50 Books Challenge 2025 Part Six

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the sixth thread of the 50 Books 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, the fourth thread here and the fifth thread here

Nice haul, @StrangewaysHereWeCome

I love Some Tame Gazelle, @Arran2024 . Re the missionary, to me the laughter is aimed at him, not "the natives". Post-WWI I'd say - I think Edith's interest in sanitation dates from post-war work with refugees.

I went for it too. Hopefully heavy on the music rather than “look at me I’m the nicest man in rock” 🙄

I thought earlier than WW1 because at one point a character asks the others to guess who Agatha bumped into in Karlsbad and the suggestion is Edward V11, who died in 1910. I also thought the vibe was of an old fashioned time, a sort of Garden of Eden.

Ah, I hadn't registered that point @Arran2024 . From memory, she started writing it in the 1930s and then she revised it for publication in 1950, so that may explain a certain dislocation in terms of time.

78. Cockroaches by Jo Nesbo

Second in the series and the second story where Harry Hole has been investigating a murder in another country, this time the Norwegian Ambassador in Thailand, which I think is an odd choice. It was ok, but felt kinda dated and I guessed the perpetrator fairly early on. I think I might give one more book in the series a go and if there’s no improvement I’ll jettison the rest.

@MamaNewtNewt I DNF’d The Bat and I’m quite a rare DNFer. I just didn’t like Harry enough to spend a whole book with him, let alone a series 😀

@SheilaFentiman I kinda feel the same way. Harry doesn’t seem to have many redeeming traits.

Just Kids by Patti Smith is in the daily deals today. If you haven’t read it I definitely recommend it. It’s one of my all time favourite books and is just a beautiful ode to art, poetry, music, New York, and Robert Mapplethorpe.

I gave up on Harry Hole. I read quite a few and liked them well enough but in the end it all got a bit…wearisome.

Second this recommendation it’s a brilliant book and I read it knowing absolutely nothing about either of them at the time!

My pace of reading is currently glacial and I'm behind on reviews as well.

24. Nightshade, by Michael Connelly. This is a new series, set on Catalina Island, featuring Sheriff's Detective Stilwell. To no one's surprise, Stilwell is a principled detective who doesn't play by the rules. This is well plotted (murder, poaching, small town corruption) but there is no real characterisation - you could replace all mentions of Stilwell with Bosch and the book would still work perfectly well. I love Bosch so this didn't bother me a bit, this is Connelly doing what Connelly does best. There's quite a bit of griping on goodreads asking if Connelly really wrote this as the characters lack the depth he normally achieves, which I thought was very funny because I don't ever think of his characters as being very deeply developed, they are just familiar. I fully expect this to be made into a TV series along with Bosch, Ballard and the Lincoln Lawyer.

25. You Are Here, by David Nicholls. I've liked but not loved previous David Nicholls books, but this one was right up my street. Two strangers, their mutual friend, and a few other folks join a cross-country walk. As the others leave for home, Michael and Marnie continue their walk and grow closer. This was very enjoyable, with very well-drawn characters and believable dialogue. Not quite a bold but not far off it.

26. I Hope This Finds You Well. When Jolene is accidentally given admin access to all of her colleagues' emails and messages, she uses what she finds out to try and save her job from restructuring. In the process she deals with her social anxiety and gets to know her colleagues better. I liked this quite a bit, but I think it suffered from being read on a very hot hospital ward, which would have challenged even the most propulsive book. I was also annoyed by the slightly clunky breadcrumbing of 'what happened with my friend Ellie', which made sense but was so drawn out. Overall, a fun way to spend a few hours.

49 Zero Days - Ruth Ware Jack (short for Jacinta) and her husband Gabe are penetration testers who hack/break into clients’ online systems and physical premises to identify weak spots. One night Jack gets home from a pen test to find Gabe murdered in front of his computer, and ends up on the run trying to find his killer while the police hunt her down as the prime suspect.

Ruth Ware is an odd author - I’ve loved some of her books, while others have been extremely average, and they range across all sorts of different genres. This one was a thriller by numbers, and even I was able to work out whodunnit very early on - it was fine to pass a bit of time but absolutely nothing to make it stand out from all the other meh thrillers out there.

Hey @noodlezoodle hope you’ve recovered from your hospital stay

@Piggywaspushed – which Sara Sheridan book is it?

80 City of Destruction – Vaseem Khan Malabar House 5. Thank you to @ÚlldemoShúl for highlighting that I wasn’t up to date with Persis. Bombay 1950. Persis shoots dead a young man who tries to assassinate the Defence Minister. As he dies in her arms, he says ‘City of Destruction’. On the same day, a burnt body is found in the suburbs. Persis is given the burnt body to investigate, is not happy and wants to investigate the potential assassination. I enjoyed this book, but Persis is still irritating me by taking unnecessary risks. Also, not enough Seema, her mentee from Book 3, far more interesting, but only relegated to a few lines in this book.

81 Before Your Memory Fades - Toshikazu Kawaguchi trans Geoffrey Trousselot RWYO. Book 3 of the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. This book sees the café relocated to Hakodate. I have no idea why. DD bought me the first book for my birthday in 2024 (I think) and I asked for the other 3 books for Christmas. My plan is to finish the series this week. Its starting to get a bit samey.

The Secrets of Blythswood Square.

Sorry @EineReiseDurchDieZeit that was unintentionally misleading! My dad was in hospital and my sister and I were with him as much as allowed. He’s on the mend now.

@Tarragon123 👋at a fellow blue. I was going to say I hope you enjoyed the match in the new stadium, but .... Let's hope Monday goes better.
#13 Appointment With Yesterday Celia Fremlin
A dark little gem. I've enjoyed the previous Fremlin's i've read, but they do swerve into melodrama (that im not necessarily adverse to), but this was more subtle and claustrophobic. 'Milly' is running away from London under and starts a new life in small seaside town. She takes up residence in a rundown boarding house.To say much more would spoil it. I felt the blurb on my copy gave away too much.
There is a lot to enjoy here. A plot that holds your attention and well drawn domestic detail. She is great at strained relationships between men and women and employers and 'the help'. Parts are genuinely sinster. I could feel the cold & smell the damp. Bravely, the characters are all pretty unlikeable. This didn't spoil it for me - it isn't that kind of book. In thrillers/noir, I think the ending is the hardest part and the commonest let down. I thought this one was great. A possible bold.

@Tarragon123 theres another scheduled to be released in January I think.

I’ve finished another of the Booker longlist.
122 Audition by Katie Kitamoura
This starts with a middle aged woman, successful in her career having lunch with a young man. A story emerges which changes completely to a different story later in the book. It looks at perception and relationships and choices. This wasn’t for me but it is ‘bookery’ so I can see how it made the longlist and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it on the shortlist even though it’s one of the lower scores of the 5 I’ve read so far for me.

'under a false name' - can't edit on phone. Or type generally. Sorry.

Yeah @ÚlldemoShúl Part I was doing something really interesting and it just inexplicably squanders it.

@noodlezoodle glad he’s ok now!

I really like Celia Fremlin @Owlbookend . I think The Hours Before Dawn is her best.

<makes a note of Celia Fremlin>

Yes - The Hours Before Dawn is great. I had a baby that didn't sleep & she captured what it feels like really well.

42 The Rule Of The Land by Garrett Carr
I enjoyed The Boy From The Sea so much I bought this earlier non fiction work and it did not disappoint. Carr undertook a walk along the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland, with a hand drawn map for each section. Some of it he travelled by canoe with an experienced friend, Paddy. Books about walking vary immensely, so I’m pleased to report this is no Salt Path, or Boring Man Makes The Lake District Sound Boring, Every Last Inch Of It.
He covers a lot of history as well as a lot of ground and I made notes on post-its as I went along, to research further into places I was especially interested in. He’s not patronising to the people he meets, nor does he give extra weight to any particular time in history. I bought a physical copy for the photographs, but they aren’t very impressive in a b/w paperback, so the Kindle version would be ok if anyone prefers that, but I’ll be able to lend it to various friends who like walking, so that’s good.