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The New Fifty Books A Year Thread 2020

(311 Posts)
TerriBull Wed 01-Jan-20 09:04:35

Happy New Year Book Readers, for all those who wish to participate in the Fifty Books A Year, here is the new 2020 one. Once again, this figure is aspirational, please don't be deterred from joining it, if you feel you won't reach that number, ANY FIGURE WILL DO that's just the title lifted from MN.

This is a lighthearted forum to come together to dicuss books, recommend ones you have loved or moan about ones you've not enjoyed and to exchange thoughts and opinions on your reads. Any book is acceptable towards the total including audio All are welcome!

Happy 2020 Reading

SueDonim Wed 24-Jun-20 18:44:47

26. I’ve given up on my next book. It’s Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. I normally like her books but this one, despite it being much lauded, just isn’t doing anything for me. It’s really rare for me to give up on a book but Urmstongran further back made me realise life is too short to read a book you don’t enjoy!

SueDonim Thu 25-Jun-20 21:26:01

27. The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. A grim read about a reform school in 1960’s Florida. It’s one of those books that’s challenging but you’re glad you’ve read it.

rosecarmel Fri 26-Jun-20 18:07:24

21 - Bento's Sketchbook - by John Berger

Maggiemaybe Sat 27-Jun-20 08:35:51

24. Now You See Her, Heidi Perks
A so-so read. Started well, promised much, tailed off to an unlikely ending.

25. Splinter the Silence, Val McDermid
Loved it. I’ve only recently discovered Val McDermid and can’t think why I’ve left it so late!

26. Madeline, Kate McCann
I bought this for my Kindle in the wake of the new suspect emerging. I downloaded the preposterous book by the Portuguese detective long ago and really should have read it alongside this. Moving and frightening.

27. How the Dead Speak, V McDermid
Well up to expectations.

28. Me Too, Patricia Dixon
Downloaded on the basis of its many 5 star reviews. There’s 99p and a few very tedious hours I’ll never get back. Predictable, and badly written and edited to boot.

SueDonim Sat 27-Jun-20 15:12:56

Pandemic 1918 by Catharine Arnold.

As you might guess, it’s about the Spanish flu. There are some astonishing personal accounts in the books as well as the historic details. It was published two years ago and ironically has brief details of how we should prepare for the possibility of another pandemic. hmm

rosecarmel Wed 01-Jul-20 18:35:05

22 - Seabiscuit - Laura Hillenbrand

Still reading ..

grannyrebel7 Wed 01-Jul-20 18:43:19

Have just discovered Sheila O'Flanagan. Needless to say she's an Irish writer! Just read Isobel's wedding which was excellent.

SueDonim Wed 01-Jul-20 22:40:52

29. The Oaken Heart by Margery Allingham. It’s a bit hard to describe but it’s based on a series of letters describing how one small village in Essex prepares for and then endures WW2, written for an American market. It’s rather wordy but a very interesting look at a past time.

granfromafar Mon 06-Jul-20 08:15:01

17. The Whisper Man by Alex North. Very creepy story about child abduction.
18. Surrounded by Idiots by Thomas Erikson. Interesting self help book aimed at people in different work situations. Read about half then passed to my son as thought it would be useful to him.
19. The Good Girl by Fiona Neill. Rather disturbing story about modern family dealing with a difficult issue. Felt uncomfortable reading it and didn't enjoy it.
20. Last Seen Alive by Clare Douglas. Excellent psychological thriller.
21.Sweet Caress by William Boyd. Another excellent book by this great author.
22. The Last Widow by Karin Slaughter. US crime drama, keeps you gripped till the end.
23 The Brass Dolphin by Caroline Harvey aka Joanne Trollope. Enjoyable yarn set in Malta in the late 1930s

TerriBull Mon 06-Jul-20 08:55:49

A few books in June

Look at me - Anita Brookner, a library book taken out before the lockdown. Fairly brief, less than 200 pages. Having read a few of her books now they usually tend to feature women who have inherited large flats in central London and lead exceptionally lonely lives, this was no exception.

Wild Fire - Anne Cleeves, as always enjoyable another of her Shetland series featuring Jimmy Perez

We know, you know - Erin Kelly. Enjoyed this one, well written. Features one of the many asylums from a bygone era that have now been turned into luxury flats. The narrative is in 3 parts,essentially about a woman who returns to her home to help nurse her mother through her dying days. Having left behind a fairly impoverished upbringing. Rather than put up in a hotel, her husband has bought an apartment in what was the old asylum. There is a personal history and back story, where an old boyfriend of the main character is also pivotal to the plot, as is the asylum. The narrative goes back and forth between the then and the now as the plot gradually unfolds.

Beneath the Surface, Fiona Neil - I see you've also read one of her books granfromafar, well this one could be described in exactly the same way as that. So ditto from me. I didn't particularly enjoy mine either. I only ordered it with my Tesco weekly, because I'd read a previous book of hers "The Betrayals" which was quite good.

Right now I've just started the new Ann Cleeves, writing about a different area north Devon and in this she introduces her new detective, Matthew Venn. I've absolute faith in Ann Cleeves, in that she never produces a dud, so I'm sure this will be as good as any of the Shetland and Vera ones.

I'm reading that before bed, but dipping into Lady Glenconner's memoirs "Lady in Waiting" by day, mainly because she knew Princess Margaret intimately who allegedly was a bit of a madam could be quite tricky. Her revelations come highly recommended. Enjoying it so far, particularly her descriptions of the family seat at Holcombe in Norfolk and a lineage that goes back to Tudor times.

I also have just bought "Where the Crawdads Sing" passed it my husband recently as he was moaning about having nothing to read with the comment "don't tell me anything about it if you don't like it" as it's not the sort of book he would pick up. He did say it's incredibly well written and very unusual and he really liked it, so looking forward to that one. smile

Greyduster Mon 06-Jul-20 09:27:00

It was March when I last posted on this thread and then I was just embarking on ‘The Mirror and the Light’, which was so good I started to eke it out because I couldn’t bear the thought of finishing it, but all good things must come to an end.
I then started reading ‘The Hunting Party’ by Lucy Foley which was a Christmas present. Full of shallow, irritating, badly drawn characters and with more holes in the “plot” than a Swiss cheese.
I’m now alternating between ‘Sharpe’s Tiger’ by Bernard Cornwell and ‘Kingdom of the Golden Dragon’ by Isabel Allende which I may pass on to GS as I think it is a book aimed at younger teenagers.

Greyduster Mon 06-Jul-20 09:35:56

Just worked out that with the last two books that makes just twelve! I had better get my backside in gear to try and even come close to fifty!

TerriBull Mon 06-Jul-20 10:03:12

Greyduster - very good description re. "The Hunting Party" I agree, very overrated it was just meh! imo.

Don't worry nothing will happen to you if you don't reach the target 50 grin that figure is a mere aspiration!

SueDonim Mon 06-Jul-20 13:24:22

I’ve got Lady Glenconner’s book on my Kindle, Terribull. It sounds a good read!

SueDonim Tue 07-Jul-20 21:51:03

30 The Horseman by Tim Pears. It’s part one of a trilogy. It’s a quiet, slow mover until almost the end, when it suddenly changes speed.

Mopsx4 Thu 09-Jul-20 14:21:33

I don’t feel as if I have read as much as usual but mid June finished my 50th book.
Since I last posted I have read
41- The best exotic marigold hotel - Deborah Moggach
42- Born in fire - Nora Roberts
43- Born in ice- Nora Roberts
44- Born in shame - Nora Roberts enjoyed this trilogy even though have read it before.
45- Mourning Ruby - Helen Dunmore
46 - Suite Francaise- Irene Nemirovsky
47- The Gathering- Anne Enright
48- Educated- Tara Westover
49 - Silent Boy- Torey Hayden
50 - Don’t lets go to the dogs tonight- Alexandra Fuller
51- sickened- Julie Gregory
52- Someone else’s Kids- Torey Hayden
53- sing you home- Jodi Picoult
54- Pigeon English- Stephen Kerman
55- Beautiful Child- Torey Hayden.

I have now started to reread books that I read many years ago before sending them to the charity shop hence few by the same authors.

lemongrove Thu 09-Jul-20 15:46:26

SueDonim

24. Once Upon A River by Diane Setterfield.

It’s set on the upper reaches of the Thames, in late Victorian times, and concerns an unknown child found in the river. It’s kind of magical realism, but also believable, a modern fairy tale, I suppose. I enjoyed it, great escapism.

Enjoyed this book very much, especially as I live near the places in the book.Her other novels are good too, The Thirteenth Tale and Bellman and Black.?
I find I want to linger over the words, rather than read quickly, as she almost paints pictures with her words.

SueDonim Thu 09-Jul-20 16:19:34

She writes most vividly, doesn’t she? I could see the pub and the river and the farm in my mind’s eye.

SueDonim Tue 14-Jul-20 20:35:09

Meadowland by John Lewis-Stempel. The author is a farmer in Herefordshire and this is his account of a year in the life of a field. If you thought of a field of grass as boring, you’d be very much mistaken! All life is contained in this beautifully written book.

lemongrove Tue 14-Jul-20 20:49:22

How strange SueD as I bought and have just read a book by the same author The Secret Life Of The Owl.He’s an excellent nature writer and I shall buy others ...The Running Hare and Where Poppies Blow ( as well as Meadowland.) ?

rosecarmel Tue 14-Jul-20 21:16:40

23 - A Square Meal: A Culinary History of the Great Depression - by Andrew Coe and Jane Ziegelman

rosecarmel Tue 14-Jul-20 21:38:26

I just checked my libraries and not one has any books by that author! Arg! They sound beautiful!

rosecarmel Tue 14-Jul-20 21:38:43

John Lewis-Stempel

SueDonim Tue 14-Jul-20 22:33:25

I think these Covid times have sent me to books that embrace how wonderful the natural world is, even when it’s trying to kill us! grin JLS’s prose is so beautiful, poetic, even. He quotes liberally from other writers, which enhances it all.

I’ve read more non-fiction than fiction, I think, during lockdown. Following a plot has been beyond me.

Rosecarmel He’s maybe a niche writer for the UK market, which is why he’s not in US libraries. This website ships to the US and his books are also available on Kindle, if finances run to buying his books. smile
wordery.com/search?term=Lewis+Stempel

SueDonim Tue 14-Jul-20 22:34:14

I meant to address my first comment to Lemongrove.