rabbitprincess is reading fully and completely in 2020 - Part 2

This year, my category challenge will feature the music of The Tragically Hip, a Canadian band from Kingston, Ontario.

I'll have all of my usual categories, plus a couple of bonus categories that are intended to let me indulge in some of my favourite topics... we'll see how that ACTUALLY plays out :)

The titles of each category contain a hyperlink to a YouTube video with the song.

General fiction – "If New Orleans is Beat"
General non-fiction – "Wheat Kings"
History (fiction and non-fiction) - "Looking for a Place to Happen"
Mysteries – "Locked in the Trunk of a Car"
SFF – "The Depression Suite"
Plays, poetry, graphic novels, other miscellaneous books – "Poets"
Audio – "Thompson Girl"
French – "38 Years Old"
Rereads – "Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)"
Group reads and CATs – "We'll Go, Too"
Aviation-related books: "700 Ft. Ceiling"
Nautical books: "Nautical Disaster"

ROOTs ticker:




2-for-1 TBR ticker:




Bingo:



✔ Book that's in a Legacy Library – Ape and Essence (in Aldous Huxley's library)
✔ Book written by an LT author – Here Be Dragons (Sharon Kay Penman)
✔ Book published in 1820 or 1920 – Main Street (get through Serial Reader)
Book published in the year of your birth – Using the Tragically Hip's birth years: 1962 The Satan Bug, Gideon's March, Atlantic Fury, The Green Branch, Like Love; 1964 Chain of Destiny, The Spire; 1966 Long Summer Day, A Stake in the Kingdom, Shooting Script
Book published under a pen name or anonymously – Gideon’s Night (JJ Marric)
✔ Book set in Asia – North Korea Journal
✔ Mystery or true crime – The Bellamy Trial
✔ Book involving a real historical event (fiction or nonfiction) – The Plotters
✔ Book about books, bookstores, or libraries – The Book of Forgotten Authors
✔ Book with at least 3 letters of BINGO consecutively in order in the title – Hollow Kingdom
✔ Red cover (or red is prominent on the cover) – Now We Are Six Hundred
✔ Title contains a pun – ATA Girl
Book about birth or death - Dear Life (Rachel Clarke)
✔ Book with a proper name in the title – Gold for Prince Charlie
✔ Book published by a small press or self-published - When Days Are Long (published by Caitlin Press)
✔ Book published in 2020 - Successful Aging
✔ Epistolary novel or collection of letters - Microserfs (told through diary entries)
✔ Book by a journalist or about journalism - Verdict of Twelve (Raymond Postgate was a journalist)
✔ Book not set on Earth – Diary of River Song Series 4
✔ Mythology or folklore – The Mabinogion
Weird book title – The Detective Wore Silk Drawers
Book with "library" or "thing" in title or subtitle – Things Ain’t What They Used to Be
✔ Book with a periodic table element in the title – Gold from Crete
Book by a woman from a country other than the US/UK – L’Armée furieuse
✔ Read a CAT - Solomon Gursky Was Here

General fiction - If New Orleans is Beat

“The river takes, takes, takes and takes / It doesn’t change, it only changes”

This category was hard to choose a song for. This song is one of my favourite Hip songs at the moment, so that ended up being why I picked it.

1. Solomon Gursky Was Here, by Mordecai Richler
2. The Mystery of Orcival, by Emile Gaboriau (Serial Reader)
3. The Eejits, by Roald Dahl, translated by Matthew Fitt
4. Millions, by Frank Cottrell Boyce
5. In Her Wake, by Amanda Jennings
6. Wives and Daughters, by Elizabeth Gaskell (Serial Reader)
7. The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot (Serial Reader)
8. The Travelling Cat Chronicles, by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Philip Gabriel (Overdrive)
9. The Stone Angel, by Margaret Laurence
10. French Exit, by Patrick deWitt
11. Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis (Serial Reader)
12. The Coral Island, by R. M. Ballantyne (Serial Reader)

General non-fiction - Wheat Kings

"Twenty years for nothing, well that's nothing new / Besides, nobody's interested in things you didn't do"

This song is based on the story of David Milgaard, who was wrongly convicted for murder and spent 20 years in prison before being exonerated.

1. North Korea Journal, by Michael Palin
2. Gender and Our Brains: How New Neuroscience Explodes the Myths of the Male and Female Brain, by Gina Rippon
3. The Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers-Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing, by Merve Emre
4. Forensics: What Bugs, Burns, Prints, DNA and More Tell Us About Crime, by Val McDermid
5. Successful Aging: A Neuroscientist Explores the Power and Potential of Our Lives, by Daniel J. Levitin
6. Is It All in Your Head?: True Stories of Imaginary Illnesses, by Suzanne O'Sullivan
7. Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language: Hereditary Deafness on Martha's Vineyard, by Nora Ellen Groce
8. Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada, by Anna Brownell Jameson
9. Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams, by Matthew Walker
10. Effective Data Storytelling, by Brent Dykes
11. Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death and Hard Truths in a Northern City, by Tanya Talaga
12. The Field Guide to Understanding 'Human Error', by Sidney Dekker
13. Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath
14. The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain As Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness, and Recovery, by Sam Kean (Overdrive)

History - "Looking for a Place to Happen"

"Jacques Cartier, right this way / Put your coat up on the bed / Hey man you got a real bum's eye for clothes"

An imagined scene in which Jacques Cartier, coming to a land he thinks is uninhabited and seeks to conquer, is greeted as a guest by the Indigenous inhabitants.

Historical fiction
1. Gold for Prince Charlie, by Nigel Tranter
2. Le Roi de fer, by Maurice Druon
3. Ships in the Bay!, by D. K. Broster
4. Here Be Dragons, by Sharon Kay Penman
5. The End of the Line, by Stephen Legault
6. A Rising Man, by Abir Mukherjee
7. La Reine étranglée, by Maurice Druon
8. The Women of the Copper Country, by Mary Doria Russell

Historical non-fiction
1. A Short History of Progress, by Ronald Wright
2. Cardiff Castle and the Marquesses of Bute, by Matthew Williams
3. The Bastard Brigade: The True Story of the Renegade Scientists and Spies Who Sabotaged the Nazi Atomic Bomb, by Sam Kean
4. Four Queens: The Provençal Sisters Who Ruled Europe, by Nancy Goldstone
5. When Days Are Long: Nurse in the North, by Amy Wilson
6. The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America, by Thomas King

Mystery - Locked in the Trunk of a Car

"I found a place, it’s dark and it’s rotten / It’s a cool, sweet kind of place where the coppers won’t spot it / I destroyed the map, I even thought I’d forgot it / However, every day I’m dumping the body..."

Chilling, like the best thrillers.

1. The Bellamy Trial, by Frances Noyes Hart (Faded Page)
2. The Mystery of the Chinese Junk, by Franklin W. Dixon
3. The Crooked Hinge, by John Dickson Carr
4. Verdict of Twelve, by Raymond Postgate
5. Dread Journey, by Dorothy B. Hughes
6. A Taste for Honey, by H. F. Heard
7. What You Pay For, by Claire Askew
8. Death from a Top Hat, by Clayton Rawson
9. Murder in Mesopotamia, by Agatha Christie
10. The Tiger in the Smoke, by Margery Allingham
11. Gun Before Butter, by Nicolas Freeling
12. Cop Killer, by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, translated by Thomas Teal
13. Beware of the Trains, by Edmund Crispin
14. A Matter of Malice, by Thomas King (Overdrive)
15. Family Matters, by Anthony Rolls (Overdrive)
16. Murder by Matchlight, by E.C.R. Lorac (Overdrive)
17. The Colour of Murder, by Julian Symons (Overdrive)
18. Murder Unprompted, by Simon Brett
19. The Christmas Card Crime and Other Stories, ed. Martin Edwards (Overdrive)
20. Surfeit of Suspects, by George Bellairs (Overdrive)
21. Murder in the Mill-Race, by E. C. R. Lorac (Overdrive)
22. Death in Captivity, by Michael Gilbert (Overdrive)

SFF and SpecFic-- “The Depression Suite”

“Bring on the requisite strangeness / It always has to get a little weird”

I agree, SFF should always be a little weird. That's part of its charm!

1. Doctor Who: Twelfth Doctor Vol. 1: Terrorformer, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Dave Taylor with Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
2. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 2: Fractures, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Brian Williamson and Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
3. Hollow Kingdom, by Kira Jane Buxton
4. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 3: Hyperion, written by Robbie Morrison and George Mann; illustrated by Daniel Indro and Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
5. Now We Are Six Hundred: A Collection of Time Lord Verse, written by James Goss and illustrated by Russell T. Davies
6. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor, Vol. 4: The School of Death, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Rachael Stott and Simon Fraser (ebook)
7. Doctor Who: Shroud of Sorrow, by Tommy Donbavand (CloudLibrary)
8. Doctor Who: The Plotters, by Gareth Roberts
9. Twelve Angels Weeping, by Dave Rudden
10. The Day She Saved the Doctor, by Jacqueline Rayner, Jenny T. Colgan, Susan Calman, and Dorothy Koomson
11. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 5: The Twist, written by George Mann and illustrated by Mariano Laclaustra and Rachael Stott (ebook)
12. Doctor Who: Darkstar Academy and Day of the Cockroach, by Mark Morris and Steve Lyons (audio, read by Alexander Armstrong and Arthur Darvill)
13. Doctor Who and the War Games, by Malcolm Hulke
14. Doctor Who and the Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis (audio, read by Michael Kilgarriff and Nicholas Briggs)
15. Doctor Who: Hunters of Earth, by Nigel Robinson (audio, read by Carole Ann Ford and Tam Williams)
16. Doctor Who: Lords of the Storm, by David A. McIntee

Plays, poetry, essays, short story collections etc. -- "Poets"

"Don't tell me what the poets are doing / Don't tell me that they're talking tough / Don't tell me that they're antisocial / Somehow not antisocial enough"

This choice should be self-evident.

Plays
1. 887, by Robert Lepage (translated by Louisa Blair)
2. King Lear, by William Shakespeare
3.

Comics and graphic novels
1. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 1: Terrorformer, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Dave Taylor with Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
2. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 2: Fractures, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Brian Williamson and Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
3. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 3: Hyperion, written by Robbie Morrison and George Mann; illustrated by Daniel Indro and Mariano Laclaustra (ebook)
4. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 4: The School of Death, written by Robbie Morrison and illustrated by Rachael Stott and Simon Fraser (ebook)
5. Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 5: The Twist, written by George Mann and illustrated by Mariano Laclaustra and Rachael Stott (ebook)

Everything else
1. Tall Tales and Wee Stories, by Billy Connolly
2. Now We Are Six Hundred: A Collection of Time Lord Verse, written by James Goss and illustrated by Russell T. Davies
3. The Beatles from A to Zed: An Alphabetical Mystery Tour, by Peter Asher
4. Canada and Impressionism: New Horizons, ed. National Gallery of Canada
5. The Book of Forgotten Authors, by Christopher Fowler
6. The Doctors: Time and Space Collection, by Adam Hargreaves
7. Doctor Third, by Adam Hargreaves
8. Doctor Fifth, by Adam Hargreaves
9. The Merry Heart: Selections 1980–1995, by Robertson Davies
10. Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier, by Neil deGrasse Tyson
11. The Mabinogion, translated by Sioned Davies
12. Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature, by Margaret Atwood (Overdrive)
13. The Souls of Black Folk, by W. E. B. Du Bois (Serial Reader)
14. Trans-Canada Rail Guide, by Melissa Graham

Possibilities
King Lear, by William Shakespeare
The Odyssey, trans. Emily Wilson

Audiobooks -- Thompson Girl

"Thompson girl / Walkin' from Churchill"

You'd need a lot of audiobooks for a walk from Churchill to Thompson. It's such a long walk, Google Maps can't even calculate walking directions.

1. Watership Down, by Richard Adams (read by Peter Capaldi)
2. Moone Boy: The Blunder Years, by Chris O'Dowd and Nick Vincent Murphy (read by the authors)
3. Doctor Who: Darkstar Academy and Day of the Cockroach, by Mark Morris and Steve Lyons (read by Alexander Armstrong and Arthur Darvill)
4. ATA Girl, by Gemma Page, Victoria Saxton, Helen Goldwyn, and Jane Slavin (Big Finish audio drama)
5. The Diary of River Song, Series 4 (Big Finish audio drama)
6. Doctor Who and the Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis (audio, read by Michael Kilgarriff and Nicholas Briggs)
7. Doctor Who: Hunters of Earth, by Nigel Robinson (audio, read by Carole Ann Ford and Tam Williams)

Possibilities:
The Diary of River Song, Series 4 (Big Finish audio drama)
ATA Girl (Big Finish audio drama)
Paths of Glory, by Jeffrey Archer (read by Roger Allam)

French - “38 Years Old”

“They mostly came from towns with long French names…”

That line is the only reason I chose this song for this category. Another solid choice would be "Born in the Water".

1. 1967, le Québec entre deux mondes, by Jean Rey
2. Le Roi de fer, by Maurice Druon
3. La Reine étranglée, by Maurice Druon

Rereads -- Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)

"Courage, my word / It didn't come, it doesn't matter"

Hugh MacLennan is one of my favourite authors, and The Watch That Ends the Night is one of my favourite books -- that book inspired this song.

1. Ape and Essence, by Aldous Huxley
2. Our Man in Havana, by Graham Greene
3. The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Orczy
4. Vampires of Ottawa, by Eric Wilson
5. The Thick of It: The Missing DoSAC Files, by Armando Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Tony Roche and Ian Martin
6. Microserfs, by Douglas Coupland

Possibilities
L'Armée furieuse, by Fred Vargas
Our Man in Havana, by Graham Greene

Group reads/CATs -- "We'll Go, Too"

"What can you do / They've all gone / We'll go too"

You want to take a trip down this reading path? We'll go too.

Group reads

La Reine Margot
Wolf Hall

CATs

2020 GeoCAT
January: Paths of Glory, by Jeffrey Archer (set in the Himalayas) -- I have the audio narrated by Roger Allam!
✔ February: Cop Killer, by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö (Sweden)
✔ March: Africa I / Middle East: Murder in Mesopotamia
April: Oz/NZ/Oceania: A Town Like Alice, by Nevil Shute
✔ May: Any place you would like to visit!: Here Be Dragons, by Sharon Kay Penman (Wales -- I've visited there but want to go back)
June: Space: The Final Frontier: A Doctor Who novel, most probably
✔ July: Our Man in Havana (Cuba) -- this will be a re-read
✔ August: Asia II: North Korea Journal, by Michael Palin
✔ September: Polar & Tundra Regions Isvik, by Hammond Innes
✔ October: Gold for Prince Charlie, by Nigel Tranter (Scotland, Rob Roy MacGregor trilogy #3)
November: Africa II All countries excluding those from March: nothing yet
December: Catch up month or read another one from your favorite CATegory!: I'll fill this with whatever I read in December.

2020 Non-fiction CAT
January - Journalism and News -
✔ February - Travel - Winter Studies and Summer Rambles, by Anna Brownell Jameson
March - Biography - Mike
✔ April - Law and Order - 18 Tiny Deaths, by Bruce Goldfarb
✔ May - Science - Space Chronicles, by Neil deGrasse Tyson
June - Society - The Inconvenient Indian, by Thomas King
✔ July - Human Science - The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain As Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness, and Recovery, by Sam Kean
August - History - Blitzkrieg: The Rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk, by Len Deighton
September - Religion and philosophy -
October - The Arts - Tune In (All These Years) / Inside Conducting
✔ November - Food, Home and Recreation - Chop Suey Nation: The Legion Cafe and Other Stories from Canada’s Chinese Restaurants, by Ann Hui
December - Adventures by Land, Sea or Air - Cruising Attitude

2020 RandomCAT
✔ January - New Year's resolution - something that challenges or intimidates you - Solomon Gursky Was Here, by Mordecai Richler
✔ February - Leap into a new year - book published in a leap year - The Tiger in the Smoke, by Margery Allingham (published 1952)
✔ March - Seasons of Love - season in the title - Winter Studies and Summer Rambles, by Anna Brownell Jameson
✔ April - Showers and Flowers - title has to do with rainshowers or flowers - The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Orczy
✔ May - Believe in your shelf - one of the oldest books on your shelf - Beware of the Trains, by Edmund Crispin
June - Take to the Sea! - a book with a sea-related title or plot - Sea Fever: The True Adventures that Inspired our Greatest Maritime Authors, from Conrad to Masefield, Melville and Hemingway, by Sam Jefferson
July - Picture This! - a book with illustrations or pictures as its primary focus - This is the World, by Miroslav Sasek
August - Get your groove on - a book about music - This Is Your Brain on Music, by Daniel J. Levitin
September
October
November
December

Aviation — “700 Ft. Ceiling”

“And I hate that for, for the things I'm thinking / When the clouds are low, 700 and sinking”

I hadn't intended to have an aviation category, but when this song came up on my iPod recently, it clinched my decision to go with this theme over another I'd been considering.

1. The Last Nine Minutes: The Story of Flight 391, by Moira Johnston
2. Flying Beyond: The Canadian Commercial Pilot Textbook, by Chris Hobbs
3. Airline Maps: A Century of Art and Design, by Mark Ovenden and Maxwell Roberts
4. Airport, by Arthur Hailey
5. Jet Age: The Comet, the 707, and the Race to Shrink the World, by Sam Howe Verhovek
6. ATA Girl, by Gemma Page, Victoria Saxton, Helen Goldwyn, and Jane Slavin (Big Finish audio drama)
7. Piece of Cake, by Derek Robinson (Overdrive)
8. The Women with Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II, by Katherine Sharp Landdeck (Overdrive)

Possibilities
ATA Girl (Big Finish audio drama)
Cruising Attitude: Tales of Crashpads, Crew Drama, and Crazy Passengers at 35,000 Feet, by Heather Poole
Ted Scott Flying Stories
Airport, by Arthur Hailey

Nautical books -- "Nautical Disaster"

"Now I was in a lifeboat designed for ten, and ten only…”

This song was inspired by the sinking of the Bismarck during WW2.

1. Gold from Crete, by C. S. Forester
2. Strike North, by William Howard Baker
3. Isvik, by Hammond Innes
4. The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919, by Dan Van der Vat
5. The Captain, by Jan de Hartog

Possibilities
Strike North, by William Howard Baker
Gold from Crete, by C.S. Forester

Starting this thread with an homage to my aviation category: a 2007 or 2008-ish documentary about the de Havilland Beaver called "The Immortal Beaver". It's about 45 minutes long but worth your time. Includes interviews with keen pilot Harrison Ford :)

https://youtu.be/b2hZe9ToaEI

Happy new thread, RP!

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread!

Happy New Thread!

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread! You're doing well with your Bingo card!

>14 DeltaQueen50: >15 thornton37814: >16 VivienneR: >17 dudes22: >18 leslie.98: >19 Tess_W: >20 MissWatson: Thank you all for the new-thread wishes! And yes, the Bingo card is coming along nicely :)

****

We've been officially asked to telework as much as humanly possible. The actual telework isn't bad, especially now that I have a way to plug one of my home monitors into the laptop, but the challenge is keeping in contact with friends and being disciplined about going out for a walk every day. The walk ends up being a half-run because I'm constantly trotting back and forth across the neighbourhood streets to avoid being on the same side of the street as another walker :-/ Keeping in touch with friends is going well so far. A few group chats and texts have been pinging away merrily today as people check in.

I also have a feeling that I'll get a lot of history read. This book may be the first of many.

Four Queens: The Provençal Sisters Who Ruled Europe, by Nancy Goldstone
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: library
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179151161

I liked this pretty well, but preferred Daughters of the Winter Queen. I think because this was an earlier book, it's not quite as polished as Goldstone's later work. Still, a solid read.

>21 rabbitprincess: I have put both those books on my list - I love history reading.

Hi RP, stopping by to visit your shiny new thread. I might have to look out for some of Goldstone's books to try, I always feel like I don't have enough historical fiction options.

Happy new thread!
Mike went to hike our local mountain trail this morning and found that everyone had the same idea. He basically had to walk in a single file line around the nature preserve.

>22 JayneCM: Enjoy!

>23 SouthernKiwi: I have a small stack of history books that never seem to get read, and this will probably end up being that time.

>24 mstrust: Yikes! I would have probably turned around and gone home :-/

Happy new thread!

>25 rabbitprincess: I would have probably turned around and gone home :-/
Me too, but Mike prefers to feel put upon and grumble under his breath, ha ;-)

Good for you for maintaining social distancing! We left our vacation early (we ended up spending only with the family we'd gone with, keeping away from everyone else and ordering groceries delivered) and on the drive home, the part along the I-95 every second car had Canadian plates as the Snowbirds raced home before the border closed.

>26 LisaMorr: Thanks, Lisa!

>27 mstrust: And especially if he already made the effort to go out, I can see him going through with it. Meanwhile, today I went out for a brief walk and someone else was about to walk past my apartment, so I literally fled back inside and shut the door until I'd heard them pass.

>28 RidgewayGirl: My dad's cousin and her husband were still in Florida at the beginning of this week... I am hoping they are on their way home today! Airlines are starting to ground themselves completely, as well.

I'm escaping Earth by visiting other worlds.

Twelve Angels Weeping, by Dave Rudden
Category: The Depression Suite
Source: library
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179286362

This is a good collection of short stories. The conceit is that they are spooky stories to tell at the holidays, each featuring a different villain of Doctor Who. I think it's just a good collection. I particularly enjoyed "Grey Matter", "Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir", and "A Soldier's Education," although all of the stories had their good points.

>21 rabbitprincess: Happy new thread! Glad to hear that you are doing your best to stay healthy and safe. An unfortunate consequence of this crisis is that the conference I was going to attend in June will likely be cancelled (though they've not made an official announcement yet). I'll have to plan a trip to Ottawa later on, when things are back to normal, so that we can meet up!

>31 mathgirl40: Yes, here's hoping that things go back to normal someday!! I was going to be attending a conference in Montreal in June, but hadn't booked anything yet and am reluctant to do so in case it gets cancelled.

Happy new thread and good luck with keeping your distances when you go out! Here in Paris I also find that people do not try as much as I would like to stay away from each other. Luckily there are almost no cars so it's almost always possible to walk in the middle of the road if the sidewalks are occupied! :)

>33 chlorine: Wow, Paris without cars! It is kind of fun to walk in the middle of the road, isn't it -- I love when there are street festivals downtown and normally busy streets are closed to car traffic. Stay healthy and safe!

****

A quiet weekend, surprise surprise. I'm de facto participating in the #StayHome24in48 readathon, just because reading is all I'm doing, but I didn't officially sign up. With readathons, as soon as I hit Start on the stopwatch, I want to be doing something else.

So this was my achievement yesterday:

Le Roi de fer, by Maurice Druon
Category: 38 Years Old, Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: Rockcliffe Park book sale
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/174965863

I really enjoyed this historical fiction book. For Game of Thrones fans, GRRM has said that this series is the original GoT, although this volume doesn't contain dragons or Starbucks cups ;) And although I know a lot about English/Scottish/Irish history, my French history is not up to the same level, so I learned a lot from this book. It also followed on nicely from Four Queens, by Nancy Goldstone, and even The Templars, by Dan Jones. Now I have to figure out a way to get a hold of volumes 2, 3, and 4 so that I can keep reading the series.

>34 rabbitprincess: Ended up ordering the books I need from this series online from my local indie to support them at this time. And bonus, the order JUST qualified for free shipping (by 85 cents before tax).

I made an order from my local independent yesterday. Got to keep the lights on!
That's the same reason I don't join Readathons, I know something would come up and make me into a liar.

>34 rabbitprincess: Yes, walking in the middle of the street is fun in general, but the atmosphere now is a bit creepy and I kind of feel like I'm in a science fiction movie. :p

I never participated to a readathon but they sound fun! I don't know if I would be able to focus for so long though...

I _adore_ Le roi de fer and I'm so glad you liked it! I found the other books in the series as good (except the last one) so it's good that you were able to order them because you should enjoy them! I hope your post service keeps running until you get them - it has now stopped here.

>36 mstrust: Yes, indeed! If this were a normal Sunday I would have gone downtown and bought the books immediately.

>37 chlorine: The other readers I follow on these things have a lot of strategies for maintaining focus. Some recommend reading a lot of short books, switching up formats every now and again, and definitely taking breaks!

Good to be forewarned about the last volume in the series. So far the mail is still running. In fact, we just got some mail a few minutes ago! I imagine this is like Christmas in terms of workload for the mail carriers, what with everyone ordering stuff online, so they're probably working overtime. I hope the mail carriers are staying safe.

****

Time once again for Doctor Who Sunday!

Doctor Third, by Adam Hargreaves
Category: Poets
Source: CloudLibrary
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/180320536

An impulse borrow via CloudLibrary. The layout didn't work that great as an ebook, and I had to switch from night mode to day mode to be able to read the text. The story was OK.

The Day She Saved the Doctor, by Jacqueline Rayner, Jenny T. Colgan, Susan Calman, and Dorothy Koomson
Category: The Depression Suite
Source: library
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179383282

A collection of four stories featuring female companions saving the day. My favourite was the Twelve and Bill story, because Bill is awesome, but I also liked that Susan Calman contributed a story, because Susan is awesome.

>34 rabbitprincess: >37 chlorine: Ooh, I have this book in English. Really must make time for it!

>34 rabbitprincess: I loved The Iron King and have books 2 and 3 just waiting! I know more about modern French history, so it was all new to me!

>40 Tess_W: I feel like I should know some French history, being French, but that's really not a strong point with me so most of the content was new to me but it greatly help me put events I a general perspective and understand the 100 year war.
My favorite French king is now Philippe the fifth and now you have to read the books to learn why! :)

>39 NinieB: Now is the perfect time for it, or at least that's what I found!

>40 Tess_W: Glad you liked it as well! Even my modern French history is a bit sketchy... I know more about older French history only where it intersects with UK (and its constituent parts') history.

>41 chlorine: I will be very glad to get a better understanding of the Hundred Years War! Looking forward to finding out why Philip V is your favourite :)

>34 rabbitprincess: >40 Tess_W: I heard about this series from Tess and have it on my to buy list (along with a million others!) It looks fascinating and I always love historical fiction written a while ago more than the more modern offerings.

>43 JayneCM: Sometimes you can't beat the older novelists! Nigel Tranter is tops in my books for Scottish history. His trilogy about Robert the Bruce in particular can't be beat. I was trying to read a new trilogy about the Bruce recently and just couldn't get into it.

****

I'm picking at a whole bunch of different books, so I haven't finished much this week. But today I hope to settle in and finish off my first audiobook of the year! I have so many choices on my list this year and am getting a bt backlogged, because I listen to only one audio at a time.

Wives and Daughters, by Elizabeth Gaskell
Category: If New Orleans is Beat
Source: Serial Reader
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/177004065

I started reading this at the end of December and only just finished it now, because it was 95 issues on Serial Reader. I ended up bingeing the last 14 or 15 installments on Wednesday because I HAD to know what happened. Going to read Cranford sooner rather than later!

Gun Before Butter, by Nicolas Freeling
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: borrowed from parents
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/176722925

My mum has a pile of random paperback mysteries, and this is one of them. I read this partly in prep for our anticipated trip to the Netherlands, and partly because Van der Valk is coming to TV this summer! Not sure if the trip is happening (we'd intended to go in the fall), but the TV series should be interesting. And I quite liked this book. It felt like Maigret to me, for some reason. Anyone who's read both want to compare notes? @leslie.98 perhaps? :)

The Thompson Girl (audiobooks) category has been empty all year. Now I have two books to report for that category.

Watership Down, by Richard Adams (audio, read by Peter Capaldi)
Category: Thompson Girl
Source: iTunes
Rating: 5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/168554635

I started reading this back in October, when I had a cold and needed a comforting voice to listen to. Now it's March, I'm at home all the time and in serious friend withdrawal, and audiobooks have been one of the things I can really focus on. Peter Capaldi's narration is phenomenal: he has so many voices! I loved his Dandelion, especially: Dandelion tells stories and has a voice reminiscent of Billy Connolly, really heavy gruff Glasgow accent. It also reminds me of the granddad from Sputnik's Guide to Life on Earth. I highly recommend this audiobook if you haven't read the book yet and like audio.

Moone Boy: The Blunder Years, by Chris O’Dowd and Nick V. Murphy (audio, read by the authors)
Category: Thompson Girl
Source: iTunes
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/135203721

This could be another comfort audio read, based as it is on one of my favourite TV shows, Moone Boy. The authors read this book themselves, which is perfect. Now I want to watch the show again. If you're in Canada, you can access it via CBC Gem (first season is totally open, the other two seasons you need to sign up for a free account to access).

>44 rabbitprincess: Nigel Tranter going on my wishlist now! I also just heard about books by Sharon Kay Penman that look good. Have you read any of those?

>46 JayneCM: Yes! I've read When Christ and His Saints Slept, Time and Chance, Devil's Brood, and Lionheart. The Category Challenge did a group read of them several years ago. They are excellent. I have her Welsh princes trilogy lined up to read this year, starting with Here Be Dragons.

>44 rabbitprincess: I never thought to compare Van der Valk with Maigret but you are right - they are quite similar in feel: European, middle-aged, somewhat grouchy & happily married. I'll have to see if I can track down some Freeling in ebook format and refresh my memory!

>44 rabbitprincess: I added Nigel Tranter to my wishlist recently but I'm trying not to buy books until I reduce Mt TBR significantly.

>47 rabbitprincess: I think the Welsh series is her best - you're in for a treat! She also has a new book that just came out that begins a new series. It's waiting on my kindle for me to find a time to read it.

>48 leslie.98: I'm looking forward to hunting for more Freeling in the secondhand shelves whenever I'm allowed to browse a bookstore again!

>49 VivienneR: That's very sensible! And this is the perfect time to be reducing Mount TBR ;)

>50 japaul22: I'm really excited to dig in! I'm in line for her new one at the library but might have to buy it.

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I took today off for some much-needed rest. Slept in until almost 10! Later I'll be baking a cake, but for now I am puttering around on LT and drinking tea.

Yesterday I indulged in Doctor Who Sunday with this treat:

City of Death, by James Goss
Category: The Depression Suite
Source: BMV, Toronto
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/147110327

This was my favourite of the Goss novelization of Douglas Adams stories, and it really captures the flavour of the TV story, even though it's based more on the rehearsal scripts. I watched the TV story afterward and found it equally delightful. The pacing is a bit different from the usual Who of the era, but I found each episode just flew by.

>47 rabbitprincess: Oooh goody, I am so glad to hear they are good as, of course, they look fabulous from the blurbs.

I thought of you today - I was browsing an online secondhand book shop and saw Smithsonian Atlas of World Aviation and immediately wondered whether you had read it or not.

>52 JayneCM: I have not read that, but it looks magnificent! Thank you for thinking of me! I might have to add that to my birthday/Xmas list :)

My mum and I both love Penman's work. She ended up reading the Henry II and Eleanor books on my recommendation, and I bought the Welsh Princes trilogy but she ended up reading them first.

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Last book of March (I was about to type April!) was a good one. I really am finding that historical fiction is good for the times we're in, and the time I have.

Ships in the Bay!, by D. K. Broster
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: The Cinema Bookshop, Hay-on-Wye, Wales
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/145726258

What better place to buy a book set in Pembrokeshire than a bookstore in Wales? I couldn't resist this book with a title like that, and this appears to be the original 1931 edition. A good story that may appeal to those who like their fiction set in the aftermath of the French Revolution and leading into the Napoleonic Wars (so Poldark era, really).

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Monthly recap coming!

March recap

In March, work eased up a bit, but then we went into hibernation to halt the spread of COVID-19. So my social life has been just like February. And once again, I read 20 books:

Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada, by Anna Brownell Jameson
Murder in Mesopotamia, by Agatha Christie (CloudLibrary)
Cardiff Castle and the Marquesses of Bute, by Matthew Williams
The Book of Forgotten Authors, by Christopher Fowler
The Bastard Brigade: The True Story of the Renegade Scientists and Spies Who Sabotaged the Nazi Atomic Bomb, by Sam Kean
The Tiger in the Smoke, by Margery Allingham
Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams, by Matthew Walker
The Doctors: Time and Space Collection, by Adam Hargreaves
Strike North, by W. Howard Baker
Four Queens: The Provençal Sisters Who Ruled Europe, by Nancy Goldstone
Twelve Angels Weeping, by Dave Rudden
Le Roi de fer, by Maurice Druon
Doctor Third, by Adam Hargreaves (CloudLibrary)
The Day She Saved the Doctor, by Jacqueline Rayner, Jenny T. Colgan, Susan Calman, and Dorothy Koomson
Wives and Daughters, by Elizabeth Gaskell (Serial Reader)
Gun Before Butter, by Nicolas Freeling
Watership Down, by Richard Adams (audio, read by Peter Capaldi)
Moone Boy: The Blunder Years, by Chris O’Dowd and Nick Vincent Murphy (audio, read by the authors)
City of Death, by James Goss (from a story by David Fisher)
Ships in the Bay!, by D. K. Broster

My favourite book of the month was Peter Capaldi’s brilliant narration of Watership Down, by Richard Adams. It really helped to have that on the go as I adjusted to full-time telework and zero-time in-person socializing.

My least favourite book of the month was Strike North, by W. Howard Baker, which was thin in size and in plot.

Currently reading

The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot (Serial Reader) — I’ve found this one harder going than Wives and Daughters was, but it’s picking up again.
Effective Data Storytelling: How to Drive Change with Data, Narrative and Visuals, by Brent Dykes — This should be checking all the report-writing boxes for me, but I found the first part rather full of blah-blah. I’m into more concrete stuff now, like exactly how to craft an effective narrative and what makes visuals work, and it’s better, but not as great as I had hoped.
Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis (Serial Reader) — Just started this one recently. Right now Gopher Prairie sounds like something out of The Prairie Home Companion. Also getting Fargo vibes for some reason.
Darkstar Academy and Day of the Cockroach, by Mark Morris and Steve Lyons (audio) — This is a two-fer Doctor Who audio-exclusive box set, one of the very few the library bought in hard copy (that I immediately ripped to my computer). So far Darkstar Academy is working out better than the stories in the other two-fer of audio adventures I read a few years ago.
Here Be Dragons, by Sharon Kay Penman — Getting ready to start this soon! Really looking forward to it.

April plans

Last month my plans were to finish an audiobook. I ended up finishing two and starting a third! Thanks, reduced ability to focus on print!

This month I hope to prioritize the non-fiction that hasn’t quite made it into my reading rotation yet for whatever reason.

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And because we're already ending the first quarter of the year, here's a Pool update:



I'm at 7/33 completed, so a little under 1/4 of the way done, 1/4 of the way through the year. I'm already not ranking my chances very highly, especially because The Odyssey is one of my books! That's going to be a big one.

I've decided to go ahead and declare a book finished.

Effective Data Storytelling, by Brent Dykes
Category: Wheat Kings
Source: library
Rating: 2.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179383205

Almost liked it, but not quite. Could also be more on me at the moment than the book. I think I'm just cognitively oversaturated, what with not being able to go anywhere but still being expected to put in my full hours of work because my job can be done totally remotely.

>44 rabbitprincess: On Elizabeth Gaskell, I don't think I've read Wives and Daughters. But having read Mary Barton, Ruth, and some Gaskell short stories, as well as Cranford, Cranford is very different from the novels and some of the short stories.

On Nicolas Freeling, I agree that (based on a very limited sample) Freeling and Simenon have a similar feel.

>56 NinieB: Good to know that Cranford is different from the novels! I also have Mary Barton on the list of her books I want to check out.

Also glad to know that assessment of Freeling and Simenon is shared :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Just catching up and saying hello.

Hi, RB. I agree with most others, Cranford is different from her other novels, probably more "folksy," but I like all of them!

>58 hailelib: Hello! Thanks for stopping by :) Hope you're doing well!

>59 Tess_W: I'm most intrigued to see just how different it is!

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After going on a run of historical fiction, mysteries are hitting the spot lately. So here's the first of the month.

Cop Killer, by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö (translated by Thomas Teal)
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car, We’ll Go Too (February GeoCAT)
Source: Christmas gift
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/81147923

I have only one installment of this series left to read! Wow. Also, I got this for Christmas 2011 and am only just reading it now...

>60 rabbitprincess: "I got this for Christmas 2011 and am only just reading it now..."

Your category "Locked in the trunk of a car" must have been literal for this book!

>61 VivienneR: Haha! It was more blocked up at the back of a bookshelf ;)

A couple more books to add to the total this weekend.

Our Man in Havana, by Graham Greene
Category: Courage (for Hugh MacLennan); We’ll Go Too (July GeoCAT)
Source: OPL book sale
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/work/7175/reviews/116422819

I set this aside for the July GeoCAT, which is taking in the Caribbean. It's also a re-read for me that I enjoyed a lot more now that I have more knowledge of the espionage efforts in the Second World War (particularly thanks to Ben Macintyre's Double Cross and J. C. Masterman's The Double Cross System).

Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 5: The Twist, written by George Mann and illustrated by Mariano Laclaustra and Rachael Stott
Category: The Depression Suite, Poets
Source: Humble Bundle
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179425675

This was a good-but-not-great collection. I prefer Robbie Morrison's writing, and I didn't feel like the art really resembled Twelve enough. But the idea of a rock concert is fabulous and very much in keeping with Twelve's interests, and Hattie made a cool travelling companion.

Doctor Who: Darkstar Academy & Day of the Cockroach, by Mark Morris and Steve Lyons (audio, read by Alexander Armstrong and Arthur Darvill)
Category: The Depression Suite, Thompson Girl
Source: AudioGO CDs
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/100241547

Third audiobook of the year! I am finding that audio is sometimes easier for me to focus on.

Do I want to know the plot of a book called Day of the Cockroach? I don't think I do ;-D.

>65 mstrust: It riffs on the idea that cockroaches will be the sole survivors of a nuclear war.

Hi RP, glad to see that you are adjusting to the full-time teleworking. Great comments re: Wives and Daughters. Any book where you have to push through the installments because you have to know what happens, is a good selling point. BB taken.

>67 lkernagh: Excellent, hope you like it!

Starting the long weekend with a book I meant to read last year, and which every Canadian needs to read.

Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City, by Tanya Talaga
Category: Wheat Kings
Source: Chaptigo
Rating: 5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/164589583

This is a heartbreaking and harrowing read, but needs to be read, and action needs to come from it.

This long weekend has been pretty productive on the reading front: a random treat and an abandoned book (that was at least in the Pool).

Doctor Fifth, by Adam Hargreaves
Category: Poets
Source: CloudLibrary
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/181382264

I borrowed this from CloudLibrary for fun and read it to myself. It was a hoot! One of my favourites.

Isvik, by Hammond Innes
Category: Nautical Disaster, We’ll Go Too (September GeoCAT - polar regions)
Source: library book sale
Rating: 1/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/125283063

This book took forever to get going, had some dubious rendering of Scottish accents in print, and gave the one female character a role that was frankly icky. So out it goes. I never did get to the Antarctica bit of the book :-/

Have a Happy Easter!

>71 mstrust: Thanks, Jennifer, and the same to you! I am sadly lacking in Easter candy, so I'll have to make do with jelly babies.

I ended up getting sucked into a jigsaw-puzzle rabbit hole last night and blasted through my latest audiobook.

ATA Girl, by Gemma Page, Victoria Saxton, Helen Goldwyn, and Jane Slavin
Category: Thompson Girl, 700 Ft. Ceiling
Source: Big Finish
Rating: 4.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/168247411

This box set by Big Finish (most well known for its Doctor Who audio dramas) tells the stories of the women (and men) who made up the Air Transport Auxiliary during the Second World War, ferrying planes from factories to the front. I love stories of women doing awesome things, military history, and planes, so this set ticked a lot of boxes for me.

>70 rabbitprincess: Regarding Isvik, thanks for taking one for the team! I've always found Innes to be hit or miss. In this case he's obviously missed.

>74 VivienneR: I could have forgiven a slow start and maybe even the dubious accents, but the way the one female character was portrayed was really not cool.

I have five more of his books on my shelves: Atlantic Fury, Air Bridge, The Wreck of the Mary Deare, The Trojan Horse, and The Killer Mine. We'll see how those fare.

Yesterday I indulged in a re-read, which also happened to be one of many "going through the stacks" books -- books I'd first read pre-LT and never properly reviewed.

The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Orczy
Category: Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)
Going Through the Stacks #81
Source: a long-ago Christmas or birthday gift, probably
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/71328452

This was interesting to re-read after reading A Place of Greater Safety and the Poldark books, which overlap this time period to at least some extent. I had to work quite hard to shut my brain up on this re-read, because I knew who the Scarlet Pimpernel was and could predict other things, and for that reason I'm not sure how well it actually held up as a re-read. For a first-time read, though, I imagine it would be a fun bit of melodrama.

>69 rabbitprincess: There was a podcast on the subject of racism in Thunder Bay that I listened to recently. It was a difficult listening experience.

>73 rabbitprincess: Jigsaw puzzles & audiobooks are great together!

>77 RidgewayGirl: That would be even more difficult to listen to those experiences being told, rather than just reading them in print.

>78 leslie.98: Especially when the puzzles are digital, so they don't take up space and are easy to clean up afterward! Ravensburger has an app for iOS and Android, so I downloaded it to my iPad.

>73 rabbitprincess: ATA Girl sounds like something I'd enjoy. Not that I need more audio backlog to listen to right now...

It's been a while since I've done a jigsaw puzzle. I used to sit on the floor but my back's not quite up to that now. I should get one of those roll-up puzzle mats so I can use the big table. I tried digital ones once or twice but never could get into them, though the apps may be better now... it's been a while for those too.

>78 leslie.98: LOL--I'm unable to put a puzzle together and listen at the same time. If I try to listen whilst putting a puzzle together, I don't "listen."

>81 Tess_W: Ah, I find that with word puzzles (crosswords, word jumbles, etc) but not with visual puzzles such as jigsaws or color by number.

>80 antqueen: My mom had a mat-like thing for puzzles that worked pretty well. I don't know if it rolled up though! She would use it to transfer the puzzle from the dining room table to the living room coffee table during meal times and then back again.

>80 antqueen: I'm finding that sometimes audio does the trick for me more than printing these days! My ability to focus is taking a beating.

A puzzle mat is a great idea! We'd need one here, because we have only one table that can really be used for puzzling.

>81 Tess_W: I'm like that with knitting and television -- I can't knit if the show I'm watching has any of my favourite actors, because otherwise I get distracted and make mistakes.

>82 leslie.98: I think word puzzles would be more of a challenge for me, but I haven't tried in a while. And it might depend on the book.

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Finally went back to a library book. Our libraries are closed until June 30, so it's not as though there's a big hurry, but I feel like June will be here before we know it.

18 Tiny Deaths: The Untold Story of Frances Glessner Lee and the Invention of Modern Forensics, by Bruce Goldfarb
Category: Wheat Kings
Source: library
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179540947

This came to my attention via Judy Melinek, who wrote the introduction. An interesting look at one of the champions of forensic science, who really helped build it from scratch.

I read about Frances Glessner Lee in Savage Appetites. She was an interesting woman.

>83 rabbitprincess: - What would I do every year without you to give me suggestions for books for the hubby for his birthdays and Christmas? I think this will go on the list too. (and I could read it too. win-win.)

>84 RidgewayGirl: She was! I like how she just went ahead and did things.

>85 dudes22: Excellent, glad to oblige! I like those gifts that would also benefit the gift-giver; that's how I pick books to buy for my mum.

****

Finally finished off a Serial Read I've had on the go since January!

The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot
Category: If New Orleans is Beat
Source: Serial Reader
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/178028533

This was my first Eliot, and I thought it was good. Compelling characters, for sure. There were some narrative-observation bits that I skimmed over, but I ended up bingeing the last three installments today to see how it ended.

>86 rabbitprincess: Eliot is one of my top 5 favorite authors! I only have 2 more works and I think I will have read all the novels she wrote.

>87 Tess_W: I'm looking forward to reading more by her!

Starting the work week off right with some reviews from the weekend.

Here Be Dragons, by Sharon Kay Penman
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen, We’ll Go Too (May GeoCAT — a place you want to visit, in this case Wales)
Source: Chaptigo
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/139133248

Very happy to check off another historical fiction book on my list. Also interesting to mentally compare this with the Brothers of Gwynedd quartet by Edith Pargeter, which I seem to recall deals with Llywelyn's grandson.

An English Murder, by Cyril Hare
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179637299

A solid Golden Age mystery that I read in a single sitting. Just what I needed!

>89 rabbitprincess: Glad to read that you tore through and enjoyed An English Murder as I have it waiting patiently on my Kindle.

>89 rabbitprincess: I also enjoyed An English Murder. Elderly detective novels are a good choice at the moment.

While I liked The Mill on the Floss, my favourite George Eliot is Middlemarch.

>90 DeltaQueen50: It is a good one, and a great cover, reminiscent of the British Library Crime Classics but not actually of that imprint (my edition was published by Faber & Faber).

>91 pamelad: I've been alternating between big fat historical fiction and sprees of crime novels. My attention span has gone a bit weird.

I'm definitely going to have to read Middlemarch next of Eliot's work.

Creaking along to the end of another week. I'm feeling another reading slump coming, so I am going to break it with some short, pointless reads.

In the meantime, I have a couple of books to report.

Piece of Cake, by Derek Robinson
Category: 700 Ft. Ceiling
Source: library, via OverDrive
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/181511890

Normally WW2 and planes would be up my alley. But after reading the excellent ATA Girl, I had far less tolerance for the chauvinism and obnoxiousness of the men of Hornet Squadron, and declared this book unfinished.

The Diary of River Song, Series 4 (full-cast audio drama box set)
Category: Thompson Girl
Source: Big Finish
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/172785268

Another book off the Pool list. I liked the last story in the set best; it's also the only one in the set to feature Tom Baker, FYI. Now to figure out what to listen to next.

Short, pointless read achieved.

Vampires of Ottawa, by Eric Wilson
Category: Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)
Source: Rockcliffe Park book fair
Rating: 3/5 (rated by Past Me)
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/135780488

I read this in half an hour. It was what I needed to break my lethargy, at least for today. I read it about 20 years ago and didn't remember much about it. But reading it now that I've lived in Ottawa for 15 years is pretty funny.

You read this in half an hour! You must have superhuman reading power, good for you!
I'm glad you found something that fitted your mood.

>95 chlorine: It was only about 100, maybe 150 pages, so not super long. And there were illustrations, which helped ;)

I'm not going to get anything else finished today, so here's the April recap.

The pandemic continues, and full-time telework with no social respite takes its toll. A slight dip in my reading, with 17 books.

Effective Data Storytelling, by Brent Dykes
Cop Killer, by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö (translated by Thomas Teal)
Our Man in Havana, by Graham Greene (re-read)
Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor Vol. 5: The Twist, written by George Mann and illustrated by Mariano Laclaustra and Rachael Stott (ebook)
Doctor Who: Darkstar Academy & Day of the Cockroach, by Mark Morris and Steve Lyons (audio, read by Alexander Armstrong and Arthur Darvill)
Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City, by Tanya Talaga
Doctor Fifth, by Adam Hargreaves (CloudLibrary)
Isvik, by Hammond Innes (abandoned)
ATA Girl, by Gemma Page, Victoria Saxton, Helen Goldwyn, and Jane Slavin (Big Finish audio drama)
The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Orczy (re-read)
18 Tiny Deaths: The Untold Story of Frances Glessner Lee and the Invention of Modern Forensics, by Bruce Goldfarb
The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot (Serial Reader)
Here Be Dragons, by Sharon Kay Penman
An English Murder, by Cyril Hare
Piece of Cake, by Derek Robinson (abandoned)
The Diary of River Song, Series 4 , by Emma Reeves, Matt Fitton, Donald McLeary, and John Dorney (Big Finish audio drama)
Vampires of Ottawa, by Eric Wilson (reread)

The best book of the month was Seven Fallen Feathers. I cannot express how important this book is.

My least favourite book of the month was Isvik, which took way too long to get to Antarctica and had only one female character, whose role was terrible.

Currently reading

Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis (Serial Reader) — Chipping away at this.
The Merry Heart: Selections 1980-1995, by Robertson Davies — A collection of speeches, essays and articles by Robertson Davies, mainly on the subject of literature. He seems a lot grumpier in this collection than he did in Happy Alchemy, his book about the theatre.
The Coral Island, by R. M. Ballantyne (Serial Reader) — Apparently the inspiration for The Lord of the Flies. I like this much better.
La Reine étranglée, by Maurice Druon — These go surprisingly fast for me, when I read in French. It helps that they are maybe 250 pages or so.
The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919, by Dan Van der Vat — Borrowed this from the in-laws pre-pandemic. The actual historical concept is interesting but the author does have some annoyingly old-fashioned writing, such as referring to “Man’s” achievements :-/

May plans

Last month my plans were to prioritize the non-fiction that hasn’t quite made it into my reading rotation yet for whatever reason. Those were Seven Fallen Feathers, which I read, and The Grand Scuttle, which is in progress. So a success on my part.

This month I have ambitions to read at least half of the books on my on-deck pile before adding more to it. Given that I have a lot of historical fiction on the pile, this may be a tall order.

>97 rabbitprincess: Maurice Druon is one of my favorite historical fiction writers. I need to read book #3 in that series.

I'll be interested in The Grand Scuttle - maybe another gift for hubby??

>98 Tess_W: Hoping to get there soon as well!

>99 dudes22: Perhaps! I am having a hard time with it, but maybe it's just the headspace I'm in. I have vacation coming up so might be more ready to tackle it then.

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Managed to knock out two books today.

The Travelling Cat Chronicles, by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Philip Gabriel
Category: If New Orleans is Beat
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/181354528

I was feeling restless and unable to focus on anything I had on the go, and this library ebook was due back in a week, so I figured I might as well read it. I ended up zipping through it in a couple of hours this afternoon. It is a gentle, not terribly demanding read, and I appreciated it for that reason.

The Merry Heart: Selections 1980–1995, by Robertson Davies
Category: Poets
Source: Great Glebe Garage Sale
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/141824795

I've been working on this one for the past few weeks. As an essay collection it is easy to graze on periodically rather than reading straight through. I agree with my comment in >97 rabbitprincess: that this collection seems grumpier in places than Happy Alchemy. It's still worth checking out though, especially for his thoughts on specific books, the writing process, and the stage adaptation of his novel World of Wonders. Also, now I need an omnibus edition of the Deptford trilogy, which I have not read! (I have an omnibus edition of the Cornish trilogy and would like to collect the other trilogies in that format.)

I'm off for a week as of today! Woo hoo! Lots of reading and watching television is in my future. Starting it off by getting a review done.

Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier, by Neil deGrasse Tyson
Category: Poets, We'll Go Too (May NonFictionCAT)
Source: part of my BF’s collection, so basically mine, especially because he doesn’t remember owning it
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/84889665

This is a collection of essays that works better for dipping into and out of rather than reading straight through, as I did, although the chapters are so short that it is hard to put the book down.

Knocking out two books in two days.

When Days Are Long: Nurse in the North, by Amy Wilson
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: library
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179541183

I found this highly readable and interesting, although also sad because substandard health care is still a problem for many Northern and Indigenous communities.

Doctor Who and the War Games, by Malcolm Hulke
Category: The Depression Suite
Source: By the Lake Books, Burlington, ON
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/149484093

I read this in an afternoon. It is the novelization of the Second Doctor's last TV story. It rattles along well.

>101 rabbitprincess: Enjoy your time off even though it will be spent at home!

>103 VivienneR: Thanks, Vivienne! It is nice just to not work for a little bit. Because my work can be done totally from home, it is more like "normal", but without social events or outside-the-home distractions it is very easy for work thoughts to be all-consuming.

I had a detour from reading to television this week. I'm attending a virtual pub quiz this afternoon (hosted by Peter Capaldi!!!!!!) that will feature Doctor Who and The Thick of It content, so I had to swot up. I went back to the beginning of the Peter Capaldi years on Doctor Who, watched up to and including the first half of season 3 of The Thick of It, and read this book.

The Thick of It: The Missing DoSAC Files, by Armando Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Tony Roche and Ian Martin
Category: Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)
Source: Book Depository
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/work/10605444/reviews/148650809

Still found this funny, and still found the Photoshopping a bit cheesy (especially of Malcolm Tucker's chat show; he was Photoshopped to be sitting behind a desk but did not appear to have legs...?)

For the rest of the morning I'll probably page through Doctor Who: The Vault. I expect to do terribly on this pub quiz because I am playing by myself, but it will be fun.

>105 rabbitprincess: Wow! Wishing you success!

>105 rabbitprincess: Oh, that sounds awesome, especially that Peter Capaldi is hosting! Hope it's fun!

>106 MissWatson: As predicted, I did terribly on two rounds (especially anything to do with current affairs, because I have drastically reduced my consumption of news) but I did reasonably well on the other three rounds. I actually think the Thick of It round might have been my best round. It was a lot of fun though. And whoever is marking the answers is going to be very amused by my wild guesses.

>107 Jackie_K: It was awesome! I wore my Twelfth Doctor costume -- two events where I might have worn it have been cancelled, so when else would I have been able to wear it? After the quiz, Peter answered a few questions from lucky fans, and that was fun! I loved how excited they would get when they realized that he was talking directly to them :D

The virtual pub quiz sounds like great fun!

>109 lkernagh: It was a lot of fun, although I am definitely "out of shape" if one can refer to trivia in such terms! I found out that the local pub quiz league has been able to shift its operations to a virtual environment, so I've arranged to join a friend's team this week :)

After spending most of last week bingeing TV, I'm back into reading. Also still on vacation. Back to work Wednesday.

The Stone Angel, by Margaret Laurence
Category: When New Orleans Is Beat
Source: Great Glebe Garage Sale book sale
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/130510979

Apparently I intended to read this back in 2017 (it was in my Pool), but I didn't get around to it then. Now I have, and it was good, although a bit heavier than I have been reading lately; the description feels weightier and more ponderous, if that makes sense. But a timely book too, in a way; the theme of how to look after our elderly population while maintaining their independence is still all too relevant.

>111 rabbitprincess: - I see that I took a book bullet for that last year, but, of course, haven't gotten to it yet. Apparently, it's part of a series based on a fictionalized town in Canada rather than a series based on characters. I'll get to it eventually.

>112 dudes22: The other Laurence book I have, The Diviners, is supposedly the last book in the series. Knowing my penchant for reading series out of order, I will probably read it before the others :)

I haven't heard anything about this as a series, but I suspect it's not a series in the usual sense. So I suspect that won't matter.

>114 dudes22: That's a relief!

****

It's been a slow week. Haven't had much interest in reading since I resumed working on Wednesday. Two of these three books I read while still on vacation, and the other is one I've just abandoned.

Beware of the Trains, by Edmund Crispin
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car, We’ll Go Too (May RandomCAT)
Source: library book sale
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/70473716

A solid collection of short stories in the Golden Age tradition.

French Exit, by Patrick deWitt
Category: When New Orleans is Beat
Source: library
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179138984

A quick read, more pathos than humour.

The End of the Line, by Stephen Legault
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/182457270

I liked the setting and protagonist, but stopped reading and couldn't be bothered to finish.

Congratulations on your virtual pub quiz. Sounds like a lot of fun. And hosted by Peter Capaldi! What more could you ask for?

I found a quiz on (I think) the Guardian's website and was so happy with the results that I rushed right in to another one. Of course the second one had a completely embarrassing result.

>116 VivienneR: It was a lot of fun! Not an opportunity that would come about very often.

>111 rabbitprincess: Indeed, the subject of taking care of our elderly is relevant these days. I'd reread The Stone Angel a couple of years ago and I'd been meaning to read/reread more from the Manawaka cycle.

I'm sad to think that, if COVID-19 hadn't hit, I would have been on my way to Ottawa in a couple of weeks. I will make that trip one day and we'll finally be able to have our LT reunion!

>118 mathgirl40: I'm going to have to move The Diviners up the TBR pile!

This just gives us more time to plan the next one! Maybe if the stars line up right, we'll be able to have @paruline and @mysterymax there as well :)

>119 rabbitprincess: Definitely! I'd love to meet more LT members in person.

>120 mathgirl40: Yay!

****

In another, less pandemic-y universe, I would probably be out at the Great Glebe Garage Sale with a friend, then having lunch somewhere with all of our purchases. In this universe, I will be seeing her today to trade books for masks (also a skirt she fixed for me). Not quite the same but it will be nice to see her in person for the first time since... February??

I haven't had a great reading week. No attention span. I have one bail and one actual finished book to my credit.

Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis
Category: If New Orleans Is Beat
Source: Serial Reader
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/180617828

The people in this book are a kind of annoying that I have no patience for right now, even in installments.

A Rising Man, by Abir Mukherjee
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: library
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179541112

A good debut to a series set in a part of the world that I haven't read much about. Will continue with the series.

Managed to finally finish another book that should not have taken nearly as long as it did.

La Reine étranglée, by Maurice Druon
Category: 38 Years Old, Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: Librairie du Soleil
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/180496406

I think if I'd had a less laggy brain, this would have been more of a 4. As it was, I found it harder going than the first one, but the end was chilling, and I liked how the very last scene propels the action toward the next book without necessarily being a cliffhanger. Very well done.

Popping in to say hi, and sorry you missed hanging out with your friend. We tried to do some book shopping today as our bookstore said they were open on their website, but we drove there and they had a little paper sign in the window that said they were closed today because of staffing issues. Dang!

>123 mstrust: Dang indeed! That would be disappointing to go out there and find it's closed.

It was gorgeous weather yesterday, too, which made it even more regrettable that we weren't out admiring china teacups, poking through secondhand books, and getting nostalgic when seeing the toys up for sale. (We went to a "vintage and collectibles" sale at Lansdowne Park last year and spent most of our time waxing nostalgic over the Fisher-Price toys and being astounded that they would be worth as much as they were.)

Popping in to say hello! I hear you about the disappointed plans. In May in ATL it is THE time to go on yard sale adventures. I miss being able to get a bunch of $1's at the bank then go up and down streets, seeing what treasures there are.

Glad you are reading what you can and abandoning what you have no time for, and what a cool pub quiz adventure. Peter Capaldi and everything!

>125 threadnsong: Hello! Thanks for stopping by! Yard sales are such fun. I might start a personal challenge to read as many books as possible that I bought at previous editions of this sale.

The pub quiz was a lot of fun, and something I would not likely have been able to go to in pre-pandemic times, so I'm glad the technology existed to make it possible.

We're having a heat wave, which has slowed down my reading and reviewing. Trying to help the reading by stocking up on crime fiction.

A Matter of Malice, by Thomas King
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/183270888

This was the first book I read in the DreadfulWater series, about a former cop turned photographer who lives in the western US, but I will be going back to the beginning!

>127 rabbitprincess: I have the first book in the series and want to get to it soon!

>121 rabbitprincess: - I have to agree with your assessment of Main Street. I gave it 3 stars back in 2015 but only because I found the audiobook version made for easy listening while doing mundane household chores (no need to pay close attention or risk missing something important happening). I think I would have chucked it if I had been reading it.

ETA to fix post pointer.

>128 Tess_W: I quite liked it! Just checked my library's e-holdings and they have only books 3, 4 and 5 in e-format, so I might at least read book 3. It will be a while before we're allowed to place new holds on physical materials; the ability to place holds has been suspended for the duration of the pandemic.

>129 lkernagh: Glad to hear it's not just me!

****

Finishing up the week with these two books. Not sure if I'll finish any more books this month, but we'll see.

The Field Guide to Understanding ‘Human Error’, by Sidney Dekker
Category: Wheat Kings
Source: bought online directly from the publisher
Rating: 4.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/183785056

I am a huge nerd who likes to read about accident investigations, so the logical next step (as recommended by a friend in the field) was to read about how investigators actually investigate! It is written clearly and has some laugh-out-loud moments, and it is thought-provoking.

As an aside, if you're interested in reading about accident investigations, here are some good books:

Beyond the Black Box, by George Bibel
Brace for Impact, by Peter Pigott
Into the Raging Sea, by Rachel Slade
The Last Nine Minutes, by Moira Johnston

The other book I read was decidedly less nerdy.

Family Matters, by Anthony Rolls
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/183817361

This is one of about a dozen British Library Crime Classics available in my library's e-catalogue. Poisoning mysteries from this era are just the right amount of grim for me.

>121 rabbitprincess:, >129 lkernagh: It's years since I read Main Street and Babbit, but I remember enjoying them as pieces of US history, particularly Babbitt with its boosterism, which is uniquely American, I think.

>131 pamelad: Babbitt is still on my to-read-via-Serial-Reader list, but it will definitely have to wait for the right time and place.

I'm not likely to finish any more books today, so here is the May recap.

I’m getting tired. Even fewer books than last month: 16 books.

The Travelling Cat Chronicles, written by Hiro Arikawa and translated by Philip Gabriel (Overdrive)
The Merry Heart: Selections 1980–1995, by Robertson Davies
Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier, by Neil deGrasse Tyson
When Days Are Long: Nurse in the North, by Amy Wilson
Doctor Who and the War Games, by Malcolm Hulke
The Thick of It: The Missing DoSAC Files, by Armando Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Tony Roche and Ian Martin (reread)
The Stone Angel, by Margaret Laurence
Beware of the Trains, by Edmund Crispin
French Exit, by Patrick deWitt
The End of the Line, by Stephen Legault (Overdrive, abandoned)
Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis (Serial Reader, abandoned)
A Rising Man, by Abir Mukherjee
La Reine étranglée, by Maurice Druon
A Matter of Malice, by Thomas King (Overdrive)
The Field Guide to Understanding ‘Human Error’, by Sidney Dekker
Family Matters, by Anthony Rolls (Overdrive)

The best book of the month was The Field Guide to Understanding ‘Human Error’. Definitely not for everyone, but for me, excellent.

My least favourite book of the month was Main Street, which I ended up abandoning after putting it on pause for over a week and not really missing it.

Currently reading

The Coral Island, by R. M. Ballantyne (Serial Reader) — Paused this for a bit because I had no patience for reading even installments of the books I had on the go. I resumed reading yesterday.
The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919, by Dan Van der Vat — Borrowed this from the in-laws pre-pandemic. One of several books I’ve left partly read because of the reading slump in May.
Doctor Who and the Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis — audio, read by Michael Kilgarriff (the Cyber Controller from the original TV story) with Cybermen voices provided by Nicholas Briggs. I am finding this really slow for some reason.
The Mabinogion, translated by Sioned Davies — I’ve read the first tale in the collection but haven’t had the energy to read any more of them.
Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath — I managed to get this from the library just before the lockdown and have plenty of time with it; it’s due back in September now! I am hoping it will tie in nicely with The Field Guide to Understanding ‘Human Error’.
Safety Differently: Human Factors for a New Era, by Sidney Dekker — I bought this along with the Field Guide at the recommendation of a friend, and I have decided that I am going to read it now, because I want to. Usually new books end up waiting a few years to be read, or I like to change up what I’m reading constantly. This is the era of the deep dive.
Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen (Serial Reader) — Yes, I own this in print, but I tend to read Serial Reader serials two at a time and was hankering after this book.

June plans

Last month my plans were to read at least half of the books on my on-deck pile before adding more to it. Given that I had a lot of historical fiction on the pile, this seemed to be a tall order. I completed 6 books and started another couple before adding more books, so maybe less than half of the books on the pile. I did do pretty well with the library pile; I have only four physical books from the library that I have yet to start.

This month I will make little plans. If I do any of these, I will be happy.
- finish two more tales in The Mabinogion
- finish or declare finished The Grand Scuttle
- read one re-read on the pile
- read one historical fiction book on the pile

OK that looks like a big list of plans, but given my reduced ability to focus (and absence of commute in which to read), giving myself choices of goals might be the way to go.

>133 rabbitprincess: It's funny to me to think of 16 books being a bad month...that would be a very good month for me! :) Also, you're making me crave some Jane Austen; I think I'll pick up Mansfield Park one of these days.

>134 christina_reads: Good call on the Jane Austen! :D

>133 rabbitprincess: I've heard this translation of The Mabinogion is a much more accurate one than the famous Lady Charlotte Guest's. I've read both and I find the tales fascinating but dense and sometimes hard to make it through. You got this!
>134 christina_reads: Echoing Christina - yes, 16 books in a month would be a tremendous accomplishment for me as well. Glad I'm not the only one looking at that list with longing.

>136 threadnsong: I'm going to go tackle one of those tales right now! Thanks for the encouragement :)

Clearing out the shelves this week.

Murder by Matchlight, by E.C.R. Lorac
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/183830013

Another enjoyable wartime mystery. Beautiful cover, too, on the British Library Crime Classics edition.

The Coral Island, by R.M. Ballantyne
Category: If New Orleans is Beat
Source: Serial Reader
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/182033556

I'd already lost patience with this book once, pausing for over a week. Then I hit the outdated-cultural-stereotypes part of the book and packed it in.

The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919, by Dan Van der Vat
Category: Nautical Disaster
Source: borrowed from BF’s parents
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/176517773

This book requires more attention than I have available for it. Also, I had to roll my eyes at the use of "she" to describe ships, which is old-fashioned, and "Man's" achievements, which is positively ancient.

****

In library news, our library is opening six branches for drop-offs and curbside pickups. Drop-offs will be allowed starting next week, and holds can be picked up by appointment starting the week after that. Holds that were ready for pickup at or in transit to a branch that is not being reopened can be transferred to one of the open branches, or you can leave them at the closed branch and pick them up when the branch reopens. I had three holds available (one for pickup, two in transit) and opted to transfer them to an open branch. When I go, I'll drop off the books I have finished. There are rather a lot of them!

>133 rabbitprincess: I think 16 books in a month is to be applauded! The Sisters Brothers was unremarkable for me so I'll skip French Exit.

>138 rabbitprincess: Murder by Matchlight sounds right up my street and I already have it on the shelf. I enjoy Lorac's books a lot. I also have Death came softly, earlier in the series and up next for me.

Our library has been offering holds by curbside pickup for a couple of weeks and it works well for me but not for my husband who prefers to browse the library shelves. I browse the catalogue and place holds for him but it's just not the same. The return slot is just open from noon to 4pm on weekdays. We had so many that we returned them in batches.

>139 VivienneR: There is nothing like a good browse through the shelves! But I can't do it too often because I usually have a lot of holds out as well :)

I had a little audio binge yesterday.

Doctor Who and the Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis (audio, read by Michael Kilgarriff and Nicholas Briggs)
Category: The Depression Suite, Thompson Girl
Source: library CD
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/136631351

For some reason I found this audiobook slow. There were 13 chapters, and I was in the middle of Chapter 8 and there was no sign of the Cybermen (or really, Nicholas Briggs). So I watched the TV story instead to get the ending. Fun fact: Michael Kilgarriff, the narrator of this audiobook, played the Cyber Controller in the TV story. So on that level it was a good choice, and he has a good reading voice. But this book was just super slow.

Doctor Who: Hunters of Earth (Destiny of the Doctor, #1), by Nigel Robinson (audio, read by Carole Ann Ford and Tam Williams)
Category: The Depression Suite, Thompson Girl
Source: Humble Bundle
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/139864916

This book, on the other hand, I read in one shot. It clocks in at just over an hour and is more like an audio drama than an audiobook. Carole Ann Ford, who played Susan on the TV series, narrates and does most of the other voices, while Tam Williams (another Big Finish player) lends support as Susan's friend Cedric.

Sometimes you just need a re-read.

Microserfs, by Douglas Coupland
Category: Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)
Source: Chaptigo
Rating: 5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/70444337

I put this on the pile because (a) I was seeking comfort food for the brain and (b) I've been bingeing Talking Heads for about a month now, and this book is how I first heard about them, so I thought it appropriate to revisit the book. A trippy time-travel kind of experience for me: remembering how cutting edge the technology in this book felt, and feeling simultaneously younger and older than the protagonists, because I was 12 when I first read this book, but now I am older than all of the main characters (even Bug Barbecue, who is 31 at the beginning). A favourite for me, but your mileage will likely vary.

I'm still trundling along with reading, but I haven't felt much impetus to review.

The Colour of Murder, by Julian Symons
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/183916028

This was a very old book on my to-read list; it was on the Top 100 Crime Novels list I used to build my Goodreads to-read list the day I joined, in April 2008. So I am glad the library ordered it. It is a solid addition to the British Library Crime Classics collection.

Finally got this one off the coffee table! It's been in progress for just over a month, but it's not the sort of book I would rush.

The Mabinogion, translated by Sioned Davies
Category: Poets
Source: bought at the National Museum of Wales, 2017
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/145590425

I bought this at the National Museum of Wales on a trip in 2017, and it was a great souvenir of my time there. I enjoyed reading the Arthurian tales to see how they compared with the ones I've already read. The explanatory notes and the introduction (which I read last) are especially helpful for making those connections. It's not a light read, though!

It's a feeling of accomplishment! Have a good week, Princess!

>144 rabbitprincess: Yay Princess! You made it through! And yes, you are absolutely right - tales from the Mabinogion are not a light read. It's also interesting to know that Tolkien was inspired through the Mabinogion, though more linguistically, if memory serves, than story-wise.

>145 mstrust: Thanks! Have a great week as well!

>146 threadnsong: The language did remind me a lot of Tolkien, particularly The Silmarillion. And now I am tempted to read Geoffrey of Monmouth again. I read it as part of a King Arthur course in university and would really have liked to read the Mabinogion for that course too!

Yesterday I went to the library for the first time in over three months. "Curbside pickup" started this week at selected branches, which are also the only branches accepting returns. I took over two big bags of books I'd borrowed back in March, and in return got two holds:

The Women of the Copper Country, by Mary Doria Russell
Trans-Canada Rail Guide, by Melissa Graham

When the library closed, all holds were paused. Then once they started offering curbside pickup, you could reactivate your holds and have them sent to one of the branches being reopened. My local is not one of the branches that has reopened, so I reactivated only the holds that had been ready or in transit when the library first shut down. I've left all my other holds paused for now.

It feels very strange to have so few physical books out from the library, but I am not comfortable taking public transit to the nearest open branch and I don't want to have to get my other half to drive me all the time. And the books are out for "only" four weeks...I say "only" even though that's longer than the standard loan period, it is much shorter than the loan period for the books that I had out before the library closed down. Those ones aren't due back until September!

One of those books I finally managed to finish today.

Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath
Category: Wheat Kings
Source: library
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/179807031

I was glad this one slipped in before the library closed. It was one of these light, engaging kind of non-fiction books that give you a nice buzz.

>148 rabbitprincess: - My local library has been open for curbside pickup all along and there's a big outside collection box outside. They also boosted their wifi so people could sit in their cars in the parking lot if they needed to use the wifi. And they've added some tables outside now so people can sit outside and use the wifi. Our state has also started doing ILL loans again and they upped the hold requests to 10 this week. I got two to start. They were actually one of the Reader's Digest top 10 friendliest libraries last year.

My library has been doing curbside for a couple of weeks but just opened the front part of the building for holds and new book browsing maybe two weeks ago. I went in a few days ago to pick up some holds. The front entrance is now exit only, and the only entrance is the auditorium entrance. An employee is there to tell you the new instructions/rules, and the holds are shelved where community flyers used to be. Follow the curve around to the front and they've lined the foyer with small shelving units displaying new releases. There's an info employee sitting inside a little glass ticket taker booth and one self-check-out. When I exited, the sliding door must have startled the peacock standing on the other side because he screamed at me :-D.

>149 dudes22: All public libraries in Ontario were totally shut down from mid-March until about mid-May, when they were allowed to introduce curbside service. So I imagine our ILL system is probably a bit dormant at the moment. Will probably wait a while longer before trying it out.

>150 mstrust: A library peacock! Wow!

Was feeling a bit stalled out on reading this week, thanks to a lot of overtime (I agreed to do it, but no more until at least August, I think). So a nice light mystery was just the ticket.

Murder Unprompted, by Simon Brett
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library secondhand bookstore
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/159294668

This is only my second Charles Paris novel but I will probably continue to read the series here and there. I like mysteries set in the theatre and especially imagining Bill Nighy in the lead role of these ones, because he plays Charles in the BBC Radio 4 adaptations.

>152 rabbitprincess: I have enjoyed all the older Charles Paris mysteries because they are so funny. Brett recently picked up the character again but I was rather disappointed.

>153 NinieB: I was snorting with laughter a fair bit throughout this one!

>152 rabbitprincess:, >153 NinieB: I think I've read all the Charles Paris mysteries, many borrowed from the library before LT, in the yellow-jacketed Gollancz editions. Like NinieB I thought the earlier books were funnier. Charles seems to have given up hope now, so there's an underlying sadness.

I also liked some of the Mrs Pargeter mysteries, but am not so keen on the Fethering series.

My library system opened with curbside pickup for holds just a week ago. Luckily, my branch was one of the five, but only a few days a week. It was thrilling picking up a book and equally thrilling returning the ones I'd had for months. Given that the number of COVID cases here is skyrocketing, I hope they don't open up more.

>148 rabbitprincess: You are reminding me I need to read more of Maria Doris Russell. I have devoured The Sparrow several times and I just fall in love with her language and her descriptions.

And did you decide to delve into Geoffrey of Monmouth again? What a cool course you took on Arthurian Lit!

>155 pamelad: I'll keep that in mind about the later Charles Paris books. I haven't really been interested in his other series...so many series, so little time!

>156 RidgewayGirl: It was so weird interacting with other humans! My other half has been doing all the grocery shopping and I work from home full time now, so I don't really see people that often. I did like the smart paper bags they gave me my holds in.
Our cases are declining, but they are still happening, so I am worried about people becoming idiots and not social distancing just because they're tired of the pandemic.

>157 threadnsong: I have a hold on The Sparrow, because one of my coworkers praised it highly (and I know it's a favourite of @Jackie_K as well). The library has only one (physical) copy though :( Might just have to buy it to support my local indie...

Haven't picked up Geoffrey yet because the summer tends to fry my brain. Might try in the fall.

And yeah, it was a cool course. We studied Geoffrey, Chrétien de Troyes, and Malory, and we also read A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. It was so strange to read Malory though because I grew up reading the Roger Lancelyn Green retelling King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table, and he borrows so much of Malory's rhythm and even sentence structure that I felt as though I'd read Malory already!

Count me in as one of the fans of The Sparrow. And there's a second book too which is good but not quite as good.

>159 dudes22: Just found out that my local branch is in the next group of library branches to reopen, which I'm very excited about! So hopefully The Sparrow will make its way to me eventually.

****

Waiting around for a thunderstorm to hit. It hasn't yet. Also remembering the earthquake that hit Ottawa 10 years ago today. I remember when it hit, I was at the office and my first thought was to save my work in case the power went out!

No earthquakes in my latest batch of books:

The Women with Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II, by Katherine Sharp Landdeck
Category: 700 Ft. Ceiling
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/184458960

Now this is my kind of WW2 history: previously untold stories of women doing amazing things. This pairs very nicely with A Spitfire Girl, by Mary Ellis, and the Big Finish audio drama ATA Girl.

The Christmas Card Crime and Other Stories, ed. Martin Edwards
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/184731288

Rather strange reading material for the middle of a heatwave, but it was fun.

>152 rabbitprincess: I love Simon Brett's Charles Paris mysteries too. Bill Nighy would be perfect as Paris.

>152 rabbitprincess:, >161 VivienneR: How about Hugh Grant? I just saw him in A Very English Scandal, where he was excellent. He does a good job of seedy and disreputable.

Now I kind of want to see a buddy cop movie starring Bill Nighy and Hugh Grant! Grant would be the straitlaced, by-the-book cop, and Nighy would be the loose cannon.

>161 VivienneR: I'm going to have to track down the audios and listen for myself! I keep meaning to but forget.

>162 pamelad: Hugh Grant would be good too! Is it weird that my favourite roles of his are as the Pirate Captain in the Aardman Animations film The Pirates!, and as the villain in Paddington 2?

>163 christina_reads: Where is the Kickstarter? I would fund this :D

Getting some reading mojo back, although I doubt I will read more than last month.

The Body in the Dumb River, by George Bellairs
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/184931090

Yet another British Library Crime Classic. This is the only Bellairs I've managed to finish, so that might be an endorsement. That said, he's not my favourite author in this imprint. I felt this was a bit too "Littlejohn shows up and coaxes people to confess" rather than actually solving the crime.

The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain As Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness, and Recovery, by Sam Kean
Category: Wheat Kings, We'll Go Too (July NonFictionCAT - Human Science)
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/185021451

Finally read all of Sam Kean's books so far! This might be a touch out of date now because it was published all the way back in 2014, but it was still good. I especially liked the new twist on the Phineas Gage story.

>160 rabbitprincess: If you are looking for the history of women in WWII, I read a book years ago called And If I Perish about the US Nurses who served in that war. They are true-life accounts, and what helped make the book great was the way that the accounts were laid out in chronological order to the US involvement in the War. It starts in the North African campaign, for example, before moving into the larger "theaters" such as Italy. If you can get your hands on it and if you are drawn to this era, I highly recommend it.

>166 threadnsong: That sounds right up my alley! And bonus, my library has it -- and we'll be allowed to place new holds starting tomorrow! I've bookmarked it so that I can do just that. Thanks for the rec! :D

>167 rabbitprincess: Awesome!! It's not an easy read because of the subject matter and congratulations on snagging a copy!

>168 threadnsong: Sometimes my library surprises me!

****

Last book of June is here. It was kind of a disappointment.

Doctor Who: Lords of the Storm, by David A. McIntee
Category: The Depression Suite
Source: Great Glebe Garage Sale
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/141824598

I picked this up because I was feeling another reading slump coming on and thought a Doctor Who novel would do the trick. This one felt ponderous and slow. That's 2 of 3 Missing Adventures novels that I've been disappointed with. I mean I'll keep trying, but it is discouraging.

I thought about starting a new thread, but I am too lazy. Maybe this weekend. So my June recap is on this thread.

The longer I stay at home, it seems, the less I read. This month my total is 15 books.

Murder by Matchlight, by E.C.R. Lorac (Overdrive)
The Coral Island, by R. M. Ballantyne (Serial Reader, abandoned)
The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919, by Dan Van der Vat (abandoned)
Doctor Who and the Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis (audio, read by Michael Kilgarriff and Nicholas Briggs)
Doctor Who: Hunters of Earth (Destiny of the Doctor, #1), by Nigel Robinson (audio, read by Carole Ann Ford and Tam Williams)
Microserfs, by Douglas Coupland (re-read)
The Colour of Murder, by Julian Symons (Overdrive)
The Mabinogion, translated by Sioned Davies
Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath
Murder Unprompted, by Simon Brett
The Women with Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II, by Katherine Sharp Landdeck (Overdrive)
The Christmas Card Crime and Other Stories, ed. Martin Edwards (Overdrive)
The Body in the Dumb River, by George Bellairs (Overdrive)
The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain As Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness, and Recovery, by Sam Kean
Lords of the Storm, by David A. McIntee

The best book of the month was Murder by Matchlight. It was one of many delightful British Library Crime Classics that got me through the month.

My least favourite book of the month was, unfortunately, a Doctor Who novel. Lords of the Storm bored me for too long. At least Tomb of the Cybermen had a TV adaptation for me to fall back on.

Currently reading

Safety Differently: Human Factors for a New Era, by Sidney Dekker — I’m chipping away at this one gradually. It gives me a lot to think about, and I like chatting with my friends who’ve also read it. So it’s taking me a while.
Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen (Serial Reader) — My brain’s casting department is blending both the 1995 movie and the 2008 miniseries with regard to casting, with interesting results.
The Souls of Black Folk, by W. E. B. Du Bois (Serial Reader) — Picked this up (if one can “pick up” a Serial Reader book) in response to world events. I will read other, more recent books as well, but this is my starting point.
Paths of Glory, by Jeffrey Archer (audio, read by Roger Allam) — The narrator is the only reason I have this book. I enjoyed the first disc (of 9) but haven’t got back to it yet.
Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature, by Margaret Atwood (Overdrive) — I enjoyed Atwood’s Stranger Things, about the north in Canadian literature, so I imagine this will be interesting too. It was published in 1972 and apparently put a lot of noses out of joint.
The Captain, by Jan de Hartog — Just started this yesterday, and it is already most compelling!
The Inconvenient Indian, by Thomas King — This was my choice for June NonFictionCAT, so naturally I am going to read it in July. (I read my July choice in June, so that's only fair.)

July plans

Last month I made four plans. If I did any of these things, I would consider the month a success. How did I do?

✔ finish two more tales in The Mabinogion: I finished the whole book, in fact.
✔ finish or declare finished The Grand Scuttle: I did declare this book finished and gave it back to my father-in-law.
✔ read one re-read on the pile: that was Microserfs
✔ read one historical fiction book on the pile: I started The King’s General, but decided I wasn’t in the mood for it, so I put a post-it note in it and returned it to the shelf. I'm counting that as an objective met (it got the book off the on-deck pile).

Making small plans worked great! Here are my small plans to choose from this month:

- read the two new library books I have out so that I can return them at my local branch when it reopens in the middle of the month
- get at least halfway through (to end of Disc 4) on Paths of Glory
- read The Inconvenient Indian, which has been on the pile for quite some time

I think that’s enough to be going on :)

****

And wow, it’s time for a Pool update for the end of Q2.



I doubled my total books read to 14 of 30. Not sure why I thought I had 33 books in the Pool at Q1, but oh well. This puts my score in a much better light. Only slightly behind the halfway mark at halfway through the year, even with pandemic brain, which is pretty good.

Not sure I will be able to complete my Pool this year, though—one book is at my parents’ place, and who knows when we will be able to see each other to swap books?

>170 rabbitprincess: I've been reading a bunch of British Library Crime Classics, since my library has almost the whole run in e-book form. They are so fun! If you like locked room mysteries, Miraculous Mysteries is great and is all short stories, so you get to experience a lot of different authors.

>171 casvelyn: Yay, my library has that one too! Requested!

>170 rabbitprincess: Good idea to make small plans. But you need to get back to Paths of Glory so that you can decide if Mallory made it to the summit. My son and I believe that he did, and that he fell to his death on the way down (my reasoning might be a sort of spoiler). Maybe that's wishful thinking because we are both fans. And it was an interesting argument by those who believed the use of oxygen was a type of cheating in mountain climbing. I read the book as well as listening to Roger Allam's excellent audiobook.

"Pandemic brain" must be catching. My reading has been so scattered and every book I pick up goes on the "currently reading" list, overwhelming me.

Happy Canada Day! 🍁

Happy Canada Day, Princess!

>173 VivienneR: I shall definitely have to get back into it to weigh in on that subject! Happy Canada Day :D

>174 mstrust: Happy Canada Day to you as well! I hope you have lots of maple goodies on hand to celebrate ;)

Started July off with an excellent book indeed.

The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America, by Thomas King
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: gift from my brother
Rating: 5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/163581484

Thomas King's Green Grass, Running Water is one of my favourite books. This non-fiction book is excellent as well. I like how he plays with narrative a bit by interjecting commentary from his wife and son, who offer their opinions on how he's presenting the material and what he needs to include or leave out. The whole book is crisp, clear, and grounded. It is angry, sorrowful, and bitingly funny, sometimes all on the same page. King brings his own stories to the table and demonstrates how history is just that: a STORY that we tell ourselves about the past. This is a must read.

>176 rabbitprincess: since you insist, I will take this as a BB!

>176 rabbitprincess: BB for me too!

>177 Tess_W: >178 Jackie_K: Excellent! I especially liked the part where he talks about how the book got its title.

****

Reading in fits and starts over the past couple of days. Heat waves don't help, and nor does eyestrain. If I read ebooks on my iPad for too long I get a headache behind the eye that had to be cured with vision therapy. Not sure whether I need to be doing some of the exercises as a refresher, whether I need to read on the iPad without my glasses, or both, or neither.

I also discovered that headaches are exacerbated by a shortage of caffeine in my system. Didn't have tea until 4 p.m. today. Now I feel much better, haha.

Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature, by Margaret Atwood
Category: Poets
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/184984574

This is a good book. It is so good that I put myself back in the ebook holds queue so that I can finish it off. My review is unlikely to change, though, so I am doing that now.

The Souls of Black Folk, by W.E.B. Du Bois
Category: Poets
Source: Serial Reader
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/184625396

This is a book that defies rating or reviewing, at least for me. It has set me on an interesting path, reading-wise. I'll be reading everything Serial Reader has to offer by writers such as Du Bois, Douglass, and others writing about race relations in the United States.

I wonder if it could have anything to do with the brightness of the screen?

>180 dudes22: Maybe. I keep the brightness fairly low, so I switched to Dark mode on Libby as an experiment. I also do think my eyes sometimes get tired, and the tiredness manifests itself by the lazier eye kind of "pulling" or manifestly working harder.

>181 rabbitprincess: I have a colleague, who when we had to start teaching online due to Covid-19, had to buy these glasses from Amazon that are tinted in such a way that she no longer has headaches when spending a lot of time online. Perhaps that's an option!

P.S. I love serial reader. It's a great pacer.

>182 Tess_W: Hmmm that is interesting that those exist! My glasses have special lenses called Shaw lenses that are designed to make the brain use both eyes together; regular glasses have prescriptions for each eye that the brain then knits together. So it might be more expensive for me to get tinted screen-busting (for lack of a better word) glasses for myself. So far today has been better than yesterday by virtue of reading more print and getting my caffeinated tea in early ;)

And yes, I love Serial Reader too! It has helped me try so many things that might not otherwise cross my path via the library.

>183 rabbitprincess: those glasses on are Amazon, I guess they remove the blue light that seem to give people headaches.

>184 Tess_W: That does seem to be how they work, and it sounds plausible. But I probably won't bother. It looks like I'd have to get a whole new pair of glasses with those lenses, because my current glasses would not likely have that ability. I only just got my current glasses and don't need to replace them yet. Eyestrain has really only been a problem occasionally, and those occasions have mostly been during this COVID period when I am not out and about as much. So I think it will sort itself out with cutting down screen time.

Managed to get a bunch of books read yesterday!

The Captain, by Jan de Hartog
Category: Nautical Disaster
Source: a church book sale
Rating: 4/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/129906131

I picked this up for the gorgeous cover and because it is about boats. Fortunately, it delivers. Recommended for those who liked HMS Ulysses. Bonus: there's some Canadian content.

Surfeit of Suspects, by George Bellairs
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/185269205

My Golden Age mystery binge continues. Thanks, library ebook collection! This one was all right.

Trans-Canada Rail Guide, by Melissa Graham
Category: Poets
Source: library
Rating: 2/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/185186376

I was frankly offended that this book totally excluded Ottawa from any significant discussion. The book considered the VIA Rail "Corridor" to be Toronto to Montreal, when in fact it is from Windsor to Quebec City (and the Toronto/Ottawa/Montreal triangle is part of the Corridor). And 10 cities got a city guide included in the book. Churchill, Manitoba, got one, but Ottawa did not. So while the information that WAS there was presented in an attractive fashion, I can't recommend this book on the basis of incomplete information :-/

>186 rabbitprincess: I don't know anything about railway lines in Canada, but it does seem funny that the guide would exclude the capital city!

>186 rabbitprincess: >187 christina_reads: And Ottawa's such an interesting place to visit, too.

Ask the author who she thinks she is.

>187 christina_reads: I could understand ignoring most of the Corridor from Toronto to Windsor, because for international tourists the only big draw would be Niagara Falls. But yeah, ignoring the entire nation's capital was not a good look.

>188 NinieB: Totally agree. I live here, though, so it's easy for me to say ;) But what I really like about it is it has a lot of stuff to do AND is really close to Montreal, which has lots of fun things too.

>189 mstrust: Perhaps she is someone the Ottawa tourism board decided not to sponsor!

I managed to devour this book in two days, which is pretty good for me considering that we have been having a mega heatwave all week.

The Women of the Copper Country, by Mary Doria Russell
Category: Looking for a Place to Happen
Source: library
Rating: 4.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/185186815

This was so good, and I especially liked the indirect recommendations of a couple of books that I have on my Serial Reader list. This book has a great author note, too, in which Russell explains what's actual history and what has been modified for narrative purposes.

>191 rabbitprincess: - Glad to see you liked it too.

>192 dudes22: It was just what I needed, I think!

****

Still rattling through the British Library Crime Classics.

Murder in the Mill-Race, by E. C. R. Lorac
Category: Locked in the Trunk of a Car
Source: library, via Overdrive
Rating: 3.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/185381913

This got me through a hot Saturday afternoon and evening. And after reading about Devonshire cream, I want scones, but it is much too hot to bake. Sigh.

>191 rabbitprincess: - Oh, The Women of Copper Country looks like something I would enjoy reading! On the future reading list it goes.

>194 lkernagh: Hurray! I hope you like it!

Note to self: stop trying to read Shakespeare during a heatwave.

King Lear, by William Shakespeare
Category: Poets
Source: Bay Used Books, Sudbury, Ontario
Rating: 2.5/5
Review: https://www.librarything.com/review/168824514

I found many people in this play irritating and the Gloucester scene in Act 3 awful (I thought the putting-out-of-eyes was going to be done offstage, certainly not on stage and at the length that is done in the play, and I REALLY get grossed out by eye things, so this nearly made me lose my lunch). I couldn't read the last two acts. Maybe I'll read them again in a decade or so?

Anyway, this is off the list.

>196 rabbitprincess: - That scene is pretty awful. Made me squirm when I watched a production back in May/June. I don't even what to imagine what it would be like to read!

>197 lkernagh: I had been considering watching an adaptation before reading the play, to give myself people to picture as I read, but I am somewhat relieved that that plan didn't work out. As horrific as my imagination would have it, I would probably find it harder to unsee any images on stage.

>196 rabbitprincess: Never read King Lear (comedies are more my style than tragedies -- or the histories, for that matter), and now I'm thinking given my squeamishness and inability to not click on spoilers that it's better to leave it that way, yes.

>176 rabbitprincess: And scrolling up a bit more, I'm adding a note to look for The Inconvenient Indian! A slightly unconventional narrative + history + native peoples + positive reviews sounds like a lot of my favorite things.

I liked King Lear more than you did. The behavior of the daughters and their husbands reminded me that Shakespeare really knew people.
If you haven't read it, you might steer clear of Titus Andronicus. It's shockingly brutal.

>199 pammab: Yes, I would recommend at least avoiding that particular scene. I actually ended up reading SparkNotes for the gist of what was happening, so that might be a good way to get around it.
>200 pammab: I do hope you like The Inconvenient Indian! Thomas King is great.

>201 mstrust: Yeah, I can't say that Titus is anywhere near the top of my Shakespeare must-read list :) I am willing to chalk up a healthy percentage of my experience to trying to force the read at what was likely the wrong time.

I've started a new thread, so come on over!