Charlotte's (charl08) reading light(houses) 5

I'm Charlotte, I'm based in north west England and I like to read. I started in the category challenge last year.

In January I was trying to think of a theme linked to something positive and uplifting (for me) and decided I'd go with lighthouses. I'm a fan. The most recent ones I've seen are from my recent holiday.


Part of a coastal tour in Oregon.
There's a lighthouse here, honest.


Cabrillo Point, San Diego

As my mum died in January so I've found this year pretty tough: less reading, more sadmin, trying not to get frustrated with my dad, trying not to let everything slip at work.

The categories from last year continue, with a couple of tweaks. I really need to pick up on a couple of them though - lets see how that goes for the last quarter of the year...

New to me (authors)

Souter Lighthouse


January

1. Murder After Christmas (New to me)
2. The Crane Wife (New to me / Essays)
3. West (New to me)

February

1. Flèche (Poetry / new to me)
2.Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (New to me)
3. A Conspiracy of Tall Men (New to me)
4. Euphoria (fiction / new to me)
5. The Year of Magical Thinking (Memoir/ new tomme)
6.There's Been a Little Incident (New to me)

March

1. All of You Every Single One (fiction)
2. Children of Paradise (fiction/ prize longlist)
3. Wandering Souls (fiction / prize longlist)

April
1. Fire Rush (Women's Prize longlist)
2. Ayesha at Last (fiction, new to me)
3. Trespasses (Women's Prize Longlist)
4. Bandit Queens (Women's Prize Longlist)
5. Scorched Grace (crime fiction)
6. Memphis (Women's Prize longlist)
7. Black Butterflies (ditto)

May
1.Strange Sally Diamond
2. Shutter of Snow (fiction, new to me)
3.This Wild Wild Country (crime, New to me)
4. The Pachinko Parlour (Novel, in translation)
5. The Ruin of All Witches (history, early US - my own book!)
6. The Lives and Deaths of K. Penza (Women in translation/ Malta)
7. Murder Under a Red Moon

June
1. Stolen (fiction in translation)
2. Tokyo Express (Reading my own books)
3. Ladies' Lunch and other stories (Reading my own books)
4. Sisters of the Lost Nation (fiction / new to me)
5 Time Shelter (in translation)
6. It's Lonely at the Centre of the Earth (GN)
7. Lost & Found (Reading my books / memoir)

July

1. Blood Sugar (fiction)
2. For thy great pain have mercy on my little pain (fiction)
3. Early Morning Riser (fiction)

August
1. A History of Burning (Historical fiction)
2. Knockout: the true story of Emile Griffith (GN/ history)
3. Tsubaki-chou Lonely Planet Vol. 1 2, 3 (manga)
4. A Treatise on Shelling Beans (in translation / reading my own books)
5. The Man in the McIntosh Suit (GN)
6. Did Ye Hear Mammy Died (memoir)
7. How to Build a Boat (fiction, booker longlist)
8. Western Lane (Booker longlist)
9. Geiger (fiction / crime / in translation)
10. This Other Eden (Booker)

September
1. Everyone in this room will someday be dead (fiction/ my own books)
2. The Cake Tree in the Ruins (short stories)
3. Red Paint: (Memoir)
4. Indelicacy (fiction / reading my own books)
5. My Monticello (short stories)
6. The Gangster we are all Looking for (fiction)
7. Echo on the Bay
8. Metamorphosis BL Vol 1
9. The Boyfriend Candidate (romance fiction)
10. Three Card Murder (crime fiction, new to me)
11. Night of the Living Rez (short stories, new to me)
12. The Sleeping Car Porter
13. The Bodyguard
14. Prophet Song Booker shortlist

October

1. Love's Work (Memoir/ philosophy)
2. Goodbye, Eri (manga)
3. Look Back manga
4. The Censor's Notebook (translated fiction).
5. Fear for Miss Betony (crime fiction)
6. Without Prejudice (thriller)
7. Legends and Lattes (fantasy)
8. Ma is Scared (short stories)
9. Bad Luck Charm (romance/ Halloween theme)
10. Locks (book group book / BHM)
11. Lessons in Chemistry (fiction)
12. My Fathers' Daughter (Memoir / BHM)
13. Brown Girls (fiction / BHM)

November

1. Days at the Morisaki Bookshop (fiction, new to me)
2. Liminal (fiction / new to me)
3. Red Memory (history)
4. Flawless (fiction / new to me)
5. This train is for (short stories, new to me)
6. Strong Female Character (memoir)
7. I Love Russia (in translation/ politics)
8. Pedro Páramo (in translation / book group book)
9. Happening (Memoir / in translation)

December
1. Hungry Ghosts (fiction)
2. Didn't nobody give a shit what happened to Carlotta (fiction, new to me)
3. Romantic Killer Vol 1 (manga)
4. Love Catastrophe (fiction, familiar faces)
5. Absolutely Not in Love
6. Russian Gothic (Reading my own books)
7. Partners in Crime (fiction/ romance)
8. Texaco (in translation, book group book)
9. My Picture Diary (Reading my books)
10. As the Eagle Flies (Reading my own books / Women in translation)
11. Divine Rivals (fantasy)
12. The Artisans (History/ memoir/ in translation)
13. Mansfield and Me (GN)

African writers (loosely defined)
This has not been going so well.


Harbour & lighthouse Kalk Bay, South Africa

Paradise (Tanzania)
Bom Boy (South Africa)

Prize winners (and nominees!)



1. Demon Copperhead (Women's Prize longlist)
2. The Unseen (several prizes! / in translation)
3. Children of Paradise (Women's Prize longlist)
4. Wandering Souls (Women's Prize longlist)

Quarter 2

1. Fire Rush (Women's Prize longlist)
2. Trespasses (Women's Prize Longlist)
3. The Dog of the North (Women's Prize longlist
4. Bandit Queens (Women's Prize Longlist)
5. Memphis (Women's Prize longlist)
6. Black Butterflies (ditto)
7. The Ruin of All Witches (history, early US - my own book!) (Wolfson History Prize)
8.Time Shelter (International Booker)
9. Em (Giller nominee)

Quarter 3

Paradise (Nobel winners)
A treatise on Shelling Beans (Polish Nike prize)
Old God's Time (fiction, Booker longlist)
How to Build a Boat (fiction, Booker longlist) Western Lane (Booker longlist)
My Monticello (NPR book of the year and several others)
The Sleeping Car Porter (Giller prize)
Prophet Song Booker shortlist

Quarter 4

Brown Girls (shortlisted Carol Shields prize / O Henry Prize)
Days of Sand (Eisner nominee)

Women in translation

Picture from visit to Lighthouse Books (Edinburgh)


February
1. Siblings Germany
2. Cocoon China (in translation/ my book)
3. Diary of a Void Japan (Reading my own books / Women in translation)

March
1. Summer Fires Italy

April
See Manga list

May
1. A Side Character's Love Story 15 (manga)
2. The Pachinko Parlour
3. The True Deceiver (novel, Sweden)
4. The Lives and Deaths of K. Penza (Women in translation/ Malta)

June
1. Je Ne Sais Quoi: adventures of a French woman in London (GN)
2. Stolen (fiction in translation) Swedish
3. Flying Witch Vol 1 & 2 / Ima Koi Vol 1/ Wolf Girl and Black Prince Vol 1 (Japanese)
4. Em (Canada / French)
5. Ima Koi 3 (Japanese)

July
1. Things Remembered and Things Forgotten (short stories, Japanese)

August

1. Miss Kim Knows (Korean)

September
1. The Naked Tree (GN/ Korean)

October
1. The Censor's Notebook (fiction / Romanian).
2. Ma is Scared (short stories, Hindi)

November

1. I Love Russia (in translation/ politics - Russian)
2. The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding (GN / in translation - Dutch)

December
1. Romantic Killer Vol 1 (manga)
2. Hunting Game (crime fiction, Swedish)
3. My Picture Diary (Japanese)
4. As the Eagle Flies (French)

Reading my own books

Bass Rock Lighthouse


January

1. Ex Libris books about books
2. Follow Me In (GN)
3. Eileen Mayo (art)
4. The Madness of Grief (memoir)

February

1. On Connection (Reading my own books)
2. Cocoon (in translation/ my books)
3. Diary of a Void (Reading my own books / Women in translation)

April
1. A Fortunate Woman (NF, biography / social science)
2. The Joy of Quitting (GN/ memoir)

May
1. Strange Sally Diamond (Reading my own books)
2. A Side Character's Love Story 15 (manga)
3. The True Deceiver (novel, in translation/ book club)
4. The Ruin of All Witches (history, early US - my own book!)
5. Insomniacs After School (manga)
6. 52 Factory Lane (in translation / Book club)
7. The Lives and Deaths of K. Penza (Women in translation/ Malta)
8. Continent (my books/ fiction)

June
1. Tokyo Express (Reading my own books)
2. Ladies' Lunch and other stories (Reading my own books)
3. Lost & Found (Reading my books / memoir)
4. Em (in translation)

July
1. The Talk (GN)
2. Foster (fiction)
3. Things Remembered and Things Forgotten (short stories, in translation)

August
1. Paradise (African writers)
2. A Treatise on Shelling Beans (in translation)
3. Geiger (fiction / crime / in translation)

September
1. Everyone in this room will someday be dead (fiction/ my own books)
2. Inspector Imanishi Investigates (fiction)
3. The Cake Tree in the Ruins (short stories)
4. Red Paint: (Memoir)
5. Indelicacy (fiction / reading my own books)
6. Ghosts of Spain (history)
7. A Feather on the Breath of God (autofiction)
8. The Naked Tree (GN)
9. My Monticello (short stories)
10. The Gangster we are all Looking for (fiction)

11. Codename Charming (romance/ familiar faces)
12. Between the World and Me Memoir
13. Echo on the Bay
14. Metamorphosis BL Vol 1
15. The Boyfriend Candidate (romance fiction)
16. Day's End (crime fiction, familiar faces)
17. Night of the Living Rez (short stories, new to me)
18. A Side Character's Love Story 16
19. Business or Pleasure (romance fiction/ familiar faces)
20. The Bodyguard
21. Prophet Song Booker shortlist

October

1. Love's Work (Memoir/ philosophy)
2. The Censor's Notebook (translated fiction / Romania).
3. Bom Boy (Black History Month)
4. Without Prejudice (Reading my own shelves / BHM)
5. My Fathers' Daughter (Memoir / BHM)
6. Brown Girls (new to me/ BHM)

November

1. Days at the Morisaki Bookshop (fiction, new to me)
2. The Fraud (fiction / bookgroup book)
3. Liminal (fiction / new to me)
4. Red Memory (history)
5. Flawless (fiction / new to me)
6. The Kiss Quotient (fiction / reread)
7. Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku (GN / reread)
8. Pedro Páramo (in translation / book group book)
9. The Other Side of the Bridge (fiction)
10. System Collapse (fiction / familiar faces)
11. A German Requiem (fiction / reread)

December
IYAGI + Take My Voice (Korean, chapbook) +So Late in the Day (short story)
2. Russian Gothic (fiction)
3. Toy Fights (memoir)
4. Texaco (in translation, book group book, new to me)
5. My Picture Diary (GN)
6. As the Eagle Flies (Reading my own books / Women in translation)
7. Mansfield and Me (GN)
8. Constructing a Nervous System (Essays/ criticism)

Graphic Novels & Memoirs



Hello Lighthouse

January:
1. I want to be a wall (Manga)
2. Asadora vol 2
3. Asadora vol 4
4. Days on Fes (Manga)
5. Follow Me In
6. The Maid at my House (1-11)
7. Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san (1)(GN)
8. A Side Character's Love Story 13
9. Seventh Time Loop (Vol 1)
10. Asadora Vol 5
11. Mamo

February
1. Ducks: Two years in the oil sands (GN)
2. The Savior's Book Cafe in Another World 1 (GN)
3. The Savior's Book Cafe in Another)World 2 (GN)
4. The Quest for the Missing Girl (GN)
5. A Side Character's Love Story 14 (Manga)

March
1. Summer Fires (GN / in translation Italy)
2. House of the Sun (manga)
3. The Way of the Househusband 1 (manga)
4. Komi Can't Communicate 1 (manga)
5. LDK 1-10 (manga)
6. Acting Class (GN)

April
1. Kiss Him Not Me 1-8 (Manga)
2. The Joy of Quitting
May
1. Kiss Him Not Me 9-10 (Manga)
2. Crumbs (GN)
3. A Side Character's Love Story 15 (manga)
4. Doughnuts and Doom (GN)
5. Alte Zachen: old things (GN/ fiction)
6. Insomniacs After School (manga)

June
1. Je Ne Sais Quoi: adventures of a French woman in London (GN)
2. Flying Witch Vol 1 & 2 /
3. Ima Koi Vol 1/ 2/3
4. Wolf Girl and Black Prince Vol 1
5. Armed with Madness: the surreal Leonora Carrington (GN)
6. It's Lonely at the Centre of the Earth (GN)
7. The Many Deaths of Laila Starr (GN)

July
1. The Talk (GN/ memoir)
2. Wolf Girl and Black Prince vol 2 (manga)
3. Bauhaus: a graphic novel NF

August
1. Knockout: the true story of Emile Griffith (GN/ history)
2. Tsubaki-chou Lonely Planet Vol. 1 2, 3 (manga)
3. The Man in the McIntosh Suit (GN)
4. The Boxer (GN)

September
1. The Naked Tree (GN)
2. Metamorphosis BL Vol 1 (manga)
3. A Side Character's Love Story 16 (manga)

October
1. Goodbye, Eri (manga)
2. Look Back manga
3. Wolf Girl and Black Prince III
4. Boss Wife III
5. Days of Sand (new to me / GN)

November

1. Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku (GN / reread)
2. Lore Olympus (GN)
3. My Special One (Manga)
4. Noir Burlesque (GN)
5. Blood of the Virgin
7.The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding (GN / in translation - Dutch)

December
1. Romantic Killer Vol 1 (manga)
2. Lore Olympus Vol 2
3. My Picture Diary (Reading my books)
4. Mansfield and Me (GN)

History and Memoir


The Cabrillo lighthouse had an exhibit about lighthouse history in California.

January
1. The Madness of Grief (memoir/ my own books)
2. Did She Kill Him? (History)
3. Eileen Mayo (Art / Reading my own books)

March
1. Old Rage (Memoir)
2. Notes On Grief (familiar faces)
3. Slouching Towards Bethlehem (Essays)

April
1. A Fortunate Woman (biography/ medicine)

May
1. The Ruin of All Witches (history, early US - my own book!)

September
1. Red Paint: (Memoir)
2. Ghosts of Spain (history)
3. Between the World and Me Memoir

October
1. Love's Work)
2. My Fathers' Daughter

November

1. Red Memory (history/ journalism)
2. Strong Female Character (memoir)
3. I Love Russia (in translation/ politics)
4. Happening (Memoir / in translation)
5. The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding (GN / in translation - Dutch)

December
1. Toy Fights (memoir/ reading my own books)
2. My Picture Diary (Reading my books)
3. The Artisans (History/ memoir/ in translation)
4. Mansfield and Me (GN)

Previous Quarter
April 18 (82)

1. Fire Rush (Women's Prize longlist)
2. Ayesha at Last (fiction, new to me)
3. Lucy by the Sea (fiction, familiar faces)
4. The Cheat Sheet (fiction)
5. Kiss Him Not Me 1-3 (Manga)
6. Trespasses (Women's Prize Longlist)
7. The Dog of the North (Women's Prize longlist
8. If Only You (Bergman)
9. Bandit Queens (Women's Prize Longlist)
10. Kiss Him Not Me 4-5
11. Scorched Grace (New to me, crime fiction)
12. Two Wrongs Make a Right (Romance / familiar faces)
13. Memphis (Women's Prize longlist)
14. Black Butterflies (ditto)
15. Kiss Him Not Me 6-8 (Manga)
16. FInn Rhodes Forever (Romance, fiction)
17. A Fortunate Woman (NF, biography / social science)
18. The Joy of Quitting (GN/ memoir, reading my own books)

Library books read in April: 5

May 26 (108)
1. Strange Sally Diamond (Reading my own books)
2. The Wrong Mr Right (familiar
faces)
3. Kiss Him Not Me 9-10 (Manga)
4. Shutter of Snow (fiction, new to me)
5. In Your Dreams, Holden Rhodes (fiction, familiar faces)
6. Olga (in translation, fiction)
7. Crumbs (GN)
8. A Side Character's Love Story 15 (manga)
9. This Wild Wild Country (crime, New to me)
10. Doughnuts and Doom (GN)
11. Black Paradox (Manga)
12. The Pachinko Parlour (Novel, in translation)
13. The True Deceiver (novel, in translation)
14. Alte Zachen: old things (GN/ fiction)
15. Chick Magnet (fiction)
16. Forever Your Rogue (fiction)
17. The Ruin of All Witches (history, early US - my own book!)
18. Insomniacs After School (manga)
19. 52 Factory Lane (in translation / Book club)
20. Letter Late than Never
21. The Lives and Deaths of K. Penza (Women in translation/ Malta)
22. Continent (my books/ fiction)
23. Murder Under a Red Moon (fiction)
24. It Isn't Over
25. Quiet (poetry)
26. The Takeaway (fiction)

Library books read in May: 10

June 21 (129)

1. Angel of Rome (short stories)
2. Je Ne Sais Quoi: adventures of a French woman in London (GN)
3. Stolen (fiction in translation)
4. Soft and Low
5. Tokyo Express (Reading my own books)
6. Yours Truly
7. Ladies' Lunch and other stories (Reading my own books)
8. Flying Witch Vol 1 & 2 / Ima Koi Vol 1/ Wolf Girl and Black Prince Vol 1
9. Sisters of the Lost Nation (fiction / new to me)
10. Love Theoretically
11. Practice makes Perfect
12. Armed with Madness: the surreal Leonora Carrington (GN)
13. Time Shelter (in translation)
14. The House of Doors (familiar faces)
15. It's Lonely at the Centre of the Earth (GN)
16. Friends Without Benefits
17. Lost & Found (Reading my books / memoir)
18. Em (in translation)
19. The Many Deaths of Laila Starr (GN)
20. Ima Koi 3
21. A Light Still Burns (Book group/ in translation)

Library books read in June: 9

Last Quarter

July 20 (149)

All this could be yours fiction
Anger Bang romance
Newcomer crime fiction / translated fiction
The Talk (GN/ memoir/ my own books)
Wolf Girl and Black Prince vol 2 (manga)
Marple (short stories)
Exhalation (short stories)
Behind the Net (fiction)
Blood Sugar (fiction / new to me)
For thy great pain have mercy on my little pain (fiction/ new to me)

Her Big City Neighbor (Romance/ fiction)
Early Morning Riser (fiction, new to me)
Bauhaus: a graphic novel
Foster (fiction / my own books)
Malice (crime/ in translation)
The Girl By the Bridge (crime/ in translation)
Stuck with you (romance)
Not the girl you marry (romance)
The Heart Principle (romance)
Things Remembered and Things Forgotten (short stories, in translation)

Library books read in July 10

August 20 (169)

1. A History of Burning (Historical fiction)
2. Knockout: the true story of Emile Griffith (GN/ history)
3. Paradise (African writers/ my own books)
4. A Death in Tokyo (crime / in translation)
5. Tsubaki-chou Lonely Planet Vol. 1 2, 3, 4 (manga)
6. A Treatise on Shelling Beans (in translation / reading my own books)
7. The Man in the McIntosh Suit (GN)
8. Kairos (fiction, in translation)
9. This is Happiness (fiction)
10. Did Ye Hear Mammy Died (memoir)

11. The Boxer (GN)
12. Old God's Time (fiction, booker longlist)
13. How to Build a Boat (fiction, booker longlist)
14. In Your Dreams (fiction, familiar faces)
15. I am Homeless if this is not my Home (fiction)
16. Western Lane (Booker longlist)
17. August Blue (familiar faces)
18. Miss Kim Knows (in translation)
19. Geiger (fiction / crime / in translation)
20. This Other Eden (Booker)

Library books read in August 15

September 23 (192)

1. Everyone in this room will someday be dead (fiction/ my own books)
2. Inspector Imanishi Investigates (fiction)
3. The Cake Tree in the Ruins (short stories)
4. Red Paint: (Memoir)
5. Indelicacy (fiction / reading my own books)
6. Ghosts of Spain (history)
7. A Feather on the Breath of God (autofiction)
8. The Naked Tree (GN)
9. My Monticello (short stories)
10. The Gangster we are all Looking for (fiction)

11. Codename Charming (romance/ familiar faces)
12. Between the World and Me Memoir
13. Echo on the Bay
14. Metamorphosis BL Vol 1
15. The Boyfriend Candidate (romance fiction)
16. Day's End (crime fiction, familiar faces)
17. Three Card Murder (crime fiction, new to me)
18. Night of the Living Rez (short stories, new to me)
19. The Sleeping Car Porter
20. A Side Character's Love Story 16

21. Business or Pleasure (romance fiction/ familiar faces)
22. The Bodyguard
23. Prophet Song Booker shortlist

Library books read in September: 3

Final Quarter

October 23 (215)

1. Love's Work (Memoir/ philosophy)
2. Goodbye, Eri (manga)
3. Look Back manga
4. The Censor's Notebook (translated fiction / Romania).
5. Fear for Miss Betony (crime fiction, new to me)
6. Bom Boy (Black History Month)
7. Wreck the Halls (romance fiction / familiar faces)
8. Without Prejudice (Reading my own shelves / BHM)
9. Legends and Lattes (fantasy/ new to me)
10. The Wren, the Wren (familiar faces, literary fiction)
11. Ma is Scared (short stories, women in translation, reading my own books)
12. Wolf Girl and Black Prince III
13. Boss Wife I & II (manga)
14. Bad Luck Charm (romance/ Halloween theme)
15. Locks (book group book / BHM)
16. Lessons in Chemistry (fiction / new to me)
17. My Fathers' Daughter (Memoir / BHM)
18. Voices of the Dead (crime fiction / familiar faces)
19. Boss Wife III

20. Brown Girls (new to me/ BHM)
21. Days of Sand (new to me / GN)
22. The Duke Starts a Scandal (romance / familiar faces)
23. Take What You Need (fiction)

Library books read this month 8

November 22 (237)

1. Days at the Morisaki Bookshop (fiction, new to me)
2. The Fraud (fiction / bookgroup book)
3. Liminal (fiction / new to me)
4. Red Memory (history)
5. Flawless (fiction / new to me)
6. Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv (prize nominee)
7. This train is for (short stories, new to me)
8. The Kiss Quotient (fiction / reread)
9. Strong Female Character (memoir)
10. Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku (GN / reread)

11. I Love Russia (in translation/ politics)
12. Pedro Páramo (in translation / book group book)
13. Lore Olympus (GN)
14. My Special One (Manga)
15. The Other Side of the Bridge (fiction)
16. Noir Burlesque (GN)
17. The Road Trip (fiction)
18. Happening (Memoir / in translation)
Kyoko and Kyoji (Chapbook)
19. Blood of the Virgin (GN)
20. System Collapse (fiction / familiar faces)
Towards 0% (in translation / chapbook)
21. The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding (GN / in translation - Dutch)
22. A German Requiem (fiction / reread)
A Walk with a goddess (chapbook/ in translation - Korean)

Library books read in November: 9

December 26 (263)

1. Scarlet Town (fiction)
2. Hungry Ghosts (fiction)
+ Take My Voice (Korean, chapbook)
+So Late in the Day (short story)
3. Didn't nobody give a shit what happened to Carlotta (fiction, new to me)
4. Romantic Killer Vol 1 (manga)
5. The Blackbirder (fiction, familiar faces)
6. Love Catastrophe (fiction, familiar faces)
7. Lore Olympus Vol 2
8. Faking Christmas (romance)
9. Hunting Game (crime fiction, in translation, familiar faces)
10. Absolutely Not in Love (romance)

11. Stranded Ranch
12. Russian Gothic (Reading my own books)
13. Weather Girl (familiar faces)
14. Partners in Crime (fiction/ romance)
15. The One with the Kiss Cam
16. Toy Fights (memoir/ reading my own books)
17. Texaco (in translation, book group book, new to me)
18. My Picture Diary (Reading my books)
19. As the Eagle Flies (Reading my own books / Women in translation)
20. Good Guy (romance)

21. Divine Rivals (fantasy)
22. The Artisans (History/ memoir/ in translation)
23. Knock off Viagra and JeJe +Like a Barbie + For that which cannot be restored (chapbook collection of 6 books / in translation)
24. Mansfield and Me (GN)
25. The Fakeout (romance)
26. Constructing a Nervous System (Essays/ criticism)

Library books read this month: 7

Happy new thread, Charlotte. The photos from the Oregon coast are lovely.

Thanks Katie! Oregon is beautiful. The wine was nice too!

I love your lighthouses, Charlotte! Happy new thread. You have read SO MANY BOOKS this year!

Happy new thread, Charlotte

Happy new thread, Charlotte!

Love the lighthouses, and the dog :-)

Happy new thread! I am at North Berwick for the weekend, and saw Bass Rock and its lighthouse (see >6 charl08: ). I have to say, the sky is not that colour today! :D

Happy new thread. Hope the last quarter reading brings pleasure.

Happy New Thread, Charlotte! Many good reads ahead!

>13 BLBera: Thanks Beth.

I have a photo montage from Powells with all the books I wished I could buy (but knew I couldn't carry home). Too many books...

>14 jessibud2: Thanks Shelley. I have good intentions for return visits, apologies.

>15 FAMeulstee: Isn't he lovely? I think (if memory isn't playing tricks on me) that the previous owners also had a lovely dog, but it was fun to see the tradition had continued the last time I visited.

>16 Jackie_K: Ooh, I love North Berwick. Although I have to say that I have also been there on days when it did not look like this!

>17 Helenliz: Thanks Helen.
A comment about enjoying the journey might fit here?

>18 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deborah. I can't quite believe we're nearly in October already (I say this every year, of course).

Happy new thread, Charlotte. Love the lighthouses!

>21 MissWatson: Thanks Birgit. Hoping to get to one much closer to home recently, I realised I hadn't been to the Mersey ones.

Here is my sister's dog eyeing up a sandwich. This photo makes me laugh every time I see it.

I have lots of reviews to catch up with, so going to be brief!

11. Codename Charming (romance/ familiar faces)
I like Lucy Parker's writing style, which is fun - there's a wide cast of characters in each novel and it's British-set without being twee. I enjoyed her previous books set in London's 'glittering West End' (not Parker's term, but one that seems stuck in my head). This one is also a setting involving celebrity, but royal rather than theatrical. I'm not usually a fan of this setting (I can't really say this makes much sense given my enthusiasm for regency-set romance). Unsurprisingly then: not my favourite of her books, but an enjoyable read.

Well, her boss was Johnny. Adorable, enthusiastic Johnny with his heart of gold and his two enormous left feet, one of which was usually lodged squarely in his mouth. E.g., when they'd arrived at the museum this evening and been introduced to the current Member of Parliament for Chelsea and Fulham, Mr. Simon Winger. Johnny had cast a quick glance at the "S. Winger" on the man's name tag and said cheerfully, "I know the House of Commons is l-legendarily full of f-fuckers, but I didn't realize things were quite that exciting."

12. Between the World and Me

This memoir has been read by just about everyone I know, and I think if you had asked me, I would have said I had read it already. (I'd read his other bestseller instead). It was on sale in a small bookshop I passed on my coastal tour, and well, you have to support independent bookshops, don't you?!!

13. Echo on the Bay
A very odd book I picked up in the SD library shop. Billed as a crime novel, for me it was more a novel about deeply rooted community conflict in a small Japanese village by the sea. Metaphorical bombs are dropped and then abandoned in the narrative, including pregnancy, abusive relationships in families with both people and animals. Short enough to finish even though I didn't really understand the author's approach.

...we'd follow his foot steps. They always disappeared into the water. They headed for the sea, like a turtle after laying its eggs. Besides his footsteps, there was never anything else there. We never saw a body.

We did see something, though. It wasn't a body-more like a living person. I can't say definitely that it was a living person. It could have been a ghost. Mr. Yoshida didn't seem certain that he'd seen it at all.

14. Metamorphosis BL Vol 1
I picked this up in Kinokunya in Portland. The idea and illustrations are charming, the story slight. A young shop clerk and an elderly woman bond over their enthusiasm for BL manga, a niche reading interest.

15. The Boyfriend Candidate (romance fiction)
Fake relationship in a gubernatorial race. A rather pleasing subplot about educational funding.

He sighed. "I didn't come out here to argue, or close the deal. I came to say I know we're giving you the full court press. But you don't have to do this."

This man was more confusing than an illustrated cover on a romance novel.

16. Day's End (crime fiction, familiar faces)
17. Three Card Murder (crime fiction, new to me)

Two crime novels to finish up my lightning speed reviews.

"And if you do see texts or pictures, you need to know it's not personal. Even if it feels like it at first." Hirsch nodded. "To a troll, it's just business, hurting someone.' "Okay,' Kate said, folding in on herself.
"Take away their power,' Hirsch said. "Block and mute and report. Don't respond - it's what they want. And keep us in the loop.'
'Be self-aware,' Wendy said. "Ask yourself, why am I dwelling on this? Is it helpful? What can I be doing instead?"
For a moment-swiftly there and gone again - Kate stuck out her mutinous, victimised bottom lip.
"Too much?' Hirsch said. Kate gave him a look and replied, with indolent charm,
'Kind of a bit preachy."
That was more like the Kate he knew.
They smiled faintly at each other and were a little better prepared to face the day.

The first one continues the series of novels set in the Australian outback, isolated and dusty. Our protagonist Hirsch continues to investigate small town, isolated farm, crime. His relationship with a local teacher with a teenager enables the author to dig deeper into the very modern, apparently 'urban' online experiences of young people. Shopping his former squad for corruption continues to affect him here, as does the consequences of dealing with violent crime. But there is the possibility of further change and redemption here. Three Card Murder by contrast, is set in off season Brighton. The seedy tourist traps by the sea, complete with fake mystics and card sharps are accompanied by apparently more modern problems, dead drug dealers. Two sisters, one working for the police, the other more accustomed to running the con, have to work together when they are both implicated in a series of dramatic deaths.

Wes looked like he was about to argue on the food front but thought better of it. 'Luminol picks up a couple of other things too. Blood is one, faeces ...' Sarah screwed up her nose.
'And horseradish.'
'Excuse me?'
He nodded enthusiastically. Yeah, weird, right? Horseradish peroxidase catalyses the oxidation in luminol.'
Sarah made him repeat the exact wording while she wrote it down in her notebook, marvelling about what a fountain of weird knowledge her family was.

NB I really hate how the publishers (? or Amazon?) pull through their little blurbs with the title now. 'Three gripping locked room mysteries in one book. Don't miss this clever, funny crime novel for 2023...' Seriously? That's not the title.
Grump grump. Off to press 'delete' in the edit my book section.

>23 charl08: Love it.

Happy New Thread! Nice to visit your lighthouses again.

>23 charl08: Your sister's dog looks cute, Charlotte.
The picture made me smile too :-)

Your sister's dog is so cute, Charlotte! Not unlike to my dog, Poppy, who is the topper on my thread. What breed/ mix is she/ he and what the name? We don't know Poppy's breed mix for certain, as her mom was a rescue, but via " DNA my dog " - took a swab from her cheek, she is 75 % or more poodle and further down the list ( much further down ) Great White Pyrenees and Brittany Spaniel.

>24 charl08: I felt similarly about Codename Charming -- I love Lucy Parker and enjoyed this book, but it's not my favorite of hers. I hope she goes back to her theater series soon, as I too am not as interested in the royals.

>30 Caroline_McElwee: She has her moments, but her expressions are so human it's hard not to laugh.

>31 dudes22: Thanks Betty. I am hoping to "add" (or at least see) a few more to my list on walks this year.

>32 FAMeulstee: She is cute: I'm not sure I'd like a dog like her, as lots of people feel the need to admire her whenever I've been out with my sister. It gets really boring!

>33 vancouverdeb: She's a bichon frise, although my sister got her in rather an unorthodox way so I don't think she's got any kind of pedigree or anything (her original owner had some family issues so gave her up).

>34 christina_reads: Glad I'm not the only one hoping that!

Night of the Living Rez
I found this collection of short stories set on a Penobscot reservation really dark reading. Narrated by David, and jumping around in time, they show a family struggling. David and his friends are into drugs and alcohol and petty crime, whilst his mum struggles to hold onto any money and his step-dad is an alcoholic. The pattern of the lives shown is so bleak that even the events of the final story where his sister's baby dies in his arms seems just part of the overall horror, and the shock is muted. A great title, reflects the story where David and his friends go to chase haunted children in the woods - and find his sister instead.

I thought this description of the end of a canoeing trip was beautifully written.

The pile of logs and thin branches ran out, and so too ran out our buzzes. We all pissed on the fire and then headed for the canoes. Each of us was settled in the quiet downer of drink, and so we said nothing as we got into the rocking canoes and stabbed our paddles into the earth to push off, and down the river we didn't have to exert any force, we simply let the river take us home, and during part of the float the river had spaced us out so Tyson was far to my left, and JP far to Tyson's left, and when we came to the bend of the river its meandering pull brought us together and it was then that we paddled four strokes to the shore and the canoes slid up on the soft dirt bank, a wall of vines dangling down like wet hair. We tied the canoes with rope to some trees, and with aching, lowered heads we walked the darkening woods to the street.

The Sleeping Car Porter
This was waiting for me when I got back from holiday at the library. I thought it was wonderful.

Baxter is the porter of the title, working on Canadian railways in the 1920s. He is haunted, figuratively by the loss of his lover, and literally by a strange figure who appears at the edges of his vision. The passengers are racist (perhaps even more cringingly, those who see the racism of their colleagues and do nothing). The company issues demerits for any passenger complaint against a porter, with a fixed total leading to termination. It's a terrible working life, with minimal sleep, but Baxter is highly motivated.

This book achieved the rare feat of making dentistry seem like an understandably desirable career.

"This book achieved the rare feat of making dentistry seem like an understandably desirable career."

That made me laugh.

The book sounds interesting. I'll have to check my library.

>37 charl08: This book achieved the rare feat of making dentistry seem like an understandably desirable career. Surely there ought to be a special award for that Charlotte.

>38 katiekrug: >39 Caroline_McElwee: Maybe I'll ask my dentist if she's read the book.

Annoying: I had plans for cleaning and the dyson went kaput. It's pretty old now, so new one ordered.

>36 charl08: & >37 charl08: Coincidentally, I have both these books on my shelf, having attended a reading at Tin House last year that included Talty and a session on researching historical fiction at a book festival this year that included Mayr.

I own Sleeping Car Porter but have yet to read it. I might join my library's November Book Club as they are reading The Sleeping Car Porter. It made dentistry seem like a desirable career? I may need to read it sooner than later. Sorry about the Dyson dying on you.

>36 charl08: I loved Night of the Living Rez and look forward to more by Talty.

>41 RidgewayGirl: I hope you have a chance to pick up both books.

>42 vancouverdeb: I think it would make a great bookclub book, Deborah. Hope you can join the group for the read if it suits you.

>43 BLBera: I am glad I read it, but I think you liked the book more than me. I found the non-linear structure disconcerting.

Prophet Song
I ended up staying up past my bedtime to read this. Such a powerful read.

The state is supposed to leave you alone, Michael, not enter your house like an ogre, take a father into its fist and gobble him, how can I even begin to explain this to the kids, that the state they live in has become a monster? All this will blow over, Eilish, the NAP will have to back down sooner or later, there is outrage all over Europe---Then why is the GNSB arresting more and more people each day, Michael, calling this a time of national emergency, the plain- clothesmen who came into our office on Tuesday and took a young fellow from his desk, Eamon Doyle, a statistical scientist, the last fellow on earth to be causing trouble, and do you know what he said when he fetched his coat, he asked that somebody call his mother...

>45 charl08: Waiting for it to land. I've heard good things about it, as well as its Booker shortlisting.

>46 Caroline_McElwee: I'm still moaning about Tan Twan Eng not getting shortlisted, but this would be a worthy winner.

The new hoover has arrived and works, little wins...

Some of August's reading.
In terms of the categories I did really well with reading my own books: but that's mostly as they were books I bought on my trip (!!) I did manage to leave some of them behind, including one in a LFL just down the road from my friend's place. I was so pleased to spot it. I just squeaked in another Booker listed book Prophet Song.

Favourites this month:
A feather on the breath of god. I'm regretting giving this one away! Loved how she created the pictures of her narrator's mother, father and a former boyfriend.

I like to try and read books about/ set in places I visit. Red Paint was on the local shelf at Powells. I found it an insightful memoir though not always a polished first book. I picked up The Gangster we are all Looking for without knowing that it was partly set in the community my friend and her partner now live in, home to many vietnamese refugees at one time.

There were two books that I didn't much enjoy reading. Everyone in this room will someday be dead. A novel about a woman with high anxiety: for me as a reader it seemed to bleed anxiety off the page. Not a comfortable read. I also didn't find it much fun reading Indelicacy, although the art / writing blurb made me think I would.

I read some global crime fiction, both authors I've read before, Japanese Inspector Imanishi Investigates and Australian Day's End. Both very atmospheric. Echo on the Bay, also translated from Japanese, which I picked up in SD's library shop, was billed as crime but felt more like lit fic.

Ghosts of Spain the first history book I've completed in a while was a fascinating look at a place I really should visit.

I visited a branch of Kinokuniya in Portland, so my reading benefitted from picking up some of their offerings. The Cake Tree in the Ruins - such sad short stories set after WW2 ended in Japan, and The Naked Tree a new GN by an author I have read before. I am not sure if this reflects her work or just the work that is translated, but this book also centres on Korea's painful wartime history. A much lighter purchase was Metamorphosis BL partly set in a Korean bookshop.

I bought the latest series of pamphlet translations from the Strangers Press / UEA publishing project.
The first story I've read is The Greatest Gamble on Earth. Kwak Jaesik's narrator parties with a rich girl he met at university, taking part in a strange scavenger hunt for the children of high Korean society.

https://www.strangers.press/iyagi

Love's Work
I can't remember where I came across reference to this book. The author was a philosopher and the books is described as a cross between a memoir and philosophy. It was a leap too far for me in terms of the philosophical discussion. She reflects on her terminal cancer diagnosis, her experiences studying philosophy, and her relationships with family, friends and lovers.

I liked this quote on memoir (Socrates)

Who is entitled to write his reminiscences?
Everyone
Because no one is obliged to read them.

In order to write one's reminiscences it is not at all necessary be a great man, nor a notorious criminal, nor a celebrated artist, nor a statesman—it is quite enough to be simply a human being, to have something to tell, and not merely the desire to tell it but at least have some little ability to do so.

Every life is interesting...

October is Black History Month in the UK, so I'm going to take advantage of the nudge to pick up some more of my own books I've been meaning to read. Choices include:

Jamica Kincaid I picked up several shiny new editions of her work and have not read them.
The Fat Lady Sings by Jacqueline Roy.
Without Prejudice by Nicola Williams. ...
The Dancing Face by Mike Phillips. ...
Bernard and the Cloth Monkey by Judith Bryan
Black and British

And on my kindle
Lovers and Strangers
Black Spartacus
Chain Gang Allstars
You Made a Fool of Death with your Beauty
The Death of Vivek Oji
Black Tudors
Black, Listed
Afropean

How did I manage to post that twice?
I've ignored all the above and am dealing Margo Jefferson instead.

We’ve read the same three books from the Booker Shortlist , Charlotte . I have If I Survive You out from the library, but I don’t think I’ll read it now . I need to read some thing non - Booker right now . I do have The Bee Sting arriving Oct 6 or so , and Paul
and Stasia are planning a group read, so that’s one more from the Booker Short List .Like you , I am keen for the Prophet Song to win . I will check the date at the library for The Sleeping Car Porter . I am planning to go this October and the book is Chop Suey Nation . I just finished Gin , Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue that I absolutely loved . It’s available in the UK, and if you can get hold of , I think you would like it too. Another book that I think would be great for discussion. Speaking of dentists, I have to go get a cavity filled on Tuesday. 🦷🥲

Has anyone else noticed that half of the shortlist authors are named Paul?

>53 vancouverdeb: Sounds like you have been doing a lot of reading there Deborah. I've not come across the Chop Suey Nation or Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue. I'll see if the library can help.

>54 RidgewayGirl: I think so! I liked this book shop's take on it. "Pick your favourite Paul "!
https://backstory.london/collections/the-booker-prize-longlist-2023

The goal: to educate the Censor inside every thinking human being. To train them to be their own Censor, but to not even suspect it, to not know. To create and to install the ideal Censor, see-through, traceless, without institutions. For there to exist, to live, in every person who thinks and creates, a Censor. The censorship of the future-invisible censorship!

I finally finished The Censor's Notebook. This has taken me ages!

I'm afraid that it's more dangerous these days to read all the time than it is to hardly ever read. Writing illuminates and darkens. Awakens and puts to sleep. People have written things before, we have a literary tradition, but nothing like what's happening now. Everyone's writing; the entire country, collective, is reading. A country of readers and writers. When is there time to work, to think, to love? What's the point of reading? I feel I'm being used, in my capacity as a censor, forced to participate in this collective, general readorgy. The situation's beyond me.

Framed as a book within a book, a "rescued" censor's text that miraculously escaped the state's destruction. The author is an expert in the field, an academic as well as novelist. The censor of the title is an enthralling character, but the glimpses we get of her life (rather than of her lengthy impressions of censorship) are at times, frustratingly brief.
There was lots here to like but for my money could have been 100 pages shorter.

Communism will fall because of reading, they're all becoming smarter than the smart ones, they ask too many questions, they have more and more desires and requests, constitutional rights, written and unwritten rights. We can barely keep writers under control. No censorship exists that can resolve the problems of the entire world, all the readers.

Fear for Miss Betony
A crime novel with the kind of writing that made me have to slow down and reread sentences! I enjoyed it, but given that I generally don't have a clue whodunnit, and I had strong suspicions here, I think probably most people would guess.

Without moving she let her gaze wander round the room. At first glance it looked much as usual. But she was leaving nothing to chance. Her dozen or so books on the bureau were tidy, but there was something peculiar about them. Emma was sensitive about books. She believed that their arrangement on a shelf should accord with their temperaments and characters, and that, as in human relationships only mutual irritation was induced by stressing incompatibility. So what was The Mistress of Shenstone doing next to Commercial Book- Keeping for the Student, and The Tailor of Gloucester, threadbare now from his many readings that had delighted Emma more than they had generations of polite listeners, shoulder to shoulder with Mr. Pendlebury's excellent Arithmetic?

Fear for Miss Betony sounds interesting , Charlotte. I'll have to see if it is available here.

Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue is available in the UK at Blackwell's Books online, but I don't know about the libraries in the UK. I've just started The Bee Sting, so that will be 4 th on the Booker Short List, and likely my last one. If Study for Obedience or If I Survive You win the Booker , I'll consider reading them. I've not yet read Chop Suey Nation, so I'm not sure it is worth looking for. I hope it's a good read.

Thanks Deborah. Gin, Turpentine... doesn't seem to have made it onto my library's catalogue yet.
Inspired by you, I think, I had a look at some Booker reaction videos. One of them was very positive about The Bee Sting, and I was almost swayed...

Another shortlist of books, this time NF.
https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/events/the-british-academy-book-prize-for-gl...

I wanted to read Red Memory anyway, and Black Ghost of Empire is a paperback, so hard to resist.

I picked up Bom Boy on holiday, a rare example of doing what I had aimed to do (find some books by small publishers). I picked it up to read for (UK) Black History Month. This is a short book, flipping between three years in the life of connected characters. The most recent, Lékè is struggling with adult life, the middle section he is struggling with his adopted mum's death as a ten year old, and then in the furthest back narrative, we hear the story of his biological parents meeting and his adoption. It's all pretty tragic, and I thought I knew where it was going I didn't. He met a nice girl and his weirdness / the curse of his biological family was lifted. Possibly. This was Omotoso's first book before the success of The Woman Next Door. I liked that I'd been to two of the places mentioned (university campuses at Ile Ife and Cape Town) so they were easy to visualise as settings.

Wreck the Halls
A Xmas romance, two children of famous musicians are challenged to set up a reunion concert. The challenge is that their mothers haven't spoken since an acrimonious split live on stage. Of course, as the adult children work together, they discover they're they're interested in their own future than that of their mums.

This was all a bit too insta-love for me, but I did enjoy the two mothers, it would have been nice to have even more of them (or a spin off book?)

Without Prejudice
One of Bernadine Evaristo's Black Britain, Writing Back collection. The author, a former barrister (lawyer) in London wrote this novel more than thirty years ago. The recent reports from reviews into the met suggest little has changed, depressingly.

The novel opens with a minor drugs case. A young trainee solicitor seeing a black woman and a white man, both smartly dressed, outside the court, assumes the black woman is the client, not the barrister. Lee is Black, working class and the child of immigrants. She attended a sink school and got into the law despite everything mitigating against it (25 years ago I can remember being given the distinct impression at school that solicitor was a much more "appropriate" aim for a girl, rather than the elite barrister. )

I think the only way the book seems dated is in the expectation that Lee will somehow continue in her job despite the ongoing micro (and not-so-micro) aggressions, without some kind of unbearable or irreparable personal impact. But given the author is still working in a senior law position, perhaps this reflects her RL experience.

If you like a legal thriller, this is definitely worth picking up.

I actually had The Censor's Notebook in my hand at the library but put it back on the shelf because I have too many library books out right now. I will add it to my WL; it sounds interesting. I tend to like out-of-the-box structure if it works. :)

>63 BLBera: I hope you like it Beth. I'm going to release my copy into the wilds of my local charity shops, hopefully it will find another reader. I'm kind of intrigued to read the author's academic papers (although not sure if they're even in English, which would be some barrier!)

Legends and Lattes
A fairly gentle fantasy story about an assassin settling down to start a new life as a coffee shop owner. I loved it.

>65 charl08: I loved this too! Looking forward to the prequel, Bookshops and Bonedust.

>65 charl08: I have this on the TBR, I've heard nothing but good reviews about it.

>66 rabbitprincess: It made me smile. Lovely book. And I hadn't realised the story of how it came to be published, so reading that in the acknowledgements was nice too.

>67 Jackie_K: Hope you enjoy it!

>65 charl08: Glad you enjoyed that one, too!

>62 charl08: I hadn't heard of Black Britain, Writing Back but it sounds really interesting and I'll have to see what I can get my hands on this side of the pond.

I finished The Bee Sting this evening, Charlotte, and I think it is a 5 star read for me. No comments as yet on my thread. I need to think about it overnight. The ending was very ambiguous , my only quibble.

>69 bell7: As the books have been published previously, you might well be able to find earlier editions more easily? (just not with Evaristo's introductions). When I used to run an african fiction book group, one of the authors explained that universities in the US help create demand for her books, that just wasn't the case in the UK (embarrassingly). Idk if the same principle applies here.

The new penguins are a beautifully designed collection, too. I'd not realised two additional ones have been added making it 13 books now. Hopefully it keeps expanding!
Sugar and Slate
Dat's Love
Evaristo is quoted on the site

"Our ambition is to correct historic bias in British publishing and bring a wealth of lost writing back into circulation. While many of us continue to lobby for the publishing industry to become more inclusive and representative of our society, this project looks back to the past in order to resurrect texts that will help reconfigure black British literary history."

https://www.penguin.co.uk/series/bbwb/black-britain-writing-back

>70 vancouverdeb: Oh, I'm almost tempted, then I remember I got nowhere with my attempt at one of his previous books! Glad it was such a good read for you.

>65 charl08: OK, that's enough positive endorsement to seek this one out.

>71 charl08: - Interesting list of books, but no #2?

>72 Helenliz: I hope you enjoy it.

>73 dudes22: I'm wondering why! The full set is shown here
https://shop.penguin.co.uk/products/black-britain-writing-back-complete-collecti...

The Wren, the Wren
I have read some very good fiction recently and I would add this book to that category.

Enright narrates from the perspective of three generations of the same family, always distinctively.
First an angsty millennial, Nell. She's so full of uncertainty her sections felt hard to read at points. Her life seems to happen almost exclusively online. This alternates with the perspective of her mother, Carmel, who became a single mum at 30. Her daughter is the centre of her world. Her memories of childhood and of bringing up her daughter bear hardly any relation to each other. Near the end of the novel there is a short glimpse, from the perspective of her father the poet as a child, but throughout the book are "his" poems.
Theres a lot going on here, despite it being a relatively short book. Nell and her mother, Carmel, are effectively raised in single parent homes. The poet, Phil, writes beautifully sensitive pieces about nature, the land, but walks out on his family, cruelly, as his wife recovers from a radical mastectomy. The book circles around this cruelty and its impact on the family.

The whole business of sinning, once you were in it, could only get worse, I said. There was always a bigger one behind the little one, if you had a mind to look.
'What age are you?'
'I am ten and two months, Father.'
And in that moment, I believe, Father Madden decided he would make a priest of me.

Every Friday, I was to call to the parish house, go to his study, take a book from his desk and lay the book from the previous week down. If the room was empty, which it rarely was, it meant a parishioner was dying and he had been called to administer the last rites. So to my many other sins was now added the hope that some poor soul would make an exit on a Friday afternoon, because the price of each book was the report I gave to Father Madden, while the next volume, burning with possibility, was tucked under my arm.

Ma Is Scared
A collection from small publisher Comma Press. Translated from hindi, this is a new collection of short stories written over twenty years. The stories focus on the experience of dalit or "reserved" / indigenous communities in India. The subject of discrimination for hundreds of years, recent attempts to institutionally offer protection are shown here to be of limited value. Schoolchildren are mocked for taking places they don't "deserve". Teachers fear telling colleagues about their background. Middle class girls are driven to school whilst the less affluent commute miles, harassed each way. These stories aren't grim reading though: there's love, intrigue, and struggles for change. I hope more of the author's work can be translated (so I can read it !).

After a moment of silence, Naina asked tenderly, 'Won't you ever leave your past behind?'

A twisted smile settled on Pammi's face. If only she could erase everything from her life, just one chance to live again! She wanted to enjoy beautiful, innocent dreams once more. She was no longer full of complaints about the past. There was a face she could still see from the backstreets of her old life: her mother's. A voice came from deep within Pammi: 'If only my mother had shown some strength. If only she had taught me to fight, rather than teaching me only to close my eyes, like her mother did with her.'

More here:
https://commapress.co.uk/books/ma-is-scared

>75 charl08: I've looked at The Wren, The Wren in the bookstore, but have yet to pick it up. Glad it is a good read, Charlotte.

>77 vancouverdeb: It's one of those books that I've kept thinking about after I put it down. I didn't read her last book but will look for a copy now.



I'm reading a lot of books at once at the moment.
Books & Islands in Ojibwe Country
My Father's Daughter
Brown Girls
Constructing a Nervous System

And for my bookgroup at work, we're reading Locks. There are some great end notes.

Dinner
Again, just for the southerners, dinner is an afternoon meal. Dinnertime at school is at midday when you go the shop, and eat your cheese barm-which is a bread roll, remember.
'So, I hear you ask, 'why do you call the thing you keep your cheese barm in a lunch box?' And with the characteristic Scouse humour that also carries the threat of imminent violence, I answer, 'Because you're a smart arse. Now go fuck off, your tea's ready.'

I finished Locks and find myself with mixed feelings. Aeon decides to travel to Jamaica to find out more about his dad's country, but is arrested by Jamaican police and put in a lord-of-the flies style juvenile detention centre. This is a great coming-of-age novel, spoilt (at least for me) by the author's need as the omniscient narrator to intervene at points and say something 'important' rather than just letting the story speak for itself. Having read a few novels recently by authors from the Caribbean or with that heritage, I also thought the magical realism wasn't as strong as it could have been. He references Obeah beliefs but it's so late in the story that it doesn't have time to grow or be reflected upon by the main character.

Recommended, but with those caveats. It will be interesting to hear what the rest of the book group make of the book at our session this week.

I didn't like Bad Luck Charm much either. I was hoping for a fun witchy story but not for me.
Grumpy reader much?

Lessons in Chemistry

Elizabeth stalked down the hallway, her heels hitting the tile in a dangerous staccato. She tried to calm herself by taking a deep breath in, but it came rushing back out at hurricane speed. Stopping abruptly, she slammed her fist against the wall, then took a moment to review her options.
Replead case.
Quit.
Set fire to the building.

This was much more my thing, despite the dog-as-narrator. It was on my list for ages, and I was reminded by all the publicity for the tv series.

The series is on apple tv here so I probably won't see it any time soon!
A reminder that I have had Sara Ahmed's book Complaint on my mind for some time. Need to read it!

>82 charl08: I enjoyed this one too Charlotte. Can't make up my mind whether to watch the series tho.

>83 Caroline_McElwee: I'm not a subscriber, so I can wait for it to pop up later on on a free channel (if it does!). When I was searching for the book cover for a picture for Litsy, the magazine headlines about the tv show were echoes of the fictional tv show's media reception (recipes! Clothes! attractive TV star!) rather than discussions of adviser abuse or women's STEM employment rates.
Plus ça change?

>82 charl08: I read this back when it was first released and before it became a thing. I tend to shy away from the big, popular books, so I'm glad I read it early because I really liked it.

>82 charl08: Glad to see you liked Lessons in Chemistry, Charlotte.
When I started it, I expected a silly romance, and was pleasantly surprised.

>82 charl08: I had it recommended to me by a colleague and wasn't sure what to make of the suggestion. Might be more inclined to give it a go.

>85 RidgewayGirl: Yes, I know what you mean. Ads on the tube always made me question whether I wanted to pick up the book...

>86 FAMeulstee: I read, and enjoy books classed as "romance", but I was surprised to see this tagged that way.

>87 Helenliz: I never know what to make of RL book recommendations. Or what to do with my face when they're really left field.

I got all the pumpkins!

>89 charl08: Congrats! I love these Treasure Hunts.

>89 charl08: Congratulations, Charlotte ! The hunts are so much fun! I got all of the pumpkins too! 🎃

>90 MissWatson: >91 vancouverdeb: Thanks! I should probably have said I used the extra clues.

Technically challenged: the LT appearance settings on my phone have changed so now the page widths are all wrong. I used to be able to toggle between desktop and mobile but now I press the button and zilch. (Fwp)

Horrible weather here. Plans involve coffee and a book. Or two.
I have ambitions to clear some of my "currently reading" pile, which once again has morphed into a "can't admit I'm unlikely to finish" pile.

>92 charl08: How badly did the storm hit you? The Baltic has flooded most areas on our coast, some parts of Lübeck and Flensburg had their electricity cut, and we hear that Denmark was also badly affected.

>92 charl08: Would it help to know that you're not alone in the somewhat out of control currently reading pile?

Hope you're hunkered down with warm things and find a book to settle with. Today has actually been quite pleasant, after a couple of days of really heavy rain. I think the east coast is still getting pretty battered though.

>92 charl08: I love it when you point out your currently reading pile as it always makes me feel better about my own tall pile. Stay dry and enjoy the reading time!

Sorry to hear that your weather has been bad, Charlotte. I've been lucky that it hasn't been raining on my dog walks the past few days. Cloudy, a touch of mist, but that's it. I think it has rained over night , or in the evenings though. A good time for hot beverages. I made some yummy minestrone soup a couple of days ago and that has been nice and warm at dinner.

>93 MissWatson: That sounds awful Birgit. Sorry to hear it.
In my immediate area, not too badly, just high winds and lots of rain - here seems more people's travel plans elsewhere affected (some of my work colleagues have long / weekly commutes). Shocking to see people from small communities in Scotland having to be rescued. I do wonder what I would do if I was told to leave for something like this - hotels aren't cheap, are they?

>94 Jackie_K: It does help, thanks!
I am mostly too warm - thought my dad getting a heated blanket would help reduce the overall temperature of the house, but not so much, so far (which at times means I am wandering around in t-shirts, feeling responsible for climate change). Glad you've had some good weather.

>95 RidgewayGirl: Thank you for the empathy! I should just accept the inevitable and create a "stuck in TBR limbo" category for my books that haven't been picked up in months...

>96 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deborah. It's more fitting for October, but just feels a bit of a shock after an oddly warm month. I had to go out and talk to the tree surgery guys on Friday as the heavens opened. I am sad as they took one look at it, in particular a funny growth on the trunk, and said that was a "bad sign" - so it looks like it might have to go altogether (we were hoping for just chopping back). In happier garden news, a rose I bought because it shares my mum's name has arrived, so need to plant that out.

My Fathers' Daughter
This was part of my (UK) Black History Month reading, and one of Bernadine Evaristo's 'Black Britain Writing Back' series. Originally published in 2005, Pool recounts her adoption as a baby from an orphanage in Eritrea. Only, she wasn't an orphan, and her father, and some of her siblings, were keen to find her. Her adopted father is an academic specialising in Eritrea, so on a return visit, left a message at the orphanage where she had been adopted from. This apparently fragile thread was enough to reconnect Hannah with not only her father, but numerous siblings and many, many other relatives.
I found this memoir really touching: from her dislocation from her (loving) adoptive family, to her struggles on arrival in Eritrea, a very different place for a young woman who recounts multiple dislocations, from language (which she doesn't speak) to wealth (some of her family just clinging on via foodaid) to the experience of living in a nation that has fought a civil war on and off for decades (one of her sisters died completing her national service as a teenager). She doesn't attempt to present herself as in control, or patient with new experiences, or capable in a situation so different from her journalist day job in London. The honesty is refreshing.

I'm obsessed over what I would have been like if I had had a 'normal' upbringing - a 'normal Eritrean' one or a 'normal English' one. The location is almost irrelevant, to my mind. It's the normality, the not being given away, that would have made the most difference...

It is suddenly getting cooler here too. On Thursday overnight it is supposed to go down to 0 C. That seems chilly to me. I'm happy to read that the rose that you purchased in your mum's memory has arrived. I hope you can plant that soon.

>99 vancouverdeb: I thought it would frost last night, but walking this morning there was no sign of it so maybe not?

I finished Voices of the Dead when I couldn't sleep this morning. This is the fourth in the series set in a medical practice in 19th century Edinburgh, and I continue to enjoy the period detail and familiar street names. There's lots of conflict, including between the surgeons and obs/gyns over recognition. The plot here centres on the idea of hypnotism, and what it might be able to achieve in medicine - if it can be proved to work.

Beyond that, difficult to say without spoilers for the previous three books. But if you like historical crime fiction, and you haven't already found these books, definitely recommended (and you have four to add to the wishlist. You're welcome!)

>100 charl08: Thanks for reminding me of that series. I read book 1, and them meant to come back to the rest in the series - and didn't.

We got used to warmer weather here. The sudden cold is a shock. Hope your weather has turned warmer, Charlotte, or at least stopped being wet.

>101 Helenliz: I think practically I'd hate olde worlde Edinburgh (especially the smells) but reading about it hit the spot for me.

>102 Familyhistorian: It's pretty soggy and miserable here, but I recently read that the rain is good for is, so perhaps I should be grateful!

So many good books here! I have reserved The Wren the Wren from my library. Enright is hit-or-miss with me, but this one does sound good. Ma Is Scared also sounds like one I would like.

I loved the character of Elizabeth in Lessons in Chemistry. Your quote captured her very well.

My Father's Daughter also sounds good...

>104 BLBera: For some reason I didn't pick up Actress but should probably try and find a copy after enjoying The Wren the Wren so much. (Weird - LT's system doesn't like the comma, even though it's in the book title on the record that comes up when you leave it out!)

My Fathers' Daughter was a good read. I liked how she nodded to both her dads in the title (her biological mum died giving birth to her, her adoptive one died as a result of a mental health condition when she was very young).

Fun to check out the difference in covers. Penguin doing something striking here for their new edition, from the Eritrean flag colours, the tigrinya script to the reference to her fragmented identity in the cut up portrait photo. Quite a contrast with the generic "African" tree silhouette when the book was first published.
The cover designer, Jodi Hunt, discusses her process here: https://spinemagazine.co/articles/jodi-hunt

I read some more books.

I'm still reading the yakuza manga series Boss Wife but with volume III still not having revealed what, exactly the plan is to turn the whole enterprise into a crime-free zone and find legit jobs for everyone, I'm thinking I'll stop here. Unless there's a 99p deal of course, in which case all bets are off.

Brown Girls fiction I am very glad I picked up on my trip, just browsing in Kinokuniya Portland. The author credits Julie Otsuka as having inspired her approach in writing the novel, combining the experiences growing up in Queens of girls of all backgrounds. I can't imagine how difficult it is to write this way so that it works. Looking for a quote I struggled to keep it short, so here is a very long one, about a "return" visit to discover roots.

Here, we're told, is the plaza where revolutionaries were executed via hanging, via firing squad, for attempting to overthrow colonial rule. Here are the mansions and fields that were gifted to those who worked with the ruling class, in exchange for selling out their own people. Here is the white-walled castle, constructed like a fortress, bordering the cerulean sea, and here an its dungeons where men, women, and children were forced into ships that traveled across the Atlantic, the sold as slaves in Britain, France, the Americas, their colonies. Here are the registers where people were forced to change their names to Spanish, English, French, Dutch ones. Santos, Díaz, James, Roberts, Moreau, Laurent, Janssen. Here are the churches where natives were told to convert. Here are the red-light districts that have sprung up beside naval bases supply and demand, you know. Here are the sweatshops owned by Apple, Nike, Adidas, Gap, and H&M; the crowds of women pouring on the streets mean they've just finished their twelve- hour shifts. Here are the call centers where, even though onto Americans get angry because they claim they can't understand the workers' accents, the workers say they're still grateful to make nine dollars an hour-That's a fortune here! And here's the city-yes, this entire city- that was once blown to pieces by bombs. Where even though we walk through its quiet streets now, we still see ghosts.

The colonized, the colonizer, Where do we fall?

Realize: Whether we like it or not, we lay claim to both.

I walked yesterday, so less reading time than usual (but feel better for the fresh air).

Days of Sand
Beautiful GN exploring the dustbowl through the eyes of a (fictional) New York photographer paid by the (real) government scheme to visit and take photos, following a 'shopping list'. Interspersed with the real photos of the time.



The Duke Starts a Scandal Although it's mostly after the book finishes, thinking about it.
I like Sophie Jordan, picked this up following a positive review on the SBTB site.

Take What You Need
I added this to my reservation list from Beth's review.
Her review is here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/352557#8236102

Two characters take turns to narrate, Leah, a translator and editor, and her former step-mother, Jean. Jean stayed in the rural community as it died, Leah left. Leah was cut off from Jean by her father, and their attempts to reconnect do not go well. In the context of this fraught relationship, Jean discovers the confidence to make art her own way, despite a lack of training, funds or almost any kind of community recognition of her work. My description makes the novel sound like a well-trodden character journey novel, and it is far from that. I am thinking about it today, and I suspect I will be thinking about it next week too.

And I loved the acknowledgements, which credit the author's welding coaches.

She called 'em capsules, he says and points out a machine she used to cut a thin metal frame from bits of scrap metal for cach capsule, how she had to match the width of the lenses with one of her spoon heads, all of which seems like a tremendous mount of work just to hold a tiny snippet of a photo and a pine cone, and I notice now the various shades of metal in each capsule's frame. I am stunned that I didn't know Jean had it in her to create a concept like this, follow through on it over and over again. After college, I attempted a few poems, and once a story but the sense of exposure was too unnerving. To slip a little of myself imperceptibly into the language of others, as an editor, suggesting words for someone else, felt safer yet still creative, still satisfying.
How did Jean find the nerve alone in this house to believe otherwise?

Hi Charlotte: I am so glad you liked Take What You Need. Novey deserves more recognition, I think.

>105 charl08: Really interesting cover discussion.

Brown Girls sounds like one I would like.

>109 BLBera: I loved the way the sculptures were described: I could imagine them as something I'd want to see in a gallery..

I hope you can find a copy of Brown Girls - I'm intrigued to see what the author writes next, too.

Talking with my siblings tonight about going to plant a tree for my mum in a nature reserve. It was my idea, but now I'm kind of dreading it.

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop
A very gentle novella about the love of books. The translator's note at the end even points out the books mentioned that aren't translated... yet.

Some of the books I read in October.

Nice graphic of some of your October reads, Charlotte. I'll keep Ambrose Parry in mind. I'm definitely a fan of historical crime fiction.

>113 vancouverdeb: Thanks Deborah. Quite glad to see the back of October.

The Fraud

Since coming to England, Bogle had grown used to silence, and to standing like a statue, eyes straight ahead. He found ways to occupy himself. The patterns in wallpaper. The sconces round lamps. The carvings on a fireplace. The paintings on walls. If there was a negro face in a corner of any painting, anywhere in a room, he prided himself on finding it in a moment - he supposed he was homesick. Yet only now did he notice the boy archer, on the opposite wall. It was not a small portrait, and maybe that in itself was the cause of the delay, for he was accustomed to finding such faces in the corner of canvases, or buried in a crowd. This boy took up the whole frame. Bogle liked him very much. He had a bow in hand and a quiver on his back, and looked just like Ellis by the side of Mr Macintosh, off to hunt wild pig. Only, this young archer was not carrying anything for anybody. These were his own bow and arrow, and he hunted on his own behalf.

I put off picking this up as I was hoping a copy would come in at the library (after I walked past a copy a month ago, thinking I had plenty to read...). The bookgroup voted for it, something I could complain about if it wasn't me that suggested it in the first place (!)
The copy never came in at the library on the reservation system, so I picked up a copy in the local Waterstones.

I really enjoyed it, found it swept me up in the story of the widowed Mrs Touchet, observer to London's literary scene and then the decline of her cousin's literary fortunes. I like Sarah Waters' books and this reminded me of those, the historical context richly illustrated, with characters who are compelling.

Although I kind of wish Mr Bogle had his own book.

Perhaps William had made it so. Over the years, despite everything, he had made a lot of things so that weren't.

Flitches of bacon and lime trees and Dick Turpin riding through Cricklewood. Eliza attributed this not to any special skill on her cousin's part but to the fact that the great majority of people turn out to be extraordinarily suggestible, with brains like sieves through which the truth falls.

Fact and fiction meld in their minds.

>114 charl08: I'm very eager to read this. Anything Smith writes is going to move in interesting directions.

I love the "flitches of bacon" quote, Charlotte. I did like the book, but not as much as you did. I thought the parallels between the Claimant and Trump were really interesting. It's one I think would make a good discussion book. I'd like to hear how your discussion goes.

>115 RidgewayGirl: I was keen to pick it up too (until it became a bookclub book, and then the 'rule of someone telling me what to read' kicked in).

>116 BLBera: I should have taken notes. One of our members speaks so incredibly quickly it would have been hard work though. As usual, I thought everyone else had thought much more deeply about the book than I had, but it was a funny meeting with lots of laughter. I continue to be a bit worried we're not going to make it much further - four of us again this time.

There was lots of nodding about the repeated and multiple nature of the frauds perpetuated in the book. Including, our host noted, Ainsworth thinking he could write (ouch).

One person really didn't like it, they thought it was overwritten and showed that she'd been writing it for Too Long. From a discussion about the choices Smith had made in telling the stories of those who (Bogle) have not left much of a record of their inner lives and views - why she chose Eliza as narrator, for example, we segued into discussion of National Trust attempts to recognise historical places' links to the slave trade, art depicting enslaved people and the need for acknowledgement, language and accents changing (the incident with the driver and Dickens). Our host quoted the author on Dickens being everywhere, and being anti-historical novel. I'm still trying to get my head round this. Is the historical novel inherently conservative?

Discuss, with examples...!

I had not come across the real legal case the book is based on, whereas two of the other members had (although this is not unusual, very well read types).

I have been recommended this podcast about the Tichborne Claimant.
https://shedunnitshow.com/thetichborneclaimant/

National Trust on colonialism and historic slavery
https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/who-we-are/research/addressing-our-histories-of...

Paterson Joseph on African figures in art history
https://artuk.org/discover/stories/the-outrageous-neglect-of-african-figures-in-...

Smith in the New Yorker
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/07/10/on-killing-charles-dickens

Hanging over all this anxiety was the long shadow of Dickens. To be my age, bookish, and born in England was to grow up under that tiresomely gigantic influence. Dickens was everywhere. He was in school and on the shelves at home and in the library. He invented Christmas. He was in politics, influencing changes in labor law, educational law, even copyright law. He was the original working-class hero—radiant symbol of our supposed meritocracy—as well as a crown jewel of the English Heritage tourist industry. (In other words, he was posthumously manipulated by many different sections of British society to score a variety of political points.)

>117 charl08: I think I'm a bit of a Dickens sceptic, though I have read some of his books as an adult, as well as lots of books with a take on his literary legacy. And I've quite enjoyed some radio and TV versions of his work.

I don't think he was really working class - his family background was middle class though with some major hiccups - debtors' prison for his father and Charles being sent off to work packaging boot polish at 12, and he had enough education and literacy to support himself and gain material for his later literary career. He also benefited from various family contacts and friends. Wikipedia quotes several passages about his early years which I think are, erm, never knowingly understated. I agree though with Zadie Smith about the posthumous manipulation.

I rather rushed through The Fraud - it's very overdue at the library - no fines now but library staff have reminded me several times about it when ringing up to say my other reservations are available, and I feel guilty. I hope to take it in tomorrow but maybe will try to look at again. I think this one might be interesting to listen to.

I finished two books after the bookclub one.

One a very slim crime novel that I picked up on a whim in a "quick visit to a bookshop" where I'd "only pick up one book". Ha ha.

Liminal
I liked this a lot - set in Berlin, translated from German. The narrator is a fallen drug squad member who got too close to the people he was supposed to be shopping after a traumatic incident. The book does a good job of recreating a kind of 'trippy' feel as he gets involved by accident in what may be a murder case, and attempts to solve it.

I went into a Turkish café in Boddinstrasse and to the man behind the counter. The man called out and sent a boy off. Then I sat at a table on the street and waited.
At the table next to me two young men were talking about stochastic theory.
A woman was sitting with them, mostly saying nothing but making the odd contribution that silenced the other two.
Hello stochastics.
Hello Neukölln.
Hello summer.
It was hot. I smoked and drank Turkish coffee. Beside a small playground on the opposite side of the street a few young people were playing table tennis. I heard the sound of the ping-pong balls springing off the concrete table.

Red Memory
I picked this up as it made the shortlist for the BA history prize (it didn't win).
https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/british-academy-book-prize-global-cultural-u...

The author was Guardian correspondent in China for many years, and here constructs a complex narrative from Chinese memories of the Cultural Revolution. She explains the way this complex period of Chinese history is still being fought over, to the extent of being ignored in public history museums. She shows the struggles in families to get some kind of acknowledgment of what happened to their relatives, killed or fatally injured in 'struggle' sessions, or shot after a denouncement. The experiences of the young people sent into the countryside - and how these memories are somehow allowable in modern China, seeing pensioners get together for reminiscences over their years separated from their homes and families, isolated in impoverished villages and forbidden to leave. Near the end of the book she includes conversations with psychiatrists, a new profession in China, and their explanations for how families have dealt with the trauma caused by the cultural revolution (as well as the wars, poverty, famine...)

There had been posters all over the walls of the town, describing the death sentences passed on people for this or that crime, 'and a brush tick on the poster in red, to show they had all been killed'.
Master Wang interjected for the first time, startling me: 'You saw it everywhere. There were a lot of death notices.'

On one level it's tempting to just point to the complete 'foreign-ness' of what she describes, but Branigan is careful to point to the current attempt to create culture wars in the UK. I've added lots of other books to my wishlist about China.

...he arrived in Inner Mongolia he was arrested and jailed, giving him a close-up view of one of the era's worst atrocities. Twenty-two thousand people were killed in pursuit of the secret Inner Mongolian People's Party, a party which, officials later admitted, did not actually exist. Wu promised fellow prisoners that one day he would write their story. After his release he fulfilled the pledge... he founded his own digital magazine, Remembrance. Each issue was emailed to just under two hundred people, which meant that - under some obscure rule - officials classed it as a private message, not a publication demanding censorship. He could not stop recipients passing it on.

I'm about 100 pages into One Puzzling Afternoon and really enjoying it . I'm quite sure you would enjoy it. I have The Fraud on hold at the library, but there are several people ahead of me at the library. I hope November is a better month for you, Charlotte.

Another list to add to er, my list.
I am intrigued by Man-Eating Typewriter. What a title.
https://www.gold.ac.uk/goldsmiths-prize/archive/prize-2023/

>118 elkiedee: We had fun discussing Dickens reappearing in the bookgroup. One member described being further on in the read and thinking 'hang on, I thought Dickens was dead...'. (Maybe you had to be there.)

>120 vancouverdeb: I'll have a look for it Deborah. I'm reading Jimi Hendrix, Live in Lviv at the moment which is suiting my mood for distraction.
Thank you for the wishes. I think this is going to be hard until after Xmas. I am trying to think of something I can do for the A&E ward who looked after mum last New Year when they were so busy (that doesn't cost a fortune). Mum used to say chocolates for nurses was kind but a bit too frequent (as in, they always got them, and they were almost always trying to eat healthier).

Someone shared this today (it's not new) and I thought it's a lovely one, and I'd pass it on.
https://www.cilip.org.uk/page/poweredbylibrarians

>122 charl08: I thought the story jumped around in time and Zadie Smith says she took a lot of liberties with the factual content of the story in her afterword. For example, in real life the central, point of view character died before a lot of her story in the novel.

>117 charl08: Thanks - it sounds like it was a good meeting.

>124 elkiedee: One of the group tried to listen to the audio and said the jumping around made it very difficult to follow.

>125 BLBera: Yes, definitely. The hour went very quickly. Gothic fiction next.

>126 charl08: I want to write a review of The Fraud so I can take the book back to the library today, as it's very overdue and I feel guilty, and also I have another reservation to collect. I think I've been hesitating over what to write because I feel I've missed things and don't have time to really get to understand the book. I will hope to get my own copy and maybe go back to it next year (or later). Some books I don't really care about but occasionally I read something that didn't quite click at the time but I'd like to look back later. Sometimes I realise I've been reading and not taking things in very well. Two examples of books I wasn't sure about first time round but loved much more on a second reading are Fingersmith and Half of a Yellow Sun.

Another I'd like to go back to, the first time was just after it was published (so probably more than 20 years now), is Zadie Smith's first novel, White Teeth.

>127 elkiedee: I can't think of books I've been that patient with. If it doesn't work the first time, I'm not very likely to go back to it.

Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv

After the fourth drink, Alik felt an uncontrollable relaxation in his body, and he got scared. How many times had he told himself: you can't drink vodka after wine! All the same, that moment always came, not too often, once every six months, when the wine ran out and there was only vodka left, or, as on this occasion, the vodka replaced the wine for some esoteric and not entirely clear reason.
"Well," the guest said slowly, giving his host a look that had been softened by vodka.
Vynnychuk wiped his lips.
"I'm writing a novel at the moment," he started.
Fear filled Alik's eyes. He thought his comrade was about to tell him the entire contents of his new novel, and that he'd deliberately filled him with booze to do so. So that Alik lacked the strength to get up and leave.

I'm never quite sure what's going on with Kurkov's novels, but this one took this to new (comedic) heights. The plot (such as it is) features an ageing hippy who is befriended by his former KGB minder, a guy who makes his living with an unorthodox kidney stone treatment, and a plague of attacking seagulls. Magical realism with plenty of laughs.
Written before the current Ukraine conflict, I found it hard to read without thinking of so many news images of destruction.

Gothic fiction next. I 'll look forward to that. They are often " fun" as in enjoyable and gripping reads. I enjoy them.

I hope you are having a good weekend, Charlotte. It's a wet one here and looks like it will be like that for the foreseeable future. Good weather for reading.

Popping in to say Hi! Looks like November is off to a good start. : )

Thanks Deborah, Meg and Kim. It's been a wet one here, and we have warnings of 60mph gusts today.

I'm in the middle of This train is for, a beautiful but bleak collection of short stories by an Irish writer.

Also I love Russia, journalism and memoir from a journalist who worked for many years for an independent newspaper which has now been closed down by Putin.

On the impact of the USSR on the Nganasan, the northernmost indigenous community on the continent. The community has been so hard hit by deaths not-from-natural-causes, at the current rate she reports it will not exist in 2050.

It took the new powers until 1920 to reach the Taymyr in full force. They travelled among the tundra camps comvening tribal councils and executive committees. In his 1929 book Indigenous Soviets, N. E. Leonov describes the first negotiations between the Nganasan and the Bolsheviks.

The Nganasan wanted to know whether they were "required to obey the new instructor as unfailingly as they had the previous bailiff." The "instructor" said no, they were not, but at their very first objection so the new ways he declared, "You, old men, have the old law in mind. praying to God and going against Soviet rule. If you keep talking like this soldiers with rifles will come here from Krasnoyarsk and lock you up in a metal box." A Nganasan recalled, "We were frightened then and kept silent, and so the meeting ended in silence."

Thinking about booking to see 'Women in Revolt' at the Tate. It looks so good!
https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/women-in-revolt

And of course, always a tempting catalogue...
https://shop.tate.org.uk/women-in-revolt-exhibition-book/28592.html?cgid=women-i...

We've had a couple of sunny days, which has been lovely, Charlotte. Not too long now until the Booker Prize winner is revealed. I am rooting for either The Bee Sting or Prophet Song, but I'll carry on no matter which Book wins. Study For Obedience just won the Giller Prize in Canada, but I doubt if I will read it.

>134 vancouverdeb: I lost track of the prize and had to go look up the date of the announcement!

I have been away planting a tree for my mum. The weather was so wet, but we had a clear morning for the planting. Hoping to come back and visit the tree in the summer too.

I reread The Kiss Quotient and Strong Female Character popped up in my feed on the kindle. I saw the author of this memoir, Fern Brady, participating as one of the contestants on Taskmaster. She was a unique contestant, memorable.
The memoir is her own account of growing up autistic in Scotland, misdiagnosed with a range of mental health conditions until finally being diagnosed and finding treatment to help. She doesn't mince words about her own experiences, or others she feels could have helped her sooner. Her observations about her experiences of the comedy circuit will not be surprising to anyone who has seen the recent accusations against Russell Brand.

>136 charl08: Fern's book is not released in Australia until February. But I have it on my to read list for then.

>137 JayneCM: Look forward to hearing what you think about it.

I love Russia: reporting from a lost country
A collection of Elena Kostyuchenko's longform journalism from her work for Russia's last independent newspaper, each prefaced with her reflections on what she wasn't able to report at the time and her own experiences. It's blurbed by Svetlana Alexievich.

I found this an eye-opening read, but a heavy one, it took me some time to read it as I would pick it up and read something else in between chapters. Not because the book isn't gripping, but just each account seems to reveal more people being mistreated, exploited and the state working hard to cover things up. Several times in the connecting sections she reflects on the six staff of her newspaper who died doing their job.
Events and policies I was vaguely aware of (the siege of Beslan, industrial pollution of the environment, opposition to LGBTQ+ rights) are accompanied by subjects that made me wonder just how much more she could have included.

On state not-quite-mental hospitals 'internat' (there are institutions for 'more serious' patients too)

Many of them don't know, and are too afraid to ask, what their diagnosis might be. I met a young woman whose periods stopped when she was twenty-six. She had a physical exam and something was logged in her record, but no one told her what, and she's too afraid to ask. Why is she afraid? Because asking questions could be interpreted as complaining. Any complaint can and probably will be viewed as "deteriorating mental condition" and be dealt with by an injection, or a transfer up to 3-A or, worse, to the mental hospital, depending on the severity of the transgression.
And this is a whole other layer of hell: You can never be in a bad mood or be angry or tearful, never call nastiness nastiness or cruelty cruelty.

On industrial corruption:

Abdullayev, lawyer and head of the Moi Dom* Alliance, chooses his words carefully. But he is willing to speak. We meet with him in his office. Norilskers believe that his letter about the spill ended up on Putin's desk.
For a long time, he was alone on the battlefield. Abdullayev has been filing public grievances against the city and Nornickel and then defending them in the courts for seven years. ....
There are no members in his organisation, but there is a skeleton crew-eight lawyers. Labour rights, corruption, ecology. "You wouldn't believe how interconnected they are." Up until last winter, the roads here were covered in a granulated slag that the city administration would buy from Nornickel. After a years long battle waged by Ruslan, the slag was finally acknowledged for what it actually was: dangerous industrial waste.
"Norilsk is like a sanctuary for corruption. They brazenly took their waste-which they're supposed to dispose of and not only sold it off but got money for it out of the city budget! I mean, goddamn!

The flipside of the picture of corruption is the minority of individuals willing to report, to complain, to protest despite intimidation of themselves, their families. The journalists themselves faced (they are no longer legal) constant surveillance (why was a building near their office constantly boarded up and 'empty' in busy central Moscow?), interference with their attempts to report (sources mysteriously change their mind) and their evidence (no samples are allowed to leave the industrial area without official approval, the police attempt to prevent boat captains taking them to polluted waters, setup checkpoints on isolated roads).

The final section opens with her reflecting on being a child, playing USSR against 'the fascists' with snowballs, honouring veterans who fought against 'the fascists', coming to read critical journalism and realising the limitations of the mainstream news, becoming a journalist. She admires those who went to report on Chechnya, reports on Donbas herself, to the present day:

In Moscow, I sleep and I have very vivid dreams. They're too vivid, it's almost painful, but also so beautiful. I get up and smoke. Come back into the room. My girlfriend is sitting up in our bed looking at her phone. I can't read her facial expression. Why aren't you sleeping? They're bombing Kyiv. What? They're bombing Kyiv and all of the major cities in Ukraine. We're bombing them? We're bombing them.
I sleep for two more hours, I make myself sleep. I get dressed and go to the office. They ask, Are you ready? Of course I am.
But really, it is impossible to be ready for being the fascists. I was not ready for this at all.

This sounds great, Charlotte. I'm adding it to my WL.

>135 charl08: How nice to plant a tree in memory of your mother, Charlotte. What kind of tree is it?

>139 BLBera: I'm hoping to catch up with a session she did which the hosts have shared on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/FjHjL4_Llck?feature=shared

>140 FAMeulstee: It was an indigenous willow.
https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/wildlife-explorer/trees-and-shrubs/goat-willow It's part of a lovely project raising money for the RSPB and creating a new wooded area to improve the environment in a fairly isolated part of the Lake District. All the trees are from seed collected and grown locally (we walked past the nursery on the way).

It was beautiful: we saw a heron on our way home from the site and there were birds everywhere. If I'd been on my own I could have quite happily stayed and just sat with the binoculars. I think she would have liked it.

I joined a bookgroup linked to the Lancaster litfest. They read a 'classic' every other month, and this month's book was the Mexican novel Pedro Páramo. It's a new translation and comes with (in the Serpent's Tail edition) an introduction by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (saying how much he loved the book, learning it off by heart and adapting it for the cinema).
I found the book incredibly hard to make sense of, it jumps around in terms of narrator, who is alive (and who is dead) and when the action is taking place. And all of this in a short text that manages to also bring in conflicting political forces in a rural Mexican community, critiques the Catholic church and includes descriptions of the indigenous setting, from plants to meals.

I came to Comala because I was told my father lived here, a man named Pedro Páramo. That's what my mother told me. And I promised her I'd come see him as soon as she died. I squeezed her hands as a sign I would. After all, she was near death, and I was of a mind to promise her anything.

The bookgroup meeting was wonderful, including lots of discussion of the difficulty involved in reading it (and recommendations to pick up the book for a reread). The host discussed visiting Mexico during the Day of the Dead, and the blurred lines between the supernatural and the natural. After the first half, we were joined by a Latin American literature specialist, whose enthusiasm just made me want to go back to the book. He talked about the significance of the text for Mexican writers, how it brings together indigenous ideas with modernist concepts for the first time, creating a new literary form in the process. He also discussed the author's biography, losing both parents by the age of ten, leaving school at 14 and creating such an influential book. He said he'd spoken to two Nobel prize winners who'd wished they'd written the book.

>142 charl08: This sounds fascinating, Charlotte. It does sound like a book that is best read with others with lots of discussion. I've heard it mentioned many times but haven't read it yet.

What a lovely memorial to your mum, Charlotte, the planting of tree. Herons are such beautiful, elegant birds. We have lot of them around here, but I never tire of seeing them.

>135 charl08: The photo is beautiful. What a lovely tribute to your mum.

>142 charl08: That sounds like a wonderful bookgroup that you've found!

>143 BLBera: I just looked Gerald Martin up online (the guest at the book club). I have downloaded a sample of his bio of Marquez. I don't have a great track record of getting through NF but I'm going to give this a go Gabriel Garcia Marquez: a life).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Martin

>144 vancouverdeb: I used to see one on the lake outside my office building in the summer when the campus is quiet. I'm not sure if it's just my timing, but I hadn't seen one in a while.

>145 mathgirl40: I maintain it's almost impossible to take a bad photo in the Lake District. Although the first day with non-stop rain almost proved me wrong! I found the previous meeting I attended a bit frustrating, as it's much more static than I'm used to. But I would suspect this is at least 50% my cranky perfectionist streak.

The other side of the bridge
I was finally motivated to pick this up as Beth reviewed it.
My mum didn't read much non-crime fiction, so during lockdown when she read my copy of the newest Mary Lawson and liked it, I went onto Biblio.com and found some second hand copies of her back catalogue. I don't think she read any of them though. I'm not sure.

I really liked this book, set in a small, rural Canadian community with two timelines. In one, Arthur struggles to deal with his brother in the 1940s, who is a manipulative character (to put it mildly). In the second, more modern timeline, Ian goes to work for the adult Arthur on his farm, whilst he tries to work out what he wants to do as a job. Does he really want to follow the family tradition and take over the family medical practice? The book felt completely absorbing and distracting in the best way.
As usual at the moment, I found the descriptions of grief particularly striking.

Now he found he couldn't sit down for his break. He drank his tea standing up, beside whichever team he was using. His father's horses were gentle with him. He'd expected them to play up, unsettled by a strange hand on the plough, but they did not. It seemed to him that they understood. They were the only comfort he had, out there alone in the fields all day.
At dinner time and again in the evening he'd walk back to the house along the track and for the first couple of weeks the prints of his father's boots were still there, like his signature written on the land. Then it rained and they were gone. That had seemed a treachery, that his footsteps could be erased so easily.

Planting a tree for your mum is a wonderful idea, Charlotte, and in such beautiful surroundings too.

I Love Russia: reporting from a lost country sounds like a way to see what the people who live in Russia are actually thinking.

>148 Familyhistorian: I'd recommend it. Hope that she writes more: I'd be interested to hear about her experience of exile (presumably, avoiding the international branch of the FSB).

16. Noir Burlesque (GN)
This was a bit more "adult " than I was expecting. I'd assumed burlesque in the sense of a play on something. No. This was in the sense of a lady who can make the tassles on her nipples move in different directions. I should have read the blurb on the library catalogue more carefully. Not enough of a plot, and not for me.

17. The Road Trip (fiction)
I enjoyed this, from the author of the The Flatshare. This time the high concept is an enforced road trip with an ex.

>147 charl08: I read and enjoyed this one recently too Charlotte. This is the third of hers I’ve read so far, I think there may be one other

Not too long until the big Booker Prize is announced, Charlotte. Who knows, but I am hoping for The Bee Sting or Prophet Song.

I've really enjoyed all of Mary Lawson's books but The Other Side of the Bridge is the only one I have yet to read. Nice review.

I'm very pleased by the announcement, and was interested to hear the lead-in to announcing the winning book (I did guess from the lead in that it was, I think, the only shortlisted book I've read so far, have also read two others from the longlist).

>150 Caroline_McElwee: Someone on Litsy pointed out that as Lawson is not the fastest writer, worth spacing them out. I wondered about keeping the one I haven't read yet for a special occasion.

>151 vancouverdeb: I was glad Prophet Song was acknowledged, but some horrible headlines (I didn't read the articles) about the book winning (suggesting it was a reaction to recent violence in Dublin). They seem to have been moderated overnight, thank goodness.

>152 elkiedee: I didn't read all the shortlist this year, there were some of the list that didn't appeal. I thought the comments by the chair on it not being unanimous were intriguing: I wondered which book(s) almost made it.

The keynote speech at the prize ceremony in London was given by Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was released from prison in Tehran, Iran, last year. She discussed the ways in which books helped her when she was in solitary confinement. “When the guard opened the door and handed over the books to me, I felt liberated; I could read books, they could take me to another world, and that could transform my life,” she said.
“One day a cellmate received a book through the post; it was The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, translated into Farsi,” she said. “Who thought a book banned in Iran could find its way to prison through the post?

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/nov/26/booker-prize-2023-prophet-song-pau...

Kyoko and Kyoji (Chapbook)
I've not counted this in the stats as it's just 40 pages. Part of the translated chapbook fiction series 'IYAGI' by Strangers Press.
Explored both gendered discrimination and experiences of pro-democracy protests in the 1980s. I'm not sure I would even have been aware of this history without Human Acts: interesting to hear another writer on how the effects of these events continue to be felt. The author has won prizes in Korea for their fiction, but it must have been a challenge to translate, as a key part of the narrative is the characters' decisions to change their names. This would not need explanation, I suspect in Korean, but in English requires context around gendered naming and meanings.

Happening
This was a reread for me, although not exactly an intentional one (I read thinking this is familiar, and LT confirmed it). Some parts I had forgotten entirely, particularly the graphic loss of the baby following her visit to the abortionist. (Maybe selective memory.) Such a powerful book for such a small number of pages.

I attended literature and sociology classes, ate in the university canteen, I drank coffee twice a day in La Faluche, the student bar. Yet I was living in a different world. There were the other girls, with their empty bellies, and there was me.

System Collapse: the murderbot diaries

"Sentience sucks."

I think I'm going to add to my never-ending list of re/reading plans the Murderbot backlist. This read reminded me of how fun they are.

Some more quick reviews -
Blood of the Virgin (GN)
A weighty GN centred on the 1970s pulp horror genre. The main character, a wannabe director / writer, is struggling with work, a new baby and his relationship. He finally gets the opportunity to direct he's been hoping for - and then finds it all too much. His wife goes home to New Zealand (taking their child). The book is full of sidenotes and back stories, and when I read at the end that it had been serialised over several years, it all made Much More Sense. The sections I found most interesting weren't really related to the main narrative at all - his mother-in-law's pre-New Zealand life (ie surviving the Holocaust in eastern Europe) and the experiences of a cowboy turned film-maker from the beginning of film.

Towards 0% (in translation / chapbook)
Another chapbook - almost memoir style, a short story about the growth of Korean film and what it means to be a filmmaker when there is no money (or if there is money, lots of commercial pressure). I could see it could be accused of occupying quite a privileged space (you have to be in a privileged position to make the choice to fund a less-than-successful film making career via tutoring, perhaps?) but near the end of the story the narrator (a young-ish film school type) meets an elderly woman who is taking evening classes in film, and has decided to make her own work.

The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding
A clearly told GN about the life (or imagined life) of Greek philosopher Hipparchia. The author creates a narrative around how she came to be a philosopher based on a planned wedding. The contrast between being a philosopher, especially one who rejected wealth and possessions, and wealthy Greek society's norms for women was sharp.
In the notes the author, Barbara Stok, explains how little detail remains to explain Hipparchia's life and choices. She also details how she became fascinated with philosophy following difficulties in her own life. That thread of her own experience, that philosophers from thousands of years ago can offer relevant insight now, is a strong one through the book: why do some think humans are worth more than animals? How do we live a "good" life? How should the world's resources be shared? How do we make choices for ourselves rather than following what "everyone" does?

A German Requiem
A reread for me, Bernie Gunther goes to Vienna after the war to try and find evidence to acquit a soldier who is about to be hung.
Of course, nothing is as it seems, and everything is very atmospheric. Think The Third Man (the filming forms part of a sub-plot).
I was going to recycle the book but I'm tempted to keep it as the reread felt practically all new to me!

Walk with a Goddess
Another Korean fiction chapbook. This story is a slightly creepy reflection on relationships. The narrator tells an acquaintance about the weird coincidence that has happened to all her ex-boyfriends. Is it her fault? Is she bad luck?

>157 charl08: After reading your review, I found a copy of The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding and reserved it, I hope it arrives next week, together with my next Bernie Gunther: The Prague Fatale.

>142 charl08: I'd like to read a bio of Garcia Marquez although I still have fiction of his to read.

Great description of The Other Side of the Bridge; I have no memory of it...

Murderbot is so much fun.

The Booker keynote sounds amazing; I will definitely watch it.

>159 FAMeulstee: I hope you like it, Anita. I think I've come across her other one Vincent also - but she has lots of comics in Dutch, I think, that aren't translated. (Ed to add: And I should have asked if you had come across these?)

>160 BLBera: Did you read it? Did I mix your recommendation up with Caroline's? Sorry!

I went to the dentist with pain today, and it turns out that I need a root canal. This year just keeps getting better!

>161 charl08: Oh no! You'll be more than glad to see the back of 2023. I hope that the dental pain isn't too bad, and they sort it out quickly.

>162 Jackie_K: Touch wood, I seem to have got away quite lightly. I've been taking painkillers and taking it gently.

They moved forward bookclub to try and avoid Xmas dos. I'm hoping to finish Texaco by Monday!

>161 charl08: I didn't come across Barbara Stork before, Charlotte, athough her name sounds familiar.
The Philosopher, the Dog and the Wedding is going to be my first, and I might look out for her other works if I like it.
Always fun to discover a new to me Dutch writer through your thread :-)

>164 FAMeulstee: I think you have a bit more of her work to look for than non-Dutch speakers (although I am amazed how much her work has travelled in translation - nice to see in these fraught times). Of course, assuming you like it! No pressure.
https://barbaraal.nl/nieuws/

Some of the books from last month.

Currently reading.
This month I like to look at what is on my (misnamed) "currently reading" section of LT and try and finish off some books (or admit defeat) before the end of the year.
Texaco (Granta Editions) Patrick Chamoiseau
The translated fiction bookgroup is reading this. They've moved the meeting to earlier in the month for Xmas reasons and I am not sure I'm going to finish in time. Fascinating book though, so I'll finish after the meeting if not.

Constructing a nervous system : a memoir Margo Jefferson
Hoping I'll have the brain space for this over the Xmas break.

Hunting game Helene Tursten
I loved her previous detective, so am feeling a bit disloyal reading her new character. Plus my phone logged me out of the library ebook app and wouldn't let me back in!

Hungry ghosts Kevin Jared Hosein
About half way through, have suspicions that things are not going to End Well for the characters, so tempted to stop. (Yes, I do realise this is fiction)

Mansfield & Me: A Graphic Memoir Sarah Laing
I normally read memoirs like this in one gulp, not sure if it's the timing with this one.

Russian Gothic Aleksandr Skorobogatov
This is quite grim, so I put it down after the first section.

The Bureau of Past Management Iris Hanika
I think I'm going to have to start this again, it's been so long.

Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World Padraig O. Tuama
This is a lovely book.

The Neverending Quest for the Other Shore: An Epic in Three Cantos (Wesleyan Poetry Series) Sylvie Kandé 2022
I am not great with narrative poetry. I have learned the French for canoe now though.

The Story of Art without Men Katy Hessel
Hoping to get to sit down with this over the break (work closes over Xmas)

Reading Shakespeare's Sonnets: A New Commentary Don Paterson
I'm beginning to think I should just donate this. I'm not as motivated as I thought to read all the sonnets, despite Paterson's refreshingly critical approach.

Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint Louverture Sudhir Hazareesingh
Chipping away at this chunkster on the kindle 1% at a time, reassured that 15% of the total is endnotes.

A Woman Is No Man: A Novel Etaf Rum
I realised this was quite timely and picked it up off the shelf and then got distracted by Library books.

Books and Islands in Ojibwe Country: Traveling Through the Land of My Ancestors
This one got left in the office by mistake, and things have been so busy I have been bad at taking a proper lunch break.

Hi Charlotte - I've been lurking but thought I should at least say hello :)

Hope you are having a good weekend. Sorry about the tooth pain. That's the pits.

>167 charl08: That is a pretty ambitious list for December. Good luck. I loved A Woman Is No Man and the Erdrich memoir, so if you have to prioritize...

>167 charl08: Your currently reading list (even if you are not currently reading it) is proving tempting, Charlotte. My library has some I'm interested in but I have to put them off since I just had 9 holds come in at the same time. Why do they do that?

>170 Familyhistorian: Eeek at 9 holds. Although I have ended up collecting 7 or 8 on one day, 5 from one library and 2 or 3 from another. Maybe you have people who share your reading interests and returned a number of the books you'd asked for at once!

>168 katiekrug: Don't worry about lurking. Everyone's so busy at this time of year. Thanks for posting (and the wishes!)

>169 BLBera: Well, I don't imagine I'll get through them all. But it is nice to have a target.

>170 Familyhistorian: I don't know why they come in at once: I've been so glad when just one or two come through. So much easier to carry two home than six! My library system are updating the interlibrary loan system at the moment, so I'm wondering what will change (or if it will all be behind the scenes).

>171 elkiedee: I've just maxed out my reservations as I was hoping to get a few graphic novels through for Xmas reading. We shall see!

Urgh. Stayed late at work (entirely my own choice) and missed book group. Rubbish!

>173 charl08: - Our ILL changed/updated their system last summer and I really dislike the new one. One big change is that you can't see where you are on the hold list. You can ask the librarian to look for you, but it was easier when I could see myself moving up the list.

>175 dudes22: I was assuming it was the out of system book system they were updating. Your option sounds more likely. I will cross my fingers for more user friendliness, as I never know when a book will come.

I read A Woman is no Man when it was the Shelterbox book. Worth reading.

>177 Helenliz: I have such a lovely edition! It's one of the Olive ones.

News on book banning...
PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE FILES LAWSUIT AGAINST IOWA FOR FIRST AND FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT VIOLATIONS

Amidst an increase in legislation aimed at banning and removing books from schools and libraries across the country, on November 30, 2023, Penguin Random House, alongside the Iowa State Education Association, filed a lawsuit against the state of Iowa challenging its recently enacted Senate File 496 (SF 496). PRH and ISEA are joined by four renowned authors whose books have been banned or removed in Iowa – Laurie Halse Anderson (Speak and Shout), John Green (Looking for Alaska and Fault in Our Stars), Malinda Lo (Last Night at the Telegraph Club and A Scatter of Light), and Jodi Picoult (19 Minutes) – three educators, a high school student, and parent.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/articles/what-were-doing-legal-action/

Just been listening to the radio, one of those "best of" shows. I want to read all the books.

Toy Fights: A Boyhood by Don Patterson published by Faber and Faber
Thunderclap: A Memoir of Art, Life and Sudden Death by Laura Cumming published by Chatto & Windus
How To Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir by Safiya Sinclair published by Fourth Estate
Twelve Words for Moss by Elizabeth-Jane Burnett published by Allen Lane
The British Year in 72 Seasons by Kiera Chapman, Rowan Jaines, Lulah Ellgender and Rebecca Warren published by Granta
Rural: The Lives of the Working Class Countryside by Rebecca Smith published by William Collins
High Caucasus: A Mountain Quest in Russia's Haunted Hinterland by Tom Parfitt published by Headline
Eve: How The Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution by Cat Bohannon published by Hutchinson Heinemann
Shakespeare’s Book: The Intertwined Lives Behind the First Folio by Chris Laoutaris published by Williams Collins

So many lists and bests of . I have another list you might be interested in. It's your top 5 books of 2023 - here - https://www.librarything.com/list/45091/Top-Five-Books-of-2023

I always have fun with those sort of lists.

>180 vancouverdeb: Thanks for posting that Deborah. I liked looking at what everyone else has read! I think 5 is too few to choose though.

Hungry Ghosts
This novel, set in Trinidad, starts dark and doesn't ever really relent. The main characters are at the bottom of the pile, living in shared accommodation. All the families have no privacy from one another, and know each others' secrets, from domestic violence to a horrendous case of hyperemesis gravidarum that makes everything smell.

Hans and Shweta are the centre of the book, struggling with a loss they can't seem to deal with together. Their young son Krishna wants to leave school. A fight between the children of the "baracks" and a gang from the local town expands from bullying into something even more serious.

Meanwhile, Hans' wealthy boss has gone missing, but the wife, Marlee, seems oddly unconcerned.

The clock struck midnight, bringing in Monday. In four hours, Marlee was supposed to have three thousand dollars delivered to the No. 4 bridge. And if Dalton really were being held for ransom, she was his last hope. It would be all up to her. She didn't have any plans to deliver the money. Being Dalton's last hope was as far as she was willing to go. He never asked her to be anything more than that. He wanted her to be the ballerina in the music box - but the tune was almost over. There were still four hours left. Then he'd be gone. Only then could she tell the police the truth. She wondered how many gleefully smoking wives stood over their husbands, watching them wrestle their own bodies and die of heart attacks. Or how many saw them choking at the dinner table only to continue eating their meals like nothing was happening. Just pleased that God listened for once in His life.

Didn't nobody give a shit what happened to Carlotta (fiction, new to me)
This book takes a unique narrative style -jumping between first person and third, sometimes mid-sentence. Carlotta is freed on parole, with some extreme conditions, including to avoid all alcohol. When she is released, she's dealing with a new-to-her-family gender identity, a lack of funds, and trying to reconnect with a teenage son. Carlotta's experience in jail has left her with plenty of scars, and being away for much more than a decade means that she returns to a New York that has changed almost indescribably.

Carlotta entertained herself by pretending to look out the window while staring at other passengers' reflections, checking for anyone else who might be looking out the window. None were, including someone who wanted to get out at the next stop. Without raising his head from his phone, he pressed a button on a metal column that made a chime go off and lit a red sign at the front of the bus that said STOP REQUESTED It's like I been away so long that motherfuckers all done learnt a different language from me, an every time they get a second to theyself, they start messin round with that phone.

The Blackbirder
I enjoyed this, a thriller set (and written) during WW2. The protagonist has escaped from Europe but an apparently chance encounter at a concert in New York means she is forced to go on the run. Some of the reviews talk about this being a case of being TDTL, but for me given the age of the main character,and her motivations, it felt compelling. Although I did wonder if some censor/ propagandist made her stick the bit in at the end about women's work. Especially given that Hughes' own working history was hardly a case of the "domestic sphere"! I wondered if there was a film or TV adaptation?

I know what you mean, it is very hard to choose your 5 best books for the year. Even more so for you, as you have read so many more books that me. I need to get to Hungry Ghosts. I'm still reading A History of Burning and very much enjoying.

>185 vancouverdeb: It's so hard to choose.

6 working days until Xmas break 🎊

> Just six days ! Hurray! I finished A History of Burning at last, and will try to gather my thoughts later tonight, or tomorrow. But what an excellent read.

>188 charl08: I liked your review, Deborah. I am wondering what she will do next.

>181 charl08: There may have just been 5 books at the top but that list went on forever! Tempting too.

>189 Familyhistorian: I just popped back and saw the list had changed quite a bit - none of my favourites have made it to the top though.

I listed the following (ask me on another day, and I would probably choose a different 5!)
Exhalation by Ted Chiang
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton
Fire Rush by Jacqueline Crooks
The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff
The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

>190 charl08: Good list. It is hard to choose just five.

>191 BLBera: Hi Beth. There is something so satisfying about a list.

I was surprised to see Makkai make it so high and then saw it only took 7 votes as everyone is so widely spread.
Handy as it reminded me I still haven't read it though.

I just finished Russian Gothic and feel like I need to go search out an explainer review. It was so odd. Only 120 odd pages, but full of violence. At the heart is the main character's apparent mental illness, plus alcoholism and (maybe) PTSD. He is obsessed with the idea that his wife is cheating on him. A figure who may or may not be real has planted the idea, and his wife is given little more characterisation than Desdemona. It felt like watching a car-crash or something equally unpleasant and being unable to intervene.
I feel like if I had to guess it's probably an allegory for the corruption of the people by the Russian state but just left me cold.

I look forward to what Janika Oza writes next too, Charlotte. Merry Christmas in advance.

Thanks Deborah. The same to you.

I am feeling very sorry for myself after having picked up some kind of cold/ cough thing. I had lots of plans but I think I am mostly going to be under the duvet. Fortunately most gifts were delivered!

>194 charl08: Hi Charlotte, I hope you feel better soon!

>194 charl08: - I hope you get better soon too. One year I had the flu/cold on Christmas Eve and so I sent my husband off with all the gifts for his family. (His family always got together on Christmas Eve). He came back with all the gifts we had received but couldn't tell me who they were from and hadn't kept the tags with the gifts. I hope you feel well enough to grab a book and read.

>195 MissBrangwen: Thanks Mirjam. Fortunately my siblings are coming to us: I can't imagine travelling feeling like this.

>196 dudes22: Thanks Betty. That sounds like about as much use as I'd be in that situation.
I'm really hoping it shifts: I had lots of tidying up on the agenda.

>194 charl08: Hope you feel better soon! Colds are no fun whenever you have them, but at this time of year when there are so many things we want to get done, they just feel worse, don't they?

>194 charl08: I hope it doesn't completely ruin the holidays for you, Charlotte. Get well soon and make your siblings pamper you.

>198 Jackie_K: Thanks Jackie! It does feel odd being ill during the break. I don't think I'm going to be finishing as many books as I hoped. But they're not going anywhere.

>199 MissWatson: Thanks Birgit. I just can't seem to shake it. Hoping things improve soon.

I've mostly been trying to finish various chunksters before the end of the year, with some romantic fiction via kindle for some lighter fare. However I couldn't sleep last night and none of my current reads appealed so I picked up Toy Fights, a book I bought last year and just never picked up.

I really like Don Paterson's poetry, and I've heard him speak a couple of times at events (I don't know if he still does this, but he used to be at quite a few Scottish Poetry Library events.) I kind of wish I hadn't picked it up. It's a fairly standard, if well-written, memoir of childhood/ youth (he stops at 20), marked by an obsession with music and ultimately a spell in a psychiatric ward after a psychotic episode.

I wrote a longish grumpy review and then thought "it's Christmas". So I'll just say that the book wasn't what I was hoping for, and leave it at that.

I hope that you have a wonderful Christmas, get over your cough/cold and find something more uplifting or fun to read, Charlotte.

Sorry you couldn't sleep last night, Charlotte. I hope you are soon feeling better and that something fun grabs you to read. Best to you and yours in the New Year.

Hope you were able to enjoy something of Christmas. It'll be different and possible difficult. I've been thinking of you.
Hope you're shifting the lurgy. One year we were so ill that we got to mid morning, when I was about to put the turkey in the oven, I asked him if he really wanted it. We put it in the freezer and had it a couple of days later instead. But with just us two, that kind of thing doesn't matter quite so much.

>202 Familyhistorian: Thanks Meg. It was very odd without Mum - I think we're mostly glad it's over. I still like the idea of heading off to a beach somewhere warm: maybe next year.

>203 vancouverdeb: Yesterday went out for a short walk with my sister and her dog and felt ok, so taking that as a win. First time I've been out of the house properly in a week.

>204 Helenliz: Thanks Helen. I hope your other half is OK. I just remember last year getting to the point where I was going to say something awful to the next person who mentioned festivities, when we knew mum had so little time and the last thing I wanted to do was sign up for a Xmas quiz team or do drinks.

I was so glad my brother was here a bit before Xmas. He kept my dad occupied so I could just slope off to bed, and very kindly picked up some of the gifts (ironically, that I'd not wanted delivered to the house in case anyone saw what they were. Ho hum.) I was gutted about the dinner though. It looked lovely, but I had no appetite, and didn't do it justice. My dad had been saying for a couple of days before my brother arrived about how awful things were going to be. However he picked up when my brother and then my sister arrived, so I think he's had an busy-enough time not to be just focusing on his loss. Difficult to tell though, as ever.

Urgh. Not a great day. Dropped off some flowers for a neighour, and fell over, straight on my nose! I think I'm going to have some impressive bruises tomorrow.

Finished The Artisans a wonderful look at a disappearing world of a Chinese village. Each chapter takes a different member of the community, exploring their families' lives during imperial times, civil war, Japanese invasion and communist takeover. The author left the village as a young man, so views the village's history as something that needs to be protected, very aware that factories are being built on the village boundary, and young people have left for the towns and cities, leaving homes standing empty.

Mr. He's herb garden was on our way to and from school. We always stopped to hang out there-chasing butterflies, picking whatever flowers were growing that season. Just one or two, though. If we tried to take more, Mr. He would appear at the doorway of the greenhouse and gently cough, and we'd scatter like the wind.

After the rainy season this year, I made a trip back to Shen Village. On the way home, I had to pass by Mr. He's garden. He passed away many years ago, though the villagers left his thatched cottage standing for a long time, in mem- ory of him. No one maintained his garden properly, though. Everyone just went in to plant and harvest whatever they needed. Each time I returned to the village I walked past his garden, and the fragrance of the medicinal herbs remained intoxicating.

On this last trip, though, the garden was gone. In its place, they'd built a church, with a cross rising high from the roof of the new building.

Oh no! So sorry about the nose! And just when you were starting to feel a little better. : P Well, the new year starts in a few days -- hope things improve!!

Oh, sorry you feel and bumped your nose, Charlotte. It sounds like it was a difficult Christmas. Here's to better days ahead.

>206 charl08: Sorry you fell on your nose, Charlotte. I hope the bruises are not too bad.

Thanks Kim, Deborah and Anita. My nose is now seasonally appropriate.


I finished the set of eight chapbooks with Korean short stories by six different authors. I think my favourite one was For That Which Cannot be Restored. my favourite of this series of chapbooks (so far). The story centres on a writer asked to judge an essay competition. When the winner withdraws the essay from publication, she is suspicious, thinking that the government has censored the author. Speaking to the author, and their family, brings up wider issues of censorship, kidnapped and even assassinated authors.

As the parliamentary election results rolled in, I smiled bitterly as what Yoon's wife had said echoed in my mind. For the first time in a while, I stepped into a bookshop. Thankfully, many professional word-peddlers weren't as naive or cowardly as Yoon and his wife. Books I could not have imagined before the June 29 Declaration had poured into the market, jostling for spots on best- seller lists.

It wasn't just previously banned books. Novels that had come straight from the North caught my eye too. Roman à clefs and memoirs that dug for buried truths. Satires lampooning the Fifth Republic and the Yushin order, so riotously amusing that I was on the floor laughing upon reading just a few pages.

But inside, I wasn't truly rejoicing. Inside was a vast void, an unsettling itch for something.

More info on the project:
https://www.strangers.press/iyagi

Boo to the rubbish Christmas, and best wishes for the new year, Charlotte.

Oh no. Poor nose. I hate falls. Hope you recover soon Charlotte.

>210 charl08: LOL. I get the picture. : )

I hope your nose goes back to its regular hue quickly, Charlotte.

Such a cute reindeer , Charlotte! :-) I have always loved Rudoph, so if your nose is red, all the better! :-)

Hi Charlotte, so sorry about your nose! And of course that Christmas was so hard, but how good that your siblings were there.

I added The Artisans to my WL.

Thanks Katie, Caroline, Kim, Meg, Deborah and Mirjam.

I think I've finished the last books of the year. Pleasingly this includes two books from the not-really currently reading list.

Mansfield and Me
Not sure why this has hung around for so long. The author wraps her own experiences of migration, work and art with the life of Katherine Mansfield, a fellow New Zealander. I could have done with more Mansfield, to be honest. The contemporary narrative just wasn't as interesting to me.

The Fakeout
Hockey romance set in Vancouver. I thought the subplot around work satisfaction well done.

Constructing a Nervous System (Essays/ criticism)
So glad I picked this up again. Jefferson looks again at cultural figures she remembers influencing her own life. She discusses the power of style in Gone With the Wind, vs all the known issues with the film's depiction of American history. She revisits her teaching of Willa Cather to (white) lit students in the light of the author's idealised descriptions of one character's white skin. And other figures, some less well known, including Janice Kingslow.

Janice Kingslow starred in Chicago production (of Anna Lucasta) and then on Broadway; Hollywood came calling after that, but she refused its blandishments when the contract stipulated that she must change her name and her race, become a white actress (of Mediterranean extraction if asked). No, she'd written "I Refuse to Pass" for the Negro Digest, and returned to Chicago to co-found the DuBois Players, a progressive Negro theater company and perform in progressive radio shows Destination Freedom and Democracy Now! while advising station executives on how to improve scripts and roles for Negro actors. (Advice politely received and firmly ignored.) Things had begun to curdle some time after that, and by the mid-'50s Janice Kingslow had all but disappeared. Until the September 1959 issue of Ebony magazine, where her first-person essay appeared, titled "TRAPPED BETWEEN TWO WORLDS: A woman's dramatic report of her fight for sanity in a world of pressures and prejudices."

So that's my year. Wishing everyone a great 2024.
I'm still thinking about a theme for next year (or tomorrow).

I sincerely wish you health, happiness, contentment and many exciting books.

Thanks Barbara!

Happy New Year, Charlotte, looking forward to your next thread and theme!

Thanks Anita. I'm over here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/356555#n8336442