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've read 10/20 of the second bunch, 3 of them at least twice (Rebecca, Nervous Conditions, Half of a Yellow Sun) - lots of black writers here, mostly women - I was going to say more recent but most were quite a long time ago, though 4 of these writers are still alive - 2 African (Zimbabwe and Nigeria), one US and one Britain

80 Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
79 Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin *
77 The Rainbow by DH Lawrence
75 The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison *
74 Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga *
71 Kindred by Octavia E Butler *
70 Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
65 The Color Purple by Alice Walker *
63 White Teeth by Zadie Smith
62 Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie *

I've read 5 of this lot - Rebecca, Dracula, The Rainbow, White Teeth and Half of a Yellow Sun. I liked all of these, my favourite is Half of a Yellow Sun which I absolutely loved.

I've read the following of the list so far. There's some authors who are clearly going to make a reappearance because their biggest hit hasn't been mentioned yet. But as always very much dead white men, and I suspect that will become even more so as this list climbs, since usually the books lower down are the more interesting ones. By the time we get to the top 20 it'll be the likes of Ullysses, Mrs Dalloway, Middlemarch, Tristram Shandy, War and Peace, Vanity Fair, Emma, Don Quixote, À la Recherche du Temps Perdu, The Great Gatsby :
• 99 The Go-Between
• 97 Catch-22
• 85 The Vegetarian
• 82 The End of the Affair
• 80 Rebecca
• 77 The Rainbow
• 76 Dracula
• 74 Nervous Conditions
• 70 Jude the Obscure
• 65 The Color Purple
• 63 White Teeth
• 62 Half of a Yellow Sun

Oh I loved White Teeth when I read it but can't recall a single thing about the plot! I am reasonably sure it was the first book I read by a black author and I would have been 19 or 20, so also part of the bridge to my own reading and away from the kid stuff/my mum's taste.

I have also DNF Catch 22 twice, seems I am in good company with this and not likely to bother trying it again.

@elkiedee and Zadie Smith as mixed race.

I hadn't heard of Nervous Condition, it sounds good.

It is, I read Nervous Conditions a few years ago and loved it, it's a book that should be read in schools because it's far more relevant to recent British colonialism than reading American novels about slavery. It's the first of a trilogy, the third was shortlisted for the Booker a few years ago.

I didn't particularly like White Teeth, it was too Dickensian for me but I've enjoyed her other novels.

Of the ones I've read on the list the ones I unreservedly loved were The Go-Between (which I read at 18 because I recognised the first line when I looking through books in the 6th form library, should probably read it again to see if it stands up), Dracula, Nervous Conditions, The Color Purple and Half of a Yellow Sun (which should be much higher on this list).

@LadybirdDaphne I also loved The Rainbow at that age. I haven't read it again; I suspect I wouldn't love it now!

My MN username is actually a D H Lawrence reference, from one of his novellas - so I’ve never entirely grown out of it (although I expect l’d bring a more critical eye to it all now).

Ooooh we do love a list, don't we?!

From the second section I've read more than the first:
The bluest eye - my first Toni Morrison - I much preferred Beloved.
The color purple - GCSE English - loved it at the time
White teeth - remember enjoying it at the time, but can't actually remember much about it
Half of a yellow sun - loved

As I confessed a few pages back I'm still only half-way through Our mutual friend
And I have both A house for Mr Biswas + Nervous conditions waiting on my kindle.

I should mention that I thought the books asterisked in this post were excellent.

I'm glad @FruAashild has said more about Nervous Conditions - It was published by the Women's Press here in 1988/89 - I was reviewing books for the student union newspaper and the Women's Press sent me what I asked for from their catalogue and this was one. The Women's Press published Alice Walker's work at that time and brought a lot of black and ethnic minority women to a wider audience. I'm not sure whether this was a first edition anywhere - or whether it was published in Zimbabwe first - but I think it might have been.

It's the story of a black girl growing up in what was still Rhodesia under white rule, I think up to and after it became Zimbabwe, struggling to get a good education in the face of a lot of discrimination. I have reread it and I've read the sequel twice - there is a third book published much more recently which was Booker shortlisted a few years ago which I still have TBR.

Interesting that day 1 was so dominated by white men, that there were so many black and mixed race women on day 2 - very contrasting lists.

I think I’ve only read Dracula out of the list so far - there are a few others which I feel like I know, but that’s probably just general knowledge or possibly films! Anyway, I never agree with these types of list -maybe we should all do our own top 100!

29 Thin Air - Ann Cleeves Another instalment of the Shetland series, this time set on the northernmost island in June, and I really liked the evocation of the light summer nights. Some friends who met at university come up for a wedding - one of them is from the island and the rest are English and visiting for the first time. There’s talk of the local folk tales, including a young girl who drowned in 1930 and whose ghost has apparently been seen since…then the ghost is seen, and one of the southern guests is found dead. What’s the connection, and is there really a ghost? Decent story, though as usual the ending was not entirely believable and involved a lot of exposition. I like this series, for all that it’s not great literature, and have reserved the next one on BorrowBox.

I've just added Nervous Conditions to my tbr.

Me too!

I enjoyed White Teeth, only read it fairly recently. I've also read The Road (loved but too depressing to read again), Catch-22 (admired rather than loved, wouldn't choose to re-read it), Rebecca (loved and have re-read), Crime and Punishment, The Color Purple and Half of a Yellow Sun (enjoyed, but preferred Americanah).

I've another couple to add to my list. How long it is now I have completely lost track though. Will have to work out how to look back at my posts and count up - a notebook to record them is an excellent idea and one I shall adopt when I've done that.

Paris Echo - Sebastian Faulks

Described by one reviewer as a 'love letter to Paris', that's exactly what it is. Hannah and Tariq are both in Paris for very different reasons; Hannah to research the occupation of Paris during WW2 for the chapter of a book, and Tariq to get away from his hometown in Morocco essentially for a bit of an adventure with a loose idea of seeing where his grandmother had lived as a child. They're thrown together in a slightly unbelievable way and this tells of their experiences. I was expecting more of the history of the periods they were exploring, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Not quite a bold though - I didn't feel we get to know Hannah properly, and what we learn of Tariq does not particularly endear us to him.

Three wishes - Lianne Moriarty

This tells the story of triplets Cat, Lyn and Gemma, who are close but all very different, and their lives in their early 30s. In typical Moriarty style they're all tall and gorgeous and it was a lovely bit of escapism and drama in the Australian sunshine. I do like her books.

There are ten translated novels and we've not had Tolstoy, Garcia Marquez or Prout yet. You wouldn't have got so many even 10 years ago.

There's a fourth book, @Bunnyofhope ? I so enjoyed the Children Of Time trilogy and it's very good news that there's another.

Did it stand up?

33. Our Bodies Their Battlefield by Christina Lamb

This is about rape and sexual abuse being used as a weapon in war, and this was a very very tough book to read.

Not because of the writing, which is excellent, but because of the subject matter. The accounts of the survivors are horrific and the global extent of this brutality, and the continuing lack of justice for the survivors, is both depressing and disturbing.

Well I thought that I’d read three today:

Mansfield Park (currently rereading & love - but I would agree with the introduction to my copy that it’s Jane Austen’s least likeable book)
Howard’s End (liked - especially as I read it after I’d enjoyed watching the film).
Vanity Fair (ok - probably need to reread).

Then, I realised that Metamorphorsis is actually Kafka’s Die Verwandlung, which sadly I have endured. It’s about an inadequate man who turns into a beetle (& seems rather symbolic of the vibe of the list).

It will be interesting to see which translated texts are included though - lots of appreciation for Thomas Mann.

Bit of a theme developing for me - I seem to have read 4 from every tranche of that list they keep releasing!

Only three:
Mansfield Park
Orlando
Vanity Fair

I do think it's overall a fairly decent list. It's reasonably varied. Not everybody will love everything, but you could consider yourself pretty well-read if you got through the lot.

Ah, I see part 3 is up! I have definitely read 11 of this list. I can't remember whether I've also read Howard's End, but I think probably not.

Never Let Me Go (ah, where's Cote when you need her?)
Disgrace
Mansfield Park
The Waves
Orlando (odd to have two Virginia Woolf novels next to each other. I assume we'll get To the Lighthouse and Mrs Dalloway later on)
My Brilliant Friend
Wide Sargasso Sea
Vanity Fair
Giovanni's Room
Housekeeping
Heart of Darkness

Lots of good ones here. I wrote about The Waves (and the excellent adaptation of it I just saw at the Jermyn St Theatre) upthread. As a book, I found it difficult but it has some fantastic moments of writing. Liked Orlando much more. Liked Wide Sargasso Sea and My Brilliant Friend (not sure if this is referring to the whole set of books or just the first one, but I liked the second better). I remember loving Vanity Fair and just liking Mansfield Park but it's probably due a re-read. I am on the pro NMLG side, although it's far from my favourite; remember very little about Housekeeping or Disgrace although I think I liked them both. Giovanni's Room and Heart of Darkness are both, in my view, masterpieces.

3 for me too.
NLMG
Mansfield Park
Howard’s End
I may have read Orlando. I know I had a Woolf phase as a student but can’t be certain. There are at least 3 DNFs including My Brilliant Friend.

31 Almost Life by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Previously recommended on this thread. Erica and Laure meet on the steps of the Sacre Coeur in 1970s Paris, setting off a lifetime of love that never comes at quite the right time. Erica shies away from committing to another woman; Laure is unconvinced that Erica is anything more than the "tourist" she is derisorily described as by Laure's friends. KMH creates great characters and Erica and Laure are among her best. They're flawed and messy and make lots of stupid mistakes. This is an enjoyably sprawling book, with beautifully done moments of intimacy, self-doubt and bad behaviour that never quite makes you hate the protagonists. Described in various blurbs as a cross between One Day and Normal People, I thought it was probably better than both.

Edited as I mis-spelled the author's name.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/ng-interactive/2026/may/12/the-100-best-novels-of-all-time?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other