Around the Year in 52 Books discussion
2020 Plans
>
Trish's second ATY challenge
Good idea to put in order of month ?
Mod
May I copy your idea ? I think it will help keep me on track x
Mod
Mod
Nope, I wouldn't want to live in the Deep South in 1939-40. This one definitely wasn't my kind of book, so it was a struggle.
Mod
Music-based cozy mystery. The setting was cool (Vancouver), and I liked the music, but I wasn't convinced by either the main character or the final denouement.
Mod
Kathi Daley writes enjoyable, short cozy mysteries. I liked the new setting for this one.
Mod
This is #22 in the Kate Shugak series, and for the most part, I've enjoyed all of them. This latest installment does touch on some darker issues than some, but it was a very good read.
Recommended for people who like PI procedurals, or just want to get lost in the Alasakan wildernss.
Mod
So, I finished this a couple of days late to actually be in January, but still pretty close.
I read this because last year I read and really enjoyed The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion, Fannie Flagg. Quite a lot of that was about the women who ferried planes in WWII, so I wanted to read something historical about them.
Mod
So, we're off to Key West later in the year, and one of the places we want to see is Hemingway's house (complete with polydactyl cats). I'd only read one Hemingway before The Old Man and the Sea, so I thought I ought to read a couple more. I chose this one, as part of it actually takes place in Key West.
While it has similarities to the Old Man - especially the fishing - To Have and Have Not is a very different book, and Harry Morgan is quite an ambiguous "hero".
If you've seen the Bogart/Bacall film, as far as I can tell, the only things it has in common is the title, the name of the protagonist and the fact that he has a boat!
Mod
Young adult mystery. Not bad, although the kids seem a bit too good to be true.
Mod
So, I'm (naughtily?) moving this prompt from March to February, but as I don't read as many long books, and this fitted pretty much in the middle of the range, I've decided to stretch the month's prompts.
I didn't enjoy it as much as The Garden of Evening Mists. I didn't find the protagonist as sympathetic, and his wilful blindness about his friend was annoying. It was still beautifully written, though, and the ending was poignant, if inevitable.
Mod
You can just about make out the prow of a ship on the left middle!
I started reading this almost exactly a year ago (27/02/19), but then put it down after reading about 120pg. However, another challenge prompted me to pick it up again, and I've ended up really enjoying it.
A classic for a reason, and a great story of betrayal, revenge and adventure. But at 1,276pg, not for the fainthearted.
Mod
The Phryne Fisher books are always my go-to for anything set in the Southern Hemisphere. This was another good one, and I loved the cameo from "Miss Mary Mead" - an old lady who sat crocheting in the corner, listening...
Mod
(Using #9 from 2019: A book from one of the top 5 money making genres - crime/mystery).
I started off really enjoying this, and ended up feeling disturbed, and wanting to see justice done to the sister, which it isn't.
Mod
The Martin Beck series, written between 1965 and 1975, is probably one of the foundations of what we now think of as Scandi Noir/Crime, and is an excellent procedural series. This is the last book, and while the plotting isn't quite as tight as the previous ones, that can be excused by the fact that Per Wahlöö died before it was finished.
Mod
A return to Rivers of London, and a new chapter in the story. Very enjoyable.
Mod
It took me a little while to get into this, but overall I enjoyed it. Starts with a bang!
Mod
It took me a little while to get into this, but overall I enjoyed it. Starts with a bang!"
I love this series. It gets funnier as it goes on.
Mod
Cool. I'm definitely going to read some more of them.
Mod
Well, this wasn't the book I was planning to read for this task - I was going to go for Outlander. But a third of the way in, I just wasn't really enjoying it enough to have to read another 600 pages.
So Miss Marple got the call!
Mod
This one had a very different feel to the other books in the Longmire series, so I didn't enjoy it as much. The Mexican desert setting was definitely sparsely populated, though!
Mod
Second in a series I started about six months ago. Enjoyable, although I suspect the next one might have the "amateur detective/actual detective" romance trope
Mod
Reading these, I can see where they may have actually influenced the character of Miss Marple, a few years later: the quite, unassuming person in the corner, who sees everything and understands human nature.
The link to Maximillian Hell, is that Father Brown is a Catholic Priest.
Mod
I know a lot of people rave about John Green, but this is the first one of his written on his own that I've read. It was well written. It covered an important subject. I'm not sure I really enjoyed it.
Mod
Second in the InCryptid Urban Fantasy series, which has been nominated for the Best Series Hugo again, this year. Entertaining and enjoyable. It'll be interesting to read the next one, which is about another member of the family.
Mod
I think the survival - or failure to survive - of the American Indians counts. This was such a difficult book - I hadn't realised the level of planned genocide that was undertaken.
While it was very well written, and the story needed to be told, I just couldn't work out how to rate it.
Mod
This is one of my go-to feel-good series, so it was the perfect antidote to Wounded Knee.
Mod
I wasn't sure what to expect from this, although I'd heard good things about it. As it turned out, I enjoyed it a lot, even if I realised who the villains were pretty early on.
Mod
This book annoyed me. So much time had been put into the worldbuilding, and creating the main alien race, that the humans ended up being a pain, and prone to doing stupid things. Plus, it doesn't really end. It just stops. As if CJA had run out of ideas.
Mod
I really like Becky Chambers' writing. This is a stand-alone novella outside of her Wayfarers series, but it still had the same attention to character, detail and environment, so I felt I was "there".
Mod
This is the latest entry in a cozy series which features a writer as the POV character. I like the characters, and this one was a mystery without a murder.
Mod
An interesting take on time travel and romance.
Mod
The Rose Hill series is one I found by accident, when I needed a book for a challenge that was set in West Virginia. I ended up enjoying it a lot. This is the fourth in the series.
Mod
A slight jump ahead into August, as this book is replete with non-traditional families. Pity the good setting was let down by some of the characters and bad editing.
Mod
This was on the list for 2019. A really good collection of very different stories, from fables, to philosophical problems, to near-future science fiction.
Mod
Shelved as Humor by 1,296 users, and Science Fiction Fantasy by 235 users (triSH).
I haven't read this since pretty much it first came out, in 1990 or thereabouts. It was still funny, and it's prompted me to think about a Pratchett reread.
Mod
This was written in early-2017, as a direct respone to, and warning about, the result of the 2016 Presidential Election.
When I first read this, a little over a year into that administration, I found it chilling and disturbing. Now, two-plus years later, and against the backdrop of the BLM movement, general unrest, and the administration's actions in Portland, OR, it's terrifying seeing how many of Snyder's warnings have been realised.
This should be mandatory reading for anyone planning to vote in November, in my view.
Mod
An honest, fascinating and at some points harrowing first hand account of the horrors of war and its effect on civilians.
Mod
Book #2 in an entertaining Urban Fantasy series with an SF twist. Likeable characters and a cool setting.
Mod
The author, Sam Hawke, is an Aussie. I started reading the book when I was trying to get through the Hugo nominees, back in July, but I only got about 85pg into it. So I went back to it this month. Okay. "Epic Fantasy" with some cool ideas, but I didn't really feel for one of the POV characters, and the more interesting one was obviously secondary. I probably won't bother with the second book unless it's nominated again next year.
Mod
#5 in the Gaslight Mysteries, set in New York in the late 1890s - a series I only read occasionally, and then always remember how much I like it.
Mod
Another of my favourite procedural series, and the descriptions of food always make me hungry.
Mod
So the geometric cover thing was proving a struggle, so I went back to look at some of the books I've read this year that might qualify, and I came up with this one, which is made up of simple contrasting shapes.
Mod
Well, the whim was it turned up as one of Team Finch's puzzles in last week's Readathon! Not bad - definitely wouldn't have been on the shelves of the library when I was a kid.
Mod
The prompt was Mini-Poll 16 Close Call (Day or month in the title). I read this a long time ago, when it first came out. I enjoyed it a lot more this time, probably because I knew who more of the characters were. .
Mod
Likeable cozy mystery set in Alaska
Mod
This has been on the TBR for a while. What a lovely society it would be - if human nature didn't make sure it wouldn't work.
Around the Year in 52 Books
Books mentioned in this topic
The Final Days (other topics)All the President’s Men (other topics)
The Final Days (other topics)
A Streetcar Named Desire (other topics)
A Streetcar Named Desire (other topics)
More...
January
1. A book with a title that doesn't contain the letters A, T or Y - - No Fixed Line, Dana Stabenow - 31/01/20
2. A book by an author whose last name is one syllable - Dead Ringer, Sarah Fox - 13/01/20
3. A book that you are prompted to read because of something you read in 2019 - Fly Girls: The Daring American Women Pilots Who Helped Win WWII, P O'Connell Pearson - 02/02/20
4. A book set in a place or time that you wouldn't want to live - The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers - 13/01/20
5. The first book in a series that you have not started - The Curse of Hollister House, Kathi Daley - 15/01/20
February
6. A book with a mode of transportation on the cover - The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas - 22/02/20
7. A book set in the southern hemisphere - Urn Burial, Kerry Greenwood - 26/02/20
8. A book with a two-word title where the first word is "The" - The Curse, Kathi Daley - 09/02/20
9. A book that can be read in a day - To Have and Have Not, Ernest Hemingway - 05/02/20
10. A book that is between 400-600 pages - The Gift of Rain, Tan Twan Eng - 11/02/20
March
11. A book originally published in a year that is a prime number - Full Dark House, Christopher Fowler - 29/03/20 (2003)
12. A book that is a collaboration between 2 or more people - The Terrorists, Maj Sjöwall, Per Wahlöö - 20/03/20
13. A prompt from a previous Around the Year in 52 Books challenge (Link) - My Sister, the Serial Killer, Oyinan Braithwaite - 04/03/20 (using #9 from 2019: 9. A book from one of the top 5 money making genres - crime/mystery)
14. A book by an author on the Abe List of 100 Essential Female Writers (link) - The Murder at the Vicarage, Agatha Christie - 07/04/20
April
15. A book set in a global city - False Value, Ben Aaronovich - 26/03/20 (London)
16. A book set in a rural or sparsely populated area - Depth of Winter, Craig Johnson - 15/04/20
17. A book with a neurodiverse character - Turtles All the Way Down, John Green - 06/05/20
18. A book by an author you've only read once before - Pressed to Death, Kirsten Weiss - 27/04/20
May
19. A fantasy book - Midnight Blue-Light Special, Seanan McGuire - 13/05/20
20. The 20th book [on your TBR, in a series, by an author, on a list, etc.] - Aunt Dimity and the Summer King, Nancy Atherton (Aunt Dimity #20)
21. A book related to Maximilian Hell, the noted astronomer and Jesuit Priest who was born in 1719 - The Wisdom of Father Brown, GK Chesterton - 30/04/20
22. A book with the major theme of survival - Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West, Dee Brown - 28/05/20
June
23. A book featuring an LGBTQIA+ character or by an LGBTQIA+ author - The City in the Middle of the Night, Charlie Jane Anders - 11/06/20
24. A book with an emotion in the title - To Be Taught, If Fortunate, Becky Chambers - 12/06/20
25. A book related to the arts - Death with a Dark Red Rose, Julia Buckley - the two main characters are writers
26. A book from the 2019 Goodreads Choice Awards - This Is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone - 06/07/20 - Science fiction nominee
27. A history or historical fiction - The Ten Thousand Doors of January, Alix E Harrow - 06/06/20
July
28. A book by an Australian, Canadian or New Zealand author - City of Lies, Sam Hawke - 11/09/20 - Australian
29. An underrated book, a hidden gem or a lesser known book - Peony Street, Pamela Grandstaff, 30/06/20 - only 341 ratings
30. A book from the New York Times '100 Notable Books' list for any year - Exhalation: Stories, Ted Chiang - 19/08/20 - 2019
31. A book inspired by a leading news story - On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder - 26/08/20
August
32. A book related to the 2020 Olympic Summer Games in Japan - The Honjin Murders, Seishi Yokomizo - 26/11/20
33. A book about a non-traditional family - Luna: New Moon, Ian McDonald - 16/07/20
34. A book from a genre or sub genre that starts with a letter in your name - Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett - 19/08/20
35. A book with a geometric pattern or element on the cover - Dead Crazy, Shannon Hill - 13/08/20
September
36. A book from your TBR/wishlist that you don't recognize, recall putting there, or put there on a whim - The Face On The Milk Carton, Caroline B Cooney - 25/09/20
37. Two books that are related to each other as a pair of binary opposites: Book #1 - War Doctor: Surgery on the Front Line, David Nott - 10/09/20
38. Two books that are related to each other as a pair of binary opposites: Book #2 - Sweep in Peace, Ilona Andrews - 13/09/20
39. A book by an author whose real name(s) you're not quite sure how to pronounce - The Age of Doubt, Andrea Camilleri - 16/09/20
October
40. A book with a place name in the title - Murder on Mulberry Bend, Victoria Thompson - 16/09/20
41. A mystery - Unidentified Woman, Mignon G Eberhart - 11/10/20
42. A book that was nominated for one of the ‘10 Most Coveted Literary Prizes in the World’ - A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams - 17/12/20
43. A book related to one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse - Mort, Terry Pratchett - 17/12/20
44. A book related to witches - Witch Is When Everything Went Crazy, Adele Abbott - 09/12/20
November
45. A book by the same author who wrote one of your best reads in 2019 or 2018 - The Last Emperox, John Scalzi - 04/12/20
46. A book about an event or era in history taken from the Billy Joel song "We Didn't Start the Fire" - The Final Days, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein - 31/12/20
47. A classic book you've always meant to read - Utopia, Thomas More - 22/10/20
48. A book published in 2020 - The Black Cat Breaks a Mirror, Kay Finch - 02/12/20
December
49. A book that fits a prompt from the list of suggestions that didn't win (link) - A Night in the Lonesome October, Roger Zelazny - 14/09/20
50. A book with a silhouette on the cover - Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens - 21/11/20
51. A book with an "-ing" word in the title - Finding Courage, Kathi Daley - 14/09/20
52. A book related to time - The Time Traders, Andre Norton - 30/11/20