Once more unto the book dear friends: 2024 reading challenge thread

[belboid]

1/30 - Lexie Conyngham - Tomb for an Eagle
2/30 - Michael Eaton - B*llocks -A Word on Trial
3/30 - Paul Simpson - Revolutionary Spirit
4/30 - Joe Thomas - Red Menace
5/30 - Daniel Clowes - Monica
6/30 - Will Sergeant - Echoes
7/30 - Wu Ming - 54
8/30 - Kathleen Hanna - Rebel Girl, my life as a feminist punk
9/30 - Aldous Huxley - The Devils of Loudon
10/30 - Volodomyr Ishchenko - Towards the Abyss: Ukraine from Maidan to War
11/30 - Dan Kavanagh - Duffy
12/30 - Samantha Schweblin - Little Eyes
13/30 - Tabitha Stanmore - Cunning Folk: Life in the Age of Practical Magic
14/30 - Nathalie Olah - Bad Taste
15/30 - Luke Haines - Freaks Out! Weirdos, Misfits & Deviants - The Rise and Fall of Righteous Rock 'n' Roll
16/30 - Willy Vlautin - The Horse
17/30 - Silvia Moreno-Garcia - Silver Nitrate
18/30 - Geoff Nicholson - The Surburbanist
19/30 - Jacqueline Pearce - From Byfleet to the Bush

20/30 - Sharon Bennett Connolly - Women of the Anarchy

Being the period which 'inspired' House of the Dragons. It's Matilda v Matilda fighting for the throne, very messily and unhappily. There are a lot of Matilda's. I think it's 15 in the index as well as others who only get mentioned in passing (eg, Henry 1 had 7 illegitimate daughters, three of whom were also called Matilda!). At one point the author writes 'she was born Edith, but for the sake of clarity, I will refer to her as Matilda'. Very helpful, thanks. Not brilliantly written but detailed and an interesting recounting of the period.

21/30 - Mark E Smith & Graham Duff - The Otherwise

The script to an unmade (and unmakeable?) film by MES & the author of Ideal. It is, as one might expect, quite bonkers. And highly entertaining. Has a few other bits in too, interviews, turning lyrics into short stories.

 

[rich!]

1. High Rise - JG Ballard
2. Notes to Self - Emilie Pine
3. Things can only get bitter: the lost generation of 1992 - Alwyn Turner.
4. The Economic Consequences of Mr Churchill - JM Keynes.

As I'm in the middle of an enormously long book on Churchill, I'm going to count the 32 page pamphlet by Keynes - a) becauase it was fucking difficult and b) because I can't believe I read it and c) because i now need to tell everyone about it..

I like the fact the Keynes is available for £500 or £0.37 depending on seller. I think he'd probably like that, too.

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

1/19 Paul Murray - Skippy Dies
2/19 Charlie Allison - No Harmless Power
3/19 Andrew Kurkov - Grey Bees
4/19 Gail Honeyman - Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine
5/19 Antonia Bolingbroke-Kent - A Short Ride in the Jungle
6/19 David Graeber - Pirate Enlightenment, or the real Libertalia
7/19 Rain - Barney Campbell
8/19 Julia - Sandra Newman