A quick trip to London yesterday to catch the last week of the Edward Burne-Jones exhibition at Tate Britain. (It finishes on 24th – so go now!) Beyond the best-known paintings such as The Golden Stairs and Laus Veneris (above), there was much to take in and admire in the seven rooms of paintings. Here’s a Read More
Author: AnnaBookBel
Wellcome reading 2019 #1 – Polio
Polio: The Odyssey of Eradication by Thomas Abraham In 1988, the World Health Organisation (WHO) together with UNICEF and Rotary International launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI). The aim was to rid the world of the polio virus by 2000. Little did they know that it would take billions of dollars and thirty years Read More
Reading between the lines?
Transcription by Kate Atkinson I really must not wait so long to write my reviews. This was the first book I read in 2019! The good thing is it was such a good book, unlike other lesser fare, I haven’t forgotten what it was all about quite yet. However so many of my blog friends Read More
A doctor’s life as a graphic novel
The Lady Doctor by Ian Williams I just couldn’t resist this graphic novel about Dr Lois Pritchard, a GP who splits her work between a health centre and the local genitourinary medicine clinic in Wales. It’s actually a follow-up to Williams’s debut The Bad Doctor, which Myriad published in 2014. The Bad Doctor followed one Read More
Some good reads from pre-blog days, and what I thought about them…
I’ve kept a master spreadsheet of what I’ve read every year since 2006, two years before I started blogging. There are entries on it from 2004 too, but not a full reading record. While I’ve only kept good stats since around 2010, I did used to write capsule reviews of those pre-blog reads on the Read More
Shiny Linkiness
Just popping in quickly to highlight my latest review at Shiny New Books. Slow Motion Ghosts by Jeff Noon Sometimes a novel just grabs you and won’t let go – Slow Motion Ghosts was one of those books! Jeff Noon is more famed for his alternative Manchester, weird slightly SF novels, but now he has Read More
‘La Serenissima’ a city of masks…
The Hourglass by Liz Heron People pass by on the fondamenta, a canal’s breadth away, and hear the strains of Mozart through the open window. An old recording, its tempo fast, the trio of singers still clear, the insistence on women’s faithlessness unmistakable behind the music’s effervescence. È la fede delle femmineCome l’araba fenice… A Read More
Two new crime thrillers – Harper and Spain
Today I have a review and a Shiny link for you – both thrillers published today. The Lost Man by Jane Harper Let me get the Shiny link out of the way first. The Lost Man is Harper’s third crime thriller, set in the Australian outback. Whereas her first two featured Aaron Falk, a cop Read More
Not one, but two longlists full of interesting books…
The International Dylan Thomas Prize Announced last week, the longlist for the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize is full of interesting writing – and I’ve read two of them! This prize is awarded for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged 39 or under, named for the Read More
Six Degrees of Separation: Fight Club
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 titles will take you to my reviews. So without further ado, our starting book this month is … Fight Club by Chuck Palahnuik Not a book I’ve read, but I Read More
The Name of the Rose – chunk the third…
Well, that’s that! I finished the NotR yesterday, just in time for this post to make my original aim to read and write about it through January. Do check out my posts on the first and middle thirds of the book here and here. The final part, days five to seven, begins with Eco giving Read More
Library Loans #2
Hot on the heels of my reviews yesterday of the first books I borrowed from the library, I returned them this afternoon – and picked up five more… The Waters & The Wild by DeSales Harrison – An American novel published here last year, described as “a bewitching literary suspense debut, rich in atmosphere and Read More
Two from the Library… yes, you did read that correctly!
I finally got a new library card last month, after not having borrowed from there since my daughter was a toddler when we used to visit weekly to stock up on picture books. I do need to spend less, to buy fewer books, but not zero – I couldn’t possibly do that! So I’m hoping Read More
Name of the Rose readalong – chunk the second
After several days of a headachy flu bug and phlegm and not being able to concentrate on any taxing reading, I was well enough earlier this week to get back on course with The Name of the Rose and am now into the final third of the book. I’ve now almost completely lost my voice, Read More
Wellcome Book Prize 10th Anniversary Blog Tour
I was delighted to be asked to take part in this blog tour, running ahead of the announcement of the 2019 Wellcome Book Prize longlist in February. This most unique of literary awards which “rewards exceptional works of literature that illuminate the many ways that health, medicine and illness touch our lives,” is ten years Read More
Weekend Miscellany
Name of the Rose update: Last weekend I was laid low by a flu-bug and just couldn’t concentrate on NotR, so I’m only up to the end of ‘Day Three’. The chesty cough I was left with from the flu-bug has this morning developed into pharyngitis – I have no voice at all, and a Read More
Review Catch-up #4 from 2018
This really is the last pair of books I read in the tail end of 2018 – from here-on in it’ll be 2019 reading all the way! But first two book group choices: Firstly the book we read over Christmas and discussed last week, and then February’s book – I’m writing about it now so Read More
Shakespeare at the Beach
Oh, I Do Like to Be… by Marie Phillips I adored Marie Phillips’ debut novel, Gods Behaving Badly, which I read in 2008 pre-blog, but did write a few lines on my trusty spreadsheet… “What happens if you’re an ancient Greek god or goddess, but nobody believes in you any more? This delightfully fun and Read More
Review Catch-up #3 from 2018
Yet another pair of shorter reviews of books I read at the tail-end of 2018. Where Shall We Run To? by Alan Garner I shall be reviewing this book at length for Shiny but it warrants a short write-up here too. I am a big Alan Garner fan (see here), and I can think of Read More
Name of the Rose readalong – chunk the first
Here’s my report on the first chunk my ‘Echoes of Eco’ readalong of The Name of the Rose. Feel free to pitch in with your comments and links if you’re joining in, it’ll be lovely to see what you’re making of it so far. I plan to get to the end of the ‘fourth day’ Read More
Review Catch-up #2 from 2018
More shorter reviews of books I read towards the end of 2018… The Language of Kindness: A Nurse’s Story by Christie Watson There are so many books written by hospital doctors these days – of all types. Surgeon’s stories in the operating theatre; junior doctor’s comedic diaries; heart-breaking lives cut short by cancer – they fill shelves Read More
Six Degrees of Separation: The French Lieutenant’s Woman
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. Our starting book this month is … The French Lieutenant’s Woman by John Fowles I read this many years ago – yes, after the 1981 film with Meryl came out, so early 1980s Read More
Review Catch-up #1 from 2018
I’ve got a pile of books I finished reading in 2018 that I haven’t reviewed yet. Some deserve their own posts, but here’s a pair of shorter write-ups. The Atlas of Disease by Sandra Hempel This is a curious book – ostensibly an ‘atlas’ produced using the latest data available, in which the author charts Read More
Name of the Rose Readalong
Last November I told you of my plans to re-read The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, and some of you said you might join in… Well I’m ready! I shall be reading my Folio Society edition, which is the original translation by William Weaver, but with some glorious extra artwork by Neil Packer Read More
My life in books I read in 2018
Happy New Year! I thought I’d do one more post looking backwards to the books I read last year, so I’ve resurrected this meme which is good fun… Book titles links take you to my reviews as always. Using only books you have read in the past year, answer these questions. Try not to repeat Read More
Year End Review #6: My Books of the Year!
And finally, in my review of my reading year, it’s my Books of the Year. I always save this post for last, in case there’s a late entry. I’ve given up trying to keep the list to a dozen and have ended up instead with a baker’s dozen, plus some runners up. All of these Read More
Year End Review #5: The Stats!
I still love compiling this post each year. I consult my trusty spreadsheet which has over ten years of basic data on it, and pull out some comparative figures about my year of reading. The top graph is accurate up to yesterday, the others to Boxing Day! For those of you who don’t like the Read More
Year End Review #4: Non-Fiction
This isn’t going to be a long post, as I’ve talked about a lot of my non-fiction reading this year recently during Non Fiction November (see here), but since that post, I’ve added several more books to that list, making my non-fiction total 31 in 2018 as of today. That’s just about 22% which is Read More
Year End Review #3: In Translation
Last year I gave books read in translation their own review – the aim was to encourage myself to read more in 2018 – I managed just 14 (10%) in 2017. This year, (up to Christmas Day cut-off) I’ve read 25 novels originally published in other languages which is just under 18%, so I’ve done Read More
Year End Review #2: The Disappointments
The DNF and the DNGS This year I was perhaps, lucky in my reading – there was only one book that I gave up on having got a little way in, despite its fab cover, and that was The Testament of Loki by Joanne M Harris. I won’t dwell on this, but you can read Read More
