Reading Challenge 2024

[Paladin]

1. Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch. 7/10.
2. The Racketeer - John Grisham. 5/10.
3. Orphan X - Gregg Hurwitz. 9/10.
4. The Longest Kill - Craig Harrison. 8/10.
5. Notes on an Execution - Danya Kukafka. 8/10.
6. The Satsuma Complex - Bob Mortimer. 7/10.
7. The Garderobe of Death - Howard of Warwick - 6/10.
8. A Village in the Third Reich - Julia Boyd, Angelina Patel - 9/10.
9. Three Days in June - James O'Connell - 9/10.
10. The Guv'nor - Lenny McLean - 10/10.
11. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen - 7/10.

I won't bore you with an appraisal. Suffice to say that I love dipping in to English classical literature from time to time, so I turned to this novel for the first time, and enjoyed it.

My favourite author by far, is Charles Dickens, and I'm looking forward to my annual reading of A Christmas Carol in a couple of months.

I have to confess to being very far behind with On the Wings of Eagles, so don't wait for me with your reviews. I'm freeing up some time and my bookshelf for the fourth group read though.

 

[Paladin]

1. Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch. 7/10.
2. The Racketeer - John Grisham. 5/10.
3. Orphan X - Gregg Hurwitz. 9/10.
4. The Longest Kill - Craig Harrison. 8/10.
5. Notes on an Execution - Danya Kukafka. 8/10.
6. The Satsuma Complex - Bob Mortimer. 7/10.
7. The Garderobe of Death - Howard of Warwick - 6/10.
8. A Village in the Third Reich - Julia Boyd, Angelina Patel - 9/10.
9. Three Days in June - James O'Connell - 9/10.
10. The Guv'nor - Lenny McLean - 10/10.
11. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen - 7/10.
12. The Brief - Simon Michael - 6/10.

This came up in my recommended list on Audible, after I finished The Guv'nor, so I thought I'd give it a go. It was ok, nothing special. A solicitor is framed for murdering his wife, and has to prove his own innocence.

Did cardboard coffee cups exist in the early 1960s? I don't remember seeing branches of Costa back in the day on Dixon of Dock Green or ZCars. Or The Sweeney, for that matter.

SOCOs weren't used in the MET until 1968, so this book was ahead of its time on this matter too. These little inaccuracies irritate me.

 

[RobMCFC]

1. Cunning Folk – Adam L.G. Nevill - 8/10
2. Bad Apples – Will Dean – 7/10
3. The Winter Road – Adrian Selby – 6/10
4. The Dark Place – Damian Vargas – 9/10
5. Act of Oblivion – Robert Harris – 7/10
6. The Tyranny of Faith – Richard Swan – 7/10
7. The Game – Micah Richards – 8/10
8. The Ticket Collector from Belarus – Mike Anderson and Neil Hanson – 8/10
9. The Satsuma Complex – Bob Mortimer – 6/10
10. Notes on an Execution – Danya Kukafka – 9/10
11. And Away … – Bob Mortimer – 7/10
12. Dead Man's Blues - Ray Celestin – 8/10
13. On Wings of Eagles – Ken Follett – 8/10
14. Priest of Gallows – Peter McLean – 8/10
15. Quantum Radio – A.G.Riddle – 3/10

It’s hard to give this book an objective score. It was a good idea that started well (for about 10 pages) and then went downhill faster than Franz Klammer.

An American physicist is working at CERN in Geneva when he makes an amazing discovery. Soon he becomes the target for unknown assassins and has to escape Switzerland and find out why he is being marked for death.

The thing that really put me off was the horrible writing. I mean, the author can string sentences together and his grammar is OK, but he seems to have set out to prove that one of the cardinal rules of writing: “Show, don’t tell”, doesn’t apply to him.

This book is full of characters telling each other things they already know, just for the reader’s benefit and it’s possibly the clunkiest exposition I’ve ever read. Two characters talk to each other in an abandoned museum, reading sentence after sentence from a display plaque that explains what’s happened for the last 80 years or so. Does this sound tedious to you? Well, you’d be correct, it is.

The characters themselves are pretty thin. The author seems to have made and effort the put some meat on the bones, but I still didn’t care because the writing was so dull and once again, he just tells us about their emotions rather than showing us.

Whilst I was fine with the wildly speculative plot in general, some of the resolutions were akin to parachuting into Nazi Germany, telling Hitler there was a better way to solve the world’s problems, and Hitler saying “Right-oh, I didn’t think of that. Let’s try it your way!” Really dumb, lazy and stupid storytelling.

The author is obviously doing something right because he has sold over 5 millions books? This book gets one 4- or 5- star review after another on Amazon and his Goodreads average is 4.2. WTF? Trawling both the Amazon and Goodreads review pages for long enough did reveal a few dissenting voices that pretty much summed up how I felt about the book, so I don’t feel too odd now. On Goodreads, there were quite a few readers who reported this book as a DNF, and I can quite understand why.

 

[stoneblue]

My favourite author by far, is Charles Dickens, and I'm looking forward to my annual reading of A Christmas Carol in a couple of months.

Like you I enjoy reading one of the classics from time to time but to my everlasting regret/shame I’ve never really got on with Dickens. Perhaps it was studying Barnaby Rudge at school! I’ve always really loved the BBC dramatisations of his work, they seem to do Dickens really well and I think the opening sentence to A Tale of Two Cities must be one of the greatest opening lines to a novel.

I’ve never read A Christmas Carol so perhaps I’ll give that a go over the Festive period and maybe have a stab at one of the others.

My favourite classic author is Wilkie Collins, a close friend of Dickens.

@RobMCFC, perhaps one of the classics for the Q4 read?

 

[RobMCFC]

Like you I enjoy reading one of the classics from time to time but to my everlasting regret/shame I’ve never really got on with Dickens. Perhaps it was studying Barnaby Rudge at school! I’ve always really loved the BBC dramatisations of his work, they seem to do Dickens really well and I think the opening sentence to A Tale of Two Cities must be one of the greatest opening lines to a novel.

I’ve never read a Christmas Carol so perhaps I’ll give that a go over the Festive period and maybe have a stab at one of the others.

My favourite classic author is Wilkie Collins, a close friend of Dickens.

@RobMCFC, perhaps one of the classics for the Q4 read?

I must be a philistine because every classic I've tried to read, I'm just bored to tears by them. 1984, Tom Sawyer and Dracula spring to mind. I haven't tried Dickens, and I may like some of his work, who knows?

I'm more than happy if people want a classic as the shared read in Q4, but depending on the time I may have to commit to it, I may opt out!

 

[Berts Neck]

1. Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch. 7/10.
2. The Racketeer - John Grisham. 5/10.
3. Orphan X - Gregg Hurwitz. 9/10.
4. The Longest Kill - Craig Harrison. 8/10.
5. Notes on an Execution - Danya Kukafka. 8/10.
6. The Satsuma Complex - Bob Mortimer. 7/10.
7. The Garderobe of Death - Howard of Warwick - 6/10.
8. A Village in the Third Reich - Julia Boyd, Angelina Patel - 9/10.
9. Three Days in June - James O'Connell - 9/10.
10. The Guv'nor - Lenny McLean - 10/10.
11. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen - 7/10.

I won't bore you with an appraisal. Suffice to say that I love dipping in to English classical literature from time to time, so I turned to this novel for the first time, and enjoyed it.

My favourite author by far, is Charles Dickens, and I'm looking forward to my annual reading of A Christmas Carol in a couple of months.

I have to confess to being very far behind with On the Wings of Eagles, so don't wait for me with your reviews. I'm freeing up some time and my bookshelf for the fourth group read though.

Mine too..Lived and worked in Rochester for a while..so Dickens is a big presence there..Now if you love Dickens and are in Kent visit Cooling Church..Pips Graves from the start of Great Expectations are there, very sad to see..nearly bought the house over the road but had been a cattery and can be allergic to some cats so declined..Had I done so Jools Holland would have been my neighbour at Cooling Castle..Cool for Cats !!

 

[Paladin]

Mine too..Lived and worked in Rochester for a while..so Dickens is a big presence there..Now if you love Dickens and are in Kent visit Cooling Church..Pips Graves from the start of Great Expectations are there, very sad to see..nearly bought the house over the road but had been a cattery and can be allergic to some cats so declined..Had I done so Jools Holland would have been my neighbour at Cooling Castle..Cool for Cats !!

Thanks for the recommendation. We like to get around the country, but haven't ventured as far as Kent yet. It's on my list of places to visit.

Northumberland, Yorkshire, Devon, Cotswolds and Norfolk have all received us this year. All with no accommodation costs.

 

[Berts Neck]

Thanks for the recommendation. We like to get around the country, but haven't ventured as far as Kent yet. It's on my list of places to visit.

Northumberland, Yorkshire, Devon, Cotswolds and Norfolk have all received us this year. All with no accommodation costs.

Well Cooling Church borders the Kent Marshes where Great Expectations starts..Rochester is nice but the Medway Towns in general are not great..if in that area and interested in the history great but not much else there..Lived in Hollingbourne over the way from Leeds Castle..possibly thought of as the most beautiful castle in the UK..Coastal Kent, Whistable, nice but now very busy and expensive..Margate Ramsgate not worth it..The Weald has beautiful villages.. Darling Buds of May types..can always PM and will advise.

 

[RobMCFC]

Well Cooling Church borders the Kent Marshes where Great Expectations starts..Rochester is nice but the Medway Towns in general are not great..if in that area and interested in the history great but not much else there..Lived in Hollingbourne over the way from Leeds Castle..possibly thought of as the most beautiful castle in the UK..Coastal Kent, Whistable, nice but now very busy and expensive..Margate Ramsgate not worth it..The Weald has beautiful villages.. Darling Buds of May types..can always PM and will advise.

My brother-in-law lived in Kent for 15 years, so we had many visits down there.

Leeds Castle, Hever Castle and Whitstable were great.

We even went to the short-lived Dickens World, which was an indoor "theme park" based on Dickens' works, including the Great Expectations Boat Ride - a real one-of-a-kind place and a shame it shut down.

 

[Paladin]

I must be a philistine because every classic I've tried to read, I'm just bored to tears by them. 1984, Tom Sawyer and Dracula spring to mind. I haven't tried Dickens, and I may like some of his work, who knows?

I'm more than happy if people want a classic as the shared read in Q4, but depending on the time I may have to commit to it, I may opt out!

Philistine! I tried and didn't complete 1984 and Tom Sawyer. I thought Dracula was ok. Thomas Hardy tends to have sad endings, so I gave up on him after The Mayor of Casterbridge and Tess of the D'Urbervilles.

@stoneblue Barnaby Rudge is one Dickens novel I've not read.

Oliver Twist is a great book to start with IMO. Not too long, and contrary to any musicals and screen versions you may have witnessed, it is full of social comment, villainy, melancholy, and wonderfully colourful characterisation.

Bleak House might be the only novel ever written to contain the death of a character by spontaneous combustion.