MissWatson visits 16 small(ish) towns in Germany

I'm Birgit and I live in Schleswig-Holstein, at the northern end of Germany. The Federal Republic has sixteen Länder, so the theme is more or less a no-brainer. It is also an incentive to read more from and about my own country. Some of the categories are specific, others deliberately wide to allow for digression and impulse reading. The minimum number of books for each category is 2, again.

I'm also going to track the number of pages I read.



January page count: 3838
February page count: 3838
March page count: 3517
April page count: 2758

Marbach / Baden-Württemberg
Category: German authors whose papers are held at the German Literature Archive



Marbach is the birthplace of Friedrich Schiller, the other giant of German literature. It is also home to the German Literature Archive. Authors can donate their papers before they die, so I may get around to read contemporary authors.

1. Der Zauberring by Friedrich de LaMotte Fouqué
2. Tage des Königs by Bruno Frank
3. Sansibar oder der letzte Grund by Alfred Andersch

Nürnberg / Bayern
Category: children/YA/Roald Dahl centenary



Nürnberg is famous for many things, among them a spicy sausage, Lebkuchen (gingerbread) and a medieval castle. It also hosts the world's largest toy fair.

1. Noch mal! by Emily Gavett
2. fünfter sein by Ernst Jandl
3. Les récrés du petit Nicolas by René Goscinny
4. Sophiechen und der Riese by Roald Dahl
5. Gritlis Kinder by Johanna Spyri
6. Der gestiefelte Kater by Ferdinand Avenarius
7. How I live now by Meg Rosoff
8. Die Glückspilze by Annegret Rausch-Hüger

Museumsinsel / Berlin
Category: arts and Graphic novels



My favourite place in Berlin is the Pergamon Museum, and my favourite object is the Ishtar Gate. Such vivid colours after so many centuries!

1. Das Lesen ist schön

Dahlewitz / Brandenburg
Category: Science Fiction and Fantasy



Dahlewitz lies south of Berlin and is tiny indeed. Its only claim to fame is to be the birthplace of Nikolai von Michalewsky who wrote SF under the pseudonym of Mark Brandis, a reference to his native region, the Mark Brandenburg. I think this was my first encounter with SF.

1. Queen of fire by Anthony Ryan
2. Shovel ready by Adam Sternbergh
3. His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik
4. Wir by Evgenij Zamjatin

Bremerhaven / Bremen
Category: books and authors from countries I have not visited myself (yet)



Bremerhaven was founded as a port for Bremen when ships became too big for the Weser river. From here the emigration ships embarked for North America. Reads for the Geo CAT will be recorded and counted here.

1. La casa de los espíritus by Isabel Allende. January Geo CAT
2. Dshamilja by Tschingis Aitmatov. February Geo CAT
3. Der Verrückte des Zaren by Jaan Kross. March Geo CAT
4. Geschichte des Baltikums by Alexander Schmidt. March Geo CAT
5. Wellen by Eduard von Keyserling. March Geo CAT
6. Wir by Evgenij Zamjatin. March Geo CAT
7. Ali und Nino by Kurban Said. March Geo CAT
8. Grimsey by Ulrich Schacht. April Geo CAT
9. The hills is lonely by Lillian Beckwith. April Geo CAT

Finkenwerder / Hamburg
Category: all things maritime



Finkenwerder is the birthplace of Gorch Fock, whose most famous book is "Seefahrt ist not!". The training ship of the German navy is named after him. Finkenwerder also provides a popular recipe for cooking plaice.

1. Seefahrt ist not! by Gorch Fock

Wiesbaden / Hessen
Category: mysteries



Wiesbaden is the capital of the state of Hesse and also the seat of the "German FBI", the Bundeskriminalamt.

1. Sauerkrautkoma by Rita Falk
2. Schweinskopf al dente by Rita Falk
3. Mord nach jeder Fasson by Tom Wolf

Stavenhagen / Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
Category: regional literature, regional dialects



Stavenhagen is the birthplace of Fritz Reuter who wrote books in his native dialect, the Plattdeutsch of Mecklenburg. There are quite a lot of authors who cherish their local idiosyncracies, so this is the category to go walkabout in Germany.

1. Winterkartoffelknödel by Rita Falk

Wolfenbüttel / Niedersachsen
Category: science, non-fiction



Two great minds of the German Enlightenment served as librarians at the Herzog-August-Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel: Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. It is now a research library for Medieval history, so the occasional history book will also slip in here.

1. Die Prussen by Gisela Graichen and Matthias Gretzschel
2. Vorgeschichte in der Bretagne by Pierre-Roland Giot

Solingen / Nordrhein-Westfalen
Category: novelas de capa y de espada / romans de cape et d'épée / Mantel- und Degenromane



Sharpe fans may remember Sharpe's Sword where he covets his opponent's fine blade made in Klingenthal. Klingenthal was founded in 1730 by Louis XV. Until then, the French army bought its swords in Solingen. The name is still a mark of quality for knives.
According to some sources, 2016 is also the bicentenary of Paul Féval who wrote an iconic swordfighting romance: Le bossu.

Trier / Rheinland-Pfalz
Category: ancient history



For nearly a century, Roman Emperors resided in Trier. The city boasts some spectacular remains.

1. Mémoires d'Hadrien by Marguerite Yourcenar
2. Romans, Celts and Germans by Maureen Carroll

Mettlach / Saarland
Category: economic history



The small town of Mettlach houses the headquarters of Villeroy & Boch, family-owned since the 18th century. Nearly all my tableware bears their mark.

1. Trade in the Eastern seas by C. Northcote Parkinson
2. Empire of cotton by Sven Beckert (abandoned)
3. The Indian cotton textile industry by M.P. Gandhi

Leipzig / Sachsen
Category: group reads and CATs



The other book fair! The Leipzig book fair holds many events for readers, so this is the category to record reads for the Dewey and Random CATs, and maybe some group reads. Since the CAT category dwarfed all others in my 2015 challenge, overlap with other categories is allowed here.

1. Firmin by Sam Savage. January Dewey CAT
2. Informatik by Friedrich L. Bauer. January Dewey CAT, January Random CAT
3. Sophiechen und der Riese by Roald Dahl. February Random CAT
4. Lilienbanner und Preußenaar by Karl Bartz. February Random CAT
5. De brevitate vitae / Die Kürze des Lebens by Seneca. February Dewey CAT
6. Die preußischen Brüder by Christian von Krockow. February Random CAT
7. Der Vorabend des Weihnachtsfestes by Rosalia Müller. March Random CAT
8. Ali und Nino by Kurban Said. March Dewey CAT

Magdeburg / Sachsen-Anhalt
Category: books about music, musicians or with music in the title



Magdeburg has many famous sons, among them composer Georg Philipp Telemann.

Flensburg / Schleswig-Holstein
Category: book bullets and the TBR pile



Flensburg is a sleepy little town on the Baltic and next door to Denmark, but once it was the largest rum importing and blending town in Germany. And what do we associate with rum? Pirates! And with pirates? Treasure-hunting!

1. Ross Poldark by Winston Graham
2. Trenck by Bruno Frank
3. The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope
4. The last chronicle of Barset by Anthony Trollope
5. La fête à Coqueville by Émile Zola. BB from VivienneR

Arnstadt / Thüringen
Category: romances and guilty pleasures



Arnstadt is the birthplace of Eugenie John who wrote romances under the name of Marlitt. Literary critics look down on her books, of course, but what do they know?! Sometimes you just need to curl up on the sofa with a favourite heroine or a swoon-worthy hero.

1. Maman la Soupe et son chat Ratu by Marcel Mültzer
2. Pauline by Alexandre Dumas père
3. The duke's daughter by Mrs. Oliphant
4. The fugitives by Mrs. Oliphant

This is the place for the BINGO dog.



1: Firmin by Sam Savage
2: Frau Maier hört das Gras wachsen by Jessica Kremser
3: Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household
5: Schriftsteller! by Jessica Durlacher
10: Pauline by Alexandre Dumas père
17: Seefahrt ist not by Gorch Fock
19: How I live now by Meg Rosoff
20: Der Verrückte des Zaren by Jaan Kross
24: Navajo Autumn by R. Allen Chappell

And here is the BINGO WomanPUP. Because I'm greedy. Overlap between BINGOs and with categories is allowed.



1: a new-to-you author: The duke's daughter by Mrs. Oliphant
6: set in Latin America: La casa de los espíritus by Isabel Allende
8: about a female critter: Danke für meine Aufmerksamkeit by Cordula Stratmann
9: published before 2000: The Prospering by Elizabeth G. Speare
12: Award winner: How I live now by Meg Rosoff

And now I think I'm set for next year.

Herzlich willkommen!

Wonderful idea for your 2016 challenge! Good luck with your Bingo cards.

>21 mamzel: Thanks! I'm really looking forward to January!

Great set-up! I read too few German authors, so looking forward to seeing what you read.

What a great idea! I love how imaginative people are in this group!

nice idea for a theme, I will be interested to see your choices as I haven't read a lot of German books

Looking forward to travelling around Germany with you this year! I will be especially interested in the Hamburg category as I am a sucker for all things maritime. :)

I am an avid armchair traveller and I am looking forward to learning a little more about Germany through following your reading again next year.

You say the idea is a no-brainer - I say it's brilliant. Absolutely love it! I'm especially looking forward to your maritime category, I love everything maritime. I read "Seefahrt is not" a few years ago, when I accidentally found it at my father's shelves. Worth to be picked up. I hope you have lots of fun next year! :)

>23 -Eva-: I think I'm reading too few German authors myself, so hopefully I'll make some discoveries myself.

>24 Jackie_K: Thank you, I love what my fellow readers come up with.

>25 Jan_1: I'm not much of a planner, so it will be mostly spur of the moment choices.

>26 rabbitprincess: Ah yes, the sea, the sea! I'm actually toying with a challenge idea involving the sea...

>27 DeltaQueen50: I shall be happy to have you along!

>28 Chrischi_HH: So Seefahrt ist not is worth reading? That's good to hear. It comes with a certain reputation...

Thank you all for visiting, I'm sure we will all have a great reading year.

I'm another one interested in your maritime category. Not for me, but for ideas for books for my husband. He loves those kind of books. Maybe there will be a gift idea or two.

>30 dudes22: Let's see what comes in with the tide...

>30 dudes22: I'm not a big maritime fan myself, but a couple of historical novels I read several years ago which I thought were excellent (although both were pretty bleak) might be worth a punt: Star of the Sea by Joseph O'Connor, and The Voyage of the Narwhal by Andrea Barrett.

Sorry to double post, I also thought of a wonderful non-fiction/travel book I read: the fabulous Billy Connolly's Journey to the Edge of the World which is a tie-in to his TV series where he travelled Canada's North-West Passage.

>33 Jackie_K: - that sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out.

I look forward to learning more about Germany and German authors through your reading. I hope you have fun next year!

>32 Jackie_K: >33 Jackie_K: Very interesting suggestions!
>35 Tara1Reads: Thank you, the last two years have been fun, so I'm very optimistic for 2016!

>29 MissWatson: Well, personally I liked it. But I'm not sure if I liked it because it was really good or if I liked it because it's maritime and has some plattdeutsch in it. Or a combination of both. But it's not too long, so give it a try!

Wonderful theme for a great category setup! Looking forward to following your reading next year!

>38 lkernagh: Thank you!

Hi Miss! I'm amazed at your categories, they sound absolutely delightful!

>40 Tess_W: Nice to see you here, Tess! Let's hope the books turn out nice, too!

Found and starred you, and what unique categories! I too haven't read many German authors but I look forward to getting some BBs from you. Looks like you'll be leading a few of us through a lesson in German Literature. : D

>42 mstrust: Welcome Jennifer! I've been wary of German authors ever since school, when they were assigned reading, and analyzing them took all the enjoyment out of it.

ETC

I finally figured out how to add pictures. This is fun!
These are the flags of the Länder, and I took the photos last year on the beach promenade in Wyk on Föhr. I didn't realise until I got home and edited them that the Saarland was missing, so I had to snag one from Wikipedia.

>44 MissWatson: I like the flags! And congrats on figuring out how to put them on :)

Really great theme and interesting categories.

This is a wonderful idea for a theme! Looking forward to seeing what you read this year. Good luck with the challenge!

Looks like 2016 will be a great year for reading! I don't know much about German literature, so I'll enjoy seeing your reviews.

What a fun set of categories. The only one I've ever actually been to is Trier, but I have travelled through Solingen and Nürnberg en route to other places. I've never read any Marlitt, but the fact that the name rang a bell means that she was probably suggested to me a one point.

Popping over to wish you a Happy New Year, Birgit and best wishes for 2016!

>45 leslie.98: >46 hailelib: >47 jlshall: >48 cammykitty: >49 inge87: >50 lkernagh: Thank you all for visiting! I hope you all enjoyed your holidays and are raring to read!

We're having frost. Minus degrees when the rest of the country is still above zero. So unfair! Still, it's a good excuse to spend the day indoors and catch up with things around here. I have started my challenge early with some books from my sister's shelves:

Nürnberg / children's books
Noch mal! is a gorgeous picture book about a little dragon who pesters his mother into reading his favourite bedtime story again and again...

fünfter sein takes a poem by Ernst Jandl and illustrates it as a picture book, which works brilliantly.

Wolfenbüttel / non-fiction
Die Prussen is a non-fiction book about Ostpreußen, telling first about the pagan tribes who lived there and were brutally christianised and colonised by the Teutonic Knights. They gave their name to the area when it was reconstituted as a secular dukedom. The second part tells of the famous archaeological collection about Prussian history housed at Königsberg and its loss and recovery after the Second World War. And the third part deals with current joint archaeological campaigns under way. Written for a lay public, so there are a number of repetitions, but an amazing tale.

Wiesbaden / mysteries
Sauerkrautkoma is a mystery set in Lower Bavaria where the plot takes second place to the idiosyncracies of Franz Eberhofer and his family. This was an audiobook narrated by Christian Tramitz who is great at creating subtle nuances between the characters and their idioms.

Berlin / arts and graphic novels
Das Lesen ist schön is a collection of cartoons from the New Yorker about bibliophiles, bibliomanes and other assorted book fiends. Very enjoyable!

Great start to your challenge!

A very well thought out theme for your categories. Good luck with your challenge and it looks like you're off to a good start.

I love your challenge theme! My brother makes regular, and sometimes extended, trips to Hildesheim for work. I was able to spend a week there in 2012. We made an overnight trip to Berlin and I fell in love with the city. I would love to go back and visit the museums. None of my travel companions enjoy museums so I missed out on those.

>53 rabbitprincess: >54 AHS-Wolfy: Thank you, there's nothing like a quiet week between festive days to enjoy reading!

>55 cbl_tn: Thanks Carrie, I hope next time you'll have a companion to enjoy the museums with you.

You're zipping through those books! And thanks for translating the genres into English; now I can learn a bit of German for the bookstores!

>58 mstrust: Hello and welcome. Having had a few days off from work certainly helped!

Finkenwerder / all things maritime // Bingo DOG: a book published before you were born

My first book in this category is the one that inspired it: Seefahrt ist not!, published in 1913, and thus also works for the Bingo DOG. It could also have worked for the regional dialect category, because all the dialogue is written in the Lower German dialect spoken in Finkenwerder, so I was grateful for the online version which offered translations for some of the more obscure words.
This book comes with some ballast, because like so many others it was instrumentalised for the warmongering of the First World War and later appropriated by the Nazis for propaganda purposes. Of course it reflects the nationalist sentiments of its time, and I was relieved to find that it is first and foremost an ode to life at sea, and here especially fishermen's lives. I also suspect that few people south of the Elbe have actually finished this, even at the high tide of its popularity, because of the dialect and the nautical terms. Having read Hornblower in German translation certainly helped with this.
He also vividly describes the landscape of his island and the many faces of the North Sea, and it is a pity that so much of this rich vocabulary for describing the world around us is already lost.

>60 MissWatson: I'm glad to see that Seefahrt ist not! turned out to be better than what you expected. :)

>61 Chrischi_HH: So am I.

Flensburg / BBs and TBR

Ross Poldark is one from the TBR. I like the setting and was intrigued to see they had regular smuggling contacts into Roscoff in Brittany, which I have visited. Cornwall is now on the bucket list.

>63 MissWatson: oh Cornwall is lovely! Definitely try to go, you won't be disappointed!

Seconding Jackie's comment about Cornwall! My family spent a week there last year (mostly Falmouth and St. Ives, with day trips) and we loved it.

>5 MissWatson: there's also a Brandenburg concerto...same place?

The Prussian history book looks interesting. You're off to a great start.

>66 fuzzi: Yes. There's an autograph of the concerts (there are six of them) which JS Bach dedicated to Christian Ludwig, youngest son of the Elector of Brandenburg.

>68 MissWatson: thanks for clarifying.

Where's Bavaria in your list? :)

Nice set-up and interesting categories. Looking forward to seeing what you'll read in your music category.
Wow, you've finished 6 books already? I'm barely 1/3 of the way through my first two books. Mostly because I've been spending my down time listening to music and watching a Lip Synch Battle marathon.

>69 fuzzi: Under Nürnberg (Nuremberg to English speakers), host of the world's largest toy fair and thus the category for children's books.

>70 VioletBramble: Thank you. Two picture books and a collection of cartoons made for very quick reading. I'm currently reading Queen of fire which will take a little more time. Over 600 pages in a small font.

>71 MissWatson: thanks! Supposedly that is where my paternal grandfather's family emigrated from.

>73 fuzzi: Ah! His family or was he born in the old country himself?

>74 MissWatson: his family. The one who came from Bavaria had a name like "Hoen-schtauffer", but it changed to "Stauffer" once they settled in Pennsylvania. There were some with the surname "Gut" also. The German side remained pure until my grandfather married a Swede, my paternal Grandmother, last name Lindborg.

I love genealogy.

I really like your Germany theme. My daughter spent a gap year in Germany recently and loved her time there. I too will be interested in seeing what you put in your music category. We enjoyed visiting the Bach and Beethoven museums when we vacationed in Germany two years ago.

>75 fuzzi: That's interesting!

>76 mathgirl40: I've got a few biographies of composers lined up.

Fantastic categories! I look forward to seeing how you get on with your reading.

Marbach / German Literature Archive

So much for contemporary authors! The first book in this category was first published in 1813, ouch.

Der Zauberring is a very odd book indeed, a tale of knights and their ladies, a magic ring, and far too many coincidences for the modern reader. It's the Middle Ages as idealised by the Romantics, in this case someone who overdosed on Gerusalemme liberata and Orlando furioso, at least I was constantly reminded of the operas based on these poems. Plus a library's worth of other romances of chivalry.
I'm still surprised I made it to the end, because the prose was very hard to swallow, again faux medieval. But I wanted to know how it played out and if I had guessed correctly who is who.

I liked learning about Germany in your category descriptions and I'm enjoying following you along in your Germany category challenge.

>80 LisaMorr: Thanks, Lisa! I find myself looking at my German books with quite a different eye.

Dahlewitz / science fiction and fantasy

I have finished Queen of fire which was a birthday present and clamoured to be read immediately. It provides a very satisfactory conclusion to the trilogy, but it proves once again that it is best to read trilogies in close succession. I had several surprises along the way and I'm sure I missed out on the hints and pointers for these in the first books. Ah well, some time next year.
I was also intrigued to find the book with its different points-of-view and parallel actions structured much like Der Zauberring, which in turn imitates medieval romances. I think Tom Shippey explained that particular literary technique...off to the shelves.

"faux medieval" oh my!

>83 cammykitty: Yes, it got a bit wearisome if taken in large doses.

Woman Bingo PUP

My first book for the Woman Bingo PUP fits the "published before 2000" square: The Prospering, published in 1967.
I owned this in German translation as a girl. I did not remember details, but when I started reading it all came back to me. It tells the story of the Indian mission and settlement at Stockbridge in Massachusetts, told through the eyes of Elizabeth Williams. I was surprised to find that she wrote this for adults, because it was surely not marketed as such when I chose this. Interesting read, but the theological arguments left me cold.

Interesting challenge. Especially as I am also German. :-)

>86 IrishHolger: Nice to see you. I noticed the Modesty Blaise category on your thread and now I've got a yearning to re-read...

>6 MissWatson: Have you been to Australia?

>88 pamelad: No, sadly I haven't. It's still on my list!

Leipzig / CATs // Bingo DOG: a book with less than 200 pages

Firmin is about a rat born in the basement of a secondhand bookstore who learns to read and works his way through most of the stock. I'm counting it for the Dewey CAT 000s, because it's about books and reading (DDC 028).
In German we have the word "Leseratte (reading rat)" for a voracious reader, so the premise looked very promising. And the first chapters lived up to it: a reader's paradise in a well-stocked bookstore, and I think most of us would recognise ourselves in Firmin's reaction to, and love for, books. Towards the end, things dragged, not enough reading, and both Firmin and his human companion Jerry Magoon did not engage my affection. Less than overwhelming.

>87 MissWatson:

Yeah, had finished all the novels a good while back and am now gradually clawing my way through the Modesty Blaise comics. She is one of my favourite heroines. In actual fact MB is my smart phone wallpaper. :-)

>91 IrishHolger: Cool!

I'm finally getting to your thread. I love your them and categories! And the flag pictures are a nice touch!

Wow, I am loving your categories! Congrats, and good luck!

>93 tymfos: >94 LauraBrook: Thank you!

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT // Woman Bingo PUP: set in Latin America

I finished La casa de los espíritus just in time for January, it took a little longer than I anticipated, because I had to look up quite a few of the American Spanish words, and the amazing number of typos didn't really help. I would describe it as an interesting read rather than an engaging one, I found all that spiritual stuff a bit hard to swallow.

Leipzig / CATs

Informatik counts for the Random and the Dewey CAT, it is a museum guide for the computer science section of the Deutsches Museum in Munich and I am the only one on LT who owns it. Not something you read in one go, it's more for dipping into. I doubt I will remember much of it a few months from now, but for now it was rewarding.

Wiesbaden / mysteries

And another audiobook from my sister's stores is Schweinskopf al dente. The National Library catalogue entry says it is abridged, so I'm hanging on to the print version for now.

>96 MissWatson:
I just finished that one too, but the spiritual parts didn't bother me too much, since it fit in with the characters. I was hoping for more magical realism, for sure. :)

>101 -Eva-: It seemed a bit over the top to my mind. I liked the part about Alba best. Some of those events happened when I was at school, our Spanish teacher had spent some years in Chile, and thus things seemed so much closer to home. The book brought this back vividly.

Nürnberg / children's books

Les récrés du petit Nicolas. Just because. Of course, these books are so much more enjoyable for adults than for kids.

Edited for touchstone

Wow, that has been a very successful month, readingwise. Nearly four thousand pages, and a very mixed bag. My favourites were Les récrés du petit Nicolas and Queen of fire.
I was planning to read Dshamilja for the February Geo CAT next, but the book has gone AWOL. I seriously need to get my shelves in order. Again.

Loved Le petit Nicholas when I was a pre-teen. I need to revisit these books as an adult.

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT

Ha. Found it! And since I had a day off, I finished Dshamilja. Just gorgeous! Even if it had to be translated at second remove, from Kirgiz to Russian to German. My edition also had an introduction by Louis Aragon, who apparently translated it into French.

Nürnberg / children, YA, Roald Dahl centenary

Sophiechen und der Riese is my very first Roald Dahl. Very enjoyable! This copy landed as a gift at my sister's library, she had no use for it, and as I had just seen a preview for the animated version it seemed like a good time to read it. Translations are always difficult, especially if they are full of wordplay like this book, but I think he managed it very well. Now I am curious from which book the BFG learned how to read and write in the original?

ETA: I just realised this also qualifies for the February Random CAT. Yay.

>107 MissWatson: He learned from Nicholas Nickleby, by Dahl's Chickens.

>108 SylviaC: Thanks!

Leipzig / CATs

One more for the February Random CAT: Lilienbanner und Preußenaar is a historical novel from the Seven Years' War. Two brothers leave Augsburg and their father's merchant house. The eldest ist headed for French Canada to join a fur trading company headed by a distant relative, where he gets drafted into the militia and fights in the defense against the English invasion. The younger falls into the hands of a recruiting officer and ends up in the Prussian army, fighting in most of the famous battles.
It's not great literature, the cast of characters is small and most of them are stereotypes. The battle scenes veer from either sentimental or pathetic to dry and uninvolving as if copied from despatches.
Still, considering that this was published in 1940, it could have been a lot worse. There's hardly any nationalistic grandstanding, some hero worship of Frederick towards the end, and quite a lot of realistic description of the harsh conditions in the Prussian army. The French are viewed with much sympathy, the English less so: they are Frederick's paymasters so that he can keep the French busy in Europe while they grab Canada.

Flensburg / the TBR pile

There's quite a lot of name-dropping in my previous book, and one of them is that of Friedrich Freiherr von der Trenck, who allegedly had an affair with the sister of Frederick II and was chained to a wall and kept in a dungeon for nine years. Seemed like a good time to pick Trenck from the shelves. The story is amazing, and in the hands of a good writer a real treat. So many larger than life characters, so much pain and blood, and at the heart of it all the enigma that is Frederick.

Nürnberg / children's books

I owned Gritlis Kinder as a little girl, it was one of several in an omnibus edition of Johanna Spyri's best-known tales, but I'm pretty sure I never read this before. One of the weepiest books I've ever read. I'm glad it's over.

Arnstadt / romances and guilty pleasures

One of my daily routines is to stop over at the two Project Gutenberg sites. The German version offers a list of people born or died on that day, and there are some fascinating discoveries to be made. And the American version showcases its latest books, one of which today was Maman la soupe et son chat Ratu, about a small black cat that keeps companies with a few French soldiers in the trenches. Short enough at 63 pages to squeeze into a lunch break, it has gorgeous illustrations and ends with a wedding.

Wiesbaden / mysteries

Mord nach jeder Fasson is a historical mystery set in 1740 in Berlin. Frederick II has just succeeded to the throne, and Honoré Langustier arrives in town to take up a post as second cook to the King, on the very same day that one of the royal adjutants is killed in the Tiergarten. Langustier is assigned to support the chief of police in the investigation and uncovers an involved plot about a corrupt courtier and high diplomacy as conducted by the previous king. The concept is intriguing, the execution less so. The author tells his tale chronologically, so we are left repeatedly with some obscure new characters and no idea how they fit into the tale until the very end. The language never gets a grip on the times, and modern German spelling sits very awkwardly with 18th century dialogue, which is a constant irritation. Bruno Frank did this so much better.

ETC

Project Gutenberg does have some amazing books that I would never have known about otherwise! I love that the German site offers a list of authors born/died on a given day. I have never really paid close attention to what interesting additional tidbits the Canadian site may offer. Must remember to go investigate!

>113 MissWatson: - That sounds like a lovely story!

>115 lkernagh: It is, to say more would spoil it, since it is very short. Ratu is an adorable cat.

ETA: I have found several books on the German site which will be perfect for the Woman Bingo PUP.

Flensburg / the TBR pile

The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope.
This is book 5 of his Barsetshire Chronicles and I was surprised to find that there is barely any mention of Church of England affairs. The others so far have been set mostly or partially among clergymen. Instead we get a glimpse at Plantagenet Palliser's relationship with Lady Dumbello and his future wife is described. There's also the failed romance of Lily Dale who is jilted by her social climber of a fiancé. Trollope himself describes her as a bit of a prig in his authobiography, and I would agree with him. Still, it's amazing to find a Victorian novel where she remains unwed at the end, although a likely candidate is presented. I'm looking forward to my next journey into Barsetshire, he is so good at creating believable, likeable women.

Trollope - there's an author I'm embarrassed to admit I haven't read. Sounds like he might be a good candidate for my classics category.

>118 cammykitty: I hadn't heard about him either, until John Major mentioned him as his favourite author (some years ago, admittedly). It has been a happy discovery for me, he's not as sentimental as Dickens, and he has a certain wry humour. I just started The last chronicle of Barset and met some old acquaintances from previous books, and I hope to fit in one or two of the Palliser series this year.

ETC to fix touchstone

Dahlewitz / SFF

Shovel ready was a quick one, a sort of crime noir set in post-nuclear New York City with a first person narrative from a hitman. Not quite as shocking or novel as it wants to be.

Happy Thingaversary!

Happy Thingaversary! I hope you enjoyed your books and the beautiful weather yesterday. :)

>121 paruline: >122 Chrischi_HH: Thank you! I did buy some new ones:
Leviathan wakes
Les demoiselles de Provence
Friedrich der Große
Wolf Winter
plus one to grow on: The king by Abder Kabdolah. As soon as I'm finished with my current Trollope...
ETC

Happy Thingaversary! Glad you celebrated with new books!

Happy Thingaversary, it's always fun to have an excuse to buy more books! :)

Happy belated Thigaversary! 'grats on the new books.

Bingo DOG: a senior citizen as the protagonist

Frau Maier hört das Gras wachsen is a mystery set on the shores of the Chiemsee in Bavaria. An elderly woman lives in a small house on the lakeshore with her cat and ekes out her pension with a cleaning job at the local hotel. A guest and her daughter are missing, Frau Maier finds the corpse and solves the case. She's a loner and finds it difficult to trust people, but she observes closely and sees things others miss. The story is told entirely from her perspective, her discoveries, her thoughts, and her curiosity almost gets her killed. Nice diversion.

Happy Belated Thingaversary. I'm playing catch-up on threads! Mine is coming up at the end of next month, and I'm trying to decide what I'll be getting. I was tempted by an online sale (today only) from a genealogical publisher, but none of the books had been on my radar before, and I really would rather peruse them in a library before ordering them. Still, the sale prices were excellent!

>128 thornton37814: Ah, these dangerous sales! Temptation always lurks.

Mettlach / economic history

Trade in the Eastern seas by C. Northcote Parkinson looks at the English trade with India and China during the French wars, 1793-1813. It is a great read, he looks at all aspects of the trade, from the routes, the ships, the working of the East India Company, the crews, the passengers, life on board, the merchandise. Very satisfying.

Leipzig / CATs

I read De brevitate vitae / Die Kürze des Lebens for the Dewey CAT. Amazing how much of it is still relevant to our times.

Leipzig / CATs

Die preußischen Brüder was another quick read, about Prince Henry of Prussia and his difficult relationship with this brother, King Frederick the Great. Since there is little solid information about Henry, much of the book consists of reflections about Prussia.

Nürnberg / children's books

While browsing the German Gutenberg site I came across a version of Puss in Boots rewritten by Ferdinand Avenarius Der gestiefelte Kater. It has lovely illustrations and the text is obviously written around them. Nice!

Marbach / German Literature Archive

Bruno Frank died in 1945, which means his works are now in the public domain in Germany. Gutenberg has published some of them recently, which is where I found Tage des Königs, a nice companion piece to Trenck. He really knows how to put his readers into the 18th century.

ETC

Wolfenbüttel / non-fiction

I picked up Vorgeschichte in der Bretagne on a whim, it's been on my shelves for years. It explains the menhirs and standing stones of Brittany, and as is often the case with books picked up in museums, it was a bit too scholarly for raw beginners and too simple for people with previous knowledge. I'll have to find something more in depth some time.

>130 MissWatson: I'm familiar with Parkinson's Law, but hadn't realised that C. Northcote Parkinson's writings were so many and varied.

Parkinson's 1955 article in The Economist is very dry and amusing.

Frau Maier sounds fun. I was thinking it's sort of hard to find seniors as protagonists, but you are right. Mysteries are the place to look - Miss Marple, Dr. Siri, Mrs. Pollifax etc... My 90 year old next door neighbor certainly could have been an amateur detective without leaving her house. She somehow always knew what was going on in the neighborhood. Or at least the gossip! Some of what she believed about people was pretty wild.

>136 pamelad: That was fun! I can also recommend his Naval series about Richard Delancey, one of which draws heavily on the studies he made for Trade in the Eastern seas., although I don't remember which one at the moment.

>137 cammykitty: Yes, old ladies gossiping are a useful feature for mystery writers. Although Frau Maier keeps rather to herself, she's a bit of an outsider in the village. Investigating the mystery entirely from her perspective was a clever touch, but I was a bit irritated by her "feeling" or "sensing" things in the atmosphere. Still, I'll borrow the first one in the series, too, next time I go to visit my sister.

>137 cammykitty: I remember reading at least one installment in a series set in New England where the sleuth was older. I just looked I read 2 installments. The books are by Cynthia Riggs and the sleuth is 92-year-old Victoria Trumbull. Setting is Martha's Vineyard. I read the first, Deadly Nightshade, and the third, The Cemetery Yew.

>140 thornton37814: Imagine being sprightly enough for sleuthing at 92!

Mettlach / economic history

Abandoned: Empire of cotton
I soldiered on until page 100, and then I quit. Beckert attempts to give us a world history of cotton and to return Asia, Africa and the Americas to their rightful place and point out the wrongs done to them. But he does so only in the colours black and white, and his relentless repetition of how bad the European capitalists were and still are is irritating, to put it mildly. When he misattributed a quote and the corresponding book to Mahatma Gandhi, I was annoyed. It got worse.

I kept muttering to myself: “Oh yeah? Says who? Really? Based on what? Compared to what?” He has read a huge amount of literature for this, but his notekeeping is highly unsatisfactory: whenever you go to a footnote you will find a number of titles listed for the paragraph, but no way of relating a direct quote to the corresponding book, unless you check every single source listed (and who is going to do that??). This may be the accepted method for historians, but I still find it lazy.

On those first 100 pages alone I was irritated by the following: He is much given to sweeping generalisations that he cannot back with numbers. He is misty-eyed about pre-modern cultivation of cotton and production of fabrics in rural households (without ever defining what these households look like). His concept of “war capitalism” is unconvincing. Capitalists are always European, yet two pages later he describes a putting-out system in China financed exactly as in Italy or England. He uses British when he should properly speak of English (as in ships trading to India in the 17th century). Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Basically, he’s selling a new version of the history of industrialisation. Sorry, I’m not buying.

Mettlach / economic history

I finished The Indian cotton textile industry (no touchstone). This is the book that Beckert misattributed to Mahatma Gandhi. It was written by M.P. Gandhi in 1930 and is very much a product of its time. The language is flowery, it has a large number of typos (which I assume are the printers' fault, not necessarily the author's, even if his English requires getting used to) and the use of the Indian numbering system (lakh and crore) are not helping. In the part about the history of cotton he jumps between centuries without making clear what he is referring to. The part about the present state of the industry reminds one repeatedly that India has not fulfilled her potential to this very day.

>142 MissWatson: Ouch! Good call on abandoning that one.

I enjoyed the discussion of elderly sleuths. Reminds me I should revisit Mrs. Pollifax!

Flensburg / the TBR pile

The last chronicle of Barset What a relief it is to return to Barsetshire after the previous books! We meet some favourite characters again, we feel that someone less liked gets what she deserved, and my only regret is that Septimus Harding did not get to meet his grandson's fiancée. Simply wonderful.

Bingo DOG / survival story

I fished Rogue Male from my shelves and think this is a perfect book for the survival story. It's short, sparsely written, and it has a very exciting plot. The most interesting things are the ones he doesn't tell, but to his contemporaries they must have been obvious. I will certainly read other books by this author if I can find them. alas, my paperback copy of this book fell to pieces in my hand.

I'm laughing that you suffered through (or part way through) a cotton book too. Mine was The Travels of a T-Shirt and it did have some useful information in it, but was a bit on the dull side. However, the Travels at least felt like mostly 1st hand research and certainly a more balanced reporting. I'll take Travels over Empire of Cotton!

@140 "Feeling" and "sensing" would get on my nerves too. Lazy writing! The author couldn't figure out a better way to get necessary info to the sleuth.

@141 Thanks for the recommendation! Here's to all of us being energetic enough to sleuth in our 90s!

Bingo DOG / about a writer

Schriftsteller! by Jessica Durlacher (I get some weird suggestions for the touchstone, but none for this book) was short enough to be squeezed into a lunch break. A first person narrative about a young Dutch author suffering from writer's block after her first successful novel. To say more would be to spoil the surprise, suffice to say that it reminded me of the vindictiveness attributed by authors to each other. The translation reads great.

Bremerhavem / Geo CAT // Bingo DOG / in translation

Der Verrückte des Zaren by Jaan Kross is a historical novel translated from Estonian, set in 19th century Livonia which belonged to the Russian Empire at the time. It is written as a diary and tells the story of Timotheus von Bock through the eyes of his brother-in-law. Bock was imprisoned under Alexander I and released under Nicholas I, but had to remain on his own estate under supervision. The story is fascinating and the fact that most of the protagonists are real persons, makes it even more fascinating. Timo was adjutant to the Czar, fought in the campaigns against Napoleon and was smitten with the ideas of the French revolution. He was a member of the German-speaking aristocracy descended from the Teutonic Knights who ruled the country in the Middle Ages, he chose his wife from the ranks of the Estonian peasants and had to buy her and her family from serfdom first. He provided a first-rate education for her and her brother Jakob, the diarist. They had to convert to Russian Orthodoxy before they could be married, and Eeva had to change her name. And barely a year after the marriage Timo is arrested and vanishes into one of the Czar's dungeons. Eeva/Katharina never stops trying to find him and finally, the new Czar Nicholas agrees to release him.
The book is full of little details that bring the country and its history to life: the snobbishness of the other aristocrats, the intellectual life (Heinrich Heine's poems arrive in Livonia a year after publication), the harsh winters, the first attempts at manufacturing. People are defined by their language, Estonian is "peasant speak", the native language of the aristocracy is German, but at court and among themselves they speak French, and of course the language of the state and of power is Russian. Certainly an author I want to read more of, and a country I want to know more of.
The translation is excellent, as far as I can tell, she provides translations for the many French and Russian phrases scattered throughout the book, and she also gives brief descriptions of the many historical persons mentioned.

>149 MissWatson: That does sounds fascinating. I always like reading about a world that I never knew existed.

>150 BonnieJune54: So do I, I've ordered a non-fiction book about Baltic history to learn more.

Leipzig / CATs

My daily visit to the German Gutenberg site threw a tale for the March Random CAT my way: Der Vorabend des Weihnachtsfestes. Unbelievably sentimental novella about a woman who suffers a loveless marriage, the loss of two daughters and a wayward son without complaint, nobly and resigned to her fate, until decades later things turn right on Christmas Eve.

Bingo DOG / self-published

I found Navajo Autumn on my book-swapping site and the name of the publisher suggested self-published. It reads like it, too. The rather simplistic case is overshadowed by all the ethnographic information he wants to share.

Arnstadt / romances // Bingo DOG / one-word title

Pauline is one of Dumas' earlier books, it is short, contemporary and written in a very complex structure: Dumas is the narrator who meets a friend, Alfred de Nerval, who tells him the story of his great love recently dead, and within this narrative we have another first-person narrative, when Pauline tells her story to Alfred. So, lots of imparfait, passé simple and the corresponding conditionnels, a great opportunity to practise conjugation. The plot has a few Gothic elements in a ruined abbey and a very Byronesque villain, Pauline's husband. The heroine is a bit too meek for my taste, but it was an entertaining read.

The notes had a chronology of his life and work, and this gave me the idea that it might be interesting to read his novels in publishing order.

I like the idea of reading Dumas's novels in publication order. Also adding Pauline to the Dumas list.

>149 MissWatson: I'm trying to read a book from every European country, so am pleased to read that you enjoyed this Estonian novel. I've just ordered the English translation, The Czar's Madman, and hope it's as good as the German.

>156 pamelad: I hope so, too. I have just learned that the translation into German was done by the author's wife, so she probably had a bit of an advantage there...

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT

I finished Geschichte des Baltikums, which provided some much-needed background for Der Verrückte des Zaren. It is directed at the general public and covers the history of the three countries we now mean when we say Baltic countries.It wasn't always so, and the author is careful to point out the many different meanings. Some familiar names and events turned up, but most of it I didn't know, especially the history of the early 20th century, which dropped out of sight during the Soviet times. He arranges his material in chronological order according to the nation in power. The region has changed hands so many times, and the people living there had so little say that it could almost qualify as a history of indigenous people. Maps would have come in useful, to illustrate the changing borders.

Flensburg / book bullets

La fête à Coqueville was a book bullet from VivienneR in the March Random CAT, and there was a French copy available on OpenLibrary. A very quick read and truly funny.

ETC

>159 MissWatson: Glad you enjoyed La fête à Coqueville as much as I did!

>160 VivienneR: Thanks for the BB. I always assumed that Zola was dark and dreary, but this quite changed my mind.

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT

Wellen by Eduard von Keyserling is one more for the GeoCAT. He was born in Kurland, which is now part of Latvia and a member of the German aristocracy, the ruling class in the region. This is a short novel set during a summer holiday on the Baltic shore, and the sea plays a prominent part in this, reflecting the moods of the main character, Doralice, who has left her aged husband for a young painter and is now ostracised by her peers. A very melancholy tale, which could have taken place anywhere else in Europe at this time.

Dahlewitz / SFF

His Majesty's Dragon is a jewel of a book. Such engaging characters, such a nifty way of tweaking history, and a book-loving dragon on top of everything! What's not to like? I must have been smiling like an idiot from first to last, humming Cole Porter: It's delightful, it's delicious, it's delectable...

>163 MissWatson: Yes! Love this series. :) Some of the books are better than others, but the overarching narrative and worldbuilding are great!

>163 MissWatson:
I've not tried it yet, but it's on the wishlist - pushing it further up the list now!

>164 christina_reads: >165 -Eva-: I've got the second lined up for next weekend, when I intend to do nothing else but enjoy my book.

Dahlewitz / SFF

I finished Wir by Evgenij Zamjatin, a science fiction classic, probably known best because he couldn't publish it in the Soviet Union. A very depressing description of the effects of totalitarianism.
On second thought, it also fits the March Geo CAT...

ETA

>166 MissWatson:
It's the best feeling when you find a new series to mow through!

Leipzig / CATs

And with the chimes of midnight I finished Ali und Nino which fits both the Dewey and the Geo CAT, as it is a love story between a Muslim and a Christian set in Baku, then part of the Russian Empire, shortly before the Russian Revolution. It took me to a very strange place, about which I knew nothing: Transcaucasia, where many nations, faiths and languages meet and mingle.

I was intrigued to find that it was published first in German in 1937, that Kurban Said is a pseudonym usually attributed to Essad Bey and that co-authorship was claimed for Elfriede von Ehrenfels. As I dug deeper I found a tale of literary mystery and machinations even stranger than the novel which needs further investigations.

Looking back on my first quarter I feel myself glowing with a sense of pride: 46 books already read, and I have reached my minimum in ten categories, out of 16.

My absolute favourite so far is His Majesty's Dragon, with Der Verrückte des Zaren a close runner-up.

I have also noticed that I pay much more attention to book reviews these days with an eye to finding something for the CATs, and thus I have discovered something very promising for the April Geo CAT: Grimsey.

Ah well, the weekend didn't turn out quite as I had planned, so no progress yet with Throne of jade. But spring has finally arrived, I bought some flowers for the balcony, ate my first asparagus and enjoyed our first open air flea market. Which means twelve new books. But how could I pass up some Maigrets in French at rock-bottom prices?

>171 MissWatson: Indeed! I wouldn't be able to pass up those Maigrets either!

Arnstadt / romances // Woman BingoPUP / a new-to-you author

My lunchtime reading has been The duke's daughter by Mrs. Oliphant, which was offered in German translation as the only book available for download on the German Gutenberg site. (One of my daily visits to see whose birthday it is) The short biography mentioned she was a contemporary of Anthony Trollope and much read in her time. I had never heard of her and so I tried to track down an English copy of this. Ah, the joys of book browsing! Well I found a digitised copy in three volumes, which also contains The fugitives.
The book was fun to read, it is a straightforward romance with lots of subtle and not-so-subtle fun poked at the aristocracy and the way women get the upper hand on their husbands and fathers. I shall certainly read the second novel, too.

Stavenhagen / regional dialects

Winterkartoffelknödel is the first in a series of mysteries set in a Bavarian village, told in a first person narrative by the local cop, in his local idiom. To my mind she hasn't got that quite right, it reads like an attempt to talk like the locals made by a Non-Bavarian. And the main character is not very likeable. If I had read this first, I probably wouldn't have continued with the series, later instalments are funnier and the dialect more convincing.

Trier / ancient history

How fitting that the first book in this category should be about a Roman emperor who actually once stopped in Trier: Mémoires d'Hadrien. Reading this required lots of attention as she writes very long sentences, but it went better than I thought. He spent most of his reign travelling around the empire and the way Yourcenar writes it he made the most of it, always trying to meet the local intellectuals and studying the culture. I took quite a lot of notes for further reading.

Nürnberg / YA // Bingo DOG / debut book // Woman Bingo PUP / award winner

Meg Rosoff has recently been awarded the Astrid Lindgren memorial Prize, so it seemed a good time to finally pick up How I live now, her first book, which also won the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize. Very impressive.

>173 MissWatson: Mrs Oliphant's Miss Marjoribanks was one of my favourite books last year. It was a free ebook from Amazon.

>177 pamelad: I downloaded it from Project Gutenberg, along with a few others, and I'm looking forward to a nice summer read. Hopefully on a beach.

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT

I finished Grimsey this weekend. A photographer flies in to Grimsey, a small island north of Iceland on the Arctic Circle, walks across it, reminisces about other islands he has visited, and leaves again.
This was an odd piece of literature which required lots of concentration, as he piles subclause on subclause. I often had to revisit the beginning of a sentence to make out what belonged where. Very detailed descriptions of the things he sees and photographs, and reflections about man's relation with nature. Interesting, especially when he loks back into his childhood on the East German part of the Baltic sea, but ultimately not very engaging.

I guess I'll be relieved that Grimsey is not available in English. I like books set in Iceland, but I'm not sure I have the energy for a book where the sentence structure is excessively complicated. Would be a great (?) challenge for a translator though.

>180 rabbitprincess: I guess it would be a challenge. And since the protagonist barely interacts with the handful of inhabitants on the small island, it's not really about Iceland, more an examination of his inner life.

Woman Bingo PUP / about a female critter

The remainders bin at Hugendubel bookstore will ruin me. Yesterday I succumbed to temptation again and brought home Danke für meine Aufmerksamkeit because the author, Cordula Stratmann, is a TV comedian highly recommended by my sister. I haven't gotten round to watching her show yet, but the book seemed a promising start, especially since it is a first-person narrative from a female mouse, Britta, so it fits for the Woman Bingo PUP. And it was hilarious. Britta has separated from her partner and taken up residence with Polly and her parents. They live in a well-to-do quarter of Cologne and Britta observes from the privileged position of a pet (she can talk) how Polly and her friends cope with their incompetent parents. Some very biting comments on modern child-rearing, but family therapy gets off lightly, since it actually works in this case.
I also learned a few unknown slang words, and some of the dialogue is funny. I'm not overfond of using English verbs when perfectly normal German equivalents exist (as in to download, which looks ridiculous when conjugated like a German verb) but I'll make an exception for headbanging: "bängte ich head" is priceless.

ETC

Trier / ancient history

Romans, Celts and Germans describes the two Germanic provinces of the Roman Empire based on archeological evidence. Precise, succinct and very readable. Highly recommended for anyone interested in Roman provinces.

Nürnberg / YA

Die Glückspilze is a book I owned as a girl and all I rembered about it was that the parents made umbrellas. One night I woke up and remembered that the family was named Pilz, so a little searching led me to a likely title, a library within reach still owned a copy and my sister got it for me through ILL. Praise be to decent libraries! I had forgotten entirely about the sisters doing a stint in their uncle's circus. A pleasant re-encounter.

"bängte ich head"
Ha! My German skills are not "real," but are mainly what I can decipher from knowing Swedish, but in this case, meaning is clear - that's really funny!

I also liked her dig at the drivers of SUVs: getting out of their vehicle, they've got all the sex appeal of a potato farmer climbing down from his harvester.

Marbach / German Literature Archive

Sansibar oder der letzte Grund is one of the books frequently read in German class in school which is one of the reasons I avoided it. My loss. This is a great story, about five people whose paths cross in a sleepy town on the shore of the Baltic sea in 1938, and all are desperate to leave the country. He takes you in very slowly, never stating outright who people are. Wonderful, unsentimental prose, almost aloof, which makes you look closer at the subtle hints, and the way he uses colours... It stays with you a long time.

ETA

On another note, springtime is open air flea-market season, and I visited the one they have on the harbour twice a year. Not very many stands, the weather was too cold and threatened rain, but there was one man with an amazing selection of children's fiction from my own time. It was like a trip down memory lane, all those familiar titles and authors, and all in pretty good condition. I did resist, however. A peek inside was enough to assure me that I do not need to re-read these.
Still, he also had a selection of hardcovers and I came home with five books:
Fahrten durch die Mark Brandenburg
Reise durch das Biedermeier
Reise nach Arabien
Rulaman
Das Kassandramal which I hope to squeeze in this month for the Random CAT...

Just when I thought we could move on to spring, we're having snow. This morning the balcony was white. It melted, but it's still snowing. I can't believe this.

>189 MissWatson: Yikes! Some flurries were in the forecast here as well, but they did not materialize. I hope it gets warmer over there so that you don't have snow! It's almost May!!!

>190 rabbitprincess: We have been promised two more days of unseasonal cold, and then the temperatures will rise. I'm not holding my breath, but at least it's not snowing any more. Just cold and wet. Perfect weather for reading, if I didn't have to work, sigh.

Bremerhaven / Geo CAT

Strictly speaking it doesn't fit my conditions of the Geo CAT because I have actually visited Scotland once, but the title caught my eye and it is set on a Hebridean island, so I'm counting it: The hills is lonely.
Lillian Beckwith recounts episodes from her prolonged stay on the island and the most interesting thing about it today is that it provides a fascinating look at the mindset of the English middle class between the World Wars, which is decidedly Imperial. She describes the natives and their world as if she had been relegated to some far-flung outpost of the empire, among the savages. There is the obsession with cleanliness, the unspoken assumption that all things English are the pinnacle of civilisation, the condescension to participate in their entertainments against her taste and so on. She makes an attempt to learn Gaelic and gives up because she obviously can't be bothered with a language that applies different genders to things than English, as if all languages should have the same grammar. And yet she never explains why she stayed all that time.

edited for touchstone

>192 MissWatson: Perhaps Beckwith would have had similar reactions if she'd moved to a working class area of England? I enjoyed all of her Hebridean books, despite her condescending attitude, because they were light and cheerful, and a snapshot of another time and place. She'd moved there after having what sounds like a nervous breakdown, because she wanted to get well away and had very little money, and stayed because the people were so kind and friendly. Unfortunately these patronising books repaid the locals poorly for their kindness. I read that the locals were very unimpressed by Beckwith's books. Not a surprise!

ETA Just looked up Lillian Beckwith and found that she was married and living in the croft with her husband, so the Lillian of the novels is a fiction.

>193 pamelad: I thought so too, remembering the horrifying details of life in a London slum I found in Goodnight Mister Tom. I think there were quite a few books with similar themes going around at the time.

April has been a very busy month at work, so I didn't get to read quite as much as I wanted. Still, progress is good. Favourite book of the month was Sansibar oder der letzte Grund, I'm looking forward to read more of Andersch.

The first of May is Labour Day in Germany, which seems like a good moment to spend some time setting up a new thread.