Translated by Don Bartlett and Don Shaw Alerted belatedly to Dolce Bellezza’s Norway in November reading month, I was able to find a novella to fit in, thus fitting #NovNov24 too. Back in 2014, I read Loe’s Lazy Days, a novel about a family on holiday, although Bror is meant to be writing. Instead he Read More
Tag: #NovNov24
2 more novellas for #NovNov24: A ‘Maigret’ by Simenon and a ‘Parker’ by Stark
The Madman of Bergerac by Georges Simenon (No 15) Translated by Ros Schwartz Inspector Maigret is embarking on a holiday, going to the Dordogne to see an old friend and colleague, with a small job to do in Bordeaux on the side, while Madame Maigret is visiting her sister in Alsace. In his sleeper compartment, Read More
Three to See the King by Magnus Mills, #NovNov24
Somehow I managed to miss reading Mills’ third novel, published in 2001, before. Time to put that right. Although Mills’ novels are always about work, and usually and specifically, men and their work (or hobbies) – they do fall into two camps. About half are set in the real world of today – from the Read More
Nonfiction November Week 3 – Book Pairings
Week 3 of Nonfiction November is the always intriguing Book Pairings topic, hosted by Liz at Adventures in reading, running and working from home. Nothing had occurred to me as suitable pairings this year, until it did. Not once, but twice! Again, I’m taking the opportunity to combine this with #NovNov24 by pairing two short Read More
#NovNov24 – an assortment of Novellas – Morpurgo, Magariel, Schenkel
Book Group Report – War Horse by Michael Morpurgo Just occasionally in our book group, we’ll read a children’s book – usually a classic – and War Horse will surely become a modern one. It begins: My earliest memories are a confusion of hilly fields and dark, damp stables, and rats that scampered along the Read More
A Screenplay for #NovNov24 – Dougal and the Blue Cat by Eric Thompson
Reading screenplays is difficult, with fewer clues apart from stage directions to imagine the scene, they often come across as strange and in the case of the first Magic Roundabout movie, completely bonkers. The screenplay written by Eric Thompson, (Emma’s dad, in case you didn’t know), who wrote the English scripts to all the episodes Read More
Shiny Linkiness – Despentes and Ayoade
I’ve two recent reviews at Shiny to share with you here too. Both are lockdown books, such is the length of the publishing cycle. Dear Dickhead by Virginie Despentes Translated by Frank Wynne I would never have predicted that Virginie Despentes, creator/director of the 2000 rape-revenge novel and film Baise-moi, author of the superb ‘State of Read More
