Charlotte (Charl08) swims with the penguins (5)

I'm Charlotte, I'm dipping my toe into the Category Challenge for the first time this year after a couple of years in the 75ers.
I enjoy reading a wide range of books, from romance and crime fiction to literary fiction, not to mention non-fiction (although less of that). I try to read fiction from different places, and in 2020 joined an online book group that just reads translated fiction.

I am keen on penguins, both of the publishing and bird kind. Inspired by a recent documentary I'm organising my categories by penguin type - but advance warning, it gets pretty tangential.


Photo by Long Ma on Unsplash

Galapagos penguin (fiction ETA and NF in translation) 30
African penguin (books by authors with links to the African continent, loosely defined) 7
Yellow-eyed penguin (Keeping things interesting i.e. first time authors) 10
Chinstrap penguin (Graphic novels and memoirs) 19
Little penguin (Familiar faces - authors I've read before) 11
King penguin (books with links to feminism) 4
Great auk (histories) 4
Southern Rockhopper penguin (new-to-me authors) 15
Adelie penguin (prize nominees) 11
Macaroni penguin (genre fiction) 89
Emperor penguin (catch all category - everything else) 10

August 24 (Total 210)
July 25 (186)
June 23 (161)
May 25 (138)
April 31 (113)
March 29 (82)
Feb 29 (53)
Jan 24

All images via wikipedia unless otherwise stated.

Galapagos penguin (fiction and NF in translation)



1. The Inspector of Strange and Unexplained Deaths (France)
2. Sidewalks (Translated from the Spanish, although author now writes in English and is based in the US)
3. London under snow (Catalan)
4. The Eighth Life (German)
5. Zero (Norwegian)
6. House on Endless Waters (Hebrew)
7. Not a Novel (German)
8. Abigail (Hungarian)
9. Paula (German)
10. Bookshops (Spanish)
11. The Book of Jakarta (Indonesian)
12. If I Had Your Face (Korean)
13. Crocodile Tears (Spanish - Uruguay)
14. Nordic Fauna (Swedish)
15. Slash and Burn (Spanish - El Salvador)
16. Snapping Point (Turkish)
17. Havana Year Zero (Spanish - Cuba)
18. The Slaughterman's Daughter (Hebrew - Israel)
19. Tomorrow They Won't Dare to Murder Us (French)
20. All Men Are Liars (Spanish: Argentina)
21. Vivian (Danish)
22. Distant Sunflower Fields (Mandarin: China)
23. Childhood: the Copenhagen Trilogy: 1 (Danish)
24. The Gold-rimmed Spectacles (Italian)
25. The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer (French: Switzerland)
26. Fresh Water for Flowers (French)
27. The Library of Unrequited Love (French)
28. Elena Knows (Spanish: Argentina)
29. The Basel Killings (Switzerland)
30. The Blacksmith's Daughter (German)

Books from the shelves

The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree (Iran)
In the Twilight: stories (Russia)
Ankomst

African penguin (books by authors with links to the African continent, loosely defined)


Photo by Lizel Snyman De Gouveia on Unsplash

1. Adua (Author is Italian-Somali)
2. Girl Called Eel (Author born in Comoros, based in France)
3. Transcendent Kingdom (Author is Ghanaian-American)
4. Lightseekers (Nigerian author)
5.La Bastarda (author from Equatorial Guinea)
6. Speak No Evil (author lives in Lagos/ New York)
7. The Fortune Men (author is British/ Somali)
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.

Possible reads from my shelves:
To Hell with Cronje
Kicking Tongues (African Writers Series)
Segu
Occasion for Loving (VMC)
Dust
Homegoing
The Loss Library
This Mournable Body
Orchestra of Minorities

Yellow-eyed penguin (Keeping things interesting i.e. first time authors)


Had never come across these penguins before until I saw the BBC documentary last week.

1. Strange Beasts of China
2. Citadel (Poetry)
3. Keeper
4. Greetings from Bury Park
5. These Ghosts are Family
6. The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney
7. A Dutiful Boy
8. How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House
9. A Net for Small Fishes
10. The Sweetness of Water

Possible reads from my shelves:
Kintu
Love and Other Thought Experiments

Possible reads from library requests:
Rainbow milk
As you were by Elaine Feeney

Chinstrap penguin (Graphic novels and memoirs)



(Photo by Eamonn Maguire on Unsplash)
Because these penguins seem to appreciate graphic design...
1. Strong Female Protagonist
2. Britten and Brülightly
3. The Golden Age: Book 1
4. Ms Marvel : Stormranger
5. Palimpsest: documents from a Korean adoption
6. Petty Theft
7. Taxi! Stories from the back seat
8. Couch Fiction (2020 edition)
9. Shadow Life
10. I Know What I Am
11. Moms
12. In: a Graphic Novel
13. Teen Titans: Raven
14. Ms Marvel: Army of One
15. Sad Ghosts Club
16. The Secret to Superhuman Strength
17. Hole in the Heart
18. I Parrot
19. Josephine

Possible reads from my shelves:
On Ajayi Crowther Street

Little penguin (Familiar faces - authors I've read before)


Saw some of these guys at Phillip Island, about a million years ago now (it feels like).
1. The Haw Lantern
2. More than a Woman
3. Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal?
4. The Pull of the Stars
5. Deacon King Kong
6. Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard
7. The Galaxy and the Ground Within
8. The Silver Collar
9. Daughters of Night
10. American Mules
11. Light Perpetual

Possible reads from the shelves: Divisadero
Summer
Rodham
Underground Railroad

King penguin (books with links to feminism and gender)


King penguin creche
1. Hag: forgotten folktales retold
2. Laura Knight
3. Eileen Agar
4. What Comes Naturally

On the shelves
Invisible Women
Voyaging Out

Great auk (histories)


1. The Berlin shadow : living with the ghosts of the Kindertransport
2. The Emperor's Feast
3. Molotov's Magic Lantern
4. A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

Currently reading:
Burning the Books

From the shelves to read
Last Witnesses
Endeavour
Black and British
A Handful of Shells: West African History
The Bad Ass Librarians of Timbuktu

From the library to read:
Mutual Admiration Society

Southern Rockhopper penguin (new-to-me authors)


1. Interior Chinatown
2. Akhmatova: Poems
3. Blue in Chicago and other stories
4. Hieroglyphics
5. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
6. The Cold Millions
7. Unsettled Ground
8. Incomparable World
9. 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl
10. Out of the Easy
11. Bright Dead Things
12.The Fat Lady Sings
13. Northern Spy
14. Asylum Road
15. Outlawed
Possible reads from the shelves/ library requests:
How Beautiful We Were

Adelie penguin (prize nominees)


1. The Bells of Old Tokyo (shortisted for Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year)
2. The Historians: poetry (winner of the Costa Prize poetry category)
3. A Village Life (Louise Glück won the Nobel for Literature 2020)
4. Luster (Women's Prize Longlist 2021)
5. Piranesi (Women's Prize Longlist 2021)
6. The Vanishing Half (Women's Prize Longlist 2021)
7. No one is Talking About This (Women's Prize Longlist 2021)
8. Detransition, Baby (Ditto)
9. The Night Watchman (Pulitzer Fiction )(2021)
10. Second Place (Booker Longlist 2021)
11. A Town Called Solace (Booker Longlist 2021)

Possible Prize winners to read:
Booker 2021 longlist ones I want to read:

A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam (Sri Lankan) requested library
The Promise by Damon Galgut (South African) out from the library
The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris (American) requested library
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (British) not sure
An Island by Karen Jennings (South African) not at the library yet
Bewilderment by Richard Powers (American) um...
China Room by Sunjeev Sahota (British) not sure. May wait until shortlist.
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead (American) requested library

Via
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/jul/27/booker-prize-reveals-globe-spannin...
Costa Prize category winners announced (Jan) -
Winner of the 2020 First Novel Award Love After Love by Ingrid Persaud (Faber)
(read in 2020)
Winner of the 2020 Novel Award: The Mermaid of Black Conch: A Love Story by Monique Roffey (Peepal Tree)
Winner of the 2020 Biography Award The Louder I Will Sing by Lee Lawrence (Sphere)
Winner of the 2020 Children's Book Award: Voyage of the Sparrowhawk by Natasha Farrant (Faber)

Macaroni penguin - genre fiction

Macaroni penguins are the most numerous penguin (according to wikipedia!)
For the full list 1-40 see previous thread.

41. The Mix-up (r) Netgalley - UK publish date 06/21
42. Edge of the Grave (c)
43. Who's That Earl (r)
44. Hard Luck (r)
45. The Dating Plan (r)
46. One Thing Leads to a Lover (r)
47. The Torso: Irene Huss (c)
48. Close Call (c)
49. The Charmer (r)
50. Riley Thorn and the Dead Guy Next Door (r&c)
51. Midnight Atlanta (c)
52. Meet You in the Middle (r)
53. A Gift of Daisies (r)
54. The Worst Best Man (r)
55. Bitter Wash Road (c)
56. The Intimacy Experiment (r)
57. The Jigsaw Man (c)
58. A Rake's Guide to Seduction (r)
59. Peace (c)
60. Back in the Burbs (r)
61. One Snowy Night (r)
62. How Town (c)
63. Professor Next Door (r)
64. Snowballed (r)
65. Redemption Point (c)
66. The Man Who Died Twice (c)
67. Talk Bookish to Me (r)
68. Set, Shift, Score (r)
69. Consolation (c)
70. Still Life (c)
71. Love Story, With Murders (c)
72. Isn't it Bromantic? (r)
73. Hands Down (r)
74. The Royal Secret (c)
75. Welcome to Temptation (r) plus (c)
76. Charming Puck (r)
77. Bet Me (r)
78. Tell Me Lies (r)
79. Puck series: 5 (r)
80. Grumpy Player Next Door (r)
81. Riley Thorn and the Corpse in the Closet (c/r)
82. Who Watcheth (c)
83. Crazy for You (r)
84. The Cinderella Deal (r)
85. Man Hunting (r)
86. Fast Women (r/c)
87. Unexpected (r)
88. Battle Royal (r)
89. Anyone but You (r)

Emperor penguin - ruling over everything else



1. A Rustle of Silk (audio)
2. From Crime to Crime (Law, Memoir)
3. I carried a Watermelon (Memoir, humour)
4. All the Young Men (Memoir)
5. Life Mask (Poetry)
6. Being Heumann (Memoir/Disability activism)
7. When We Rise (Memoir/LGBT activism)
8. Many Different Kinds of Love (poetry/ health)
9. Surfacing (nature writing)
10. Pandora's Jar (classics)

Currently Reading

Happy new thread, Charlotte.

Happy new thread, Charlotte! How are you liking The Man Who Died Twice? I'm thinking I might want to read The Thursday Murder Club soonish.

>14 BLBera: Thanks Beth!

>15 bell7: Thanks Mary. I am enjoying it very much. I am trying to resist posting every other page onto Litsy's 'quote' feature with a laughing emoji.

Happy new thread Charlotte. Love all the penguin pictures, especially those in ice and snow as it is so very hot here.

I'm creeping the library catalogue daily, hoping they'll order the new Richard Osman! Although given how much my mum and I both enjoyed The Thursday Murder Club, perhaps we should buy our own copy!

A dip with the Galápagos penguin in >2 charl08: would be so refreshing right now! Our temperatures are "only" in the 30s Celsius, but it's very humid.

Happy New Thread, Charlotte. I think you may have missed me on the last thread. Just sayin'...

I hope the work week is off to a good start.

Happy new thread, Charlotte. The penguins are very nice to look at in this muggy weather, they look so cool!

Happy new thread, Charlotte.
Nice to see the penguins again. Oh! and what you've been reading, of course...

Happy new thread, Charlotte.

I hope you are enjoying The Living Mountain and My Name is Red.

>17 mdoris: I was watching a documentary last night on netflix about the penguins in Simon's Town - my Dad and I were trying to spot places we recognised. Major advantage of the documentary over real life - no authentic penguin odour.

ETA Penguin Town - this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2X-1Ui3G48

>18 rabbitprincess: I think the first one broke records for sales, so not surprised if it's popular in the library too.

>19 msf59: Sorry! Week has started. This is as far as I am prepared to acknowledge :-(

>20 MissWatson: I am jealous of their access to the water. I need to get back to swimming.

>21 Helenliz: Well spotted! Reading's in there somewhere, Helen. I think...

>22 FAMeulstee: I was, then I put them down. I need to pick them up again. Tomorrow maybe? Or maybe when I go on leave...

Happy new thread, and hello again lovely penguins!

Thanks Jackie.

Light Perpetual
This was a fascinating read. Spufford was inspired by a real bomb that went off in a branch of Woolworths during WW2 to imagine a similar group of lost children's lives carrying on untouched through the years. Jumping from primary school rebellion to pensioner choices, we're whipped through British history highlights. I enjoyed the printer character most, as my dad also faced the same issues (death of compositing). There are some lovely descriptions of the wonder of setting type. Not so keen on the lengthy rendition of a Pentecostal sermon though it was related to the plot I wasn't quite sure we needed so much of it. I'm not sure what it all meant, or if there was a theme. There are obvious comparisons here, not least to Kate Atkinson. But I enjoyed reading it, and cared about the characters.

... she is finding, just now, when things are hard, how sharply it seems she can still regret the lives not had, the music never recorded, the fame not gained. Old sorrows she thought were long worked through - no, more than that, which she thought were actually abolished by her having had different desires fulfilled - turn out to be still capable, still bitter, able like ghosts to billow up and start talking, if given a drop of blood to feed upon. She stumps up the hill, and the unquiet ghosts say: Why only this? Why this life and not the other? Why this ending and not another?

>25 charl08: - I've got that one on The List. It's gotten a lot of love around here... at least on the threads I follow!

>26 katiekrug: I've missed (or equally likely: forgotten) those comments Katie, but nice to hear it is being read. I loved his previous one Golden Hill too.

The Man Who Died Twice

Sue looked at me at one point and said, 'Is this Joyce?' She told Elizabeth to ensure I told no one about the shooting and the body and so on. I said, 'Sue, you're safe with me,' but she didn't even look in my direction, just at Elizabeth. Elizabeth reassured Sue I wouldn't tell a soul, and she nodded, unconvinced. To be honest, I think she had bigger fish to fry.

MI5 know who I am now though, so that's one for the Christmas newsletter.

If you read the previous book (and with over a million sales in the UK, you've got plenty of company) you'll be pleased to hear all the (ETA good) things about the previous book are back here too. The fancy retirement village, the surprisingly murder-y environment and the wit.

The four of us were on the list, of course, and Kendrick. Imagine if it was Kendrick? In a book it would be. Wouldn't it be fun to be in a book? I bet my hip wouldn't hurt so much in a book.

>28 charl08: Confession time: I've seen you and others here on LT posting about the Thursday Murder Club series, and I just ignored it because I thought you were talking about a not-very-good series that I accidentally read a book from and immediately crossed off my list.

But that smart, wry excerpt you posted from the second book didn't seem like James Patterson material, and I started to wonder if I was confused. Long story short — yes. The Patterson series is Women's Murder Club and it is ... not great. Whereas this Thursday Murder Club series seems right down my street, and I've reserved the first book at the library.

A mind is a terrible thing to waste, really.

>29 rosalita: Easily done. Hope you enjoy the book, Julia.

I like the idea of this post, although my experience with the PDR varies. Posting here to try and remember where it was!
https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/reading-like-a-roman

>31 charl08: Oh, thanks for the link. My reading out loud group is a few books into the Aeneid, and I think they will find this interesting.

Happy New Penguin-strewn Thread, Charlotte. Fun! I love all the photos.

>32 ffortsa: There are some lovely images. I'm amazed that they are managing to piece together fragments of old papyrus to retrieve lost texts. Seems a (insert appropriate classical reference here) task.

>33 jnwelch: Thanks for visiting Joe.

I want to read Light Perpetual soon, Charlotte. I haven't seen any negative comments.

>31 charl08: Thanks, that's quite interesting. And gorgeous images.

>35 BLBera: I think you might like it, Beth! I was reminded of good books - Daisy Jones and the Six and (title escapes me) by Kate Atkinson (aha! Life after Life) and (for the printing bits) Parrot and Olivier in America.

>36 MissWatson: I had heard about the graffiti demonstrating literacy, but hadn't realised that it referenced books too. Although having recently read about the general awfulness of Roman slavery, in A fatal thing happened on the way to the forum, I was thinking about Emma Southon's warning about over-romanticising (is that a word?) the classical past.

Now reading Night Watchman and it's rather marvellous.

Now Thomas stood on the slab of concrete beyond the circle of the outdoor flood lamp. Looked up into the cloudless sky and cold overlay of stars. Watching the night sky, he was Thomas who had learned about the stars in boarding school. He was also Wazhashk who had learned about the stars from his grandfather, the original Wazhashk. Therefore the autumn stars of Pegasus were part of his grandfather's Mooz.

Here is an Ojibwe star map that includes Mooz:
https://web.stcloudstate.edu/aslee/OJIBWEMAP/home.html

>37 charl08: I really liked The Night Watchman and I'm glad you're enjoying it.

>38 RidgewayGirl: I am hoping I can have it back at the library soon so someone else can enjoy it sharpish.

The Gold-Rimmed Spectacles
I picked this up because it was one of those very stylish new Penguin covers, I'd not come across this author before. Bassani writes about a gay man in his small town, a doctor, in Fascist Italy. Told from the perspective of a young Jewish student, who describes how the town gradually realises the doctor is gay, and he is ostracized. Following this, his own family realises that the antisemitic policies they feared were on their way. The town doesn't come out well from this picture.

>40 charl08: The Novel of Ferrara, a collection that includes this novella, is on my wish list, so this is a reminder to get to it. The film of The Garden of the Finzi-Continis is based on another of these novellas.

>41 pamelad: Yes, and they're all in beautiful editions which is very tempting.

Another prize shortlist full of temptation.
http://www.thekitschies.com/

The Red Tentacle (Novel)
A Tall History Of Sugar by Curdella Forbes (Canongate)
The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin (Orbit)
The Lost Future Of Pepperharrow by Natasha Pulley (Bloomsbury)
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury)
The Ministry For The Future by Kim Stanley Robinson (Orbit)

The Golden Tentacle (Debut)
Sharks In The Time Of Saviours by Kawai Strong Washburn (Canongate)
The Animals In That Country by Laura Jean McKay (Scribe)
The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson (Hodder & Stoughton)
Djinn Patrol On The Purple Line by Deepa Anappara (Chatto & Windus)
Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko (Hot Key Books)

The Inky Tentacle (Cover Art)
The Arrest by Jonathan Lethem, Cover Design by Allison Saltzman and Illustration by Dexter Maurer (Atlantic Books)
Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin, Cover Design by Ben Summers (Oneworld)
Monstrous Heart by Claire McKenna, Cover Design by Andrew Davis (Harper Voyager)
The Harpy by Megan Hunter, Cover Design by Lucy Scholes and Illustration by Amy Judd (Picador)
The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin, Cover Design by Lauren Panepinto (Orbit)

And the online fiction in translation bookclub I'm in has a new website (and a new season of books)

https://borderlessbookclub.com/

And the books are available here:
https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/borderlessbookclub

I think I am most looking forward to Forty Lost Years which centres on a Republican who has to go into exile when Franco wins.

BORDERLESS BOOK CLUB
SUMMER PROGRAMME 2021.

July 15th
Nordisk Books | Fixed Ideas
8pm-9.30pm
Online

Nordisk Books present Fixed Ideas by Eline Lund Fjæren, with translator and Nordisk director Duncan Lewis

July 29th
Comma Press | The Book of Reykjavik
8pm-9.30pm
Online

August 12th
Charco Press Elena Knows
8pm-9.30pm
Online

August 26th
V&Q Books | The Blacksmith's Daughter
8pm-9.30pm
Online

September 9th
Fum d'Estampa Press | Forty Lost Years
8pm-9.30pm
Online

>44 charl08: hm. It just occurred to me to wonder if these titles are available in the US. I'll take a look at the website.

Eta: it appears that some are, or at least can be pre ordered within a reasonable timeframe.

>44 charl08: Thanks for the information about the online book club. I always have good intentions...

>45 ffortsa: Yes, there are several members who are US based. Several of the publishers also offer e-book options.

>46 BLBera: Me too. I was so tired after work I fell asleep during the last one. So a good job I keep my camera switched off in the "main room"!

The Night Watchman
I loved this novel, which takes a real historic event (attempts by the US government to cease to recognise tribes, and by extension, renege on treaty agreements for support) and creates a patchwork of characters around it.

He had been night watchman for seven months. In the beginning, his post as chairman of the Turtle Mountain Advisory Committee could be dealt with in the late afternoons and evenings. He'd been able to sleep most mornings after his shift. When lucky, like tonight, he even grabbed an additional catnap before driving to work. But every so often the government remembered about Indians. And when they did, they always tried to solve Indians, thought Thomas. They solve us by getting rid of us. And do they tell us when they plan to get rid of us? Ha and ha. He had received no word from the government. By reading the Minot Daily News, he'd found out something was up. Then Moses had to pry papers out of his contact down in Aberdeen. It had taken precious time to even get confirmation, or see the actual House Resolution stating, as its author said, that the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa was targeted by the United States Congress for emancipation. E-man-ci-pation. Eman-cipation. This word would not stop banging around in his head. Emancipated. But they were not enslaved. Freed from being Indians was the idea. Emancipated from their land. Freed from the treaties that Thomas's father and grandfather had signed and that were promised to last forever. So as usual, by getting rid of us, the Indian problem would be solved.

Asylum Road

Normal people argue, I said once, and then we had a very quiet argument in the garden centre, beside an LED Buddha fountain and a sign that read TRANQUIL OASIS. I felt such relief despite the humidity, the claustrophobia, the smell of rabbit hutch. His moods would shift abruptly, and at times I would find myself having crossed an obscure boundary into a strange place, a territory which only minutes ago had not been there.

Unsettling book that might have suffered due to being read after the Erdrich. Anya escaped Sarajevo as a small child, but the effects of war and dislocation from her parents, plus the grief of the loss of her brother seem to be expressed in her high levels of anxiety. Her relationship with Luke is an apparent place of safety. They visit her parents, still living in their wartime flat. And things start to unravel further.

Happy new thread, Charlotte!

>16 charl08: I had the same issue with The Thursday Murder Club; too many quotable quotes. It's outside my usual reading but my husband (who's not really a reader) picked it up after we saw the author on the Graham Norton show and it was a lot of fun. I'll look out for The Man Who Died Twice but it looks like it's not out in paperback yet.

I've started reading The Night Watchman too, courtesy of Netgalley, and would echo the recommendation.

I didn't like the first Erdrich novel I read much, but but it was a very long time ago, 1988/89 - think it was her second or third novel - and I now think it must have just been the wrong time, and that I might well have a totally different response now. I read The Antelope Wife in late 2011 and rated it 4.5* - and yet it's taken me nearly 10 years to start another of her books.

Erdrich is one of my favorite writers. She has a new one coming out in the fall that I am waiting for. The Night Watchman was inspired by her grandfather's experience.

>49 humouress: I don't think it's out here until September - this was an ARC. I was very happy to be sent a message through netgalley suggesting I might like to download it. For once, the emailed was not wrong.

>50 elkiedee: My memory is that The Round House got a lot of promo over in the UK: at any rate, this was the one that got my attention. I've tried to find her other books since reading that one.

>51 BLBera: That seems really quick Beth! I am not complaining though.

Visited a gorgeous NGS garden. Just some of the wide collection of plants. (Garden had been going for 45 years, so I've got some time to work with...)

>53 charl08: So beautiful, Charlotte, thanks for sharing!

Hi Charlotte! I've just finished Light Perpetual and also loved it. I was also reminded of Daisy Jones in the music-y parts, and Kate Atkinson (mostly Behind the Scenes at the Museum). His writing is so, so gorgeous that I didn't want to finish it and not have it to read any more.

>54 FAMeulstee: I thought I took loads of photos but only realised all the areas I'd not caught when I got home. They had different 'rooms' of converted spaces, really impressive.

>55 susanj67: A lovely read. Have you read much else by him? I still have a copy of Red Plenty on the shelf unread. (Not good)

Now reading two library crime novels and not really that faffed by either of them (possible book hangover from the Erdrich though). Red Widow just seems like every other spy book I've read, and The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer I am finding a bit jerky - one person narrating the original crime, another narrating the 'present day'. Maybe I'll just take a bit of a book break until my leave starts on Friday.

The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer
Gripping crime thriller, but with some clunky translation moments (and *so* long!) I also find it odd when when someone writes a book set in an English speaking country in another language. It's like writing a version of Wallander where Kenneth Branagh is in Sweden speaking English. Odd.

>40 charl08: I love those editions! I used to think I wanted to collect them, but they are rarely on special so seem to cost too much! Second hand ones do come up from time to time, so I own about ten .

Good thing you posted about the next Richard Osman book, Charlotte. I didn't realize it was out already (well, probably not here yet) but my library has it on order and I've added my name to the holds list. I really enjoyed The Thursday Murder Club.

>59 LovingLit: They're lovely, aren't they. I don't officially collect them, but sometimes these editions come home with me from the shop.

>60 Familyhistorian: It was an ARC so it sounds like your library is ahead of the curve!

>61 charl08: You've gotta watch out for those sneaky editions that follow you home — worse than stray dogs, they are.

>58 charl08: I found it odd as well the Kenneth Branagh/Sweden mix. He is so intense. It didn't work for me nearly as well as the Yellow Bird production.

>62 rosalita: Yes, they can be sneaky. I fear some might come home with me on my upcoming travels.

>63 mdoris: For me Kurt will always be Kirster Henriksson.

>63 mdoris: ditto, he did a brilliant job.

Some graphic novels came in at the library, so I read them.

In: the graphic novel
I really loved this book. The narrator is an artist struggling to make genuine connections in the city. He's not depressed, just self-centred. He lightly mocks the city and gentrification, and his own inability to make links to others. And then he tries something different. The way this is expressed in the illustrations is just beautifully done. Reminds me of Posy Simmonds (or rather, it reminded me of somebody, and I had to do a lot of searching in my library to find it, and NB, I need to make a decision re GN tag vs Graphic Novel)

Recommended.
(I covet a copy for myself)


Love the names of the coffee shops which continue throughout.

Moms
Korean graphic novel inspired by the author's mother. He asked his mum to keep a diary and then used the text to inspire this story of four friends, all women approaching retirement age. I loved that he centres older women's lives, focusing on their interests. From conflicts with other women over partners, attempting to unionise and dealing with adult children, these lives are hardly quiet. Finance is a major concern. For one woman an ex-husband drained family finances with a gambling addiction, others struggle with the expectations of younger partners.

This graphic novel was less successful for me, but has had rave reviews elsewhere. I liked that the women's experiences were intermingled, but felt the signposting for different characters' stories could have been clearer.

>66 charl08: Coffeeboarding! I love that one.

And I read a book from my own shelf!

Speak No Evil
Heartbreaker alert.
Niru lives in a fancy part of Washington with his wealthy parents, both Nigerian migrants to the US. He attends an elite school, holds an early acceptance from Harvard and is a winning runner. However, the school is pretty blind to the racism Niru experiences day to day, while his parents' expectations weight heavily on him. And then he realises he is attracted to men, a big problem for his pentecostal family.

This is a bleak story in many ways, that seemed so "now" I was surprised to read that it was first published in 2016.

This use of "you tried" is a key memory of my time trying to learn Igbo. It sums up so much in two words: I value that you had a go, but really, you're nowhere near, and I'm not sure that you're going to get there anytime soon.
Or maybe I was reading that in...

I kept pushing, my steps timed and rhythmic. I grow think up a song, Niru told me when I asked how he ran so steady, how he ignored the pain, and I play it on repeat in my head until I can't think of anything else. Then I don't feel and I'm free.

You tried, Niru said to me when I finally reached the half way. He sat on a log by the path in the small shade of a scraggly tree. Here, drink up, he said and he gave me a bottle with water sloshing around a frozen ice core. You ran here with this, I said. Of course he did.

>65 mdoris: Now I want to go back and watch them again!

>68 ursula: There are also some fun bar names too. Opening page made me laugh out loud. ("Your Friends Have Kids" bar)

Speak No Evil is among a huge pile of review books that I really need to start reading and reviewing, Bizarrely, I seem to have been allowed back in to the Amazon Vine programme recently. Less books but errm yes, there are a few now adding to my huge Vine TBR, as well as the Netgalleys.

Happy Saturday, Charlotte. I am glad you loved The Night Watchman. It feel a bit short for and I wish it would have been a lot shorter to boot. I do like the sound of the "In" GN. I am getting ready to start Factory Summers. I am a fan of Delise.

Love the garden photos, Charlotte.

>71 elkiedee: I thought it was pretty powerful, but not a light read.

>72 msf59: I could have read another book the same size from Erdrich quite happily.

>74 BLBera: It was lovely, hope to get the chance to go again. From the sound of it the owners are getting to the point where it may soon be too much for them to manage.

You got me with the two GNs, Charlotte. My library has them so onto my holds list they went.

A bit distracted from the reading.


At the V&A Dundee

>76 Familyhistorian: Hope you like them!

Consolation
Third in the series about a policeman demoted to a small community station in Australia. There's lots going on here, and I'm still enjoying Disher's description of rural Australia.

The hunt sharpened his senses. It didn't matter that it was touch-and-go country; it was a living landscape. He'd been formed by a city, its exact delineations of asphalt streets and bricks in orderly rows, but out here the angles were unpredictable. Roads shot off in unlikely directions, build ings decayed at a lean and the end less flatland was neither endless nor flat, throwing up stone reef patches or plunging into gullies. And it was a land scape charged with unheard testimony: an ochre hand stencil in a cave; a stick figure carved into a rockface; a grinding tool laid bare after a flash flood.

>78 charl08: That series was not on my radar but it sounds interesting. I'll have to see if the library here has it.

>78 charl08: Nice. And, what Julia said.

>77 charl08: Lovely trip by the look of it Charlotte. Was the Club exhibit still there? I saw it on the final 'Inside Culture' programme.

>79 rosalita: I've read the three books relatively close together and now have to wait for Disher to write another one.

>80 BLBera: The hero here is such a thoughtful character, I like it.
I've been lucky with the weather so far, was very glad I had my hat today.

>81 Caroline_McElwee: It is, Caroline. I had fun at the silent disco. Was tempted to dance around my handbag... They sent me an online evaluation, which I thought was a bit ambitious. ("Did the exhibition help you understand the way club culture used the interaction of architecture, music etc...") I was more at the level of listening to the soundtracks and admiring the creativity of the invitation designers.

Does your library have any books in the two other series by Garry Disher, or were they published too long ago? I read The Dragon Man, #1 in the Hal Challis series, years ago, and remember I liked it but not much more. I recently (April) bought a Kindle copy presumably on special offer - my crime fiction collection is in such chaos that I don't know where it is, or whether some books stored in very poor conditions are still likely to be at all readable (rather assuming the worst)

My original copy was Soho Press, but Bitter Lemon seems to have published at least the first two Hal Challis books too at some point.

>83 elkiedee: Quite possibly! I'll have to remember to have a look, thanks for the nudge.

>77 charl08: Lovely pictures, Charlotte.
I like "Thinking out loud" (are those tiles?) and the hand with the wooden ball.

>85 FAMeulstee: There were some lovely things, Anita. I would have quite happily taken home the beautiful paisley patterned shawls.

The swimmers was a collaborative art piece to mark the site's former use as a pool. It was painted, but I guess the tile appearance nods to the way a lot of Victorian pools were designed.

I finished some books. Both Scottish. Still Life is a crime novel set in Edinburgh but with travel all over, including beautiful bits of Fife. Karen Pirie investigates a skeleton in a VW and a missing person with links to a much earlier case.

"Is it another cold case? More paintings stolen from castle walls?'
'It's a cold case that has a very warm element to it. A murder this week that ties into a suspicious disappear ance ten years ago.'
'Ooh, that sounds like an episode in that series where Trevor Eve gets all shouty.'
Karen chuckled. 'If you have to get that shouty, you're not doing it right.'

Surfacing
Poet Kathleen Jamie writes about her travels, from the frozen north to parts of China, writing about memory and state power. Fascinating on working with archaeologists discovering new insight into early human communities.

The trees all around, they commune with each other you can sense it, a knowingness between them. They've been rooted here centuries already and seen it all.

A plane is passing, up in the bone-white sky, above the branches and going where? Maybe over the shrinking icecap.

Concentrate.

Green ferns in the groin of an oak. Green moss cloaking a stone. Voice of a crow. Voice of a chiding wren. A smirr of rain too soft to possess a voice. Voice of the shrew, the black slug. Voice of the forest ... Did you hear something move out the corner of your eye? The same moth come back? Or another leaf falling? You are not lost, just melodramatic. The path is at your feet, see?
Now carry on.

>86 charl08: I love Kathleen Jamie's writing - everything I've read of hers has been wonderful.

>87 Jackie_K: I'm not sure if I've read anything by her before.

Pandora's Jar
I thought this was a great read.
Haynes assigns a chapter each to women in Greek myth, from Medea to Penelope, and argues that many translations, including those for children, exaggerate the misogynistic aspects of many classical myths. I enjoyed finding out about the way in which many myths were told in different ways in the past, and the many different examples across media linked to ideas explored in Greek myth, from Beyonce and the Lego Movie to Phaedre.

We now hear Medea wailing from inside the house wishing she could die.
.... The nurse is upset by this, as we might be. Mothers don't generally go around wishing their children dead. The nurse tells the chorus that it's better to be an ordinary person rather than rich or powerful. And in Greek tragedy, at least, she is right: disaster rains down upon the high-born. You are much better off being the nurse or the tutor you're hoping to survive to the end of a play.

>88 charl08: Glad you enjoyed this one. I thought it excellent. Witty, informative and just enough snark to keep it snappy.

>77 charl08: Hooray for going somewhere and seeing things! It looks lovely, and I like the sound of the shawls too.

*lurking along*

>89 Helenliz: Yes, the snark was a plus!

>90 susanj67: Yes, have definitely missed the going somewhere and doing stuff.

>91 humouress: Thanks for visiting :-)

Just found this via Litsy. From the author of The Bromance Book Club. It made me smile.
https://www.lyssakayadams.com/men-read-romance

Hard times, shopping for books in Edinburgh.

(This shop even said they would mail them home for me: my back may yet survive the trip)

Glamorous assistant is Artemis, Bookshop Dog extraordinaire.

>93 charl08: look at that magnificent boy. Did he have good recommendations for you?

>93 charl08: Love your book minder Charlotte.

Books in the Stack

Unwell Women
The Undocumented Americans
Requiem
What you have heard is true
The Age of Mechanical Reproduction
Ain't I a Woman
Heating and Cooling
The Perpetual Race of Achilles and the Tortoise
Imperial Intimacies
To the Warm Horizon

>94 VictoriaPL: Very friendly, but no recommendations (not that I needed any encouragement).

>95 Caroline_McElwee: I love the bookshop, it's changed hands since I was there but the stock is still v good.

>93 charl08: Outstanding photo, Charlotte.

You got me with the Jamie and Pandora's Jar.

It was really nice to spend a bit of time browsing. The second hand shop I'd wanted to go to the day before was also open, but I didn't do quite as much damage there.

Love Story, With Murders
I enjoyed this unusual crime fiction set in Cardiff. Fiona has Cotard's and studied Philosophy at Cambridge, but now works for the police. After uncovering a frozen leg in a house clearance, pieces of another dismembered body are found. Are the cases linked? Can Fiona control her boredom and play by the rules of the investigation? And is her dad, an apparently reformed crook, somehow involved?

We arrive around nine thirty. A civilian vehicle, an Astra enters the car park with us. The woman who gets out of the Astra wears a red-and-white bobble hat and says she's an Export Manager. She doesn't look like a dealer in illegal arms, but maybe she didn't know that's what she was. Or maybe arms dealers like to wear Christmassy bobble hats.

>99 charl08: Thanks for reminding me I need to get back to that series, Charlotte. I read the first three and a couple of short stories and enjoyed them all.

>93 charl08: Artemis is a lovely bookshop host, Charlotte. I would be distracted from the books by such a lovely dog, but I see you found enough books :-)

>93 charl08: She's gorgeous!

>93 charl08: What a beauty! What shop is this? I must pay it a visit next time I'm in Edinburgh :)

>93 charl08: Even me, a not a dog person, thinks that's an awfully intelligent looking dog.
Nice pile of books too.

>100 rosalita: Good to hear Julia. I'm hoping to get to the others soon.

>101 FAMeulstee: She came running out as they opened up, Anita, a lovely welcome.

>102 humouress: Yes. And very friendly!

>103 Jackie_K: Lighthouse Books (near the university). It used to trade under another name, but despite new name and new owners, is still very much a great source for new and interesting books.
https://lighthousebookshop.com/

>104 Helenliz: I am not usually so much of a fan of big dogs but...

Fresh Water for Flowers
Making the most of the last few days off, I finished this library book today. A very gentle novel that I would describe as "very French". Set in a graveyard, the main character Irène looks after everyone, selling flowers to mourners and looking after those who work and grieve there. Lots of mourning, affairs and wistful looks.

I waited until Philippe Toussaint had left, on his bike, to read the back cover of L'Oeuvre de Dieu, la part du Diable. I had to read out loud: to understand the meaning of the words, I had to hear them. As though telling myself a story. I was my double: the one who wanted to learn and the one who would learn. My present and my future bent over the same book.

Why do books attract us the way people do? Why are we drawn to covers like we are to a look, a voice that seems famil iar, heard before, a voice that diverts us from our path...

>105 charl08: Thank you - Lighthouse Books is on my list already, I've heard lots about it. *makes mental note for next visit to Edinburgh*

>107 Jackie_K: I'm not surprised! I can report that Edinburgh was looking lovely in the sunshine.

Urgh. I picked up a lurgy whilst travelling (but the test result says that it is not, in fact, *that* one). Having flu in the middle of a heatwave seems really bizarre: am I feverish or is it just stinkingly hot? I had Isn't it Bromantic on autobuy and it suited the sneeze/sleep/cough/feel-sorry-for-myself cycle. Fourth book in a series based around a guys' bookclub, using romance novels as a way of challenging (and changing) their relationships.

A quote from >109 charl08:

American pasteurization laws make it impossible. What you buy in the stores is a watered-down version with none of the texture and seduction of the real thing."
Elena didn't know what those words meant in regards to cheese, but he was on a roll, so she didn't want to interrupt him.
"That is why I must operate in the dark," he said. "In the underground."
"So you're like a resistance fighter against a cheese conspiracy?"
"At the highest levels of government and dairy."

Part of my trip north was to catch up with a friend and her new(ish) baby. My gift of the board book version of Don't Worry Little Crab proved a big hit with the little one, although I think this might have had as much to do with his mum's storytelling panache as with the beautiful illustrations.

>109 charl08: Sorry to hear about your lurg Charlotte. Hope it passes soon.

>109 charl08: Wishing you a speedy recovery!

Feel better, Charlotte!

Hope you're feeling better soon! The book is beautiful. I will have a nephew to buy for soon so will have to add this to my list.

>109 charl08: Sorry to hear you're feeling rotten, Charlotte. Lurgies will be on the rise again after so long in isolation. But at least it's not *that* one. Maybe there's a market for badges that say "Don't worry - I've tested negative".

I saw someone on BookTube talking about the fourth Bromance Book Club novel, which made me want to get on with book 2...

Get well soon, Charlotte.

>111 charl08: I love it! It looks like a great book.

Love the little crab images. Aww.
Hope you're feeling better with the lurgy soon. I had a cold (just a cold) a couple of weeks ago and it was such a surprise! Not had a cold in a very long time, probably as a side effect of not seeing anyone in months.

Thanks for the kind well wishes everyone. I did have a very uncomfortable couple of days: npt helped by the heat level in the house which was just unpleasant (although in comparison to most places, probably not much to mention!). Sleep seemed to be the best solution. So a great weekend (ha). The garden looks a bit wild, hoping to feel a bit more up to managing it this week.

Currently reading The Royal Secret, continuing this historical crime series.

There is unfortunately no record of what happened to Samuel Pepys's lion.

Another great entry to the series The Royal Secret continues the rather dirty and dissolute experiences of Cat and James, as they get caught up in a spy case linked to Charles II and his sister, who is married to the King of France's brother. There's also a lion, although it's rather mangy and doesn't have a great time.

A list! A (Booker 2021) list!

A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam (Sri Lankan)

Second Place by Rachel Cusk (British/Canadian)

The Promise by Damon Galgut (South African)

The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris (American)

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (British)

An Island by Karen Jennings (South African)

A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson (Canadian)

No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood (American)

The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed (British/Somali)

Bewilderment by Richard Powers (American)

China Room by Sunjeev Sahota (British)

Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead (American)

Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford (British)

Via
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/jul/27/booker-prize-reveals-globe-spannin...

>121 charl08: I've just been reading the Telegraph article about the list ("For once, the judges have ignored experimental fiction and plumped for novels that are - shock, horror - a pleasure to read"). I looked up some of the titles in the library catalogue and discovered that BorrowBox now has ebooks as well as audiobooks. How did I not know this before?! I've filled up my reserve slots (only 4) already. They also have The Ashes of London, sitting there available to borrow immediately.

>122 susanj67: Ashes of London? The first in the series? Imagine that...

Borrowbox replaced the previous online system for us so it's my source for e everything from the library.

I am so enjoying Jennifer Crusie. How did I not pick up her books before? I'm reading Welcome to Temptation not Paradise, which is making me laugh, despite the (horrors) occasional dated references eg video stores and (Bill) Clinton.

"He'd been dating Georgia Funk for ever," Clea said. "But on Saturday night, after the cast party, Frank took me out to the Tavern for a Coke, which, let me tell you, was big stuff. And he parked in the back which is pretty much Temptation's lovers' lane, and he made his move, and that's when I lost my virginity." Clea drained her second glass.
"Ouch," Sophie said.
"He promised me he was through with Georgia," Clea said. "But when I got to school on Monday, she was wearing this tiny chip of an engagement ring."
"Maybe we could film a murder mystery," Amy said.

I'm a big fan of Jennifer Crusie, too, Charlotte. Is Welcome to Temptation the first of hers you've read? My favorite is Bet Me - I think you'd like that one.

>125 katiekrug: I think so, Katie. I'm really enjoying this one, so it definitely won't be the last. Thanks for the recommendation.

I'm trying to finish The Living Mountain. I thought I would love this book, but I think it's suffering from my raised expectations. I like walking but am not that bothered about getting to high places.

The Library of Unrequited Love

.The inexhaustible milk of human culture, right here, within our reach. Help yourself, it's free. Borrow, because as much as accumulation of material things impoverishes the soul, cultural abundance enriches it. My culture doesn't stop where someone else's begins. In fact, the library is the place where the greatest solidarity between humans takes place.

A spiky novella told in the form of a monologue as a librarian details to a trapped customer the benefits of reading, her dry life and her feelings about the profession. Not exactly in the vein of most of the books about books I read: this librarian is not entirely convinced the books are on her side (and her colleagues definitely aren't).

...there was one thing they didn't manage to do, in the Revolution. Oh, I don't blame them, they didn't have any computers in those days, but it's the Big Catalogue. In 1789, they confiscated twelve million books from the aristocrats and the clergy, and they thought they'd distribute them to public libraries. That's a terrific idea. You have to give them that. Admit it. Thank you, I'm glad you agree. But alas, if you want to know the rest, they never got round to it.

>121 charl08: Oh look, another list I'm no going to get too. Mind you, I do have one of those on the Book bullet list, so maybe I'll get to it.

>129 Helenliz: Ha! I've made a few reservations at the library, and I'm currently reading the Cusk one. I'd heard good things about Great Circle so looking forward to reading that when it comes in at the library. My library system had copies of most of the books, so I'm hoping to get my hands on at least some of them soon.
On the other hand, the Powers one isn't even published yet (in the UK?)

>124 charl08: BorrowBox seems to have more of a UK feel to it, which is very different from Overdrive. I'm trying to be strong but...we all know how that usually works out.

>130 charl08: My library over the road has The Sweetness of Water, which I'm going to look for at lunchtime when I take some books back. I checked the catalogue yesterday and it was "On the shelf" and it still seems to be this morning. The main challenge is finding *which* shelf, as always.

>109 charl08: I haven't dropped by in a while so I hope you're all better by now.

Hmm ... *makes note* Bromance Book Club.

>110 charl08: Funny! :0)

>111 charl08: Cute.

>120 charl08: Poor lion.

>124 charl08: 🤦‍♀️

Borrowbox, hmm. I wonder if I can get it.

>131 susanj67: Founded by an Australian company (Bolinda). Hope you find the book on the shelf...

>132 humouress: I have a cough that sounds like I smoke 50 a day, but have now had two negative tests, so...

Charlotte, I am so happy that you are enjoying Welcome to Temptation - that is one of my all time favorites, and I have read it many times. It always makes me laugh, and I love that it also has a mystery. I have read most of her stuff - Tell Me Lies is another good one. And Faking It is a follow up to Temptation that tells Sophie's brother's story. Not as good as Temptation, but still a fun read.

>121 charl08: Oh! Thanks for the list!

Sorry about the cough. Hoping you feel better soon.

>133 charl08: Sadly I got there, looked up the book again and it was "Being transferred between libraries" so someone must have requested it after I checked this morning. I did find some other things,though...

I hope the cough goes soon.

>135 susanj67: booo. How very dare they!

Hoping the cough goes. Or do you have a sexy, husky voice to go with it? I'm always slightly miffed when I return to my normal register after a bout of sexy voice.

>134 Crazymamie: Oh, now I am thinking that I might just buy myself a paper copy. Because I could totally see myself rereading it.

>135 susanj67: Pah. Hope another copy appears sharpish.

>136 Helenliz: Nope. Not so much sultry as that guy in the desert in the mint advert!

Bet Me
Thanks to Katie for this recommendation. I think I am going to try and read something by someone else next though. I resented work all day today, and wanting to get back to this book was the main reason. Too much fun!

I'm so glad you liked it!

Hoping you do buy your own copy, Heather. Sounds like I need to read Bet Me - that is one of the few I haven't read by her. Not sure how I missed it.

>139 Crazymamie: ha! Bet Me is the only Jennifer Cruise that I’ve read. I enjoyed it!
I love how we are all so different.

>138 katiekrug: I wondered why neither book had been made into a film, think they'd be a fun watch.

>139 Crazymamie: I'm grateful for Katie's recommendation. Yours next!

>140 VictoriaPL: Me too. I found her website, she's got a blog which turned into a bit of a rabbit hole for me last night. Lots of stuff about how writing works etc.

Second Place (Booker longlist)

Unimpressed by this. I've liked Cusk's other books in this "trilogy" but not this one. A woman writes to a friend about an artist she hosted on her property. He turns out to be less than grateful, and she has a bit of a meltdown.

I sat there on the bed and went back over my conversation with L, and thought again about the feeling his attention had given me, which was a golden feeling of health. Oh, why was living so painful, and why were we given these moments of health, if only to realise how burdened with pain we were the rest of the time? Why was it so difficult to live day after day with people and still remember that you were distinct from them and that this was your one mortal life?

Raven: Teen Titans

This was a fun quick GN read firmly in the YA bracket. It's somehow linked to Marvel but I don't think you have to know the connections to enjoy the read. Raven loses her memory in a car accident and is sent to live with family in New Orleans. There are the usual new school dilemmas, as well as those of the fantastical power variety too.

Ms Marvel Army of One (Originally published as 2015/1-12)

Well, these were good, but I got to the second half and realised I'd read those ones. I would like clear volume numbers on these things in big numbers.
Like an academic journal, basically, would be my ideal. Can't think why they haven't gone for this approach...(!)
Fun stuff here with Kamala dealing with the ongoing life/superheroing dilemma.

(August 2nd)

Travelling by book (from The Fortune Men)

The masjid had been a welcome discovery after all of that. The 'asr call to prayer bounded off the onion-domed building, pigeons and black kites stirred the inert cloudless sky, intricate tiles adorned every surface of the masjid. Between two grand pillars, surrounding the wide pool of water, crouched a crew of maimed beggars, eating slowly and politely from a shared platter of rice and watery dhal. It was all peaceful enough to move something in him. When a local told them in a mix of Hindi and Arabic that the masjid was known as 'the ship of the world to come' because it had been built on water, Mahmood had stored away the phrase in the part of his mind where he kept things of beauty.

>145 charl08: ahh, Jimmy. I have those old editions too, as well as the lovely Library of America set.

>147 Caroline_McElwee:: I have some quite old James Baldwin editions too, though I've replaced a couple with Penguin Modern Classics in better condition too, and I now have some of them on my Kindle. While officially I only collect Persephone and Virago Modern Classics in paper, actually when I trawl charity shops or secondhand I always check out any Classics type section - Oxfam Bookshops have them normally and some other shops occasionally do, and there are a number of publishers of attractive editions, often introductions by other writers etc - so publishers whose books I will get in Kindle form if possible but hone in on the dead tree versions - Penguin Modern Classics, Oxford World's classics (my grandparents worked for OUP), Capuchin, Eland (esp red and white books), NYRB, Harvester, Women's Press (black and white stripy spines, and also their science fiction series), Faber Finds, Pandora, Feminist Press (US) - and in crime fiction, Bitter Lemon and Soho Press. This isn't a complete list. My dad has given me a couple of Library of America volumes, think one is Edith Wharton, and yes, they're beautiful and collectable.

I read Another Country by mistake from the library when I was 14 - it was a hardback copy with no dustjacket and no information and I think I thought it was linked to a film starring Rupert Everett (blushes with embarrassment|). But it was a lucky accident because I really loved it - I don't know why but I loved it - and I probably wouldn't have picked it up at that point on the strength of any blurb.

>148 elkiedee: My grandfather worked for OUP as well - I have lots of wonderful treasures from his book collection. I collect VMC too - the green ones. But there are certainly some beautiful editions from so many different publishers.

>149 JayneCM: When did he work there? I have a few books from my grandparents, and my sister who only lives a couple of miles away has some. I think my shelves of children's books upstairs probably include some OUP children's books in paperback that were bought for me - Ransom for a Knight by Barbara Leonie Picard - and some that might have just been absorbed into my collection. I'm sure this was part pf my love of historical fiction (shared by my mum and her sisters).

When we visited Oxford I spent many hours reading bits of the Oxford Junior Enncylopaedia - my favourite was Volume 5 which was the biographical one. That's at my sister's house. I think Winne worked in reference books - I'm not sure whether the children's reference section was separate or just part of wider reference.

>150 elkiedee: This was OUP Australia. He started as a publisher's representative in 1946 and was Deputy Manager Australia when he retired in 1981.
I inherited his Oxford Classics collection - the little ones with the super fine paper. I also have a fantastic collection of biographies that OUP published and a collection of myths, legends and fairy tales from different countries/cultures.
As well as other random assortments. He always kept letters he received from authors in the books, so I have a few of those as well.
He certainly inspired my love of books. There was nothing I loved more than going to my grandparents on the weekend and hanging out in his library. When I was young, he gave me my first historical fiction - Rosemary Sutcliff's The Eagle of the Ninth sequence - and I have loved the genre ever since.
And I used to love reading encyclopedias as well! I remember when I was about 8, my ambition was to read through all the volumes from A-Z!

>151 JayneCM: That's really interesting - he must have started at a similar time to my grandfather, who lived in Oxford but was born in New Zealand and came to the UK as a Rhodes scholar in 1936. He then enlisted to fight in the war, and switched after a year from the British army to the NZ army, partly because of a principle/promise to his father who was born in Ireland and was horrified that his Dan would fight for the British (Dan, my grandfather, saw himself as fighting against fascism rather than fighting for a country/empire).

My mum also grew up with a number of Rosemary Sutcliff's books as occasional presents etc. As she had sisters, 4 years older and 17 months younger, some of these may well have ended up with my aunt, or cousins. I also have a lot of ex library hardbacks from 1980s sales (my own teen years) - those books aren't in especially good condition but I sometimes see very similar sounding copies listed in Amazon Marketplace for quite eyewatering amounts of money.

Sorry Charlotte for this thread hijack!

>148 elkiedee: I came to Baldwin at aged 14 too Luci. Unusually for my era, I had a mixed race English teacher who introduced him. I read Go Tell it on the Mountain and Giovanni's Room first, then Another Country and his wonderful essays.

I've reread all of those more than once, and some short stories, but still have a couple of later novels not yet read.

Well I feel a bit miffed as my dad worked for OUP's rivals for many years and we don't have lots of beautiful children's books sitting on the family shelves. We never ran out of scrap paper to draw on though, so there was that.

Hi Charlotte - Too bad the Cusk was a disappointment.

The graphic samples are hilarious.

Hi Charlotte! I also read Baldwin in High School. I was very impressed, and still am, but I think his depiction of women tends to leave something to be desired.

>152 elkiedee: Yes, I apologise also Charlotte!

My grandfather was at Lothian before the war. He was captured at the fall of Singapore and spent years in Changi. That is a whole story of its own, of course.
I can see why an Irishman would prefer his son fought in NZ rather than with the British.
I have quite a few of those hardback editions - it is amazing the prices they fetch!

>154 charl08: My dad was the head of computers at his work, in the days when a computer took up a whole room which had to have special air-conditioning! We used to have tonnes of that printer paper they had back then - the sheets with holes on the side and perforations to separate the sheets. It was great as you could keep the sheets together and make huge banner-style drawings. My sister and I once tried to copy the Bayeux Tapestry with the paper spread down the hallway. Don't ask how much of a nerd I was - all I can say is I blame the books!! :)

>155 BLBera: I don't know if it was just my mood, reflecting on it. There's some change afoot at work and as usual, I am dealing with the emotions around it in a completely well managed way. (Sarcasm)

>156 banjo123: I've never got very far with his writing (not a comment on the writing, but on my ability to put books down and get distracted by the shiny new ones), but I do love this quote.

>157 JayneCM: No need to apologise at all.
I love the Bayeux tapestry idea. When I did work with kids we used to do quite a few activities with rolls of plain wallpaper - something about the space available that helped get creativity going.

I've never read any Baldwin, but I've seen him mentioned quite a lot on here. Recommendations on where to start?

>157 JayneCM: When I worked at various newspapers, we would sell the end bits of the press rolls to the public (once they get down to a certain point there's not enough paper left to actually print on). Lots of preschools and kindergartens loved them for messy crafts. It was a great way to recycle them.

>159 Helenliz: That sounds like a question for Caroline's thread, Helen! (ETA I would also be interested in the answer though!)

>160 rosalita: I love this.

I just read about this new consultation on changes to copyright law.
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/uks-future-exhaustion-of-intellectua...

UK publishers are not impressed (clue in the campaign title).
https://www.saveourbooks.org.uk/

From a letter to the Times
"Weakening the UK’s copyright laws would impair our ability to earn an income which would have a devastating impact on this country’s vibrant, world-renowned book industry. If writing becomes a profession only accessible to the wealthy, important stories will not be told.’"

The Sad Ghosts Club
Sweet YA GN that explores depression and shame using ghost costumes. There's lots of hope here too, for the power of sharing /supporting each other.

Well, in a reading slump. In not unconnected news, my mum's tested positive for COVID. Weirdly, this is after I tested negative twice, and my dad has also tested negative. Both my parents have had the vaccination, so not quite as terrifying as it would have been last year. But still scary. One of mum's friends is in the hospital.
(ETA Less importantly obviously) I am stuck at home until at least Wednesday (if I don't get symptoms).

>164 charl08: Oh dear. On many counts. Hope that she's OK and not feeling too bad. Let's hope that the cabin fever doesn't get too severe.

>164 charl08: Oh no - all the best to you and your mum. I hope she recovers quickly.

>164 charl08: Oh my indeed. I hope you stay symptom free Charlotte, and that your mother's case is mild. We had a neighbour in hospital with it for a week, but she is home now.

Adding my voice to the oh dears - I hope that isolation doesn't have you climbing the walls, and I really hope that your mum's symptoms are mild. Thank goodness indeed for the vaccinations.

I'm taking a BB on The Sad Ghost Club.

SO sorry about your mom, Charlotte. I hope her symptoms remain mild and you and Dad stay negative.

Fingers crossed for all of you! Hope your mum is feeling better soon.

Oh dear! Stay well.

Oh Charlotte. I'm sorry your mom has COVID. I hope it is a light case and that you and your father don't get it.

Sorry work is stressful right now as well.

>163 charl08: Well, that's one way of looking at it.

Take care.

Charlotte, I'm sorry to hear about your mum. I, too, hope that she has only mild symptoms and that you and your dad continue to test negative.

Best wishes to your mom for a speedy recovery!

Sending lots of good wishes to your mum and you, Charlotte.

Wishing you and your parents all the best - a speedy asymptomatic recovery for your Mom especially.

Thanks everyone.
It turns out that mum's friend in the hospital hadn't had the vaccine. Not sure why. Hoping she is able to come home soon. Mum is coughing a lot but not seen the scarier end of the symptoms (touch wood). Dad and me still fine (touch more wood).

I finished Elena Knows for the book group on Thursday. It's a big women's right to choose polemic, wrapped up in a crime novel. I am wondering what the take on it will be.

>177 charl08: - Good news, Charlotte. Just a little more proof (as if it's needed) that the vaccines are doing what they are meant to do. So good that you and your dad are doing fine and that your mum's symptoms and *illness* so far is mild. Sadly, proof is not something anti-vaxxers seem ready to listen to, for whatever misguided reasons they may have.

Oh no. Scary. I'm glad your mother's not showing other symptoms, but unsettling that even vaccinated folks can still get sick. I hope she recovers quickly and completely.

>177 charl08: Wishing your mother a speedy recovery, Charlotte. And I hope your father and you stay fine.

Glad to hear your mum is doing better and the rest of you remain symptom-free. Yes, a testament to the power of the vaccines, and thank goodness for that.

Good news that your mom is better and that you and your dad aren't sick. Fingers crossed.

>178 jessibud2: Yes, very glad we got access to the vaccine (and so quickly in my parents' case especially).

>179 ffortsa: Yes - I really don't want to think about what it might have been like without the jabs.

>180 FAMeulstee: Thanks Anita. I have my fingers crossed, etc!

>181 rosalita: And to the NHS system which means they are free to everyone, I guess. Work is now hosting a walk in vaccination centre, so hopefully more people will be taking it up too.

>182 BLBera: Beth, I am relieved by all the health stuff. But also to be allowed out of the house!

The Secret to Superhuman Strength


So because of everything healthwise, plus ongoing COVID restrictions on travel and some other changes going on I have been feeling pretty blargh. This seemed to be hitting the reading too. I saw this on offer at Blackwells (who are still doing free postage for books) and snapped up my own copy. I really enjoyed (if that's the right word for such a bleak story) Fun Home. This isn't quite so dark, I think, but still manages to ask important questions about managing work and life. I'm not someone who skis or has ever even tried karate but her accounts of getting swept away by a new fitness craze were fun to find out about. I also loved the footnotes, always a winner for me.
Recommended.

ETA I left out all the stuff about romantic / transcendental writers and their relationship with the natural world (especially mountains). Still trying to decide which (all?) to add to the wishlist.

Hi, Charlotte. I just learned the news about your Mom. So sorry to hear that. I hope she recovers quickly.

ETA- I just finished the new Bechdel and it was a 5 star read. My favorite GN of the year...so far.

>184 charl08: Thanks Mark. I do appreciate all the time people have taken to write a kind message, it does make a difference.

Who Watcheth
I've been terribly lax with this series about the Swedish cop Irene Huss (there is a sort of link here to Bechdel's book - can anyone spot it?) . This one is 9th in the series, so her kids have left home and the frantic combination of work and motherhood has relaxed a bit. (Fairly sure they were just teenagers in the last one I read before this)

Irene is on the case of a mysterious killer, who doesn't appear to have any links to his victims, whose bodies are found wrapped in plastic and left in churchyards. And then strange things start happening at home: is she next? I really like how Irene is such a strong figure, and her husband never questions this, unlike in a couple of British crime things I've read recently. She goes out at night with the dog and a torch and her husband jokes 'I'll leave this to the police'. It's not that she's never scared, she is, just that it's not her default.

>186 charl08: I like the Irene Huss books too. I think you're substantially ahead of me.

The Irene Huss books sound like ones I would like. I'll have to look for them.

Wasn't The Secret to Superhuman Strength good? I laughed at some of the fitness parts.

>187 ffortsa: I've jumped ahead and missed some in the middle there. I found her teenage kids a bit annoying.

>188 BLBera: Yes, made me laugh too. She was very willing to laugh at her own obsessions.
I envied her the school with a pool. We had to get the bus, and by the time we'd got in it felt like it was time to come home!

I read two from the Booker longlist. Both were good reads, so I hope the Booker wand means they get lots of extra readers.

The Fortune Men is based on a true story, of a Somali sailor who was hanged on the flimsiest of evidence following the awful murder of a shopkeeper in Cardiff. Mohamed beautifully evokes a lost community of poor Welsh and migrant workers living on the docks (Tiger Bay). She traces Mattan's life as the son of a trader, to his escape down the coast and eventual career as a merchant sailor. This is interspersed with the story of the Volackis, a family of women who had just about survived the war, the new generation negotiating what being both Welsh and Jewish meant. They are no more in a position to argue with the police than the accused.

Nothing you couldn't buy under that tall vaulted roof: fake gold, squawking chickens, embellished rugs, toupees and henna, Hindu gods and technicolour paintings of Jesus and Mary, oily perfumes and incense sticks, defanged cobras and bleat ing white kid goats. The masjid had been a welcome discovery after all of that. The 'asr call to prayer bounded off the onion-domed building, pigeons and black kites stirred the inert cloudless sky, intricate tiles adorned every surface of the masjid. Between two grand pillars, surrounding the wide pool of water, crouched a crew of maimed beggars, eating slowly and politely from a shared platter of rice and watery dhal. It was all peaceful enough to move something in him. When a local told them in a mix of Hindi and Arabic that the masjid was known as 'the ship of the world to come' because it had been built on water, Mahmood had stored away the phrase in the part of his mind where he kept things of beauty.

A Town Called Solace
This book made me want to order the rest of Lawson's back catalogue, as I think I've only read her first one before. In a 1970s small town in rural Canada, a teenage girl has gone missing. Her little sister Clara desperately waits for her to come home. Her elderly neighbour is in the hospital, and a strange man has moved into the neighbour's house. How Lawson brings all these threads together is so quietly done, but heartbreaking. Luke's treatment by his mother, and the replacement family he finds next door, made me worry that this was not going to End Well, so I was relieved at the glimmers of lighter times to come at the end of the story.

Driving home he was struck by the thought that, increasingly, his life prior to coming north seemed to be taking on the quality of an old movie, one in which he'd been deeply engrossed while watching it but which now seemed trivial, unconvincing and profoundly lack ing in either colour or plot. Solace had colour and plot in spades, maybe too much. In every way it was coming to seem more real than Toronto, with its end less malls and traffic jams and high-powered jobs.

Though maybe, if he went back to Toronto, the same would be true in reverse. Maybe when he'd been back for a couple of months he'd find that it was Solace that seemed unreal, its unremarkable streets and stores like something from a dream, its dramatic landscape fading to nothing, like a holiday photo left in the sun.

Booker list- still to read
A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam (Sri Lankan)
The Promise by Damon Galgut (South African)
The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris (American)
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (British)
An Island by Karen Jennings (South African)
Bewilderment by Richard Powers (American)
China Room by Sunjeev Sahota (British)
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead (American)

Read (in order of preference)
A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson (Canadian)
Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford (British)
The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed (British/Somali)
No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood (American)
Second Place by Rachel Cusk (British/Canadian)

I'm impressed that you've read 5 already.

I downloaded the library ebook app on my phone, as I can't read epub books on my Kindle Paperwhites, and have borrowed a few books including A Town Called Solace. (Others aren't Booker listed titles).

Islington seems to have 4 dead tree copies of each title on order, including additional copies of Klara and the Sun - I joined some waiting lists for a few of the titles but am a bit unnerved to find myself #2 on most and #1 for one book - I expect I'll just have to cancel some as if the whole order turns up at once it would just be silly for me to add all in one go to my tottering library book piles.

Great comments on both The Fortune Men and A Town Called Solace, Charlotte. I'm reading Great Circle right now, quite a tome (about 600 pages). Still, it's starting off well. I've only read Klara and the Sun and No One Is Talking about This.

>192 elkiedee: It's a bit of a cheat: I read No One is Talking About This and Light Perpetual before the list came out.

Re the orders: I wish they could add estimates of when the book is likely to come into stock, as it would help me work out how many to ask for, I think.

Isn't there some cosmic rule that says no matter how carefully you plan it out, and no matter that you're first in line for one book, and 47th in line for another, all library holds must come available at the same time?

>195 RidgewayGirl: That's often how it feels!

>193 BLBera: I am quite intimidated by the size of The Great Circle, Beth.

Sorry to hear about your Mom. Hope she recovers quickly. Nice job on reading the Bookers! I have only read Klara and the Sun which I loved. Enjoy the weekend!

>197 charl08: It is a tome, Charlotte. However, the beginning is promising.

>195 RidgewayGirl: >196 elkiedee: I think so re the cosmic rule.

I didn't get to pick the latest ones up on Saturday so will have to adjust my work day or wait until Thursday and late opening.

>198 Berly: She seems all but fully recovered, which given that she has asthma and is over 70, seems like a win for the vaccine.

>199 BLBera: I need to get on and pick this up.

The Basel Killings
The first in this Swiss crime series to be translated into English. Hunkeler is coming to the end of his career on the Basel police force, sidelined for bar (ETA or rather, bad behaviour. But it's linked to a bar) behaviour. His close knowledge of the town's community proves useful, however, as he tries to understand the links between the death of a prostitute and a tramp. The tramp turns out to have half a million in a private account, and to have been quietly driving long distance lorries on known drug routes. And someone saw two Albanian guys with crime links waiting in a local bar on the night of the killing.

"Then I'll buy a bottle of wine, if that's OK," Hunkeler said. It was very much OK. And the food Hunkeler ordered was good as well. Sauerkraut with juniper berries and bacon, and watery potatoes to go with it. He liked sitting there and talking to writers. They talked about their fellow author Rainer Brambach, who'd died twenty years ago. Simply fallen off his bicycle and dead, the best of them all. About Dieter Fringeli, who'd drunk himself to death. About Guido Bachmann, who'd succumbed to whiskey. About Adelheid Duvanel, who'd gone out into the wood and lain down to die.
"Basically, Basel's a poet's town," Lutz maintained, "full of hidden beauty, full of poetry. Though hardly anyone notices. That's why the authors in this town come to a bad end."

If you like your crime fiction with a side order of social commentary this might be the read for you. Underneath the claims to democratic discussion, claims Schneider, is a society that has failed to come to terms with the legacies of decades of anti-traveller policies, continuing discrimination against migrants, and a tendency to care more about appearances (where the police drink) than in solving crime.

>200 charl08: Charlotte, that's great news about your mum. Hooray for the vaccine!

>202 susanj67: I still can't quite get my head round dad and I escaping (touch wood).

The Cinderella Deal
My fast gallop through Jennifer Crusie's back catalogue continues. This one was straight romance rather than crime/romance.

Glad to hear Mum's on the mend.
Vaccine for the win!

>204 Helenliz: What Helen said.

Glad you are continuing to enjoy your romp through Crusie's canon. I read most of them pre-LT, so no record of what I read or when. I remember liking The Cinderella Deal, but I love the ones that include a mystery the best. Have you read Fast Women yet?

I do like my crime fiction with social commentary, Charlotte. Great comments >201 charl08:. I'll check this one out.

>204 Helenliz: Yes, it's been remarkable really.
Did your new Peirene book arrive? I'm building up a backlog!

>205 Crazymamie: I've not read that one. I may have just ordered a copy though. Biblio.com prices were too tempting for me to resist.

>206 BLBera: I'd be intrigued to hear what you make of it, Beth. I know little or nothing about Switzerland but this was definitely not the chocolate/clocks version of that part of the world.

>207 charl08:, yes, this week. I just finished Yesterday which was the last one, so I'm not feeling too bad on that front!

A Conspiracy of Violence
I've enjoyed some of Gregory's other books so picked up the first of this series on Audible. Set in the Restoration London. Thomas Challoner has returned from the Netherlands where he has been working as a spy for the (British) state. He's trying to get new work without much success, and is pressured by his girlfriend to get a steady job and settle down. He's asked to investigate some missing gold, hidden by one of the leading parliamentarians when they fled the country at the end of the Commonwealth. But others are more interested in tracking down conspirators against the King. It all gets very murky, but it's a look at a period that saw such a rapid change from one system to another. Gregory makes a convincing case for the make dos and work arounds, temporary alliances and shifting allegiances of those in the ranks below.

>208 Helenliz: Impressive stuff Helen. I should follow your lead. It would probably help if I stopped ordering other books. Ahem.

>207 charl08: >208 Helenliz: I have a backlog too, but just started the new one.

My library has a copy, Charlotte, so I hope to get to it yet this year. We'll see. :)

>210 charl08: I'm behind on my book subscription, so any claims to smugness can rapidly be dispelled!

>211 Caroline_McElwee: Thanks for that, Caroline.

>212 BLBera: I won't hold you to that Beth! I know how that goes.

>213 Helenliz: Good luck with that then Helen!

Hole in the Heart

This graphic memoir is entirely in black and white. Henny Beaumont's third child was born with Down's syndrome, after reassurances that the pregnancy was healthy. Beaumont details all the grief that followed as she and her family dealt with changed expectations. Beth needed open heart surgery once she was big enough. The starkness of the emotions is sometimes hard to read, but the story is very much one of learning and adapting as a family. Plus some people being rubbish to Beth at school.

>177 charl08: how is your mum? Pretty full on to have an official diagnosis! I hope she recovers well

>216 LovingLit: Thanks Megan. Pretty much back to normal. The tests are everywhere here now: you can even pick up a set from your local library!

Good to hear your mom has recovered.

>218 BLBera: Yes. Big sighs of relief all round.

Book mail today.
Stories of Your Life and Others (blamed on Litsy)
Fast Women
Josephine The theory is this is going to help my French...

OH, Fast Women is good fun!

>220 katiekrug: I just finished Manhunting, I really enjoy her sense of humour. I went on her website and apparently some of her books were out of print for a while, but have been reissued. I am not sure if that's why the second hand copies are reasonably easy to get hold of.

I am not really doing very much in terms of proper reviews, am I?!

I've been mostly distracted from the books by pressing "next episode" on a Korean series I started watching on Netflix, Hospital Playlist. It involves far too much wothy doctors/patients crying to be something I think I'd watch if it was in English, but I'm almost taking notes re the food discussions, which happen every episode. I am tempted when lockdown ends to go on a trip to Seoul just to try all these different dishes (not many Korean restaurants near me). Plus one of the characters goes camping (on a wooden platform, which seems like cheating to me, but maybe is because of ticks?) and the scenery is amazing. (Query: do Korean restaurants deliver to campsites? Another query: can I manage on a holiday only using vocabulary learned via a medical comedy/drama?)

I went to see a gallery exhibition in Tate Liverpool for the first time in ages. Don McCullin's photos were fascinating, although I found the wartime ones a bit too much and decided to skip the wall about his Biafran War experience altogether. I nearly managed to escape the shop with postcards only.

https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-liverpool/exhibition/don-mccullin

>221 charl08: "Nearly managed to escape the shop with postcards only"? That implies that you bought other things, perhaps ... a book or two? Do tell!

>22 FAMeulstee: My thoughts exactly.

Hello, Charlotte! Loved reading your thoughts on the Korean show you've been watching. Craig says the wooden platform is probably about insects and... snakes. YIKES!

>221 charl08: I think medical vocabulary would be immensely helpful!

My other half and I briefly took a night school course in Japanese (a refresher for him, a totally new experience for me), and our instructor taught us fairly quickly the words for all the demonstrative pronouns (this, that, those, these). Her thinking was that it would make it easier to go to a store, for example, and be able to say "I want that please" and point, rather than racking your brains for the word for "apple".

>222 rosalita: Whoever buys the books in for the Tate shop should get a prize. It's always really tempting. I bought (another) book about women artists. It's one of those little hardback books that I always find hard to resist.

>223 Crazymamie: Argh. Snakes eh. I might pass on the nice view then.

>224 rabbitprincess: That makes sense. I had a laminated card for Portuguese dishes which worked on much the same principle for a trip to Lisbon.

Oops, I forgot it's bookclub this week. I better get reading The Blacksmith's Daughter.
https://borderlessbookclub.com/programme

>226 charl08: That looks interesting. It says it is the first in a trilogy. Do you know if they have all been translated?

Hi Charlotte! I haven't visited in a while because your thread moves so fast that if I haven't managed to keep up, it's a bit scary to jump in again ;0)

I'm glad your mum's better now and that the virus passed you and your dad by.

>192 elkiedee: If you're borrowing library e-books on Overdrive, I can read my Overdrive on my desktop in another tab (because Apple has switched Macs to 64 bit rather than 32 bits - or something like that - the app no longer works unfortunately). It's a lot easier on the eyes than my phone screen.

>228 humouress: Thanks, I prefer reading on my iphone screen to my laptop (PC, not Mac), but I prefer reading eink on my Kindle ideally. My real issue is about glasses and getting a new eyet test.

>229 elkiedee: Yes, I'm in a similar position. I have to enlarge the font on my phone so much that it only fits a handful of lines and I have to swipe constantly.

I think my library will (now) let me transfer books to Kindle but, having not done it so far, I'm too lazy to go through the process :0)

>227 JayneCM: I'm hoping to find out more at the book group meeting on Thursday. The publisher's rep usually talks a bit at the start about how they came to publish the translation. The translator also speaks about how they came to the job, and how they found the process of doing it. The last one was unusual, it had been one of the first books the translator read from Argentina, and then she was asked to translate it some ten years later.

>228 humouress: Thanks! Always interesting to hear how other people use these things.

>231 charl08: I did read an article that said it took a long time to come to translation. Hopefully you may learn more!

Hi, Charlotte. Wow! You have been reading some very good books. I want to read the new Lawson. I have not read her in years. What did you think of Second Place. I was really impressed.

Hole in the Heart also sounds good.

>232 JayneCM: I need to get the book read. The questions have arrived for the discussion and I'm only half way through.

>233 msf59: Grandpa Mark! Your new arrival is super cute.
Bookswise, I've enjoyed Rachel Cusk's other ones, but this did not do it for me, Mark. At all. Glad it worked for you though.

Fast Women
This was fun! Lots of references to classic detective stories, amongst the usual Crusie set up of a woman rethinking her life in a small town. Plus some unwanted discoveries in freezers. Made me remember how much I liked my palm pilot though.

So glad to read that your mom's recovering, and that you and your dad stayed health.

You have gotten some good reading. I am looking forward to the new Bechdel.

>235 banjo123: Thanks Rhonda.

I wasn't going to book for this literature festival, and then I saw that Sarah Hall is speaking...
https://litfest.org/

Well, I got home on Thursday night with a cracking headache so missed bookclub. I'll have to catch up with the podcast.

I finished The Sweetness of Water which was a lovely read, if a little bleak. The novel centres on a small southern town just after the end of the Civil War. One white man has always gone his own way (with the money to do so) and when he meets two freed men in the forest on his property he hires them at fair wages to help him grow a new crop. This doesn't go down well with their former owner, or the rest of the town. For me this book was remarkable in recreating a moment that was simultaneously full of so much promise but also crippling fear.

The idea he'd long cherished that of his mother living elsewhere, perhaps even in the North - rang true only to the side of him that still entertained fanciful notions. He would see her walking up a ahead on a dusty trail, a woman with black hair like a nest upon her head, her primrose dress alight in the eye of the sun; or imagine her in the woman getting water from the pump on a dusty road, her delicate fingers cupping water to her child's mouth. Yet he always knew it was the work of his mind. He figured Landry had known as well, that it was a secret they withheld from each other so as to keep the truth untrue, to keep their story, and her being, forever alive.

Now he faced reality. That it was him. Alone. The thought was a bolt of fear, but he knew that he would come to know this new life as he'd learned to know all those that had come before-for every step in life had been an obstacle, yet here he was, still standing day after day, ready for whatever might happen next. The shred of hope felt like salvation, and it drew him toward a deep slumber.

>237 charl08: I have that one out from the library, Charlotte. I love the quote, especially the very last sentence.

>238 Crazymamie: I thought it was a good read, Mamie. I can't quite believe it's a first novel. Hope it gets shortlisted.

Outlawed

In the year of our Lord 1894, I became an outlaw.

What took me so long to pick this one up? I was swept up by this alternative history / dystopia which imagines an alternative America after a flu pandemic hits in the 1850s. There's definitely Atwood notes here, but by skipping a hundred years or so of scientific understanding, North hooks that lack of medical knowledge to fertility fears. In this imagined world, women face stark choices when they don't conceive. Those rejected by their husbands may also be blamed for other women's health problems. Adam's experience as a midwife apprenticed to her mother means she has more understanding than most: her mother can't protect her from a German Measles outbreak.

Thanks to Beth for reviewing and recommending this great novel.

>237 charl08: I have requested that book from the library, so I'm just waiting for it now. But apropos of nothing, I find it highly annoying when writers use "primrose" as a color without specifying whether they mean bright yellow or soft pink.

Glad you liked Outlawed, Charlotte.

The Sweetness of Water has gotten some great reviews around here. I'm patiently waiting my turn.

>226 charl08: this is such an interesting book cover. I really like it.

>240 RidgewayGirl: I didn't know there was a pink version of primrose. Consider my horizons widened...

>241 BLBera: I was hoping it might be a series, Beth. I thought some of the characters could have done with their own book.

I bow to your patient approach. I am still trying: I meant to go get some reservations on Saturday and instead I went back to bed. I am now not patient to read All the (newish) Crime Fiction that I ordered in a moment of enthusiasm.

>242 LovingLit: The pump has a place in the story too, it's not just a decorative choice. As the bookclub meeting has gone past I have 50 pages to finish and am feeling no pressure to. I probably should before I forget everything I read.

My Crusie crash read continued with Anyone But You. Nice bit of meta romance fiction with a character editing a friend's first book.

Funny, I tend to think of primrose as pink first and didn't know it also came in yellow!

>224 rabbitprincess: and I'm exactly the reverse. Primroses are yellow.

I think that >244 rabbitprincess: and >245 Helenliz: prove my point beautifully. I thought of it as a pink until it became clear in a novel that the color the author kept calling primrose was a shade of yellow and so I had to look it up. And looking it up solved nothing!

The colour bit of the (long) definition I found in the OED has it as "The colour of the primrose flower, a pale greenish yellow or lemon." FWIW, of course.

The Blacksmith's Daughter
I finished off this rather rambling novel this evening, after being sidetracked by a headache and missing the bookgroup on Thursday evening altogether. It's the first part of a trilogy in German. The author follows Gül's life from childhood to motherhood here in the first book. It ends with her leaving for Germany as a migrant worker. When she is a kid, her father is wealthy, relatively speaking, but there's still not much in the way of luxury. Her mother dies and the three girls must learn to cope with their "new mother". It's all pretty quiet: not a lot happens, but change is gradually taking place in their small community, from radios to more and more young people taking up foreign jobs. It will be interesting to see where the next two books take Gül and her family, whether the author chooses to focus specifically on her or also bring in the experience of her children as the Turkish/German second generation.

So a primrose, can it also be called primula? If so it comes in a vast array of colours, purple, white, pink, yellow, orange. They are pretty bullet proof ,the perennial ones, and withstand a great deal of drought. I love them as they are such early bloomers.

>240 RidgewayGirl: Now that you bring it up, it crystallises a subconscious memory; I came across ‘primrose’ as a colour in my reading quite recently and, after a moment’s confusion, my mind went with pink. But I suspect that if you asked me about the flower, I’d go with yellow.

>248 mdoris: The common primrose - so Wikipedia, that font of knowledge, tells me - is primula vulgaris, not related to evening primrose. Both come primarily in yellow but also in white or pink.

>248 mdoris: >249 humouress: There's a blog here which mentions the colours of the plant (now) and how it relates to the name as a colour.
http://khkeeler.blogspot.com/2014/05/plant-story-primroses-primula-post.html?m=1

I wonder if UK/European primroses are primarily yellow and North American ones primarily pink? That might account for the confusion - I'm another Brit who had no idea there were pink primroses!

By the sounds of it 2 different plants sharing the same name. Confusing!