50 Books Challenge 2025 Part Five

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fifth 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 or / 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 like to bring over lists to the next thread- again, this is up to you.

The first thread of the year is here, the second thread here , the third thread here and the fourth thread here.

@Tarragon123 yes, so annoying when stupid mistakes like that are made, isn’t it! There was a big thing made of arriving off the train in the dark and not seeing the beautiful surroundings until the next morning (standard gothic novel trope!) and it almost made me give up on the book. Thankfully, it got better after that!

Only 15 books left @Tarragon123 ? Wow!

I hope life gets less fraught for you soon @PepeLePew and @Owlbookend

I’m really not sure if I like We Pretty Pieces Of Flesh. The lives and relationships between the central characters are fascinating and there are some beautifully poignant descriptions of their lives and surroundings. However, the rendering of the Doncaster speech is awful. Possibly the worst translation of dialect to paper I’ve ever read and I usually drop into it easily after a couple of pages. It’s like the Four Yorkshiremen meet t’owd farmer from Dracula.
I’m giving it a fair chance, mainly because it’s on my Kindle and I can turn the brightness down - I had an emergency appointment at the eye hospital on Saturday for a bleed caused by Posterior Vitreous Detachment. Not unusual for someone over 50 with lifelong short sight, but there’s a chance it could lead to a tear or retinal detachment. Which is fab. Awaiting further tests this week back at the hospital. The Weiss Rings are dancing about too much to focus on a physical page so I’ve had to leave Night Swimming for now. Apparently my brain will learn to tune out the dancing cobwebs eventually <sigh>

Wishing you a good recovery @AlmanbyRoadtrip

Hoping things improve for you @AlmanbyRoadtrip . thank goodness the kindle is working for you right now.
I finished one book at the weekend:
81 The Names by Florence Knapp
Great premise- a new mother hesitates over the name to give her newborn baby boy- should she name him her choice, her husband’s choice or her daughter’s. It then splits into 3 sliding doors type narratives. It’s well written but because of the set up we never get into depth in any of the characters really. Huge trigger warnings for detailed domestic violence.

90 Doctor Who: The Writer’s Tale: The Final Chapter - Russell T Davies and Benjamin Cook (NF)

I bought this in 2016 and it wasn’t marked as read, so maybe I read it then and maybe I didn’t!

Anyway. The book is largely based on emails exchanged by the authors during the last 2 years of RTD’s first tenure on Doctor Who Benjamin Cook worked for Doctor Who Magazine and this was initially intended to be an article, but the correspondence kept going until it became a book, then an extended book. It is a fascinating look at the writing and TV producing process. (If you aren’t a Whovian, though, probably baffling because you won’t have the overview of the Whoniverse)

As at 3rd June last year I was at 50 books so I have had it in my head to get to 90 by tomorrow… and I have done it! Might do something other than read for the rest of today…

@AlmanbyRoadtrip sorry to hear about your eye, that sounds painful. Audio books for a bit?

I started We Pretty Pieces of Flesh at the weekend and was put off almost instantly but the 4 Yorkshiremen speak. I wonder if it would be better on audio? I've put it down for the time being in favour of another Maeve Kerrigan but it's being touted as a potential Booker listing so will probably return.

Well done Sheila!

Hope your eye problems get sorted soon Almanby - sounds nasty.

Best Wishes to everybody having a shitty time at the moment!

Rupert Everett can come round and read to me @Stowickthevast but I’m not a fan of audio books. Might have to use all the Audible credits Amazon keep sending me if I need an op, but here’s hoping otherwise!
Thanks for all the good wishes. The joys of getting older, I guess and not even down to actions of a misspent youth <tut>

79 . Question 7 by Richard Flanagan

Chekhov’s Question 7 originates from Anton Chekhov’s 1882 satirical piece titled The Tasks Of A Mad Mathematician a parody of absurd arithmetic problems. The seventh question in this series reads :

Wednesday, June 17, 1881, a train had to leave station A at 3 a.m. in order to reach station B at 11 p.m.; just as the train was about to depart, however, an order came that the train had to reach station B by 7 p.m. Who loves longer, a man or a woman?

This seemingly nonsensical question exemplifies Chekhov’s early use of absurdity to illustrate the illogical nature of certain societal expectations.

In Richard Flanagan’s 2024 memoir Question 7 (which won the Baillie Gifford Prize) the title draws inspiration from Chekhov’s original question. Flanagan explores themes of existential uncertainty and the search for meaning, echoing Chekhov’s belief that literature should pose essential questions rather than provide definitive answers. Flanagan reflects that in Chekhov’s stories, "the only fools are those with answers," suggesting that the quest for understanding is more significant than any conclusive resolution.

Flanagan draws a line between the writer HG Wells, the Hiroshima Bomb, his father’s status as a Japanese POW and his own birth showing how things that don’t appear to connect, connect.

This is way more accessible than I’ve probably made it sound and only 280 pages. I really enjoyed this, read it quickly and it teeters close to a bold. Existential. Currently 99p.

Sorry to hear that AlmanbyRoadtrip, what a worry.

Hope your appointment goes okay @AlmanbyRoadtrip If it's any consolation I started getting floaters years ago and was told I had PVD and my brain really has stopped noticing them. The only time I'm conscious of them is on a really bright day and then sunglasses come in handy for muting them out.

1. The Forgotten Tower, Lulu Taylor
2. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
3. All the Colors of the Dark Chris Whittaker
4. Pretty Girls, Karin Slaughter
5. Strange Sally Diamond, Liz Nugent
6. Fairy Tale, Stephen King
7. The God of the Woods, Liz Moore
8. The Grey Wolf, Louise Penny
9. Black Woods, Blue Sky, Eowyn Ivey
10. The Little Liar, Mitch Ablom
11. The List of Suspicious Things, Jennie Godfrey
12. Onyx Storm, Rebecca Yarros
13. The Hunter, Tana French
14. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
15. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte
16. The Burning, Jane Casey
17. Mystic River, Dennis Lehane
18. The Frozen People, Elly Griffiths
19. Slow Horses, Mick Herron
20. The Missing Ones, Patricia Gibney
21. The Reckoning, Jane Casey
22. Learning to Swim, Clare Chambers
23. Coming to Find You, Jane Corry
24. Piranesi, Susanna Clarke
25. Dead Lions, Mick Herron
26. Listen for the Lie, Amy Tintera
27. The Last Girl, Jane Casey
28. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, VE Schwab
29. Blue Sisters, Coco Mellors
30. The Phoenix Ballroom, Ruth Hogan
31. I Who Have Never Known Men, Jacqueline Harpman
32. The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
33. The Last Word, Elly Griffiths
34. The Butterfly Garden, Dot Hutchinson
35. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls
36. The Stranger You Know, Jane Casey

My MN has gone all weird!!!

The Count of Monte Christo, Alexandre Dumas

Despite (badly) leading the read-a-long, I have managed to finish after almost everyone else by about 2-3 weeks. This was a reread and I really enjoyed it and all the interesting observations and bits of knowledge that come with reading as a group. I am hoping to find some time for various adaptations over the next few weeks.

I have been in a total reading slump, not getting into anything, or just generally falling asleep. I have a non fiction travel book on the go and Babel’s Odessa Tales on the go, but bought the new Elif Shafak and the 47 Borders book at the airport last week and am dying to get into them.

Scattering bookish good wishes to those who are having a tough time at the moment!

I’m in the thick of the GCSE and A Levels double whammy myself 🙃

29 Gamemasters: The Comic Book History Of Roleplaying Games - Fred Van Lente

This was a fun read which I backed on Kickstarter and just got the PDF ahead of the book itself shipping. As the name suggests, it’s a history of RPGs in comic book format and very nicely done, with great illustrations and lots of fun facts. A good one for the D&Der in your life.

I'm sorry to everyone having a hard time.

I also bought Wellness by Nathan Hill in the deals which I haven't seen mentioned yet.

I'm on holiday! But to update on what I finished before I left:

The Eights by Joanna Miller. Historical novel about the first cohort of women to study at Oxford after WW1, following 4 young women who live on the same corridor and become best friends. An enjoyable and easy read which would be good for a holiday, it was kind of ladies historical fiction by numbers though - everyone has a fairly predictable secret. I'm pretty sure this has been bought for film already and would work well on the screen.

Murder at Gulls Nest by Jess Kidd. Much reviewed, first in a new detective series about former nun Nora Breen solving mysteries in a run down sea side town. I thought this was fine, I didn't love it though it was a good concept. There was a lot of backstory for the characters and the townspeople, presumably to set up for future books, which I found a bit distracting from the plot.

Close to Home by Michael Magee. Follows Sean, back in Belfast after going away for university, struggling to find a job and getting drawn into his brother and friends' world of drinking and drugs. And grappling with some family trauma. It sounds bleak because it is, but well written and powerfully done.

38 Us - David Nicholls. I liked the idea and execution, especially the immersion in the culture and art of the cities visited but ultimately I didn't really feel for any of the main characters. The end, even though it doesn't go the way you anticipate, left me a bit flat and not really caring one way or the other.

@GrannieMainland I read and really enjoyed Wellness last year.

Miss Silver Intervenes - Patricia Wentworth
I’m not very well and not up to doing much, including reading, but I’ve managed to read another Miss Silver book - perfect sickbed stuff. I suspect today will consist of another one as I’m not well enough to be up and about, but no longer needing to sleep all the time.

Sending best wishes to everyone who isn't feeling well and going through difficult times at the moment 💐

I'm in a go-slow at the moment. I enjoyed the first instalment of 'Dombey and Son' which was good and lively. I have a few books lined up including the latest Maeve Kerrigan book that I'm looking forward to.

Echoing the sympathy to anyone in a slump, for whatever reason.

Two recent reads:

63 Living with the Laird, Belinda Rathbone
Has been on my shelf for several years, although its provenance is now uncertain. This is a memoir by an American woman who married a Scottish man who inherited a large house, and her dawning realisation that her new life is not going to be as romantic as expected. She starts off cosplaying an Edith Wharton heroine - "British-born" people have an inherent understanding of how to run these big houses, of course, unlike little old New World her. This "British-born" savoir faire does not, however, extend to the lower classes who occupy cottages on the estate - once they depended on the landowner and did an honest day's work, and now they depend on the state and don't lift a finger. Also, they put up frilly net curtains. Her real frustration, though, is with her husband (now ex) who not only hoards, but refuses to dispose of the hoarding done by previous generations, and will only carry out projects according to his own idiosyncratic schedule. I rather like memoirs as the chance to sample someone else's life. In this case, I read without envy.

64. Britain by the Book, Oliver Tearle
A miscellany of lesser-known literary anecdotes. A mildly diverting train read.

Best wishes to all those going through troubles.

Imogen - Jilly Cooper I first read this as a teenager in the 70s and I’ve re-read it countless times, usually at this time of year. It’s about an innocent young woman (Imogen) who goes on holiday to the South of France with a glamorous crowd of more sophisticated people and it’s full of glorious descriptions of food, drink, clothes, beautiful people and really evokes that hot beach holiday feel.

However, it also contains some awful racist slurs and the fattism is something else. Imogen was 11 stone at school, has since lost more than two stone (so is eight stone something) and still considers herself fat. I wonder if this is JC’s own insecurities.
The age gap between the two leads is something too.

I still love it but am fully aware of its many failings.

Thanks @ÚlldemoShúl I'd missed the Catherine Chidgey when trawling the details. I've finally got round to starting Remote Sympathy by her after borrowing it from the library and renewing it many times.

I have borrowed and bought so many books recently I'm keen to read and I've slowed right down. Like @MegBusset I have one kid doing A levels and the other doing GCSE, but I don't think I can blame my slow reading on them, generally, though last night might have been an exception, as DS1 took 80 minutes from saying "I'm on my way home, can you run me a bath" from a mate's house which is literally round the corner and can't possibly be more than 2-5 minutes walk away. I found it really hard to settle into reading before he showed up, and all this was between 11.30 pm and 12.50 am.

Sympathy @AlmanbyRoadtrip about sight issues. I had a different problem 3 years ago - had to have cataract surgery - and found reading library ebooks on my phone with white text/black background. Wishing everyone improvements in health, stress levels and reading quality/quantity.

Anna, Where are you? Patricia Wentworth
More sick bed reading. I liked this a lot until the ending, which was ridiculous.