HAPPY NEW YEAR! It’s a grey day here in Abingdon and the anticipated hard frost didn’t materialise, so I’m hoping that it is not quite so cold as the past few days have been. This means a good brisk walk to start working off all those chocolates. I’m not good at making, or keeping, New Read More
A Great Year of Reading
I’m so pleased with my reading this year. I’ve managed to read 114 books – the most I’ve read in a year since my commuting days (when I could easily polish off 3 or 4 books a week in a hour each way journey). I’ve reviewed them all on Librarything and the full list of Read More
The Ice Queen by Alice Hoffman
I have my Secret Santa to thank for reading this book – it was unputdownable, a wonderful choice – thank you! The Ice Queen by Alice Hoffman is a quirky, modern fairy tale taking its inspiration from the Brothers Grimm. A young girl wishes her mother dead, and then when it happens, she lets it Read More
The Island at the End of the World by Sam Taylor
This book is definitely one of those love it or loathe it novels. You’ll either love it – for the clever plotting and gradual reveal of what has happened to its family, or loathe it primarily because many chapters are written in eight year old Finn’s phonetic speaking voice, where things like changing an ‘a’ Read More
Ho! Ho! Ho!
Just in case the jokes in your crackers are awful, here’s some more … Q: What is an ig?A: An Eskimo house without a loo Q: What’s orange and smells of carrots?A: Rabbit sick Q: What’s yellow and stupid?A: Thick custard Q: What do you call a girl with a shrimp on her head?A: Barbie! Read More
Hearts and Minds by Rosy Thornton
The British campus novel is generally a cosy thing (unless there’s a murder involved). Often they can be rather claustrophobic too, peopled with backbiting dons, scheming students, and inscrutable college servants, all of which give opportunities for creating high comedy – naturally I’m thinking David Lodge here, or the funniest of all, Porterhouse Blue by Read More
Book Bloggers Secret Santa
I signed up for the Book Bloggers Secret Santa last month, and chose and sent my gift. This morning the postlady brought me a packet of joy! My present from my Secret Santa had arrived. I couldn’t wait to get inside the jiffy, nice purple wrapping paper (gets the thumbs up from Juliet who is Read More
My best books of the year
I can’t resist it! Being a bit of an inveterate list-maker (how sad is that!), and as everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn’t I – I feel compelled to share my best reads of the year with you. To add a little interest, I’ve created some categories to put them in. I’ve had Read More
Love In A Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford
Set between the wars, this novel follows the lives and loves of an impossibly rich and aristocratic family – the Montdores, seen through the eyes of Fanny, a childhood friend of their daughter Polly. Being from a less well-to-do family, but in demand by the Montdores as a sensible friend, Fanny is ideally placed to Read More
Book Group Annual Report
The book group I belong to doesn’t have a name – we’re all just mates. Membership varies with a core of about eight, then half a dozen or so occasional visitors, whom it is lovely to see when they can make it. Here’s what we read this year (the scores are my ratings, not group Read More
Short Takes
I’d like to introduce you to a couple of books that I particularly enjoyed earlier this year before I started my blog … Gold by Dan Rhodes. This is a gently humorous novel about Miyuki and her annual trip to the same Welsh seaside village out of season, where she walks, reads, and drinks beer Read More
Blindness by Jose Saramago
Translated by Margaret Jull Costa 1997 Nobel laureate Saramago was born in 1922 and is considered to be Portugal’s top living writer. He wrote this novel in 1995 and what a book it is! This was our book group choice for December, and we all found it an intense and compelling read. When an epidemic Read More
Oliver Postgate R.I.P.
I was so sad to hear of the death on Monday of Oliver Postgate. My childhood TV viewing was full of gems from him. Sadly, I was just beyond the age for the ‘Watch with Mother‘ lunchtime slot when Bagpuss came along, but I have always loved the Clangers … Some years ago, when my Read More
Transmission by Hari Kunzru
This is a novel of globalisation and alienation, set in a world in which electronic communication and understanding is instant, but that between humans remains a mystery. Arjun, a naive young Indian thinks he is about to achieve the American Dream. He lands a job in the US, but finds he’s signed up for a Read More
Santa Claus is comin’ to town …
I just got back from my daughter’s school Christmas concert which was lovely. I was amazed though to find out that the perennial favourite Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town (preferably the Springsteen version for me), has some introductory verses: I just came back from a lovely trip along the Milky Way, I stopped off Read More
This had me in fits …
Browsing in my super-local-indie-bookshop Mostly Books yesterday, my eye was drawn to this sitting by the till… Wendy: The Bumper Book of Fun for Women of a Certain Age by Jenny Eclair and Judith Holder. It’s a girl’s type annual for grumpy old women by one of the sharpest comedians on the planet. I only Read More
The Pets by Bragi Olafsson
Translated by Janice Balfour Last year I read some Halldor Laxness, and found the Icelandic humour distinctly hard to get. This contemporary novel by Bragi Olafsson (formerly in the Sugarcubes with Björk) was much less oblique, but despite its relative brevity took some time to get going. When it did though, it became the stuff Read More
Christmas Competition
It’s the first day of advent, and it was Cadburys for breakfast for daughter Juliet. When I was little, there was no chocolate involved in advent calendars. But enough of that humbug! … My blog’s first competition closed yesterday and tis time to find out who won. Firstly thank you to everyone who entered. I Read More
Mummy, what’s your favourite song? …
… asked daughter Juliet, who since her Dad bought some noise cancelling headphones has been glued to the family iPod. Well, where to start? I couldn’t possibly choose just one song, so in time-honoured Desert Island Discs fashion will try to limit it to eight! Here they are, in no particular order: Everybody knows by Read More
Victory for the little guy over bureaucracy!
This was one of those books that once spotted, had to be purchased. A new author to me with an intriguing name and equally interesting book title, a great cover, plus it was an American import that shouted ‘quirky’ at me. There’s nothing I enjoy more than a novel with a bit of quirk in Read More
It’s a beautiful day
I’m sitting looking out over school playing fields, the early morning frost has melted leaving the grass glistening. A few trees stubbornly hang onto their last leaves, and the church spire points heav’nward, contrasting against a hazy blue and cloudless sky. All is perfect except for just one thing … Blooming leaf blowers!!! I can Read More
The Sonnets by Warwick Collins
This is an ambitious novel. The author has taken Shakespeare’s sonnets and created a novel around them, selecting those that fit this narrative – 32 in all, reproduced in full within the text. Although I love Shakespeare’s plays, I’ve never read the sonnets, just knowing a couple of the famous quotes. This novel was a Read More
Alan Coren – 69 for 1
In spare moments after lunch for the past couple of months, I’ve been dipping into the humorist Alan Coren’s last book of columns. I can’t believe it’s over a year since he died, but reading these mini-masterpieces of wit, I can hear his voice, in turns mocking and exasperated, but always with tongue firmly in Read More
By Dickens! …
… I’m enjoying the Beeb’s Little Dorrit. I watched three episodes back to back last night and loved every minute. I have to admit I nearly shed a tear when Little Dorrit left the Marshalsea looking back to lovely, nice Mr Clennam. Talking of Mr Clennam, I definitely prefer Matthew MacFadyen here to his turn Read More
Desert Island Books #2
Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable Some may consider choosing an encyclopaedic dictionary a bit of a cheat, but I maintain that if you were on a desert island with no internet – there is no better book than Brewer’s for frequent dipping into for little nuggets of information. It is simply the original and Read More
Synchronicity & Serendipity
Sometimes in the book blogosphere we’re all looking at books of the moment – several reviews will be posted about a new book or a title in the news – there’s a synchronicity about it all … Take the book I’m reading now for instance – Warwick Collins new novel The Sonnets which puts Shakespeare’s Read More
Moviewatch – Stardust
One of the best films I’ve seen recently on DVD was Stardust. It’s a truly magical comic fantasy adventure for all the family. Neil Gaiman’s fairy tale has been realised beautifully for the screen and features an all-star cast that goes all the way down into some of the smallest parts. The only one who Read More
Le Manoir comes to Abingdon
There was great excitement in Abingdon on Saturday. Raymond Blanc was coming to Mostly Books to do a signing – one of only a handful around the country for his autobiography A taste of my life . I got there half an hour early and was about 15th in the queue. By the time he Read More
Christmas Prizes!
Two of my biggest hobbies, when not reading or blogging, are compiling quizzes and sewing. So I’ve combined both into my blog’s first giveaway with a little festive quiz. Yes, I know it’s only November, but so I can get prizes to wherever they need to go to in time to be useful on a Read More
I’m a Hardy convert!
Back in September on this blog I confessed that I had never read any Thomas Hardy. As this admission coincided with the recent BBC adaptation I chose Tess of the D’Urbervilles to read. I only watched the first two episodes on TV though, and can honestly say I didn’t know the second half of the Read More
