50 Books Challenge 2025 Part One

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the first thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2025, 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.

Who's in for this year?

@ÚlldemoShúl

I'm a bit stuck as I can't give the feedback "it was far too YA for my taste and quite long, drawn out and boring" without sounding a terrible snob and possibly giving offence to a really nice person hoping to share a common interest. I will read the next two and then have a verdict!

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit yes it’s tricky when it’s a recommend from someone you like- maybe talk about how inventive the magic system is- most Sanderson fans love the magic systems- and they are very creative and detailed.

@inaptonym I absolutely love Joe Abercromie's The First Law trilogy. I met him at a book signing years ago and he was so much fun. I managed to track down a copy of the First Law graphic novel which is extremely rare now, and worth quite a bit. I recently listened to the trilogy on Audible, narrated by Stephen Pacey and it was almost like experiencing the books for the first time again. Bliss. Unfortunately his Shattered Sea trilogy is no where near as good, but the Age of Madness books are brilliant.

@SomethingBlues I read all of the A Court of Thorns and Roses books this time last year. They are not at all demanding, written in a young adult style, but very much 'adult' books! Strangely compelling though.

I love fantasy and historical fiction, especially as my job is so high pressured which leaves little space left in my brain for complex literary works. I still enjoy more complex and 'serious' subjects, but can't always face them and need silly fluff and nonsense.

I have never managed to read 50 books in a year, and have never really tried to either. I think I managed 32 one year, but most years read about 26 and I'm happy with that.

@noodlezoodle and @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie I can't find the Schrodingers butler thread! Links?

I really like the First Law series and I think that's what got me reading a few more fantasy books. @Zireael I might have to revisit via the audiobooks!

Totally agree with others that it’s such a lovely thing you’ve kept going @Southeastdweller

i joined 8 years ago on mat leave and have ducked in and out. I often (but not always) hit 50 but that isn’t always a reflection of my best reading years (dodgy thrillers in the middle of the night when I’m stressed)

I love having this thread as chatting about books makes me want to read more. I think I read more by knowing when to DNF, having lots of different genres depending on what I’m in the mood for and also prioritising it more than doom scrolling / tv (it doesn’t always happen)

It was just a wonderful throwaway comment by @noodlezoodle - until she reads the book, the butler’s unrequited love is both bloody boring and profoundly moving. For the rest of us, it’s one or the other and I admit I may be in a minority.

I cheerfully enjoy lots of books that are maligned by others on here, from the Butler to Station 11 to all of Sally Rooney! I read quite a lot of books but am still sometimes astounded by those in the hundreds. I have a small child but read before bed and on my commute. I'm a fast reader, going back to being a child but I think turbo charged by doing a literature degree. But also, I'm really good at knowing what kind of books I like and I don't read outside that very often. A bit limiting maybe, but it means I'm nearly always reading something I'm excited to get back to.

1. The Party by Tessa Hadley. Beautifully written novella about two sisters in post-war Bristol who are invited to a party by a rich stranger. I thought it really captured the sordid and darker side of the world they lived in, with bombed out pubs and sinister men trying to take advantage of them, while the girls themselves were full of life and brightness, all art school and beautiful clothes and hope for the next decade.

I don't know why numbering has stopped working for me...

@GrannieMainland

It's not working for anyone

I’m another who is very much Team Butler- it was my favourite read last year but I love how we all love something different and have read loads of books I might not have considered otherwise because of reviews here. I credit the 50 Bookers entirely for my rediscovered interest in reading non-fiction

Interesting to see the Mistborn review @EineReiseDurchDieZeit . I read Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson last year to see if I’d enjoy his writing before attempting any of the door stopper books but I found that wayyy too twee for me. Sometimes I feel like the only person on the internet who doesn’t love certain books, that being the case with Tress!

Stoner, John Williams

Book 2 for the year. I had never heard of this until last year where I saw it all over booktok so I grabbed it in the 99p kindle deals one month. Then a friend highly recommended it to me and said it was an all time favourite. Well, I thought, I’d better read it.

I found this to be a very melancholy, beautifully written tale. It is the life story of William Stoner, told in chronological order as he rises from farmers son to tenured professor in English literature, experiences an unhappy home life and stressful work situations. However despite all of the shit in his life, it is Stoner’s love of literature and teaching that he holds onto. I finished this a few days ago and I am still musing over the characters of Stoner, his wife and daughter.

Recommend! 4/5 for those who like a rating.

I think I am on my fourth year of this thread and I love it. I have never yet managed 50 books but I have read books I WOULD NEVER have tried before and for me, that is the joy.

one of my absolute favourite things is writing a review then a few pages on noticing someone posting about having been inspired to pick up the book and read it. That’s a wonderful feeling.

I do recall accidentally causing a minor debate to do with Margaret Atwood I believe but it was all terribly good humoured.

I am still working my way book one of the gear but I am enjoying it. I am pondering whether to finish the book I was reading in December as I abandoned it. It’s The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett who I usually absolutely adore but this just hasn’t grabbed me at all. December was very stressful however and much of my story time is actually in the car listening and I found I didn’t have the attention span. I would had to force my way through when maybe what I need to do is leave it for a while longer and start from scratch. I did that with Pyramids as I was struggling enormously. I also looked at the Wikipedia page and I will be honest that really did help. Once I got a grip of the general thing and filled a few gaps in my understanding I was away again.

Yay 😀😀

Lucky you! 🤩
I used The First Law to refer to all 10 books in that world, so currently am on (actually just finished) The Trouble With Peace. Totally agree that this final AoM trilogy is on another level - I adore seeing the ramifications of everything decades on, and the OG cast as parents to their variously feckless/frightening adult offspring. The mothers' matchmaking tea party in this one absolutely sent me, despite the darkness in that plotline. Also prefer the more industrialised world and range/variety of female characters. His development reminds me of Pratchett's* in moving from from meta/satire on genre conventions to more explicit sociopolitical targets, although I think his humour is closer to Mick Herron*'s. Annoyingly impossible to review at this stage without spoilers, though!

Steven Pacey is a wonder, although at this stage he must be running out of regional British accents. I liked the original TFL well enough on paper,
really fell for them when I revisited on audio, and was all in after Best Served Cold (still a favourite - can see why it's been picked for adaptation). If you haven't listened to it, the audiobook of Sharp Ends (story collection) includes a fun joint interview with SP and JA. JA reads one story himself (the chronicle Sworbrick's writing in Red Country) before then SP comes in as Cosca with notes 😁

It’s always been interesting and entertaining seeing where our views on books have converged and diverged. From what I recall, there are only three books that all the 50 bookers who’ve read them have enjoyed:

84 Charing Cross Road - Helene Hanff
A Heart That Works - Rob Delaney
The World I Fell Out Of - Melanie Reid

I don’t know if ‘enjoyed’ is the right word for the Rob Delaney book? I know I felt very glad to have read it, afterwards.

Interesting discussion on Brandon Sanderson too. I read Mistborn when it came out and wasn't inspired to seek out more. I think his whole schtick is the 'hard magic system' so if that's not appealing I'd cut losses @EineReiseDurchDieZeit he's unlikely to deliver on character, style or even satisfactory plot development (based on the rants I've heard about his latest series).

I wasn't around for the original BBBBunfights so while staunchly #teamButler am content to sit it out. Slightly bemused/curious how the debate here came to be focused on unrequited(?!) love, rather than y'know individual/collective responsibility, history, memory, storytelling, ALL OF LIFE.... 😁

@MonOncle I love Stoner - actually that's another one universally loved (or at least admired?) among everyone I know online or off. Maybe I need to hang out with more iconoclasts!

Anybody who doesn’t like Charing Cross Road needs roasting with their own mock goose sent over from America in a Christmas parcel and burying with a bookmark piercing their cold and shrunken heart.

But how do you REALLY feel, Remus? 😀

This thread is the gift that keeps on giving!

@satelliteheart I have just started using my kindle page turner and rapidly went from 'this was a bit indulgent' to 'this is amazing'. I'm now interested in a kindle holder - which one do you have and do you recommend it?

1. The Cracked Mirror, by Chris Brookmyre. Spectacular. Penny is a Miss Marple-alike amateur detective and Johnny Hawke is a hard-boiled LA detective who doesn't play by the rules. So far, so cliched. Their paths cross as they work on separate cases, and it becomes increasingly clear that there are clear parallels between their investigations. As they team up and begin to work together things start to get strange. I'll say no more for fear of spoilers, but this veered very far from the original premise, and I was quite chuffed with myself that I figured out what was going on before the 'reveal'. I have nothing but admiration for how Chris Brookmyre laid the groundwork and carefully left clues throughout the book. Thoroughly unexpected but a very bold bold to start the year.

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit I read a lot of fantasy, but was also very meh about Mistborn
It's a while ago, but I think i read the first two before deciding they weren't for me.

I did feel not so much that they were YAish (I also read & enjoy a lot of YA books), but that I'd have liked them much more when I was 13 & had read a lot fewer other fantasy novels.

@PowerTulle I read papercup in the summer while staying about half a mile outside the place where the women is returning the ring. Made quite a good reading experience as I was visiting and then reading all the places mentioned.

For some reason this came up on my twitter feed - what doyou think? Would it help you relax? xmasglad.com/products/anxiety-bookshelf-shake-away-your-anxiety-eimj?twclid=26895i4hcavcl5lyvu229sg4ws

I think Private Rites by Julia Armstrong is going to be a DNF. It’s self indulgent and confusing and I can’t tell one character from another.