Lea’s Comments (group member since Jan 04, 2017)

Lea’s comments from the 2022 ONTD Reading Challenge group.

Any award you want - you can go high-brow with the Nobel Prize for Literature, the Man Booker Prize or the National Book Award, explore what’s best in speculative fiction with the Hugo and Nebula awards, get scared by the Shirley Jackson or Bram Stoker Awards, read women with the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction, fall in love with the Romance Writers of America (RITA Awards), etc!

BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION
Awarded to a female author of any nationality for the best original full-length novel written in English, and published in the UK in the preceding year
The Power - Naomi Alderman

NOBEL PRIZE FOR LITERATURE
Awarded by the Swedish Academy to an author from any country who has, in the words of the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal[ist] direction". "Work" refers to an author's work as a whole.
Kazuo Ishiguro

MAN BOOKER PRIZE
Best original novel, written in the English language and published in the UK
Lincoln in the Bardo - George Saunders

MAN BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE
Given to a book in English translation
A Horse Walks into a Bar - David Grossman

PULITZER PRIZE
An award for achievements in literature in the United States
The Underground Railroad - Colson Whitehead (Fiction)
Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City - Matthew Desmond (General Nonfiction)
Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy - Heather Ann Thompson (History)
The Return: Fathers, Sons, and the Land in Between - Hisham Matar (Biography or Autobiography)
Olio - Tyehimba Jess (Poetry)

PEN/FAULKNER AWARD FOR FICTION
Awarded to the year's best works of fiction by living American citizens
Behold the Dreamers - Imbolo Mbue

COSTA BOOK AWARDS
Recognises English-language books by writers based in Britain and Ireland
Golden Hill - Francis Spufford (First Novel)
Days Without End - Sebastian Barry (Novel)
The Bombs That Brought Us Together - Brian Conaghan (Children's)
Falling Awake - Alice Oswald (Poetry)
Dadland: A Journey into Uncharted Territory - Keggie Carew (Biography)

BRITISH BOOK AWARDS
Honours the commercial successes of publishers, authors and bookshops
The Essex Serpent - Sarah Perry (Book of the Year)
Dodgers - Bill Beverly (Crime and Thriller Book of the Year)
The Girl of Ink and Stars - Kiran Millwood Hargrave (Children's Book of the Year)
What Belongs to You - Garth Greenwell (Début Book of the Year)
East West Street: On the Origins of "Genocide" and "Crimes Against Humanity" - Philippe Sands (Non Fiction Narrative Book of the Year)
Hello, is this planet Earth?: My View from the International Space Station - Tim Peake (Non Fiction Lifestyle Book of the Year)

ORWELL PRIZE
A British prize for political writing of outstanding quality
Citizen Clem: A Biography of Attlee - John Bew

ROYAL SOCIETY SCIENCE BOOK PRIZE
Celebrates outstanding popular science writing and authors
Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society - Cordelia Fine

WELLCOME BOOK PRIZE
Celebrates exceptional books that engage with the topics of health and medicine
Mend the Living - Maylis de Kerengal

WAINWRIGHT GOLDEN BEER BOOK PRIZE
The prize seeks to reward the best writing on the outdoors, nature and UK-based travel writing
Where Poppies Blow - John Lewis-Stempel

CARNEGIE MEDAL
A British award that recognises one outstanding book for children or young adults
Salt to the Sea - Ruta Sepetys

YA BOOK PRIZE
Champions Young Adult books written by authors living in the UK or Ireland
Orangeboy - Patrice Lawrence

WATERSTONE'S CHILDREN'S BOOK PRIZE
An award given to a work of children's literature published during the previous year, open only to authors who have published no more than three books
The Girl of Ink and Stars - Kiran Millwood Hargrave (Overall Winner and Younger Fiction)
Orangeboy - Patrice Lawrence (Older Fiction)
There's a tiger in the garden - Lizzie Stewart (Illustrated Book)

The ONTD post is up! Thanks for the great recs, Rachel! :D

https://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com...

Yesterday I finished The Doomsday Book by Connie Willis, which Kim recommended. I loved it!!! One of my faves of the year, so so so good.

It's set in the near future, where time travel has been invented. Oxford historians start sending researchers to the past. The book is about a historian who goes to the Middle Ages, only things don't go quite as planned.

I'm squeezing in a last minute read, something that Kim recommended in a few posts, Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. Loving it!! It's so fast paced and the concept is so interesting.

I read Seraphina, which was ok, not mind-blowing but pretty good for YA.

I had also picked A Gentleman in Moscow, which I was really enjoying (it's a really breezy read), but then I thought "maybe I should read more about the Russian Revolution before reading this". Not that the book demands it, but I thought it would be cool. So now I'm reading Orlando Figes' book about the Revolution and I'll come back to it after I'm done.

I read Seraphina, which was recommended in this post. It was, indeed, a cute book about dragons.

Alright, so I read 4 fiction books this month: The Unknown Ajax by Georgette Heyer (funny, but not the besssst Heyer ever); The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford (l o v e d it, can't wait to read more by her; Les Liaisons dangereuses by Choderlos de Laclos (amazing tbh, so scandalous); and The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden (really nice fantasy). Good month!

I think I'm going to try to read a classic this month, so maybe The Woman in White, Dracula, Frankenstein, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde or The Turn of the Screw...

Eve wrote: "Does it have to be one that was technically recommended, or can it be one that someone said they were currently reading or had just read and enjoyed?"

I think if someone says they read and enjoyed a book, that counts as a rec. Not sure if it counts if it's just a comment saying they're currently reading something. What do you guys think?

I'm pretty proud of myself that I actually did the 5 continents thing this month, even though I didn't like every single book I picked.

I ended up reading 6 books by women authors who were new to me! 3 I didn't like (Jane Harper, Maurene Goo, Ayelet Gundar-Goshen), 1 I did (Gillian Flynn), and 2 I'm now a fan of (Gail Honeyman and Yaa Gyasi).

Rachel wrote: "I've been reading a fantasy novel called,Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey. I am liking it more than i thought; I thought it would be just trashy sex book but it's a lot more than just sex! its su..."

I'm curious about Kushiel's Dart. I see it recommended a lot in fantasy websites, and then I see people talk about the masochistic sex premise and I don't know what exactly the book is meant to be. Is it more fantasy or erotica? How explicit are the sex scenes?

I'm reading Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, who was born in Ghana. It's a multigenerational story and each chapter focuses on a new character. It's best appreciated if you read it one chapter at a time instead of all at once, in my opinion - it's a lot to take in. It's a fantastic book, but so sad and infuriating.

Rochelle wrote: "i think ill check this out so long as its sad in a good way? "

I better do a content warning: the book is about a survivor of child abuse (not sexual, but emotional and physical). There's a bit about DV (incl. rape) as well but that part is told, not shown. It's pretty heartbreaking to read about but it's not misery porn by any means, it's very human and touching. Good things happen to Eleanor too.

I just finished Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman, who's from the UK (Scottish I think?). This was a LOVELY book, very sad but ultimately uplifting. Definitely my favourite from this challenge so far. I'll be looking forward to the author's future books!!

I just finished Gone Girl, my very first Gillian Flynn (yes I'm several years late to the party lol)! I liked it, but watching the movie first definitely spoiled the twists. So I think I'll read another one of her books soon to really get that first-hand experience. Which one should I pick up? Dark Places? Sharp Objects? Or another?

Finished The Dry. Unbelievably overrated IMO.

I just finished I Believe in a Thing Called Love by Maurene Goo, who is American. It's basically a rom-com about a girl who decided to apply K-drama tropes to real life. But the result, in my opinion, was more creepy then endearing.

Anyway, another dud for me this month! Boo.

Ok! I started with Asia, picking up Waking Lions by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen (from Israel). It's the story of an Israeli doctor who one night after a long shift goes driving in the desert and hits an illegal Eritrean immigrant with his car. He sees that the man is dying and runs. But the man's wife saw everything and finds the doctor and starts to blackmail him into participating in a clandestine clinic for immigrants.

It was recommended by the New York Times as a gripping thriller, and you'd think it was from that premise... but it's actually really introspective, there are loads of boring internal molonogues, stream of conciousness stuff. I feel like an editor really should have trimmed a bunch of passages, plus the translation was kinda awkward. In the end, I didn't like it very much :/

Yep, I would say America!

Ok, all done!! I'm hoping to finish Waking Lions today, so I can kickstart the Asian thread.