50 Books Challenge 2025 Part Eight

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the eighth 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 , the fifth thread here , the sixth thread here and the seventh thread here

I love your copy of Patricia Brent, @cassandre, and I especially like the line in the blurb that the story is a comedy concerned with the complications that ensue from Patricia's thoughtless act. Delete Patricia, insert any relevant name - from Elizabeth Bennett onwards - and you have the formula of pretty much every romantic novel in a nutshell 😆

My latest is a bit more, erm, gruesome….but gripping nonetheless.

96. Frozen in Time - Owen Beattie & John Geiger

When Sir John Franklin's 1845 expedition to find the Northwest Passage failed to return, national breastbeating and shock ensued. Many search parties were formed and dispatched and by the 1850s it had become clear that the entire crew of Erebus and Terror had met a grim end in the wastes of the Arctic. The remains discovered included three complete burials of the first men to die, probably in very early 1846 (the final survivors struggled on for another two years).
Then, in the 1980s, forensic anthropologist Dr Owen Beattie was among a group that set out to determine the causes of the disaster, and was allowed to examine the three graves. The bodies were exhumed and this book gives the account of what happened. It’s very definitely not for the faint-hearted, as the colour photos of the bodies are stark - but the permafrost kept them largely preserved, right down to clothes, hair, and in one case, hands and feet that could have sprung to life, so eerily perfect did they look.
After extensive sampling and testing, the bodies were respectfully reburied and Beattie's conclusions were that the reliance on tinned food - then an innovative technology, but unfortunately probably badly done by a time-pressured contractor - had slowly poisoned the crew with the lead contained in the solder used to seal the cans. Since the book was published there have been revisions to this idea, and I think it’s now believed lead poisoning wasn’t a major factor - but there’s still no real consensus as to what really happened to cause so many deaths (well, other than extreme temperatures, food gradually running out, treks in sub-zero temps in grim conditions…..duh). But anyway. A completely fascinating read if this is your sort of thing.
(paging @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie - you must have read this?!)

@GrannieMainland I agree re: woman locked in bedroom. She seemed a little adrift when all the others were so rooted. I personally enjoyed mediaeval knight and the slight ambiguity of his ending, told from a bit of a sideways look and a fragmentary report.

Thanks all for the suggestions of further Hall titles too.

I've also bought In Love With Love for a friend so I'm glad to hear it's readable.

And a semi-seasonal read:

84. Snowdrift and Other Stories - Georgette Heyer

This was a RWYO and I have been dipping in and out of this on my Kindle when I didn't have my physical copy of The Forsyte Saga with me. I don't generally find short stories very satisfying as they are over too soon/lack depth and detail. However, this worked well for me even if there were too many elopements! Escapist fun and it probably helped I didn't read them all back to back.

Murder on the Links, Agatha Christie (audio read by Captain Hastings)

I am very slowly working my way through Poirot and Marple on audio, who seem to have good readers. This takes place in France when a man contacts Poirot and asks him to visit as he is afraid he will be murdered. Sleuthing ensues, when the man dies before Poirot arrives. This was very twisty and turny (for want of actual expressions) and I liked it. Apparently I have it 4 stars when I read it in 2013, but just a solid 3 star romp.

Have added Helm to my library list. The Frozen in Time book sounds very interesting too - not in my library but I'll keep an eye out.

149. 61 Hours, Lee Child
A rather seasonal outing for Reacher; not that we see him under the Christmas tree with eggnog, but it's a snowy winter in South Dakota, and Reacher finds himself helping the local police department to protect a witness under threat from an international gang. The usual macho fun.

150. Other People's Fun, Harriet Lane
A woman attends an event at her old school and strikes up a friendship of sorts with an old classmate, whose life is not quite the glorious success she portrays on social media. I picked it up thinking it would be a fairly standard psychological thriller with added commentary on social media, but it was better than this. It reminded me unexpectedly of Barbara Pym's No Fond Return of Love, which features a heroine who was born to stalk people on social media but alas, was born decades too early. The book looks at the gap between the life you're supposed to lead, to impress others, and what life is actually like. The main characters are women who're no longer occupied with marriage and child-rearing and wondering what next. I found it really engaging.

151. Venetia, Georgette Heyer
More Regency romance. A young woman falls for a rake and it's all good fun, but as often with Heyer, it's the dialogue between siblings and parents that adds a lot of the fun, with some awful in-laws in the mix. Not one of her best, but still enjoyable.

And currently on:
152. Worth Dying For, Lee Child
Follows immediately on from 61 Hours, and the action has moved to rural Nebraska. I'm enjoying the portrayals of small town America in this series. This book features a local family which has been dominating the area for a long time and is up to something shady. There are competing groups of bad guys adding to the fun.

It was me - not really a rec as I bought it in the deals and haven't read it yet, but it sounded very Remus-y to me

The Warrior Priest was my favourite in Helm, particularly his views on the indulgent monks he stays with at Shap Abbey. Agree the Lady shut in her quarters seemed weak, but I took her circumstances as emblematic of the age when a field of standing stones was seen as a wasted field, and of the clash between a stark, unforgiving false Christianity and the older, softer ways where it and paganism coexisted peacefully.
It took me an embarrassing amount of time to realise that it was Long Meg being quarried from the Eden 🤦‍♀️.
I should stop now, because a) spoilers and b) I might reach Cuddy levels of book evangelism and sorely wear the patience of my fellow 50 Bookers

231 No Friend to this House - Natalie Haynes

Retelling of the Jason/Argonauts/Medea story. Good, but a lot of characters/short chapters so more confusing than her other books.

Insufficient peril for true Remus-level, but I really enjoyed it. Looking forward to your review.

@Terpsichore i think I’ve read most of what exists on the Franklin expedition. The maritime museum in London also had an excellent exhibition a few years ago, with replica 3d displays of the bodies and various hypotheses about what may have happened. There’s another good book iirc called, ‘The Man who Ate his Boots’.

At my current rate of reading this will arrive in 2028...

I've been on this thread for 8 years now and my sweet-spot number of books for the year seems to be 44 (3 out of the 8 years!). I did hit 50 one year but am 100% here for the book chat and not the numbers.

That said, have just surpassed myself and finished number 45 (with 10 days left, I might even finish another 😮)

45 - Becoming you - Suzy Welsh
My bestie recently attended this training course in NYC which aims to help you figure out what your authentic life and career might look like. At 50, I wonder whether I am too old for this now :( but it proved to be an interesting listen, read by the enthusiastic but far from irritating (!) author herself.

Thanks to whoever reviewed Small things like these recently as it has been on my TBR for a while and I had no idea the story took place in the days leading up to Christmas - sounds perfect for my next read.

This is my 13th year on this thread and every year I've ended up between 50 and 57 books. The thread definitely helps me to hit 50 - I like to have a target!

I lost track of my books mid summer so haven't been listing them .
Will try harder next year !

65 Gnomon - Nick Harkaway WTF have I just read?! A bold. Hard to know how to describe this - it’s a huge, pretentiously literary, monster of a book that took me ages to read because I had to properly concentrate and needed to look up the meaning of more words than in all the other books I’ve read this year put together. It definitely won’t be for everyone, but recommended for anyone who is ok with dense text, layers of meaning and confusion - though I’m sure plenty of people who read more of this sort of thing than me will find it derivative, silly, or too obvious 😄

As a brief summary of the plot: in a future version of London governed by the people as a direct democracy via The System, a woman who has been living off-grid dies during an interrogation. Detective Inspector Neith is assigned to investigate her death, and ends up uncovering far more than she anticipated. That’s the anodyne version and completely unrepresentative of the overall story, but saying more would be spoilery…just read it (or don’t, it really won’t be everyone’s cup of tea).

Thanks to whoever reviewed Small things like these recently as it has been on my TBR for a while and I had no idea the story took place in the days leading up to Christmas - sounds perfect for my next read

@nowanearlyNicemum I'd also recommend the film if you get the chance to see it - but probably read the book first.

And I’ve finished for 2025. I know I’m previous but I’ve really struggled with my last 5 reads and need a good break, so I finished with :

130 . Sunrise On The Reaping by Suzanne Collins

The fifth Hunger Games novel and 2nd prequel finds us going over Haymitch Abernathy’s games in the Quarter Quell. A lot of people have called this ‘a return to form’ but I found it quite repetitive. The ending is particularly dark for a YA novel also. Didn’t rate it but haven’t rated anything in ages so I suspect it’s me.

I have just read 12 Ways To Kill Your Family At Christmas by Natasha Bache. Good points. Many many deaths. Locked room. Silly.

Bad points.

It is utter codswallop and OMG the Americanisms!

I have checked. Bache is British. She has a degree in English from Keel and a Master's in Creative Writing form Warwick. She has THREE editors so how HOW did all of these get through?

Repeated use of gotten
damn as an adjective
Goddamn as an adjective
fire trucks
to hell in a handbasket
foyer for hallway
Eggnog
wrench for spanner
dumpster
repeated assholes
butt for bum
repeated 'not a dime'
likely for 'in all likelihood'

Yes - I made a list...

Add to this a 'heals' for heels , a Welsh landowning family inexplicably called Weiss, a police officer called Lakeith Rudolf and a hunky DH who repeated says Oh my Christ like he's Pam from Gavin and Stacey and who apparently are filthy rich because they own a goldmine?? I mean What??? She normally writes fantasy erotica, apparently : is this very American? I do find when marking kids' writing these days I have to keep picking them up on gotten and likely. But this is a published writer!

Poppycock!!

Only one Amazon reviewer picks up on this so I must be very picky.

The Land In Winter by Andrew Miller
I quite liked this, wanted to read to the end, but I didn’t love it. The female characters were better written than the male ones (unusual for a male writer) but all were somehow self-consciously Deep and Meaningful. I had the paperback but I wouldn’t be surprised if the ebook has a flashing pop-up for Laboured WW2 Reference, or Past Catches Up With Former Prostitute or Look, Everyone Is Smoking Because This Is The Olden Days.
Eric needed a hard smack and I hope there’s a sequel where his further adventures see him losing extremities to frostbite. Irene needs to stop being so saintly and get together with Gabby. Bill should change his name back to the family name and stop being such a snob about where the family money comes from. I think that covers it. I will try and choose a book that doesn’t take itself so seriously next.

@MaterMoribund you could always start a Helm spoilers discussion thread! I have lots of thoughts about it too!

232 Immaculate Conception - Ling Ling Huang

Much reviewed on here. I echo that this is a wonderful book.

191 War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
I’ve been reading this a chapter a day with my book group and went ahead and finished the second epilogue today so I have a gap before starting the Les Miserables readalong. I’m sure everyone knows the premise- it tells the story of interconnected young people and their families in Russia before during and after the 1812 war. I loved the parts about the people, I was less interested in the war bits as they were often polemics or histories rather than our characters experiences at war. As we got closer to the end I struggled as it was mostly war. I’m glad I’ve read it but am pretty sure I’ll never read it again!

192 The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan
I spent a couple of years living in Tasmania so have always wanted to get around to the books of Richard Flanagan but wow this was a hard read. It took me a while to get into- the structure makes it challenging to get into and the main character Dorrigo Evans is a bit flat but once I got into it, I couldn’t put it down. It tells the stories of the Australian POWs working on the Burmese railroad and the Japanese and Korean guards who ran the camp. Horrifying and tragic. The story of ‘Darky’ Gardiner will stay with me forever I think. I’m not sure if this is a bold or not yet- I think I need some time to sit with it. I’m not sure if I can bring myself to watch the series- has anyone else watched it?

69 Dombey and Son - Charles Dickens
Proud and obstinate Mr Dombey causes almost a thousand pages of grief and suffering, most especially to his neglected daughter Florence. A darker and more serious outing from Dickens.

Yay!

I watched three episodes and gave up. Muttery , poor lighting, disjointed and I felt completely unable to feel any attachment to any character or stories. DH had no clue who any of the soldiers were as individuals. Really disappointing.