50 Books Challenge 2026 Part Seven

[Southeastdweller]

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

Entitled - Andrew Lownie

The story of the now ex-Duke and Duchess of York. I spent the half thinking ‘yeah, not surprised, I knew most of that’ but as it gets to its conclusion it raises more and more questions about how they were allowed to get away with their behaviour and who knew. There are suggestions towards the end that hint that there’s more to come out and that the monarchy is not out of the woods. Really, it’s quite breathtaking.

43 A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute. This is in two parts, the first half is set in Japanese-occupied Malaya during WWII and the second part takes place in Australia a few years later (plus a short section in London). I preferred the first half - Jean Paget is a great character and it was fascinating to read about the experiences of a group of women and children during this period, especially as I read The Railway Man earlier this year and there was an introduction by Eric Lomax in my copy of A Town Like Alice. I liked the Australian part too, but not as much. As others have said, the book's references to indigenous people are very much of its time.

44 A Beast Slinks Towards Beijing by Alice Evelyn Yang. From the 2026 Women's Prize long list. Qianze is a young woman living and working in New York when her father, who left the family when she was 14 years old, turns up on her doorstep in a bad way - ragged and confused and drinking too much. She would like to believe that he loves her, but his brain seems to be lost in the past talking about a "prophecy". There are timelines set in China during the Cultural Revolution and the earlier Japanese occupation of China (it's a coincidence that my previous book dealt with a similar theme) and some magical realism. This has been well reviewed on this thread and on paper it should have been my cup of tea, but for some reason it wasn't for me. It has taken me ages to read because I kept falling asleep over it!

I said I’d lead an Oliver Twist read along @TimeforaGandT- if @Piggywaspushed isn’t doing a Dickens in the near future?

Not interested in Middlemarch but I have just finished a book:

46. Chinese Parents Don't Say I Love You by Candice Chung This has been extensively pushed- my husband bought it for me from the buy one, get one half price table in Waterstones and it's a Financial Times Best Summer Book and it's been featured on a radio book club.

Anyway, I didn't love it and in fact struggled with it - nearly a dnf.

Candicevis a food journalist in Sydney. Her family is from Hong Kong but they now all live in Australia; however she isn't close to her parents. She invites them on her restaurant reviews after she leaves a long relationship and loses her dining companion - this is her way of trying to get close to them. Meanwhile she is falling in love.

I thought there would be much more drama in the relationship with the parents - more revelations, understandings etc but actually nothing much happens there. The story is more about her new relationship and covid upsetting her way of life.

There is a lot of food writing as you would expect- but it's the sort of Asian food that makes me feel queasy, like when they eat at a Japanese street stall which uses all the pieces of a chicken.

Anyway, I thought the love story element was lovely and it didn't disappoint.

I read Middlemarch back in my twenties and was mainly struck by the theme of how little we know the people we marry, and how much we project what we want to see onto our romantic partners. Of course it was even more the case in the nineteenth century, when there were fewer chances to get to know the person unchaperoned, but it didn't prevent me making the same mistake myself.

With thanks to @AgualusasL0ver for the recommendations, I've got The Regency Revolution from the library, and the Banine books sound good too.

Less reading over the last week or so while I finished the Pennine Way (go me!) but finished the following

118. The Killing Floor, Lee Child
The first Reacher book, and the series starts as it means to go on, with Reacher being wrongfully arrested in the first sentence. Lots of violence, but we know that he is ultimately on the side of the angels (Old Testament style avenging angels, obviously) and will prevail. From the internal evidence, you can work out that Reacher would now be in his sixties, which is rather an odd thought.

119. A Comedian Dies, Simon Brett
Amateur detective tries to work out who killed a comedian - and refreshingly, completely fails, accusing all the wrong people until he eventually gets an unsolicited confession from the actual murderer. What I liked with this was the portrayal of an older comedian struggling with the transition in the 1970s from the world of working men's clubs to the new world of TV light entertainment. There was an unexpected poignancy to this.

120. Timeline, Michael Crichton
Young archaeologists are sent back to the fourteenth century to rescue their professor. Lots of action, narrow escapes, finding secret tunnels etc. The characters are not well-developed or engaging, but it was very cinematic. I read it thinking that it would be a great film, but then discovered that in 2003 it was made into a film that flopped completely. Might see if I can watch it all the same.

Currently on London Falling, by Patrick Radden Keefe and enjoying the murky world of the super-rich (or at least those presenting themselves as super-rich, whatever the truth behind it).

I'm not sure whether I'd join or not. I'm generally not great with the pace of readalongs, though would never have read W&P without the one a couple of years ago. I'm not quite seeing why it was voted the best novel of the century yet but maybe that will come.

A couple of Irish books here:

95..The Story Of Lucy Gault - William Trevor. Shortlisted for the 2002 Booker, this was a book club read. It starts in 1921 Ireland during the Troubles. Three boys try to set fire to the house of Captain Everard Gault and his English wife Heloise. Gault shoots one of them in the shoulder and they escape. But this makes the Gaults want to leave for England. Their 8 year old daughter Lucy is not on board with this as loves the house, beach and countryside where she has lived so runs away as they are leaving. This and a few other events lead to her parents leaving anyway, believing she's dead, and Lucy growing up alone. This was a sad book that evokes the time and place of 1920s Ireland and beyond. The book follows the course of Lucy's life over the century.

96. The Country Girls - Edna O'Brien. Set in 1950s Ireland, this is narrated by 14 year old Caitleen, and follows her and her friend Baba, through school in the country to a convent school and finally to Dublin. It reminded me a bit of My Brilliant Friend in the dynamics between the girls. Baba is quite mean to Cait who wants her approval. Cait is the clever one but has a pretty tough life with an alcoholic father. It's quite funny but also a bit disturbing, particularly the local posh man Mr Gentleman who takes a liking to Cait. I quite enjoyed it but am not rushing to read the next in the trilogy, although it does finish very abruptly.

I have two project reads on the go this year, one is Lonesome Dove (so far shaping up to be the stand-out read of the year for me) and Middlemarch, which hasn't made it past 10% read on my kindle yet. I'm liking what I've read so far but I've been getting distracted by other things, so I'm definitely up for the readalong to try and keep me on track

I have two project reads on the go this year, one is Lonesome Dove (so far shaping up to be the stand-out read of the year for me) and Middlemarch, which hasn't made it past 10% read on my kindle yet. I'm liking what I've read so far but I've been getting distracted by other things, so I'm definitely up for the readalong to try and keep me on track.

Did I see something a while back about A Suitable Boy readalong next year?

Oh that's a good point @InTheCludgie. I think I said I was up for that one too, but I wouldn't want to do both!

Congratulations @bibliomania on completing the Pennine Way - that's an awesome achievement.

Thanks @Tarahumara , there were a few times I doubted whether I'd do it!

The Green Road Anne Enright
This is the first 'proper novel' I have read (well listened to) in a long time. It is also my sort of thing or at least what my sort of thing used to be. Yet im not sure I got on with it. The Madigans are meeting for one last Xmas in the family home that matriach Rosaleen plans to sell. We meet each of the children in the early chapters at different points in the past, before the final section when they congregate for Xmas. I think i'm getting weaker in some ways as i get older. I found some of it quite difficult to get through.
Dan is gay and we meet him during the height of the AIDs epidemic in New York. Since having cancer the descriptions of having AIDs, people dying and people shying away from death seemed very close to home even though it is an entirely different disease. The vunerability, the weakness , the fear i recognised it. No sooner had we finished with that then we moved onto Constance having investigations for breast cancer (which i had) the reality of the banal details (putting clothes in shopping baskets, making chit chat with strangers while you wait for potentially the worst news) captured the whole experience. It was essentially reliving experiences i've had. Enright is very good at accurately describing life. We then had Emmett an aid worker in Africa up close with the horrors of absolute poverty and Hanna overwhelmed by early motherhood and alcoholism. The family is very disfunctional they are all disconnected from each other. I found Rosaleen incredibly irritating and aggravating. I think you are supposed to find her this way, but it felt at times like being forced to spend a lot of time with someone i dont like. There were lengthy sections from her that practically made me want to scream.
There are sections i thought were good (and i did laugh a couple of times - i know seems hard to imagine), but i was connecting with the situations not the characters. It is hard to describe - they all apart from Rosaleen and perhaps Emmett seemed quite hard to get a hold of. I would try another Enright - im not totally sure what i thought about it. I think it all seemed a bit coloured by my own real life experiences. Apologies im rambling.
PS I dont think it will come as a surprise to anyone that i wont be reading Middlemarch any time soon.

I'd be up for a Middlemarch readalong - but it was also me who precipitated a potential Suitable Boy readalong so I don't mind which we do. Like some, I read Middlemarch at university (I remember trying to get ahead on my first ever girls' holiday to Greece the summer before...didn't get very far through it though 😂) and did a whole module on it. I enjoyed it but it's been so long I'm sure I'd get more out of it. I also enjoyed the 90s TV adaptation starring Juliet Stephenson and actually rewatched it fairly recently when I had a rare bit of time to myself.

38 - The Folded Earth - Anuradha Roy

Maya moves to the foothills of the Himalayas after a bereavement. She supports her eccentric landlord and helps her lovesick teenage neighbour communicate - illicitly - with her beloved. I liked Maya and the story of how she came to be where she is was believable. The other characters aren't fleshed out quite so much but her descriptions of the natural world are beautiful, and I enjoyed learning about that part of India.

39 - Here One Moment - Liane Moriarty

I have a weakness for Moriarty that I know not all of you share. I needed something easy to read and attention grabbing for a long and busy train journey and this was perfect.

A woman on a domestic flight in Australia makes predictions about how and when the other passengers are going to die. Said other passengers are unsettled but try to brush it off - until some of her predictions come true. This was quite fun (despite the subject matter!) and the passengers whose stories we focus on are a decent bunch. The central character becomes known as the 'death lady' and the way her story unfolds is good - you start thinking she's just a bit weird but are a lot more sympathetic by the end. Not a bold but fitted the bill nicely for what I wanted and I will read more of hers.

I enjoyed your review @Owlbookend. I also feel ambivalent towards Anne Enright.

@DesdamonasHandkerchief I’m up for the Oliver Twist readalong!

To address a few things upthread!

Yes, I did indeed say I would not lead an OT readalong as I have read and taught that many times so forge ahead!

It is also correct that A Suitable Boy was discussed as a readalong on the current Les Mis thread. Happy to park that as Middlemarch seems to be a frontrunner and we probably shouldn't have too many at once!

Thanks for confirming that Piggy didn’t want to step on any toes.
For anyone who is interested I’ll work out a reading schedule for Oliver Twist and we can start next month as we’re already, somehow, in September.
Probably will look to read it over around 5/6 months.
I’ll link the thread here when it’s up and running.

Wait, there’s a Middlemarch TV series AND Rufus Sewell is in it? How did I not know about that? I’m off to iplayer immediately.

There is! And it’s a good one ☺️

Just to add - I didn’t know that there’d been a proposal for a readalong for A Suitable Boy as I'm not on the Les Mis thread - so if everyone wants to go with that and postpone a Middlemarch one, then of course feel free, especially if an Oliver Twist one will be happening too.

I’m happy to join any of the suggested readalongs but probably only one and only after we’re finished with Les Mis.

Yep! Though I got the wrong Juliet… Definitely worth a watch.

Oh dear. I refuse to ever read Oliver Twist again either. I’ll get my coat.

Maybe Middlemarch starting in Jan 2027 followed by A Suitable Boy after we've finished?