Moon over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch This is the second novel in Aaronovitch’s ‘Rivers of London‘ series of humorous police procedurals involving magical crimes in contemporary London. If you’ve not read the first volume Rivers of London – head over here to find out about it – for you won’t understand much of what’s going on Read More
Author: AnnaBookBel
A Russian fairytale
The Year of Miracle and Grief by Leonid Borodin, translated by Jennifer Bradshaw Leonid Borodin was a writer, Soviet dissident and Christian. He was born in Irkutsk – one of those areas of Russia only familiar to me through the board-game Risk! He was imprisoned twice, the second time after the English publication of his Read More
The grown-up conclusion to Garner’s Weirdstone trilogy
This post was republished into it’s original place in my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive. Boneland by Alan Garner Last month I was privileged to attend a lecture given by Alan Garner , and came home enthused to read everything he has written, starting with the ‘Weirdstone Trilogy’. I’d read the first two books as Read More
Britten centenary – my memories of Noyes Fludde …
This weekend marks the centenary of the birth of composer Benjamin Britten. Radio 3 is celebrating with ‘Britten 100’, a weekend of programmes. I thought I’d celebrate too with some personal memories from my younger years of listening to and performing some of his works… In 1966, the Canadian conductor Arthur Davison, who had made his Read More
A novel about men and their ‘work’ – it must be Magnus Mills!
This post was republished into my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive Explorers of the New Century by Magnus Mills Mills fifth novel is another very dark and subversive comedy about his speciality – men and their work. This time though, it’s not about manual labourers, white van-men, bus drivers or any of their Read More
50th Anniversary of the Assassination of JFK
The Assassination of JFK: Minute by Minute by Jonathan Mayo I was just three and a half when JFK was assassinated, so I remained blissfully unaware of the tragedy that had happened on 22nd November 1963. They say it’s one of those events that everyone remembers where they were when they heard the news. I’ve Read More
YA books and sex!
I wasn’t going to write a post featuring the book below as it was a DNF (Did not finish) for me, but it did raise questions and I wanted to ask your opinions, especially after I heard someone calling for debate on lowering the age of consent to 15 on the radio this morning … Read More
Woman, interrupted …
The Pumpkin Eater by Penelope Mortimer This painful novel, her seventh published in 1962, is widely regarded as Penelope Mortimer’s most famous. It was filmed with Anne Bancroft, Peter Finch and James Mason in the leading roles and, it is the Oscar-nominated Bancroft who graces the cover of the Penguin that I inherited from my Read More
‘A Duty-Dance with Death’ – ‘So it goes’
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut This was our book group’s choice for discussion in November. Whilst it’s fair to say that whilst nobody loved it, and some didn’t get on with it at all, it did provoke some good discussion. I quite enjoyed it, and would certainly read more by Vonnegut. My only previous experience with Read More
Rediscovering Alderley Edge’s Old Magic
This post was republished into it’s original place in my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive. The Weirdstone of Brisingamen & The Moon of Gomrath by Alan Garner After going to see a lecture given by Alan Garner, reported here, I naturally wanted to read more by him, and especially to (re)read the Weirdstone Trilogy. In Read More
How to add to your wishlists with Nick Hornby…
This post was combined and republished into my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive. The Complete Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby One of the easiest ways of adding lots of books to your wishlists, (apart from the recommendations of other bloggers of course), is to read a book about books. Even better if said book Read More
‘November spawned a monster’?
This post was combined from two and republished into it’s original place in my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive. Autobiography by Morrissey First thoughts: Is anyone planning to read Autobiography by Morrissey? I’ve got a copy, and am admitting to feeling daunted by it. The opening lines go like this: My childhood is streets upon Read More
Now my shelf is full …
With the arrival of the final volumes (Orange and Grey) from the Folio Society, my collection of Andrew Lang’s collected fairy tales is complete, and they fit that shelf perfectly. I really must stop buying books now until after Christmas – except as presents, and those already on order, and I do have a full Read More
Stephen King’s Dark Tower #6
Song of Susannah by Stephen King King’s magnum opus is not a series that you can jump into midway through, so if you’ve not read it, I suggest you start at the beginning. See my post with links to all of the volumes and find your starting point, don’t read on. It’s fair to say Read More
‘The sleep of reason brings forth monsters’
Dark Satanic Mills by Marcus & Julian Sedgwick, John Higgins, Marc Olivent It’s a rare thing for me to read a graphic novel – in fact the only one I’ve read since starting this blog was The Crow by James O’Barr, (see here). When I finished reading that, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to Read More
Old heads on young shoulders, and yet …
Absolute Beginners by Colin MacInnes Narrated by an eighteen year old photographer, MacInnes’ novel captures the essence of what it was like to be a teenager in London in the late 1950s … Mr Wiz continued, masticating his salmon sandwich for anyone to see, ‘It’s been a two-way twist, this teenage party. Exploitation of the Read More
A lecture by Alan Garner
This post was republished into it’s original place in my blog’s timeline from my lost posts archive. This week I went to see the ‘Magical Books: From the Middle Ages to Middle-earth’, exhibition at the Bodleian Library in Oxford during its final days (it finishes tomorrow) – I’ve been meaning to go all summer ever since Read More
Ten Books that Represent Great Britain
A couple of days ago, Simon at Savidge Reads and Thomas at My Porch created a new meme (Yes Simon, I know you didn’t want to call it a meme, but it is one – a nice one!). The challenge is to pick ten books that sum up your own country geographically but authors from that Read More
The answers are in Africa in this novel …
The Coincidence Authority by J W Ironmonger At first glance this novel may seem like a quirky romance between two unlikely would-be lovers, Azalea and Thomas, who having found each other, get mixed up in Azalea’s quest to analyse what she believes are coincidences that happened to her family, and many father figures. Underneath this Read More
Q&A with Jane Thynne, author of ‘Black Roses’
Back in March, I reviewed a fabulous romantic thriller set in pre-WWII Germany. Black Roses by Jane Thynne is the story of Clara Vine, a young actress who goes to Berlin to pursue a film career and ends up as a British spy and confidante of Magda Goebbels, the infamous First Lady of the Third Reich. Read More
Telling it from the monster’s side …
Sad Monsters: Growling on the Outside, Crying on the Insideby Frank Lesser. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been having a chuckle dipping into this book of humorous short pieces, which are written from monsters’ points of view. Almost any monster you can think of puts in an appearance – let me give you a Read More
Introducing Bernie Rhodenbarr
It’s some years since I read one of Lawrence Block’s crime novels, and then I’ve only read the first twelve of his seventeen Matt Scudder books. In this series alcoholic ex-cop turned private investigator Scudder plies his trade around the shady joints of NYC. Scudder is a very likeable PI, but the books are quite Read More
Gothic with a twist
Isabel’s Skin by Peter Benson Peter Benson is one of those underrated British authors that never write the same book twice. Each novel is different. I’ve only read one of his before: that was Odo’s Hanging about the commissioning of the Bayeux Tapestry published in the mid 1990s. Lately he’s been best known for Two Cows and Read More
What a Wonderful World – the Blog Tour stops here today…
Today science writer Marcus Chown’s blog tour to promote his book What a Wonderful World: One Man’s Attempt to Explain the Big Stuff, stops here! Marcus is the cosmology consultant of New Scientist magazine, and has published several successful popular science volumes which have delighted science enthusiasts on cosmology, quantum physics, and other physics concepts, Read More
What a cast!
A vintage theatrical diversion for you today… Sorting through a pile of assorted clippings, programmes etc of my late mum’s I found this theatre programme … and my first thought was ‘What a cast!’ You can see for yourself … The Way of the World is one of the very best Restoration comedies, first performed in Read More
Life by the tracks …
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson I couldn’t bring myself to spend £12.99 on the hardback of this novella, but now it is out in paperback I snapped it up as I’d heard great things about it – and wilderness novels always seem to appeal to me. Train Dreams tells the life story of Robert Grainier, Read More
From drifter to hitman …
King of the Ants by Charlie Higson Comedian and author Charlie Higson has lately been very successful in scaring the pants off older children with his rather wonderful zombie novels, and giving a sense of thrilling adventure in his Young Bond series. You may not be aware that before all that, he wrote four gritty adult Read More
A man walks into a bar…
The Weir by Conor McPherson Occasionally we like to have a different kind of reading experience in our Book Group, and for this month’s read, we chose a play. This particular choice was prompted by the fact that the father of one of our number was mounting a production later this autumn. Older plays on the Read More
For popular science book fans …
A little bit of advance publicity. Marcus Chown writes for New Scientist, and has a new book coming out on October 3rd. It’s called What a Wonderful World: One Man’s Attempt to Explain the Big Stuff, and I’m delighted to be taking part in his blog tour. You can see all the blogs taking part Read More
From Here to Eternity – first thoughts …
One of the books I’m currently reading is James Jones’s doorstop of a novel From Here to Eternity. First published in 1951, it’s set in Hawaii, and follows the peacetime exploits of G company in the months immediately preceding Pearl Harbor and the USA’s entry into WWII in 1941. It has just been republished with Read More
