Stringcat3's 2021 50-Book Challenge

Discussions50 Book Challenge

Rejoignez LibraryThing pour poster.

Stringcat3's 2021 50-Book Challenge

1stringcat3
Jan 15, 2021, 1:43 am

1. Ten-Second Staircase - Christopher Fowler

A re-read (well, it was an audiobook). Not my favorite Bryant & May.

2stringcat3
Jan 16, 2021, 9:32 pm

3stringcat3
Jan 31, 2021, 1:44 am

3. White Corridor - Christopher Fowler
4. On Silbury Hill - Adam Thorpe
5. The Victoria Vanishes - Christopher Fowler

4stringcat3
Fév 5, 2021, 6:58 pm

6. Bryant & May On the Loose

5stringcat3
Fév 7, 2021, 5:30 pm

7. Bryant & May Off the Rails - Christopher Fowler

6stringcat3
Fév 13, 2021, 6:15 pm

8. The Memory of Blood - Christopher Fowler

One of the grimmer Bryant & May books.

7stringcat3
Fév 20, 2021, 7:11 pm

9. The Burning Man - Christopher Fowler

Tear-jerking ending for the old pals as well as for Longbright and Renfield, but Meera and Colin!

8stringcat3
Fév 21, 2021, 1:40 pm

10. Dark Encounters: A Collection of Ghost Stories - William Croft Dickinson

Decent enough collection, with obvious nods to MR James.

10stringcat3
Modifié : Mar 3, 2021, 2:20 am

12. The Burning Man - Christopher Fowler

11stringcat3
Mar 5, 2021, 4:34 am

13. Strange Tide - Christopher Fowler

12stringcat3
Mar 12, 2021, 3:55 am

14. Bryant & May and The Bleeding Heart - Christopher Fowler

13stringcat3
Mar 13, 2021, 6:24 pm

15. Sherlock Slept Here - Howard Lachtman

A very readable account of Conan Doyle's trips to the US, plus some commentary on The Case-book of Sherlock Holmes and on "The Noble Bachelor".

14stringcat3
Mar 20, 2021, 11:08 pm

16. A Thousand Ships - Natalie Haynes

Very good - the Trojan War from the viewpoint of the women caught up in it. Could have used better copy editing ... "disorientated"? Really?

15stringcat3
Modifié : Mar 23, 2021, 7:04 am

17. Wild Chamber - Christopher Fowler

18 Hall of Mirrors - Christopher Fowler

16stringcat3
Avr 6, 2021, 2:46 am

19. The Lonely Hour - Christopher Fowler
Possibly the best of the Peculiar Crimes Unit books, and undoubtedly the funniest and saddest. Raymond Land has come into his own as a character (as much as Raymondo ever could, that is).

20. Oranges and Lemons - Christopher Fowler
The most recent of the PCU series, with an interesting new character introduced.

21. Three Houses - Angela Thirkell
A sunny memoir of a Late Victorian childhood by the author of my beloved Barsetshire series. Thirkell was the granddaughter of the painter Burne-Jones and Rudyard Kipling's first cousin once-removed; she and his daughter Josephine were dear friends until the latter's death at age 7.

17stringcat3
Modifié : Avr 13, 2021, 2:52 am

22. Galahad at Blandings - P.G. Wodehouse

The gallant Galahad rides again, righting wrongs and uniting lovers (between cocktails).

18stringcat3
Avr 18, 2021, 6:17 am

23. Breakfast at Tiffany's - Truman Capote

Not a patch on the original, Isherwood's "Goodbye to Berlin".

19stringcat3
Mai 7, 2021, 4:18 am

24. Full Moon - P.G. Wodehouse

More silliness at Blandings, with The Hon. Galahad on hand.

20stringcat3
Mai 9, 2021, 6:09 pm

25. The Dead Shall Be Raised
26. The Murder of a Quack

A George Bellairs tandem edition from the British Library Crime Classics series. Easy reads, more interesting for the mid-1940s English settings than the mysteries themselves.

21stringcat3
Mai 11, 2021, 4:03 am

27. The Stones of Muncaster Cathedral - Robert Westall

A YA novel of the supernatural, well-written.

22stringcat3
Modifié : Fév 19, 2022, 7:07 pm

28. The Girl from the Channel Islands -

23stringcat3
Juil 19, 2021, 11:32 pm

29. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe

Engrossing classic novel from Nigeria examines the life of a man who both upholds and defies traditions in his village. He meets his nemesis when Christianity arrives.

30. Ghost Stories - Robert Westall

YA collection, not all ghosts, some supernatural. Not bad, overall.

31. Monday, Monday - Ben Aaronovitch

Lame graphic novel in Rivers of London series. Pointless.

32. The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman

YA novel, decent enough. The framing of the adult protagonist returning to the Sussex farm seemed a bit forced.

24stringcat3
Modifié : Août 4, 2021, 3:32 am

33. The Long Good-bye - Raymond Chandler

I can see the appeal of noir detective stories, and enjoyed the snappy dialogue, but this genre still leaves me cold. None of the characters are of interest and I didn't give a rat's who killed whom.

34. Early Riser - Jasper Fforde

Another romp from the wildly inventive and slightly mad Fforde.

35. Island of the Mad - Laurie R. King

A B-minus Holmes/Russell outing, with the setting more interesting than the "mystery".

36. Paris Was Ours - Penelope Rowlands, ed.

Short pieces by 30+ writers describing their experiences of the city. Most were quite good.

25rocketjk
Août 4, 2021, 12:38 pm

>24 stringcat3: I, too, loved Early Riser.

26stringcat3
Août 15, 2021, 4:36 am

>25 rocketjk: I need to get The Constant Rabbit. I wish he'd continued the Nursery Crimes.

27stringcat3
Août 15, 2021, 4:42 am

37. Malice Aforethought - Frances Iles

Clever "mystery" takes the reader along with the criminal on his merry murderous way. The question is, how will he be caught? Character-driven, engaging. I generally hate mysteries but this was quite different from the usual tedious whodunnits.

38. So Big - Edna Ferber

A well-read audiobook. I was startled when it ended because it just ... ended. Harrumph. And the mother was the main character for most of the book. When the focus moved to her son, the story became much less interesting.

28rocketjk
Août 15, 2021, 12:58 pm

>26 stringcat3: Rats! I'm behind again. I didn't even realize there was a Jasper Fforde novel out that I hadn't read. On the other hand . . . Hurray! There's a Jasper Fforde novel I haven't read!

Thanks for letting me know.

29stringcat3
Sep 12, 2021, 9:58 pm

39. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

30stringcat3
Sep 17, 2021, 8:42 pm

40. The Splendid and the Vile - Erik Larson

Excellent account of Churchill, his family, staff, and other close associates during 1940-41. I never knew he had a cat named Nelson.

31stringcat3
Oct 4, 2021, 2:47 am

32stringcat3
Oct 4, 2021, 2:52 am

43. Faith Fox - Jane Gardam

33stringcat3
Nov 2, 2021, 4:59 am

44. Letters of Note: Cats - Shaun Usher, ed.

A small volume of (mostly) amusing letters

34stringcat3
Nov 5, 2021, 3:13 am

45. Ghostland: In Search of a Haunted Country - Edward Parnell

An unusual mix of memoir and English travelogue, with lit crit of favorite authors of spooky tales. Oh, and birdwatching, which I mostly skipped. But worth reading, nonetheless.

35stringcat3
Nov 14, 2021, 12:26 am

46. The Angry Dead - Rosemary Pardoe

A slim volume of slight tales. Not bad, but not much, either.

36stringcat3
Déc 19, 2021, 5:00 pm

47. The Claverings - Anthony Trollope

A re-read, after 15 years or so, for the Classic Lit group. Trying to convert people to Trollope-lovers (will settle for "Sure, I'd read something else by him"). This was the first novel of Trollope's I'd read, and it does hold up.

48. The Exploits of Dr. Sam: Johnson, Detector - Lillian de la Torre

The fourth and last volume of the clever mystery stories narrated by "Bozzy", featuring the Great Cham.

37stringcat3
Jan 8, 2022, 12:16 pm

49. Lord Halifax's Ghost Book - Charles Lindley Wood Halifax

Interesting anecdotes and ghostly tales collected by Viscount Halifax

50. Weird Women: Classic Supernatural Fiction by Groundbreaking Female Writers 1852-1923 - Lisa Morton & Leslie S. Klinger, eds.

Disappointing collection mostly of tedious stories.