February has been a great month for watching as well as reading. This year I’ve started keeping a watchlist diary. I reported on Facebook for Jan, but want to say more about some of the items I watched, hence this post… Movies on the Small Screen Firstly, my movie of the month is… News of Read More
Month: February 2021
Reading the Decades #2: The 1970s
Those who visit this blog regularly will know of my devotion to contemporary fiction, the shiny and the new. But I’m not really a one-trick pony in my reading. The metrics in my annual reading stats include the number of books I’ve read published before I was born in 1960 and those between 1960 and Read More
Hiiii, Ouaf Ouaf, Crôa Crôa, Coin Coin, Piit Piit
The Strays of Paris by Jane Smiley For those who don’t know their French animal noises (NB: I cheated and looked them up) above we have a neigh, woof, caw, quack and squeak. We can only hear these onomatopeic words, but the animals in Jane Smiley’s new novel can understand each other perfectly. Smiley hasn’t Read More
Blog Tour – Fez Inkwright – Botanical Curses and Poisons
I’m delighted to be the last stop on the the Random Things Blog Tour for Fez Inkwright’s new book, Botanical Curses and Poisons: The Shadow Lives of Plants, just published by Liminal 11. I’ve always had a fascination for ‘poisonous’ plants – not that I want to cultivate them for any nefarious purpose – if Read More
A case of act first, think later…
I Was Jack Mortimer by Alexander Lernet-Holenia Translated by Ignat Avsey Alexander Lernet-Holenia was Austrian, a protégé of Rilke, he wrote poems, novels, plays and screenplays. He served during both world wars, but managed to keep his distance from the National Socialist Party. I Was Jack Mortimer (Ich war Jack Mortimer) was published in 1933, Read More
This can’t be ‘love’?
Made for Love by Alissa Nutting These days as a cynical divorcée, I tend to ascribe to the view that Valentine’s Day is just a marketing exercise that I don’t wish to join in with again, but you can’t get away from it, and even I can be persuaded to read or watch some romantic Read More
Shiny Linkiness
Just a quick post to direct you towards Shiny New Books where I have two reviews posted this week, both from indie publishers: Mr Cadmus by Peter Ackroyd This is Ackroyd having huge fun with not a Victorian in sight! This novella is a sort of dark, twisted version of a quaint British cosy mystery Read More
Indie ✓ – Hungary ✓
Metropole by Ferenc Karinthy Translated by George Szirtes I’m on fire with my reading for #ReadIndies month and #ERC2021, crossing Hungary off the list of European countries with this novel published by Telegram Books, Saqi’s world literature imprint. Metropole is the story of one traveller’s nightmare. Budai, a linguist, was on his way to a Read More
Six Degrees of Separation: Redhead by the Side of the Road
My favourite monthly tag, hosted by Kate at Booksaremyfavouriteandbest, Six Degrees of Separation picks a starting book for participants to go wherever it takes them in six more steps. Links in the titles will take you to my reviews where they exist. This month our starting point is Anne Tyler’s latest, which I’ve yet to read, but Read More
Friday Face-Off Tag – Comparing cover art…
I discovered this weekly tag through a Book Connectors post on FB, anything to avoid writing reviews which are such hard work! The tag was created by Books by Proxy and currently hosted by Lynn’s Book Blog. This week’s theme is ‘a book with a romance that you’ve enjoyed’ (next week’s is ‘something furry’. It Read More
More Indies and Japan – Porter and Tanizaki
Today I have a Shiny link and another Japanese cat for you, both from indie publishers … The Death of Francis Bacon by Max Porter In his third short novel, (my review of his first here), Porter gets even more experimental, presenting a series of imagined word pictures as the tortured artist lies dying in Read More
European Reading x3 – Kundera, Laurain, Malvaldi
I’m taking part in the European Reading Challenge 2021 hosted by Gillion at Rose City Reader this year, hoping to cross off as many European countries as possible in my reading. With these three, I’m up to six in January alone… (Czech Republic, France, Iceland, Italy, Russia, UK). Here are my reviews for the Czech Republic, France Read More
