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.

Yes I get 400 pages.as well

I used to see a list along the left-hand column of all the different categories in the deals - literary fiction, detective, biography, history, food etc. That’s disappeared now and I can’t find any way to narrow it down. I don’t want to wade through 400 pages. They seem absolutely determined to prevent the monthly deals being easily accessible.

I just go on the site and click Kindle Book Deals

I got :

Precipice
Conclave
Nora Webster
All The Colours Of The Dark
Everything Must Go
Blood Meridian
The Master
The Coin
Beautyland
Maurice And Maralyn
Redhead by the side of the road

in case anyone wants these and hasn’t spotted them

I have got there! But it's a bit convoluted.

The steps are as follows.

1. Kindle book
2. Kindle bookdels
3. Literary fictio
4. See more
5. Then Kindle book deals - in top LH corner.

I have 'only' 118 pages to go through.

I can do steps 1 to 3 but steps 4 & 5 aren't showing

Wne you get to Literary fiction there is a See more with an arrow on the same line as Literary Fiction. Follow that!

I'lltry to add a screen shot

Screen shot

If you click on the image you'll se the link!

Thank you I was being incredibly thick

@Terpsichore if you are on the site and click on the red 'limited time deal' on any book (eg Precipice) then you can filter by Kindle ebooks and then you can get the sectors

www.amazon.co.uk/deals?discounts-widget=%2522%257B%255C%2522state%255C%2522%253A%257B%255C%2522refinementFilters%255C%2522%253A%257B%255C%2522departments%255C%2522%253A%255B%255C%2522341678031%252F341689031%255C%2522%255D%257D%257D%252C%255C%2522version%255C%2522%253A1%257D%2522

But it definitely used to be easier!

Thanks Sheila, I’ll try this. There generally aren’t many fiction books I’m interested in and I always want to look at the non-fiction first. They clearly don’t understand this mindset!

I bought:

No Way Out: Brexit: From the Backstop to Boris -Tim Shipman (been on my list for ages)
The Zig Zag Girl - Elly Griffiths
After You'd Gone - Maggie O'Farrell
Precipice - Robert Harris
Built to Move: The 10 essential habits that will help you live a longer, healthier life - Juliet Starrett, Kelly Starrett (wildcard for 99p)

Went back in, just letting everyone know that Story of a Heart is 99p

Thanks @Southeastdwellerfor the thread

Here's my list:

1. Polo; Jilly Cooper
2. Five Little Pigs; Agatha Christie
3. Gallows Walk; Giles Ekins
4. Distance; Luna Mason
5. The Drowning Game; Barbara Nickless
6. Detonate; Luna Mason
7. The Thirteen Problems; Agatha Christie
8. The Man who Made Husbands Jealous; Jilly Cooper
9. The Sinner; Shantel Tessier
10. The Estate; Denzil Meyrick
11. Appassionata; Jilly Cooper
12. My Dark Desire; L. J. Shen & Parker S. Huntington
13. Three Act Tragedy; Agatha Christie
14. Murder at the Altar; Veronica Heley
15. The Seven Dials Mystery; Agatha Christie
16. Defined; Dakota Willinck
17. The Cypress Maze; Fiona Valpy
18. Twisted Love; Ana Huang
19. Twisted Games; Ana Huang

Thanks everyone, I've gone back and picked up Story of a heart too.

47. Evenings and Weekends - Oisín McKenna. I really liked this book which is set over a sunny weekend in east London in 2019. We follow various people but mainly Phil, a gay man who is struggling with sex after an abusive encounter, his best friend Maggie, who has just found out she is pregnant, and her partner Ed, whose father recently died and is unsure of his own sexuality. There's also quite a few chapters from the point of view of Phil's Irish mother Rosaleen, who has been diagnosed with breast cancer. It's set in my part of London, and coming to it in a sunny week really helped - it just felt real with well-develioed characters and enough plot to keep me invested. The one down side for me was the narration on the audiobook which sounded a bit like one of my 15 year old's friends but I guess it made it authentically London! I could also see people finding it quite annoying, about a load of 20somethings partying and navel gazing, but I remember being there about a hundred years ago!

Just picked up Precipice, Jamaica Inn and The Cracked Mirror in the kindle deals, all recommended on here

72 Herc - Phoenicia Rogerson

Billed as a queer, feminist retelling of the Hercules myth, this was… ok. Herc himself never “speaks” - the chapters are from the POVs of his lovers, wives, family. Which honestly makes him somewhat distant in the book (his cousin Eutheymus, setter of the labours, describes him as an oaf; others hero worship him; neither seems fully believable).

I think others have done this kind of retelling better.

I've picked up Beautiful Ugly, The penguin lessons, Cloistered, Everything must go and The anxious generation.

Another Precipice buyer here. @SheilaFentiman I did indeed find the categories from your link - thank you - but can I get to the same place by trying to navigate from scratch myself? No, I cannot!

I’ve already read Precipice but agree it’s a great deals month. I got:
The Piano Tuner- Daniel Mason
The Master- Colm Toibin
After You’d Gone- Maggie O’Farrell
The Ghosts of Rome- Joseph O’Connor
The Coin- Yasmin Zaher and
Liars- Sarah Manguso

I also picked up a few in the Audible monthly sale:
The Museum of Innocence- Orhan Pamuk
The Sweetness of Water- Nathan Harris and
The Sellout- Paul Beatty

17) The Picnic by Matthew Longo

This won last year's Orwell Prize sovit cam with great reviews. I found it a bit slow to start with but then it really picks up and I couldn't put it down.

The titular Picnic took place in Hungary, on the border of Austria in Aug 1989. East Germans had made their way there in huge numbers on the chance they might be able to escape.

The book follows the fortunes of several families who risked everything.

Strong recommend, though i think it would be a better read in hard back (I was reading the paperback).

Maurice and Marilyn has been on my wish list for ages. Thank you!

I also bought All the Colours of the Dark by Chris Whittaker

Placemarking and am going in for the deals!

I may be a while.