50 Books Challenge 2025 Part Two

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the second 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.

The first thread of the year is

I'm currently planning a trip to Bath and Bristol. This means I can finally go to Mr B's and Persephone Books in person - exciting!

If I love Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day more than almost any other book ever written, what should I look out for in Persephone? Really looking for a similar sort of period humour and quirkiness, if such a thing exists!

@BitterTits Butter is on my TBR list, but I'm questioning whether it's going to be for me, if there's a lot of slurping and the like. I'm not good with noisy / messy eaters.

I gave Butter four stars but made it a bold on the basis of its originality. I don't remember excessive slurping and I did it as audio.

https://magazine.punch.co.uk/image/I0000BaPhg4sVCD4

@MyrtleLion see below

I like the sound of Miss Buncle’s Book @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

https://persephonebooks.co.uk/collections/grey-books-social-comedy

I am giving up on the first Slow Horses for the minute. I seem to have been reading it for weeks and still only on 11%. I should have read before watching the TV series as I know what happens so the excitement is removed. I will return to the books but I’ve got a horrible cold and need something I don’t have to think about.

I’ve moved on to Death At The Sign of The Rook - Kate Atkinson which I’m finding much more entertaining.

@Remus one of my favourite Persephone books is High Wages. Not quirky and humorous, although I think I remember some dryingly amusing dialogue, however I loved the period detail in this story of a young woman leaving her unreasonable, inflexible employer to set up a rival draper's shop in a small town.

I think it was with @Terpsichore that I had a long online chat about our memories of these shops, where items were kept in labelled mahogany drawers, and prospective purchases were laid out on a glass-topped counter to be perused before purchase. Very different days.

The women working in the Persephone bookshop in Bath should know their stuff to advise you. I recall from discussions on here that some of us found the staff in the old shop in Bloomsbury pretty sniffy and offhand, however, when I was in Bath for the Persephone Festival last year, the women I encounterd were all friendly and knowledgeable. It was a brilliant couple of days.

Can I also recommend Skoobs Books in the Guildhall Market in Bath for the best second-hand bookstall I've seen. The guy really knows his stuff; the books are high quality and sorted into genres. Well worth a visit.

I'm reading Butter atm and enjoying it a lot. I'm going to be making rice with butter and soy sauce soon, but it will have to be with President rather than something mega expensive.

Thanks, folks. I've read a bit of Miss Buncle's Book before, but it didn't grab me at the time tbh.

I go to Skoob books in Bloomsbury occasionally - I didn't realise there was one in Bath too. I'll look out for it.

#4. Unfinished Woman, Robyn Davidson

I bought this after I got to hear the author speak in person at a book festival last year. This was a huge excitement as I'm a big fan of her first book Tracks. This memoir is hard to summarise. She's now in her 70s and the book jumps around a lot between her childhood (especially the loss of her mother) and the many different places she's lives around the world. I enjoyed it but am quite glad I've finished it now!

Taking notes as I am taking myself to Bath in the summer for my birthday for a bit of Ibsen, but I’ll obviously need to fill the time.

Maybe you should talk to someone by Lori Gottlieb - Gottlieb is an LA therapist and this book is an account of her work and also her own experience of therapy as a patient. I liked the way the cases were presented, with all 3 running through the book alongside the author’s own. I did a lot of eye rolling - this is a privileged world where long term therapy is the norm along with bikini waxes and manicures, where foregoing botox in order to preserve retirement income is seen as slightly contemptible, and where people need therapists to process the death of their previous therapists - and I didn’t need the constant reminders that Gottlieb’s clientele are in Hollywood. I also would have liked evidence for some of the claims she makes - ‘if C works through her complicated feelings towards her parents with me, she’ll find herself increasingly attracted to a different type… of partner’. I found it long - would have preferred 300 pages to 400 - but all this said I found it interesting and engaging.

I am in Northumberland for a holiday and have made the trip the 50 Bookers favourite shop - Barter Books!

Just three purchases, I have a few unread books on my shelves at home and also on kindle and like many others I'd like to make a dent on them this year.

I am off to Edinburgh later in the week though, and there are a couple of book shops on my list for that day too....

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie
Had a look through my LibraryThing "collection" of Persephone books - I have 106 and have read about 60 of them, though I already can't remember some well. The ones I remember as funny are the first two Miss Buncle books, and Miss Ranskill Comes Home by Barbara Euphan Todd (best known for Worzel Gummidge) but it's not necessarily very like Miss Pettigrew. At the outbreak of WWII Miss Ranskill was shipwrecked on a desert island - she has been rescued and returned to England during the war and knows nothing of rationing and other restrictions placed on everyone since she left the country. The humour is mixed with sadness.

Here are the Persephone books I've logged on LT

https://www.librarything.com/catalog/elkiedee/persephonebooks

There are quite a few readers of Persephone, Virago and other reprint who post on Librarything, and some of them including Liz and Simon (who has an editorial role on the British Library Women Writers series) also have their own book blogs.

I really recommend Persephone's own website for detailed information on all the books they've published.

@highlandcoo ah yes, fond memories of our chat about drapers’ cabinets and shelving! 😊

Ooh Ibsen is THE BEST! Jealous!

Finally managed to finish another book to take me to 5

5 City of Destruction by Vaseem Khan

I continue to enjoy this detective series set in post-partition India. The lead character, Persis Wadia, the first female inspector in the Indian police force, is a great, nuanced portrait of a (possibly neurodivergent) woman in a man's world; not wholly sympathetic, but you always root for her. Khan has said that his reason for writing these books was partly to inform people about this period of Indian history, about which I am woefully ignorant, so they're good on that front too. There was quite a political edge to this one; the central plot is about the attempted assassination of the defence minister, and how that might affect India-Pakistan relations. And Persis's relationship with English criminologist Archie Blackfinch continues on a knife-edge. Just what I need at the moment.

I loved The Lacuna @RazorstormUnicorn. Enjoy!

Just finished the third Slough House book, which is called something to do with tigers. I liked it, but it did feel a bit long in places. Some really great characterisation: Lamb, Catherine, Louisa and Shirley more so than River.

Have finished off two books this week- one good fun the other no great shakes but with our (NI) equivalent of OFSTED in tomorrow it’s possible my sky high stress levels are making me overly critical.

10 Day One- Abigail Dean
I found Dean’s other book Girl A well written, tense and upsetting. The protagonist was very ‘flat’ but that totally fitted for her POV. The protagonist in this book, Marty (short for Martha) is equally flat but it doesn’t work as well for this character. She is (and is meant to be) unlikable but I just couldn’t connect at all and found the flitting between POVs distracting. It tells the story of a school shooting in which Marty’s mother, the class teacher, is killed trying to protect her students so trigger warnings for parents.

11 The Hanging Tree- Ben Aaronovitch
I really enjoyed this latest instalment in the Rivers of London series. These are ridiculous stories of magical mayhem in London being investigated by a special unit of the met. In this episode, the daughter of one of the river goddesses gets into trouble and Peter and co have to help out as well as investigate a crime. This pulled lots of threads together from previous books and the plot was more coherent that normal. It was, as ever, read beautifully by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith. I don’t think I’d enjoy these half so much on paper and this book was exactly what I needed right now.

You lucky thing @RazorstormUnicorn . Love Northumberland.

The Dark Tower by Stephen King

I read the first in the series in April 2019 and gave it two stars. I carried on with my Stephen King read through knowing I'd have to read the rest at some point and grew to love the characters and enjoy spending time with them. I picked up this final book with some trepidation. I wanted to read it and know how it ended, but I didn't want the story to be over. A six year trek through mid world and end world and New York.

I won't summarise the plot, I have no wish to give spoilers to anyone not yet started on this journey.

I cried during the book but not at its end.

This one is 5 stars. I am sad to see the tale finished, say thankee sai King.

Oh, good luck with the inspection!

So many tissues needed. :(

Yes, hope all goes well.

Sending strength for the inspection @ÚlldemoShúl