too fragmentary and lyrical for me. With this book finished, I completed the 2024 Booker shortlist, even though I originally didn’t intend to. Stone Yard Devotional and Creation Lake are the only two novels of the six I really liked.

88. Un sac de billes [A Bag of Marbles], Joseph Joffo 5/5
    This is a short French memoir, originally written for children and published in 1973, about how the author and his brother (aged 10 and 12) travelled to the south of France on their own in order to survive the Nazi occupation. It’s a text frequently read by students as part of their French A-Level course (I have seen it mentioned in many UCAS statements over the years!), and I was under the impression that it wasn’t very good (I remember a colleague of mine mocking it once). It wasn’t what I expected though: it turned out to be marvellous, and very moving without being twee or sentimental. There’s also a lot of humour in it. It’s a shame that the English translation is out of print (apart from a graphic novel version).

89. Death at the Sign of the Rook, Kate Atkinson 4/5
    This was a great holiday read. Atkinson plays with the tropes of the murder mystery, and her detectives are in fine form. I did find the end a bit confusing when a whole horde of actors descended upon a stately home, and all the loose plot strands were tied up with breathless speed. But this is a minor quibble.