the wonderful world of reading 2020 reading challenge thread

[QueenOfGoths]

1."Tombland" - C. J. Sansom
2. Exit Wounds" - compilation
3. "Murder in the Crooked House" - Soji Shimada
4."Into the Woods" - Tana French

5. "The Chalk Man" - CJ Tudor. Very enjoyable, sightly creepy thriller.

 

[DaveCinzano]

• 1/52: Fast Times And Excellent Adventures by James King
• 2/52: Life Moves Pretty Fast by Hadley Freeman
• 3/52: You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried by Susannah Gora
• 4/52: Irregular Army by Matt Kennard
• 5/52: Operation Ajax by Mike de Seve and Daniel Burwen
• 6/52: Judgment On Gotham by John Wagner, Alan Grant and Simon Bisley
• 7/52: The Jungle Is Neutral by F Spencer Chapman
• 8/52: The Films Of Danny Dyer by Jonathan Sothcott and James Mullinger
• 9/52: Judge Dredd Vs The Fatties by John Wagner, Alan Grant, Ron Smith, Carlos Ezquerra, Cam Kennedy & Tom Frame
• 10/52: Judge Dredd Vs Otto Sump by John Wagner, Alan Grant, Ron Smith & Tom Frame
• 11/52: The Judge Child Quest by John Howard (John Wagner & Alan Grant), Brian Bolland, Mike McMahon, Ron Smith & Tom Frame
• 12/52: Dirty War, Clean Hands: ETA, The GAL And Spanish Democracy by Paddy Woodworth

• 13/52: Frontline UK by William Corderoy, Ian Kennedy and Clemente Rezzonico (additional material by Steve Holland) - A typical DC Thomson adventure strip, full of binary morals and very few meaningful consequences; the set-up is a sneak invasion of Britain by a sinister Asian superpower, the ‘Yellow Moon’, with a three-man British Army Scorpion tank crew leading resistance. Frankly it doesn’t compare very well with Pat Mills’ similarly-themed, Clive Egleton-inspired strip ‘Invasion’ (certainly neither the protagonist Sergeant Sam Strong nor his enemy the ‘Y.Ms’ are a patch on Bill Savage or the Volgans), but there’s some beautiful Ian Kennedy black & white line work in the first half. Comic historian Steve Holland’s introductory essays are customarily excellent, and place the strip in context and explain in detail the genesis of the story and how it ended up in DC Thomson’s response to IPC’s ‘Action’, ‘Bullet’.

 

[DaveCinzano]

• 13/52: Frontline UK by William Corderoy, Ian Kennedy and Clemente Rezzonico (additional material by Steve Holland) - A typical DC Thomson adventure strip, full of binary morals and very few meaningful consequences; the set-up is a sneak invasion of Britain by a sinister Asian superpower, the ‘Yellow Moon’, with a three-man British Army Scorpion tank crew leading resistance. Frankly it doesn’t compare very well with Pat Mills’ similarly-themed, Clive Egleton-inspired strip ‘Invasion’ (certainly neither the protagonist Sergeant Sam Strong nor his enemy the ‘Y.Ms’ are a patch on Bill Savage or the Volgans), but there’s some beautiful Ian Kennedy black & white line work in the first half. Comic historian Steve Holland’s introductory essays are customarily excellent, and place the strip in context and explain in detail the genesis of the story and how it ended up in DC Thomson’s response to IPC’s ‘Action’, ‘Bullet’.

View attachment 200953

One of the best/worst things is the regularity with which Sgt Strong and his boys accidentally cause a massive explosion with a single shot:

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest
2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)
3/70 - Liz Nugent - Unravelling Oliver
4/70 - Elizabeth Strout - Anything is Possible
5/70 - Alice Sebold - The Lovely Bones
6/70 - Ruth Rendell - Make Death Love Me (re-read)
7/70 - Michael Farris Smith - Rivers
8/70 - Malcolm Pryce - Last Tango in Aberystwyth
9/70 - Stephen King - Elevation
10/70 - Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait
11/70 - Donald Ray Pollock - Knockemstiff
12/70 - John Irving - Avenue of Mysteries
13/70 - Liz Nugent - Skin Deep
14/70 - Annie Proulx - The Shipping News (re-read)

15/70 - Val McDermid - How The Dead Speak

 

[Poot]

1/23 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
2/23 The Magus - John Fowles
3/23 Shakespeare - Bill Bryson
4/23 No and Me - Delphine De Vigan
5/23 Orphan Boys - Phil Mews

 

[Ptolemy]

1/50. Royal Babylon: The Alarming History of European Royalty. - Karl Shaw.
2/50. Hrafnkel's Saga and Other Stories - Unknown (translated by Hermann Palsson).
3/50. Born 1900 - Hunter Davies.
4/50. The Pearl - John Steinbeck.
5/50. A Journal of the Plague Year - Daniel Defoe.
6/50. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick.
7/50. A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf.
8/50. First Love - Ivan Turgenev.
9/50. The Color Purple - Alice Walker.
10/50. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger (re-read).
11/50. The Last Man - Mary Shelley.
12/50. A Very Easy Death - Simone de Beauvoir.
13/50. Wide Sargasso Sea - Jean Rhys.
14/50. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen.
15/50. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen (re-read).
16/50. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis.
17/50. Lord of the Flies - William Golding.
18/50. A Study in Scarlet - Arthur Conan Doyle.
19/50. Mansfield Park - Jane Austen.
20/50. The Castle of Otranto - Horace Walpole.
21/50. The Passion of New Eve - Angela Carter.
22/50. The Sign of Four - Arthur Conan Doyle.
23/50. The State and Revolution - V. I. Lenin.
24/50. Decline and Fall - Evelyn Waugh.
25/50. The Mysteries of Udolpho - Ann Radcliffe*.
26/50. Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen.
27/50. A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess (re-read).
28/50. One on One: 101 True Encounters - Craig Brown.
29/50. Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes*.
30/50. Fathers and Sons - Ivan Turgenev.
31/50. The Day of the Triffids - John Wyndham.
32/50. Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon - Jane Austen.

* = more than 500 pages.

 

[editor]

I never get around to reading many books, so I'm more interested in the short ones!
Grief is the Thing with Feathers was a cracker.

 

[billy_bob]

*1/40 Wilkie Collins - The Woman in White
2/40 Nathaniel Hawthorne - The Scarlet Letter
3/40 Hans Rosling - Factfulness
4/40 Alastair Bonnett - Off the Map
5/40 Anna Burns - The Milkman
6/40 Charles Fernyhough - Pieces of Light: The New Science of Memory
7/40 Julia Leigh - The Hunter
8/40 John Higgs - William Blake Now: Why He Matters More Than Ever
9/40 Ammon Shea - Bad English: A History of Linguistic Aggravation
10/40 Donald D. Cohen - Depression Folk: Grassroots Music and Left-Wing Politics in 1930s America

*11/40 Daniel Rachel - Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge (really good oral history, this one - felt like half the length of its 500-odd pages)
12/40 Shalom Auslander - Hope: A Tragedy
13/40 Reinhard Kleist - Nick Cave: Mercy on Me

* my target this year is to read more long books. * = 500+ pages.

(I started the big heavy one I hinted at last time I posted, then I got a bad cold and didn't feel up to yer man Joyce for a bit ... but it's coming)

 

[nogojones]

1/50 Paul Lafargue - The Evolution of Property
2/50 Michio Kaku - Physics of the Impossible
3/50 Issac Asimov - Foundation
4/50 Ted Chiang - Stories of Your Life and Others
5/50 Philip K. Dick - Martian Time-Slip
6/50 Margret Atwood - The Penelopiad
7/50 Emma Goldman - Living My Life Vol.2
8/50 Jeremy Varon - Bringing the War Home: The Weather Underground, The Red Army Faction and Revolutionary Violence in the 60's and 70s
9/50 Lina Dencik, Oliver Leistert (Eds.) - Critical Perspectives on Social Media and Protest: Between Control and Emancipation
10/50 Chester Himes - Blind Man With a Pistol
11/50 Takashi Hiraide - The Guest Cat

12/50 Alice Goffman - On the Run: Fugitive Life in an American City - Posh white girl lives in the ghetto for a few years and writes an anthropology book from her experience. Much better than it sounds. Well written, like a series of the Wire without the perspective of the cops
13/50 Neal Stephenson - Zodiac - Easy going, fun eco-thriller
14/50 Will Self - My Idea of Fun - Really enjoyed this. At first I thought WS just got a thesaurus for Xmas and was showing it off, But I really got into it's darkness. The Fat Controller has to be one of the greatest malevolent characters ever

 

[Shirl]

1/40 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf - Lauren Friedman. Yes I know, but it's a hard back book and I read it cover to cover.
2/40 The house on the Strand - Daphne Du Maurier
3/40 Afternoon of a Good Woman - Nina Bawden
4/40 Familia Passions - Nina Bawden
5/40 Spiderweb - Penelope Lively - 5 books in 10 days is a lot for me but I've spent an awful lot of time hanging around in hospitals + nothing much on the telly.
6/40 A Little Love, A Little Learning - Nina Bawden
7/40 The Day That Never Comes - Caimh McDonnell
8/40 In Search of the Rainbow's End: Inside the White House Farm Murders - Colin Caffell
9/40 A Woman of My Age - Nina Bawden
10/40 Let's Kill Uncle - Rohan O'Grady
11/40 The Wych Elm - Tana French
12/40 An English Murder - Cyril Hare
13/40 Transcription - Kate Atkinson
14/40 Christine Falls - Benjamin Black
15/40 The Silver Swan - Benjamin Black
16/40 The Secret Guests - Benjamin Black
17/40 The Book of Evidence - John Banville
18/40 Disclaimer - Renee Knight
19/40 The Secretary - Renee Knight
20/40 The Rumour - Lesley Kara. A bit rubbish tbh.

 

[D'wards]

#368
1/36 - Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
2/36 - Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread)
3/36 - The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
4/36 - Me by Elton John
5/36 - Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
6/36 - Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch
7/36 - Amazon Adventure by Willard Price

 

[DaveCinzano]

Amazon Adventure by Willard Price

Nostalgist!

 

[D'wards]

Nostalgist!

A rollicking boy's own adventure!

Whilst it's not particularly offensive, its defo a product of it's time and should be treated as such - there's no women really, the 'Indians' are largely nameless background baddies.
However what rankles most is the animal slaughter- they kill a tiger whilst trying to capture it, then eat it. On board their boat they have an anaconda and they need to feed it so they spot a family of manatees having a drink in the river, and shoot the baby in the head (who is stood between his mum and dad) and throw it in the anaconda's cage without a bye your leave

 

[PursuedByBears]

1/50 Hilary Hinds - A Cultural History of Twin Beds
2/50 Alan Garner - Boneland
3/50 James Herriot - All Things Bright and Beautiful
4/50 Philip Pullman - The Secret Commonwealth
5/50 Edgar Allan Poe - Tales of Mystery and Terror
6/50 China Mieville - Kraken
7/50 Terry Pratchett - Pyramids
8/50 Terry Pratchett - Guards! Guards!
9/50 Adam Kay - This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor
10/50 Alastair Reynolds - Revenger
11/50 Brett Anderson - Afternoons With the Blinds Drawn
12/50 Andrzej Sapkowski - The Last Wish

13/50 James Herriot - All Things Wise and Wonderful

 

[Poot]

1/23 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
2/23 The Magus - John Fowles
3/23 Shakespeare - Bill Bryson
4/23 No and Me - Delphine De Vigan
5/23 Orphan Boys - Phil Mews
6/23 The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat - Oliver Sacks

 

[hattie]

1/4 The Memory Police by Yōko Ogawa

2/4 Normal People - Sally Rooney
3/4 The Three Button Trick and Other Stories - Nicola Barker

 

[Pickman's model]

7) katherine kerr, daggerspell

8) conan doyle, a study in scarlet
9) conan doyle, the sign of four
10) steven saylor, roman blood

 

[PursuedByBears]

1/50 Hilary Hinds - A Cultural History of Twin Beds
2/50 Alan Garner - Boneland
3/50 James Herriot - All Things Bright and Beautiful
4/50 Philip Pullman - The Secret Commonwealth
5/50 Edgar Allan Poe - Tales of Mystery and Terror
6/50 China Mieville - Kraken
7/50 Terry Pratchett - Pyramids
8/50 Terry Pratchett - Guards! Guards!
9/50 Adam Kay - This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor
10/50 Alastair Reynolds - Revenger
11/50 Brett Anderson - Afternoons With the Blinds Drawn
12/50 Andrzej Sapkowski - The Last Wish
13/50 James Herriot - All Things Wise and Wonderful

14/50 Anna Sewell - Black Beauty

 

[butchersapron]

It's a proper grind this year:

1 - The Fourth Reich - The Specter of Nazism From World War II to the Present - Gavriel D. Rosenfeld
2 - Cataclysm 1914: The First World War and the Making of Modern World Politics - edited by Alexander Anievas
3 - Between Occultism and Nazism: Anthroposophy and the Politics of Race in the Fascist Era - Peter Staudenmaier
4 - Cursed Britain: A History of Witchcraft and Black Magic in Modern Times - Thomas Waters
5 - The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers' Party - Brian Hanley and Scott Millar
6 - Crisis, Movement, Strategy: The Greek Experience - edited by Panagiotis Sotiris
7- Vichy France and the Jews - Michael Marrus and Robert O. Paxton
8 - A Journal of No Illusions: Telos, Paul Piccone, and the Americanization of Critical Theory - Various
9 - Official Irish Republicanism, 1962 to 1972 – Sean Swan
10- - The Resistance in Western Europe, 1940–1945 - Olivier Wieviorka
11 - The Last Nazis: SS Werewolf Guerrilla Resistance in Europe 1944-47 - Perry Biddiscombe
12 - The Jews and Germany: From the "Judeo-German Symbiosis" to the Memory of Auschwitz - Enzo Traverso

 

[Me76]

L - library
Ld - my sister's library

1/50 The Gallows Pole, Benjamin Myers - Ld
2/50 You, Caroline Kepnes - Ld
3/50 Women Within, Anne Leigh Parrish
4/50 Life After Life, Kate Atkinson - Ld
5/50 Creed, Celina Grace
6/50 The Dilemma, B A Paris
7/50 Drive, James Sallis - L
8/50 Waking Lions, Ayelet Gundar-Goshen - Ld
9/50 The Surrogate, Louise Jensen
10/50 The Note, Zoe Folbigg
11/50 Divergent, Veronica Roth - L
12/50 In a Dark, Dark Wood, Ruth Ware - ld
13/50 Our Stop, Laura Jane Williams - I was worried when I started reading this one as it seemed to be almost the same story as The Note that I read a couple of books ago - two people see each other on a train and fancy each other but keep missing each other - and it was, but still lovely and probably better than the Note.

 

[D'wards]

1/36 - Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
2/36 - Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread)
3/36 - The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
4/36 - Me by Elton John
5/36 - Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
6/36 - Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch
7/36 - Amazon Adventure by Willard Price
8/36 - Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane

 

[imposs1904]

1/26 Smart Moves by Stuart M. Kaminsky
2/26 Think Fast, Mr. Peters by Stuart M. Kaminsky
3/26 Buried Caesars by Stuart M. Kaminsky
4/26 Hunting Grounds: A Scottish Football Safari by Gary Sutherland
5/26 Poor Butterfly by Stuart M. Kaminsky
6/26 The Melting Clock by Stuart M. Kaminsky
7/26 The Devil Met a Lady by Stuart M. Kaminsky
8/26 Winter at the Bookshop: Politics and Poverty, St Anns in the 1960s by Sylvia Riley

9/26 The Quiet Assassin: The Davie Hay Story by Davie Hay with Alex Gordon

 

[colbhoy]

1/10 - Die Trying by Lee Child
2/10 - The Three Kings: Busby, Shankley, Stein by Leo Moynihan
3/10 - The Sentry by Robert Crais

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest
2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)
3/70 - Liz Nugent - Unravelling Oliver
4/70 - Elizabeth Strout - Anything is Possible
5/70 - Alice Sebold - The Lovely Bones
6/70 - Ruth Rendell - Make Death Love Me (re-read)
7/70 - Michael Farris Smith - Rivers
8/70 - Malcolm Pryce - Last Tango in Aberystwyth
9/70 - Stephen King - Elevation
10/70 - Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait
11/70 - Donald Ray Pollock - Knockemstiff
12/70 - John Irving - Avenue of Mysteries
13/70 - Liz Nugent - Skin Deep
14/70 - Annie Proulx - The Shipping News (re-read)
15/70 - Val McDermid - How The Dead Speak

16/70 - Patricia Highsmith - The Talented Mr Ripley

 

[Shirl]

1/40 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf - Lauren Friedman. Yes I know, but it's a hard back book and I read it cover to cover.
2/40 The house on the Strand - Daphne Du Maurier
3/40 Afternoon of a Good Woman - Nina Bawden
4/40 Familia Passions - Nina Bawden
5/40 Spiderweb - Penelope Lively - 5 books in 10 days is a lot for me but I've spent an awful lot of time hanging around in hospitals + nothing much on the telly.
6/40 A Little Love, A Little Learning - Nina Bawden
7/40 The Day That Never Comes - Caimh McDonnell
8/40 In Search of the Rainbow's End: Inside the White House Farm Murders - Colin Caffell
9/40 A Woman of My Age - Nina Bawden
10/40 Let's Kill Uncle - Rohan O'Grady
11/40 The Wych Elm - Tana French
12/40 An English Murder - Cyril Hare
13/40 Transcription - Kate Atkinson
14/40 Christine Falls - Benjamin Black
15/40 The Silver Swan - Benjamin Black
16/40 The Secret Guests - Benjamin Black
17/40 The Book of Evidence - John Banville
18/40 Disclaimer - Renee Knight
19/40 The Secretary - Renee Knight
20/40 The Rumour - Lesley Kara. A bit rubbish tbh.
21/40 Ralph's Party - Lsa Jewell

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest
2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)
3/70 - Liz Nugent - Unravelling Oliver
4/70 - Elizabeth Strout - Anything is Possible
5/70 - Alice Sebold - The Lovely Bones
6/70 - Ruth Rendell - Make Death Love Me (re-read)
7/70 - Michael Farris Smith - Rivers
8/70 - Malcolm Pryce - Last Tango in Aberystwyth
9/70 - Stephen King - Elevation
10/70 - Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait
11/70 - Donald Ray Pollock - Knockemstiff
12/70 - John Irving - Avenue of Mysteries
13/70 - Liz Nugent - Skin Deep
14/70 - Annie Proulx - The Shipping News (re-read)
15/70 - Val McDermid - How The Dead Speak
16/70 - Patricia Highsmith - The Talented Mr Ripley

17/70 - Sally Rooney - Conversations With Friends

 

[BoatieBird]

1/70 - Shirley Jackson - The Bird's Nest
2/70 - Annie Proulx - Accordion Crimes (re-read)
3/70 - Liz Nugent - Unravelling Oliver
4/70 - Elizabeth Strout - Anything is Possible
5/70 - Alice Sebold - The Lovely Bones
6/70 - Ruth Rendell - Make Death Love Me (re-read)
7/70 - Michael Farris Smith - Rivers
8/70 - Malcolm Pryce - Last Tango in Aberystwyth
9/70 - Stephen King - Elevation
10/70 - Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait
11/70 - Donald Ray Pollock - Knockemstiff
12/70 - John Irving - Avenue of Mysteries
13/70 - Liz Nugent - Skin Deep
14/70 - Annie Proulx - The Shipping News (re-read)
15/70 - Val McDermid - How The Dead Speak
16/70 - Patricia Highsmith - The Talented Mr Ripley
17/70 - Sally Rooney - Conversations With Friends

18/70 - John Green - An Abundance of Katherines

 

[PursuedByBears]

I can't concentrate at all given the current circumstances. I haven't even picked up a book in the past week

 

[pennimania]

1. The Generous Earth – Philip Oyler
2. Excitements at the Chalet School
3.The New Mistress at the Chalet School
4. Betty: the story of Betty MacDonald - Anne Wellman
5. The Coming of Age of the Chalet School - Elinor Brent Dyer
6. The Chalet School and Richenda - “ “ “
7. Trials for the Chalet School - “ “ “
8. We Took to the Woods – Louise Rich Dickinson
9. Theodora and the Chalet School - Elinor Brent Dyer
and
10. Camera Lucida - Roland Barthes (reread)
11. Joey and Co in Tyrol – Elinor Brent Dyer
12. Ruey Richardson at the Chalet School – Elinor Brent Dyer
13. Oil Paint and Greece – Peter Hemming
14. The Hellbound Heart – Clive Barker
15. The Chalet School Reunion – Elinor Brent Dyer
and
16. The Valley and the Farm - Monica Edwards
17. Black Hunting Whip - " "
18. Punchbowl Midnight - " "
19. The Spirit of Punchbowl Farm - " " (these books from my childhood are a delight. I still have them)
20. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C S Lewis
21. Prince Caspian - " " "
22. The Last Battle - " " "
23. The Feud in the Chalet - Elinor Brent Dyer
24. The Chalet School Wins the Trick- " " "
25. A Future Chalet School Girl - " " "
26. A Leader in the Chalet School - " " "
27. The Empty World - D E Stevenson
28. The Obesity Code - Jason Fung
29. The Go Between - L P Hartley
30. Station Eleven - Emily St John Mandel

 

[D'wards]

1/36 - Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
2/36 - Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread)
3/36 - The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
4/36 - Me by Elton John
5/36 - Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
6/36 - Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch
7/36 - Amazon Adventure by Willard Price
8/36 - Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane
9/36 - Gotta get Theroux This: My Life and Strange Times in Television by Louis Theroux