Charl08 reads

Nice spot for some reading (Derwentwater, The Lake District)

Having lurked on and off on these pages for a couple of years, I'm signing up this year and commit to writing about my reading. So lovely to see so many people doing the same.

From The Restless Supermarket "Reading belongs in the head, behind the eyes, not just under the breath, but inside the folds of the brain."

From The Uncommon Reader “Books are not about passing time. They're about other lives. Other worlds. Far from wanting time to pass, one just wishes one had more of it. If one wanted to pass the time one could go to New Zealand.”

Read in 2015 46

January (25)
Mercy Department Q
One Man, One Murder by Jakob Arjouni
The Absent One by Jussi Adler-Olsen
An Unnecessary Woman by Rabih Alameddine thanks to LizzieD
Truth Peter Temple - Foreign Bodies
Tomorrow there will be Apricots
Bad Boy Brawly Brown -Foreign Bodies
Five Children on the Western Front -Costa
White Butterfly
As the Crow Flies- African Women Writers
Stone Mattress
Lila
Entanglement -Foreign Bodies
Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned
Academy Street - Costa awards
The Miniaturist
The Map of Love - African Women Writers
Memoirs of a Woman Doctor
The Thin Man
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Distant view of a minaret - African Women Writers
A Red Death
How to Be Both
The Children Act
The Toughest Indian in the World

February (21)
The Holy Thief
A Little Yellow Dog
Outline
Elizabeth is Missing - Costa
I was Jack Mortimer
July's People - African Women Writers
Blonde Faith
How to Build a Girl
Our sister Killjoy- African Women Writers
Dept of Speculation
A Man Called Ove recommended by VancouverDeb
Can't we talk about something more pleasant
The Serpent Papers
The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher
The Zig Zag Girl
A Thread of Grace
A Land More Kind Than Home
Kindness Goes Unpunished
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
The Spectre of Alexander Wolf
The Corpse on the Dike

Currently reading
Country Girl
Carnival
Chop Chop Costa Awards
Your Madness not Mine
Harraga

To read in 2015

Foreign Bodies 'challenge' - 3 read so far

• Nigeria The XIth Hour CM Okonkwo
• Australia Truth Peter Temple READ
• US Walter Mosely Bad boy brawly Brown READ
• Poland Zygmunt Miloszewski's Entanglement READ
  
• Thanks to drneutron I can add The Land of Dreams to the wish list too :-)

To reread in 2015
Remains of the day (thanks to Sandykaypax's post)

Reading my bookshelves in 2015

• Middlemarch
• The Broken Road By Patrick Leigh Fermor
• The Story of a Non-marrying Man
• The Periodic Table
• In a Free State
• Season of Migration to the North
• The Wake
• Three Letter Plague

Gateway for Africa / Bookshy's list of 50 Books by African women everyone should read /
I've listed by country of nationality here, but this is obv. simplistic - more bio details on bookshy's page.

5 Read so far in 2015!

1. The Translator - Leila Aboulela (Sudan) READ b4 challenge
2. The Aya Series - Marguerite Abouet (Cote D'Ivoire / France)
3. Half A Yellow Sun - Chimamanda Adichie (Nigeria) READ b4 challenge
4. Americanah READ b4 challenge
5. Changes: A Love Story - Ama Ata Aidoo (Ghana)
6. Our Sister Killjoy - READ
7. African Love Stories: An Anthology READ b4 challenge
8. Our Wife and Other Stories - Karen King-Aribisala (Nigeria)
9. Everything Good Will Come - Sefi Atta (Nigeria)
10. So Long a Letter - Mariama Ba (Senegal)
11. Tropical Fish: Stories out of Entebbe - Doreen Baingana (Uganda)
12. Patchwork - Ellen Banda-Aaku (UK/ Zambia / Ghana)
13. The Shining Girls - Lauren Beukes (South Africa) READ b4
14. We need new names - No Violet Bulawayo (Zimbabwe)
15. Daughters of Africa - Margaret Busby (Ghana / UK)
16. Nervous Conditions - Tsitsi Dangarembga (Zimbabwe) READ b4
17. Woman at Point Zero - Nawal El Saadawi (Egypt)
18. The Joys of Motherhood - Buchi Emecheta (Nigeria)
19. The Memory of Love - Aminatta Forna (Scotland / Sierra Leone) READ b4 challenge
20. July’s People - Nadine Gordimer (South Africa) READ
21. The Collector of Treasures - Bessie Head (South Africa)
22. In Dependence - Sarah Ladipo (Nigeria/ UK)
23. Secret Son - Laila Lalami (Morocco)
24. Sundowners - Lesley Lokko (Ghana/Scotland)
25. Black Mamba Boy - Nadifa Mohamed (UK / Somaliland)
26. Your Madness, Not Mine - Juliana Makuchi (Short Stories, Cameroon)
27. Neighbours: The Story of a Murder - Lilia Momplé (Mozambique)
28. Ripples in the Pool- Rebeka Njau (Kenya)
29. Efuru- Flora Nwapa (Nigeria)
30. I Do Not Come To You By Chance- Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani (Nigeria)
31. The Promised Land - Grace Ogot (Kenya)
32. Bitter Leaf - Chioma Okereke (Nigeria / England)
33. Zahrah the Windseeker - Nnedi Okorafor (US / Nigeria)
34. The Spider King’s Daughter - Chibundu Onuzo (Nigeria)
35. Dust - Yvonne Adhiambor Owuor (Kenya)
36. The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives (Nigeria) Lola Shoneyin READ b4
37. The Map of Love - Ahdaf Soueif (Egypt) READ
38. This September Sun - Bryony Rheam (Zimbabwe)
39. Distant View of a Minaret and Other Stories -Alifa Rifaat (Egypt) READ
40. As the Crow Flies - Véronique Tadjo (Côte d'Ivoire). READ
41. The Blind Kingdom (also by Véronique Tadjo)
42. On Black Sisters Street - Chika Unigwe (Nigeria / Netherlands) READ b4
43. Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria - Noo Saro-Wiwa (Nigeria / England)
44. Butterfly Burning - Yvonne Vera (Zimbabwe).
45. Nehanda (also by Yvonne Vera)
46. Teaching my Mother How to Give Birth - Warsan Shire (Kenya / Somalia)
47. The Ghost Le Revenant in French) - Aminata Sow Fall (Senegal)
48. Men of the South - Zukiswa Wanner (South Africa)
49. David’s Story - Zoe Wicomb (South Africa)

Costa Shortlist novels & category winners

The Lives of Others
House of Ashes
How to Be Both READ
Nora Webster READ

• First novel
A Song for Issy Bradley
Academy Street READ
Elizabeth is Missing READ
Chop Chop

• Biography The Iceberg: A Memoir ABANDONED (TOO GRIM)
• Children’s book - Five Children on the Western Front READ

Non-fiction
Still thinking about this, but tempted by Verso books' feminist publishing list for 2015, which is on the list of 'things I think I should read more about'

• Michèle Barrett and Mary McIntosh The Anti-Social Family
• Lynne Segal Straight Sex: Rethinking the Politics of Pleasure
• Sheila Rowbotham Woman’s Consciousness, Man’s World
• Juliet Mitchell Woman’s Estate
• Shulamith Firestone The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution
• Christine Delphy Dominating Others: Feminism and Racism after the War on Terror.

Plus Being mortal by Atul Gawande

and check my shelves again for other possible 'targets' for the year, and read a book of poetry and a novel in a language other than English.
And Abina and the important men, just because.

(All aspirations only: quite happy to run into 2016!)

Best books of 2015 (so far)

Five Children on the Western Front (Costa book prize list)
Lila
The Map of Love
Dept of Speculation
Can't we talk about something more pleasant

Welcome! Glad you made the plunge. :)

Hi, and welcome to the group!

PS: I love the picture on your profile page - *snork!*

Thanks for the welcome. I've started with a book that I have come to very late - and only been reminded by seeing the film advertised online. I'm not a fan of seeing the film first, so wanted to read this, the first book. I'm a bit confused by the title - they seem to have different names in different places (my copy is called Mercy Department Q, but is coming up elsewhere - including in Librarything as The Keeper of Lost Causes.

I don't read much Scandi-crime (except for the amazing Martin Beck series, e.g. Roseanna) but this was gripping and I've already downloaded the next one. Hoping BBC radio drama might follow up Martin Beck with dramatising this one.

Dropping my star off. Thanks so much for visiting my thread! I read that Jussi Adler-Olsen book and agree with you that it was gripping. My title is The Keeper of Lost Causes. I didn't know that they were making a film - very exciting! I have not gotten to the second book in that series yet, but I do have it on my shelves.

This one's on my list, but I haven't gotten to it yet. I guess I need to! If you're interested in more Scandicrime, I just finished The Land of Dreams, written by a Norwegian author, but set in Minnesota in the Norwegian-American community. It's a three-book arc, really one story, and I had to run out to the library to pick up the second right after finishing the first!

I'm kind of cheating with the next book I just finished One Man, One Murder (Kemal Kayankaya 3). I started this in 2014 and it's not the longest book in the world in the first place! It's in translation from the German, and features a Turkish-German investigator trying to find a missing Thai migrant. I found this series through the first Foreign Bodies series, and thinking about what crime I want to read in 2015, I've used their new series Mark Lawson's Foreign Bodies series

In these latest programmes Lawson went (via fiction) to Cuba, Nigeria, Australia, Poland and the US.
For Cuba - I listened to the dramatisation of Leonardo Padura's Havana Quartet so want to mark him 'done' (!).

I've read (and love) Helon Habila's back catalogue waiting for an angel Helon Habila, but not CM Okonkwo, so adding him to the list for Nigeria.

Australian crime - Truth Peter Temple sounds intriguing (and is also available to order at my local library, even better).

For Polish crime, Zygmunt Miloszewski's Entanglement is also now on my reservation list, so I'll have to wait for my fellow borrowers to finish.


I'm embarrassed that I've only "read" one Walter Mosely (via audiobook) so have added Bad boy brawly Brown to that library list.
Thanks to drneutron I can add The Land of Dreams to the wish list.

I'm in the middle of The Miniaturist a book I have heard a lot of praise for on various cultural programmes. I didn't think it would be of interest, but as it was on sale on my Kindle... I'm gripped.

While I wait for the library books to come in, I'm indulging myself in the middle of horribly wintry January weather and just continuing with the lost causes series - so now reading Disgrace (Department Q Book 2) by Jussi Adler-Olsen.

Just dropping by to check out your thread and drop off a star. I'm afraid I rarely read crime mysteries--they get a little grisly for me. I do love mysteries, though, I suppose I'm more of the cozy sort.

happy reading!

Sandy K

Well, I finished Disgrace (Department Q Book 2) and am finding the tone of the relationship between the detective and the assistant from a mystery country (but probably Iraq) off-putting now, so I'll give this series a break and maybe come back later. I'm wondering if something has been lost in the translation into English, (can you translate jokes anyway?)

On a completely different note, picked up An Unnecessary Woman set in Beirut. (Thanks to LizzieD's recommendation on her pages)
Have to love a novel that manages to incorporate such quotes as:

"I think of Brodsky:

I sit by the window. The dishes are done.
I was happy here. But I won't be again."

Off to google Brodsky.

Good for you , deciding to start a thread! It's a busy place in the 75's! I took a break last year. I have enjoyed the Department Q books, but I am not up to date on the series . Dropping a star.

The library reservation system delivered The Truth by Peter Temple yesterday - I only ordered it the day before. :-) Impressive stuff.

I finished An Unnecessary Woman by Rabih Alameddine (thanks to LizzieD for the including it on her list, otherwise I would not have read it)


Such a wonderful book! I started highlighting quotes about half way through, and then found that I was highlighting something on almost every page. I was so surprised that the author was male - he has conjured such an effective account of a woman in her 70s that at one point I wondered if I had misread the genre, and it was actually a memoir. Beirut has a tragic history and the book gives one person's perspective of living through civil war. But it's also an account of dealing with extended family, as well as dealing with solitude and being 'different'. This sounds really serious - and it isn't at all.

Aaliya's dry humour leads us through the book: "I'll admit I'm not fond of children. They stick to you like burrs, and tearing them off is cumbersome..."

Aaliya lives with authors as a translator and bookseller. The book is littered with quotes about life, reading and literature, e.g. Nabakov "History... will limit my life story to the dash between two dates" Books described sound tempting, and I'm going to follow (Alameddine's) recommendations from the book for several authors I'd not come across: Fernando Pessoa and Bruno Schulz, The emigrants, How i came to know fish, this way for the gas ladies and gentlemen, Fateless Kertesz and Sepharad, plus a recommendation for Ransom by David Malouf.

I finished The Truth by Peter Temple
I'm not sure I would have finished it if it wasn't for the heavy weight of Mark Lawson's recommendation as part of the Foreign Bodies list. I've not read any of Temple's previous books (where some of the characters appear) and the style is so abbreviated, staccato even - it's difficult to be sure you've got a grip of what's going on. I do love the Australianisms though. I plan to use "Bomb it to snake" in future.

I just found the Costa announcement, so I'm going to try and read these too. The Costa awards are divided by genre, so I'm going for the winners in each category

Novel Award — Ali Smith, How to be Both
Poetry Award — Jonathan Edwards, My Family and Other Superheroes
Children's Book Award — Kate Saunders, Five Children on the Western Front
First Novel Award — Emma Healey, Elizabeth is Missing
Biography Award — Helen Macdonald, H is for Hawk

(and probably the short-listed novels as well).

Because of Costa in the past I've been introduced to some favourites such as English Passengers
Michael Frayn, Spies
Claire Tomalin, Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self
Vernon God Little
Don Paterson, Landing Light
Eve Green
Stef Penney, The Tenderness of Wolves
Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture
The Hand That First Held Mine
Nathan Filer, The Shock of the Fall - I know I'm in pretty good hands choosing to read these.

https://www.costa.co.uk/costa-book-awards/costa-book-awards/

I'm enjoying your reading comments here, and hope to follow along the rest of the year.
I've been eyeing An Unneccessary Woman for quite sometime, and really should just break down and get it. I liked Peter Temple's Broken Shore quite a bit more than Truth.

Thanks for stopping by! Arubabookwoman. I am really enjoying reading about everyone else's reading, although I'm already wondering if I'm ever going to keep up with all the new books I want to read from others' posts, as well as the posts themselves.

From your message I'm wondering whether to add Broken Shore to my TBR pile. I'm not sure I could read another of his unless it was in one sitting. Maybe if I had a holiday, and no distractions.

A mixed plus / minus record on my progress yesterday.

I should probably add at this point that I'm 'signed off' just now from working after a (routine) operation. I'd love to say I always have this much time to read non-work books, but...

I went to the library and was kind of gobsmacked to find a whole load of books I had listed here available. However because of the op I can't carry lots of weight, so back half of them had to go on the shelves. Probably a good thing not to be too much of a book hog, and I am supposed to do more walking so no excuses not to go back, but still, galling...

Because I do love ignoring a list, I ended up picking up tomorrow there will be apricots which in no way features on any of the booklists I have mentioned above.
In lots of ways it was a lovely change compared to the crime reading. It was full of wonderful sounding (and I'm sure tasting) descriptions of cooking and baking, and a very sweet first romance. In others it was a bit grim, not flinching from family conflict. I have to admit that I skimmed some of the flashback scenes (I don't want to spoil the story which is a gradual reveal, so will leave this vague) as I just found them unbearable.

I'm not that impressed that it is 2015 and I'm reading a recently published novel that despite showing both parents in the story as dreadful at parenting, the mother character is the central focus (as 'the problem') whilst the father's failure just seems to be taken as read. It's odd to me.

I am another one who loves book quotes. I especially liked the one from your introduction about how reading belongs inside the folds of the brain. Brilliant! I am stealing borrowing it for my quote file in Evernote. it is for my own enjoyment so I hope you don't mind.

Count me in amongst the book quote lovers. I have several on my profile page and I constantly collect them.

I finished Bad Boy Brawley Brown so can now return it to the library. In this novel Easy Rawlins is in his 40s, living in LA with his family and managing a school janitorial staff, when he's asked to step in to help a friend's son. The son has joined an extremist group tired at the pace of civil rights changes. Things escalate from there. I really enjoyed this novel, all the pace of Chandler, and the historical touches about the development of California kept me interested. Planning to add Walter Mosley's other books to my TBR pile.

Starting on my Costa challenge, as the library had a copy of Five Children on the Western Front just sitting on the shelves. The book barely looks as if it has left the library (only bought in December!).

I was predisposed to love this because I loved Enid Nesbit's books. I was a bit worried about someone else trying to mimic her style, but it worked for me. The book itself is a beautiful thing, gorgeous cover (although I would have loved some line illustrations). It's aimed at children, and I did wonder how Kate Saunders would deal with the death and horror. The reader was carefully prepared for what was to come, but it never felt too 'Basil Exposition' for me. It also included lots of humour, and some lovely descriptions of getting on (and not getting on) with siblings.

Going to get it for my godson, who may soon be old enough to appreciate it (I hope!)

I read
this review in Joe's Cafe this morning.

I went to the bookshop today. I had already ordered it at the library, but I was a double-figure number in the queue. I thought I would be safe, because the town bookshop is small, and they probably wouldn't have it...

Long story short, I am currently reading Being Mortal (and not one of the long list of books above!).

Isn't it funny---I just finished my first Easy Rawlins book, and enjoyed it very much. I had read some of Walter Mosley's science fiction and stand alone books before, but not any of his mysteries. I will be reading more Easy Rawlins.

As to whether to add The Broken Shore--I liked it a lot, but didn't particularly like Truth, so yes, I'd say give it a try.

>17 charl08: What a great title! A good candidate for one of the meme spots next year.

I'm feeling a bit:



However, have finished another Easy Rawlins White Butterfly which if anything, was better than the first I read. Partly because I'm also more interested in that period of American history I think. It turns out, the library has most of them in large print only though, so I'm going to have fun carting huge hardbacks back and forth working my way through them all (I hope!).

Also the first on my African fiction list, As the Crow Flies by Véronique Tadjo. I think this is the first book I've read from Côte d'Ivoire.

It wasn't the kind of novel I'd pick up for myself to read, having an unusual structure of lots of very short, numbered chapters with unidentified characters (mostly told through first or second person with no names). I think without the guidance of the back cover, which told me I wasn't supposed to know who was speaking, I'd have given up on it. I'm glad I didn't though, as having lots of different narratives pulled together as accounts of people dealing with relationships and loss. This ranged widely, from a man coming home to be with his mother, to a woman who tries to help a street child.

Wikipedia tells me she's written children's novels, poetry and novels that have been translated into English: I'm adding the novels to my TBR (but maybe for a future year!). The Shadow of Imana: Travels in the Heart of Rwanda Queen Pokou and Far from My Father.

I finished Stone Mattress this morning. This was a book I only ordered at the library because of a LT thread, so muchas gracias, folks.

Although it's short stories, some of them are interlinked and these were the ones I enjoyed the best. I'd forgotten how funny her stories are - I wish I had the time to get out her other books for a reread.



Off to read the Guardian's review section to see what they recommend for the reading pile :-)

I loved those first three interlinked stories, too! Such a great collection!

Well, I'm not getting far with the reading my own bookshelf, as the library delivered up four reserved books at once yesterday (one of them the Atwood). I picked up Lila which was on the returned bookshelf as I checked out my haul.



I don't remember much of Home or Gilead - but this really sucked me in and I couldn't put it down. She writes so beautifully about terrible poverty - I'm not sure how that's even possible, but she does. The narrator's experience of the dust bowl makes me think I should go back to The Grapes of Wrath. But she's also so good on narrating individual loss and loneliness and making such common experiences new again in how she phrases and shapes the story. I thought of Brooklyn which struck me in a similar way.

So at least she always had a movie to think about. And when she was sitting there in the dark, sometimes, when it was crowded, with somebody's arm or knee brushing against hers, she was dreaming some stranger's dream, everybody in there dreaming one dream together. Or they were ghosts gathered in the dark, watching the world...

I've just finished Entanglement but I don't really know what to say about it. I don't think I would have finished it if it hadn't been for a list (even just one I set for myself). Mark Lawson makes a great case for reading international crime as a way to encounter different places within what appears to be quite a bounded genre. Entanglement gives you a sense of the city of Warsaw for those who live there, as well as attempting to scratch below the post-communist, pre-Euro prosperity / democracy (set in 2005).

One of the main reasons I wanted to give up on it was that I really struggled with the attitudes to women throughout, including descriptions of every female character in terms of her physical attractiveness (or not) to the investigating prosecutor. Women exist in this book only as foolish lovers, poor colleagues, duped wives, avaricious witnesses.

Not an author I plan to return to.

Next up is Academy Street, one of the shortlisted novels for the Costa. It 'establishes Mary Costello as one of Ireland's most exciting literary voices', apparently! Looking forward to reading it.

Although, I've also picked up Everything Good Will Come by Sefi Atta from the bookshelf, as part of the 50 women writers challenge.

I finished Academy Street this afternoon. Wow. What a heavy book (although in terms of length, a light one at less than 200pp). The book takes Tess from her mother's death when she is just a small child in rural Ireland, to her own old age in New York in the 21st Century. I can see that it has some lovely writing in it, beautiful imagery. I think I would have liked it more if I hadn't read Brooklyn. In comparison it does similar things in talking about emigration, migrant communities in the US and young women trying to make sense of that experience - but in a way that I found made for more gripping, and less grim reading.

In contrast The Map of Love came from the library already, and I am loving the story of an Englishwoman in Egypt in the early 20C, and her American descendent visiting an Egyptian woman and the two of them piecing together the historical story. It's an enormous book, so hoping that it continues to be so wonderful all the way through.

I *finally* finished The Miniaturist. Just loved this novel, although for me it was a slow starter. I was recently in the Netherlands and saw some beautiful miniatures in the Rejk Museum. Jessie Burton is clever to take this real bit of history and weave into it all sorts of mystical possibilities. The food, the damp, the costumes all made the story even richer. I'm wondering/ hoping if it might even be the first in a series.

Having read The Miniaturist I was trying to remember another book and link to the museum. Has been bugging me!

Found it though - I was thinking of The Thousand Autumns of Jacob Zoet. The Rejkmuseum has a really detailed model of Dejima, the tiny Dutch trading colony off the coast of Nagasaki, Japan.

I didn't realise they had all these beautiful images online (although this one is wiki open source as the others wouldn't load!)

Paul C is looking at first libraries on his thread.

I just love the pictures of libraries and first libraries. When I was a kid we got taken to our local library (the outskirts of Cambridge), where a stern lady sat behind a high wooden desk and our tickets were taken out from the book and put into cardboard sleeves behind the counter.


When I was a bit older I was allowed to go to the Central library, and I remember being amazed that the children's section was as big as the whole library at Mill Road.

Both a far cry from the refurb of Liverpool central library, near where I am now - they kept the outside and the beautiful features of the old building,


but getting rid of some of the very tired interiors (and the damp!).

Well, I think my month of crazy reading is coming to an end, as I managed an hour and a half of walking yesterday, so presumably can be considered 'recovered' (official confirmation on Wednesday). Back to proper hiking too.

The Map of Love is one of those books that the kindle was made for - at 500 pages I'm not sure I would have had the patience (and certainly not the back muscles) to lug around in my bag for my usual lunch hour, coffee shop, commute reading. Thanks to being at home I have been able to indulge myself.

The brief outline of the book is the story of a British woman, 'Lady' Anna, in the early 20C who travels from London to Cairo. This is mingled with the story of Amal, a British - Egyptian woman who lives in Cairo in 1997, and is brought Anna's diaries and letters by one of her descendants, Isabel. Anna's initial scepticism about western imperialism develops as she comes to know the British community in Cairo, and then meets Amal's grandmother, and her family. It is a powerful love story as well as an account of struggling against (British) imperialism. Despite having studied some Sudanese history (and that there were close links between Egypt and Sudan in the early 20C) I had very little knowledge of the nationalist debates that Soueif discusses, so some of the Basil Exposition that takes place in the later section of the novel to explain Egyptian politics was relevant for me. Although it was published in 1999, the discussion of conflict both in the 'present' sections and at the turn of the century have unfortunately continued to be relevant.

Although The Map of Love includes men it is predominantly from the perspective of women - so the novel describes the experience of social segregation with beautiful descriptions of the 'haramlek' the area for women in the home. It also discusses reform - one of the characters argues for girls to be educated as part of a discussion of education demands. and in Memoirs of a woman doctor, although it is anger in El Saadawi's book but mostly sorrow in Soueif's I think. E Saadawi introduces her book, which is a very short account of growing up in Egypt, and training to be a doctor in the face of gender discrimination.

The woman stands before the man, deprived by the world of her freedom, her honour, her name, her self respect, her true nature and her will. All control over her spiritual life has been taken from her

The copy I had is a reprint, and El-Saadawi introduces the text saying that although she also is a trained doctor, and like the character in the book, became very successful, the book is not meant to be read as memoir.

Perhaps the most powerful section of the book are the early chapters, which deal with growing up. She describes feeling like a second-class citizen as a girl, unable to run and play as she wishes, to be careless of appearances: instead she has to ensure propriety is observed, her body is covered. "Everything in me was shameful and I was a child of just nine years old." Medical training gives her the power (in her own mind) to finally reject the view of herself as the inferior gender:

A vast new world opened up before me. At first I was apprehensive, but I soon plunged avidly into it, overwhelmed by a frenzied passion for knowledge. Science revealed the secrets of human existence to me and made nonsense of the huge differences which my mother had tried to construct between me and my brother

Originally the text was printed as articles in a newspaper, and the current edition is the version that had to pass the censors (the original being lost). Given the tone and critique I wonder what was censored. She is also critical of the medical profession, describing training students without care for patients, without acknowledgement of the limits of medical treatment. She acknowledges ultimately her problems with charging for healthcare when people are in poverty (dealing with a horrible case of TB). She alludes to helping a young girl who was raped (I think) have an abortion (this is left very vague), discusses leaving her first husband after he attempted to end her career.

Although told this is not a memoir, to me it reads as a passionately felt manifesto for gender equality and medical reform.

And now for something completely different: The Thin Man read after a short stop at an Oxfam (second hand) bookshop. Lovely penguin classic cover, very atmospheric. I'd not read any Hammett, and after the recent Walter Mosley makes for intriguing comparison. Hammett's New York is white, except for one n-word reference to a red-herring case.

A little bit of audio distraction The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - I'd heard the BBC version, which for my money was narrated better - but because they only have 15 minute slots (x5 or for the really unusual ones x10), you lose quite a bit. Despite the narrative being familiar it was still engrossing.

I have claimed elsewhere not to be buying books. By this I meant *new* books. Second hand don't count (ahem!).

Finished Distant view of a Minaret waiting for my appointment with the consultant this morning. Lovely distraction. Stories wide ranging, sometimes magical (a woman falls in love with an exotic animal) sometimes desperately sad (an arranged marriage fails). Powerful images of Cairo's increasing urban population too (like the title story, a flat slowly losing the view of the city's old landmarks).

Finished A Red Death in super large print, although I'm not complaining (the library system's only copy, so better than nothing!). I think I am going to pass on The Iceberg - I only realised when I started reading the first chapter that I had read a review of it when it first came out. It is essentially a memoir of losing her husband to a terminal tumour, and I can't bear this kind of writing at the best of times, no matter how beautifully done. Back it goes to the library.

Finished How to be both. This took me ages to get into, partly because the description made me think that it would intersperse the modern day story with the historical, and I kept thinking 'am I missing something?' (it came in the second half). Just seemed to catch fire about a third of the way through. Descriptions of the relationship between a young girl and her (younger) brother in places made me laugh out loud, she has really caught the wonder of a small child trying to make sense of the world, and their brilliant malapropisms. But also very touching - of a family dealing with loss, and of the place of women and art. Also one of the best accounts I've ever read of trying to deal with some of the horrors of the net when you are powerless to change what has been filmed / photographed. Plus thought provoking reflections on how someone from a different time might see us:

cause this place is full of people who have eyes and choose to see nothing, who all talk into their hands as they peripatate and all carrying these votives, some the size of a hand, some the size of a face or a whole head, dedicated to saints perhaps or holy folk, and they look or talk to or pray to these tablets all the while by holding them next to their heads or stroking them with fingers and staring only at them, signifying they must be heavy in their despairs to be so consistently looking away from their world and so devoted to their icons.

Highly recommended!

The Children Act came from the library (along with a whole load of other reservations. If I knew anything about computers I'd ask them to rework their system so that people could 'pass' on a book if they've already got, say 13 books out already, but I don't so...). Pretty short book, the usual McEwen beautiful prose, people thinking a lot, not talking as much as they could/should to explain themselves and avoid horribly convoluted situations... I liked it, I finished it all almost in one go (albeit with a quick break to see if a new TV crime series was worth the hype).

Left thinking that I must reread Atonement.

What a lot of good reading you've done this month! As the Crow Flies looks interesting, as does the Atwood and the Smith book. I've heard lots of good things about both of them. You have ambitious reading plans for the year. Good luck.

Thank you! Always easy to make the plans in January ...

The Toughest Indian in the World

Love everything this man writes. Short stories in places terrifying, thought provoking and laugh out loud funny. Particularly liked the bear who took up residence on the roof of a church: "During that brief and magical time "How's the bear" replaced "How are you doing?" as the standard greeting".

After an interview at the tail end of last week a crime novel The Holy Thief has proved light relief (if Stalin's Russia can ever be considered 'light'). I've found this period of history fascinating since ugrad days, and Ryan's use of a 'moral' detective amongst the craziness of an imminent purge makes sense in the same way that Philip Kerr's Bernie Gunther character works in Berlin Noir.

Just finished The dark meadow which claims to be revolutionary crime, as there is no detective, just separate chapters from the perspective of different witnesses. Set in post-war Bavaria, the story of the murder of a young woman and the re-opening of her murder investigation some 12 years later.

Not really a novel, more of a novella, and the length was just right for me. I'd read more of this writer (especially when translated by Anthea Bell).

Oh dear, maybe it was a mistake coming here. There are just too many good books to be found. :)

How to be Both and An Unnecessary Woman for starters. Meanwhile, here the hot wind blows and I am in need of coffee, so I shall promise to return, and leave a star in my wake.

>48 LovingLit: Welcome! An Unnecessary Woman came highly recommended on LT, for which I am v grateful.

I am slowing right down my reading now: although loving Rachel Cusk's Outline. This snapshot of conversations in Greece is perfect for the horrible wintry weather here. She is swimming in a beautiful blue sea :-)

However, I do have snowdrops, so maybe Spring is coming.
https://www.librarything.com/pic/4716353

Wow! You certainly have had an amazing January of reading! How to Be Both sounds interesting . Don't laugh too hard, but I thought it might be about someone who was bi - sexual. ;) So you have cleared that up for me.

What a great start you have had to your reading year! So many good books!

>50 vancouverdeb: >51 alcottacre: Thanks for the lovely comments. I feel like I should plug my local libraries here, as without their reservation system I'd never have got my hands on most of these books.

(Although I am still 18th in the queue for The Narrow Road to the Deep North which seems to have caught everyone's imagination.)

Just finished A Little Yellow Dog after an unexpected visit to a second hand bookshop. Thinking that I might get through the series this year :-)


This filled in some of the blanks for me, as I'm not reading the series in order.

Finished reading Outline.
When I was looking for the image of the book, came across the Guardian review, where the comments below the line made me laugh a great deal. Apparently Cusk has lots of 'haters' who are frustrated by this book. According to the review this is a 'return to form' but I this is the only book of hers I have ever picked up.

I really love the writing style - I think it is similar to some of Coetzee's books in that not much happens but much is discussed. Cusk uses the idea of a writer teaching a creative writing course in Greece as a frame. She meets a man on the plane and he tells her his life story, speaks to students about writing exercises, meets with a publisher and other writers. Some of the criticisms on the Guardian site suggest that people are tired of writers writing about being a writer - but I wouldn't have said that this is what Cusk is doing here. She writes about relationships, about truth-telling, about bringing up children. Being a writer is what her character does, rather than the focus of the book (at least for me).

It is interesting how keen people are for you to do something they would never dream of doing themselves, how enthusiastically they drive you to your own destruction: even the kindest ones, the ones that are most loving, can rarely have your interests truly at heart, because usually they are advising you from within lives of greater security and greater confinement, where escape is not a reality but simply something they dream of sometimes. Perhaps, he said, we are all like animals in the zoo, and once we see that one of us has got out of the enclosure we shout at him to run like mad, even though it will only result in him getting lost

Hello Charlotte! It's just as well I had the library catalogue open while I was reading your thread :-) A Map of Love sounds excellent in particular, and I do sympathize with >25 charl08:! I did laugh at >54 charl08:, though - haters in the Guardian? Really? :-) I've given up reading the below the line comments this year and already feel more cheerful!

Here you are, you reading machine you! It's great to see all the wonderful books you've had in your hands and mind in January. In return for *Unnecessary Woman*, you have given me C. Tomalin's *Samuel Pepys*. I love her, and I've read only somebody's abridgement of the autobiography, so this is a natural need for this moment. I just ordered it from AMP, and I'm certainly grateful to learn that 2nd hand books don't count! In that case, I am the model of bookish frugality!
You make me anxiouser and anxiouser for How to Be Both, but I happily just got a copy of There but for the while I wait for the 2nd hand price to go down! I'm also panting after *Deep North* ---- we'll see!

Hi Charlotte - I've just found your thread, weeks after you visited mine, and I am sitting here half laughing and half groaning at how bad you are going to be for my pile of unread books!

I think our reading tastes overlap massively, only I am now reading a few pages a day and am not letting myself loose in a bookshop till I have figured out a way to read a bit more during the school term. So I am not going to go off and buy The Holy Thief, Outline, An Unnecessary Woman , or anything else. Really. But I will hunt down Five Children on the Western front to read with the kids (10 and 8 and Edith Nesbit fans). It's a good thing you're slowing down your reading...

PS I saw on your blog that you are learning Igbo - how very cool!

Hi Charlotte - Outline sounds like something I might like. Onto the list it goes.

>55 susanj67: Yes, I should have realised. What really made me laugh was that one of the commentators was suggesting that the other commentators were annoyed because the book was good, so they couldn't get riled up at Cusk. (!!)

>56 LizzieD: "Reading machine"? I'll take that, thank you! Can recommend the BBC dramatisation of Pepys' diary with Kris Marshall. Manages to get some of the admiralty stuff in as well as his private life (I always wonder how he managed to fit it all in - did he sleep? at all?)

>57 cushlareads: Would love to hear how they like Five Children on the Western Front.

The less said about my Igbo prowess the better I think after a very embarrassing meeting with Okey Ndibe at a book reading. It's on my to do list for 2015.

>58 BLBera: Hope you enjoy it!


I finished Elizabeth is Missing, part of my Costa prize reading list.

Although I'm glad I read it, as it has been talked about endlessly on review sites, I feel very ambivalent about it. Briefly, the story is told by Maud in the present and speaking about the 1940s, as in the present she tries to understand where her friend Elizabeth is (and progressively gets more 'confused') and in the past tries to put the pieces together about her sister's disappearance after the end of WW2.

Dementia is a personal thing to me, not a remote disease (as I'm sure it is personal through the experience of families and friends for many people). I'm not suggesting that Healey takes it lightly, but the humour here in Maud's memory loss makes me uncomfortable at times.

I think also there is a real tension between the lack of a narrative consistency in dementia (the way in which people can be there one minute and gone the next) and the neat resolution the book provides. Jury's out.

>54 charl08: Adding Outline to the BlackHole. Thanks for the recommendation, Charlotte!

>60 alcottacre: Hope you like it!

Trying to finish I was Jack Mortimer a very odd, historical (1933) crime novel. It's published by the Pushkin Press in an absolutely gorgeous small format.

As mentioned I was Jack Mortimer was an odd read. It centres around a taxi driver who finds a dead body in the back of his cab, and is convinced that he is going to be accused of murder. He then spends a night frantically trying to escape from this accusation. It also includes the story of the murderer, and the taxi driver's failed romances.

It was an interesting read, but more for the historical background (social class, attitudes to police, European attitudes to American 'gangsters') than for the plot, which is more melodrama than suspense. I do enjoy a lot of crime in translation for the context, e.g. Georges Simenon more than the crime, so not a terminal criticism, especially when the setting did seem unusual - a working class man without much to distinguish him. Doesn't stand up well to the other crime translated from German I have read though such as von Schirach and Friedrich Durrenmatt.

I did love the edition. The kind of beautifully produced book you would like to have on your bookshelf, 'french covers' (apparently this is the name for the paperback cover that has a fold you can use as a bookmark?) and all!

I've been intimidated so far by the small print and the size of this, but another person has requested this at the library, so here goes...

The Lives of Others (wasn't this also the name of a German film?)

Oh Dear. The Lives of Others opens with a guy going all Rohinton Mistry on his family. Not sure I can cope with this!

Nice comments, Charlotte. I'll give Elizabeth Is Missing a pass. I Was Jack Mortimer does sound interesting. I'll add it to the list.

I sort of have Outline in the back of my mind now, but The Lives of Others has been in the middle for a bit as I wait for the price to come down. *Jack M* - my jury is out; *E is M* - on my Kindle. I'm sort of keeping up!
IGBO! WOW!!!!!

I got a voucher for Xmas which I have joyfully spent in my local Waterstones on Country Girl which, as well as fitting my love of lit memoirs and Ireland, has the most gorgeous cover. Also The Spirit Level which I have been meaning to read for ages rather than just vaguely knowing the main argument (equality is better for everyone, not just morally but practically).

I'm afraid this may mean the attempt to read The Lives of Others have been abandoned as the return to the library is imminent.

>65 BLBera: Hi Beth, looking forward to your report on Ghettoside especially as my library system doesn't have it. I suspect I am Jack Mortimer has started something dangerous. I started poking around on the Pushkin Press' site (and the pages of the LT members who read them) and there are so many crime novels in translation I may be some time...

>66 LizzieD: Hi Peggy, sounds like you've got plenty to keep you busy! I'm enjoying the Wimsey on your thread.

>35 charl08: Nice view of Liverpool library Charlotte. It is great to see you making such strides in the group already this year.

I normally have a little prize for the rookie poster of the year (most posts on his/her thread) and you are probably the favourite for this early doors!

Don't be shy to drop by and add your two pennies worth in the various threads as you'll find we are all mostly a friendly enough bunch.

Hi Paul, thanks for the message. The new library in Liverpool is definitely worth a visit, even if just to have a gawk at the new & old architecture.

Sad to read of Andre Brink's death on kidzdoc's thread

Some lovely tributes on the web, acknowledging his major role in literature and anti-apatheid protest through his writing. I grew up with a lot of the classics of South African anti-apartheid literature on the shelves at home, but A dry white season although I cannot remember even the plot, left such an impact on me as a bleak, horrifying book that seeing the cover on the bookshelf reminds me of that feeling. A bit less easy to shock now, but The Other Side of Silence depicts awful violence as the main character is brutalised in Germany and Namibia (then a Germany colony). However it is also a portrait of loving kindness, of keeping going in the face of little hope.

I started Philida which describes slavery in the Cape, a topic I had led a seminar on and so knew a little about the circumstances of those enslaved there, but have a bad feeling it had to go back to the library and I never finished it.

The book I would get everyone to read, though, is Praying Mantis. It's just amazing, about colonisation, migration, trying to translate belief. Beautifully written. And then read John and Jean Comaroff's two massive books on the same subject, and wonder at Brink's ability to convey so much with so little!

All our names and A bit of difference were on the 'new stuff' shelves at my local library.
It would be rude not to.

>71 charl08: Charlotte, I often feel the same! It's like they've put things there *just for me* :-) I just need to work on not snatching them up and hugging them to myself. Or muttering "My precioussssssss."

How great to have a book voucher to spend - I'm working my way through an Amazon voucher and trying to spend it only on books and not household stuff. A book voucher is like someone *insisting* that you buy books.

Charlotte, thanks for stopping off at my thread. I can see yours will be dangerous for Mt. TBR.

MENA doesn't have Leila Aboulela on our list yet, but who knows? In February we are reading In the eye of the Sun by Ahdaf Soueif. I am looking forward to it after Harafish that was written from a male point of view. Though the writing was good, I got tired of only secondary female characters, and am looking forward to one where a woman is front and center in the story.

>72 susanj67: An amazon voucher on household goods? Really? oh no. Book vouchers burn a hole in my pocket, always have.

>73 markon: I've just had a look for In the eye of the sun and my library even has it in e-book format. Temptation!

And in other news I am feeling smug as the Folio book prize short list has been announced, and I have read half already. Would hate to be a judge though - even just comparing Outline to How to Be Both seems impossible.

10:04 by Ben Lerner (Granta)
All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews (Faber)
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill (Granta)
Dust by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor (Granta)
Family Life by Akhil Sharma (Faber)
How to Be Both by Ali Smith (Hamish Hamilton)
Nora Webster by Colm Tóibín (Viking)
Outline by Rachel Cusk (Faber)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/booknews/11400737/The-Folio-Prize-2015-...

I am enjoying Country Girl - Edna is still in rural Ireland.

Some lovely quotes about the limited reading materials available to her - on the Irish Messenger:

The avowed aim of the magazine was to promote happiness in the home, repel the influence of 'hot rhythm dance bands', and avert the advance of communism which had enslaved Russia... There were also tips on how to make a baby's matinee coat with picot edging...'

This is a dangerous thread indeed!

I love Edna O'Brien! I've been on and off again with Cusk. It's hard to put a finger on what it is, but she can be very irritating. Or very good. She's one of those authors I tend to look for in the library, rather than rushing out to buy the book. . .

HI Charlotte, Just found your thread and thanks for the visit to mine. Wow, I looked at the books you've already read this year (at the top of the thread) and I will be able to add lots to my Mt, TBR. Hope that you like the David Lebovitz book. I am just about to finish The Unnecessary Woman so will have to check back and see what you said about it.

Hi Charlotte, how lovely of you to visit my thread! Wow, some great books here! I am really happy to hear about Praying Mantis and how much you liked it. I read Philida a couple of years ago and very much enjoyed.

So much great book stuff here. Country Girl sounds wonderful. Thanks for the Folio shortlist; I've only read three of them, and while I thought Dust had promise, I didn't think it was in the same category as Nora Webster or All My Puny Sorrows. I do look forward to Outline and How To Be Both and will search out the others on the list.

>76 sibylline: Cusk seems to keep the Guardian Review pages busy. I'm embarrassed to say this is the first thing I've read by O'Brien, but I am really enjoying this one.

>77 mdoris: Hope you liked An Unnecessary Woman! All credit to LT recommendations for me picking it up, so glad I did.

>78 lit_chick: Fascinating discussion about Maggie O'Farrell and families on your thread. Of course, the other reason I loved it was because it talks about living in Edinburgh.

>79 BLBera: I'm still to read Dust, I'm hoping it comes for my birthday! Non-too-subtle hints in the process of being dropped to f & f's :-)

>81 charl08: So I am plodding on with July's People, mostly because I am doing the 50 Women Writers challenge and really want to be able to say that I gave them all a good shot.

Briefly, the setting is of a white family rescued by their house worker and taken to the rural 'location' to escape a full scale war, imagined as taking place instead of peaceful negotiations and the end of apartheid.

The narrative is deeply uncomfortable. She's looking directly at racism, at privilege and at poverty. There's a lot of stuff about 'gaze' in criticism of postcolonial literature - I'm not sure about Gordimer's. The way she speaks about the rural community setting to me in places seems simplistic. I'm struggling on though! I can see that when she was writing, this was a direct challenge to the white community in South Africa: how are you going to deal with your privilege when the military collapses? (and perhaps too: don't think because you claim to have 'liberal' values that it will be any less difficult to deal with the legacies of apartheid).

So she writes about the impact of men being forced to work away from their families for years:

Most of the women of child-bearing age had husbands who spent their lives in those cities the women had never seen. There was a set of conventions for talking about this. The man had written or had not written, the money had arrived or was late this month, he had changed his job, he was working in 'another place'

Done! Done! I can't believe it was only 150 odd pages, it felt much longer.
To add to the previous post - there are also some beautiful descriptions of the scenery, fishing, children playing -

At once the boys race back. You can count the beads of spinal vertebrae bent over their handiwork. Later, they pull their father from the hut and make him go fishing with their following troupe of children and babies. Red and yellow weaver-birds they disturb mass in shrill joy and flower briefly at the tips of tall grasses too slender for support.

2014 books -

Describe yourself -- All My Puny Sorrows
Describe how you feel -- Burying the Typewriter
Describe where you currently live -- All the Birds, Singing
If you could go anywhere where would you go -- Far North
Your favourite form of transportation -- The Walk Home
Your best friend is -- Good Girls don't Die
You and your friends are -- If I Knew You Were Going To Be This Beautiful, I Never Would Have Let You Go (lol)
What's the weather like -- The Shock of the Fall (well, more like the shock of the Winter, but still)
You fear -- Death and the Penguin
What is the best advice you have to give -- We are not Ourselves
Thought for the day -- Lucky Us
How you would like to die -- Life after Life
Your soul's present condition -- The Zone of Interest

And for a bit of a change, another Walter Mosley Blonde Faith which turned up at the library today. It's the late 1960s, and after the Watts riots, things are changing in LA. Easy is trying to find a friend who fought in Vietnam and is now facing former soldiers who are drug running.

I find the setting and the characters convincing in this series (although I know nothing about the setting!) and not as predictable as some crime novels. Easy isn't the usual washed up, bitter detective (although he does reference Marlowe!)

For a much-needed laugh reading How to build a girl. I know I am going to like this, because her columns make me laugh (or they did, before Rupert thought it was a good idea to put a newspaper behind a paywall).

Twenty minutes later I was bored of The Sound of Music. The bit after Maria and the Captain gets married goes on a bit, although I could relate to it on some levels: for instance, coming from a similarly large family, I totally appreciated that it took the driving force of an impending Nazi Anschluss for Maria to get all those kids' shoes on, then go for a walk up a mountain.

>74 charl08: Well, I read In the eye of the sun a couple of years ago and liked it better than The map of love if that's any enticement.

Wanted to drop links to an interesting article about translating Mahfouz and a google books document that has some info on symbolism in Harafish in case you're interested. (ETA starts on pg. 144)

Hope your birthday finds you with Dust & that you enjoy it!

Wow. Article v. interesting, thank you. Also the list of women writers recommending other writers. The TBR pile grows again!

How To Build a Girl had me laughing all the way through - similar to her own life story, Moran's narrator is a young girl who manages to break into national journalism at a young age, despite growing up on a council estate in Wolverhampton. Her family is convincing and she's got the desperation of the teenager down perfectly. I was never as into music as the character in the story, but some of the Indie bands are familiar. I'm not sure how far some of the Britishisms would travel (she mentions a US and UK editor, so perhaps they don't have to) and in places near the end she veers off into debating making mistakes and finding yourself as a kid which I would have cut if I was the editor. Overall met my expectations though (which were high). Some nice quotes about reading, too:

Sitting on the kerb I peel the tangerines, reading Joyce in the weak-tea sun. I've never tried to read Joyce before. For twenty minutes, I enjoy how he appears to be writing across all space and time - his past, present and future, as himself, and a dog, and the sea itself - and then I realise I've read the same page twice, go, 'Oh God, I can't handle this right now,' and buy Viz instead from the mini-mart opposite.

Forgot to add in the last post - Edna O'Brien in her memoir has made it to Dublin, where in contrast to Moran, she does not pass go and collect £200. Instead she works in a chemist's shop and takes evening classes to become a pharmacist. For four years.
She takes great pleasure in pointing out that the same senior church figure who drove around the Dublin streets looking for immorality, would be revealed on his death to have kept a telescope to spy on young men on the beach and a 'penchant for sexually explicit medical manuals in Latin'.

I'd thought that Benjamin Black was exaggerating the gothic in Christine Falls, but apparently not.

edited to correct my bad proof-reading!

Both the Moran and the O'Brien have jumped onto my wishlist, Charlotte. I love the quotes from How to Build a Girl. I will have to search out more of her work; I'm not familiar with her at all.

>87 charl08: Charlotte, How To Build a Girl sounds like a great read. I thought it was more columns, like How To Be a Woman, and didn't realise it was a novel. I miss Caitlin - my £8 per month digital subscription was going to increase in price to £24 per month, due to all their amazing new sports coverage, so I cancelled it. I wish they'd do a "bundling" option for the digital subscription, sort of like Sky does with its TV channels, so that people who don't want the sports don't have to pay for it, and can just pick news, or news + columnists, or weekend supplements and so on. The big legal websites do it - you pay for the modules you want and you just don't get access to the others. Then I could get Caitlin back, and also Robert Crampton, who was another favourite.

>89 BLBera: Beth - reading may cause laughter in public places - you have been warned!

>90 susanj67: Susan - every Saturday I pick up the Guardian, and read Tim Dowling in the magazine and then throw the rest out except for the Review.
I'd read more reviews if the magazines / weekend editions weren't so expensive. Despite using various websites for reviews, I enjoy reading reviews as a group, together, on paper (Luddite alert). So your idea sounds great. Sign me up. Until then I get my Caitlin fix via her books and twitter feed.

>87 charl08: How to Build a Girl does look a winner, Charlotte.

I love reading reviews well written too. Used to always buy the Literary Review until it further served to encourage my book buying habit. One of the steps of BBA (Book Buyer's Anonymous) is a discouragement of such publications - in 2013 when not failing to obtain a monthly copy of the magazine I bought more than 100 books per month, and the moniker "Cranswickian" was coined by one of the wags here (I forget who was to blame) for glutinous book splurging)!

Have a lovely weekend .

Finished Our Sister Killjoy. It's known as a classic, taught and studied across institutions, and there are lots of insightful reviews out there, so I won't go on at length. It is written as the story of 'Sissie', who goes to Europe (I think it's supposed to be the 60s - it's not made clear - after independence, anyway) on scholarship. She stays in a German castle on a work project, visits friends in the UK and writes to a former boyfriend. This isn't really the centre of the writing, though: Aidoo is describing the experiences of a generation of people who were sent abroad to study.

Our sister tried to explain herself. That as far as she was concerned, Nigeria not only has all the characteristics which nearly every African country has, but also presents those characteristics in bolder outlines. Therefore, what is the point in persuading a friend to see the miniature version of anything, when the real stuff is there?

Like July's People the novel is clearly of its time, but for me this was a more gripping read nearly forty years after publication.

Adding Askari Jacob Dlamini to my TBR pile too.
http://africainwords.com/2015/02/12/askari-jacob-dlamini-a-story-of-collaboratio...

>92 PaulCranswick: Your post crossed with mine Paul, wasn't ignoring you, honest.

One of my favourite things about LRB and TLS are the ads for books that I know I'll never read, but are for subjects I've never even heard of.
Was so sad when the recession seemed to kill off the mad LRB dating ads.

(100 books a month? Where do you put them?)

The Dept of Speculation is just lovely. Vikram Seth and Don Paterson came to mind. Incredibly sad, but also funny. This tweeter has saved me typing out a good quote:

Another win for a 75'r LT recommended book (and sorry I can't remember who you are...)

(Edited to correct my spelling of 'Paterson'. Ouch.)

I think I must have had something in my eye whilst reading A Man Called Ove. Really sweet story, not what I was expecting from the first pages describing a shopping rage in a mac store. Gorgeous edition too, complete with illustrated lining paper featuring cats and hacksaws.


Edited: Shopping RAGE (!)

Guardian Reviews



Will Self reviews 'Charles the Heart of the King' by Catherine Meyer (the review is entertaining, but I'll pass on the book)
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/12/charles-the-heart-of-a-king-catheri...

John Gallagher reviews John Hooper's The Italians (in a world where I had time to read everything, I'd read this)
'Italian fantasia, a word whose meaning, John Hooper explains, “lies somewhere on the permeable frontier between imagination and creativity”. In The Italians, he sets out to explore the borders between the real and the seeming in Italian history and culture.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/14/the-italians-john-hooper-review

Sarah Churchwell reviews Young Eliot: From St Louis to the Wasteland by Robert Crawford (er, no)
'one waits in vain for such memorable insights as Cynthia Ozick’s remark that Eliot’s tormented first marriage “blackened him metaphysically,” or Ackroyd’s sardonic observation that “a picture of Eliot in a prospect of drizzle evokes a quality in the man himself”.' (Ouch)
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/11/young-eliot-st-louis-waste-land-rob...

Emily Witt on 'Girl in A Band by Kim Gordon (Yes)
'Gordon's memoir is as much an attempt to parse her own misplaced expectations as it is a celebration of her many achievements' (including as bassist for Sonic Youth).
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/12/girl-in-a-band-kim-gordon-review-au...

Laura Miller reviews 'The First Bad Man' by Miranda July (Yes)
'multiplying weirdness becomes unamusing absurdity'
(negative review, but still quite tempting!)
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/11/the-first-bad-man-by-miranda-july-r...

Helen Dunmore reviews 'Widows and Orphans' by Michael Arditti (probably not)
'uncomfortable but very readable novel about the careless greeds of the way we now live.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/14/widows-and-orphans-by-michael-ardit...

Hannah Rosefield reviews 'Scorper' by Rob Magnuson Smith (probably not)
'Scorper has the trappings of an old-fashioned mystery novel, but these are only so many misleading clues.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/14/scorper-rob-magnuson-smith-review-e...

James Smart reviews Scott McCloud's 'The Sculptor' (Yes)
'a wonderful introduction to the medium, mixing critical theory with playful drawings'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/02/the-sculptor-scott-mccloud-review-g...


Julius Purcell reviews Wrinkles by Paco Roca (if they fix the translation, or I find the French)
'Set in a care home for people with Alzheimer’s disease, Roca’s Wrinkles has sold more than 50,000 copies since it was first published in France and Spain in 2007. Now this unflinching tragicomedy on old age can at last be read in English.' Tempting until the final para of the review, where Purcell notes that the translation is badly done.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/13/wrinkles-paco-roca-review-graphic-n...

Josh Lacy reviews Blue Moon Day by Anne Fine (might gift?)
(I can't find the link!) 'writing realistically about life at boarding school for a young readership'

Nicholas Lezard reviews Mark Ovenden's Great Railway Maps of the World (might gift)
'But, on the whole, this is a beautiful and inspiring collection. You don’t have to be nutty about railways to revel in it, you simply have to appreciate good design, in which the demands of conveying information and stimulating desire contend.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/10/great-railway-maps-world-mark-ovend...

Think I'll stick to Girl in a Band and The Sculptor

>97 charl08: Charlotte, thanks for this! What a great idea. I'm with you on "er no" for the Eliot one but I like the sound of Widows and Orphans and the railway maps one. I've added them and Dept of Speculation to my library wishlist for when a reserve slot comes free. The Fredrik Backman one appears to be on the shelf at my local branch, so I think I'll get that on Monday if I finish something this weekend instead of watching telly :-)

Oh dear, your thread is dangerous, Charlotte! I've added How to Build a Girl and the O'Brien memoir to my giant WL. Luckily for me A Man Called Ove was already there. Happy Saturday to you!

Charlotte - I second Susan - what a great idea. The First Bad Man looks interesting... I reserved How to Build a Girl from my library. I think I'm four or five on the list.

I notice reviews of books by men outnumber by far the books by women...

Charlotte, loved your comments on A Man Called Ove. I've requested this one from my library. Have read several very good reviews recently.

Finally getting caught up here!

>13 charl08: Great comments on An Unnecessary Woman. I loved it and agree with everything you've said.

>33 charl08: I'm putting The Miniaturist on the wishlist. Sounds fascinating, and I've been looking for good historical mysteries.

>97 charl08: I can't say I'm the biggest Sonic Youth fan, but I'm really looking forward to the Kim Gordon memoir!

Hi Charlotte. Found your thread and enjoyed reading your comments.

>95 charl08: Dept. of Speculation is one I've heard good things about and that quote is funny! I will look out for it at the library.

>98 susanj67: Hoping the railway maps turns up in my library soon.

>99 Crazymamie: You're welcome - sure that you'll return the favour...

>100 BLBera: I know right - why doesn't it change? Aren't women the majority of readers?

>101 lit_chick: Such a librarything win - can't take any credit for this one!

>102 DorsVenabili: Nice to see you! Any chance of a women's rock group read?

>103 souloftherose: I'm hoping this one might also be delivered by the birthday fairy.

Next up I'm reading Carnival, to try and persuade myself that it wasn't just because it had such a beautiful cover that I felt the need to buy it.

Hello Charlotte, found you and starred :-).

Edna update:
The Country Girl is now in London, surviving a disastrous marriage and earning enough for a glam lifestyle in the capital from her books, plays and film adaptations. Name-dropping furiously, from tripping with R.D. Laing whilst Sean Connery looked on, to strange encounters with Judy Garland and a serenade from Paul McCartney.

(If it seems like I am dragging this book out, you're right, I am. Despite the tendency to list famous people, the lovely phrasing continues, and makes me want to make it last longer, so I'm rationing her).

Culture update:

The Whitworth gallery reopened, with an impressive weekend of events.


As you can see from the first picture, the original building was Victorian red-brick. This has been re-developed with floor to ceiling glass to allow masses of light and a sense of the building and the park being much closer.

Caught an inspiring education talk, where the head of learning shared the range of programmes including mental health art gardens and 'art picnics' for children to take into the local park. Gallery full of people (they had over 12,000 through the doors on Saturday, and people were queuing up as we left).


If you get a chance to go, recommended.

Then went to see Selma, at which I wept and winced mightily, and resolved to read more about the FBI and their surveillance of protest. (How did Oyelowo not get nominated for an Oscar? How?)

(Pictures not working, though they're showing on my member gallery: will try and fix.)
Ed. Fixed!

>97 charl08: I agree that that is a great idea Charlotte but probably not too healthy for me given my proclivities for adding to my collection. Almost 2000 physical books added in two years and only 300 read is not the recipe for a happy home - Hani has complained severally of being "surrounded by books" - she is too - there are over a thousand five hundred books on top of our wardrobes and she always glances nervously at the same when getting out one of the several thousand dresses - apparently she has nothing to wear.

>109 PaulCranswick: I have been told that rather than having more space I should clear out some books. Harumph to that.

Reading, and enjoying The Serpent Papers although half way through and realised that it's a trilogy, so the ending is going to be incomplete after 500 pages. Argh! I want to have resolution...

I love that you are rationing Country Girl! Happy Monday, Charlotte!

>111 Crazymamie: I am of the firm belief that 'happy' and 'Monday' do not belong in the same sentence.

Hurrah Can't we talk about something more pleasant turned up at the library today :-)

>104 charl08: Any chance of a women's rock group read?
That's a very good idea! I would participate. I have Rat Girl, the Kristin Hersh memoir, that I want to get to too.

Can't we talk about something more pleasant filed in the 'thank librarything members for excellent recommendations' box. Funny and sad - and startlingly frank in places - account of the loss of two parents, through the stress of fragility and ultimately hospice care.

OK I am caught up on your thread Charlotte or should I say I made my way through the mine field of book bullets haha. Anyway, I have The Miniaturist on my Kindle and your comments are nudging me toward picking it up sooner rather than later. I keep going back and forth about Dept. of Speculation but I think you've convinced me to read it soonish. This is an awfully dangerous thread but I will be back.

Hi Bonnie, thanks for the visit. I did find the miniaturist slow going at first. I don't think that all the hype helped, but worth finishing (for me).

Always interested to hear others thoughts though, so will check out your thread!

Ooh, someone donated The Miniaturist to the book exchange yesterday! How funny :-)

>117 susanj67: Will it last long?

Pancake day here. Have a pancake at Great Gables:

or two? (Carrick-a-rede rope bridge)

(all via the National Trust)

Finished The Serpent Papers


I don't usually pick up books like this, partly because they are such bricks, but also because the magic / history mix with mystery isn't my bag. That said, Cornwall writes really well, and the Spanish setting is evocative. I want to go to Barcelona. Ideally yesterday.

From the first the literary detective searching for a lost ms is accompanied by a narrative about young women killed in Barcelona, horribly mutilated in 2003. In 2013, the investigator is not convinced that the man who was convicted was the murderer.

The problem was that I could have done with a lot less of the debates around alchemy and witchcraft, and I found myself skimming. I preferred People of the Book, where Geraldine Brooks traced the history of a beautiful ms, and I cared about both the people and the fate of the work. Here, not so much. I don't think I'll be looking out for the rest of the trilogy, but I can see that I am not the target market for this.

Dang, you got me with The Miniaturist. Our local library has a copy.

>118 charl08: Great photos. I hope none of the pancakes missed the pan ;-).

Hope you enjoy it Barbara.
---------------

More ideas for other books:

Oprah's lists quite often suggest books I've not come across 'over here' (!)
(link here http://www.oprah.com/book/Best-New-Books-Winter-2015)

A spool of blue thread 'By the end of this deeply beguiling novel, we come to know a reality entirely different from the one at the start.'

Ruby Murder mystery. 'A writer whose unflinching yet lyrical prose is reminiscent of Toni Morrison's.'

Find Me 'Everyone in this book, Joy in particular, is damaged but searching—for connection, for meaning, to be truly seen.'

Hall of Small Mammals Short stories

Reeling through Life: How I learned to live, love and die at the movies (Memoir)

The Marauders 'finger lickin'-good Louisiana noir'

The Sasquatch Hunter's Almanac :
'A housewife finds an unconventional cure for her unhappiness when she leaves her husband for Bigfoot.'

Also intrigued by Gateway to Freedom on the underground railroad, which is trailed on the O site (but not shown).

-------------------

Finished The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher a small collection of short stories. This caused so much controversy in some areas of the press, but about very little in my opinion. The final story describing a woman hosting an assassin, is probably the most straight-forward, the others all have room for weirdness, oddness and unexplained events. Probably more expected for the reader of Beyond Black than Wolf Hall. I particularly liked the story about a writer on a speaking tour asking herself what would Anita Brookner do?

This is not the cover I have from the library, but it is SO much better!

The copy of Kintu I ordered from Kwani arrived today. Tempted to ignore everything else to read this straight away.

>121 charl08: I have A Spool of Blue Thread reserved already as I love Anne Tyler, but I'll have to investigate some of the others! Gateway to Freedom is also on my list, as I'm taking Professor Foner's Civil War course via edX and he is a fabulous lecturer. But it's not showing up at the library yet, even as "ordered". Hmph. Not that I need any more right now, with four out already and three on their way.

I'm not allowed to reserve anything else, as I'm at my limit at the library. Worse, 5 are waiting to be picked up, which I can't get until I finish the ones I have.

I feel like someone is whispering in my ear "read faster, read faster..." which is somewhat limiting the enjoyment.

Charlotte, how many books or medias are you aloud to take at the same time? I can have 25 medias at the max.

>67 charl08: I started The Spirit Level and found it to be chokka with statistics and research and graphs. It is much quoted in social justice literature, and I mean to complete it one day.

>85 charl08: I like the sound of Caitlin Moran, she had good things to say about libraries, and that they are the last bastion of public space that doesn't cost you anything. I totally agreed with her, I have yet to read her books though!

Oh, and I have that voice in my ear going "read faster read faster" too :)

I'm all caught up on your thread. Wow, my TBR list just grew a mile! And how did I miss pancake day?!

>125 Ameise1: 20, plus 6 ebooks or audio files. But the reservation system seems to chuck everything at me at once! (Also I got distracted by recent purchases).

>126 LovingLit: Phew. Not the only one with the crazy book-voice.

>127 rosylibrarian: If it helps, I've decided to declare a 'pancake week' this year due to an over-supply of batter. Currently experimenting with apricot jam & pancakes.

Hi Charlotte, Thanks for visiting my thread, so I had to find yours and star it!

>129 connie53: Welcome! Hope you find something of interest.

>124 charl08: Ah, reserve limits. I promised myself I would have no more than THREE things on my reserve list at any one time this year (my limit is 12). Then I thought that I could add stuff that hadn't been published yet, because it couldn't all arrive at once, so it didn't really count. But five things are currently in transit. D'oh! I know exactly what you mean about the "read faster" voice - I am seriously considering taking tomorrow as holiday to catch up!

Reading The Zig Zag Girl, historical British crime fiction (set in 1950s Brighton).

Just checked the kindle daily deal though, and The boys in the boat is 99p! Brenzi and others have been raving about this, so whoosh onto the kindle it went :-)

Done with The Zig Zag Girl. Found this a bit 'ploddy' in places, although the idea was interesting, reuniting a wartime group who all had experience of variety theatre. She has a local's sense of Brighton, which I enjoyed. Intrigued if her series writing (Ruth Galloway) is a similar style.

The Crossing Places (Ruth Galloway 1) is only 99p at the moment. I quite enjoy the series.

ooh. Do love a deal. Thank you!

Not sure what to read next, and am delayed by my turn(s) to post --shameless plug alert-- on the blog (reviewing African Lives, one of those books that leaves you with an ENORMOUS wishlist in its wake - you have been warned).

Choices include the following from my library (!):

All our names Mengestu, Dinaw, 1978-

A bit of difference Atta, Sefi

Star of the morning Jooste, Pamela

Before I forget Brink, André

Harraga Sansal, Boualem

Bonita Avenue Buwalda, Peter, 1971-

The orchard of lost souls Mohamed, Nadifa, 1981-

A land more kind than home Cash, Wiley

Chop chop Wroe, Simon

Divided lives : dreams of a mother and a daughter Gordon, Lyndall

The broken word Foulds, Adam

So long a letter Bâ, Mariama

Poison, shadow and farewell Marias, Javier

Bad blood : a memoir Sage, Lorna

Advice welcome!

I struggle to choose which book to read too, and would with that list.

I would like to read Divided Lives, and eek, I had the Islington Library catalogue open already and they have an available copy. I think I really need to read some of what I have out so I can return it though, before I request anything else. My partner's office is in the central library building there, and reservations are free, so I request a lot of books through the reservation system and get him to take the books in and out! Three reservations came through on Monday and I have two, I've returned another book which someone else has reserved so I can get the other one.

I really liked All Our Names, and have to write a review, I also own a copy of one of his earlier books and must get to that, I should read and review Chop Chop, have had a copy from Penguin for ages, and I'd like to reread Bad Blood.

With a personal delivery person I think I would be even worse with the reserved books than I already am! You have a reader for the All Our Names review here. No pressure :-)

OK, so looking for possible interest in the Women & Rock reading, given the range of memoirs, biographies and autobios out there (maybe August/ Sept) - please head over to Kerri's thread for more info.

(Here's a picture of Janis Joplin reading to tempt you:

That sounds like a fun theme, Charlotte! Stopping in to wish you a happy Friday!

>139 charl08:: Love the picture, except for my frustration at being unable to see what she's reading.

>141 elkiedee: I was thinking the same thing...

No idea what she's reading. Reminded me of these though (Penguin thinkers series):

or perhaps more appropriately for LT readers?:

Just found this site: http://lovelybookcovers.com/archive

I'll be back in a couple of days... *drools*

Edna update:

Things not going well in Casa O'Brien after years of glitzy name-dropping. She describes being forced to sell her glamorous house, back to smaller, less central rented flats. Although glam holidays and private hospitals continue, along with bizarre accounts of visits to a guru, health farm, international spa. Distractions don't help the writer's block:
The words would not come, and I would remember when they had come and it had been so effortless, the rapid handwritten pages of this story or that.

Charlotte, as far as your library list goes, I have only read one of them but I can highly recommend it. A Land More Kind Than Home by Wiley Cash was one of my favourite reads last year. I think it has been quite popular here on LT. I know that Lit Chick aka Nancy really liked it too. It's dark, but a very thought provoking read.

Great list in 136. I'll be watching for your comments.

The only book on your list that I've already read is A Land More Kind than Home and it was a good one Charlotte. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to get lost on that site with all the book covers.

>147 vancouverdeb: >149 brenzi: I'll move that up the list!

>148 BLBera: Thanks! I'm just hoping no one requests the books so that I have a couple more renewals-worth to read them all. Just got another email saying two more had turned up: panic!

-----

Just finished A Thread of Grace, which (again!) was an LT recommendation, although when I opened my copy found that it had a 'book of the month' sticker, so someone in the library system agrees too.

I was completely gripped by this, admired the way the author put together so many diverse characters and their experiences of war and resistance in WW2 Italy. I particularly liked the feisty grannies, the 'black crows', using their apparent innocence to great effect.

I'm glad you liked A Thread of Grace! I liked the old women in black, too, and that their invisibility allowed them to go places without being noticed.

I have Dreamers of the Day ready to read, but I'm trying to hold off a while, as Russell doesn't write quickly.

Guardian reviews 21st Feb



Ghettoside
"what sets Ghettoside apart from the slew of factual police procedurals published every year, is a compelling analysis of the factors behind the epidemic of black-on-black homicide, and the beginnings of a policy prescription for tackling it. This makes Ghettoside an important book, which deserves a wide audience."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/18/ghettoside-investigating-homicide-e...

Frontline Ukraine
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/19/frontline-ukraine-crisis-in-borderl...
'it is a relief to find a book on the Ukrainian conflict that is cool, balanced, and well sourced'

I've always kept a unicorn
'I’ve Always Kept a Unicorn – a line from Denny’s piano ballad “Solo” – is rich in insight from those who loved and despaired of her.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/18/ive-always-kept-unicorn-sandy-denny...

Between Two Worlds: How the English became Americans
'We are all too accustomed to viewing North American colonisation in retrospect as a glorious success story for all but the native Americans and their environment. In Gaskill’s account, we are reminded that it was a close run thing'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/20/between-two-worlds-how-the-english-...

Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary
'The BBC broadcaster Anita Anand tells the beguiling story of Sophia Duleep Singh, from exile in the Suffolk country estate of Elveden to the suffragette battleground of Westminster, via various trips to her ancestors’ home.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jan/11/sophia-princess-suffragette-revolut...

How Good We Can Be
'Has Hutton’s hour come round again? Can stakeholder capitalism be resurrected? In this book, Hutton tries to give it new life. When the British left is so bereft of vision and so tentative about the modest ideas it does have, Hutton comes as a breath of fresh air.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/19/how-good-we-can-be-review-will-hutt...

Before, During, After
'the action takes place against the backdrop of 9/11 and the inner lives of his two protagonists are detonated on the same day that the twin towers fall. Thus the title, and thus does Bausch seek to have the private refract the public.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/20/before-during-after-richard-bausch-...

Lies, first person
'Wilful naivety, policies of retribution and a society that views forgiveness as weakness and humanising the tormentor as offensive all come under sneak attack here. Hareven has written a complex, humane novel that is not easily forgotten. '
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/20/lies-first-person-gail-hareven-revi...

Wolf Winter
'It’s 1717 in Swedish Lapland, winter is approaching and a new family of settlers has arrived on the bleak and beautiful Blackåsen mountain, hoping to hardscrabble a living from the unforgiving land. When 14-year-old newcomer Frederika stumbles on the mutilated body of a man in the forest, the locals are keen to blame wolves, but Frederika and her mother, the tough, resourceful Maija, are determined to get to the truth.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/21/wolf-winter-review-tremendous-evoca...

These are the Names
'Winner of the 2013 Libris prize, the “Dutch Booker”, Tommy Wieringa’s poetic, ambitious novel is a tale of two journeys. The increasingly desperate wanderers flee poverty and repression, while Beg searches for meaning and identity in his lonely life.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/21/these-are-the-names-by-tommy-wierin...

Second Life S J Watson
'his portrayal of the dark side of internet relationships, how their tendrils can spread to every aspect of life in the real world, is horrifying.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/15/second-life-sj-watson-review-murky-...

More reviews here http://www.theguardian.com/books

>151 RidgewayGirl: Ah, you read my mind! I meant to look for some more of hers. Quite tempted by Doc.

I have Netgalleys of the Sandy Denny bio and Wolf Winter - I looked at the Ukraine book and decided I might get too cross reading it.

Charlotte (you share your name with my daughter, by the way), Doc is fantastic. I can't recommend it highly enough. And she's just written the sequel.

Hi Charlotte, what superb reading you're up to! I can also highly, highly recommend Doc. I like it better than A Thread of Grace, but that's me. Would be curious to know what you think.

>155 RidgewayGirl: >156 lit_chick: Thank you. On the wishlist.
(Might wait a bit to order it though until the pile from the library goes down a tad. :-)

>136 charl08: Thank you for bringing my attention to your review and this blog! I plan to check it out when I have a bit more time.

>139 charl08: Oh, thank you! There seems to be a tiny bit of interest, but not much. I think I'll do it September though, so I hope you join us (or perhaps just me?). That is a cool photo.

>158 DorsVenabili: I'm definitely in for the music reading - I'm looking forward to finding out more about these women's lives.

Finished A Land More Kind Than Home. I don't know what I think about this book - I think it's suffered a bit by coming straight after A Thread of Grace. Will maybe come back and comment on this later, when I've had time to think a bit more about what I read.

I loved Ghettoside and have Wolf Winter from the library right now. Thanks for posting these.

>160 BLBera: The Ghettoside review made for interesting reading, not least because i had heard that The Wire was based on a book, but not made any effort to read it - onto my wishlist!

These posts are mostly self interested - I love reading reviews but generally am left with a vague idea about the title of that book that I read a good review of when I get to the shop / library / website!

For something completely different, reading Chop Chop: Ramilov, in one of his letters, says that's what all cooking is, a smart apology for a savage act

Just decided to trial Scribd (three months free with a code :-).

So many books...

>163 charl08: Amber's thread is discussing what genre you wouldn't read. I've gone from this to thinking about cover art and what I do / don't read.

This is partly because of reading Chop Chop, which is very funny, set in a London kitchen with a sadistic head chef. The cover is a horror though.
Mine from the library is a more sickly green colour.

US version much better:

>163 charl08: Ew, that *is* awful! Ha!

Yes - what they were thinking?

Finished Kindness Goes Unpunished. I've not read any of the others in the series, and am reading completely out of sync (I think this one is the third in the series?). I liked the humour although I'm sure there were several references I didn't get (sports). The mother / daughter storyline was odd but perhaps it made more sense for faithful readers.

Inspired by various accounts of RL book groups, I went to my local bookshop to ask if they host a group. And accidentally ended up volunteering to run one for them.

Not sure why I did that!

From the library:
The Spectre of Alexander Wolf
The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian
The Corpse on the Dike
Praying Mantis (a re-read for a series we're thinking about for the blog on Andre Brink)

From the recent discovery of Scribd and its digital wonders I have downloaded / saved several books on blogging that I should read, but fun things include Zakes Mda and The Pedant in the kitchen a Julian Barnes I hadn't come across before.

Following responses to a post on the blog, I've also got some books to add to my list of women writers linked to Africa. And my library has all three of them :-)

Zenzele: a letter for my daughter by Nozipo Maraire

Living, loving and lying awake at night by Sindiwe Magona

Muriel at Metropolitan Miriam Tlali

Good luck with the book group! I have a copy of Zenzele.

We'll see if it comes off. There was mention of World Book Night as well, so hope so. Would be good to see the library a bit busier.

Hi, Charlotte! I admittedly hadn't been following your thread, but after I read it and saw that we share nearly 250 books I have starred it.

I also have a copy of Zenzele but I haven't read it yet. Please let me know when you decide to read it.

>171 kidzdoc: Thanks for visiting. I'm looking forward to reading Malcolm X's autobiography.
Re Zenzele It will be dependent on the library delivery, but hopefully soon!

----
I'm enjoying Sherman Alexie's young adult book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (yet another LT recommendation).

He very modestly says in the interview they've printed in the back of my copy, that he isn't a young adult writer, just a writer with a very good editor. There is a difference in style, but he's still sharp on poverty, on alcoholism, and on the difficulties of maintaining hope in the face of so much.

The cartoons by Ellen Forney are also very funny (although this one is more about the quote):

Good for you, running a book / reading group! I hope it goes well! I'd be quite daunted! Have fun!

I really love this thread Charlotte and I can see it is going to be a popular stopping off spot for many of us!

>139 charl08: I will certainly join in. She only sort of qualifies but I reckon I'll be reading Suze Rotolo's biography.

>152 charl08: This is a great feature and far too tempting for the weak-willed such as I. Gaskill, Hutton and Watson would be the three that most appeal to me from the latest crop.

>174 PaulCranswick:: Paul, I recommend her memoir as a good read, but I don't think it does qualify. Suze Rotolo was an artist, not a musician, and her life was far more interesting than just being Dylan's girlfriend.

>175 elkiedee: I fear you are right Luci and to my shame I was thinking of her in terms of being Dylan's girlfriend and, in particular, THAT cover.

Yes, well the cover of my copy of the book does rather lead to that assumption - I read it for that reason too, but I really thought there were lots of things in the book that were more interesting than their relationship.

I've just added the review I wrote when I read it (a few years ago) on the LT page.

>173 vancouverdeb: Thanks. Whether the group materialises will be interesting. I know there were a couple in the town, but not sure if they are still running. I was in one in a bookshop before and it was lovely because they let us in when the shop was closed and let us have the run of the shop (with wine in hand). It will be hard to beat that.

>174 PaulCranswick: Thanks for the lovely comments Paul. I am enjoying the company of the group and the encouragement to read. And so many great recommendations.

>175 elkiedee:-177 This sounds intriguing. I know little or nothing about Rotolo and Dylan (I can only apologise) so will head over to the review page. I've ordered up a couple of the suggested books for women in rock reading, so roll on September :-)

Charlotte, well done re the book group! How awesome it would be just to be alone in there after closing time (wine or not!) with no-one standing for ages in front of the very thing you want to look at.

I'd never heard of (or maybe paid attention to) Scribd, so I had to look it up...The free trial offer looks good but maybe not right now, with my huge haul of library books...:-) (Two more this morning - aaargh!)

>179 susanj67: Although I signed up to Scribd because a) it was free and b) I was nosy because other people were saying how good it was, it's proving invaluable for the books I didn't think I could get from the women's fiction list - I've been able to dip into Your Madness, Not Mine starting off with a short story about a village healer dealing with the loss of a forest due to international loggers. There's a lovely gag about a guy who renames his bar 'Eyes Coal Bear' in the village following a visit to the city where everyone asked for ice cold beer

'He had scoffed at cold beer. Who drinks cold beer, he asked. Beer tasted like beer just the way it was'.



Also further seduced by the Pushkin Press, as I've started The Spectre of Alexander Wolf: completely intriguing premise. Our hero believes he killed a man fighting in Russia as a teenager. Many years later he reads an account of the encounter, but from the perspective of the dead man. He sets out to investigate. The blurb review quote is fab: "If Proust had been a Russian taxi-driver in the 1930s..."

>167 charl08: I ran a book club at a library I worked at for a little while. It really opened my eyes to how much work it is and how much pressure it is to pick the perfect book. I had really flaky attendees though so I hope yours goes a little more smoothly. :)

>181 rosylibrarian: Yes, kudos to everyone who runs a group in the face of a lack of enthusiasm / reasonable expectations. Here's hoping everyone's willing to take some group responsibility!! 'or failing that, alcohol', as Wendy Cope helpfully points out.

Penguin have emailed me (ha, if only) - sent me their latest group mailing - including this rather lovely site of 'vintage' ladybirds. I do remember the rather stepford wife-ish Cinderella from my childhood.
http://www.vintageladybird.com

My kids really love those very traditional stories - not sure we have Cinderella, but that may be my fault for stereotyping the boys' tastes! I always try to rifle through any Ladybirds in charity shops and see if there's anything good there.

>182 charl08:

>184 rosylibrarian: Nice.

How about this one?

>183 elkiedee: I missed your message, sorry! I wonder which ones turn up the most second hand? Most of the ones we had were already pretty battered even before we got our hands on them.

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Finished The Spectre of Alexander Wolf. I think crime novels / mysteries must have followed different rules in the 1930s, because there is very little of the consistent attention to plot that I would expect in a modern story, which was the same thing that I noticed about I was Jack Mortimer. The story of the narrator, moving from fighting in Russia post WW1 to become a journalist in Paris was absorbing, as he searches for Alexander Wolf to find out the truth of their encounter on the Russian 'steppes'.

In contrast to some of the British novels I've read from this period, apparently writers in Russian didn't have to worry about the censor so much. There's no double standard: both partners have a romantic back story without the soul searching (pretty striking when you contrast with Harriet Vane's tedious self-crit in Strong Poison).

The author Gaito Gadzanov sounds like he had quite a life (driving cabs at night whilst studying at the Sorbonne and writing during the day) - I'd love to read his biography.

I have returned to Harraga a book I started and then got distracted by other, newer and more shiny books from the library. I've not read anything by Boualem Sansal before, although he's published numerous novels and been awarded a range of prizes. Writing in French, his work is banned in his native Algeria for criticising the state's policies. Harraga refers to someone who leaves the country, as the main character's brother has done, going over the border to Morocco, and then hoping to reach Spain.

Lamia describes the family house, a history that in a nutshell summarises the international movement of people to and from Algiers. The (fictional?) house built by 'an officer of the Ottoman court' was then taken over by a French officer who subsequently converted to Islam. On his death the French family reasserted their claim over his Algerian, Muslim wife, and the house was managed by a Jewish broker. The broker then sold the house to a Transylvanian migrant, who in turn sold it to Lamia's family, becoming the first Algerians to own it.

The house dates back to the seventeenth century, to the Regency of Algiers. The rooms are poky, the windows Lilliputian, the doors low and the stairs, which are treacherous, were clearly made by carpenters who had one leg shorter than the other and very narrow minds. This perhaps explains - if explanation be needed - why everyone in my family grew up to have one calf muscle thicker than the other, a pronounced stoop, a waddle like a duck and very narrow minds. It has nothing to do with genetics; the house made us that way.

Hi Charlotte! I thought I would pop by and say hello. Nice thread and I also like your book choices. I have not read many African authors, so I might find some good ideas, over here.

I hope you are enjoying Part-Time Indian. I am a big fan.

Not a dry eye in this house when I looked at the Cinderella Ladybird cover on your thread. We have many of them from the old days torn and in tatters and held together with failing tape. Loved them!

>188 msf59: You don't want to get me started recommending books from African authors. I tend to overwhelm people with the enthusiasm and they start backing off waving hands, looking embarrassed...

>189 mdoris: I found some of our childhood books (that I thought my mum had thrown away years ago) recently. I guess these covers carry memories for lots of people - it's nice that the penguin people are giving them such a beautiful display online.

I do like these Charles Tunnicliffe ones:

I had huge amounts of Ladybird books both when I was small and recovered when the kids were the same age. I remember having that Cinderella book - my favourites were "The Three Little Pigs", "The Gingerbread Boy" and "Goldilocks and the Three Bears". Beautifully illustrated all.

Morning, Charlotte! You got me with your comments on The Spectre of Alexander Wolf - adding it to the giant WL. Love the quote from Harraga!

>190 charl08: I don't know if you are close enough for this to be of use to you, Charlotte: Ladybird Books Exhibition at Bexhill. I still have many of my childhood Ladybird books, mostly dating from the mid 60s, and shall be going to visit this exhibition soon. The webpage that the link goes to has details of the exhibition but also links to press articles - many of them with illustrations - as well.

>191 PaulCranswick: Ha! My gran used to open the three little pigs with a 'choose your own adventure' style request feature. Did I want the happy ending or the one where the first two pigs er, 'failed to escape'?

>192 Crazymamie: I have this house imagined in my head. I like the idea it might be real (please, no one google and disillusion me).

>193 CDVicarage: Bit far off, sadly. I did see the documentary about them though, did you? Fascinating thing. Might still be on the iPlayer. The 'what to see' ones were from a BBC report of an exhibition in Wales last year. I'd love to hear about your visit to the exhibit though. They do look gorgeous in print so I'm sure the originals are stunning.

On a completely different note (but kind of relevant to Alexander Wolf, where I did wonder a few times):

“Personally, as a reader, I don’t mind being puzzled.” —Nadine Gordimer http://t.co/oDbbBgY3dx

— The Paris Review (@parisreview) February 25, 2015

I'm not sure how I feel about 'being puzzled' though!

I am new to all this, (take photo, save to junk drawer, transfer to thread) so it is still kind of new and I'm making lots of mistakes. But lots of fun laying out the OLD ladybird books (sniff) and then going to the site that has the show now in London at the De La Warr Paviliion in Bexhill on Sea in East Sussex. How fun it would be to go to that! I have a friend going to London soon to visit her daughters and she is definitely a book person so maybe she will go!

More fun. This one's for Paul!

Hmmm, thought I had the 3 little pigs on the shelf!

>195 mdoris: >196 mdoris: They look like they've been well read :-)

9 Books waiting on the reservation shelf at the library. Argh!

I was planning to read Canada for the Richard Ford reading this March by audio. However, the Scribd copy is *not* audio but an ebook and so back to the drawing board!

Reserved books are required, by law, to arrive all at once.

>199 RidgewayGirl: Ha! That would explain a lot.

Whee, I've made 200 posts. In a panic over the reservations disappearing, my reading has abandoned all apparent sense. I've started Bad Blood, a book I ordered from the library because of Grace Dent's radio documentary, where she goes to the village where Lorna Sage was brought up by her warring grandparents, and where the memoir was set.

I was quite pleased to find the documentary is still available to listen to, think I will go back and listen again once the book is done.

And because I want to go back to the library and pick up (some of) the 9 books waiting on the reserve shelf, I've picked up The Corpse on the Dike in the hope that I could finish it soonish.

I went for a bike ride today, taking several book options for the (self-bribe) cafe at the end of the tow-path. It took me a lot longer than I thought to cycle (including some moments when I thought I was going to end up in the canal due to the lack of skills-with-mud riding). The cafe was almost closing, so I ended up reading just another short story in the Your Madness Not Mine collection super fast and making a hasty exit before I was mopped into a corner.

I'm not sure if all the stories are set in the same village, but this one had the same characters as the previous story I read. This time the village are in the midst of an election, and everyone is debating who to vote for, which party has the best hopes, and making plans for campaigning. The children are less keen:
When the face of the president of one of DP's youth sections appeared on the screen, the children all sighed and most of them left our house- after all, they had only come to watch Thelma, Deacon Frye, Carleton, and Hillary.

The Corpse on the Dike

A series recommended by rebeccanyc on her club read thread. Again I'm starting in the middle with this book (#3) (this time because the library didn't have the first one available to order).

I enjoy reading crime from different places as if it's done well you get a sense of the place as well as a well plotted story that has a clear genre you can follow. This book fits that pattern, although it's the Netherlands of a time before terrorist attacks, of course. Not that it's dangerous now unless you walk in a cycle lane.

Van de Wetering includes description of location that makes me want to go back and have a nice walk along a canal.

The commissaris, having stumbled onto the island during the a murderous adventure... had made the place his favourite haunt. He could often be found there, during weekends and holidays, wandering about the alleys, sitting on a wooden bench in a public garden, standing on the quay craning his neck to admire a gable top or dreaming in the courtyard of deserted mansion. He always ended up in the same small pub, the last of its kind, where a very old landlord - a living skeleton - still poured jenever for his few guests from a stone bottle. It made a gay tinkling sound as he filled the delicate tulip-shaped glasses with the amber-clored, syrup almost frozen, explosive.

>198 charl08: NINE reserves waiting?!!! Oh my goodness! Your post did make me giggle - how well I kow that panicked feeling of OMG there aren't enough hours in the day. I hope you can read your way through them in time. I now have seven reserve slots free, which is dangerous. Although my Easter Reading Extravaganza is coming up...

Nine reserves? Been there! :) I stopped by the library yesterday to pick up a book I had on reserve waiting for me and somehow 6 managed to follow me home...