50 Books Challenge 2026 Part Four

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fourth thread of the 50 Books Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2026, 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 and maybe authors as well of books you've read or going to read as this makes it much easier to keep track of books or authors that may appeal (or not appeal) to everyone else.

Some of us bring over our updated lists to the new thread. Again, this is up to you.

The first thread of the year is here the second thread here and the third thread here

I really loved both The Children's Book and Possession. I do agree they're not ones you can zip through though!

Sorry about your dog Arran. So hard.

All the Colours of the Dark by Chris Whitaker - I took a dislike to this, shouldn’t have persevered but it was a book group choice and came recommended. The author is marketed as being a Londoner on the UK edition but it is set in America and very much playing to an American audience. Teenager Patch is kidnapped, held in the dark, until one day a hand takes his, and he has company in his ordeal. When Patch escapes, there’s no evidence anyone actually was with him, but he, and his devoted friend Saint, will never stop looking.

I couldn’t suspend disbelief, didn’t like the kids-outdoing-professionals plotting, which always feels a bit Enid Blyton to me. I also don’t like my crime reading to focus on the aftermath. There is so much misery. I read the author’s We Begin at the End a few years ago and found some of the characters and plot developments too similar. All that said, after a lot of skimming through the middle, it did keep me up late reading the end. Wish I’d stuck with my initial feeling and given it a miss though.

17) Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. This has been widely reviewed here so I won't say much about the plot save that it's a modern retelling of David Copperfield set in the Appalachian mountains.

I've never read David Copperfield so went in blind, but I enjoyed this one. Not a bold for me as I felt it was over long, and the middle section dragged. It was around this time that I started finding Demon's voice quite irritating, although it got better towards the end. Perhaps I just needed to plough through the annoying teenage years. All I know is that I was more interested in Angus, Maggot & June during this period.

Oh, and I have an irrational dislike of the book's cover (Demon leaning out of a schoolbus window), but that's just me being petty!

congratulations @GrannieMainland !

ulldemo – anoyingly, I cant tag you! I haven’t read Persuasion. Or Mansfield Park.

@Arran2024 – I’m so sorry. I'm sitting with my ancient old boy beside me and I dont know how I'll cope when the time comes.

@Iamnotaloggrip – it was me who mentioned the book weekends. You can actually go for a week as well, but that’s a bit expensive.

56 The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Bronte. Fine

57 Demon Copperhead – Barbara Kingsolver RWYO. Goodness, this was good. Hard going, but good. I must be the last 50 booker to read this. The physical book has been languishing on my shelf for ages. I’m back on Audible, so I decided to jump start my reading. This was really helpful. It’s a fairly chunky at 546 pages, so its taken my a while to get through it. Do I need to review it? I’m sure everyone knows that it’s a rewrite off David Copperfield. I decided to read David C first and I’m glad I did.

The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall - Fine

oooof damning with faint praise

North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell

The Hale family move from an idyllic village in the south of England to an industrial town in the north of England.

Cue a will they, won't they love affair between Margaret Hale and mill owner John Thornton. Throw in a bit of social justice discussion, several deaths, and some incongruous passages relating to workers and the class divide (including a peculiar passage about Thornton learning about providing meals for the workers) and you have a bit of Pride and Prejudice, a lot of Dickens (he was the editor at the time of serialisation) and an interminable read.

I didn't like this that much.

22 Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico
A couple move to Berlin to live the perfect millennial photographable lifestyle but gradually are dissatisfied.

I loved this. It was quite a scathing satire of the Instagram lifestyle and the emptyiness in it. Very short and readable.

The TV series is much better @CrochetGrannySquare Richard Armitage as Thornton! It’s probably scandalous saying that but out of my final year reading list in uni it was the biggest chore

I've not seen North and South on the telly and I'm sure that Richard Armitage could make even a paper bag seem endlessly fascinating so thank you for the recommendation @EineReiseDurchDieZeit

I’m SheilaFentiman and I haven’t read Demon Copperhead (though I do own it)

I have read it! I am piggy and I disliked it.

@CrochetGrannySquare& @EineReiseDurchDieZeit- I watched the TV series of North and South first then read the book (which I enjoyed so that was probably the right way around). I really liked the series - I also liked the earlier series of Wives & Daughters. I probably should reread both once I’ve finishrd rereading Jane Austen. I’ve always liked Elizabeth Gaskell partly because of how she deals with social issues but also because her characterisation of her main women characters is much more interesting than her male contemporaries (A Tale of 2 Cities being a topical example - Dickens is great at describing Mme Defarge, less so the angelic Lucie).

I’m Eine and I prefer David Copperfield and The Poisonwood Bible

I preferred A Place Of Greater Safety to A Tale Of Two Cities

Thanks for all the contributions to my non fiction thread!

I’m Úll and I thought Demon Copperhead was good but overrated and that Barbara Kingsolver can be a bit preachy.
I really didn’t like North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell- I much preferred the 1980s John Jakes North and South about George and Orry in the US Civil War (with a miniseries starring the late lamented Patrick Swayze)

I'm Stowick and I love Barbara K and think she should be president. But I don't like Dickens and only made it about a quarter of the way through David C before giving up.

I think you need to be in the right mood for AS Byatt @AliasGrape. She doesn't wear her learning lightly.

Patrick Swayze was excellent in Donnie Darko, but wasn’t he, tremendously off topic, a massive wife beater? Or did I get that wrong?

aha! Google says other way around!

Were they not famously married for years and years? I have not heard this rumour.

34 years! There’s plenty of Google hits to back it up. I remember her crying on Oprah but not the context

I also own Demon Copperhead and haven't read it. Maybe a summer project

Incidents In The Home by Josh Malerman
Bela and her parents are haunted by Other Mommy, followed to whichever house they flee. I liked the creepy descriptions of Other Mommy; as in, when I got up for the loo in the night I scared myself
The rest was utter tosh. It starts with an explanation of how to read the text, because there aren’t any speech marks and speech is slightly offset. Thanks but I can read stuff mate, been doing it for years
Plot wonky, there’s a death that everyone, including the police, ignores, a stupid ending. Avoid, unless you speed read for jump scares.

I can’t believe the Patrick Swayze rumour? Someone say it’s not true!!

There is a tiny piece of my heart that will always belong to Patrick Swayze. Very relieved to see it’s not true that he was a bad man.

I think I have Demon Copperhead, but haven’t read it yet - I picked up a Barbara Kingsolver in the chazzer last week, purely because I recognised the name from here. I think it was that one.

I just bought The Pretender too. RWYO going great, as always.

I DNFed Demon Copperhead very quickly last year. But I was in a different headspace then. I might try it again at some point.

I thought Demon Copperhead was good.
I suspect I'd like David Copperfield more, however, as I love reading Dickens.