Forester is terrific at meshing the mechanical workings of a vast machine like a ship at war with the personal motivations and attributes of the characters functioning within it. His descriptions of naval tactics and the ways of the sea are unsurpassed.
In the great tradition of N.C.Wyeth and Howard Pyle; gorgeous stuff, beautifully presented!
A kind of extended love letter to one of popular culture's finest creations; lovely!
"The wind in the ash tree sounds likes surf on the shore at Truro. I will shut my eyes...." Gorgeous!
Could Melville write anything that wasn't poetry?
A delightfully illustrated children's book; takes me back!
Another lovely Penguin anthology, full of terrific discoveries!
These older Penguin poetry anthologies are beautiful things, and wonderfully edited; I'm always finding writers who have undeservedly slipped from view.
I have to confess, I bought this book in a secondhand store because I thought the cover was lovely! I see that Bennett Foster has written quite a few westerns, so maybe I'll give it a go.
Originally published as one of three short stories in Monsarrat's Depends What You Mean by Love, this extraordinary tale of a Commander desperate to get his badly wounded battleship back to port is as much a love story as a tale of war at sea. Writing of such ease and almost hidden beauty that it sneaks up on you and makes you go back to read whole passages again; extraordinary!
The first in a truly marvellous series featuring the exploits of Jim Stringer, steam-detective. Historical fiction at its best wrapped up in beautiful writing, interesting characters, intriguing plots and (of course) the pleasures of steam railways!
What a great idea, and beautifully realised. So many marvellous poems in here!
Still one of the finest volumes of gay poetry.
Hero by Perry Moore
The author of this lovely book died far too soon. The young hero is here coming-out in so many ways, making clear the parallels we've always known about with secret lives.
The character of Superman deserved a great novel, and this is it. So much more than a generic superhero slugfest, this is the young Clark Kent growing up in Depression era America, and just starting to figure it out. Marvellous!
Really charming! Who would have thought, baseball and haiku?
I'd never read any Jack Higgins and found this lying around a beach house, so picked it up and started reading; terrifically well paced with well delineated characters.
Nicholas Monsarrat is a recent discovery, and I'm totally bowled over! A bit like C.S.Forester in that his writing is so natural, it sneaks up on you until you suddenly realise that you're reading something utterly remarkable.
Simply one of the most gripping reads I've had recently. We forget (I think) what a great writer Forester was because his writing is so natural and "artless". A bit like the movies of John Ford: "I make westerns....."
A children's book I picked up in an second-hand bookshop in Woodend (Victoria, Australia); a sweet little book with really charming drawings. I also nabbed a companion volume called Sailors of the Queen, which is also quite lovely!