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.

I haven’t even heard of GEB!

Some interesting classic dystopias in the kindle sale today.

I have a feeling it was a Cote d’Azur favourite!

Another Christine Dwyer Hickey novel, The Lives of Women, is also on Kindle offer at 99p at the moment (no idea how long for! - I already bought it years ago)

69 . Conclave by Robert Harris

Another Finisher. High drama ensues when the Catholic Church tries to elect a new Pope. I did this as an audio until my Spotify credit ran out and then finished it in print. It worked really well. I thought it was taut, well read and written, really engaging but found the ending a little abrupt. The film is excellent too and there are few changes. Probably a bold.

Thanks @elkiedeeI’ve bought that

I watched the film (Conclave) at the weekend on Prime and enjoyed it. It stayed faithful to the book in most respects. I enjoyed watching my family's reaction to the twist!

I finished a few over the weekend

64 Middlemarch by George Eliot
I really wanted to love this- so many people cite it as their favourite book of all time but I just didn’t get the love. I’m not a huge Victorian fan anyway but this one was overlong with an unconvincing male hero and an irritating female one. I really only kept reading for Fred Vincy and Mary Garth- loved the whole Garth family and the Farebrothers.

65 What the Wild Seas Can Be (Audio) Helen Scales
A shortlisted book for the WP for Non-fiction. I really enjoyed this. I’m not generally into nature type books or tv shows but I do find sea life fascinating after being whale watching a few times. This looked at different species and the impact of humans on them and their environment. I liked the directness with which Scales addressed our fault in what’s happened but also the positive action of what we can do next. I enjoyed this so much that it’s even convinced me to try Raising Hare

66The Secret Room- Jane Casey
The latest Maeve Kerrigan, on which our heroine investigates a locked room mystery when a wealthy interior designer is found dead in a hotel room. Meanwhile Derwent has trouble of his own to deal with. Bold for me- loved every minute.

The Plague and I by Betty Macdonald - I think it was Bookish that made me reserve this, along with a lovely review on here by PermanentTemporary for whom this book is an old friend. This is a memoir of Macdonald’s stay (as an adult who had 2 young children) in a Seattle tb sanitorium in the 1930s - but done with such humour and style that it’s an absolute joy to read. Fascinating, and horrifying - many patients stayed for years, kept in icy rooms with windows open, punctuated by horrible treatments, the purpose being at least as much to keep infectious patients away from other people as to cure them - there was no communication to patients about their condition so even eventual release came as a surprise. Getting out of bed even for a daily toilet visit is a privilege won only after at least several weeks’ good behaviour. Makes you newly grateful for antibiotics and immunisations.

74 No Way Out - Tim Shipman

The third in Shipman’s series of books about the Brexit referendum, the build up and consequences. This one is subtitled “from the backstop to Boris” and covers Theresa May’s tenure. The author is a senior political journalist for the Sunday Times. I enjoyed the first two books (All Out War and Fall Out) and this was very good too (long, though - 700 pages!) Covers the ins and outs of the negotiations with the EU, the MPs, the Cabinet… and how bloody difficult it all was…

I love the sound of this! And it’s on Audible, so just added to my TBR :)

The Plague and I is a marvellous book - one of my all-time favourite comfort-reads, I think, despite the unpromising setting. Goodness knows how Betty MacDonald managed it but she balanced the hilarity and the sadness so beautifully. Definitely due a re-read!

The House of Mitford - Jonathan and Catherine Guinness

This is an interesting read for Mitford fans. It’s written by Diana’s son (from her first marriage) and granddaughter. It’s therefore good for giving some personal insights (such as Jonathan recalling visiting his mother in prison during the war, and little anecdotes like nicknaming his Aunt Nancy’s fire). However, I would have liked more of that sort of thing. The book was originally written in 1984 when four of the sisters were still alive, so I suspect the authors shied away from too much personal stuff. The version I read was updated in 2004, when only Debo was still alive, but I don’t think they had changed much of the text.

The downside of this book is its inevitable bias towards Diana - while it does give the factual information about what happened to her, and does call out a few things she said, it doesn’t put forward much condemnation of her views.

It’s also not a great book to start with if you don’t know anything about the Mitfords as it does assume a certain level of knowledge about some of the key events. I am very glad I read it though to give a different perspective on the family.

I also discovered while idly googling that Jonathan Guinness is still alive - he’s 95. He obviously inherited his mother’s longevity (she was 93 when she died).

@CornishLizard and @Terpsichore - it looks as though The Plage and I is out of print (and I don't do audiobooks, or at least not yet). Did you get second hand copies, or am I missing a reprint? Thank you!

I borrowed a library copy @noodlezoodle - it’s an ancient speckled and battle scarred period piece in its own right!

I’ve had an ancient Penguin copy for years @noodlezoodle - they are around secondhand so you should be able to pick one up, but unless you get lucky with a charity shop find I don’t think any are super-cheap, having had a quick scan of the usual places…

I blame this thread for making me go and see "Pride & Prejudice - Sort of" last week -very, very good! Disturbingly quite liked cross-dressing Darcy.

Also read Bookish, slightly sad bit around parental death if that's an issue for anyone but otherwise a good read and lead me to ignoring Real Life for a day while I consumed it. Will need to reread Bookworm now.

Blame and thank are close cousins, @TabbyM :)

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie I am part way through The Second Sleep by Robert Harris and enjoying it, though the protagonist is, nominally at least, a member of the clergy - so that might rule it out for you!

I’m done with clergymen. Done, I tell you.

I’m seeing P&P Sort of again next weekend. Really looking forward to it.

I went to see the National Theatre Live production of The Importance of Being Ernest last night. I've never read the book/ play, but my was it good. And Ncuti Gatwa in stockings? Oh my!
ThenI fell down a wormhole of looking at classic plays on 2nd hand book sites. But I couldn't decide which cover style I should buy. So I didn't. Which my wallet was grateful for

I did it for A Level @BlueFairyBugsBooks it put me off! It was so hard to write about for essays. I did get an A though (polishes halo)😇

48 Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary – Anita Anand. I first came across Princess Sophia Duleep Singh via the Empire Podcast, which is co-hosted with Anand. Sophia is an extraordinary woman, daughter of the Maharaja Duleep Singh, the last Sikh Maharaja of the Punjab and former owner of the kohi noor diamond. She was god daughter to Queen Victoria. This was a fascinating read about Sophia and her family. Recommended.

Thanks Cornish and Terpshichore. My library only has 'in library use' copies which must mean they are on the fragile side. I was going to go for second hand but then stumbled across this 2016 reprint, so I'm going for that.

I just had to DNF Raw Content by Naomi Booth as it was way too triggering re mental health and early motherhood.