Hello, this is my first posting to any group on LibraryThing. I'm trying the 50 Book Challenge because I'm so engrossed with this site at the moment, I'm worried it's going to cut down on my reading time (I am a list maker and have read almost 100 books in a year in the past).

In January I read:

A Killing Frost by R D Wingfield
Nella Last's Peace by Nella Last this is the fascinating diary of a housewife writing for Mass Observation in the post World War II period. As well as giving an idea of the national mood after the end of the war, it also shows how soul-destroying the traditional woman's role could be at that time. The diarist had dreamed of being an author when she was a child and has finally achieved published status after her death. The previous book Nella Last's War is equally good if you are interested in the social history of World War II.
Tales of Mystery and Imagination by Edgar Allan Poe. This had been on my bookshelves for ages and one of my aims this year is to read some of the longer standing items on my to be read list, so I ploughed through it. I enjoyed the more famous stories like The Pit and the Pendulum and The Fall of the House of Usher, but some of the earlier stories were very hard going. The cumulative effect of reading all these stories at once is rather disturbing. I wouldn't want to be in his mind!
The Ghost by Robert Harris
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates - This is the best book I read in January - a period piece in a way because of the role of women as portrayed in the book, but timeless in the way that it provokes thought about how easy it is to slip into mediocrity and how we justify compromise to ourselves.
Roseanna by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo - First in a series of Swedish police procedural novels which I have decided to reread since my interest in Scandinavian crime novels was reawkened by reading Henning Mankell. If you have enjoyed Mankell I think you would enjoy this.

So far in February I have read:

The Outcast by Sadie Jones - This is interesting in the contrast between it and Revolutionary Road. Both deal with the fifties but The Outcast is written retrospectively looking at present day concerns (domestic abuse, mental health) and how they were dealt with (or ignored) fifty years ago. This is a very involving story (the first for a while to keep me up later at night than is good for me) but the characters are not as subtly drawn as in Revolutionary Road.

and am halfway through The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield - I'm enjoying it so far and will comment further when I've finished it.

Message edited by its author, May 9, 2009, 1:37pm.

Hi, vestafan!
I have been interested in the Mass Observation diaries lately. I had never heard of them until about a year ago. Sounds like that one was pretty good. You are off to a great start on your reading challenge. Welcome to our group! :) By the way, I read The Thirteenth Tale last fall and loved it.
--BJ

Nella's Last Peace sound interesting. What are Mass Observation diaries? I recently read Revolutionary Road and loved it, too. You're off to a great start this year and definitely a faster reader than me!

Thanks for your messages. Mass Observation started in the late 1930s I think - the idea was to record everyday life through the thoughts of ordinary people. Lots of people did keep the diaries during World War II and there are three compilations of them - I've read Our Hidden Lives and We Are at War: the diaries of five ordinary people in extraordinary times and I've got Private Battles which I'm hoping to get to soon. I love the particular details of people's lives and the feeling you're seeing beneath the propaganda of the time.

I finished The Thirteenth Tale at the weekend. I thought it was a well-written yarn and dealt interestingly with the subject of twins. I have now begun The Vicar's Daughter by E. H. Young. Not very far into it yet, but so far it seems a sensitive and perceptive look at the quietly desperate middle class in the 1920s.

I'm finding this group very good at keeping me on track with reading and not getting distracted!

Message edited by its author, May 9, 2009, 1:38pm.

Finally finished The Vicar's Daughter by E. H. Young this weekend. I found her to be sensitive to the insecurities of the socially isolated but sometimes the internal agonising of the characters was rather heavy going. I then turned to Blaming by Elizabeth Taylor which I thoroughly enjoyed. The author seemed to me to be equally perceptive, but her writing was so elegant and precise it was a joy to read.

I've now started Utopian Dreams by Tobias Jones. The author spent a year living in different communities, and writes about his experiences. He's interested in what difference the ideology of a community (political, social or religious) makes to its success.

Message edited by its author, Feb 23, 2009, 10:00am.

Having finished Utopian Dreams, I have now started on No Fond Return of Love by Barbara Pym, a recent Virago Modern Classic, picked up in a 3 for 2 offer at a local Waterstone's (no willpower). Pym's books deal with the lives of genteel ladies in the fifties and early sixties (often in modest professions or married to a clergyman). They are much better written and interesting than I have just made them sound!

I appear to be managing about 6 books per month but I haven't yet embarked on any of the more weighty books reproaching me from the shelves, so I might slow down as the year goes by.

Read 7th Heaven by James Patterson at the weekend - in fact in about 3 hours. His books seem to be rolling off a production line now - very disappointing.

I'm having a light reading week so I've moved onto 31 Dream Street by Lisa Jewell.

Finished 31 Dream Street last night - I don't read much of this genre, but this author isn't bad - I've now moved on to No Trace by Barry Maitland, a crime novel about the disappearance of a child.

I've definitely been reading more purposefully since I started this challenge - and watching less TV, which is probably a good thing.

Hi Vestafan,

You've been reading some of my favourite authors! I read Blaming last month and agree exactly with what you say about it.

I read Jenny Wren by E.H Young at the end of last year and appreciated her thoughtful approach but she definitely lacks the precision and subtlety of Taylor. I am still looking forward to reading the sequel, The Curate's Wife, though. Another thing I liked was the setting of Clifton in Bristol, which is where my grandmother was from.

Oh and I LOVE Barbara Pym! I haven't read No Fond Return of Love yet but am planning on getting hold of the new Virago edition very soon!

Hello Soupdragon

I'm having to ration my Elizabeth Taylor consumption, but think I might go for A Game of Hide and Seek next.

Did you know that there's a biography of Elizabeth Taylor being published in April this year? It's published by Persephone and I found the details while 'browsing' on Amazon.

I haven't worked out how to embed links into LT messages yet, but here is the link in all its messiness:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Other-Elizabeth-...

I'm having a light week this week, reading some library books (yes, I still borrow things, as well as having more TBR than is reasonable)!

Thanks for the link Vestafan, (I can't do the short and snappy ones either!)

That's another one that's gone straight to my Amazon wishlist. Did you notice that the author is Nicola Beauman, Persephone's founder?

I finished No Trace at the weekend and whizzed through The Miracle at Speedy Motors by Alexander McCall Smith. I love the Mma Ramotswe books, and althought I feel the portrayal of Botswana and its people might be rather idealised, I'm prepared to suspend disbelief for the short time it takes to read one of this series.

I've now moved on to a classic I've been meaning to read for ages - The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford.

Oh, I have been wondering about The Good Soldier myself. I can't wait to see what you think of it. Have a great day!
--BJ

I finished The Good Soldier last weekend. I found it fascinating and not at all what I had expected. I was anticipating a fairly straightforward narrative, but the narrator is unreliable and although he knows more at the end of the story than at the beginning, it's still not certain if he fully understands what has been happening. It's convincing, because you can believe that if you sat down and gave someone a long account of a relationship, you might be as contradictory as he is. I can imagine reading it again in the future and getting more out of it.

I've started readingA Game of Hide and Seek by Elizabeth Taylor. The clarity of her writing is quite a contrast to the style of Ford Madox Ford.

I finished A Game of Hide and Seek yesterday and enjoyed it immensely. In a restrained way it shows how a woman who has lived an exemplary life with her husband and teenage daughter becomes intensely involved with a man from her past and how this feeling overwhelms her. You really get the feeling of her moving through her everyday life in a trance, oblivious to her daughter's problems, aware only of the relationship outside her marriage. To me, the object of her feelings is not worthy of them, but this only emphasises the apparent irrationality of such a fixation.

On to something lighter now. I've just started Dying to Sin by Stephen Booth, a crime novel set in the Peak District.

I finished Dying to Sin, which I enjoyed, but which doesn't tempt me very much to visit the Peak District - so much mud!

I'm now reading The Making of a Marchioness which I'm enjoying very much so far (just up to the end of Part One).

Finished The Making of a Marchioness today. The men don't come out of it very well, but reading the introduction and the afterword, it seems this reflected the author's own life. I also found Emily's attitude to life wore rather thin when she was being so sorely tried! The first half is better than the second, I think.

I'm now reading The Lost Diaries of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend - this should be a light read, but I enjoy them partly because they are set in Leicester, my home town and mainly because they're very funny.

As I thought, The Lost Diaries of Adrian Mole didn't take very long to read, but I enjoyed it. I'm now reading A Woman of My Age by Nina Bawden, mainly because I heard another of her novels, Family Money, read on BBC Radio Four a week or so ago and enjoyed it very much.

In the past week I've been travelling quite a long way by train, which has given me some of the reading time I used to enjoy when I commuted on a daily basis. So, having finished my Nina Bawden book, I have also finished A Wedding in December by Anita Shreve and The Bad Quarto by Jill Paton Walsh.

You are getting lots of books read these days! Yea!! :) Have a super day!
--BJ

I think my current book will take a bit longer to read - it's Private Battles by Simon Garfield, a book of extracts from Mass Observation diaries written during World War II. It's not only the insight into the Home Front that's interesting, but the comparisons with domestic life today, leading you to speculate on how you would have coped yourself.

I look forward to seeing what you think of that book. The Mass Observation diaries intrigue me. I have been thinking about getting them myself!
--BJ

Finally finished Private Battles - it's longer than the other mass observation books and we had visitors so reading time was curtailed. I enjoyed it, but felt it was a little too long - periods of time when nothing much seemed to happen - but then maybe parts of WW2 seemed to be like that for those at home. billiejean, if you're thinking of trying one of these books, We Are At War might be a better one - it's shorter and deals with the outbreak of WW2, so you could read them chronologically if you wanted to try others. However, if you're looking for the most characterful diarists, Our Hidden Lives probably wins on that score. They're all really fascinating, though, and thought provoking.

I'm having a little light relief now with Circle of the Dead, a crime novel set in Dublin.

Thanks so much for the tips on the mass observation diaries. I am going to add both to my wishlist. Have a super day!
--BJ

Whizzed through Circle of the Dead and also The Overlook by Michael Connelly, both of which I enjoyed while half guessing the outcomes.

I'm now reading The Squire by Enid Bagnold - a Virago Modern Classic I've recently acquired.

I finished The Squire yesterday - an account of a woman's thoughts as she is about to give birth to her fifth child. Not being a mother myself, I can't speak from experience, but it seemed deeply felt and quite frank for a novel written in the 1930s.

I've now begun Is Heathcliff a Murderer?, a book of short essays about puzzling aspects of some 19th century novels, which aims to resolve uncertainties and contradictions in their plots. No doubt this will lead me to add some more items to my TBR pile.

I finished Is Heathcliff a Murderer? and enjoyed it - some of the puzzles would only have been apparent to readers at the time of publication and some would still puzzle today. The side effect is that I now feel like reading more Antony Trollope, but maybe that will have to wait.

I then read Now and Then by Robert B Parker, the most recent of his Spenser novels to come out in paperback. I wouldn't recommend it - if you were starting to read these novels, the early ones are so much better - now I feel he's going through the motions.

Now I'm reading Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis - at the moment my feelings are mixed, so I'll comment when I've finished it.

Finished Lucky Jim this morning, having been distracted by All the Colours of Darkness by Peter Robinson on the way.

How depressing the 1950s seem according to Kingsley Amis! Snobbery, academic rivalry, awful lodgings and bad relationships with women, relieved only by alcohol. Some of the farcical situations are quite amusing, but I disliked most of the characters, even Jim. This is probably a book best read at the time it was published.

I usually enjoy Peter Robinson's Inspector Banks series and this was a good read, although some of the subject matter (which I won't give away for anyone who might yet read it) I found quite depressing.

So, deciding to go along with the prevailing mood, I have decided to read The Road by Cormac McCarthy next. I understand the subject matter is very grim, so I'm bracing myself.

Message edited by its author, May 13, 2009, 6:05am.

I finished The Road at the weekend and am so glad I overcame my dread of the subject matter and read it. It is one of the most powerful and heartbreaking books I have ever read, although I can imagine that not everyone would want to immerse themselves in a world so bleak for any length of time.

I found it quite difficult to choose something else to read after finishing it. Anything too light might seem trivial and another serious book might keep the intensity going at too much of a pitch for too long. Eventually I decided to read The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula LeGuin. This is a book my other half is always recommending (he re-reads it every year or so himself), and so I thought I'd give it a go. So far, I'm finding the plot interesting but the other worldly names are rather irritating. I'm pressing on though, and hope to be more gripped as I progress.

I've finished The Left Hand of Darkness and it's taken me rather a long time for a relatively short book. Partly this is because we had visitors, but it's also because try as I might, I don't seem to be able to embrace the genre of science fiction/fantasy and really enjoy it. This is a book my other half really enjoys and I don't think I'll ever feel as attached to it as him. Although as the book went on I enjoyed the growing relationship between the two main characters and the exploration of the effect of gender and climate on a society, the invented names of months, planets etc were too much of a distraction. I feel I have done my duty trying this genre, but I probably won't be revisiting it very soon.

I've retreated to the familiar world of crime fiction and have just started to read No Time for Goodbye by Linwood Barclay.

Having read No Time for Goodbye, I whizzed through Cold Case by Faye Kellerman. The first I enjoyed as a page-turner, although I don't know how memorable it will be, and the second I enjoyed as one of a series I've more or less kept up with since it started (I still think the first one The Ritual Bath is the best).

Having been lucky with getting a few Persephone books second hand, I've just started reading The Victorian Chaise-Longue by Marghanita Laski, which looks promising.

Since my last post, I have been away visiting family and then out of town for a work meeting. Still, I have read Why I Write by George Orwell and The Bone Garden by Tess Gerritsen.

The Orwell was very interesting - I like the uncomplicated style of his writing and quite a lot of his comments on politics could still apply today. I wonder what his views would have been on the recent banking crisis?

The Gerritsen differed from her usual crime novels because the majority of the book had a historical setting. Although I have a reasonably high tolerance for crime novel gore, some of the descriptions of post-childbirth infections were extremely gruesome. Death or survival was a real lottery before the development of antibiotics and the knowledge of how infections were spread.

I am now reading Bad Blood by Lorna Sage, a memoir of the writer's early life in post-war Britain. I have been meaning to read this for some time and so far it's living up to expectations.

Hi Vestafan. Just to say I've just found your thread and am enjoying it. You've read some of the authors I like (Elizabeth Taylor, E.H. Young, Barbara Pym) and have whetted my interest in others. I agree with you, by the way, that the first half of The making of a Marchioness is better than the second.

I'll call in again!

Hello parmaviolet, thanks for dropping by. I've not been able to log on for long recently for various technical reasons, but since I last posted, I have finished Bad Blood, and also read A Darker Domain by Val McDermid and They Were Sisters by Dorothy Whipple.

I finished Bad Blood feeling nothing but admiration for the author who had succeeded against the odds with very little family support; in fact the family seemed quite toxic in many ways. I always try to imagine how I would have responded to similar circumstances, and I suspect I wouldn't have found it in me to persist in my aims in the same way Lorna Sage did.

A Darker Domain is a standalone novel rather than one of the Tony Hill/Carol Jordan series, and I'm beginning to like these more than the series as I think its getting a little tired. I think A Darker Domain is good, but not up to the high standard set by some of McDermid's earlier novels: A Place of Execution and Killing the Shadows are my favourites.

They Were Sisters was my first Dorothy Whipple book. I found it compelling, particularly the sections dealing with the effect on a family of a bullying father. My only criticism is that for me everything is spelt out a little too much, but it's a good read and she's an author worth a try, I think.

I've not had much time to post recently, but since the last one, I've read three items:

The Pyramid by Henning Mankell
The Piano Shop on the Left Bank by T.E. Carhart
and
The Nose by Nikolai Gogol

I'm very sad as I think I've now read all the Kurt Wallander stories - I wish Henning Mankell would write some more, but I don't think it's likely. I love the slightly melancholic air to the novels.

The Carhart book was very interesting. The author describes how his interest in the piano was reawakened while he was living in Paris and came across a piano shop in his neighbourhood. We have just acquired a piano and at a somewhat mature age, I am attempting to learn to play - this book persuaded me that I probably need to take lessons and also that I would like to visit Paris again. I enjoyed the details about hidden aspects of the city and the protocols involved in getting access to them. The historical information about how pianists like Liszt used to leave wrecked pianos all over the stage after a recital made me realise that there is nothing new under the sun - they must have been the rock stars of their day.

The Nose is a bit of a cheat - it is one of the 1001 Books You Should Read Before You Die and in fact is a short story. It's very surreal and the subject matter contrasts with the formal style (and those double barrelled names!).

For a change of pace and mood, I'm now reading She Done Him Wrong by Mae West.

Finally finished She Done Him Wrong; it took a while because I was distracted by reading Thank You For the Days by Mark Radcliffe which was requested by another reader at the local library. I'd wondered whether to buy this, but I'm glad I didn't - it's an amiable set of anecdotes from his life in music and broadcasting, but nothing particularly special - I think radio is his best medium.

I enjoyed Mae West - no wasted words and makes me want to see some of her films again.

I've now returned to my WWII theme and am reading Love and War in London, another Mass Observation diary - first impressions are very favourable.

Finished Love and War in London today - although I picked it up because of my interest in WWII social history, the most interesting part was the honesty and self analysis of the author, dealing with a moral dilemma which had nothing to do with the war itself. Olivia Cockett must have been quite an unusual person (I can't think of many people who would set themselves to read Finnegan's Wake) and I feel slightly ashamed at my sometimes superficial approach to reading when I see how seriously some people took their cultural life.

I have now embarked on The Grass Is Singing - a novel I've seen recommended for years but am only just getting round to.

"The Nose is a bit of a cheat - it is one of the 1001 Books You Should Read Before You Die and in fact is a short story. It's very surreal and the subject matter contrasts with the formal style (and those double barrelled names!)."

I'm not sure why you would say "The Nose" is a cheat. Wouldn't we maybe say that the cheat was on the part of the person who put a short story on that 1001 Books list rather than on the part of Gogol, who wrote the story completely unaware that someday somebody would compile such a list?

At any rate, one of my favorite short stories ever! Boy, would I love to be able to read that story again for the first time!

Anyway, nice list. Happy reading!

Hello rocketjk

Thanks for dropping by. I certainly meant no disrespect to Gogol, a writer that's new to me and whose short stories I will definitely be returning to. It just seemed odd that a weighty novel is equally one of the 1001 books - it just shows up the innate impossibility of choosing a list of recommended works.

I've just looked at your profile and I notice that Philip Roth is one of your favourite authors. I have two of his novels, The Plot Against America and American Pastoral, neither of which I've read. Would you recommend one as being a better introduction to Roth than the other?

So much to read so little time!

Happy reading to you and have a good day.

I finished The Grass is Singing yesterday - sooner than I expected due to a sleepless night. I wouldn't say I enjoyed it, but I did admire it. It gives a damning portrayal of mid twentieth century Southern Rhodesian society and of a marriage between two flawed and incompatible people. From the start you know it ends in the murder of one of the them and its just a question of how it comes about. The way in which people take on the colonialist attitudes of the farmers despite their good intentions is perceptively drawn, and the mixture of domination and fear in the white farmers' relationship with their black workers comes over very powerfully.

A little light relief was required after that and I've just raced through Oxford Menace by Veronica Stallwood, a light but enjoyable crime novel set in Oxford.

Hi vestafan! Interesting set of books. If you like Scandi crime, I can also recommend Pernille Rygg's The Butterfly Effect. I saw you have Steig Larsson - Män som hatar kvinnor recently came out as a movie, though I haven't read or seen it - would you recommend it?

Hello ljbwell - good to hear from you. Thanks for the Pernille Rygg recommendation - I'll add it to my Books to look out for list. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is still on my to be read list so I can't give an opinion although all the reviews I've read have been positive. Have you any other Scandinavian crime fiction recommendations? I've read the Henning Mankell books and the older series by Sjowall and Wahloo, and I'm wondering if any of the Icelandic authors are worth a try.

Thanks for dropping by - happy reading!

I've just finished Good Evening Mrs Craven, a collection of stories by Mollie Panter-Downes which she wrote for the New Yorker magazine during World War II. I enjoyed them - they're well written in a very accessible style with occasional dashes of humour, all looking at the Home Front and mainly the experience of women. Written mainly from the point of view of the upper middle class who were feeling the absence of servants, but touching on more universal experiences during wartime.

#40> Hi, vestafan. Sorry it took me a while to get back here. Of the two Roth books you mentioned, American Pastoral, in my opinion, is better by far. I found The Plot Against America to be great for the first half, but to fade away noticeably in the second half. Another relatively recent Roth novel I very much recommend is The Human Stain.

Funny you mention the Icelandic authors - I only just the other day saw Arnaldur Indridason on another LTer's thread and was intrigued myself. No idea, other than what I read there.

As for Swedish crime, I think being so surrounded by it, I actually try to avoid it. :-) I loved Let the right one in, but that is vampire, not trad crime - though a lot of similarities. My other fave is a) quirky and b) not in English (keep an eye out for Zac O'Yeah's "The Tandoori Elk").

I've heard good things about Camilla Läckberg and Håkan Nesser, but again, haven't read them.

Sorry I can't be of more help!

Message edited by its author, Jul 20, 2009, 3:50pm.

Thanks, rocketjk

I've many many books tbr but will put American Pastoral first when I try a Philip Roth.

Thanks ljbwell

Coincidentally, I was looking at Let the Right One In in a bookshop the other day and decided not to buy it - maybe I'll look again. The Tandoori Elk is completely new to me - so far as I can tell its not published in English yet, but the title is pretty unforgettable so I'll look out for it.

Just finished Killer Heat by Linda Fairstein, a crime novel set in New York. I enjoyed it, but think that a bit too much historical background has been inserted into her last few novels, in a way that doesn't sit very easily with the plot. It's a real talent to wear research lightly, which this doesn't quite achieve.

I finished The Summer Book by Tove Jansson today. This was a recommendation from my OH and I loved it - a beautiful and unsentimental evocation of the relationship between grandmother and granddaughter against the background of summer holidays spent on a small island.

I finished Under the Paw by Tom Cox this morning - a light and mainly humorous look at his affection for and relationships with cats. As someone who has only recently become a cat owner, I identified with a lot of the quirks of feline character and my own rationalisations of cat behaviour - however, even though it was essentially a light read, I was still affected by the accounts of animal misfortune and illness, and have come to the conclusion it's better for me to stay away from books of this kind in the same way its better not to poke at a sore tooth.

Hello Sue;
Are cats not one of the most fascinating creatures to watch? I have 6. We did have 7 but one (she was 17) disappeared over the winter. But I love to sit and watch them. Whether they are inside or outside I just love to watch how they interact with each other, how they are so easily distracted by a sound or movement. (as opposed to our dog who becomes fixated on one object to the point of obsession and will NOT be distracted) They are so delicate when they bathe themselves. Don't you just love them?
"in the same way its better not to poke at a sore tooth." You do have the turn of a phrase there girl. I have never heard that one before. LOL
later,
belva

Hi Belva

Thanks for dropping by. I agree, we spend hours watching our cat, and we only have one (originally we rehomed two last year, but the mother who was a very old lady, died not long afterwards). Our cat has now been an only cat and therefore the centre of our attention for about a year and we're not sure how she'd welcome sharing the limelight with another cat. When we first got her, she had bad teeth and an eye infection and its such a pleasure now to see her able to groom herself so meticulously and look up with eyes that show no signs of soreness. I wouldn't be surprised if we got another cat or two sometime in the future.

Have a good day

Sue

Just finished reading A Particular Place by Mary Hocking today. Given the subject matter (clergy in a small town), I was expecting something like a Barbara Pym, and was surprised to find that it was written at the end of the 1980s. Apart from a few contemporary references, I thought the book could have been written 25-30 years before it was. I liked the open-endedness of the conclusions, but guessed how the central dilemma would have to be resolved quite early on in the book.

I just finished Angela Carter's The Passion of New Eve this morning, and while I appreciated that she is a fine writer, I must admit to admiring rather than enjoying this book. I could appreciate the examination of gender and the way sensations (particularly smell) are described, but I found it hard to empathise with any character. Perhaps this was the wrong Angela Carter book for me - I definitely think I shall try another at a later date.

I finished Saplings by Noel Streatfeild yesterday and I really liked it. The theme of the novel is the harm caused to families, particularly children, by war (in this case, WWII), and shows that no matter how comfortable or even idyllic life was before war broke out, family life as it was before is shattered. Your heart aches for the children, particularly Laurel and Tony.

I finished The Rebecca Notebook today - quite a pleasant collection of essays by Daphne Du Maurier as well as some of her preliminary notes for the novel Rebecca itself. I'm trying to read only Virago Modern Classics this month (short diversion to read Saplings), so my next book will be All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West.

Sue;
I, also just attempted The Passion of New Eve and I think I only made it about 50 pages. Like you, I give her kudos for her writing style but found that I just didn't care for the sensationalism in this particular book. I know there are some who love Angela Carter but based on this one, I don't know if I want to try another although I did buy another one while I was visiting my daughter (They are in the box I shipped home and haven't arrived here yet.) and I already have her Wayward Girls and Wicked Women and The Second Book of Virago Tales. But those are just basically edited by Ms. Carter.
I don't think I will have any trouble fobbing them off on someone if I decide to get rid of them. I am enjoying this month of reading only Viragos. I did break for the book I took on my trip as I needed a tome that would last two weeks so I took and finished Battle Cry of Freedom. Excellent book!~!
Well, I will catch up with you later.
belva

Hi Belva

Good to hear from you - I have also been trying to have a Virago only month (although I broke off to read Saplings which I'd wanted to read for ages as it's so well-spoken of on the Persephone readers group message board.

It's interesting that you felt the same way about The Passion of New Eve as I did. I think I will give her another chance - I've got The Magic Toyshop lurking somewhere at home - but not for a while.

I've enjoyed my other Virago reading more than the Angela Carter - I read The Rebecca Notebook by Daphne du Maurier, All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West and then moved on to three books about WWII and its aftermath: On the Side of the Angels by Betty Miller, which examined how war affects men and women and their relationships; One Fine Day by Mollie Panter-Downes (which I could flippantly describe as the difficulties of surviving without satisfactory domestic staff - however, that would be rather unfair) and I'm currently reading A Fine of 200 Francs by Elsa Triolet - a collection of four stories about the Resistance in France.

I hope you enjoyed your trip. My OH and myself celebrate our anniversary this week and we are having an overnight stay in Cambridge as a treat. No doubt I shall return home with even more books (LT has introduced me to the joys of rummaging through charity shops and 2nd hand book shops).

Best wishes

Sue

Having finished A Fine of 200 Francs, I finished my month of Viragos with The Life and Death of Harriett Frean by May Sinclair. My September reading has begun with Stranger in the House by Julie Summers, in which women talk about the experience of men returning after World War II and how many were unprepared for how traumatised their fathers/sons/brothers were. Now I'm back to Persephone Books and am reading The Crowded Street by Winifred Holtby

Message edited by its author, Sep 4, 2009, 3:44pm.

Sue;
On the Side of the Angels by Betty Miller, and One Fine Day by Mollie Panter-Downes both sound good to me. I will be on the look out for them. I have Saplings, which I have heard is very good.
And I did fob those Angela Carters off on Andrew. They just might be the ticket for him. I hope he enjoys them. I will try something else by her later. I have heard good things about her. I think I just got hold of the wrong books for me.
Sue, way back at the very beginning of this thread you mentioned that you had read A Killing Frost by R D Wingfield but made no comments on the book. I was wondering how you found it to be. I am trying to decide whether to go for the (I think it is a) trilogy or not. Would you care to tell me what you thought of the book?
I loved the All Virago/All August (or vice versa, whichever) month. I loved each and every one that Andrew chose for me. hee hee
Wasn't I a little chicken to make him go to my library and choose for me? He did a great job. Not a loser in the bunch!~! I am at the moment deep into The Shack. It has had such controversial comments and reviews here on LT that I just had to read if for myself plus a kindly LT friend gifted me with it after he had finished it to see what I thought with the intent that I send it on to another LTer who has not, but wants to read it. So far, so good.
Will catch you later.
love,
belva

Hi Belva

Good to hear from you. A Killing Frost is one of a series of detective stories whose main character is a cantankerous police detective, Jack Frost, who's impatient with the formalities of police investigation and tends to go his own way. I probably started at the wrong end of the series as this is the last I think (the author died recently). Checking on Wikipedia I see that there are six altogether in the series. I think the character was used in quite a long running TV series - I don't know if it's been showed in the U.S. I enjoyed the book and liked the character of Frost as well as seeing how he might drive his colleagues mad. If you like police procedurals I think you would enjoy it. I've been meaning to look for others in the series in the local library, but I've been so engrossed in LT that I haven't had time.

I have really enjoyed exploring the Virago and Persephone series in more depth since I dIscovered LT. As I think you've said elsewhere, the way it broadens the range of reading is fantastically enjoyable and stimulating, whether we achieve the challenges we set ourselves or not, and I love being involved with a community of people who enjoy books and reading as much as I do.

Have a good day
Sue

I finished The Crowded Street and have also just finished House-Bound by Winifred Peck. I'm feeling the need to move a little away from the subjects of single women browbeaten by their families and the difficulties of coping without servants in WWII, although I've enjoyed the books concerned (The Life and Death of Harriett Frean and One Fine Day as well as the two mentioned above).

Enthused by comments on the Persephone readers group, I am about to start Little Boy Lost, which also chimes in with my 999 challenge subject of WWII and its aftermath.

I finished Little Boy Lost at the weekend and thoroughly enjoyed it. As well as the gripping story, the account of post war France was very effective and the main character's emotional turmoil was convincing to such an extent that I found myself speaking aloud to him in utter frustration. This is in my top ten of books read this year.

I'm now reading Mrs Miniver - fortunately for me after my previous post, it's too early in wartime for servant problems to have manifested themselves.

Finished Mrs Miniver last night - it wasn't quite what I was expecting - Greer Garson kept coming to the forefront of my mind and the film which if I remember rightly takes place later in the war than the time that the book is set. I'm slightly surprised that it was considered to be such good propaganda as the life described is limited to a fairly small social group, but maybe the (to me) idyllic picture of family life struck a chord at the time.

I've also just finished In the Dark by Mark Billingham - a crime novel which I thoroughly enjoyed.

I've just finished reading The Blank Wall which I enjoyed very much. As well as the suspense plot, there's also a real feeling of unease relating to the central female's powerless position within the family.

I've just finished reading Forgotten Voices of the Second World War by Max Arthur. It consists of extracts from taped interviews held at the Imperial War Museum arranged chronologically for the period 1939-1945. There's lots more military detail in this book than any other I have read and some of the strategic and technical descriptions were slightly lost on me, but you did get a wide range of accounts of WWII. Historically I found it informative (shamefully I have only an outline knowledge of the sequence of events) and some of the accounts were quite moving. Some things never seem to change - the number of problems caused by lack of communication and equipment that didn't work, but also the matter of fact heroism shown by so many.

Just finished Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh - the tale of an innocent abroad in the world of the rich, cynical and amoral.

Finished The Hours by Michael Cunningham today. A well written novel re-examining the themes of Mrs Dalloway. I enjoyed the film which I saw a few years ago, but the book has greater depth I think.

Just finished Compulsion by Jonathan Kellerman. I enjoyed it, but reading more widely as LT has encouraged me to do, does make me realise how thin some writing is.

I've finished two books since my last post - The House in Paris by Elizabeth Bowen and The Writer on Her Work edited by Janet Sternburg. The House in Paris required some concentration and I was rather distracted by the way in which the children's thoughts were described - in so adult a way that it seemed unreal.

The Writer on her Work is a collection of women writers' thoughts on their writing life. Published in the early 1990s, it reminded me how much more of a presence overtly feminist thought had at that time.

I finished How Fiction Works by James Wood yesterday. Not having studied literature since A levels, I found it accessible and interesting.

I had a few days when I couldn't settle on one book, but eventually I picked up The Warden by Anthony Trollope. Really enjoyed it and am now re-reading Barchester Towers. I'm liking the slower pace these novels require - great reads for long dark evenings.

I'm going through a period where I can't settle with any book in particular. I put Barchester Towers to one side and whizzed through An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear, a historical crime novel set between the two World Wars. Enjoyable, though very light.

Barchester Towers is now complete and I enjoyed the leisurely read. Having slowed down for a while, I'm now whizzing through The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and will probably sit up this evening until I've finished it.

Message edited by its author, Nov 6, 2009, 4:26pm.

I've finished The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo now. I enjoyed it very much although I'm slightly dubious about the amount of detail of some of the violence. I'm now reading The Men Who Stare at Goats which to be honest I'm having trouble taking seriously.

Message edited by its author, Nov 10, 2009, 5:10am.

Finished The Men Who Stare at Goats today. I shall have to withdraw my remark in the last post - the first few chapters just seem mad, but halfway through things take a much darker turn and by the end I was quite disturbed.

My current read is We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver. I find I can only read smallish amounts at a time, because it lowers my spirits. That's not to say I'm not admiring it and it's very thought provoking, but the life of the mother and son seem relentlessly awful. Knowing what will happen from the start the reader knows things won't get any better either. I give the author credit for creating characters that don't feel the need to observe any of the social niceties that, no matter how superficial, get people by on a daily basis.

I finished We Need to Talk About Kevin yesterday - I've not got a lot to add to my previous comments; I'm still thinking about it and puzzling about the motivation of all the major characters.

Depressing in a different way was Double Cross by James Patterson. It could have been written by a computer - why do I bother?

I've just finished Writers Revealed by Rosemary Hartill - an interesting set of interviews with writers about the influence of their beliefs (or lack of belief) on their fiction and approach to writing.