The Fifty Book Challenge

Below is a list of the books I read whilst undertaking the 2007 Fifty Book Challenge. I've included a short review of each.

1. Sexuality in Medieval Europe: Doing unto Others, by Ruth Mazo Karras. A pleasant enough read, but lacking sufficient material to justify its length. Rasonably wide-ranging, though without nearly as much material on Jewish and Muslim customs as it boasts, this would make a decent beginner's guide to the subject but isn't particularly interesting beyond that. It does have the advantage of being fluently written, however.
2. Unspeakable Love: Gay and Lesbian Life in the Middle East, by Brian Whitaker. Comprehensive, thoughtful and delightfully easy read, this is a book which raises as many qiestions as it answers, a pleasing change from overfamiliar propaganda on 'both' sides of the usual debate. Though Whitaker does take a political stance, being in favour of equality, this doesn't seem to bias his provision of data and he is willing to substantiate anti-homosexual Islamic arguments which, in the West, are often deliberately misrepresented to make them look ridiculous. He also provides a fascinating insight into the sheer variety of attitudes and traditions within the region. The one thing I feel is missing is a proper look at the historical context of these attitudes - traditional behaviours are considered only briefly, which may leave newcomers to the field somewhat befuddled. Otherwise, I recommend this.
3. The Female Malady: Women, Madness and English Culture, 1830 - 1980, by Elaine Showalter. A dense and beautifully written history of psychiatric treatment in England over the specified period, making excursions into other times and places where necessary. It's a little out of date, so needs to be read as a history rather than as a presentation of extant theories; likewise it requires caution with regard to its feminist bias, though for the most part it maintains a high standard of objectivity; but its thoroughness and abundance of references more than make up for this.
4. The Invisibles: The Invisible Kingdom, by Grant Morrison. A re-read. I'd lent this to Stuart and it was lying around on the couch after being returned, so I read it accidentally whilst eating my supper. I do think it goes up its own arse a bit towards the end, but Morrison is obviously having fun with his melodramatic elder thing linguistic showdown and at times that's infectious.
5. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll. A re-read. I was going to an Alice themed party so thought I ought to have a look through this old thing again. I think it's actually the first time I've done so since encountering Carroll's photography, which does cast rather a different light on things. I still adore his poetry.
6. Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There, by Lewis Carroll. See above. A more skillfully composed book in many ways, but it doesnt quite have the charm of its predecessor - perhaps, indeed, that very skill deprives it of some of its dreamlike quality.
7. Invitation to a Beheading, by Vladimir Nabokov. So I go from Alice to Little Emmie... I'd long been meaning to get round to reading more Nabokov and I found this tremendously enjoyable. The story of a condemned man waiting to be executed, it's perhaps more accessible for those of us who've been through similar surreal experiences (having scary health problems can do that), but its most urgent quality is something else altogether, something which will snap clearly into focus for anyone who has that vital and yet socially disastrous spark possessed by its miserable protagonist. It doesn't take itself terribly seriously but is nevertheless one of those rare books in which I feel I could curl up and take refuge, breaking the spine and folding the pages about me to muffle the inconsiderate 'realism' of the wider world.
8. The Invisibles: Counting to None, by Grant Morrisson. Another one which was lyig around after being len to Stuart, this is probably the most tedious of the series, with a huge section devoted to a supposed fleshing out of its most boring character, a farce which descends into a series of twists which would embarrass the Wachowski brothers. Too much pretentious pseudo S&M bullshit, too - the clothes maketh not the man. But there are still a few smart ideas in there.
9. Warm Worlds and Otherwise, by James Tiptree Jr. I believe this short story collection to have contained the very last Tiptree I hadn't read, so I approached it delicately and made it last, drawing out expected pleasures. As it happens, it contains little on a par with her best work, with the exception of Love is the Plan, the Plan is Death, the one tale I'd read before. Still enjoyable, though, and with a few very powerful bits of prose lurking in there.
10. Lunar Park, by Bret Easton Ellis. This seems to be a love it or hate it book. I found it fairly pleasant, which I suspect is the last thing the author would want, and I feel a vague sense of guilt about that, as I'd hoped to find it in me to care more. All the smart things it has to say were said more effectively by the team that is Lewis Padget in a tenth of the space. The mistakes it makes in piling on unnecessary and distracting horror cliches are reminiscent of the early work of Ramsey Campbell, and disappointing in the same way, because they ultimately end up reducing the emotional impact of the story. What Ellis does very well is to write about the subtle process of disintegrating relationships within an attempted family unit, showing an unexpected maturity which one wishes he had more faith in. His simple prose is elegant throughout and grips the reader very effectively. It's just a shame to see him narrowly miss something much better.
11. The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins. Reading this book was rather a peculiar experience since it wasn't amed at the likes of me at all, but rather at people who have grown up with a mindset which I find it almost impossible to relate to. I found it interesting as an insight into that way of thinking - I've read plenty of sophisticated theology in the past, but nothing which has helped me get a handle on what's going on with the average religious man in the street. Dawkins is less obnoxious here than in some of his earlier work, and maintans the energetic writing style and sense of humour which make his work so readable; he also does a good job of providing a comprehensive introduction to the topic without belabouring things too much for those of us who're familiar with the scientific arguments already. He made a couple of slip-ups in areas which are more my field, which made me wonder if there were others I wasn't noticing elsewhere, but otherwise it was an impressively wide-ranging work for just the one guy. Not revelationary, but enjoyable enough.
12. Western Attitudes Toward Death from the Middle Ages to the Present, by Philippe Ariès. Essentially a transcribed series of lectures, this highly informative book is impressively ebullient and easy to read. It covers its subject in great detail, but was more impressive to me, as a relative beginner in the field, for the sheer scale of the societal changes it identified and sought to explain - changes which I honestly hadn't seen that way before. The latter part of it goes some way toward identifying why western society is often so hostile toward goths, albeit without saying so specifically, and that interested me, as it can be something which is difficult to understand.
13. Passing for Normal - Tourette's, OCD and Growing up Crazy, by Amy Wilensky. Not the sort of book I'd normally pick up - it has a white cover with the title in calligraphy and a soft focus picture on the cover, which sums up much of the content, really - this was lent to me by a friend. I have quite a few other friends who have Tourette's, so I'm reasonably familiar with the condition, and there was nothing much new for me here in that regard. If anything, the author seemed to have got away with it quite lightly. I felt some sympathy for her awkward childhood experiences, as many of us have had them, but overall she whined too much and I couldn't help but feel that she'll come back to this thing in five years' time and feel quite embarrassed by it. Not that she should. She's clearly done her best - it's just that her understanding of the semiotics of disability is somewhat underdeveloped. She sems to have only just understood that any stranget she sees in the street might be invisibly afflicted too, and she hasn't yet taken in that this may include her readers and the several individuals whom she benchmarks as 'normal' whilst trying to analyse her interactions with them. As such, the book doesn't really have much to teach, but it's a passable read and might appeal to those who want to know more about conditions they've only just heard of.
14. Agricola, by Cornelius Tacitus. Quite probably biased, since the author was writing about his father in law, but nevertheless a fascinating snapshot of life in the upper echelons of Roman society at the time of the conquest of Britain. As so often with this sort of thing, it's the incidental details, rather than he comments on the man himself, which reveal the most. Tacitus' thoughts about censorship also make for interesting reading.
15. Germania, by Cornelius Tacitus. This is something which I'd read bits of before and had meant to get round to reading properly for years. It's a fascinating and very thoroughly researched assessment of the various tribes of North Western Europe extant in his time, one of our most important historical sources on the matter, and though much of it was already familiar to me I found it a very satisfying read.
16. News of a Kidnapping, by Gabriel Garcia Mÿrquez. Highly informative and a thrilling read, this incredibly detailed, well-researched piece of journalism plunged me deep into an unfamiliar world and really made me feel involved in what was happening. Given my own experience with hospital isolation wards and the ever-present threat of death from disease, I could relate very closely to the concerns of the hostages and their families, though their varied perspectives were fascinating and many things about what happened to them were different from hat I had previously imagined. I felt that Mÿrquez's incisive assessment of the political situation in Colombia at the time not only educated me about that specific situation but also gave me an improved understanding of civil war and terrorist situations in the wider world. Despite his analytical approach, he never loses sight of the human aspects of the situation, making this somewhat like a politicised In Cold Blood, similarly poetic and at times distressing to read. Highly recommended.
17. The Star Wars Technical Manual, by Shane Johnson. Heh. Well, when I undertook this challenge, I vowed to be honest about it. The truth is that I'll read just about anything. Even now, when reading is physically difficult and can be very tiring, I read all the ingredients and company address details on food packaging, all the small print on notices on public transport which have nothing to do with the routes I use, etc. I read anything that's there, and I bumped into this one lying about on Stuart's bed. It's quite sweet. A lot of effort has been made with some of it, and then there are phtographs of carefully constructed models featuring those familiar clunky plastic action figures. It reminds me of the sort of thing I used to create when I was ten.
18. The Lucifer Effect: How Good People Turn Evil, by Philip Zimbardo. I'd been eagerly awaiting the release of this one for some time, and did pretty well with it coming out just before my birthday, so I got it for a present. In it, Zimbardo goes into more detail about the Stanford Prison Experiment than he ever has before, a procss which is evidently deeply personal and difficult for him; and he relates this to his experiences in and perceptions of the trial of one of the US soldiers who tortured inmates in Abu Ghraib prison. It's a very interesting book, and I highly recommend it, though I suspect the rasons why it intrigued me were rather different from the intended ones. Zimbardo and I are coming from very different places: he assumes everyone will start out with a basic belief that most people are essentially nice and disinclined to do horrific things; I don't think I've ever had the luxury of believing that. He also assumes that no reader will already have been tested in the sort of ways he describes, which is rather curious. Illuminating, nonetheless, with what it says about the (to me) mysterious mindset of the general public; and his naivete, overlaid as it is with professional brilliance and considerable intellectual ability, is rather charming, like the clumsy Bronx misuse of common words which sporadically punctuates his otherwse elegant prose. It's a very likable book.
19. Meteor, and Other Stories, by John Wyndham. I had thought this contained some stories which were new to me, but I think I'd actually read all of them before, albeit some not for twenty five years. I'm still very fond of Survival and Dumb Martian. They're not particularly sophisticated works and, indeed, this book would make a good introduction to the science fiction genre for children (provided they and their parents didn't have overly delicate sensibilities), but they're really well composed, smart and to the point.
20. James Tiptree Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon, by Julie Phillips. A biography of a writer whose work I have long adored, and a very good book in its own right. What's more, reading this was an odd experience for me, as I had no idea beforehand how much Ms Sheldon and I had in common, and that's something I don't encounter often. The stories about her disastrous attempts to be a girl and her crushes on inappropriate women were painfully familiar, though I felt that this was something which the author didn't quite get and that she was rather heavy-handed in her interpretations. For those who don't relate in that way, well, this is still a fascinating book about a fascinating person, and I highly recommend it.
21. Port Mungo, by Patrick McGrath. Classic McGrath; not his most intellectually challenging or literary work, which disappointed me a little, but beautifully drawn throughout. What it lacks in mystery it more than makes up for with its rich, seductive imagery and masterful characterisation.
22. Amsterdam, by Ian McEwan. McEwan has written some unforgettably brilliant books, and some shite ones. This is one of the shite ones. In creating a tabloid journalist as one of his characters, he has taken on a tabloid approach to a complex and serious subject, approaching it with a level of intellectual vigour which is more often found in the Daily Mail. His prose is elegant as always, and there are hints here of more interestingly developed character ideas, but the overall work is trite, obvious and - worst of all - very boring.
23. On the Beach, by Nevil Shute. I think this is quite probably my favourite book of the year. The story of the Australian survivors of a nuclear war which has devastated the northern hemisphere, it goes way beyond making important points about politics and warfare to challenge our relationship with mortality and the way we invest in the wider world. Impeccably researched and always readable, it has a way of drawing out those emotional responses which we all learn to bury as children, living in the world as we do. It's an education we all dearly need.
24. The Nichomachean Ethics, by Aristotle. Another of those books I'd long met to get round to. I found this a dense and rather wayward but surprisingly entertaining read. There's a genuine wit and warmth to it which encourages one to bear with the author despite the difficulty of communicating between such different cultures. Whilst it didn't encourage me to share all of his ethical positions, it did improve my understanding of the way some other people think, of how they reason out what are to me quite alien conclusions.
25. Elidor, by Alan Garner. I got this book from my friend Jonathan, and I do believe it's the only piece of Garner's work which I hadn't previously read. Naturally it would have meant more to me in childhood but I stil enjoyed it, if only by way of admiring the author's craft. However, I must take issue with the blurb which suggested it's the creepiest and most adult of his works. The Wierdstone of Brisingamen and its sequel terrified me as a child (though I loved them). Where this did create some sense of dread - as shadowy forms from another world threatened to break through into ours - it reminded me of The Giant Under the Snow, except that that book did it better.
26. How Animals Have Sex, by Gideon Defoe. Any other book with this title could be expected to be atrocious, tacky and embarrassing, but Mr. Defoe brings to it that same combination of sound research and whimsical narrative with which he graced his pirate adventure books, and the result is something which is dangerous amounts of fun.
27. Where there is No Doctor - a Village Healthcare Handbook for Africa, by David Werner. I'd requested this manual because I reckoned I'd find it useful at home and also because I have sometimes been involved in chatity work assisting Americans unable to access doctors. It's a very thorough book yet I think any reasonably intelligent person could use it effectively. I also found the section on extant African medical myths and folk remedies intriguing.
28. Welsh Legends and Folk Tales, by Gwyn Jones. Another gift from Jonathan. I have a general interest in mythology but I didn't find this book anything like as entertaining asI'd hoped. Though all myth patterns include an element of repetition, it seems the Welsh have got it down to a fine art. Also, from much of this book, one would think they did nothing but feast and fuss over their beards. I'd like to read further such works in the hope of being proven wrong, but I'm afraid to.
29. The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, by Alan Moore. You say stop-gap, I say stop! Of course I shall still buy the third proper installment in the series, but I shall be nervous when I do so, for rarely have I been so disappointed by a book as with this. That said, it contains some moments of sheer brilliance. Moore's Shakespeare parody is a delight, and What Ho, Gods of the Abyss by the Rt. Hon. Bertie Wooster a must read. When it's vicious, with Mr. Bond's scheming and Mr. O'Brien's marriage, it's elegantly so. The relationship between its two central characters works beautifully, though I didn't think it adequate to portray something which had lasted fifty years. Mina, so strong in the earlier books, is still a fascinating creature, but less interesting without her earlier sense of propriety. There's altogether too much liberal fucking and the text's insistence that all the splendid heroes are also great in bed feels like juvenile power gaming - I've nothing against pornography, but this is dull. The story is weak and the ending, promoting hippy escapism over the sense of moral involvement in the world which gave the other books their power, inclined me to violence and later to the wrong sort of tears.
30. Goblin Market, and Other Poems, by Christina Rosetti. I'd read the title poem before, but not many of the others, unless I did so when I was very young and half-forgot - with Rosetti's rich melancholy imagery it's hard to tell, as this was the stuff of many a childhood fantasy. It's elegant and beautifully written, quite timeless. I hope to enjoy it on many more occasions before I die.
31. No Nice Girl Swears, by Alice-Leone Moats. My dear friend Aidan got me this for my Christmas. It's an intriguing little book, written in 1933 as a guide for young women on the brink of being introduced to Society. It gave me rather a flavour of what my grandmother might have liked to have happen to me. Naturally this sort of thing inclines the educated individual to scream, shout, draw blood, and ransack several major cities, so it's interesting to see it presented by a creature who is clearly both erudite and deliciously smart, yet who has chosen to survive within it - indeed, to master it. She has that splendid combination of charm and viciousness evocative of Evelyn Waugh. Sadly, she died a few years ago. I would have loved to see her create a sequel advising on the proper way to be 'successful' as a woman under the Taliban.