50 Books Challenge 2025 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 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 here, the second thread here and the third thread here.

And other busy reading day means I’ve finished
46 The Iliad- Homer- Emily Wilson and Richmond Lattimore translations
I’ve been reading these for weeks. I have read two other translations before and wanted to try the new Wilson one and someone in my book group insisted the Lattimore was better- she was right. I enjoyed the Wilson very much but the Lattimore is more poetic and dramatic. Enjoyed them both very much and am planning to do Pat Barker’s trilogy based on Greek tragedies (loved the Oreistia in the past) along with with some Euripides. Heading to Athens in the Easter break so am getting in the mood!

47 A Single Thread- Neneh Cherry
I decided to read the WPNF shortlist - had already read and loved Agent Zo. This is my third- I found the second Private Revolutions underwhelming. I listened to this one on audio and it was more enjoyable than I expected, considering I don’t usually like books about music. I found her more honest at facing her faults than many celebrity memoir writers so that made her very likable. A bit name droppy at times, but I guess that’s to be expected. Her childhood was the most interesting part to me along with the very nomadic lifestyle she has had for her whole life.

Thanks @Cherrypi

79 Newer. Robyn Abbott
A short sci-fi novella. Set in the future, humans have pretty much destroyed Earth and subsequently colonised the rest of the universe. Joseph is arrested trying to illegally move to the planet Europa, he's sentenced to 6 years in prison and assigned Bot Neem22 as a rehabilitation worker.
Kali moves to live with her uncle on Europa after she loses her parents and her arm in a car crash on earth. She befriends Neem22.
This was an enjoyable, super quick read, where the bots have a plan. Not that I can remember it mind you!

80 The Return of Frankie Whittle. Caroline England
Frankie seemingly has it all. A happy marriage, a career "in the City" and a baby on the way. But then it all comes crashing down. A chance to move into an exclusive gated community called The Pavilliom comes up, and in a weird twist of fate it's in the grounds of the old hospital Frankie was born in. Then dark secrets come to the fore, I think saying more would be a spoiler. But I loved this. The language annoyed me at times, but overlall it was good. There are themes of babyloss and suicide though.

81. The Spanish Daughter. Soraya Lane
    A "you know what you're getting" type book. Dual timeline, Spain in the 1930s and 40s, and the modern day. Rose inherits a box with a small figurine in, and a scrap of fabric when her mother dies. She goes off to Spain to discover her family history. I love this kind of book for an easy, comfort read.

82. Sister, Liar, Suspect, Sleuth. Lisa Nicholas
    Cosy Crime, so of course it's totally unbelievable. Mila flees from her home country (I'm not sure if it says where, but I assumed Ukraine) after being framed for her sisters murder. But eventually her supposed crime catches up with her. Another nice, easy read.

83. The Wartime Chocolate Maker. Gosia Nealon
    Kasia works for the Polish resistance in 1943, using her chocolate company as a cover for smuggling notes and information. This is the kind of book I usually love, but something was missing for me.

84. The English Wife. Anna Stuart
    A fictional account, but based on real events, of Clementine Churchill, wife of Winston. I found this fascinating and realised I knew far less about Winston than I thought. But it's not really about him. Clementine was fab! She took her turn fire watching in the Blitz, visited air raid shelters and was involved in various charities and a maternity hospital.

85. Rembrandts Promise. Barbara Leahy
    Another historical fiction, based on real events. Geertje is a widow living in poverty who is sent by her brother to work for the artist Rembrandt. When his wife dies he sets Geertje up as his mistress, eventually giving her a marriage token, which was generally seen as a promise to marry. He goes back on his promise and Geertje, amazingly for a woman of her time, sues him for beech of promise and demands recompense.

86. The Shining Men. Nicky Heymans
    Part 3 of a series based on the book of Joshua. I loved this, but probably not of interest to anyone who isn't religious/ interested in religion.

87. I seek a Kind Person. Julian Borger
    Julian Borger is the child of a Holocaust survivor who was sent to England pre-Kindertransport via an advert in the newspaper. This the story of Julian's father, and some of the other children who's parents advertised them in the same way. Some who came to England, some who didn't. Really really interesting.

88. Barley Sugar. Jack Charles
    This was a bold. Lewis is a 15 year old who lives with his widowed Mum. He's in trouble at school, and with the police so his Mum turns to her FIL, Francis, for support.
    
    Francis takes Lewis on a road trip, and whilst they are away tells him about his youth in 1950s London. Sounds like he had an exciting, but very misguided life. There's gang violence, guns, girls and all bad things. But there's also a group of friends who will do anything four each other.
    I found it was a really lovely story at the heart of it. Plus I love a bit of violence in my novels!

89. Three Children in Danger. Marion Kummerow
    Another historical fiction, based on real events. This one based on "Mission Swedish Furniture" which was the astounding mission to move 'undesirables' out of Berlin by hiding them in packing cases of furniture being sent to Sweden. I'd never heard of it before, so loved learning something new. This story centres on 3 young siblings, whose parents have been deported. I think they are fictional children, but the bare bones of the story is true. It's another one where the writing let it down at times, but wasn't bad enough (for me) to stop reading.

90. Remembering Demons. J.Cornelius
    Another bold. Daryl is a man who has possibly been through the worst thing you can, and subsequently ended up in a psychiatric facility. I used to work in MH care, and thought the portrayal of psychosis was really accurate. Daryl can't look in mirrors because of the demons that inhabit them. The blending of reality and psychosis was so seamless that I'm not entirely sure what was and wasn't real!

91. The Seven O'clock Club. Amelia Ireland
    Another bold. 6 strangers meet at a club, at 7 o'clock, having all suffered a loss 6 months earlier. The aim of the group is to help them heal and move on. There's a massive twist so it's hard to say any more without giving it away. But it was so beautiful. The kind of book that will stay with me for a while.

92. The Art of Life. S.L Russell
    Fen seemingly has a good life. Married for 25 years, her children all grown up. But she's not happy. So she goes away to an art retreat to find herself. This is a book with a Christian undercurrent, Fen decides to paint a triptych based on the book of Revelations. Then disaster strikes at home and she has to abandon her art. At the same time the retreat centre is rapidly running out of money and needs a serious cash injection. I did find that at times large chunks of time happened without anything happening in the story, so 3 months might have passed between chapters and it wasn't always clear that had happened. Which meant it seemed like some things happened very fast. But overall, a nice read.

15 A Mouth full of Salt by Reem Gaafar

The most recent Shelterbox pick and a bit of a mixed bag. Set in a north Sudanese village, the story begins with the drowning of a young boy, the only son of his household - an all-too-frequent occurrence in this area near a treacherous part of the Nile. Our narrator is Fatima, a teenage girl with ideas beyond her village, and through her eyes we see the despair of the boy's mother meeting this tragedy after her husband has taken a second wife. There is a truly grisly childbirth scene, and then the focus suddenly shifts to a much earlier era where we find out the background to the boy's family. The time shift completely discombobulated me; the second story was interesting, but the author then left only a very few pages to return to the first, leaving a whole handful of loose ends. Which annoyed me, because it started promisingly. Hugely interesting on a topic I knew virtually nothing about (20th century life in Sudan); not really successful, in my view, as a fully-realised novel.

16 One of the Good Guys by Araminta Hall

Reviewed by a few 50 bookers recently, I grabbed this when the price was reduced recently. I'm not at all sure that the style of the novel - first from one point of view, then another, and then a third, interspersed with social media posts - fully worked for me, but I did find it compelling and read it quickly. Cole, from whom we hear first - seems like a nice guy whose relationship has broken down in the midst of a failed IVF attempt. But - predictably, given the title - he is perhaps not quite as he seems - and nor is anyone else. It's fairly easy to work out what's going on (at least I found it so), but the power of the book is in the insidious nature of the control that runs through it. I think that part of it at least will stay in my mind.

The Morse of the TV series is certainly not Colin Dexter's Morse and nor is Sgt Lewis.

It's a rare case of the TV series being head and shoulders above the book. What a lucky day for Colin Dexter when Kenny McBain et al decided to make the TV version.

55. Confessions by Catherine Airey - this was a page turner read set in New York and Co. Donegal, following three generations of women with plenty of secrets. I wouldn't say it's a fine piece of literature but I found it hard to out down once I'd started - sometimes that's just what you need!

Now reading another book set in Co. Donegal - The Boy From the Sea by Garrett Carr.

I am off to Bath for a day exploring the bookshops. I don’t think my bank balance will thank me…

Enjoy your day out in Bath! 📚📚📚

Oh lovely - enjoy @ChessieFL

I have my Agatha Christie weekend this weekend finally.

Enjoy @ChessieFL

Oh lovely @ChessieFL. I feel a need for a trip to Bath soon.

24 All Fours - Miranda July
Ok, let me be the thread oddball who loved this (and was also fond of the infamous Pod a couple of years ago). The core theme - the realisation that hitting middle age is not the end, that we need to continue to grow throughout life - is the message I need at this stage in my own life. Right book at right time for me. Also loved individual turns of phrase and highlighted lots with the feeling of ‘yes! That is just how it is!’ Like answering questions at the doctors feeling like describing a horse she owned (as opposed to recounting her actual bodily experience).

I’m not sure this was an ‘unhinged’ woman, as much as a woman openly and unashamedly working through a crisis to rediscover her core self. In a batshit privileged wealthy Californian way not many people can emulate, admittedly. But I still found it inspirational.

Willing to accept I may also be somewhat lacking in the hinge department.

Enjoy your trip @ChessieFL - and please report back on your acquisitions.

I signed up for the mailing list of the Bookbar, a small bookshop in Highbury/ Finsbury Park, and I got an email of their recommendations this month - all sound quite tempting. They're all hardbacks and libraries don't yet seem to have any. I have one by Megan Hunter that I'll read soon.

@IKnowAPlace I already had The Confessions on my wishlist so was pleased to grab it as a Kindle deal the other day. It sounds like the sort of thing I enjoy.

For fans of Lindsey Davis there's a new Flavia Albia out. There Will Be Bodies.

10 years after Vesuvius, Uncle Tulius has bought a countryside villa. Flavia and Tiberius are tasked with renovating it on the cheap. They're expecting bodies from the aftermath of the eruption, but those they find show signs of foul play and Flavia can't leave it alone.

If you're a fan of the series, you'll enjoy it.

@inaptonym thanks for the really interesting thoughts on Dream Count, I definitely found it carried on some of themes in Americanah. It's interesting to watch Adiche's development.

@ReginaChase I was also really disappointed in the Morse books. Have you read Reginald Hill's Dalziel & Pascoe books? They're way better, but remind me of Morse.

@LadybirdDaphne - another All Fours fan 🙌. I also liked Pod.

@IKnowAPlace good to hear a positive review of Confessions. I'm on holiday and it's next on list.

38. Long Island Compromise - Taffy Brodesser- Anker. I really didn't like this and probably should have DNF but am not very good at not finishing, and the last quarter is marginally better than the rest. It starts with a rich Jewish businessman Carl Fletcher being kidnapped for a few days, leaving his pregnant wife and 2 small children to deal with the stress. Once he is released, nothing is the same. This is in the prologue. Then the book follows each of the three children 40 years later and the impact the kidnapping has had on their lives. All three are incredibly annoying, self-indulgent & whiney - I think they're meant to be and it's meant to be funny, but it really didn't do it for me. And I did quite like Fleischman which I know lots of people hated. This is so much worse.

It's going back a few pages now but Die With Zero was transformative for my DH.

He saves because that's what you do and he isn't into material 'stuff At All. We are privileged enough to be heading towards an ok retirement (current market shenanigans not with standing!). We don't have children, and so this sparked a lot of 'but what/who are we saving for' discussions and he now takes quite seriously the idea that a few of our dream trips would be better to do now in our 40s rather than hold off til 60s when health is less assured and both my parents died before retirement anyway....

I still have a pension, but I don't shovel every penny into it.

It is far easier to get my DH to open his wallet now than it was a year ago! And this book was a big part of that.

And yes we had to adapt the book to put circumstances, he talks a lot about wealth that is out of reach for most normal people.

The illusionist: the true story of the man who fooled Hitler - Robert Hutton

Dudley Clarke (played by Dominic West in the recent BBC SAS rogue hero’s series) is an out of the box, independent minded, creative and intelligent career army officer who finds himself in Cairo in 1940 and given orders to develop the role of deception in the allied attempts to push back the Axis powers across North Africa and the Middle East. He goes about creating a network of informers and sources across the region and by the end of the 1943 the Germans have vastly overestimated the forces at the British hands and you can see how the deception efforts have had a direct
impact on the out come of WW2.

This was very Ben MacIntyre in its approach (perhaps a touch less engaging as there are lots of tank movements across the North African desert!), so if you enjoyed them you’d probably enjoy this. I found the magician’s analogy a little tiresome as the book progressed and the last section on Operation Mincemeat and the planning of D-day a little irrelevant as Clarke wasn’t particularly involved. Overall, I’m left feeling in awe of these individual people who did such important and fascinating work at a time when their country needed them most.

The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim I know this is much loved but I'm afraid I found the intial enchantment soon tipped over into rather banal sentimentality.

An Ordinary Youth by Walter Kempowski beautifully translated by Michael Lipkin. This, on the other hand, was terrific. It's an "autobiographical novel" based on Kempowski's coming of age in Nazi Germany recounted in a series of vignettes; it reminded me of the understated but equally powerful style used in the film Heimat. The narrative is interspersed with some rather esoteric quotes and phrases where thankfully the translator has chosen clarity over faithful rendering of the original. It all comes together as a mesmerising and disturbing combination of the young Walter's observations set against the corrupt and disintegrating society, and starkly illustrates the banality of evil. Recommended.

@FortunaMajor my copy arrived at the weekend courtesy of DH who bought it for me as a “gift for some celebration I’ve forgotten” type present 😊 Sadly I’m about 4 books behind in the series: perhaps I’ll use this as the inspiration to catch up - if I don’t keep getting distracted by all the temptations on this thread…

32 The Outsiders by SE Hinton

Ponyboy Curtis and his “greaser” friends and brothers don’t have much, but they have each other. There are frequent rumbles between the Greasers and the Socs, the ‘haves’ to the Greasers ‘have nots’. One night the violence erupts, and a boy lays dead.

I saw the film years ago, but didn’t really remember much about it. I absolutely loved this, it’s brilliant, and that’s before you take into account that the author wrote this when she was sixteen! I listened to this on audible and definitely had a tear in my eye on several occasions. A bold.

I re- read The Outsiders a couple of years ago (a search on here tells me it was April 2023) and thought it was outstanding. Incredibly moving.

Here’s my book haul from today (you may have to wait for Mumsnet to approve the picture). The book with sprayed edges is the first three Wizard of Oz books - I can’t resist pretty sprayed edges! It was an expensive day although it’s not quite as bad as it looks - 4 of them were from charity/second hand shops. It was a lovely day with my DD though (also a bookworm). Now just got to decide which one to read first…

I just loved it and cannot get over the fact that a sixteen year old wrote it. In fact she started writing it when she was 15!

Great haul @ChessieFL, although I must admit I really struggled with aspects of Cider With Rosie when I reread it last year.

I haven’t read The Outsiders since I was a teen myself. Must add it to a re-read list. Loved it at the time.
Great haul @ChessieFL Obviously, you’ll enjoy the Jane Casey but I also enjoyed The Rotter’s Club