Charl08 (Charlotte) reads towards the light (house) #8

Split Point Lighthouse - they filmed 'Round the Twist' here, which I suspect will mean nothing unless you were watching British children's TV at the same time as me! I visited here nearly ten years ago, the main thing I remember is the crazy persistent flies who refused to give up, and made walking around horrendous. The picture found online however, makes it look much less fraught.



This is the slightly less streamlined lighthouse in Burnham, visited recently.



And this is a lighthouse I enjoyed walking past when hiking north of Edinburgh, on the Bass Rock.



Reading update
I'm a would-be researcher / teacher who is not employed as either right now*, with the distinct side-benefit that I get a lot more time to read outside of 'my' field (although I like to do that too). Although I'm not a big goal-setter, given that just now reading is leisure activity, I'm making progress through the long-listed 'women's prize for fiction' and another list, of 50 books by women from the African continent, that two bloggers that I like and respect (along with the RCS) put together. On both lists I've found books I have loved, so :-) I've added the Booker longlist, which has rather slowed reading for the other targets!

*Hope springs eternal!

To fit with the lighthouse, my current fitness goal is to 'swim the channel'

Best books of 2015 (so far)

Five Children on the Western Front; Lila; The Map of Love; An Unnecessary Woman; Dept of Speculation; Can't we talk about something more pleasant; The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing; Bad Blood; Aya of Yop City; History of the Rain; Sights Unseen; The Narrow Road to the Deep North; A Month in the Country; In These Times;The Bone Clocks; In Diamond Square; The Real Jane Austen: A life in small things; Displacement; On the Move, A Spool of blue thread. Crooked Heart, The Book of Aron , How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents, The Shore, A History of Seven Killings, A Place called Winter, Sleeping on Jupiter, The Green Road, The Woman I Kept to Myself.

Updated to read targets

Gateway for Africa / Bookshy's list of 50 Books by African women everyone should read / 10 Read so far in 2015!
2. The Aya Series Aya of Yop City- Marguerite Abouet (Cote D'Ivoire / France) READ
5. Changes: A Love Story - Ama Ata Aidoo (Ghana)
6. Our Sister Killjoy - READ
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) READ
11. Tropical Fish: Stories out of Entebbe - Doreen Baingana (Uganda)
12. Patchwork - Ellen Banda-Aaku (UK/ Zambia / Ghana)
14. We need new names - No Violet Bulawayo (Zimbabwe)
15. Daughters of Africa - Margaret Busby (Ghana / UK)
17. Woman at Point Zero - Nawal El Saadawi (Egypt) READ
18. The Joys of Motherhood - Buchi Emecheta (Nigeria)
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) READ
26. Your Madness, Not Mine - Juliana Makuchi (Short Stories, Cameroon) READ
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)
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)
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)

Baileys Women's Fiction long list 6 to go
Rachel Cusk: Outline READ
Lissa Evans: Crooked Heart READ
Patricia Ferguson: Aren’t We Sisters? READ
Xiaolu Guo: I Am China READ
Samantha Harvey: Dear Thief READ
Emma Healey: Elizabeth is Missing READ
Emily St. John Mandel: Station Eleven READ
Grace McCleen: The Offering DNF'D
Sandra Newman: The Country of Ice Cream Star
Heather O’Neil: The Girl Who Was Saturday Night DNF'd
Laline Paull: The Bees
Marie Phillips: The Table of Less Valued Knights READ
Rachel Seiffert: The Walk Home READ
Kamila Shamsie: A God in Every Stone
Ali Smith: How to be Both READ
Sara Taylor: The Shore READ
Anne Tyler: A Spool of Blue Thread READ
Sarah Waters: The Paying Guests READ (DNF'D)
Jemma Wayne: After Before
PP Wong: The Life of a Banana

Booker Longlist 2015 : 3 to go

A Brief History of Seven Killings Marlon James READ
A Little Life Hanya Yanagihara
A Spool of Blue Thread Anne Tyler READ
Did You Ever Have a Family Bill Clegg READ
Lila Marilynne Robinson READ
Satin Island Tom McCarthy
Sleeping on Jupiter Anuradha Roy READ
The Chimes Anna Smaill READ
The Fishermen Chigozie Obioma READ
The Green Road Anne Enright READ
The Illuminations Andrew O’Hagan READ
The Moor's Account Laila Lalami
The Year of the RunawaysSunjeev Sahota READ

Total in 2015 225

August 25
Bee season (US, F)
Louisa Meets Bear (US, F )
H is for Hawk (UK, F)
The Year of the Runaways (UK, M)
The Shore (US, F)
Voices (Iceland, M)
The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau (UK, M)
When the Thrill is Gone (US, M)
Pereira Maintains (Italy, M)
Maigret's Revolver (France, M )
A Brief history of Seven Killings ( Jamaica, M)
The Novel Habits of Happiness (UK, M)
A Place Called Winter (UK, M)
The Chimes (New Zealand, F )
Love, Nina (UK, F)
Come and Tell Me Some Lies ( UK, F)
Reunion ( Germany, M)
Twilight of the Eastern Gods (Albania, M)
I am China (China / UK , F)
Sleeping on Jupiter (India, F)
The Buried Giant ( UK, M)
The Girl from the Fiction Department (UK, F)
Kismet (Germany,M)
The Beautiful Struggle ( US, M)
Book of Silence (UK,F )

September 26
A Florentine Death ( Italy, M)
The Green Road (Ireland, F)
The Fascination of Evil (France, M)
In the Fold (UK, F)
Exit Wounds (Israel, F)
Did You Ever Have a Family? (US, M)
And Sometimes I Wonder About You (US, M)
The Snack Thief (Italy, M)
The Sea Detective (UK, M)
The Woman I Kept to Myself (US, F)
Paris in Love (US, F )
Girl Interrupted (US, F)
House of Orphans ( UK, F )
The Illuminations (UK, M)
The Dead Can Wait (UK, M)
Sweet Caress (UK, M )
The Known World (US, M)
Under the Frangipani (Mozambique, M)
Time's Arrow (UK, M )
The Great Fire (Australia, F)
Nightwalking (UK, M)
Ice Haven (US, M)
Persona non Grata ( UK, F)
Nimona (US, F)
A Study in Murder (UK, M)
Songdogs (Ireland, M)

Stats Sept
Gender F 10 M 16
Region: Europe 15 ( UK 10), Israel 1, US 8, Africa 1 (Mozambique), Australia 1

Stats August :
Gender F 11 M 14
Region: US 5, Europe 17 (UK 11), Caribbean 1, Pacific 1 (New Zealand).

So I'm first!

Oh, a short thread! Let me jump in to wish you a Happy New Thread, Charlotte!

A piece of this rather splendid lighthouse cake for the first?

Happy new thread, Charlotte!

Love your thread-topping pictures, as I am a bit of a lighthouse fan-girl myself :)

Happy new thread, Charlotte and congrats on reaching 200! Impressive.

Happy New thread Charlotte! Love the lighthouse!

Happy New Thread, Charlotte! Love the lighthouse toppers!

>8 katiekrug: The National Trust rents out historic lighthouses for holidays.... Just saying...

>9 BLBera: I'm watching your thread keenly Beth for the feedback from your students on Station Eleven. Hope they like it as much as me.

>10 vancouverdeb: I was thinking of putting some up on the wall Deb. Maybe!

>11 msf59: I was trying to think of novels featuring lighthouses. Is there one by Alison Moore?

^I have still not read this one. Have you?

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf.

We start Station Eleven in a few weeks. I'll let you know what they think.

Happy new thread, Charlotte! Living on an island like I do, I tend to get a little ansy everytime I hear rumours of the federal government talks about decommissioning or putting some of the lighthouses up for sale since they view the majority of them as being surplus to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans needs. I continue to love skimming through your best books of 2015 every new thread. I am not an Enright fan, which I blame on my read of The Gathering which I did not like.

Happy new thread, Charlotte!

Happy New Thread, Charlotte!

Great minds think alike >13 msf59: and >14 BLBera: I love those lighthouse covers.

>16 scaifea: Thanks Amber. Loving your teacher credit thread.

>17 connie53: Thanks Connie: I must visit your thread!

>15 lkernagh: Oops, missed you there. I can't say that my best of list is very brief, but I excuse myself by saying that I've read some particularly good books this year thanks to LT recommendations....

As for the government trying to cut safety measures I sympathise. Some bright spark decided to cut the number of coastguard bases around our coast, arguing that they weren't needed, despite evidence that in cold seas it's so important to make sure the rescue times are fast. I think anyone suggesting this kind of thing should be chucked in the water and see what they think then (!)

Reading update: going rather slowly with the Rachel Cusk I picked up second hand, In the fold.

I loved The Light Between Oceans. And yes, there is The Lighthouse by Alison Moore. Also a Dalgliesh novel of that title by P D James!

^Obviously, this is not a book cover, but it should be!! I love it!

Luci, thanks >22 elkiedee: for confirming I got a name right, as I am Doubtful Often....

>23 msf59: Mark, I love that picture: looks like Elizabeth R in her early days.

In the Fold



I picked this up because I loved Outline and so thought I should try her other books. Harumph. I'm not convinced. The focus is on Michael, at first as he attends a party at the family house of a college friend as an 18 year old, and is completely taken in by their crazy ways, and then as he returns to visit as a father in the middle of a disintegrating marriage. The people are all horrible or pitiable, and I couldn't really care about any of them, and the childcare descriptions are rather terrifying.

However, there are some brilliant uses of language: most deep and meaningful about disintegrating relationships, but my favourites featuring scathing comments about fashion and dress, including a lady dressing younger than the years, whose hairstyle 'looked slightly askew, as though it had been thrown at her head and nearly missed'.

Guardian Reviews 5th September (ish, as you've probably noticed, they've gone to a book of the day format online whilst leaving the paper version largely unchanged. Futilely do I keep filling out feedback forms requesting 14 pages of book - not book and art and architecture- of reviews. I Should be grateful they even publish the paper I suppose).*


Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick deWitt reviewed by Liz Jensen Sounds like fun. And recommended by a favourite author, no less...
"This is the territory of the Brothers Grimm, as seen through the skewed lens of Wes Anderson or Monty Python, a place of wood-chopping and petty thieving and puppies drowned in buckets, where they speak a Euro-Biblical-Yiddishy scramble of “and then they did do this” and “enough already”. And why shouldn’t that work? It works."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/undermajordomo-minor-patrick-dewitt...

My Name’s Not Friday by Jon Walter reviewed by Tony Bradman Wow. This sounds amazing.
'We first meet Samuel in an orphanage for “coloured” children, and I challenge any reader not to be captivated by his voice, part Huck Finn, part Oliver Twist, but wholly himself. He tells his story in the first person, and within a few pages it’s like listening to an old friend.'
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/my-names-not-friday-jon-walter-revi...

Another Mother's Son by Janet Davey reviewed by Grace McLeen um, no.
"It is precisely Davey’s attempt to faithfully represent “real life”, however, that can make this novel feel drab and exhausting. We are regaled with minutiae: individual curtains (“sun-bleached on the inner edge … the hem falling short of the floor”), purchasing a cup of tea, the sipping of said tea. Intended to convey the tedious nature of Lorna’s existence, the descriptions are themselves tedious" http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/another-mothers-son-janet-davey-rev...

Up Against the Night by Justin Cartwright reviewed by Christopher Hope I like Cartwright, but I'm several books behind, so it might well be ages before I get to this one.
"Since apartheid ended there has been a spate of returnee novels from South African writers. A prodigal makes a trip home to find a land turned upside down, a dysfunctional family and, more often than not, a disputed farm. What Justin Cartwright has done in Up Against the Night is to turn these stock features into something rich and strange."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/up-against-the-night-justin-cartwri...

West of Sunset by Stewart O’Nan reviewed by David Winters This sounds fab - I loved Careless People
"O’Nan imagines the last three years of Fitzgerald’s life, from 1937 to 1940, less as a second act than an intermission; a moment of uncertainty, in which the familiar scenery disappeared. West of Sunset captures the sadness of such moments, but also their promise"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/03/west-of-sunset-by-stewart-onan-revi...

Promised You a Miracle: UK 80-82 by Andy Beckett reviewed by Ian Jack This is one of those books I think I should read. Hmm.
"Beckett tells us that his purpose isn’t to give a simple thumbs-up or thumbs-down to Thatcherism. As well as zealotry and the tumbrils, social revolutions involve “complicity, last-minute conversions, the acceptance … of new realities, and countless other forms of psychological rewiring”"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/pomised-you-a-miracle-uk-80-82-andy...

Physical: poetry by Andrew McMillan reviewed by Ben Wilkinson I suspect that this will be difficult to get hold of.
"Adept at finding the surreal in the everyday, turning an ear to the lilt of conversation alongside serious (but rarely solipsistic) reflection, McMillan’s verse worries away at what it is to be human, to feel through both the flesh and our emotions, to lose and to love, but most of all, what it means to be a man."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/05/physical-andrew-mcmillan-review-poe...

The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante reviewed by Alice Clark I'm hoping to read the trilogy and enjoy it more than The Days of Abandonment which I was underwhelmed by.
"The story of childhood friends Elena and Lila – for all that it chronicles a particular stratum of postwar southern Italian society and foregrounds the painful struggle to reconcile motherhood and self-determination within an inherited, rigidly gendered and seemingly invulnerable framework, for all its tentacular reach into radical politics, corruption, organised crime and intellectual elites – is essentially a story of the uncertainty of identity, of competing and contested and spawning narratives"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/03/the-story-of-the-lost-child-elena-f...

Two Years, Eight Months and Twenty‑Eight Nights by Salman Rushdie reviewed by Ursula K LeGuin I've never got anywhere with Rushdie's books. Sadly.
"Rushdie is our Scheherazade, inexhaustibly enfolding story within story and unfolding tale after tale with such irrepressible delight that it comes as a shock to remember that, like her, he has lived the life of a storyteller in immediate peril."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/04/two-years-eight-months-and-twenty-e...

A House in St John’s Wood by Matthew Spender reviewed by Lara Speigl Sounds a bit tell all to me!
"It is the most truthful account we have had of the poet Stephen Spender and an unusually candid book for any son to write about his parents. It is also fearless in its self-exposure."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/aug/30/house-in-st-johns-wood-matthew-spen...

Affirming: Letters 1975-1997 by Isaiah Berlin reviewed by Stefano Collini No, but I love the cover!
"As a historian of ideas, Berlin was wide-ranging, even learned in an eccentric way, but that way was far removed from the contemporary academic model of specialised “research”. He moved easily in the company of the thinkers from the 18th and 19th centuries who most interested him – figures such as Vico, Herder and his great hero, the Russian liberal Alexander Herzen. He understood the outlook of such writers, drawing on a kind of intellectual empathy to reanimate their ideas for later generations, but he did not build up a thickly textured context of lesser minds or grub around in archives"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/03/affirming-letters-isaiah-berlin-edi...

The Red Web by Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan reviewed by Luke Harding Wow. This sounds terrifying.
"Russia’s spy agencies have the ability to snoop on emails via Sorm, a sophisticated system first developed by the KGB to eavesdrop on phone calls. The FSB’s (Federal Security Service) legal powers go well beyond those of the US National Security Agency or GCHQ. Russian internet service providers are obliged to install Sorm black boxes; they have no clue as to what Russian intelligence agents choose to intercept. Soldatov and Borogan argue that what troubles Vladimir Putin is that the servers of big global platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are located in the US. Russia’s president takes a dim view of the internet, which he personally doesn’t use. In 2014 he dubbed it a “CIA project”. The challenge for the Russian authorities, as they saw it, was to force these US-hosted platforms to relocate their servers to Russian territory. There, of course, the state could control them."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/02/the-red-web-review-andrei-soldatov-...

And an interesting article about Oliver Sacks http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/04/tea-with-oliver-sacks-will-self-and...

*This has all gone rather Eeyore. Oops.

Charlotte, I loved Outline when I read it earlier this year, mainly because of the cover and the reviews. I'd been given one of her autobiographical books when my first child was born - it looked good but somehow I never managed to get very far into it. I do think I need to give it another try, but it did put me off of Cusk for fifteen years!

Just a quick pop by, Charlotte. Yes, there a book called The Lighthouse by Alison Moore. I really loved it! I read it more or less together with two other people here on LT - lit_chick and ctpress. We had a great discussion on all of the symbolism in it. We've all written a review for The Lighthouse here on LT. It's a dark book and I am pretty sure it was short listed for the Orange Prize, now known as the Bailey's prize. It's dark, but only 180 pages long. I had to read it twice to try to fully understand all of the symbolism. I'd recommend it, but of course, no book is everyone's cup of tea.

The Light Between Oceans was enjoyable, and less dark, but still quite dark. I really enjoyed it overall. Big recommendation from me. Later I'll check your Guardian Reviews - thanks for posting them.

Later today - much later, I am gathering with my family to have good bye party for for my nephew. He is 25 and working towards his PhD. He is off to Cambridge University, Darwin Hall. He spent 6 weeks at Oxford on a ? summer student course a year ago and really loved the UK. It seems so far away and for a long time! He's a brave soul to cross the pond for such a long time. He is studying - err - genomes and stuff like protein folding - it's bit beyond my understanding.

>27 RidgewayGirl: Like you, I don't think I'd have picked up Outline based on the fact it was authored by Cusk. In the Fold included a hellish description of what sounded to me as postpartum depression, but woth no sense of acknowledgement that that was what it was. Awful grim stuff to read.

>28 vancouverdeb: I liked the Alison Moore but I can't say I was that big on the metaphors Deb. I hope your nephew enjoys Cambridge. I've never studied there, but lived there as a kid so my recommendations are limited to swimming pools and parks (of which there are many, as I am sure he will have no problem finding)!!! Cambridge has such a large international student community that I'm sure he will find lots of people like himself to socialise with and support each other as they identify all the weird things British People Do and Eat..

Vaguely linked anecdote: a couple of friends who were international postgrads at Edinburgh were in an amazing international society that used to hire a bus at weekends and go see castles and historic places supercheap. By the end of the first year they all had a better grasp if Scottish history than I did. Shaming!

Happy New Thread, Charlotte. I love lighthouses. Probably because we don't have a sea and they have a magic of wanderlust.

Thanks Barbara. Hope your weekend is providing a chance for your family to recover from the week.

I am gripped by Did you ever have a family, but I'm going to have to get on with reading it because it seems the rest of Lancashire has woken up to the Booker praise and it has gone from lots of copies sitting in many branches to mine being reserved and wanted back at the end of the loan period. Seems I got in at the right time *smug look*

When a graphic novel comes into the library I like to take it to read in one of the town coffee shops. Exit Wounds was another great read in the genre, the story of Koby and his search for his estranged father following a bomb in an Israeli café. For me the romance / relationship was a little too disjointed to be particularly credible, but still the kind of engaging story that made me want to find out what happened, with engaging characters

Happy new thread, Charlotte. I love your lighthouses. I saw 2 very pretty ones this past Wednesday when I went sailing off Newport, RI.

You've lured me into putting Exit Wounds on my OWL.

Hi Charlotte - Thanks for the reviews. I do like Rushdie, so that is on my list. The O'Nan and Ferrante are the others that look good to me. I love the description of Every Mother's Son -- "drab and exhausting." I think not.

I already have Under Major Domo Minor on my WL because I loved The Sisters Brothers so much. And Stewart O'Nan is a favorite of mine so I will probably read West of Sunset eventually - the premise isn't particularly appealing, but then again, I loved his novella about closing down a Red Lobster restaurant so he can make lots of things worth reading!

>34 cameling: Ooh any pictures? Or did you have your hands full with the boat?

>35 BLBera: I fancy the O' Nan too Beth, the review suggests that he has published others in the US, just not in the UK. But hopefully they'll be available if this one sells...
I really hope the author of Every Mother's Son doesn't read that review. That quote isn't the worst of it.

>36 katiekrug: I think I was a bit more lukewarm than you on The Sisters Brothers but the review made me quite excited about this new book. But you'll probably get to it first, so I have a safety net there... (if that's not taking you for granted too much...) I wonder if Mamie will include it in her Gatsby reading kick?

Operation Storage is a go!

Just managed to get two bags of unwanted books to the charity shop in as many days.

Then went to one of our local bargain stores where thanks to all the returning students there were several deals on flat pack storage containers. I'm keen to get some stuff binned but mostly to organise myself, not least to cut down dust and put summer stuff away given limited cupboard space, and work out what I've got .

Also (whisper it) maybe think about selling/ donating my academic book collection, as it is not returning the investment, taking up loads of space, and I am contemplating moving onto a canal boat which probably would sink with the current book weight. Sad Face....

Happy new thread, Charlotte! Thanks for the Guardian books (and I think a touch of the Eeyores is perfectly justified in the circumstances). I'll get the Andy Beckett one at some stage - his book about the 70s is staring at me right now from the bookshelf. And My Name's Not Friday looks good. I keep seeing Stewart O'Nan mentioned here, so I might try him too.

Yay for the new storage! It's difficult about textbooks though, I know. Until a couple of years ago I still had some of my university law books, which sat in a cupboard unused. And I may still have a legal dictionary somewhere...

Despite the description I read a previous Janet Davey novel and though I probably won't go looking for this one I might read it if I come across it somewhere.

>40 susanj67: Thanks Susan. I'd be intrigued if the Telegraph reviewed the Red Web. The Guardian one just raised the spectre of Russian anti Internet policy as determined as China. The encouragement re the storage project is most welcome. Not too sure what is worth storing long term, so will just try and clear little by little I think. I was kind of surprised that an author would not be published in the UK if popular in the US. I thought those days were gone given global markets etc. Never mind.

>41 elkiedee: I'll look for the earlier novel then I think. The reviewer does sag something about different opinions...

Finished Did you ever have a family. Really powerful read. Will try and think over something intelligent to say about it that isn't completely spoilertastic. It's so good, my Booker personal rankings are in ruins. Ruins!

Wow, Charlotte! That is a fantastic review of Undermajordomo Minor. Thanks for sharing. I LOVED The Sisters Brothers!!

I also really enjoyed Exit Wounds.

Hurrah Mark, so I've got comments from you and Katie to look forward to before I have to make up my mind!

I read Jon Walter's first book, Close to the wind earlier this year and would definitely read another by him, though they are children's books.
If you liked Exit Wounds then you'll love Modan's The property.

Thanks Kerry. I'm hoping a few of the books I've requested (asked them to buy) will come in soon so that I can request some more - unfortunately Exit Wounds is the only work by Modan the library has in the system, despite the stamp log showing it's been popular.

I didn't love The Sisters Brothers. I thought it was style over substance, but did find it entertaining. I'd automatically skip DeWitt's new one, but it does look interesting.

I've already got a copy of The Story of the Lost Child. I raced through the first three.

>47 charl08: Shame, The Property is a more recent publication.

Love the Cusk quote. I am up and down with her too.

Must check out Did You Ever Have A Family?"

>48 RidgewayGirl: Yes, you're one of the reasons I'm keen to give her books another go!

>49 avatiakh: They're normally pretty good about getting books in for me, so fingers crossed I might even get hold of it before Xmas.

>50 sibylline: The humour was good, the relentless depiction of people tormenting each other not so much. I still haven't said anything lucid on the Bill Clegg book. Will now try.

I read the cover puff to make sure I don't give away too much about Did You Ever Have a Family. I was quite nervous about reading this as it is billed as opening from the perspective of a woman at the point of the loss of her daughter, her fiance, her father and her boyfriend in a tragi house fire. We've had two bereavements in the family in the past months, and I didn't think that I could bear 300 pages detailing grief, no matter how well written.

However this isn't that book. Each chapter is narrated by a different character somehow linked to the fire. It becomes clear that very different explanations for the fire are possible, in the same way that those left after the fire have different approaches to dealing with their grief. Towards the end I was as much keen to find out what would happen as appreciating the different voices Clegg uses to tell the story. I think this would make for a brilliant book group read, as his focus is as much on what families are, as how people deal with loss.

North of Aberdeen along 109, it's all beach. Little houses, a few motels and beach. And above it all the widest sky I've ever seen. It was May and still chilly, but we pulled over to the side of the road and walked past the dunes to the water. Kelly told me to take my shoes off even though the sand was freezing cold. The wind was wild, and as we walked, we leaned into it to keep moving forward. It was the first real effort I had made in months, leaning in, not allowing myself to be blown back or down. The hard, cold sand beneath my feet felt good, and I remembered I had a body and that it could feel.

And Sometimes I Wonder About You is the latest in Mosley's Leonid McGill series. I found this the strongest yet, with Leonid's son Twill stepping up to his own investigation, and the reappearance of other familiar family and friends. The case plotting was tight, and there was even a misfiled library donation as a key plot point to really appeal to the bookish. Hoping for another soon.

I just saw this on Tim Spalding's twitter feed, How Much Money do Libraries Spend on e-Books?Amazed that it costs so much more for a library to buy an e-book.

eta: he also posted a link to an article he wrote back in 2009 predicting this: http://blog.librarything.com/thingology/2009/10/ebook-economics-are-libraries-sc...

$72.00 for a library to stock an ebook copy of Between the World and Me. That's shocking.

I wonder if this is a similar picture internationally?

Following a lengthy sties of the top 100 novels in English by Robert McCrum, appeal for readers' suggestions included Beloved, Lanark and Woman on the Edge of Time.
http://gu.com/p/4bqmh?

McCrum's top 100 novels written in English
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/aug/17/the-100-best-novels-written-in-engl...

1. The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan (1678)

A story of a man in search of truth told with the simple clarity and beauty of Bunyan’s prose make this the ultimate English classic.

2. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (1719)

By the end of the 19th century, no book in English literary history had enjoyed more editions, spin-offs and translations. Crusoe’s world-famous novel is a complex literary confection, and it’s irresistible.

3. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift (1726)

A satirical masterpiece that’s never been out of print, Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels comes third in our list of the best novels written in English

4. Clarissa by Samuel Richardson (1748)

Clarissa is a tragic heroine, pressured by her unscrupulous nouveau-riche family to marry a wealthy man she detests, in the book that Samuel Johnson described as “the first book in the world for the knowledge it displays of the human heart.”

5. Tom Jones by Henry Fielding (1749)

Tom Jones is a classic English novel that captures the spirit of its age and whose famous characters have come to represent Augustan society in all its loquacious, turbulent, comic variety.

6. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne (1759)

Laurence Sterne’s vivid novel caused delight and consternation when it first appeared and has lost little of its original bite.

7. Emma by Jane Austen (1816)

Jane Austen’s Emma is her masterpiece, mixing the sparkle of her early books with a deep sensibility.

8. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)

Mary Shelley’s first novel has been hailed as a masterpiece of horror and the macabre.

9. Nightmare Abbey by Thomas Love Peacock (1818)

The great pleasure of Nightmare Abbey, which was inspired by Thomas Love Peacock’s friendship with Shelley, lies in the delight the author takes in poking fun at the romantic movement.

10. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe (1838)

Edgar Allan Poe’s only novel – a classic adventure story with supernatural elements – has fascinated and influenced generations of writers.

11. Sybil by Benjamin Disraeli (1845)

The future prime minister displayed flashes of brilliance that equalled the greatest Victorian novelists.

12. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (1847)

Charlotte Brontë’s erotic, gothic masterpiece became the sensation of Victorian England. Its great breakthrough was its intimate dialogue with the reader.

13. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (1847)

Emily Brontë’s windswept masterpiece is notable not just for its wild beauty but for its daring reinvention of the novel form itself.

14. Vanity Fair by William Thackeray (1848)

William Thackeray’s masterpiece, set in Regency England, is a bravura performance by a writer at the top of his game.

15. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens (1850)

David Copperfield marked the point at which Dickens became the great entertainer and also laid the foundations for his later, darker masterpieces.

16. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne (1850)

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s astounding book is full of intense symbolism and as haunting as anything by Edgar Allan Poe.

17. Moby-Dick by Herman Melville (1851)

Wise, funny and gripping, Melville’s epic work continues to cast a long shadow over American literature.

18. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865)

Lewis Carroll’s brilliant nonsense tale is one of the most influential and best loved in the English canon.

19. The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (1868)

Wilkie Collins’s masterpiece, hailed by many as the greatest English detective novel, is a brilliant marriage of the sensational and the realistic.

20. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1868-9)

Louisa May Alcott’s highly original tale aimed at a young female market has iconic status in America and never been out of print.

21. Middlemarch by George Eliot (1871-2)

This cathedral of words stands today as perhaps the greatest of the great Victorian fictions.

22. The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope (1875)

Inspired by the author’s fury at the corrupt state of England, and dismissed by critics at the time, The Way We Live Now is recognised as Trollope’s masterpiece.

23. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (1884/5)

Mark Twain’s tale of a rebel boy and a runaway slave seeking liberation upon the waters of the Mississippi remains a defining classic of American literature.

24. Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson (1886)

A thrilling adventure story, gripping history and fascinating study of the Scottish character, Kidnapped has lost none of its power.

25. Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K Jerome (1889)

Jerome K Jerome’s accidental classic about messing about on the Thames remains a comic gem.

26. The Sign of Four by Arthur Conan Doyle (1890)

Sherlock Holmes’s second outing sees Conan Doyle’s brilliant sleuth – and his bluff sidekick Watson – come into their own.
27. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (1891)

Wilde’s brilliantly allusive moral tale of youth, beauty and corruption was greeted with howls of protest on publication.

28. New Grub Street by George Gissing (1891)

George Gissing’s portrayal of the hard facts of a literary life remains as relevant today as it was in the late 19th century.

29. Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy (1895)

Hardy exposed his deepest feelings in this bleak, angry novel and, stung by the hostile response, he never wrote another.

30. The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane (1895)

Stephen Crane’s account of a young man’s passage to manhood through soldiery is a blueprint for the great American war novel.

31. Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897)

Bram Stoker’s classic vampire story was very much of its time but still resonates more than a century later.

32. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (1899)

Joseph Conrad’s masterpiece about a life-changing journey in search of Mr Kurtz has the simplicity of great myth.

33. Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser (1900)

Theodore Dreiser was no stylist, but there’s a terrific momentum to his unflinching novel about a country girl’s American dream.

34. Kim by Rudyard Kipling (1901)

In Kipling’s classic boy’s own spy story, an orphan in British India must make a choice between east and west.

35. The Call of the Wild by Jack London (1903)

Jack London’s vivid adventures of a pet dog that goes back to nature reveal an extraordinary style and consummate storytelling.

36. The Golden Bowl by Henry James (1904)

American literature contains nothing else quite like Henry James’s amazing, labyrinthine and claustrophobic novel.

37. Hadrian the Seventh by Frederick Rolfe (1904)

This entertaining if contrived story of a hack writer and priest who becomes pope sheds vivid light on its eccentric author – described by DH Lawrence as a “man-demon”.

38. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (1908)

The evergreen tale from the riverbank and a powerful contribution to the mythology of Edwardian England.

39. The History of Mr Polly by HG Wells (1910)

The choice is great, but Wells’s ironic portrait of a man very like himself is the novel that stands out.

40. Zuleika Dobson by Max Beerbohm (1911)

The passage of time has conferred a dark power upon Beerbohm’s ostensibly light and witty Edwardian satire.

41. The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford (1915)

Ford’s masterpiece is a searing study of moral dissolution behind the facade of an English gentleman – and its stylistic influence lingers to this day.

42. The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan (1915)

John Buchan’s espionage thriller, with its sparse, contemporary prose, is hard to put down.

43. The Rainbow by DH Lawrence (1915)

The Rainbow is perhaps DH Lawrence’s finest work, showing him for the radical, protean, thoroughly modern writer he was.

44. Of Human Bondage by W Somerset Maugham (1915)

Somerset Maugham’s semi-autobiographical novel shows the author’s savage honesty and gift for storytelling at their best.

45. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1920)

The story of a blighted New York marriage stands as a fierce indictment of a society estranged from culture.

46. Ulysses by James Joyce (1922)

This portrait of a day in the lives of three Dubliners remains a towering work, in its word play surpassing even Shakespeare.

47. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis (1922)

What it lacks in structure and guile, this enthralling take on 20s America makes up for in vivid satire and characterisation.

48. A Passage to India by EM Forster (1924)

EM Forster’s most successful work is eerily prescient on the subject of empire.

49. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos (1925)

A guilty pleasure it may be, but it is impossible to overlook the enduring influence of a tale that helped to define the jazz age.

50. Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf (1925)

Woolf’s great novel makes a day of party preparations the canvas for themes of lost love, life choices and mental illness.

51. The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

Fitzgerald’s jazz age masterpiece has become a tantalising metaphor for the eternal mystery of art.

52. Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner (1926)

A young woman escapes convention by becoming a witch in this original satire about England after the first world war.

53. The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway (1926)

Hemingway’s first and best novel makes an escape to 1920s Spain to explore courage, cowardice and manly authenticity.

54. The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett (1929)

Dashiell Hammett’s crime thriller and its hard-boiled hero Sam Spade influenced everyone from Chandler to Le Carré.

55. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner (1930)

The influence of William Faulkner’s immersive tale of raw Mississippi rural life can be felt to this day.

56. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (1932)

Aldous Huxley’s vision of a future human race controlled by global capitalism is every bit as prescient as Orwell’s more famous dystopia.

57. Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons (1932)

The book for which Gibbons is best remembered was a satire of late-Victorian pastoral fiction but went on to influence many subsequent generations.

58. Nineteen Nineteen by John Dos Passos (1932)

The middle volume of John Dos Passos’s USA trilogy is revolutionary in its intent, techniques and lasting impact.

59. Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller (1934)

The US novelist’s debut revelled in a Paris underworld of seedy sex and changed the course of the novel – though not without a fight with the censors.

60. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh (1938)

Evelyn Waugh’s Fleet Street satire remains sharp, pertinent and memorable.

61. Murphy by Samuel Beckett (1938)

Samuel Beckett’s first published novel is an absurdist masterpiece, a showcase for his uniquely comic voice.

62. The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler (1939)

Raymond Chandler’s hardboiled debut brings to life the seedy LA underworld – and Philip Marlowe, the archetypal fictional detective.

63. Party Going by Henry Green (1939)

Set on the eve of war, this neglected modernist masterpiece centres on a group of bright young revellers delayed by fog.

64. At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O’Brien (1939)

Labyrinthine and multilayered, Flann O’Brien’s humorous debut is both a reflection on, and an exemplar of, the Irish novel.

65. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (1939)

One of the greatest of great American novels, this study of a family torn apart by poverty and desperation in the Great Depression shocked US society.

66. Joy in the Morning by PG Wodehouse (1946)

PG Wodehouse’s elegiac Jeeves novel, written during his disastrous years in wartime Germany, remains his masterpiece.

67. All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren (1946)

A compelling story of personal and political corruption, set in the 1930s in the American south.

68. Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry (1947)

Malcolm Lowry’s masterpiece about the last hours of an alcoholic ex-diplomat in Mexico is set to the drumbeat of coming conflict.

69. The Heat of the Day by Elizabeth Bowen (1948)

Elizabeth Bowen’s 1948 novel perfectly captures the atmosphere of London during the blitz while providing brilliant insights into the human heart.

70. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell (1949)

George Orwell’s dystopian classic cost its author dear but is arguably the best-known novel in English of the 20th century.

71. The End of the Affair by Graham Greene (1951)

Graham Greene’s moving tale of adultery and its aftermath ties together several vital strands in his work.

72. The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger (1951)

JD Salinger’s study of teenage rebellion remains one of the most controversial and best-loved American novels of the 20th century.

73. The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow (1953)

In the long-running hunt to identify the great American novel, Saul Bellow’s picaresque third book frequently hits the mark.

74. Lord of the Flies by William Golding (1954)

Dismissed at first as “rubbish & dull”, Golding’s brilliantly observed dystopian desert island tale has since become a classic.

75. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov (1955)

Nabokov’s tragicomic tour de force crosses the boundaries of good taste with glee.

76. On the Road by Jack Kerouac (1957)

The creative history of Kerouac’s beat-generation classic, fuelled by pea soup and benzedrine, has become as famous as the novel itself.

77. Voss by Patrick White (1957)

A love story set against the disappearance of an explorer in the outback, Voss paved the way for a generation of Australian writers to shrug off the colonial past.

78. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (1960)

Her second novel finally arrived this summer, but Harper Lee’s first did enough alone to secure her lasting fame, and remains a truly popular classic.

79. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark (1960)

Short and bittersweet, Muriel Spark’s tale of the downfall of a Scottish schoolmistress is a masterpiece of narrative fiction.

80. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (1961)

This acerbic anti-war novel was slow to fire the public imagination, but is rightly regarded as a groundbreaking critique of military madness.

81. The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing (1962)

Hailed as one of the key texts of the women’s movement of the 1960s, this study of a divorced single mother’s search for personal and political identity remains a defiant, ambitious tour de force.

Malcolm Macdowell in A Clockwork Orange
Malcolm Macdowell in Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange film.
82. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess (1962)

Anthony Burgess’s dystopian classic still continues to startle and provoke, refusing to be outshone by Stanley Kubrick’s brilliant film adaptation.

83. A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood (1964)

Christopher Isherwood’s story of a gay Englishman struggling with bereavement in LA is a work of compressed brilliance.

84. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (1966)

Truman Capote’s non-fiction novel, a true story of bloody murder in rural Kansas, opens a window on the dark underbelly of postwar America.

85. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (1966)

Sylvia Plath’s painfully graphic roman à clef, in which a woman struggles with her identity in the face of social pressure, is a key text of Anglo-American feminism.

86. Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth (1969)

This wickedly funny novel about a young Jewish American’s obsession with masturbation caused outrage on publication, but remains his most dazzling work.

87. Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor (1971)

Elizabeth Taylor’s exquisitely drawn character study of eccentricity in old age is a sharp and witty portrait of genteel postwar English life facing the changes taking shape in the 60s.

88. Rabbit Redux by John Updike (1971)

Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom, Updike’s lovably mediocre alter ego, is one of America’s great literary protoganists, up there with Huck Finn and Jay Gatsby.

89. Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison (1977)

The novel with which the Nobel prize-winning author established her name is a kaleidoscopic evocation of the African-American experience in the 20th century.

90. A Bend in the River by VS Naipaul (1979)

VS Naipaul’s hellish vision of an African nation’s path to independence saw him accused of racism, but remains his masterpiece.

91. Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie (1981)

The personal and the historical merge in Salman Rushdie’s dazzling, game-changing Indian English novel of a young man born at the very moment of Indian independence.

92. Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (1981)

Marilynne Robinson’s tale of orphaned sisters and their oddball aunt in a remote Idaho town is admired by everyone from Barack Obama to Bret Easton Ellis.

93. Money: A Suicide Note by Martin Amis (1984)

Martin Amis’s era-defining ode to excess unleashed one of literature’s greatest modern monsters in self-destructive antihero John Self.

94. An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro (1986)

Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel about a retired artist in postwar Japan, reflecting on his career during the country’s dark years, is a tour de force of unreliable narration.

95. The Beginning of Spring by Penelope Fitzgerald (1988)

Fitzgerald’s story, set in Russia just before the Bolshevik revolution, is her masterpiece: a brilliant miniature whose peculiar magic almost defies analysis.

96. Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler (1988)

Anne Tyler’s portrayal of a middle-aged, mid-American marriage displays her narrative clarity, comic timing and ear for American speech to perfection.

97. Amongst Women by John McGahern (1990)

This modern Irish masterpiece is both a study of the faultlines of Irish patriarchy and an elegy for a lost world.

98. Underworld by Don DeLillo (1997)

A writer of “frightening perception”, Don DeLillo guides the reader in an epic journey through America’s history and popular culture.

99. Disgrace by JM Coetzee (1999)

In his Booker-winning masterpiece, Coetzee’s intensely human vision infuses a fictional world that both invites and confounds political interpretation.

100. True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey (2000)

Peter Carey rounds off our list of literary milestones with a Booker prize-winning tour-de-force examining the life and times of Australia’s infamous antihero, Ned Kelly.

Both the American library and the Canadian library I have cards for use Overdrive. I don't know what format is used in the UK or elsewhere.

Here in Auckland, NZ we mainly use Overdrive at the library, also BorrowBox. Now I understand while they'll order multiple copies of bestsellers in hardcopy but only 2 or 3 in digital.

We have overdrive, but often copies listed in the US aren't available in my library.

Hi, Charlotte! I've been hearing great things about Did You Ever Have a Family. I want to get my greedy mitts on that one. I heard his previous memoirs are excellent too.

Interesting list. I love that it includes Heart of Darkness which is a huge favorite of mine, but I hate that it included The Catcher in the Rye which I think is ridiculously over-rated.

I'm really looking forward to reading the Bill Clegg novel.....

>63 msf59: I'd be interested to hear what the audio version is like. Or are you gunning for a hardcopy?

>64 katiekrug: Katie I agree with the critics of the list who point out that it works if you take it as one man's opinion of the best 100. It doesn't meet the claims in its title when viewed on Gender, Asian and African representation (for example).

The Snack Thief was a fun visit to Sicily, as unlike the TV series Montalbano was not pursued by a flock of blonde women with little discernment and appeared to have some kind of inner moral sense as well as thinking about police cases. The Inspector attempts to avoid involvement in a murder lined to smuggling, and instead investigates the death of an elderly man, found stabbed in a lift. Fun because of Montalbano's inability to pass a restaurant without three courses, the argumentative relationships with his colleagues and the amazing scenery (borrowed from my memories of the tv series).

Very different UK cover to the US one...

"Or are you gunning for a hardcopy?" Not sure yet, Charlotte. If I stumble upon the audio, I may give it a go!

I have read the first 4 Montalbano books. I like them and need to get back to the series.

>54 avatiakh: I read somewhere that part of the issue with ebooks is not just a loss of customers for the physical book in bookshops, but also the fact that an ebook lasts forever in the same pristine condition, as it can't fall prey to the chain-smoking nose-pickers. A library would (or might) buy replacement copies of hard copy books if they're very popular and get strange stains on them (not *my* library, mind you...), but with ebooks they never have to. There was some suggestion a while ago that libraries should only be able to lend an ebook to a certain number of patrons before they had to buy a new one. Like Charlotte, my library has Overdrive but we don't get a lot of the ebooks that I see people talking about here in e format. It's getting better though. Maybe not for long at those prices!

It's my understanding that an e- book can only be lent so many to a certain number of patrons before they have to purchase a new "copy" and that an e- book is more expensive than a physical book for a library. I know my public library had a deficit this year due to the cost of ebooks. Here is an interesting article on the cost of e-books to libraries. It seems it is more of a licensing fee for a library to be able to lend out ebooks.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidvinjamuri/2012/12/11/the-wrong-war-over-ebooks-...

Interesting article. One quote from the article The challenge to libraries is not insignificant. Four of the six publishers are not providing eBooks to libraries at any price. The other two – Random House and HarperCollins lead the industry with two different models. Random House adjusted eBook pricing in 2012. While the prices on some books were lowered, the most popular titles increased in price – some dramatically. Author Justin Cronin’s post-apocalyptic bestseller “The Twelve” whose print edition costs the Douglas County Libraries $15.51 from Baker & Taylor and whose eBook is priced at $9.99 on Amazon was priced at $84 to Douglas County on October 31st.

HarperCollins meanwhile has adopted a different model, selling eBooks to libraries at consumer prices but electronically limiting them to 26 lends and then requiring that the book be repurchased.

I can't wait to get my hands on Did you Ever Have a Family , just like Mark!

In Canada, we have Overdrive too.

>67 msf59: I've only picked this up because it was in the house: I was not sure that I would like it, because I do get very frustrated with the sexist side of the tv show, but (as usual) the books are more subtle than the television.

>68 susanj67: >69 vancouverdeb: I don't know much about ebook prices for community libraries, but I was gobsmacked by how much academic publishers charged for ebook and digital journals. Given that so much of the work for these publications is undertaken by academics who don't get paid to edit, review or write, it is astonishing to me that the prices are tenable.

The McCrum's top 100 novels written in English is quite an impressive list! Sadly, I can only admit to having read 13 from that list.

On the e-book discussion, my local library uses a number of different service providers: Overdrive, Hoopla, 3M Cloud Library, zinio for libraries (for popular magazines) and AudioBookCloud.com to name a few. They all have monthly restrictions on how many items a patron can hold/borrow in a given calendar month, but right now I am a big fan of Hoopla in that there are no holds.... anything they have in their service catalogue can be instantly downloaded for a 21-day loan period. I have yet to try out AudioBookCloud.com. I must go investigate that one some more.

ETA: AudioBookCloud is a streaming service and requires an internet access to listen to the audiobooks. Good to know for when I am puttering around the house, but not so good for listening to while I am out and about walking. ;-)

Ha. I've read 27, but quite a few (e.g. Passage to India) are amongst my worst reads ever. It's reminded me that I want to read more Elizabeth Bowen though, so not all bad!

Storage update: mission anticlutter continues, have cleared out several boxes from the garage, pulled out some stuff for charity and binned the rest. I've got to call a couple of shops tomorrow to see if they'll take my chalet school paperbacks (I'm thinking probably not, and I'm not willing to sell the couple of hardbacks which were pricey on my budget when I bought them, or the lovely Chambers 190s hardback reprints of the first four which have sentimental value because my dad got them for me). Attempt to hang the South African wall hanging I've had stashed away for over a decade foiled by the rail I bought which turned out not to be a good match for how I wanted it hung. So back to the drawing board on that one.



(I'm looking at her hat now and thinking surely the long bobble would have been counterproductive at high speeds..?)

>73 charl08: What a fabulous book cover! Definitely a keeper.
We have just been going through and weeding out the bookshelves--I have a hard time giving anything up, but at least it's an excuse to buy more books.

I need get on an anti clutter mission myself! Rhonda is right -with that darling cover @73, it's a bit of a keeper just for the darling cover!

I enjoyed your list of McCrum's top 100 , I can only claim to have read 15 of them, and mainly ones that I read as a child - ie - Wind in The Willows, Alice in Wonderland etc and ones that I had no choice but to read during school, like Lord of the Flies, Catch-22 , though I was a fan of Charles Dickens on my own , and not so long ago read The Prime of Miss Jean Brody. Interesting list, Charlotte!

McCrum's list is interesting; I guess the number of British books is unsurprising, given the source. I think I missed the broad criteria used. All seem to be English-language, representing the US, England, and other sometime British Empire holdings. I've read 52 or 53 of them. Others are on my TBR list. And some titles are new to me.

>74 banjo123: I'm terrible at the weeding. The good thing about the books in the garage was that they had been there for ages, so it was difficult to argue that they were wanted, given that no one had dug them out in that time! My more recent shelves are going to be more of a challenge.

>75 vancouverdeb: I was in the same boat Deb: quite a few (like he dreaded P to I) I had to read for school. So glad those days are long gone!

>76 weird_O: Written in English was the key criteria, although you could be forgiven ( especially in the first half of the list) for thinking that the brief was rather British oriented (But don't we still publish more books per head than anyone else? Although not sure that stands up as an argument for quality control/ entitlement to list-hogging!!)

McCrum wrote a weekly column for each choice, so there is a longer case made for each book accessible online. I thought that the response by readers has been interesting too.

My crime spree has continued with The Sea Detective.. Although a crime novel, it featured the key role of tidal patterns, something I'd not come across in fiction before.I also enjoyed the descriptions of living in Edinburgh and of the beautiful Scottish coastline. Nice, largely unchallenging reading (possibly because I skimmed the discussions of sea currents and coordinates).

I've read around 30 on the McCrum list but there are many there that I intend to read eventually, mostly modern classics.

>79 avatiakh: I liked that there were quite a few I've not heard of, plus some that I was aware of before via LT among other things!

I picked up Nightwalking again this morning after a week or two when I've struggled with non-fiction. It seemed to come alive for me in a discussion of Samuel Johnson and his night time wanderings around London with a very dodgy character called Richard Savage. This kind of detail makes me want to revisit Claire Tomalin's wonderful biography of Boswell, and reminds me that I also have Rebecca Solnit's much praised book on the topic on the TBR pile.

From Thomas Traverse, 17 c poet:

To walk is by a thought to go;
To mov in Spirit to and fro;
To mind the Good we see;
To taste the Sweet;
Observing all the things we meet
How choice and rich they be.

From Rousseau:

I have never thought so much, existed so much, lived so much, been so much myself.... as in the journeys I have made alone and on foot....

>80 charl08: Yes, and some that I hadn't thought about for a long while, these lists are sometimes similar to finding a forgotten or long lost box of books and rediscovering read/unread treasures.

>77 charl08: I saw that "written in English" as the page faded to black. I'll have to look for some of McCrum's weekly columns at the Guardian website.

>82 avatiakh: I love that analogy.

>83 weird_O: I think I need to revisit some of the full columns for some of the books that are new to me before I commit myself!

The Blue Room was a bit of a misfire, as I was convinced it was a Maigret novel until about half way through I realised that it wasn't just a daring redesign of a police procedural, but that's it wasn't a Maigret novel! The plot focuses on a married man whose affair goes badly wrong: as this short novel opens Tony is being repeatedly interviewed whilst held in Poitiers' jail. I must admit that I find this type of novel difficult to read without feminist specs: like Chandler, in this novel women seem to be either simple, trusting types or conniving for their own interest.

Lovely cover though:

Well, I suppose by the law of averages it makes sense that some of the long list for women's fiction would not sit well with me. I'm really struggling with The Offering, a book that touches on a range of issues that I think have to be done sensitively and - perhaps above all - innovatively so that we're not all just peering through the bars at people deemed odd or other. I'm carrying on with it at present but may well shortly stop.

Charlotte, your August was spectacular! Twenty-five books.

Here is the Long Point lighthouse off the shore of Cape Cod (Provincetown), where I recently vacationed. The tower in the distance is a Provincetown icon.

By the way, I loved Exit Wounds and I'm very much looking forward to reading Did You Ever Have a Family. I'm in the queue for a copy from the public library.

>81 charl08: Nightwalking sounds very interesting but sadly no copies available at any of the libraries I'm a member of. Did Tomalin write a biography of Boswell? She wrote one on Samuel Pepys which I have in my TBR pile.

>88 EBT1002: Hope the book comes quickly!

>89 souloftherose: Well spotted! I was muddling her bio of Pepys up with Adam Sisman's book on Boswell and Johnson. Can I blame too many Samuels?! Funny because I was just looking at this book yesterday trying to decide if I could bear to send it to the charity shop (no).

>87 EBT1002: And I love that picture of the lighthouse. It looks so picturesque!

I dipped into The Woman I Kept to Myself when it arrived in the post, after Beth's recommendation. I love the copy I was sent, one of hose floppy 'American' paperbacks that let you rest it upside down without apparent incident, lovely paper and design too that all makes a mockery of my kindle's claims to readability. Beth has quoted from and reviewed the book at length on her thread.



I finally picked it up again last night and found it was the perfect antidote to the book before, beautifully expressed and even discussing the impact of writing, of thinking through written expression. Her poem on reacting to a lecturer's belief that poetry can only be written in mother tongue is a current favourite (I suspect this will keep changing as I reread)

For months I suffered from a bad writer's block
which I envisaged, not as a blank page,
but as a literary border guard
turning me back to Spanish on each line

Hi Charlotte - I'm glad you're enjoying the Alvarez poetry. She's one of my favorites. Regarding "best of" lists. They always seem to come up short with books by women and people of color, so there's that. It's fun to look at the lists, but I have a hard time taking them seriously.

Sea Detective sounds interesting. Off to check to see if I can find it at the library.

>92 charl08: There is something about a well-made book that is a joy to read.

>92 charl08: and >94 RidgewayGirl: So true. P and I have decided to buy each other Kindles for Xmas this year, mostly in anticipation of a long-ish vacation next summer, but I know that I will sometimes want a good old fashioned, nicely constructed book to hold in my hand. And, of course, I will need to continue working my way through my substantial TBR shelves!

I'm glad TWIKtM served as an antidote to either The Blue Room or The Offering, depending on which of those it was for which you needed an antidote! Perhaps both....

And I am reminded by your comments here and over on Beth's thread that I want to dig back into TWIKtM. I couldn't focus on it at the same time I was reading The Bone People, which required all brain cells and all heart waves.

>93 BLBera: It's wonderful Beth. I was feeling so blue last night and it was like finding a friend who had been through similar things and was reaching out a hand. Her poems about grief are so touching. I'm not sure whether to share them with my mum. I tried to suggest Did you ever have a family and I think it was too sensitive a subject.

>94 RidgewayGirl: This topic makes me want to go through my books and lost the best produced. Geek alert!

>95 EBT1002: I found that the main thing I wanted the kindle for, academic texts, had the major barrier of cost. I think there's room in that field to really make a dramatic impact on how digital texts are read in comparison with each other.

For fiction, it's mostly travel. I read descriptions of holidays downloading novel after novel and think how wonderful to have that flexibility, especially after my book related back injury!

>73 charl08:, >85 charl08:, >92 charl08: ~ When I see great book covers like these, I want to frame them or otherwise display them so I can enjoy them all the time. Like I've framed some of my old vinyl record covers. Right now, we've got the first Led Zep cover, one of Joni Mitchell's covers, and one of Simon & Garfunkle's covers up on our family room wall.

eReaders (Kindles) are great for me, now that my old eyes are giving out on me. I wish they made a larger Paperwhite so, when my eyes are too tired to see well and I make the font really big, I wouldn't have to flip the "page" so often. I do love the feel of a real book, though, and really, some books need to be printed (like graphic novels and novels with illustrations and maps).

Oh so sorry to hear you have been feeling blue. I'm glad that The Woman I Kept to Myself helped you out. Sometimes a light hearted book will boost my spirits, other times it takes a sad book that makes me feel understood. Receiving a book in the mail can be an antidote in itself.

Boo to blue!! Boo to blue!

I have never read Alvarez. Does she work for non-poem readers, like myself?

How is the Illuminations coming?

>97 Storeetllr: I love the idea of framing books and record covers. I am putting together an orange Penguin collection (the ones with black and white drawings and orange borders, with some green crime fiction and my hope is to frame those in a clever way that doesn't mean chopping off the cover. Clever way yet to emerge though!). I wondered if kindle could come up with a slide show function, as I have the large print problem when trying to read at the gym; would also test their reading speed calculator!!

>98 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deb. I think the fancy term for what we're doing is bibliotherapy and I agree it's different genres at different times. Alvarez was perfect and I shall now try and read her novels. (And yes to the book in the post: love that! My brother once ordered half my Amazon wishlist without telling me and I went to pick up the box to find all these lovely books. Nice birthday!!). I've gone on to Paris in Love about the year Eloisa James spent in Paris with her family. Her descriptions of her experiences of French food, fashion plus dealing with two teens is making me laugh out loud, just what the doctor ordered.

>99 msf59: I think there's a poetry reader in all of us, so I might nor be the best person to answer that!! Beth has some lovely examples from the collection on her thread, that might help decide. Have you tried The Golden Gate by Vikram Seth? One of my favourites, a novel in a poem.

Paris in Love proved a nice, light hearted memoir about a year the author Eloisa James spent in Paris on sabbatical from her job as a lit prof in New York. She's self deprecating, deeply interested in her temporary home, and as committed to exploring streets and museums as chocolate shops and clothes boutiques. I could have done without the essay recommending tailored clothing (with what cash?!) but for the most part I smiled along as she tried to write whilst wrangling a teen and a tween plus her Italian husband and his extended family. My favourite anecdote involved a fat dog wedged behind a sofa. That's about my level whilst reading this!

We interrupt this reading report for a historical building visit: Speke Hall is a surprising survivor from the Tudor period, complete with antique furniture, Priest hole and the usual National trust guides who are wonderfully keen to share their knowledge with visitors. As one lady said, given the way the docks were bombed in WW2 it is amazing that it survived - and in such wonderful condition.

This picture is from the central courtyard, where two yew trees still grow - they think they were there when the house was built in the 1500s.

I had to rush to look at many more photos and read a little about Speke Hall. What a pile! And what miracle that it wasn't destroyed. Fascinating! I'm listening to the Shardlake books presently, so I'm thinking about that period as well.

Alvarez has some fiction too!

I'm sorry you've been down, I hope it passes soon.

>103 sibylline: It's a fascinating building. I was a bit miffed that they'd roped off the library in such a way that you could only see the titles on one set of shelves. It was a lovely room, small but looked like somewhere comfortable to sit and read. Beautiful William Morris wallpaper too...

It also had an interesting modern history: the last landlord was a single woman who ran a large and successful farming business for years at the beginning of the 20C.

I picked up Girl,Interrupted at the Oxfam bookshop at the beginning of the week. I'd been vaguely aware of it debtors the film adaptation, but not really known more than that it was a young woman in a mental institution.

Despite being published about twenty five years after the experiences she recounts, Susanna Kaysen's book feels immediate. She describes how a period of depression led her to being hospitalised with a diagnosis of personality disorder, the insanity of the mental health system in the late 1960s and how she and fellow patients formed a community to endure their surroundings. Carefully she shows how much of the mental hralth system's assumptions were built on sand: the case of the young man nurses believed was fantasising about his father's CIA links, who years later is vindicated in public record. Perhaps most convincing though are the reproduced examples from her medical file, where jargon and official speak covers up an unwillingness to acknowledge the powerlessness of the system to do anything but act as a prison. The system's inherent sexism: from her initial diagnosis as due to supposedly sympomatic casual sex, to her release to get married (!)

Powerfully written: a moving read.

High time to find and visit (and star of course) your thread. You've been reading some phantastic books this year and are almost through the Booker LL, wow! :)
Great Pictures as well. Travelling to Germany next month for my mum's 70th birthday which she'll celebrate in a small town on the North Sea coast, so looking forward to it! Dunes, lighthouses, the sea breeze... :)

Just heard I've got some work for the next couple of weeks to keep me ticking over. Phew!

>106 Deern: I've got The Illuminations out from the library, must get on and read that! Nice to see you here, hope that your booker reading continues to go well. I hik I'm still rooting for the Tyler, but very aware that she faces stiff competition.

Hope you all have a wonderful time celebrating your mum's birthday.

Hooray for work! That sounds odd, doesn't it? I think I read Girl, Interrupted -- nice comments. It sounds really familiar.

I'll be watching for your comments on The Illuminations.

Girl Interrupted sounds really interesting, but also a bit sad. I've not read the book, nor seen the movie. You have piqued my interest but I'm make sure I'm a very solid happy mood when I decide to take it on. I hope The Illuminations works out well for you.

>102 charl08:->104 charl08: Fascinating! Wish I could go there to see it in person. Someday. Love that time period. I just finished (a month or so ago) the latest Shardlake mystery, which was really good.

I've seen Girl Interrupted mentioned here and there, but I had no idea what it was actually about. I'm going to look for it . Do you think it would be good as an audiobook?

Charlotte, I remember that you were puzzled as to Outline by Rachel Cusk being on the the Canadian Giller List Prize, as well as the Bailey's Women Prize book and mentioning that you thought her to be British. Really, you are quite right. I checked up on it and though Rachel Cusk was born in Canada, she did not spend more than ? 4 years here and then in the USA for 4 -5 years and then moved to Britain. So I'd say she is much more British than Canadian, you know how different countries like to claim good writers as their own! :) .

I read Girl Interrupted last year, all I really remember is that it was a quick read and that I was quite shocked at how easy it was for her doctor to commit her. I should watch the film again.

>108 BLBera: Hurray indeed. I've got sidetracked by my TBR pile, so the Illuminations might be delayed. All the clearing out (still ongoing) has made me realise how many books I've brought into the house lately...

>109 vancouverdeb: Books like this tend to make me more angry than sad Deb, given the incompetence, but I appreciate your point about getting the right frame of mind for a book on this topic.

>110 Storeetllr: There's quite a lot of surviving Tudor history round a x about to explore. One of the nuggets from the tour was that these black and white buildings are a victorian creation - apparently in the Midlands you can see more authentic brown on brown versions of the wattle and daub style as ay Speke. I think it would be good audio : the account is first person and is quite short and powerful. The only loss might be the reproduced official records which the author was able to reclaim from the hospital.

>111 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deb. Sounds like she had a globe trotting childhood. I like the book so if the prize helps promote it, sounds good to me.

>112 avatiakh: Yes, the committing story was scary. Along with the whole financial aspect (thrown out if your insurance ran out).

I really enjoyed House of Orphans set in Finland in 1902 amongst communist revolutionaries. Eeva has lost her father and taken from the comrades who wanted to look after her according to her father's wishes, due to the concerns of the state about revolutionary bad influences. Her new employer is mourning his wife, but is rapidly becoming aware that the girl he hired from the orphanage has secrets.

I would say if you've never read any Dunmore, start with The Siege which is amazing. But this is still a great read, an absorbing story set in a place and setting new to me.

Guardian Reviews

Eggshells by Caitriona Lally reviewed by Claire Kelly "Lally thrusts the reader into a guessing game. We are not Vivian: we are the people who encounter her on her bizarre outings. We are the passengers who won’t sit beside her on the bus. Vivian does not question her behaviour, but we do. Is this woman merely ditsy, or is she mentally ill? If she is mentally ill, what is the nature of her condition? Is she autistic? Does she suffer from OCD? As soon as we have labelled her condition, Vivian’s insight confutes it. "
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/12/eggshells-caitriona-lally-review-no...

Arcadia by Iain Pears reviewed by Steven Poole
" For years Lytten has been making notes about his nice feudal society. Then one day Rosie, the 15-year-old girl who comes round to feed Lytten’s cat, walks through a rusty old pergola in his basement and finds herself in the rural idyll of Anterworld, where she proceeds to have adventures with people dressed in hessian and leather.."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/11/arcadia-iain-pears-review

The New World by Chris Adrian and Eli Horowitz reviewed by Stuart Kelly
"I would probably read a shopping list written by Chris Adrian. He is one of the most accomplished novelists of his generation, whose interests combine the technological with the theological without ever losing sight of the human. His novels are dream-hauntingly surreal."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/10/the-new-world-chris-adrian-eli-horo...

Stalin’s Englishman: The Lives of Guy Burgess by Andrew Lownie reviewed by Richard Norton-Taylor
"Andrew Lownie’s argument, and it is convincing, is that, far from being a relatively minor figure, an irritant and merely a source of embarrassment to Maclean, Philby, Blunt and Cairncross, Burgess for years passed on thousands of classified documents to Moscow, many containing extraordinarily useful information, including the west’s position on key issues and negotiations at the start of the cold war."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/10/stalins-englishman-lives-guy-burges...

Black Earth by Timothy Snyder reviewed by Richard J Evans
"an engrossing and often thought-provoking analysis of Hitler’s antisemitic ideology and an intelligently argued country-by-country survey of its implementation between 1939 and 1945."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/10/black-earth-holocaust-as-history-ti...

The First Thing You See by Grégoire Delacourt reviewed by Peter Bradshaw
"The book doesn’t offer us anything much, other than a brush with ersatz fame."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/09/the-first-thing-you-see-gregoire-de...

Voices in the Ocean: A Journey into the Wild and Haunting World of Dolphins by Susan Casey reviewed by Philip Hoare
"What starts out as a feelgood, new-agey account darkens like the sunlight diminishing in the deep, subtly turning into a devastating chronicle of one of the most egregious mismatches in natural-human history. The result is a brilliantly written and passionate book." http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/09/voices-in-the-ocean-journey-into-wi...

Noonday by Pat Barker reviewed by Lara Feigel "Readers may find that the documentary detail provides a reassuring accuracy of time and place; for me it sometimes made the characterisation rather flimsy."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/09/noonday-pat-barker-review-love-lost...

The Prank: The Best of Young Chekhov selected by Anton Chekhov reviewed by Nicholas Lezard
"The stories themselves, I gather, are available to Russian readers, but not in the form chosen here: that is, as a self-contained collection, selected by Chekhov himself. So this edition allows us to see the fruits of his early years in the way he intended. The difference between young and mature Chekhov is striking."
http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2015/sep/08/the-prank-the-best-of-young-chekh...

Submission by Michel Houellebecq reviewed by Alex Preston
"... both a more subtle and less immediately scandalous satire than the brouhaha surrounding it might suggest. Rather than being a dark vision of a world ruled by mad mullahs, it presents the moderate Muslims who take over France as a force of spiritual integrity and revolutionary verve"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/08/submission-michel-houellebecq-revie...

The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood reviewed by Stephanie Merritt
"It’s gloriously madcap, though the heightened comic tone keeps the reader at one remove from her characters, whom we only ever know by their first names. There are poignant moments, but if the level of emotional engagement feels more superficial here, Atwood compensates with pace and comic timing"
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/07/the-heart-goes-last-review-margaret...

Happy Saturday, Charlotte! I really like Dunmore and loved The Siege. Looking forward to reading more of her work next month.

Have you decided which one (s) you'll be reading yet Mark?

Hi Charlotte - When I saw your comments about House of Orphans, my thoughts echoed yours - a time and place I'm not familiar with. I loved The Siege so will look for this one.

Thanks for the Guardian reviews. I have several on my wishlist: the Pears, the Chris Adrian, and, of course, the new Atwood. There are others that sound like possibilities, too. Good list this week.

Hey Beth : I'm looking forward to seeing the LT reaction to the new Atwood: from this review seems like it will be a great read.

I'm a big fan of Helen Dunmore too! I've read 5 of her books, including House of Orphans. Glad you enjoyed it!

>99 msf59: Mark (I know, Charl, it's your thread but I have to chime in!), I don't think of myself as a poetry reader at all and I have found Julia Alvarez's The Woman I Kept to Myself very accessible. It's perhaps helped me find my inner poetry reader (love that).

I love the comment in the Guardian review for The New World: A Novel (touchstone not working) that they would read a shopping list written by Chris Adrian. He's not an author I know but that review is tempting.

>115 charl08: I brought Arcadia home from the library this week and it looks very promising though it is a chunkster.

I have not decided on what Dunmore to read, Charlotte. I did LOVE The Siege. Possibly House of Orphans?

>121 EBT1002: Thanks, Ellen. Good endorsement. I will have to try Ms. Alvarez.

Hi Charlotte! Just waving and keeping up with your thread!

>115 charl08: I do love those Guardian summaries, Charlotte. Looks like a strong, if slightly, Francophilic week.

Have a great weekend, Charlotte. xx

>120 vancouverdeb: Good to know Deb. I was surprised to find how many of hers I had.

>121 EBT1002: If you like Julia Alvarez, I think you're a poetry fan! And All poetry warbling very welcome.

>122 avatiakh: Looking forward to hearing more about it!

>123 msf59: Have you got to The Betrayal already Mark? I enjoyed that. The Russian setting is gripping.

>124 connie53: Hey Connie. Hope all is good, thanks for visiting!

>125 PaulCranswick: Hey Paul. Nice to see you out and about on the threads! It's funny they've had a couple of Italian weeks, I wondered if they were doing some kind of exchange review deal. Of course (cue moan) if they had more reviews, we could all read loads of translated fiction from all over the world reviewed every week (!)

Happy Sunday, Charlotte! I was a bit disappointed in The Betrayal. For me, it was a bit of a letdown after the excellent The Siege.

Someone else mentioned A Spell of Winter, which sounds good. Have you read it?

>128 msf59: Nope. I've read Counting the Stars perhaps unusual for her as set in Roman times. I liked The Greatcoat, a spooky rather tham terrifying ghost story and Zennor in Darkness which was a fictionalised version of D.H.Lawrence's life in WW1. I didn't realise she also wrote poetry: intriguing!

>128 msf59: - I remember liking A Spell of Winter, Mark, but I read it ages ago. Another of Dunmore's that I liked was the creepy Burning Bright.

Thanks for the Dunmore recs. At least she gives you plenty of titles to choose from. Sweet!

I have the Atwood reserved, and I think I am #1 on the list, so it should be available in a couple of weeks. I have some other books to read before then. I am really looking forward to it.

I'm thinking that 2016 may be, for me, less a year of challenges than a year of completions: completing some enjoyable series and completing some authors' oeuvres. I could see Margaret Atwood falling into that latter category, so I might get to The Heart Goes Last in the coming year. What a great title.

I had to google. Speke Hall. It's a wonderful place.

>130 katiekrug: >131 msf59: Glad to hear I've got more Dunmore to catch up with...

>132 BLBera: That heady sense of book anticipation! Hope it's a good read for you Beth, and destroys the book blahs.

>133 EBT1002: I love that idea, but realistically I'm too distracted by shiny new books! Will you read in publication order, or how the fancy takes you?

>134 Ameise1: There's plenty to see in the northwest of England! Good to know you found it interesting.

Enjoying this so far:

The troops felt inspired. It was not the job they wanted but they were susceptible to the major's speech. Inspiration is a con, thought Luke. It always has been a con. People who want blood will always encourage each other with talk of life giving water.

Whee! Got to try out the new uni pool today. For most of the swim it was me and two others, and I swam twice as far as usual. Lovely. Sadly the sauna isn't running yet,but can't have everything...

> 104 That does sound interesting - the lady running the farming business out of the Hall.

Sounds like fun - a swim a new pool with just two others. Glad you enjoyed yourself! I enjoyed The Illuminations so I am glad you are too!As for the Booker Shortlist, who knows what the judges are looking for.

>105 charl08: wow, that one looks great. I hadn't realized it was a novel before it was a film. I liked the film back when it came out.

>127 charl08: >128 msf59: I read The Siege and The Betrayal, and though I liked both, the first one was just so intense, I couldn't help but be more drawn to it. I ended up giving them both to my sister as they made a great looking parcel!

>137 charl08: I just this week joined the gym on our campus and I have been gathering together the things I need to go for swims. I used to swim a lot for exercise and it has been years. I'm looking forward to it. It's so meditative.

>138 sibylline: Now it's on my radar I'm hoping to keep an eye out for a talk about the hall's 20C history, as her work interests me!

>139 vancouverdeb: It was wonderful Deb. Clean, and with no one thinking they own the pool and doing head down crawl as if they did. Although I've told everyone in the office, I was tempted not to, in the hope that it might stay empty a little longer.

>140 LovingLit: Although she's a novelist, thus is nonfiction. She talks about how her memories and the doctor's records differ in places: sometimes demonstrating doctors' abuse of their power in the process.

I find that period of Russian history fascinating. I studied Stalinist Russia as part of my degree and felt the book rang true.

>141 EBT1002: I think I would find it more meditative if I had the pool to myself more often. Mostly I'm too busy dodging traffic! I want to get myself a waterproof mp3 player so I can block out some distractions. My favourite way to escape the stress of it all through exercise still is a hike. Hoping the weather cooperates this weekend.

Well I loved The Illuminations. Perhaps because I found the portrait of dementia more comfortable to me than some of the other books I have read lately about ageing and memory difficulties. I liked the nod to photographers like Diane Arbus, but also (and her name escapes me) the lady who was a new York nanny, but whose realistic shots of US city life were 'discovered' after her death. I can see that there isn't a tight plot, so this might not suit everyone, but this rather gentle book (despite the war stories) suited me just now.

They didn't ask me, but my shortlist would have been:

A Brief History of Seven Killings Marlon James
A Spool of Blue Thread Anne Tyler
Did You Ever Have a Family Bill Clegg
Sleeping on Jupiter Anuradha Roy
The Green Road Anne Enright
The Illuminations Andrew O’Hagan

Not read:
A Little Life Hanya Yanagihara
Satin Island Tom McCarthy
The Moor's Account Laila Lalami

>143 charl08: Vivian Maier is, I think, the photographer. Here's a one of her self-portraits.



You can see many of her photos at www.vivianmaier.com

Thanks! Love that image.

The Heart Goes Last is a book I've definitely got my eye on for an October read.

I thought the Illuminations would be one of those many Booker candidates I read and forget, but I find I like it better in retrospect than during reading. It begins very disconnected but ends quite harmoniously. Not my favorite, but among the better ones so far on my personal list.

Regarding the Booker shortlist - I was surprised that The Green Road isn't on the list. I'm going to read A Little Life soon and am working up to reading A Brief History of Seven Killings, which hasn't appealed to me, but since I keep running into it, I'm just going to bow to pressure and read it.

Nice comments on The Illuminations, Charlotte. You liked it a bit more than I did; to me the war parts just didn't fit with the rest of it. Still, there was some beautiful writing, and I loved the relationship between Anne and her grandson.

I enjoyed The Illuminations, too Charlotte,. Great comments about The Illuminations . I'd agree it wasn't a tight plot, but still I enjoyed it. I admire how many Booker List and Orange List reads you have done! They might as well asked you to be a judge!

>147 cameling: I'm not sure if I will get to this anytime soon, but looking forward to reading everyone else's comments.

>148 Deern: I don't think The Illuminations is my favourite either, but I did like it a lot.

>149 RidgewayGirl: A Brief history of Seven Killings wasn't my usual kind of book from the blurbs, but once I got used to the language, it was such a gripping read: so many complex characters, motivations, shifting perspectives....

>150 BLBera: Maybe because you'd highlighted the break between the war sections and the narrative set in the UK, I didn't have the expectation that there would be a close tie between these sections, and so didn't feel there was a loss or gap. I don't know that I want to analyse the book too deeply, but I did appreciate the way the writer didn't let the story arc create - what is to me - a false sense of neat resolution for those who do have memory problems or difficulties.

>151 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deb. Very kind of you to say so. The library has done sterling work with their supply of the Booker longlist this year.

Oh I am so tired after my first week back at work. Time for a glass of something cold and a copy of The Dead Can wait which has come in at the library...

Wishing you a relaxed weekend, Charlotte. Our library has got a copy of Death On The Ice by Robert Ryan. Have you read it and could you recommend it?

Hi Barbara: I guess Autumn is here?

This is only the second Ryan I have read, both about Dr Watson and WW1. Death on the Ice looks interesting though, do you like reading about polar exploration?

Yep, autumn has arrived - my favourit season.

Hi Charlotte - The Dead Can Wait sounds like good, relaxing weekend reading. How is the job? I know I was dead tired last night. I think I fell asleep reading about 9 p.m. Then, of course, I woke about 11, wide awake...

I haven't read any Ryan; I'll watch for your comments.

Hey Beth. Thanks for asking, mostly just glad to have some work still, looking forward to using the pool this week.

I enjoyed The Dead Can Wait, the second book in Robert Ryan's series about Dr Watson's investigative work in WW1. Difficult to review at any length without spoilers for the previous book. Definitely worth reading that first! Watson is a fascinating character,and the setting of this book: a top secret development centre where a new weapon appears to be killing the men it is supposed to protect, is full of period detail alongside the tension and suspense. A couple of apparent editorial glitches were frustrating in a book of this quality - hopefully later editions caught these.

Guardian Reviews 20th September



The Evolution of Everything by Matt Ridley reviewed by John Gray No thanks.
"...fundamental difficulty concerns the role of ideas and values. Why should anyone accept Ridley's libertarianism?"

Furiously happy by Jenny Lawson reviewed by Kathryn Highes No, but her earlier memoir sounds good, so I'll look for that.
"Sedaris manages to make his observational humour seem as if it really has been found in the moment, whereas Lawson's jokes often feel strained and reached for."

Cameron at 10: The inside story by Anthony Seldon and Peter Snowden reviewed by Gaby Honsliff Not my bag.
"The useful questions about Cameron with which the authors introduce their account... are never satisfactorily answered.... The detail is exhaustive, but it is hard to see the wood for the trees."

Making a Point : The Pernickety story of English Punctuation by David Crystal reviewed by Sam Leith
I'll be buying this as a Christmas present for a family member who insists on the Victorian school of grammar.
"...puts Truss's apostrophe-rage in its sociolinguistic context, and gently encourages the reader to think in a nuanced way about how marks work"

Reckless: My life as a Pretender by Chrissie Hynde reviewed by Megan O'Rourke Hoping the library has a copy soon.
"...full of engaging stories, dry wit and revelations, but the distance she had on stage also saturates the book"

The Making of Zombie Wars by Aleksandr Hemon reviewed by Marcel Theroux Sounds bonkers but fun. Maybe!
"a rambunctious farce that includes zombies, a lot of slapstick, comedic violence, allusions to the Bible and Spinoza, and a climactic showdown involving a stoned Desert Storm veteran and a samurai sword."

Bream Gives Me Hiccups & other stories by Jesse Eisenberg reviewed by Alfred Hickling Nope.
"... as a satirist, he rarely fais to hit the target"

The Book of Memory by Petina Gappah reviewed by Maya Jaggi I should probably read her first book, sitting untouched on the shelf, first!
"...a powerful story of innocent lives destroyed by family secrets and sexualities jealousy, prejudice and unacknowledged kinship across the "artificial divisions this country has erected to keep people apart"."

Grief is the thing with feathers by Max Porter reviewed by Kirsty Gunn Sounds rather lovely.
"the most exquisite little flight of a story captured between hardback covers, and its appearance has been crafted to show us that we are in for something unusual."

http://www.theguardian.com/books/books+tone/reviews

NB Idiocy at work in some designs of Gappah's Zimbabwe set book, with a strelitzia that looks awfully like 'Mandela's Gold' on the cover. The book is set in Zimbabwe. A bit like putting a red rose on the cover of a book set in Scotland. Although at least it's not the ubiquitous baobab tree....

>161 charl08: Making a Point looks good! I haven't had great luck with my last couple of Guardian reads, though, so I will approach it with caution :-)

I hope you're got some quality napping in over the weekend so this week is less tiring. Just focus on that pool :-)

I really like David Crystal, Susan. I find he writes really clearly, definitely a skill to be treasured amongst academics (ho hum). Fingers crossed the future books chosen are a better fit though...

Went for hike with Significantly Fitter friend yesterday, so hoping stiffness wears off in time for the office delights...!

>164 charl08: Ah, the Significantly Fitter friend, I have one of those, at work. If I go out at lunchtime with her it's an hour of fast (by my standards) walking and thousands of steps for the Fitbit. And then total exhaustion and a desperate wish for a nap. And she's not even going fast for her.

I think the Hynde and Gappah look promising. Will check to see if they're available here. Once again, thanks for posting Charlotte. Ah, the SFF. We all have those. I work with a marathon runner. Sometimes I hate her.

>165 susanj67: Luckily, my SFF has accepted that I am happy to hear stories of surfing, climbing, running and skiing but will stick to hiking and swimming for myself...

>166 BLBera: Marathon and triathlon competitors in my current office. All v impressive - I keep my head down!!

Argh. I wrote a review for Sweet Caress and lost it. Will try again!

I have Netgalleys of the books by Jenny Lawson, Max Porter and Petina Gappah. I really like Gappah's short story collection, An Elegy for Easterly. I think Chrissie Hynde's memoir has caused some controversy over sexual politics, but I'm still curious to read it.

A book about David Cameron - no! Who will write the first book about Jeremy Corbyn, and how nasty will it be?

Nice to read your thoughts on The Illuminations-- I plan to read it--hopefully sooner ratHer than later!

>169 elkiedee: Yes, it's An Elegy for Easterly that I have on my TBR pile/ shelf. I should really read it. Some day! The full review talks about the controversy over her reaction to the assault she describes in the book, but compares it with her song about the same incident (I don't know her music to know the album the review refers to). I thought it was a fascinating review to read in full, and the book sounds worth a read.

>170 banjo123: It was a good read for me, I hope that the Booker nomination means that more people will get to hear about it.

Sweet Caress - second attempt!

I really like William Boyd's novels, and ws a bit taken aback when Restless was so popular and everyone else discovered him too.

Sweet Caress might disappoint fans of that book, because it's not a thriller in that sense. However, fans of Any Human Heart will be delighted with the return to the faux memoir form. Amory, the narrator, has a gripping life history to recount. Her career as photographer evolves from portraits of 20s hooray Henry types at balls to Vietnamese villagers in the midst of the war there in the 1960s. He's particularly good on the experience of war journalism, from the rather mercenary excitement of the stringers at the prospect of attacks that might lead to photo opportunities, to the changing attitudes of the military to their presence.

Boyd includes images supposedly taken along the way. I found these a bit distracting, as I tried to work out what these images really were (ie photoshop or 'found' images).

As always with Boyd, the historical detail is convincing without being overly expositional. I found this a great read and I am reminded again that I must get on and read more of his back catalogue.

Just reserved Career of Evil. Looking forward to finding out what happens next to Cormoran and Robin when it comes out next month.

I still haven't read any William Boyd but I have a couple on the TBR shelves that I hope to get to this fall.

I gave up and pre-ordered Career of Evil. The idea of being number 26 in a queue was too much for me.

I have a copy of Restless and should read it soon. I made a rule some time back that I couldn't buy a second book by an author if the first was still unread. It has kept the tbr down (a little) and does get me to read that book so I can grab a copy of the new, shiny book.

I've got a copy of The Illuminations now. Should read it within the next few weeks.

>174 EBT1002: Any Human Heart is a bit of chunks terms, but totally worth it, IMHO.

>175 RidgewayGirl: Restless is a really gripping thriller - hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

I thought I'd go in early with my Rowling reservation - I'm number 66! (Over 30 copies in the system though, so not as bad as it could be).

Just lost another review. Cross!
Been in bed today with chicken soup and the grumps about working in places full of young people full of bugs!

In between the dozing finished The Known World, a book which with the type of unusual structure that actually worked well with intermittent dozing. I know this is popular on LT and I'm grateful to everyone who raved about it as I think otherwise I wouldn't have come across it. Fascinating detailed picture of slave holding in one small county in Virginia. I was struck by the way this novel reinforced one of the messages of a lecturer who taught me US history of slavery. He stressed the way the Tara plantation dominates the idea of slave holding, when most people owned (and we're owned) by one or two people, not hundreds. This of course makes it tricky to argue slaveowners were distanced from the reality of their choices, and puts financial greed clearly in the picture. As does Jones' book: powerfully so.

Hey, I just read The Known World. And I've been thinking about it ever since. While at first I felt like it took me out of the story, I ended up really enjoying the way Jones told us the fates of the various characters as they appeared. It was a touch of hopefulness, especially Blueberry Street.

And I hope you feel better soon, Charlotte.

Congratulations on an absolutely epic reading list Charlotte. And... ♫Have you ever, ever felt like this♫ Thanks for bringing my attention to McCrum's list too, I hadn't come across it, and it's an amazing list - some of my top five books on there, combined with ones that make me screw up my nose and say "Really?!" (and on a quick count, I think my total is about 42/100, with a lot more on my To Read list... which has now grown yet again)

Thank you for posting those Guardian review lists here. Too often I forget to check their book page regularly.

And get better soon!

Charlotte, I'm sorry to hear that those lurgificated young people have infected you. I hope it's not too horrible.

I bought The Known World for my Kindle a little while ago, which means it must have been cheap at some point. I'm looking forward to it, once I've made a bit more progress with Mount TBR and the Samuel Johnson prize nominees that I reserved this morning (ahem).

So sorry to hear you are not feeling well. I hope you are feeling better soon. I've not read The Known World, but as far as slavery goes in the US, I've read several books that I've considered to be excellent. Someone Knows My Name by Lawrence Hill was excellent and won a number of awards. The other one that comes to me offhand is The Kitchen House . Both are excellent, but of course I cannot compare them to The Known World as I've yet to read that . I'm still reading If I Fall, I Die ,my Giller Long list Prize current read. Of course as luck would have it, Did You Ever Have a Family and another book my sister recommended both arrived at the library as I had put in the queue, and A Beauty, another Giller Longlisted book is arriving by post tomorrow. It never rains but pours. ! :)

Hi there, sorry you're under the weather and hope you'll feel better soon. I own a copy of The Known World and look forward to reading it as I've heard so many good things about it. *sigh* I'm thinking about rearranging my bookshelf from alpha order to read sooner rather than later order. Ha! RSRL order. I'll consider that!

Thanks for the kind wishes. Next year I'm getting a flu jab.

>179 RidgewayGirl: It was a very different approach to most of my reading and rather reminded me of 19c novelists' long digressions from the plot.

>180 evilmoose: Ha! Someone else who recognised the lighthouse. I must go back and look again at the list, as here were many I'd not heard of that sounded interesting.

>181 Deern: Hope you've seen something that appeals. It's a rare week when I don't!

>182 susanj67: Hope that you get to it Susan: really is a fascinating read. I've just been over to your thread and had a look at the Samuel Johnson prize. All very tempting.

>183 vancouverdeb: Thanks for the recommendations! Sounds like you have lots of good reading going on and planned. Hope you have enough loan time to get through it.

>184 Carmenere: You've reminded me I really need to clear some shelf space. I'll keep trying to recycle some of the have reads. Kindle is not helping, distracting me with digital to be reads...

Wow.. great reads, Charlotte. I really like Robert Ryan and haven't read this one, so off to the OWL it goes.

Keep warm, drink lots of fluids and I hope you kick the bugs and feel heaps better soon.

Oh la la the next Cormoran and Robin!!!

I'm a William Boyd fan. A Good Man in Africa is a small masterpiece.

>187 cameling: I'm sorely tempted to skip the reservation wait and just go straight for the kindle copy.

>188 sibylline: Always good to hear about another Boyd fan. I've got that on the TBR pile, must get on with reading it.

Still feeling fairly rough, but was reminded at the top of the thread about the lighthouse theme: rediscovered the covers of this nautical series about the meals of a lighthouse keeper.

Some lovely Virginia Woolf covers:





Inside the lighthouse?


I guess the lighthouse is just around the corner?


This is the one I wish I owned though!

Under the Frangipani is a fascinating book (so short, could be considered a novella, but I'm still counting it!). My copy comes with an introduction by Henning Mandel, and a rave quote on the cover by Doris Lessing. Detective fiction was mentioned, but it's not like any crime novel I can recall. I Izidine Naíta is a police inspector sent to investigate the death of Vastsome Excellency, who was in charge of the old people's refuge in isolated São Nicolau, a former prison. This is postwar Mozambique, but there is nothing post about the politics of that war. Naíta is also 'occupied' by the spirit of Ermelindo Mucanga, incorrectly buried so is 'one of those dead men who are still attached to life by their umbilical cord'. The two interview the elderly survivors about their knowledge of Excellency's death, the problem being that everyone wants to confess. This is darker than Dr Siri's adventures in Vientiane but with a similar willingness to take non-western belief systems seriously.

Let me tell you a story. It's from the old days, from the time of Vasco da Gama, so I was told. They say that in those days there was an old black man who wandered along the beaches picking up flotsam and jetsam. He collected the remains of shipwrecks and buried them. It so happened that one of the wooden planks he stuck in the ground grew roots and came back to life as a tree.
Well now mister inspector, I'm that tree. I came from a plank in another world but my ground is here, my roots were reborn in this place.

Time's Arrow has been on the TBR pile for some time. The central conceit is of a man's life lived backwards, with the key thing being the man's a war criminal. It's a powerful read.

Finally getting to The Great Fire : reading the author's bio, including time spent working for MI6, also wondering if she wrote a memoir about her life.

Under the Frangipani looks really good! I just finished the latest Dr. Siri book so need something like this.

It was a fascinating read, and short too. I'll be looking for more of his books.

The Great Fire was a second hand bookshop purchase, presumably picked up because of the cover proclaiming Orange prize and Virago apple.

The story is (mostly) set in Japan and Hong Kong just after the end of the second world war, through the eyes of two young men who have fought and now undertake roles linked to the end of the war. One, Leith, has walked through China on a vaguely described commission to depict it before future change, and his friend Exley is in Hong Kong, interviewing and preparing cases for war crime tribunals.

This was a rather unexpected read: I only really got into it about half way through when it seemed to shift from being a study of two men making sense of their lives after conflict, to a thwarted love story for the more charismatic of the two. I think I was hoping for a different book: considering her own life history, Hazzard's female characters were largely given a back seat, seeming trapped, clichéd and largely irrelevant to the desires or goals of the men. The interesting stuff: Hiroshima after the bomb, Hong Kong shifting in the face of Chinese civil war, even the experience of those who had been in the Japanese camps and postwar had to rebuild their lives was never more than touched upon. It felt like Neil Shute novel. I like some of Shute's books, with the usual reservations re the of- its-time attitudes, but didn't expect to be reading something similar that was published relatively recently. To be fair, I suspect this book also suffered by comparison to Jane Gardam and Tan Twang Eng's books about colonisation and WW2 in this region.

Also learnt new word: pusillanimous

>161 charl08: oh oh oh, I want to read the Chrissie Hynde one, I have already modelled my hair cut on hers....so it's the next logical step to read her book :)

That's disappointing about The Great Fire. I've got that on my tbr and I only now realize that I bought it because I'd confused Shirley Hazzard with Sheri Holman, who wrote The Dress Lodger and The Mammoth Cheese, both of which I loved. Also, I really thought it was about the Great Fire of London.

>198 LovingLit: I do too, but I've been cut off from reserving more until other ones come in. Oops.

>199 RidgewayGirl: I know the book has fans, so maybe I'm not the best judge?

I could see that in a different mood I might have liked it more. I'm not sure when it was written but it certainly felt to me as though it could have been published in the 40s or 50s. As an example, it had that (now) weird way of eliding sex, so there's no break in the sentences, no next morning, just the understanding between reader and writer that censorship means none of us can go there but we all know what's going on! And the language and sentence structure that takes no prisoners whatsoever. Perhaps I should just be more flexible?

Finally finishing off Nightwalking, not unconnected to the fact someone has requested it at the library. (How dare they?)

Apparently in the 19c "the way one walked, as well as when and where one walked, took on socially significant meanings..."*

I liked this book a lot, especially the bits about Samuel Johnson wandering around at night in London. But I suspect it could have been ruthlessly pruned to make a much more accessible text!

*Would it be wrong to have a picture of John Cleese?

Ice Haven a series of interconnecting comic strips set in a small town, came in at the library so I've sat and read it whilst plotting a weekend full of crime (Both the new Ruth Downie and the next in the Dr Watson series came on on the reservation shelf).



Ice Haven is fun, dark and pretty much what you'd expect from the author of Ghostworld. I particularly liked the character of the failing poet sending rude letters to his neighbours' loud children (anonymously, of course) and then unreflexively accepting their help with his car...

Hi Charlotte- Under the Frangipani sounds really good. I have a Couto from the library that I want to get to soonish.

I liked The Great Fire more than you did, but it's been a while since I read it.

Enjoy your weekend of crime.

>202 charl08: Love John Cleese! Did you ever listen to his rendition of The Screwtape Letters? Perfection! And, of course, Fawlty Towers was wonderful fun.

Thanks for the Ice Haven reccie. Looks like my kind of GN (I also loved Essential Dykes to Watch Out For).

>204 BLBera: I'm tempted to go back to The Man in the Wooden Hat and the rest of the trilogy to see what a direct comparison would be like to The Great Fire.

My weekend of crime (fiction) has kicked off with Persona non Grata in which the Medicus goes home to Gaul to answer an urgent summons from his family, only to find that no one will admit to having sent the summons, that his stepmother wants to marry him off and that he's forgotten to mention his relationship with Tilla the Briton. Oops.

I'm enjoying this series: particularly liked the details about the gladiatorial games behind the scenes. The cultural stuff about Romans and Britons and their ideas about each other are interesting too.



I was going to say how much I liked the US covers with their edited images of marble sculptures, but this one is a guy in a Roman soldier's costume. Sigh.

>205 Storeetllr: Sorry, I cross posted! I must try and get my hands on more Alison Bechdel. I've still only read the two. Enjoying finding what the library has though, some fascinating looking ones on the catalogue that I just have to remember to order...

I haven't read any Downie, Charlotte. I'll have to check to see if my library has some. Yes, the cover is a bit unfortunate.

The U.S. cover I'm seeing is quite different, Charlotte. No cheesy Roman Centurion, only a glass of blood-red wine spilled on a marble floor.



I really like the Medicus series, Beth! Not as much as the Falco series, or the SPQR series, probably because it's later in time and mostly set in Britain, and I'm not as familiar with that period of Roman history. Still, it's very good and worth checking out.

>208 BLBera: >209 Storeetllr:

I don't mind the poison cover, but I do like these late ones much more.

Hi Charlotte - hope you're feeling better. I'm not even going to try to catch up on 3 months of your threads, but you have just sent me to my Kindle to spend 5 pounds on Medicus. Sounds good! (and yes I am sure our library has it, but it is not here and my Kindle is.)

I'm going to go and read the 100 best novels list now. I read Robert McCrum's book about his stroke ages ago, and loved it.

Hey Cushla! Lovely to see you here. I hope your house building project is going well. Medicus is entirely 'the fault' of LT, so pleased to pass the parcel along...

Guardian Reviews 26th September ( work in progress)

Where My Heart Used to Beat by Sebastian Faulks reviewed by Christobel Kent I think I've read most of Faulks' back catalogue. He writes so beautifully, and I was so impressed with hearing him speak at a reading a few years ago (an elderly veteran asked him a very grumpy question and he was beyond kind and polite in response) he has ensured brand loyalty (!) - this is on the list.
"Combining as it does the cultural narrative of a complex century forsaken by God and certainty, a serious investigation of the vulnerability of the human mind and an old-fashioned – in the best sense – story of love and war, this is an ambitious, demanding and profoundly melancholy novel."

The Wild Beyond by Piers Torday reviewed by Gillian Cross Probably not, but I can imagine a younger me loving it.
"Many dystopian novels have a similar setting. What makes Torday’s trilogy stand out is the extraordinary cast of characters he assembles to fight against Factorium and its evil creator, Selwyn Stone. The trilogy’s hero is a boy called Kester. He is mute, but he can communicate telepathically with animals. This gift enables him to collect a band of comrades, including a rat, a cockroach, 100 pigeons and a mouse who dances what she wants to say. "

A House in St John’s Wood by Matthew Spender reviewed by Blake Morrison This is a review of a book reviewed by the Observer a few weeks ago. BECAUSE there are so Few Books to review. HARUMPH!
"His book is an attempt to understand his parents, not settle scores with them. Still, as he admits, an element of revenge is present, too – a desire to expose truths that his mother tried desperately to hide."

The Underground Hamid Ismailov by Hamid Ismailov reviewed by Phoebe Taplin
I want to quote the whole review. This sounds amazing.
"The Underground recreates a lost Moscow. The narrator’s memories map out a haunting, bittersweet cityscape, with landmarks that no longer exist and names that have long since changed."

How To Plan a Crusade by Christopher Tyerman reviewed by Jessie Childs
Am I the only person who reads the title and expected an old fashioned Usborne history picture book? Sounds v good though, more seriously.
"We are constantly being told that the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant is medieval in its outlook. It is invariably meant pejoratively, a stubby finger pointing at a group known for bigotry, obscurantism and bloodlust. This magisterial study takes us to the administrative and intellectual hinterlands of the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries, offering a finer, more expansive view. It reveals faithful minds more than capable of sophisticated planning, manipulative propaganda and the application of reason to religious warfare – areas in which Isis has shown a proficiency that is, indeed, positively medieval."

>213 charl08: Oooh, definitely the crusades one! I've just wishlisted it. Maybe also the Faulks. Thanks for the reviews, Charlotte! I share your views on papers reviewing stuff that their sister papers have already reviewed - so annoying!

I discovered the How to plan a crusade today as well.

>213 charl08: Thanks for the moral support! Particularly odd as they already have a column comparing what other reviewers are saying about noteworthy books. I was half wondering if I was outing myself as 'Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells'... To confirm - I have been reading this paper, the Saturday bit pretty religiously for (cough cough) years, so I am a fan. Or perhaps that should be 'friendly critic'?

>214 susanj67: Doesn't it look good? I am quite keen to find out more about the connection between the bear and the life saving operation...

Off to pick up Nimona which has come in at the library, and (possibly) buy Don Paterson's latest book of poetry. Which is by way of saying, more reviews tbc

>216 charl08: Well, I'm about to join Twitter just so I can send Sky News the correct pronunciation of Lake Tekapo (where the British tourist drowned - they're saying it incorrectly twice an hour at present). So I'm not really in a position to judge :-)

Charlotte, don't worry a bit about getting to a book that you have reserved at the library. Tis a problem that I face myself! :)

>218 susanj67: Ha. I wonder how many disgruntled kiwis are contacting then to very politely tell then they've got it wrong!

>219 vancouverdeb: I do the maths on how long it will take me to read everything and then pretend I haven't. Not constructive! Thanks for the empathy though ☺

Finished Nimona, a fun mash up of fairy story and super hero style evil villain (who may not be quite so evil after all. The humour is great (Don't make fun of the science!)

Listened to the BBC radio dramatisation of the Shardlake novel Sovereign. I've never read the books, but I really like the way the radio lets me imagine the huge Tudor royal procession.

CJ Sansom - Sovereign - Episode 1 - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06djx24

>222 charl08: That sounds good! I don't make the most of BBC radio, so I might give that one a try. With the new headphones I could actually keep up around the house! I'm now wishing I hadn't just done a huge pile of ironing listening to Magic FM...

Oh no, not Magic (!)

Do you have a smartphone? They've just upgraded the BBC radio app, so you can download loads of stuff (including masses of documentaries, book discussion programmes as well as drama and book of the week serialisation ) and for much longer (usually a month) than before for free - maybe for your walks?

I was listening to Mariella interview Bill Clegg about Did you ever have a family whilst on my way to the shops yesterday. Makes the walk go faster...(Although not my feet, sadly)

Happy Sunday, Charlotte.

Lovely (peaches?) Barbara!

My weekend of crime continured with A Study in Murder, the third in the Dr Watson series by Robert Ryan. I enjoyed this and was gripped as I read the last third, wondering how Ryan was going to get his characters out of the various challenging circumstances.

If you've not read the earlier books, it's difficult to describe without a... There is the return of some previously met characters, including Churchill. Watson is in a prison in Germany, but Mrs Gregson is determined to get him out. She decides to enlist the help of the terrifying German spy Miss Pilsbury.

Happy Sunday, Charlotte! I am so glad you loved Nimona. What a pleasant surprise that one was. It might still be my favorite GN of the year.

I WANT to read Did you ever have a family, in a bad way.

Thanks Mark, hope you've had a good one. The problem with listening to a half hour show when people talk about books is that I want to read all of them in a bad way! Even some of the work of Patrick Modiano who has got a v mixed reaction here on LT.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06bd86w

>192 charl08: Got me with that one, adding Under the Frangipani to the wish list. Well, I put it on hold at the library. :-)

Oh good, another fan of Nimona. It's one of my all-time favorite GNs.

I've got Have You Ever Had a Family from the library, but so far, I read my Giller Long listed prize book , and then went for a cozy read - another Maisie Dobbs! Shame on me! Nimona looks interesting, but my library hardly carries any Graphic Novels and I find purchasing them to be very expensive. They have a lot of Manga Comic books/ magazines, but so far they don't appeal to me.

Here is a link to Manga, in the rare event that you are not familiar with them. :) http://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens

Thank you for the link to the BBC broadcast of Sovereign, which is my favorite Shardlake. Wonderful production! Looking forward impatiently to part 2.

I end up wanting to read most of the serialisations and a lot of the books discussed on R4. Book Club with James Naughtie and World Book Club have all the archive available, just in case you're short of ideas for reading....

>224 charl08: Alas, yes, Magic :-) I'm usually an Absolute fan, but their breakfast DJs are idiots all week and on the weekend. And Heart (second choice) has two dingbats on Sunday mornings. So it was the Kim Wilde request show. I like the way that the already-famous presenters don't seem to go crazy trying to make a name for themselves and being zany and annoying. Emma Bunton and Jason Donovan are the same - excellent presenters but with nothing to prove.

For some reason I thought the iPlayer app on the TV included radio, but it doesn't (apart from Radio 1, for some reason). I can get the radio player on my BlackBerry, but I just can't hear it when there's traffic noise, wind blowing etc, even turned up past the "YOU WILL RUIN YOUR HEARING" message. I'll have to try on the Kindle at home, because I have all the apps on that. Or I could record radio things on the PVR and listen to them through the TV. That would involve upgrading to a listings guide that includes radio, which is not the case with the 50p ones :-) But, while I have little patience with the "culture is only accessible to the middle classes" argument, and I have fearlessly gone into museums, theatres and libraries since I arrived here, I find BBC radio intimidating, like it's a club I'll never belong to. It's that triumvirate of The Archers, the Shipping Forecast and the Today programme, I think. And, once scared off, the rest of it feels like a foreign country.

>230 EBT1002: I really liked Nimona. The library bought a copy when I requested it, so I'm hoping some other people might like it too...

>231 vancouverdeb: I've not worked out Manga Deb. There are a lot of graphic things that I don't look at when I've looked at the graphic shelf. It kind of amazes me that everything is shelved together, so there are Marvel comic books with things like Lucy Knisley's books, some of which deal with such adult themes (dementia, caring).

>232 Storeetllr: Glad you liked it. I love their history dramas especially. I shall refrain from writing a long list of the history dramas I like (!)

>233 elkiedee: Good to know I'm not alone in the radio book link. I do like the way Mariella Frostrup clearly reads critically. The recentish programme with a long interview with Colm Toibin was a particular highlight for me. I'm a fan of the archiving feature: have spent a couple of walks listening to Melvin Bragg's In Our Time history discussions. Fascinating stuff.

>234 susanj67: I shouldn't knock Magic, I really like that we have such a range of radio to listen to. I remember vividly when I was abroad and the radio just cut out at 12 and I couldn't believe there could be radio silence. Spoiled for choice here. I'm very rarely not listening to something, although usually when I'm reading or working it's classic. Hope the kindle option works. I was forgetting just how loud London can be.
(And I know what you mean about the Archers!)

I'll be waiting for the Downie on audio - mad for the Medicus series!!!

Enjoyed the bit of Ice Haven on offer!

>238 sibylline: oh I'd listen to that too. I loved the version they did of Falco so much I bought them on audible.

Reading update: trying to catch up with my library stack so reading We are Spain and the rather amazing Colum McCann novel Songdogs.

Listening to the first episode of Reading Europe - Danish author Dorthe Nors speaking abut the power of a local bookshop. Asked the library to order her book of short stories...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06f239c

I'm not a Manga reader either, Charlotte. But as it happens, that seems to be what my library carries instead of graphic novels. I guess that they must be popular with the YA or 20 something year olds. I am not sure. My city also has a 60 % asian population , and I suspect perhaps that makes the Manga books even more popular.

I think they're huge amongst a certain (as you say, young) demographic. If it gets people into libraries, sounds good. I usually have to order the graphic novels or memoirs I want to read as the stuff the library carries in my branch is limited.

Songdogs came about because I wanted to read some more Colum McCann after TransAtlantic.



This is also a beautiful novel, oddly picking up the photographic theme of the William Boyd I just read, and The Illuminations as well as memory that seems to be so popular a theme running through novels just now. Although this novel really hovers around the ethics of photography and photographic subjects, and the way in which photos fix a memory, strikingly effective in such a short book. There are no famous faces here, unlike Frederick Douglass in the more recent novel. People are lost and not found, letters go unanswered, and a son must make up his own stories from the frozen images that remain. This is exactly the kind of book that appeals to me, that takes sorrow and silences and makes them into beautiful elegies for broken people.

Long ago, when they told me their stories about Mexico, Mam and Dad, I believed they were true. And I supposed I still do. They were my Songdogs - my mother by the washing line, my father flailing his way against the current. They tried very hard to tell me how much they had been in love with one another, how good life had been, that coyotes really did exist and sing in the universe of themselves on their wedding day. And maybe they did. Maybe there was a tremendous howl that reached its way all across the desert. But the past is a place that is full of energy and imagination. In remembering, we can distilled the memory down. We can manage our universe by stuffing it into the original quark, the point of burstingness.
It's the lethargy of the present that terrifies us all.

I'll have to read this. I'm in the middle of The Illuminations now and enjoying it quite a bit. The writing reminds me of McCann and also Anne Enright.

Yay. And that's my third 75.

>245 RidgewayGirl: Yes, I think those comparisons make a lot of sense. The lyrical quality to the writing, definitely.

Congratulations on your third 75!

>246 charl08: Your third 75?! Congrats x 3!

I've read McCann's Let The Great World Spin and I liked it very much.
Congrats on your third 75, Charlotte.

Cheers m'dears. No idea what to do for the next thread. Hmm....

So instead I bought some secondhand books at the fabulous News From Nowhere bookshop including In Between the Sheets by Ian McEwen. Also a new one which looked really interesting: Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine
( I'm usually very tempted to buy many more, which was certainly the case today).

Oh, you hit me with a BB on Colum McCann's Songdogs, Charlotte. Loved TransAtlantic! Also read The Illuminations recently and very much enjoyed the perceptions of truth of the main characters.