Catching up

I seem to be in a perpetual state of 'Catching up' so it's nothing new that I'm three books behind with my reviews. Let's see if I can be brief for once. (Hint: nope, didn't manage it, 'bout time I stopped kidding myself I can do it. )

First up, The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson.

Constance Haverhill is currently on the south coast of England, acting as a companion to the mother of her previous employer, a Lady of the Manor type, who kept Constance's mother close by as they had been close friends for years. Sadly, her mother has now died. Constance has been running the estate farm but now her brother is back from WW1 with a wife and Constance, for several reasons, is not required. So here she is, temporarily in a seaside town with no idea what her future holds. Enter Poppy Wirrall who has been riding a motorbike during the war and doesn't want to give it up. So she's starting a business ferrying women about the town in a sidecar attached to her motorbike. It's not long before Constance is involved with Poppy and her business and that of trying to entice Poppy's brother, who lost his leg in the war, to help restore an old aircraft. I think I first heard about this book on Constance from Staircase Wit's blog. It was one of her favourite books from last year (I think) and I can see why as it's a delight. Yes, it's full of get-up-and-go and fun ideas. But it also has serious issues as a theme, that of men returning from the war and needing their old jobs back, or new ones. And it was really hard for the women too because they had learnt independence and liked being useful. And some, like Constance, were cast adrift with nowhere to go and no prospects: she needed a job to live. The book is full of interesting, very individual characters whose lives and futures I became very caught up in. It maybe overdid the female angle just a smidgeon but I could forgive this quirky book that because it was so well written and 'fun'. 

Next, The Shell House Detectives by Emylia Hall.

Ally Bright, a woman in her sixties, has a beach house on the coast of Cornwall. She's been a widow for a year, her husband, Bill, was a retired policeman, still rather immersed in the community, whereas Ally liked to live a more solitary life as an artist. Her peace is shattered one night when a young man, in quite an agitated state, knocks on her door looking for her husband. Feeling unable to help him, Ally sends him away. Next day, ex-policeman, Jayden, is one of the people to find the young man at the bottom of a cliff, barely alive. Did he jump or was he pushed? Ally, feeling partly responsible, and Jayden, missing his policing days, set about finding out. This was so good. For my money, it wasn't purely a murder mystery story. The found family aspect, the concentration on the characters, what their lives were and why they were as they were, made this more of contemporary fiction book with a strong element of crime. I would also not put this into the 'cosy' crime genre. What I also loved about the book was its very strong sense of place. I know the area where it's set, the north Cornish coast, not up near the Devon border, but right down in the Penzance/St. Ives area of West Penwith. As someone from that area, it was the perfect setting. I already have book 2 on my Kindle, it takes place at Chistmas so I may well leave it until November or December to read that.

Lastly, The Man in the Dark by Susan Scarlett, written in 1940 by the author, Noel Streatfeild, of Ballet Shoes fame.

Marda Mayne is 26, and the eldest sibling of a GP and his wife. Until now she's worked as a dispenser in her father's surgery but finances suddenly become tight and Marda decides to find another paying job. She's taken on by one, James Longford, as a companion to his 17 year old American ward, Shirley, who is about to come and live with him, having lost her father. James was blinded in a racing car accident and has withdrawn into himself, becoming a recluse as he doesn't want to be a burden or to have his friends pity him. It doesn't take sparky Marda long to realise that things in this mausoleum of a household need to change and with Shirley's help the two set about their mission to bring light and joy back into the house. So, this was a delightful, undemanding read, no mention of the war so I presume it wasn't actually written in 1940 but possibly a few years earlier. The whole point of the story was that of bringing James back into the real world and that was well done. I liked Marda and her sparkiness and common sense, Shirley was a trifle more annoying, especially her rather overt attentions to James but her heart was in the right place, unlike James' awful sister. This is a lovely, gentle, amusing read, republished by Dean Street Press, that I would recommend to anyone feeling the need for that kind of thing at the moment. At £2.99 the Kindle versions of these republished books are very reasonable and I have quite a collection now. 

I was going to say that that's me up to date but I've actually also just finished Nigel Slater's new book of memoir type essays, A Thousand Feasts, mainly about food, but I'll talk about that another time as this post is long enough. I'll just leave you with this bookish quote from him, which made me laugh:

 Annotations tell a story too. My aunt put a simple pencil tick in every Mills and Boon romance she borrowed from the library so she could spot those she'd read. An entire literary lifetime of stories of 'doctor falls in love with nurse'. I have a cookery book, picked up in a charming shop near Kew gardens, that is annotated by the previous owner. A recipe for 'Moist fruit cake' comes with the grumpy addition, 'No it isn't'.

I hope you're all well and finding as many good books to read as I am. :-)

I have been reading...

That header is telling a slight porky as I've not been reading a huge amount this month at all. Being busy, plus having family visiting has curtailed my reading a bit, but I do have three books to report on, one fiction, two non-fiction.

First up, City of Ruins by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. 

This is book 2 in the author's 'Diving' science-fiction series. The main protagonist is a woman known only as 'Boss' who dives abandoned space-craft wrecks in outer space. In book 1, Diving into the Wreck, the chance discovery of a Dignity ship from centuries ago, with lost technology from that era, changes the course of Boss's life. She's now running her own company investigating occurrances of this lost tech. and this takes her and a motley crew of people to the city of Vaycehn to look at something called 'death holes' which suddenly appear and swallow whole neighbourhoods. In order to investigate properly they must keep certain things secret from the authorities, such as the technology they suspect is somewhere deep in the newly discovered cave system under the city. So, if anything this was even better than book 1 and that got a 5 star rating from me. I loved all the cave explorations, what they discovered, the startling thing that happened and the results of that. I'm not giving much away you'll notice but this was seriously good and I'm so pleased to have discovered this series via Tracy.

Next, The Dream of Rome by Boris Johnson.

I've had this on my tbr shelf for about ten years, possibly longer (it was first published in 2007), and as I was looking for background books for my Latin studies, this jumped out at me as I loved Johnson's book on Winston Churchill. The Dream of Rome is like a book-long essay to be honest, exploring the Roman Empire, how they managed to maintain the peace for hundreds of years and why it came to an end. It starts with the first emperor, Augustus, and outlines what a piece of work he was: that was a real eye-opener although my Latin tutor had previously told me that he was a very ambivilent character. Fascinating stuff. Johnson's writing style suits me very well as he's funny and writes in a very accessible manner. I spent a lot of time laughing and I learnt a lot. I will say that this is a good 'starter' book for Roman studies, it's probably not much use to anyone who already knows a lot, I suspect there's not much new in it but I found Johnson's opinions interesting, particularly his way of comparing the Roman Empire to the EU. Some things I agreed with, some I did not, but I do like to listen to and consider 'all' points of view. A more academic viewpoint on the Romans would be the wonderful Mary Beard and I will be moving on to something by her soon, there's quite a lot of choice! And I would really like to read a deeper biography of Augustus, so must look to see what's available.

Lastly, a lovely friend sent me Traces by Patricia Wiltshire as she knew I shared her fascination with how murders are solved.

The author is a palynologist who didn't start out that way but always had a love of the natural world, especially plants. She was born in Wales to rather dysfunctional parents but adored her grandmother to bits. She did allsorts, which I now forget, before ending up qualified to help the police with murder enquiries. Palynology is the scientific study of pollen, spores, fungi, that sort of thing. It seems none of us can go anywhere at all without picking up evidence of where we've been, often in the shape of plant pollen on ourselves or in soil on our shoes, in the car and so on. So when someone is murdered, the study of the area where they're found versus what kind of plant pollen they have on them is vital in deciding where they were killed and who might have done the deed. I found the cases she described quite fascinating... true crime sort of thing. The biographical stuff was ok by me (some on Goodreads did not like that), I too was very attached to my grandmother so I could identify with that. I did find the author a bit prone to waffle, a bit too much repetition, but all in all this was a very interesting read and I'm glad to have increased my scientific knowledge just a little bit, which is not difficult as there's so little to begin with. :-)

So, the two books I'm currently reading are these:

 

Both are absolutely delightful. 

And this is the book themed jigsaw puzzle my daughter and I worked on over the Easter, 2,000 pieces and huge fun to do. Click on it for a clearer view.

 

So I hope you're all keeping well, enjoying spring if you're in the northern hemisphere, autumn if in the southern, and finding lots of lovely books to read.

Books read in March

Spring has definitely sprung here in the UK and because of all the rain we had in the winter everything is green and the spring flowers, especially the primroses, are really lovely this year.

 

I had what I would call a 'fun' reading month. Aside from one book, everything I read was enjoyable in an easy reading manner. Sometimes that's just the ticket.

10. A Mudlarking Year - Lara Maiklem 

11. Stone Maidens - Lloyd Devereux Richards 

12. Lady of Quality - Georgette Heyer 

13. The Aeneid - Virgil. I've been reading this for a few weeks and finished it a week or two ago. I'm not going to try to review it as I wouldn't have a clue where to start. But Virgil was a Roman writer who, it's thought, wrote this epic as a tribute to Emporer Augustus who was 'A piece of work' as we say these days. It charts the journey of Aeneas, after his defeat at Troy, to the shores of Italy where Rome was founded. It was an interesting read for various reasons but I found all the battles and descriptions a bit tedious. At some stage I will go back and reread Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey but not just yet. I am however enjoying this foray into the worlds of ancient Greece and Rome to connect with my Latin studies.

14. Diving into the Wreck by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

This series is set thousands of years into Earth's future where humans are out among the stars. 'Boss' is a female who dives wrecks, not under the sea, but out in deep space: she's definitely a bit of a maverick. She lost her mother when she was a child, to a mysterious room known as the Room of Lost Souls. Boss was with her but somehow survived and no one knows how. She comes across a new wreck, an Earth ship thousands of years old, but it should not be in this part of space, it should actually be impossible for it to be where it is. So how is it here? So I have Tracy at Bitter Tea and Mystery to thank for this wonderful discovery. I thought I was up on sci-fi authors but I'd never heard of this series, or this author. This was top-notch science fiction writing, great characters - I liked Boss and her relationship with her mad scientist, ambivilent father a lot. The world building is excellent and the menace, because there is one, is so well depicted it actually scared me. That's good writing for you. I'm already halfway through book 2, City of Ruins, and if anything, it's even better. 

Tracy's review is HERE 

15. The Marriage Season by Jane Dunn.

Sybella Lovatt is a widow with a young son, her husband having died in the Peninsula War. She has a younger sister, Lucie, who is stunningly beautiful and Bella is determined to find her a good marriage. Off they trot to London to stay with Lucie's elderly godmother so that she can have a proper coming out. Shenanigans ensue of course, including various suitors, not only for Lucie but for Bella, who wasn't even looking. Shades of Sense and Sensibility in this one although Lucie is nowhere near as daft as Marianne and Bella not as self-sacrificing as Eleanor. It's more similar to several Georgette Heyers but, although not badly written at all, not quite on that level. It suffers a little from something I complain about a lot, too much intelligent speech and thoughts coming from very young children, in this case a three year old boy. I also thought the villain in it was too much of a cartoon character. All that said, it was fun, especially the interactions between Bella and Mr. Brabazon, and there were some decent period details. I have a couple more of the author's books on my Kindle so will read more at some stage.

So, that was my March reading month. Six books read, one non-fiction, five fiction, bit of a motley mix, as is usual with me, but no disappointments among them and that's as much as you can ask for really.

I hope you're all keeping well and have some good reading plans for the month of April. 

 

I have been reading...

 I thought it was time I did a quick catch-up of the three books I've read this month. It's been a little bit of a busy time, plus last weekend was the first anniversary of my husband, Peter's, passing away. The family came together of course and we quietly celebrated his memory. I don't know where the year went to be honest, but on the other hand it feels like I've been a widow for 'years'. Life is strange. 

Anyway. I started the month by finishing A Mudlarking Year by Lara Maiklem. 

This is a follow-up book to her Mudlark: In Search of London's Past Along the River Thames, which I reviewed HERE. In many ways this is a continuation of the story but this time she charts a whole year of finds on the Thames' foreshore, in chronological order, starting, of course, in January. It's like spending a year in London, experiencing the weather - it was a heatwave year - the people and the moods of the river itself. Lovers of London will love this. I don't 'love' London but I have a certain fondness for it, my mother was a Londoner so it's probably in my blood, but also Peter and I had many a holiday up there, sometimes alone, other times with American friends who actually knew it better than we did. One of the best points of Lara Maiklem's books, for me, is all of the investigating she does into the backgrounds of her finds and how much knowledge she imparts to the reader. And all in a very readable manner, dry history this is not. Another five star read from her, I do hope she's busy writing more books. 

 

Next, Stone Maidens by Lloyd Devereux Richards.

Christine Prusik is a forensic anthropologist attached to the FBI in Chicago. Teenage girls are disappearing and being discovered murdered in southern Indiana, and in the throat of each victim... a small stone carving. Prusik leads the team investigating the murders but is up against it as the men under her are not fully co-operating. Plus, she has mental issues connected to a visit to Papua New Guinea, where she had previously come across similar stone carvings. A suspect is indentified quite quickly, and everyone is sure he's their man... except Prusik. Ok, so this is a 'love it' or 'hate it' book according to Goodreads. Because I know nothing about the workings of anthropology depts. in the FBI I had no thought that the author might've got procedure wrong. To me it was quite a good, pacey sort of crime yarn, with an outcome I had vaguely considered, but still thought it was well done. I 'did' find it odd that Prusik was popping pills willy-nilly to keep herself stable and that got old quite quickly. Plus, it would be nice to have a female in a lead role where the author does not make her being a female such a problem for the men - to the point of jeopardising the case because they won't listen to her. Perhaps this does happen in real life, I don't know, but I find it over-used in crime fiction. Four stars because it is a well written and very pacey story and overall I did enjoy it. 

Fancying something completely different next, I moved on to a reread of a Regency romance and that was Lady of Quality by Georgette Heyer.

Annis Wychwood is 29 and considers herself, if not an old maid then certainly 'on the shelf'. She has gone to great pains to create an independent life for herself in Bath but it's not easy to persuade her family to let her lead said independent life: her brother in particular is interfering. She becomes embroiled in the problems of a runaway, Lucilla Carleton, an orphan, but from a wealthy family who are suffocating her. This brings her into contact with Lucilla's uncle, Oliver Carleton, who has the reputation of being the rudest man in London. The family are not happy and Annis's life becomes difficult and complicated but she's certainly not bored any more! So of course, as with most of Heyer's Regencies, it's pretty obvious where this is heading but that's what us fans read her for. The writing is exquisite in all her books, she was funny and entertaining and, although there a few good writers of Regencies around these days (I'm told, I haven't tried many... but Sophie Irwin is quite good) no one compares to her, unless you count Jane Austen. Highly recommend for a romantic wallow. Five stars on Goodreads.  

I'm now at that stage where I need to choose a new book but haven't a clue what I fancy. I'm 12 pages from the end of this:

 Virgil's The Aeneid has been interesting but not what you would call a pageturner. A bit too battley for me, who came, how they were slaughtered, who their fathers were... Gods quite often it seemed to me... I couldn't keep track. But I'm pleased to actually get to the end! I'm going to try Ovid next and also go from Rome back to Greece and read one of the modern retold Greek myths written from the woman's point of view. I have a few collected on my Kindle.

Enjoy spring or autumn, depending on where you are and I hope you're well and finding lots of good books to read.

Some February reading

So, what with visitors and being busy and Latin lessons and a huge jigsaw puzzle... I've been a bit absent, and I didn't realise it had been three weeks since I last posted! Apologies. But I have been reading, a bit anyway, and so far this month I've read four books, so an update is more than overdue!

On the Marsh by Simon Barnes, could well end up being my favourite non-fiction book of the year. (I admit it's possibly a trifle early in the year for such sweeping statements.) Simon Barnes is quite a well-known British birder, writes books and has a column in the quarterly RSPB magazine. He bought ten acres of land next to a part of the Norfolk Broads and set about restoring it to a more natural condition. The book charts the first year of their work and the birds they see as they go about said work, or just sit with a drink and observe. Simon Barnes writes beautifully and with humour about their mission, but also his family and the people that come and give him advice... and the wonderful birds of course. I loved this book to bits and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys nature writing and, in particular, watching birds. And just look at that gorgeous cover! 5 stars on Goodreads.

 

Next up, Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Sutano.

Vera Wong is the sixty year old owner of a tea shop in San Francisco. Sadly, it's a declining business with hardly any customers, which is a shame as Vera is an expert on Chinese tea. She has one son, who is rather neglectful, although Vera doesn't help matters by bombarding him with texts telling him how to run his life. Things change drastically when Vera comes down one morning to find a dead body in the shop. The police think the death was an accident but Vera feels otherwise and sets about investigating herself. Soon she has various suspects lined up, the dead man's wife/partner, his brother and two people the dead man was conning via a corrupt business deal. The trouble is, these suspects have rapidly become her friends. She cooks for them, looks after the dead man's child and so on, Vera doesn't want any of them to be a killer. So this was a bit of a slow burner. I was irritated by Vera at first but she slowly grew on me, it was clear she was lonely and only had people's best interests at heart. And all the wonderful descriptions of Chinese cooking and the umpteen dishes Vera made didn't actually harm either... Chinese being my favourite of the various cuisines (although Italian comes a close second.) It's very much a found family book, something I do enjoy, but it's also written with a great deal of warmth and humour which I also appreciate. 4 stars on Goodreads.

Next, A Lady's Guide to Scandal by Sophie Irwin.

Eliza Balfour has been married to the Earl of Somerest, twenty years her senior, for ten years, when she is suddenly widowed. It's not exactly a sad loss as the marriage was far from happy. A period of strict mourning must follow during which Eliza has to be careful not cause any scandal or the terms of the will mean she will be disinherited. Not wanting to stay in the mausoleum of a house, partly because she hates it but also it now belongs to the new earl whom Eliza was once going to marry, Eliza and her cousin, Margaret (loved Margaret!), set off for Bath. Eliza plans to live quietly but of course that doesn't happen or there would be no book. Lord Melville and his sister come into their lives, they are half Indian due to their father coming home from India with an Indian princess for a wife, and both are, if not exactly infamous, gossipped about a lot. Between the two men in her life, old love, the new Lord Somerset, and new love interest, Lord Melville, Eliza is very hard-put to stay out of trouble. I saw this mentioned on a You Tube channel and grabbed it for my Kindle out of interest. So glad I did as it was a wonderful Regency romp. There were definitely elements of two classic books in it, both from Jane Austen, Persuasion and Mansfield Park. The former because of the lost love returning (similar situation to Captain Wentworth), and the latter because Lord Melville and his sister reminded me of the Crawfords and their rather ambiguous lives. But most of all, this book was 'fun'. Beautifully written, so much going on, all of the characters well drawn and very individual, and a nice amount of humour to boot. I absolutely loved it. 5 stars on Goodreads. 

Lastly, Can't Spell Treason Without Tea by Rebecca Thorne.

Reyna and Kianthe want to open a lovely bookshop together, with cake and tea provided and places to sit and chat and so on. Every bookworm's dream I imagine. But there's a problem. Reyna is a guard/assassin type working for the country's tyrant of a queen and leaving her employ would be treason. But after a particularly nasty incident she does a runner and heads north with Kianthe and her griffon. Kianthe has a griffon because she's basically the head mage of the world, so her disappearing into oblivion is not simple either. But they do it and end up in Tawney, which sounds a bit like a Norwegian Fjord type place where the winters are freezing and snowy, plus there are threatening dragons living in neighbouring valleys. So what happens next? Well, quite a lot and this was a fun, cosy fantasy read about found family and relationships (the romance element is quite strong). The fantasy is there in the shape of dragons and why they're attacking the village, and Kianthe's magic, but I would say it's not the strongest element of the book. I liked the world building and the bookshop was delightful but the books weren't ones you would recognise and it did feel slightly contrived. I gave this a 4 on Goodreads because it was undemanding fun, but its overall Goodreads rating of 3.74 is closer to the mark in my opinion.  

So that's  my reviewing up to date, it's unlikely I'll finish anything else now before the end of the month, so it's four books for me for February and that's fine.

I'm currently reading two books:

 

I read Lara Maiklem's Mudlark from 2019, last year, and loved it to bits. This is her new book and it's wonderful too.

 

Yes, still reading The Aeneid, I'm about halfway through. It's good in places, in others there's too much about battles and who was there and why and what they were wearing. But as background to my Latin lessons and to learn how connected the Greeks and Romans were, it's excellent. I plan to reread The Iliad this year and try some Ovid, but also read several of the modern retellings of Greek myths by people like Natalie Haynes, Pat Barker, Madeline Miller and so on.  

I hope you're all keeping well and have had an excellent reading month in February. 

 

Books read in January and more bookish bits

 So, here we are in February, I'm not sure where January went but at the same time it dragged quite a bit. I was saying this to a friend and we laughed at how contrary us Brits are. It's still very much winter here, no storms at the moment, two last week though and I'm betting the next isn't far off. Brits are also weather-obsessed. I'm sure people from elsewhere will have noticed...

Before I trot on, I want to recommend a blog post to you and it's by Margot Kinberg. A passing comment I made in my review of, The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard, about the difference between a fiction book 'written' at a certain time, say the 1930s, and a book 'set' there but written decades later, gave Margot an idea for a post discussing that and how it works. It's HERE and is very much worth a read. 

I read five books in January, a good number for my 'slower reading' plans for 2025 I feel. These are they:

1. The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst 

2. The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard 

3. A Cold Spell by Max Leonard. Non-fiction about ice, in nature and as used by humans. Fairly interesting but dragged in places, sadly.

4. Metropolitan Mysteries edited by Martin Edwards 

5. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. Underwhelming but it was beautifully written and most people loved it so don't take any notice of me if you fancy reading it. I may or may not review it properly, it's a tricky one as everything you might say would be a spoiler. We'll see.

So. Four fiction books, one non-fiction read in January. Genres: two fantasies, one murder mystery anthology, and one historical fiction. As a mix I think that's ok. I can't live on a bookish diet of one genre only, I need variety, 'tis the spice of life, as they say.

Favourite book of January? The Light Years by Elizabeth Jnae Howard - no contest. 

Currently, I'm reading these two:

I thought I would struggle with The Aeneid by Virgil but I'm not, so that's good. It means my plans to reread The Iliad and The Odyssey (first read when in my teens) later this year are realistic. Although, it might have been more sensible to read the other two before The Aeneid but hey-ho.

My other current read is, On the Marsh by wildlife and nature writer, Simon Barnes.

 The author is essentially a birder, so birds feature very heavily in this book. As I just spent ten minutes watching a little wren work its way around a wild patch of my garden outside one of my windows, that's fine by me. Barnes is an excellent writer, not at all academic in his approach to his craft so the book is very readable and very funny:

Talking about the Suffolk landscape (very flat) where he now lives beside an area of marshland:

'When I talk about landscape, you must understand that I also mean skyscape. The two things are pretty much indistinguishable in this part of the world. You can see the sky all the time, even when your head is slightly lowered. A level gaze from a standing position will more or less fix your gaze on the horizon. I have stayed in more lumpy parts of our own country and been unable to see the sky from the bedroom window: green fills it from top to bottom - soft green grass that can only be grazed by cramponed cows able to rope themselves together or fitted with one pair of legs longer than the other.'

And Christmas:

' The Christmas tree, vast as always, its tip bent at a right angle by the ceiling - it typical of Cindy's generous heart that she always found a tree just a fraction too large for the space - was shining gently all around. The Christmas cake had yet to be decorated, though. Eddie and I had made it a couple of weeks earlier, and quite a lot of the cherries made it into the cake.'

I find this kind of writing enriches me somehow. I love its gentle, meandering, witty style and am greatly reminded of one of my all-time favourite non-fiction books, The Magic Apple Tree by Susan Hill, which charts a year of her life living in the Cotswolds. (And on a side-note her two books about books, Howards End is on the Landing and Jacob's Room is Full of Books are wonderful.) 

I will probably choose a third book to start today. Mainly because I'm reading these other two slowly so I want something as a main read, something murder related or a sci-fi, that cracks along at a faster pace. I liked Kathy's review of Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers and I've got it on my Kindle, so it might be that. We'll see.

So, I hope your January reading month was excellent and that February will bring even more terrific reads. Stay warm and safe.

Bookish this and that

So it's been storm after storm here in the UK, Storm Eowyn on Thursday into Friday, Storm Herminia following it on Sunday and really hanging around all day Monday. Best thing to do, if you can, is stay indoors and read! (Other hobbies are available...)

So what have I been reading? Well my book 3 for this year was A Cold Spell by Max Leonard, a non-fiction about the history of ice (the ice age, mountaineering, warfare under the ice, its use as a food preservative and so on) that I seem to have been reading forever. Which is a good indicator of how much I enjoyed it. It wasn't a bad book but it just did not grab me as some non-fiction books do. Never mind, win some, lose some. 3 stars on Goodreads.

Then I moved on to one of the lovely BLCC collections of short stories, Metropolitan Mysteries, edited of course by Martin Edwards.

This is a collection of murder mystery short stories all set in London. And look at that absolutely gorgeous cover! Eighteen stories in this collection and, as usual with most anthologies, there's a degree of variation in the quality of them. It starts with a couple of stalwarts, Dorothy L. Sayers and Arthur Conan Doyle, and moves on to authors such as Baroness Orczy, Anthony Berkeley, John Dickson Carr, J. Jefferson Farjeon and so on. I had five favourites. The Case of the Faulty Drier by Josephine Bell was something I'd not come across before, a murder in a hairdressers! Great stuff. Unsound Mind by Anthony Berkeley... a doctor commits suicide... but did he? This was 'so' twisted, I'm not normally a fan of Anthony Berkeley but this was very good. Man in Bond Street by Anthony Gilbert, is just simply a police inspector talking about a strange case in his past concerning a lame man who lurks around Bond street, and a stolen ruby. Very nicely done, good twist. Death on Nelson's Column by Eric Bennett was again a very unusual setting! How did the murderer get the body up there! Well told and quirky. But my favourite of all the tales was, Back in Five Years by Michael Gilbert. There's a reason he's one of my all-time favourite crime authors. This was so clever and so well written, with his usual witty one-liners and a twist I did not see coming but should have. A good collection and particularly so if you like London as a setting for books. 4 stars on Goodreads.

So, I have three books on the go at the moment, well, two and another I'm about to start. These are they:

I'm halfway through Piranesi by Susanna Clarke and feeling distinctly underwhelmed, despite all the glowing reviews on Goodreads... apart from one person who gave it 1 star and said, 'Is that it?' I feel like that. Perhaps I won't when I get to the end. Says she, hopefully... On the Marsh by Simon Barnes is about marshes and bird-watching and I'm about to start it and quite keen after loving Winterwatch on the BBC last week. Virgil's The Aeneid was recommended by my Latin teacher as good background reading for my lessons and, you know, 'Romans'. Just started it and finding it interesting. We'll see how that goes. 

I haven't done a 'Plans for 2025' post because I haven't got that many. But a lovely friend and myself decided to do our own Book-Bingo chart and this is it:

Already having a lot of fun with that. We did twelve squares each and I think have managed a nice mix which will enable a lot of mood reading. I have so far crossed off, 'seasonal' with The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard (it's very summery) and 'a tree on the cover' with The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst because, well you've guessed, it has a tree on the cover.

Plus, I have a 'winter' tbr pile I'm working from, although I must confess to regular chopping and changing of the actual books. But this is what it looks like at the moment. (Not a great photo.)

 

And last but not least, a couple of new books I got from an independent bookstore I follow on Twitter/X that specialises in travel and nature books. They are Sherlock and Pages who hang out in Frome in Somerset, not a million miles from me so I feel a roadtrip coming on in the summer, maybe. Their website is HERE. I was very pleased with the speedy service and quality of the books.

Climbing Days by Dorothy Pilley is, as it says on the tin, all about the author's climbing adventures in the 1920s. The other book is Stories of Trees, Woods and the Forest edited by Fiona Stafford, an anthology of stories about, yes, 'trees'. Can't wait to read both of these. 

Anyway, I've rambled on long enough. I hope you're all well and if it's winter where you are I hope you're staying safe and warm and have loads of brilliant books to read.

The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard

I have a thousand and one posts I want to do here but I made a resolution to write more book reviews and not fall behind in 2025 (cue hysterical cackling from the peanut gallery). So the other posts can wait a while and I'll talk a bit about The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard, my second book for 2025.

So, the setting for this book is two consecutive summers: 1937 and 1938. The Patriarch and Matriarch of the Cazalet family are William and Kitty, both in their seventies. They live somewhere near the south coast of England in a large house and every summer they host the whole family for the school summer holidays. They have three sons, Hugh, Edward and Rupert and an unmarried daughter, Rachel, who lives with William and Kitty. The sons all have wives and families so the house, in the summer, is very lively and full. 

It's hard to say what this book is about as it doesn't have an exciting plot that cracks along and whizzes the reader off on a roller-coaster ride. It's not at all 'pacey'. It's a book about the every day lives of the middle classes just before the war: what their attitudes to current affairs were, how their marriages worked, or didn't, how they dealt with their children, how said children felt about their upbringing, schools, relatives, that kind of thing. The big surprise to me was to discover that this book was not written in the 1930s but in the 1990s. But as I went along I realised that I would not have been under that misapprehension for very long. Some of the issues featured in some detail in this book, infidelity, sex, lesbianism, menstruation, married women not being happy with their lot and much more - these are not things that would you find in books by Angela Thirkell, D. E Stevenson, Molly Clavering, who actually did write in the 1930s. Not as blatently or in such detail anyway. But none of it is offensive... don't come away with that idea. It's all handled very delicately, matter-of-factly, 'this is what happened, you decide for yourself what you think about it' sort of thing. I love it when authors do not tell you what your opinion should be (happens far too much in modern fiction), that approach can be far more effective in informing and stretching the reader.

I loved the voices of the children. There were of course brothers and sisters, cousins, ranging in age from a newborn to fifteen or sixteen, a dozen or so in all. (Thank goodness for the family tree and list of characters at the beginning!) The dynamics between boys and girls in the 1930s was interesting, sometimes quite 'Enid Blyton', others very much not in depicting the selfishness of children, their very real worries, the manipulative or predatory nature of some teenage girls... even one of the wives is only just into her twenties for instance (second marriage) and has yet to grow up properly... and the sometimes uncontrolled violence of boys and what they're prepared to do to be top dog amongst their peers. 

There are some fascinating stories here. I was transported to another age but one that is about to change out of all recognition, and they know it. The writing is sublime (I was reminded of Rosamunde Pilcher), so much detail and beautiful characterisation, from the aging parents, to cheating husbands, bored housewives, vivacious children and even the cook and chauffeur were every bit as real as the rest of the cast.

I gave this an unreserved 5 stars on Goodreads. I had a feeling I would like it as I've seen glowing reviews from bloggers I respect, but as we all know that's not always what happens. Book two, Marking Time, deals with the outbreak of war. I already have it, having anticipated liking The Light Years enough that I would want to read the second book fairly soon. Good choice.

So, this is only my second book for January and I'm quite happy with that. Last year I decided to read more slowly and actually cut my number read by about 30. And I may well end up reading even less this year but enjoying more. 

I hope you're all keeping well and finding excellent books to read this first month of 2025.

The Spellshop - Sarah Beth Durst

So, I've now completed my first book for the brand new year of 2025 and it was The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst. This is one of those hyped up, flavour of the month books of 2024, so I was curious to see how it would go.

Kiela is one of many librarians who work in the massive library that is The Great Library of Alyssium. She's not a mixer or a joiner, and her job, where she also lives as well as works, gives her the opportunity to hide away from people and be solitary amongst the books. But revolution is in the air, The Emporer is unpopular and is about to be deposed. The city is burning and that includes the library. Kiela knows she has to leave but she can't allow the books to burn. Taking what she can rescue, her and Caz, her assistant who is actually a spider-plant, escape the city, by boat, carrying several crates of precious spell books. 

Where is she to go? Well, home of course, to the island of Caltrey, the place her parents left many years ago in order to get a better life in the city for themselves and Kiela. She can barely remember it but recalls enough to know her way there by sea and to know that the family cottage should still be standing and waiting for her. And it is but it's a little dilapidated and the garden is overgrown. 

Enter, Larran, naturally a hunk, who turns up with free food and help but Kiela, being a recluse and worried about the spell books to boot, is not exactly welcoming. She thinks she can go it alone and repel all boarders until it dawns on her she now has to feed herself and that requires an income. Can she use magic to facilitate that? It's illegal, but perhaps she can cover up the fact that she's using it...

So I think the correct subgenre for this would be cosy romantasy. If you want epic fantasy, conflict, angst, death, intricate world-building, this is probably not the book for you. Although there 'is' world-building. There is magic but ordinary people are not supposed to use it. I fancy it's a bit of an evil empire but it's not entirely clear. There's an amazing library apparently but we hear hardly anything about it

It's peopled by all kinds of individuals: Kiela is blue for instance, Caz is a spider plant. There are people with antlers, a healer who can fly, a centaur, mer-horses that Larran looks after and so on. Oh... and flying cats. So it's interesting all right, but all a little bit surface. I can't help feeling there is an amazing book here waiting to get out. 'More' would've been nice.

I liked the found family aspect of it, but then that's a favourite trope of mine. There is some conflict in the second half of the book, that did pep things up a bit. You might be thinking that I didn't like this book but that would be wrong. I gave it 4 stars on Goodreads because it was gentle, with interesting characters, the island was gorgeous and, you know... 'raspberry jam'! If 3.5 was available that's what it would've got, Kiela needed a good talking to in my opinion, to the point of being annoying. The spider plant had the measure of her in my opinion! I should also add that there is no explicitness in this book so it's safe for anyone to read if that's not your bag. 

I hope your first book of 2025 lives up to your expectations. Mine was 'not bad' so I'm happy. I've moved on to a historical novel now, book one of the Cazalet Chronicles by Elizabeth Jane Howard.

 

I know a lot of people adore this series and already I can see why, beautiful writing and interesting people... I love the occasional narrating voices of the children in it. I think I might be in for a bit of a treat. 

Happy New Year and favourite books

 A very Happy New Year to all of you who visit this blog during the year, especially those who comment and who I consider to be friends. I hope 2025 will be a good one for you and yours. If, like me, 2024 was personally a bit of a shocker, due to the death of a loved one or some other trauma, then I truly hope this new year will see better things for you and new beginnings.

Books-wise I read 74 books in 2024. Much less than in 2023, partly due to circumstances of course, but I did actually plan on reading a little less last year and to take my time more over books I was enjoying. That, I feel I succeeded at and will do the same in 2025. 

First, a quick list of the five books I read in December:

70. Steeple Chasing - Peter Ross. I finished this one in December having started it in September apparently! Anyway, a delightful non-fiction book about the author's trips around the UK visiting old churches. A lot of snippets of history and a good sense of place throughout. 4 stars.

71. Murder in the Falling Snow edited by Cecily Gayford. A solid antholgy of winter based crime stories. 3 stars (3.5)

72. Sherlock Holmes and the Three Winter Terrors - James Lovegrove. Three cleverly connected Holmes novellas, again with a winter theme running through. Enjoyable. 4 stars.

73. The Willows at Christmas - William Horwood. Toad's home has been invaded for Christmas by the Relative from Hell. Can Mole, Ratty and Badger save him? A fun read. 3 stars. (3.5)

74. Tour De Force - Christianna Brand. Book 6 of Brand's Inspector Cockrill series, wherein he's on his hols in Italy with a group of strangers. When one of them is murdered he's on holiday no longer. Closed circle murder mystery, similar in feel to the other book I read by her, Green for Murder. The group of suspects is very small and it's hard to believe any of them could've done the deed or why. 4 stars.

OK. So... ten favourite fiction books of 2024, in no particular order.

 Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky was an absolutely amazing sci-fi novel (possibly my book of the year) and I plan to read on in this series this year and read some of his other books too.

Dr Thorne by Anthony Trollope. Book 3 of his classic Barsetshire series, romantic, funny, beautifully written, just a joy.

Illyrian Spring by Ann Bridge. 1930s holiday romance sort of thing involving a middle-aged woman and a younger man. Set mainly on the coast of present-day Croatia. Loved it, another author I want to read more of this year.

The Girl Beneath the Sea by Andrew Mayne. Diving skulduggery off the coast of Florida. Pacy thriller that I really enjoyed.

Black Sun Rising by Celia Friedman. An unusal blend of sci-fi and fantasy that really worked for me. Great world building, fascinating characters.

The Trouble with Mrs. Montgomery Hurst by Katie Lumsden. A historical comedy of manners, reminding me of Emma or Cranford. Joyous, I absolutely loved it. 

The Haunting of Aveline Jones by Phil Hickes. Children's/young adult spooky novella. Very strong sense of place and time of year, and quite creepy. 

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. Most peculiar in its ideas but this mix of fantasy and murder really worked for me. Looking forward to book 2 this year.

The Woman in the Woods by John  Connolly. Unlikely I'm going to do a 'best of' list and not include a John Connolly, if I've read one. Creepy, atmospheric, amazing back story, he never disappoints. 

Saving Missy by Beth Morrey. A delightful contemporary fiction book with an older protagonist making new friends in unexpected places. Loved it. 

So those were some of my favourite fictional reads of 2024. A mixed bunch but I see sci-fi/fantasy/supernatural have come to the fore a bit more recently and I plan to continue with that into 2025. Still loving my crime fiction though. 

I only read 16 non-fiction books this year so I may or may not do a favourites post on that. Several of those were really excellent so perhaps I might do a top 5.

Hope you're all well and here's to an excellent 2025, full of good books.