50 Books Challenge 2026 Part Five

[Southeastdweller]

Welcome to the fifth 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, the third thread here and the fourth thread

Ooh, we might have found something we agree on. I've been listening to the radio adaptations, which have been rather cleverly brought at least 40 years into the future in the case of these first few books, for years. I started reading them when I was awaiting cataract surgery, as library ebooks on my phone were the most comfortable thing to read, and the humour didn't hurt either.

Nice to see you @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie with as pithy a review as always

I finished Of Cattle and Men by Ana Paula Maia and the book has one character in common with her International Booker shortlisted On Earth as it is Beneath. The setting of the books is different- this one is in a slaughterhouse, and it’s brutal and thought-provoking. I’ve preordered the third connected book.

Lovely to see you Remus but of course you are dreadfully wrong about the trippy mushroom-fest that Solace House morphed into

Thanks everyone, and glad to find something we agree on @elkiedee
Cheers, @EineReiseDurchDieZeit I’ll have a look.

29) Night Swimmers – Roisin Maguire

Much reviewed on here. On the eve of lockdown Grace is living alone in a remote coastal village in Northern Ireland. She saves Evan from drowning, a man who is in intense grief from the loss of his baby daughter. His son moves in as lockdown continues and the three are forced to confront their pasts, form bonds and look at the natural world through new eyes.

This started slowly for me but at some point the story just clicked and got more engrossing. I enjoyed the character of Grace as a strong, different female protagonist. However, without giving away spoilers, there was one event in the latter part of the book which jarred and could have been left out. Altogether the book was better than expected, but not a top read for this year.

I felt the same about Night Swimmers @RomanMum and I bet it was the same point in the plot that we found jarring.

The Hill In The Dark Grove by Liam Higginson
This was on my Wish List for a few months but I waited for it to be 99p as I had it down as a bit of folk horror fluff. It’s much better than that!
Carwyn and Rhian are Welsh sheep farmers, Carwyn’s family farm in the valleys shadowed by Yr Wyddfa. The story moves back and forth in time in a smooth, organic way, in the form of their memories; of meeting as children, family tensions, friends they grew up with. Interspersed with their story are snippets from much earlier times and we slowly come to realise that the titular mound that Carwyn becomes obsessed with excavating has had a huge influence on anyone who has ever lived in the area.
Flints, beads, strange devotional objects…..the mound gives up its treasures slowly and slyly. Something affects the livestock and the crops. There are subtle nods to Welsh nationalism and a paganism never successfully overwritten by Christianity.
it’s beautifully written - in other hands it might have become a series of jump scares and gross-outs - Higginson is very much a master of Show, not Tell. However, there are some deliriously horrific moments, such as Rhian’s memory of the night the Mari Lwyd visited her house as a child. It’s a tale sprinkled with unease and undefined menace, based on a solid foundation of folklore and history.
It’s an interesting contrast to Solace House in fact and I have to admit the handling of Messing With That Which Shouldn’t Be Messed With is in many ways superior.

47. Answer in the Negative - Henrietta Hamilton

50s crime caper featuring married amateur detective couple Johnny and Sally Heldar, booksellers by day and sleuths….well, seemingly most of the time, as they don’t appear to do much work in the bookshop they run. This is one of the reprints in the Mermaid Collection, a recent venture reissuing mid-century fiction, and I’d been stalking it for a while - it went down to 99p the other day so I pounced.

Sophie Hannah gives a rave review in the preface, but I suspect that’s because the plot is quite Hannah-like - Johnny and Sally are called in by an old friend working in a picture library/press cuttings agency about nasty practical jokes being played on a member of his staff. Soon, it escalates to murder and the few suspects come under the Heldars' scrutiny. Maybe it’s just me, but I found this simultaneously somewhat plodding and deeply confusing, with the minutiae of timelines and the layout of buildings (which I found hard to visualise) crucial to the unravelling.

Hamilton did write a few more Heldar novels, so I'm not averse to trying another - and I definitely did yearn to live in their little Regency house…in a quiet Bloomsbury backwater, where the light fell kindly on the little Adam mantelpiece, the flowered chintzes and the Persian rug, the old rosewood and mahogany pieces which they had inherited. Oh, and a convenient live-in Nanny to look after 'Peter and the twins'. All that would do nicely!

1. Blood’s Echo - Isabella Maldonado
2. Phoenix Burning - Isabella Maldonado
3. Death Blow - Isabella Maldonado

Workaday crime trilogy on Kindle Unlimited (note - as long as you don’t sync your kindle after your free subscription runs out, the books stay there)

Detective Veranda Cruz, based in Phoenix, is obsessed with tracking down the Villalobos Mexican crime family. Her mother is obsessed with getting her married now that she is in her 30s. Shoot outs, betrayals and kidnapped Latina teenagers ensue.

This is rather Tell, Not Show…”Detective Blah Blah did such-and-such, demonstrating his tactical prowess” was one corker. But if you want an easy read in the bath, these are fine.

#19. Never Mind
#20. Bad News
#21. Some Hope
#22. Mother’s Milk
#23. At Last
All by Edward St Aubyn

The above short semi autobiographical novels follow upper class Patrick Melrose through his abusive childhood into his drug addicted 20’s. (The second novel is just one long litany of drug taking and is a particularly difficult read)
The third book, Some Hope, finds him in his early 30’s, newly clean, trying to find his way in the world.
Mother’s Milk depicts Patrick as a father to two young boys, now struggling with alcohol addiction, and feeling his son’s have usurped his place in their mother’s affections.
The final book, At Last, takes place over the day of his mothers funeral where 45 year old Patrick finally comes to terms with the abuse and neglect he suffered at the hands of his parents and sees some hope for the future.

I can’t say I enjoyed these novels particularly, they were like A Dance To The Music Of Time crossed with Trainspotting, but I did enjoy some of the biting satire and was invested enough to keep reading to find out how Patrick’s story unfolded.

48. The Castaways by Lucy Clarke

Sisters Lori and Erin are on holiday in Fiji, but get separated in disastrous circumstances. Erin misses a flight to an island resort after an argument with Lori, and then the flight crashes on a remote deserted island.

It’s told from the viewpoints of both sisters, Lori in the past on the doomed flight and then trying to survive on the island, and Erin 2 years on in the present trying to discover what happened to her sister. Erin’s part of the story starts at about the time that the pilot of the missing flight appears in a Fijian hospital.

It’s ok. I didn’t find it particularly thrilling or unputdownable, and after the final reveal I did wonder about whether certain characters had thought through the practicalities of their long term plans, but it’s an ok easy read. Possibly not the best one to read just before flying off on holiday though!

1. Hush Kate Maxwell

I finished something 🍾Im not ignoring everyone's excellent book suggestions. This was a half finished audible version on borrowbox that interested me enough to finish before starting something new. Stevie who is engaged in a career in New York decides to come back to England and have a baby solo with donor sperm. Told through a mixture of the present day and flashbacks this explores Stevie's difficulties with early motherhood and her relationships with her parents and siblings. This is not a book without problems a secret from the past is so obvious you realise where it is going very early on and some things stretch credulity (Stevie and one of her sisters seem to have effortlessly got green cards, it seems entirely implausible for very mundane reasons that the secret could have been maintained for this long). Despite this I found it worth 'reading'. To me, the imperfect relationships amongst the family were quite touching and relatable. Little sections are very well written. The scenes when Stevie's aging mother visits her and her infant son moved me. Sometimes things hit a nerve.

Nice to see you poppibg in @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

@InTheCludgie – I really enjoyed Hex by Jenni Fagan.

@ClaraTheImpossibleGirl – I am contemplating Anne of Green Gables as I cant cope with anything too taxing at the moment.

@MaterMoribund – I’m a convert too, although from a Church of Scotland background, so completely different. We did get to choose a Saint, it’s a very important part of our journey and I choose St Margaret of Scotland. IIRC, there is a shrine to her at Durham?

Congratulations @SheilaFentiman on your 100!

Hello @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

I’ve been MIA thanks to an extended hospital stay. Was only meant to be in overnight after surgery and it turned into a 5 night stay. Having never been in hospital before (other than to have DD in 1993) this has been a culture shock for me. I’m still half off my face on medication, cant settle to anything really, other that Hercule Poirot and Mma Ramotswe. And possibly Anne of Green Gables.

Oh I’m sorry to hear that @Tarragon123 I hope everything turned out ok.

@Tarragon123 Sorry to hear about the health woes and hope you find some comfort in your reading.

Book 35 - Rosemary's Baby' by Ira Levin*. Even knowing the plot in every detail, as I do, it's still a chilling read. Also, aside from the horror plot, it's also interesting as a period piece, as there are lots of little details in it about New York life in the mid-1960s (when an out-of-work actor and his wife who doesn't work at all are apparently able to afford to rent a flat in Manhattan, pregnancy is celebrated by opening a bottle of wine, and the fortifying drink that Rosemary makes for herself to keep up her strength for the baby contains a raw egg and some sherry). There's a particular plot element that doesn't age well - something that would probably cause a woman today to leave her husband and possibly call the police is merely the subject of a minor disagreement - but it's a very cleverly written, claustrophobic and tense read.

Book 36 - The Dangerous Stranger by Simon Mason. The fifth and last existing book in the Ryan Wilkins/Ray Wilkins crime series, set in Oxford. I enjoyed a lot, and both Ryan and Ray have developed a lot as characters over the course of the series, which has addressed some of my criticisms of the first book. This one had quite a topical subject matter and it was handled in an interesting way. I think I would be happy to see the series end there, though; it feels to me as if the characters found a lot of resolution in this instalment.

Book 37, which I've just started, is Frenchman's Creek by Daphne Du Maurier. I love a bit of Daphne, and have no idea why I never got round to reading this one before, as I've read all her other novels I think. I'm only two chapters in and it's gripped me immediately. It has that ominous, atmospheric quality that Du Maurier is so brilliant at.

Book 38, which I've also just started, is My Work Is Not Yet Done by Thomas Ligotti. Ligotti writes very sly, thoughtful dark fiction that explores philosophy and psychology through horror, this time in relation to the daily grind of office work and corporate life.

That sounds quite frightening - I hope you feel much better soon, @Tarragon123

👋 @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie

@Tarragon123 Sorry you’ve had such a tough time and hope you feel better soon. I’d definitely recommend the Charles Paris series, if you want some fairly comforting, but not twee, crime.

Interesting @DesdamonasHandkerchief I have Mother's Milk somewhere in the TBR pile but have put it off until I had the other books. Do you think it would work as a stand alone? Not sure if I have the will for the whole series.

@Terpsichore Bloomsbury house sounds perfect!

Hope you get better soon @Tarragon123

Sorry to hear of your health issues @Tarragon123. There is indeed an altar to St Margaret in Durham Cathedral, with a portrait by Paula Rego I will pause a little longer by it than usual next weekend when we go up to Durham and send a thought for your recovery.

I, too, have just finished Mother Mary Comes to Me . I am a huge fan of God of Small Things and Roy in general and loved this. I really liked to bit about Berger and his elephant ears. I concur with everyone that this is a beautiful book.

Hope all is ok @Tarragon123

Hope you recover quickly @Tarragon123. It's always a good time to reread Anne in my opinion.

54. Fundamentally by Nussaibah Younis - finished this today and am still unsure what it was I read. I really didn't enjoy the Gen Z/London voice though I can see how other people would find it 'wickedly funny' as the blurb says. It reminded me a lot of Ministry of Time, which was another debut novel with 4-5 books worth of ideas in it, none of which are explored in a satisfactory manner. I did enjoy the satire about aid agencies and aid workers. And I appreciated the questions it raised about what it means to be a British Muslim and the different ways it is possible to be a good Muslim. I wish we could have seen those questions explored more thoroughly and clearly and not right at the end. I would probably have enjoyed the mother-daughter angle in a different novel but it struggled to be seen in the hodge podge. Overall, a very meh experience for me interspersed by a couple of hmm, that's interesting moments. It engaged my brain somewhat but not a single character engaged my heart. In fact I found it confusing initially that the epilogue told us how all the characters were getting on after the main events. Then I realised - oh, it's because the author thinks I actually care about the characters!

Hospital stays are always unpleasant, coupled with the sleep deprivation. Get better soon @Tarragon123

@Stowickthevast, I think if you were going to read Mothers Milk as a stand alone you’d probably need to read summaries of the first 3 novels before you embarked on it.
The first half of the novel is told from Patrick’s son’s perspective and you see people and events through his eyes, then it switches to Patrick’s POV.
You probably need to have a basic knowledge of the characters and events that have led them to where they are as, from memory, Aubyn doesn’t do the handy recapping thing to let you know what’s gone on before. There are characters that resurface from time to time (hence it reminding me of Dance to the Music of Time, well that and the upper class-ness of it all!) and I found myself having to go back to remind myself of who was who even when reading them in quick succession.