Helenliz Houses the Hoard, pt 4

Dette er en fortsættelse af tråden Helenliz Houses the Hoard, pt 3.

Snak2019 Category Challenge

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Helenliz Houses the Hoard, pt 4

Dette emne er markeret som "i hvile"—det seneste indlæg er mere end 90 dage gammel. Du kan vække emnet til live ved at poste et indlæg.

1Helenliz
Redigeret: sep 29, 2019, 7:16 am

Seeing we are approaching the final quarter of the year, I thought I may as well take the time on a Lazy Sunday to sort out my final thread for the year. I'll also do my thrid quarter review and be all se for the run in to the turn of the year.

I'm Helen, and I'm a Quality Manager for a small company making medical devices (asthma inhalers). I'm also now secretary of a local bell ringingers association, which is a new addition to my list of things to occupy my time. I enjoy reading, cross stitch embroidery, growing edible things in my garden (and then eating the results!) and watching documentaries (usually to relieve the boredom of ironing).

As for last year, I don't want to set too many targets. I can get a bit obsessed or very put off by targets, it's a chalk and cheese thing with me. So there will be no particular numbers in each category. That's not to say I don't want to stretch my reading, as ever. To achieve that, I have changed up some of last year's categories and introduced a few new ones that will make me think a bit harder about what I am going to read.

My theme is historic buildings and houes. I like visiting sites of this kind, they are usually interesting, with questions around who built it, who later made changes, what they kept and what got removed. They come in all shapes and sizes and histories. They're fun to clamber around, they look interesting in the landscape and they tell us something of who we are. It's fun to imagine being at the top of the social structure, but I know that in reality I'd have more likely been stuck slaving away in the scullery or other equally unglamerous corner of the building. I've tried to pair the buildings with the themes I've picked.

Thread construction now completed, wipe your feet on the mat and make yourselfves comfortable on the sofa.

2Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 31, 2019, 12:13 pm

Currently Reading:


Library books on loan - yes, down to only 2!
Maid in Waiting
Beyond Black

Adding book bullets
✔️ The Crossing PLaces (Elkiedee) (Norfolk setting) (completed)
✔️ The Way of all Flesh (charlotte yet again)
✔️ Transcription (Stacy, amongst others)
✔️ Mr Dickens and his carol (This-n-that)
✔️ Platform Seven (Susan) (local setting)
The Stranger Diaries (Charlotte & Susan)
Why We Sleep (Jackie_K)
The Great Typo Hunt (Cindy)
The Silence of the Girls (Susan) (I'm a sucker for retellings of the ancient Greeks)
Rain: Four Walks in English Weather (Carrie) (Walking in rain is sometimes the best thing ever)
The Century Girls: The Final Word From The Women Who've Lived The Past Hundred Years of British History (Susan)
Alone in Berlin (Tess)
The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (Stacy)
Cain (Annamorphic)
I will never see the world again (Charlotte)
The Five (Carrie)
The Bookish Life of Nina Hill (Charlotte - again).
Whitefly (DeltaQueen)
Fools and Mortals (Birgit)
Wakenhyrst (Susan) (again)
Play It Again: An Amateur Against the Impossible JackieK

3Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 31, 2019, 12:14 pm

The list: 2019

January
1. The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead, ***
2. How to be Both, Ali Smith, ****
3. Wrote for Luck, DJ Taylor, *** (audio)
4. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne, ***
5. Atonement, Ian McEwan, ****1/2
6. The Saga of the Volsungs, Anon, ***
7. Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell, ***
8. Devil's Cub, Georgette Heyer, ****

February
9. Murder by Matchlight, ECR Lorac, ****
10. Distant Voices, Barbara Erskine, * (Abandoned) (audio)
11. Belinda, Maria Edgeworth, ***

March
12. Lady Susan, Jane Austen, ***
13. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle, **** (audio)
14. Munmun, Jesse Andrews, ***
15. The Convenient Marriage, Georgette Heyer, ****1/2
16. The Italian Teacher, Tom Rachman, ***
17. The Lemon Table Julian Barnes, ****, Audio
18. The Glorious Heresies, Lisa McInerney, **

April
19. For Your Eyes Only and Other Stories, Ian Fleming, ****, (audio)
20. Circe, Madeline Miller, *****
21. The Absentee Maria Edgeworth, ****
22. The End of the Affair, Graham Greene, ***
23. The Crossing Places, Elly Griffiths, ***
24. A Good Hanging and Other Stories, Ian Rankin, ***

May
25. The Janus Stone, Elly Griffiths, ****
26. The Last Summer Ricarda Huch, ****
27. The Darkness of Wallis Simpson and other stories, Rose Tremain, *** (Audio)
28. Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer, ****1/2
29. The Monk, Matthew Lewis, ****1/2
30. Invisible Agents, Nadine Akkerman, ***
31. Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, ****
32. Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay, ****, (audio)

June
33. May we be Forgiven, AM Homes, ****
34. Means of Evil and Other Stories, Ruth Rendell, *** (audio)
35. Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan, **
36. The White Monkey, John Galsworthy, ***
37. A Silent Wooing, John Galsworthy, ***
38. The Silver Spoon, John Galsworthy, ***
39. Marrying off Mother and Other Stories, Gerald Durrell, *** (audio)
40. Bad Girls, Caitlin Davies, ****
41. And the Wind sees All, Guðmundur Andri Thorsson, ****

July
42. Passers By, John Galsworthy, ****
43. The Scent of Almonds and other Stories, Camilla Läckberg, **, (audio)
44. Homeland, Walter Kempowski, ****
45. The Blue Flower, Penelope Fitzgerald, **
46. Far Eastern Tales, W Somerset Maugham, **** (audio)
47. Octopussy and The Living Daylights and Other Stories, Ian Fleming, *** (Audio)
48. Little, Edward Carey, ****
49. The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories HP Lovecraft, * (Audio)

August
50. The Three Clerks, Anthony Trollope, ***
51. The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer, ***
52. The House at Sea's End, Elly Griffiths, ***
53. Morse's Greatest Mystery and Other Stories, Colin Dexter, ***, (Audio)
54. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling, ****
55. Loch and Key, Seanan McGuire, ***
56. The Name of the Wind, Patrick Rothfuss, ****
57. The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane, *****

September
58. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges, ***
59. Reader, I Married Him, various, ****, (Audio)
60. Classic tales of Hauntings, various, *** (Audio)
61. The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay, ****
62. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, JK Rowling, ****
63. War by Candlelight, Daniel Alarcon, ****
64. Terry Deary's Knight's Tales, Terry Deary, *** (audio)
65. The American Lover Rose Tremain, *** (Audio)
66. A Woman of no Importance, Sonia Purnell, ***, (Non-fiction)

October
67. Inspector Colbeck's Casebook, Edward Marston, ***, (Audio)
68. Swan Song, John Galsworthy, ****
69. True UFO Stories, Terry Deary, ***, (Audio)
70. An Infamous Army, Georgette Heyer, ***
71. The Mistletoe Bride and Other Haunting Tales, Kate Mosse, ****, (Audio)
72. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys, ***
73. Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu, *** (Non-Fiction)
74. Tales of Persuasion, Philip Hensher, ** (audio)

November
75. Moral Disorder, Margaret Atwood, *** (audio)
76. Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston, *** (non-fiction)
77. Tales from the Dead of Night, Cecily Gayford, **** (Audio)
78. Everywhere I look, Helen Garner, ***, (Audio)(Non-fiction)
79. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte, ***

December
80. Classic Tales of Horror, Various, *** (Audio)
81. Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey, ***
82. Tales of the City, Armistead Maupin, *** (Audio)
83. The Sleeper and the Spindle, Neil Gaiman, *****, (Audio)
84. The Way of all Flesh, Ambrose Parry, ***
85. A Girl Made of Dust, Nathalie Abi-Ezzi, ***
86. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, ****
87. Transcription, Kate Atkinson, ****
88. Mr Dickens and his Carol, Samantha Silva, ***
89. Platform Seven, Louise Doughty, ****

4Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 31, 2019, 12:14 pm

Challenge Category 1: Women Authors



This impressive house is Hardwick Hall. It was built in the Elizabethan period and was renown in its time for its use of glass and the size of its windows. A rhyme of the time went "Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall".

At the top of each bay you can just make out there is an E and S. These are the initials of the builder, Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury, known to her time and to history as Bess of Hardwick. She was born in a now demolished house on this site. It is this house she is most associated with, despite actually being influential in Chatsworth, as well as the Old Hall on the Hardwick site. Married 4 times, she founded a dynasty; the Cavendish family (the Dukes of Devonshire) were the offspring of her first marriage. She died in her 80s, having lived a life extrordinary by any standards.

In 2017 two thirds of the books I read were by women authors. In 2018, so far, I've achieve parity. I want to maintain that parity into 2019.

Hardwick Hall is now in the hands of the National Trust

1. The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
2. How to be Both, Ali Smith
3. Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
4. Devil's Cub, Georgette Heyer
5. Murder by Matchlight, ECR Lorac
6. Distant Voices, Barbara Erskine
7. Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
8. Lady Susan, Jane Austen
9. The Convenient Marriage, Georgette Heyer
10. The Glorious Heresies, Lisa McInernery
11. Circe, Madeline Miller
12. The Absentee Maria Edgeworth
13. The Crossing Places, Elly Griffiths
14. The Janus Stone, Elly Griffiths
15. The Last Summer Ricarda Huch
16. The Darkness of Wallis Simpson and other stories, Rose Tremain
17. Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer
18. Invisible Agents, Nadine Akkerman
19. Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
20. Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay
21. May we be Forgiven, AM Homes
22. Means of Evil and Other Stories, Ruth Rendell
23. Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
24. Bad Girls, Caitlin Davies
25. The Scent of Almonds and other Stories, Camilla Läckberg
26. The Blue Flower, Penelope Fitzgerald
27. The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer
28. The House at Sea's End, Elly Griffiths
29. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling
30. Loch and Key, Seanan McGuire
31. Reader, I married Him, Various
32. The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
33. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, JK Rowling
34. A Woman of no Importance, Sonia Purnell
35. An Infamous Army, Georgette Heyer
36. The Mistletoe Bride and Other Haunting Tales, Kate Mosse
37. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
38. Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu
39, Moral Disorder, Margaret Atwood
40. Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston
41. Tales from the Dead of Night, Cecily Gayford
42. Everywhere I look, Helen Garner
43. Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey
44. A Girl Made of Dust, Nathalie Abi-Ezzi
45. Transcription, Kate Atkinson
46. Mr Dickens and his Carol, Samantha Silva
47. Platform Seven, Louise Doughty

5Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 21, 2019, 9:33 am

Challenge Category 2: Classics



The country cottage, with a thatched roof and roses growing round the door has to the be classic, chocolate box, impression of English houses. I hate to disappoint, but it ain't necessarily so. That doesn't stop us hankering after the classic cottage experience, right until reality hits your head on low beams, windows that rattle in the wind and a chimney that can't be persuaded to draw. However, let's ignore reality and imagine oursleves in a better place.

This category is for housing those books that have achieved classic status, at times, in spite of their failings. I'd like to read at least 6 of these this year.

1. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
2. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle
3. The Absentee Maria Edgheworth
4. The Monk, Matthew Lewis
5. The White Monkey, John Galsworthy
6. A Silent Wooing, John Galsworthy
7. The Silver Spoon, John Galsworthy
8. Passers By, John Galsworthy
9. The Three Clerks, Anthony Trollope
10. Swan Song, John Galsworthy
11. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte
12. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

6Helenliz
Redigeret: nov 19, 2019, 3:46 pm

Category Challenge 3: Non-Fiction



The Mill has to be the most down to earth building. At one time they were essential to the survival of every village. They come in a variety of forms, depending on the local resources; this is a post mill, a typically East Anglian design of wind powered mill. It is built around a central post that runs the height of the mill and everything you can see with the exception of the circular roofed lower storey rotates to ensure that the sails face the wind.

This example is Saxtead Post Mill and it is in the hands of English Heritage

This matter of factness makes the mill the place I will house my selections of non-fiction. I aim to read one per month, but that's not always met, so I'll aim for 10 over the course of the year.

1. Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
2. Invisible Agents, Nadine Akkerman
3. Bad Girls, Caitlin Davies
4. A Woman of no Importance, Sonia Purnell
5. Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu
6. Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston
7. Everywhere I look, Helen Garner

7Helenliz
Redigeret: okt 13, 2019, 11:49 am

Category Challenge 4: Heyer Series Read



The terraced house is a product of its time, the need to get more houses in a smaller space. They're not the maximum occupancy of the back-to-backs, but they get a bad rap. There was a tendency in the 20th century to build rows and rows of terraces, all looking the same, just one after another. But it is people that make a house a home, and this example of a terraced house is not just any terrace, it is the childhood home of Paul McCartney.

This, along with John Lennon's childhood home, are both open to visitors on pre-booked tours, as they are in the hands of The National Trust

As terraces come one house after another, I'm using the terraced house as my place to read all of Gerogette Heyer's romances in publicaiton order. This is a work in progress, as shown below. I have read 7 this year, and that was stalled by not owning 2 of them, so I will aim to read 8 of these in the year.

Heyer romances:
(r) Set in Regency Period
(g) Set in Georgian Period
(h) Set in prior historical Periods.

Finished
✔️ The Black Moth (g) 1921 Finished 01Jan18, ****1/2
✔️ Powder and Patch (g) 1923 Finished 05Feb18, ***
✔️ The Great Roxhythe (h) 1923 Finished 30Apr18, ***
✔️ Simon the Coldheart (h) 1925 Finished 7May18, ***
✔️ These Old Shades (g) 1926 Finished 31May18, ***
✔️ The Masqueraders (g) 1928 Finished 17Jul18, ****
✔️ Beauvallet (h) 1929 Finished 08Sep2018, ****
✔️ The Conqueror (h) 1931 Finished 25Dec2018, ****
✔️ Devil's Cub (g) 1932 Finished 31Jan2019, ****
✔️ The Convenient Marriage (g) 1934 Finished 12Mar2019, ****1/2
✔️ Regency Buck (r) 1935 Finished 08May2019, ****1/2
✔️ The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer Finished 10Aug2019, ***
✔️ An Infamous Army, Georgette Heyer Finished 13Oct2019, ***

To be Read
Royal Escape (h) 1938
The Spanish Bride (r) 1940
The Corinthian (r) 1940
Faro's Daughter (g) 1941
Friday's Child (r) 1944
The Reluctant Widow (r) 1946
The Foundling (r) 1948
Arabella (r) 1949
The Grand Sophy (r) 1950
The Quiet Gentleman (r) 1951
Cotillion (r) 1953
The Toll Gate (r) 1954
Bath Tangle (r) 1955
Sprig Muslin (r) 1956
April Lady (r) 1957
Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle (r) 1957
Venetia (r) 1958
The Unknown Ajax (r) 1959
Pistols for Two (short stories) 1960
A Civil Contract (r) 1961
The Nonesuch (r) 1962
False Colours (r) 1963
Frederica (r) 1965
Black Sheep (r) 1966
Cousin Kate (r) 1968
Charity Girl (r) 1970
Lady of Quality (r) 1972
My Lord John (h) 1975

8Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 12, 2019, 4:34 pm

Category Challenge 6: Short Stories



This building, which is both small and slightly short on sides, is Rushton Triangular Lodge. It is an intricately decorated building, the original use of which is not entirely clear. It is generally accepted as having been used by a warrener, overseeing the safety and health of the local warren. Yes, it could be the most highly decorated bunny keeper's house. It is the decoration that makes this special though. It was built in the Elizabethan by a catholic who was less than secretive about his faith. He was imprisioned more than once, died in the tower and left the family in poverty when the estates were confiscated. Relatives of the family were involved in the Gunpowder plot. The decoration is in multiple of 3 (the holy trinity) and gets a lot more complicated from there. There are inscriptions that run around the walls and the windows make cross patterns when viewed from inside. If you knew what you were looking for, this building would have been a dangerous statement of faith.

The lodge is now in the hands of English Heritage

The size (and shortage of walls) makes this the perfect choice for short stories. Since my commuting time has reduced, I've taken to listening to short stories on audiobook in the car, on the grounds that I can stop between short stories without too much difficulty, or recap from the beginning as I set off next time. No numbers here, as it's a bit of a variable feast!

1. Wrote for Luck, DJ Taylor
2. Distant Voices, Barbara Erskine
3. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle
4. The Lemon Table, Julian Barnes
5. For Your Eyes Only and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
6. A Good Hanging and Other Stories, Ian Rankin
7. The Darkness of Wallis Simpson and other stories, Rose Tremain
8. Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay
9. Means of Evil and Other Stories, Ruth Rendell
10. A Silent Wooing, John Galsworthy
11. Marrying off Mother and Other Stories, Gerald Durrell
12. Passers By, John Galsworthy
13. The Scent of Almonds and other Stories, Camilla Läckberg
14. Far Eastern Tales, W Somerset Maugham
15. Octopussy and The Living Daylights and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
16. The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories HP Lovecraft
17. Morse's Greatest Mystery and Other Stories, Colin Dexter
18. Loch and Key, Seanan McGuire
19. The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
20. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges
21. Reader, I Married Him, Tracy Chevalier
22. Classic tales of Hauntings, various
23. War by Candlelight, Daniel Alarcon
24. Terry Deary's Knight's Tales, Terry Deary
25. The American Lover Rose Tremain
26. Inspector Colbeck's Casebook, Edward Marston
27. True UFO Stories, Terry Deary
28. The Mistletoe Bride and Other Haunting Tales, Kate Mosse
29. Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu
30. Tales of Persuasion, Philip Hensher
31. Moral Disorder, Margaret Atwood
32. Tales from the Dead of Night, Cecily Gayford
33. Everywhere I look, Helen Garner
34. Classic Tales of Horror, Various
35. The Sleeper and the Spindle, Neil Gaiman

9Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 7, 2019, 7:20 am

Category Challenge 5: Orange Prize
(yes, these did get in the wrong order!)



The building above is an Orangery. In the 18th century, having one of these showed you'd made it to the top of the social tree. They were a glorified greenhouse, for the growing of exotic plants in the miserable English climate. They were positioned to take advantage of what sun was available, often on the edges of walled kitchen gardens. The gardeners of the day alos used to make use of tricks like having the compost heap on the back wall, to provide warmth to the fruit trained on the other side of the wall.

these days they are often converted to make attractive tea rooms or resturants with a garden view.

The example above is at Belton House, which is in the hands of The National Trust

The books to accompany the Orangery are those that have won or been shortlisted for the Orange Prize in any year. I know it has changed its name now, but it'll always be Orange to me. I'd like to taarget reading 6 in the course of the year.

1. How to be Both, Ali Smith
2. The Glorious Heresies Lisa McInerney
3. Circe Madeline Miller
4. Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
5. May we be Forgiven, AM Homes
6. The Blue Flower, Penelope Fitzgerald
7. The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
8. Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey

10Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 21, 2019, 2:48 pm

Category Challenge 7: 1001 List



This imposing building is Apsley House, most famous for being the London residence of the Duke of Wellington.

Apsley House is maintained by English Heritage

Apsley House also bears the fabulous address of No 1, London. And when you number a list, you start with number 1, so this is the place for that monster list, the 1001 books you should read before you die. As I'm a sucker for a good list, and the combined 1001 list (comming in at ~ 1300 books) is too good to pass up. I may not finish them, but it certainly gives me a good stock of titles to work my way through. I'm currently at 114 titles read. I would like to read at least 6 in the year, 10 would be excellent.

1. The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
2. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
3. Atonement, Ian McEwan
4. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle
5. The Absentee Maria Edgeworth
6. The End of the Affair, Graham Greene
7. The Monk, Matthew Lewis
8. Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
9. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges
10. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
11. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte
12. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

11Helenliz
Redigeret: sep 29, 2019, 6:39 am

Category Challenge 8: Translation



The attra ctive courtyard and house above is Chiswich House, an estate that was once in the countryside surrounding London, but is now an oasis of green in the sprawling metropolis. It is built in the neo Palladian style.

Chiswick House is now in the hands of English Heritage

As the palladian style was first used by Palladio in the villas in the vicinity of Venice and then across italty, this is an imported style. Like all foreign ideas, it doesn't always travel well; loggia and the like are all very well in a warm Italy, but less suited to a cold wet climate. Having said that, it does work well for my aim to read more books that have been translated into English from foreign languages. This is a new category, so I will aim at 4 for the year.

1. The Saga of the Volsungs, Anon
2. The Last Summer Ricarda Huch
3. Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
4. And the Wind sees All, Guðmundur Andri Thorsson
5. The Scent of Almonds and other Stories, Camilla Läckberg
6. Homeland, Walter Kempowski
7. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges

12Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 31, 2019, 12:14 pm

Category Challenge 9: New Authors



This is an image of a most unusual building, it is a Jacobean riding house. William Cavendish was a man on the move, trained in France, he introduced the young Prince Charles (the future Charles II) to horsemanship. After the restoration of the monarchy, he returned to his family's estate and built Bolsover castle as a family retreat. It was sibsequently extended to include a large wing to impress the hoped for royal guests. The final buildings on the site were his riding house. He was the author of a book on horsemanship that we would recognise as the origins of dressage. The book is not entirely outmoded now, with his insistence on working with the horse than against it.

Bolsover Castle is maintained by English Heritage

As this is the last historic house/castle/building I visited (last weekend) I am using this to house those authors who are new to me. This is another new category, but it is one I have done before. Target is 12 new authors in the year, averageing one a month.

1. The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
2. How to be Both, Ali Smith
3. Wrote for Luck, DJ Taylor
4. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
5. Atonement, Ian McEwan
6. Distant Voices, Barbara Erskine
7. Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
8. Munmun, Jesse Andrews
9. The Italian Teacher, Tom Rachman
10. The Glorious Heresies Lisa McInerney
11. The Crossing Places, Elly Griffiths
12. The Last Summer Ricarda Huch
13. The Monk, Matthew Lewis
14. Invisible Agents, Nadine Akkerman
15. Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
16. May we be Forgiven, AM Homes
17. Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
18. Marrying off Mother and Other Stories, Gerald Durrell
19. Bad Girls, Caitlin Davies
20. And the Wind sees All, Guðmundur Andri Thorsson
21. The Scent of Almonds and other Stories, Camilla Läckberg
22. Homeland, Walter Kempowski
23. Far Eastern Tales, W Somerset Maugham
24. Little, Edward Carey
25. The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories HP Lovecraft
26. The Three Clerks, Anthony Trollope
27. Morse's Greatest Mystery and Other Stories, Colin Dexter
28. Loch and Key, Seanan McGuire
29. The Name of the Wind, Patrick Rothfuss
30. The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
31. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges
32. The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
33. War by Candlelight, Daniel Alarcon
34. Terry Deary's Knight's Tales, Terry Deary
35. A Woman of no Importance, Sonia Purnell
36. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
37. Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu
38. Tales of Persuasion, Philip Hensher
39. Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston
40. Everywhere I look, Helen Garner
41. Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey
42. Tales of the City, Armistead Maupin
43. The Way of all Flesh, Ambrose Parry
44. A Girl Made of Dust, Nathalie Abi-Ezzi
45. Mr Dickens and his Carol, Samantha Silva
46. Platform Seven, Louise Doughty

13Helenliz
Redigeret: sep 29, 2019, 6:50 am

Category Challenge 10: Miscellaneous



This is Souter Lighthouse, set on the Northeast coast, just south of Sunderland, midway between the Tyne and the Wear. Opened in 1871 Souter is an archetypal lighthouse, hooped in red and white. Souter was the first lighthouse in the world designed and built to be powered by electricity. I didnl;t realise that each lighthouse not only casts a rotating beam, but that for each lighhouse the frequency and number of flashes is unique. They're not all just one light going round. It's to help with identifying the lighthouse when at sea. Well I never.

Souter Lighthouse is not longer a working house, and is now in the hands of
The National Trust

As Lighthouses come in all shapes, forms and ages, I'm going to use this category to record any books that don't want to fit anywhere else, it's the miscellaneous pile. No target numbers here - too many and I will have to rethink the categories for next year!

14Helenliz
Redigeret: nov 13, 2019, 3:54 pm

Category Challenge 11: BingoDog (and any other challenge lists)



Ightham Mote (said Ing-am, before you put your teeth out trying to get that out) contains a real rarity, a grade 1 listed dog kennel. yes, really. Built by the owner in the Victorian period, it is some size and fits in with the much older buildings that surround it. It is in the courtyard of the beautiful 14th century moated manor house. It is incredibly pretty, but the practical side of my brain is screaming "but think of the damp". Maybe not for me then.

The dog kennel and the rest of the estate at Ightham Mote are in the care of The National Trust

A victorian dog kennel makes this the ideal house for storing the BingoDog card. I will also include any other list type challenges that appeal to me during the year.



BingoDOG 2019 Squares: The Official List
1. Book made into a movie The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
2. Main title has 6 or more words in it For Your Eyes Only and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
3. Title contains a homophone word (such as hair/hare, slay/sleigh, there/their/they’re) Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay
4. Weather (title contains a weather word, or book involves/centers around a weather event) And the Wind sees All, Guðmundur Andri Thorsson
5. Book has an LT rating of 4.0 or more Munmun, Jesse Andrews
6. Book in translation Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
7. Prize-winning book Atonement, Ian McEwan
8. Children’s/YA book, or reread a childhood favorite Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling
9. Graphic novel The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
10. Food-related title or topic Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
11. Read a book bullet (meaning another LT member inspired you to read it) The Crossing Places Elly Griffiths
12. Book mentioned in another book you have read The Monk, Matthew Lewis
13. Animal on cover/in title/plays a significant role Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
14. Short stories or essays Wrote for Luck, DJ Taylor
15. Debut novel Lady Susan, Jane Austen
16. Book about/featuring siblings The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
17. Book with an artistic character How to be Both, Ali Smith
18. Fairy tale (classic or reworked) The Saga of the Volsungs, Anon
19. Author uses middle name or middle initial The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle
20. Cover has at least two human figures Devil's Cub, Georgette Heyer
21. Part of a series Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer
22. Alliterative title Murder by Matchlight, ECR Lorac
23. Topic or character related to medicine/health The End of the Affair Graham Greene
24. Eastern European author or setting The Last Summer Ricarda Huch
25. Read a CAT Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges

Goodreads Around the Year in 52 Books
1. A book that was nominated for or won an award in a genre you enjoy The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
2. A book with one of the 5 W's in the title (Who, What, Where, When, Why) The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
3. A book where the author’s name contains A, T, and Y Wrote for Luck, DJ Taylor
4. A book with a criminal character (i.e. assassin, pirate, thief, robber, scoundrel etc) Murder by Matchlight, ECR Lorac
5. A book by Shakespeare or inspired by Shakespeare
6. A book with a dual timeline How to be Both, Ali Smith
7. 2 books related to the same topic, genre, or theme: Book #1 Tales from Dead of Night, Cecily Gayford
8. 2 books related to the same topic, genre, or theme: Book #2 The mistletoe Bride and other Haunting Tales, Kate Mosse
9. A book from one of the top 5 money making genres (romance/erotica, crime/mystery, religious/inspirational, science fiction/fantasy or horror) Devil's Cub (g) 1932
10. A book featuring an historical figure Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer
11. A book related to one of the 12 Zodiac Chinese Animals (title, cover, subject) The White Monkey, John Galsworthy
12. A book about reading, books or an author/writer Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
13. A book that is included on a New York Public Library Staff Picks list Circe, Madeline Miller
14. A book with a title, subtitle or cover relating to an astronomical term True UFO Stories, Terry Deary
15. A book by an author from a Mediterranean country or set in a Mediterranean country The Italian Teacher
16. A book told from multiple perspectives The Glorious Heresies Lisa McInerney
17. A speculative fiction (i.e. fantasy, scifi, horror, dystopia) Munmun, Jesse Andrews
18. A book related to one of the elements on the periodic table of elements
19. A book by an author who has more than one book on your TBR A Silent Wooing, John Galsworthy
20. A book featuring indigenous people of a country Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
21. A book from one of the polarizing or close call votes
22. A book with a number in the title or on the cover The Three Clerks, Anthony Trollope
23. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #1 Something Old The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer
24. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #2 Something New Little, Edwaed Carey
25. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #3 Something Borrowed Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges
26. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #4 Something Blue The Blue Flower, Penelope Fitzgerald
27. A book off of the 1001 books to read before you die list The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, AC Doyle
28. A book related to something cold (i.e. theme, title, author, cover, etc.) (Cold War) Octopussy and The Living Daylights and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
29. A book published before 1950 The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
30. A book featuring an elderly character The Lemon Table, Julian Barnes
31. A children’s classic you’ve never read The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
32. A book with more than 500 pages Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling
33. A book you have owned for at least a year, but have not read yet The End of the Affair Graham Greene
34. A book with a person's name in the title Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
35. A psychological thriller The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories HP Lovecraft
36. A book featured on an NPR Best Books of the Year list
37. A book set in a school or university The Last Summer, Ricarda Huch
38. A book not written in traditional novel format (poetry, essay, epistolary, graphic novel, etc) Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay
39. A book with a strong sense of place or where the author brings the location/setting to life The Crossing Places Elly Griffiths
40. A book you stumbled upon Distant Voices, Barbara Erskine
41. A book from the 2018 GR Choice Awards
42. A book with a monster or "monstrous" character The Saga of the Volsungs, Anon.
43. A book related to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) (fiction or nonfiction) The House at Sea's End, Elly Griffiths
44. A book related in some way to a tv show/series or movie you enjoyed (same topic, same era, book appeared in the show/movie, etc.) For Your Eyes Only and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
45. A multi-generational saga Swan Song, John Galsworthy
46. A book with a (mostly) black cover Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
47. A book related to food (i.e. title, cover, plot, etc.) May we be Forgiven, AM Homes
48. A book that was a finalist or winner for the National Book Award for any year Atonement, Ian McEwan
49. A book written by a Far East Asian author or set in a Far East Asian country Far Eastern Tales, W Somerset Maugham
50. A book that includes a journey (physical, health, or spiritual) The Absentee Maria Edgheworth
51. A book published in 2019 A Woman of no Importance, Sonia Purnell
52. A book with a weird or intriguing title The Name of the Wind, Patrick Rothfuss

PopSugar reading challenge 2019
01 - A book becoming a movie in 2019
02 - A book that makes you nostalgic Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
03 - A book written by a musician (fiction or nonfiction)
04 - A book you think should be turned into a movie The Name of the Wind, Patrick Rothfuss
05 - A book with at least one million ratings on Goodreads Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, JK Rowling
06 - A book with a plant in the title or on the coverThe Blue Flower, Penelope Fitzgerald
07 - A reread of a favorite book The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
08 - A book about a hobby The Italian Teacher
09 - A book you meant to read in 2018 Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
10 - A book with "pop", "sugar" or "challenge" in the title
11 - A book with an item of clothing or acceessory on the cover
12 - a book inspired by mythology, legend or folklore The Saga of the Volsungs, Anon
13 - A book published posthumously Far Eastern Tales, W Somerset Maugham
14 - a book you see someone reading on TV or in a movie
15 - A retelling of a classic Circe, Madeline Miller
16 - A book with a question in the title Why Don't You Stop Talking, Jackie Kay
17 - A book set on a college or university campus Wrote for Luck DJ Taylor
18 - a book about someone with a super power
19 - a book told from multiple POVs How to be Both, Ali Smith
20 - a book set in space The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories HP Lovecraft
21 - a book by two female authors Bonjour Tristesse, Francoise Sagan
22 - A book with a title that contains "salty", "sweet", "bitter" or "spicy"
23 - A book set in Scandinavia
24 - a book that takes place in a single day And the Wind sees All, Guðmundur Andri Thorsson
25 - a debut novel Lady Susan, Jane Austen
26 - a book that's published in 2019 A Woman of No Importance, Sonia Purnell
27 - a book featuring an extinct or imaginary creature Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling
28 - a book recommended by a celebrity you admire
29 - a book with "love" in the title
30 - a book featuring an amateur detective The Crossing Places Elly Griffiths
31 - A book about a family The Man who Loved Children, Christina Stead
32 - A book written by an author from Asia, Africa or South America Stay With Me, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀
33 - A book with a zodiac sign or astrology term in the title The White Monkey, John Galsworthy
34 - a book that includes a wedding Atonement, Ian McEwan
35 - A book by an author whose first and last names start with the same letter The End of the Affair Graham Greene
36 - A ghost story Classic tales of Hauntings, various
37 - a book with a two-word title Devil's Cub, Georgette Heyer
38 - A novel based on a true story Little Edward Carey
39 - A book revolving around a puzzle or game Murder by Matchlight, ECR Lorac
40 - Your favorite prompt from a past Popsugar Reading Challenge
Advanced:
41 - A "cli fi" book
42 - A "choose-your-own-adventure" book
43 - An "own voices" book Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston
44 - Read a book during the season it is set in
45 - A LitRPG book
46 - A book with no chapters / unusual chapter headings / unconventionally numbered chapters The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
47 & 48 - Two books that share the same title
49 - A book that has inspired a common phrase or idiom For Your Eyes Only and Other Stories, Ian Fleming
50 - A book set in an abbey, cloister, monastery, vicarage, or convent The Monk, Matthew Lewis

15Helenliz
Redigeret: dec 7, 2019, 7:20 am

Category Challenge 12: CATs



This gorgeous structure is the Wellington Arch. Built in 1825–7, it was originally intended as an outer entrance to Buckingham Palace. At first it stood facing the Hyde Park Screen, but it was moved to its present position in the 1880s. Its original design was never completed, and a controversial giant statue of the Duke of Wellington was erected on top of it in 1846. The quadriga sculpture that crowns the arch today was placed there in 1912. Since then the roads have moved and it sits in the middle of a roundabout, and was London's smallest police station for a time. I love this and the statue that crowns it.

Wellington Arch is naintained by English Heritage

This is a bit of a stretch but as the Wellington Arch is an arch (duh!) and cats are known to arching their back, this is the house I am going to shoehorn my CATs and KITs into. Not sure which one's I'll be participating as yet, this will be updated as they are established.

AlphaKit
January: Q, A - How to be Both Ali Smith
February: K, O
March: U, L - The Glorious Heresies Lisa McInerney
April: B, M - Circe Madelline Miller
May: H, V - May we be Forgiven AM Homes
June: J, D
July: C, P - The Blue Flower Penelope Fitxgerald
August: N, I
September: F, W The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
October: G, T
November: S, Y Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey
December: E, R

TBR CAT
January: dudes22 -- First in, last out - read one of the oldest members of your tbr - Atonement, Ian McEwan
February: Helenliz -- A book you borrowed to read and still haven't got to Belinda, Maria Edgeworth
March: sallylou61 -- Book acquired on/for trips or for a special occasion
April: mathgirl40 -- Book originally acquired for an LT group read or challenge The End of the Affair, Graham Greene
May: LibraryCin -- Book that I keep looking at, but never manage to open Invisible Agents, Nadine Akkerman
June: donan -- Book bullet (i.e. book suggested by someone else, not necessarily on LT) Bad Girls, Caitlin Davies
July: LittleTaiko -- Book by an author with more than one book on your TBR shelf Passers By, John Galsworthy
August: The_Hibernator -- Book purchased with great excitement and with plans to read right away that is somehow still on my tbr a year later The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane
September: Robertgreaves -- Classics I feel I should read Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges
October: DeltaQueen50 -- Book purchased because of its visual appeal (striking cover or colors, beautiful edition, etc.) Brazen, Pénélope Bagieu
November: MissWatson -- Book given to me as a gift Barracoon, Zora Neale Hurston
December: RidgewayGirl -- A book I bought because it was so cheap (library sale, remainder table, etc)

Random CAT
January: Your name in print Emsworth's Plum, Linda Newell
February: We need a break The Italian Teacher
March: European Country
April: Tournament of books winner (claiming The Italian Teacher)
May: Dance
June: Playing cards Drew 4 diamonds. The White Monkey, John Galsworthy,
July: Birds
August: School. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling
September; Equinox The Translation of the Bones, Francesca Kay
October: knock off. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
November: Childhood Tales from the Dead of Night, Cecily Gayford
December: December Dear Thief, Samantha Harvey

16Helenliz
Redigeret: sep 29, 2019, 7:12 am

I'm not sure where the year is going, how can it be September already?! It's been a busy old year, that's for sure.

Three Quarters Review:
Number of books: Seems that the number of books has levelled out, with 7 and 8 in the last 3 months. At 66 for the 9 months puts me on target for 88 in the year. That's more than I'd have anticipated at the start of the year, and I'd be more than happy with that.

The last quarter has been a little variable. One stand out book The Lost Words which is beautiful on every level. My second 5 star book of the year, and I don't doll those out like sweeties. At the other end of the scale, I least enjoyed my first HP Lovecraft, far too OTT for me. I also didn't really enjoy The Blue Flower and The Scent of Almonds just not quite my thing, rather than active dislike. But I'll take the lack of any further DNFs as a good thing, leaving Distant Voices as the only one in the year.

Challenge 1: Women Authors: 35 books read by women authors out of 66 books. I wanted to aim for at least 50% so I'm doing OK on this one so far.

Challenge 2: Classics: With a target of 6 and 9 completed sees me continuting to add to this already finished category.

Challenge 3: Non-Fiction: 4 in 9 months is much lower than my rate of non-fiction reading over the last few years. And with a target of 10 for the year, I'm waaaay behind schedule. Not actually sure what's going on here. I have a lot of really good non-fiction on the pile to read, I'm just not picking them up. One to rethink for next year, methinks. I'm still buying non-ficiton, just not seeming to read it. Maybe just too much else on the agenda.

Challenge 4: Heyer series read: 4 read in 9 months sees me falling behind my target of 8 for the year. Only 1 in the last quarter has not helped, meaning I'm further behind than I was at half way. The next one up I have already read, I wonder if that is delaying me picking it up?

Challenge 5: Orange Prize. 7 read so far this year, with a target of 6 for the year has this category already completed. I've been enjoying these.

Challenge 6: Short Stories. 25 in this category so far. With no target, these are just for fun. I'm enjoying the variety.

Challenge 7: 1001 List: I've now completed 9 from the 1001 list. With a range of 6 to 8, I could call this category a success. The 1001 group reads are helping here.

Challenge 8: Translation: With 7 books in translation finished this category is also hit it's full year target. I'm enjoying the variety here. There's so much out there once we look beyond the horizon. I've also now subscribed to Pirene Press, so that will add to the available pool of books in translation for the future.

Challenge 9: New authors. With 35 new authors out of 66 books read I'm amazed at how varied my reading has been and that this category has also far exceeded its year long target. I'm really pleased with this one. When I am stressed or otherwise unhappy, I tend to retreat into my comfort zone. That this category is running away with itself tells me something very positive about my state of mind. Very pleased with this one.

Challenge 10: Miscellaneous. Nothing in here, but that's not a bad thing. It just means that I've made my categories wide enough to capture almost everything!

Challenge 11: Bingo & other challenge lists: Bingo is done. I suspect I've got as far as I am going to on the other two. The remaining ones just don't really appeal, or involve too much hard work to find books that fit. I'm going to count this done having completed the Bingo card and try to resist the attraction of a list next year.

Challenge 12: CATs. Mixed results, but that's OK. 6 out of 9 in Alpha (where I only intended to read one every other month), 8 out of 9 on TBR and 6 out of 9 in Random CAT is fair enough. I'm not too worried about this one, it's just for fun.

Some thinking to do about what to have for next year, some of these are filling up without trying, some are not filling. Now's the time to consider what to do for 2020...

Bring it on.

17rabbitprincess
sep 29, 2019, 9:24 am

Happy new thread! It looks like you've had a great three quarters.

I don't understand how it's the end of September already either. Also have to pick a theme for 2020... I have a list to choose from but haven't settled on one yet.

18NinieB
sep 29, 2019, 2:55 pm

Happy new thread! It reminds me what great reading you've done this year. You and I read at about the same pace.

19MissWatson
sep 29, 2019, 2:59 pm

Happy new thread. looks like a very successful year to me.

20VivienneR
sep 29, 2019, 3:58 pm

Happy new thread! It's a treat to revisit all those beautiful buildings.

21Helenliz
sep 30, 2019, 2:19 am

>17 rabbitprincess:, >18 NinieB:. >19 MissWatson:. >20 VivienneR:, thank you one and all!

>17 rabbitprincess: I think I have next year's theme identified, just need to decide which categories I want to do and how to shoe-horn the theme to fit. Not at all tenuous in places...

>18 NinieB:, It's nice to have people read at a slightly slower pace. These people who get through 100s of books a year leave me feeling a bit s l o w .

22Jackie_K
sep 30, 2019, 6:25 am

>21 Helenliz: To call my planned theme 'tenuous' is generous in the extreme! I'll be using all the same categories, just adding some different pictures. But I giggle every time I think about it, so that'll do for me :D You've done a lot of reading this year, very impressive!

23charl08
sep 30, 2019, 6:59 am

Happy new one Helen. I was wondering if I could get away with a category thread all based around penguins...

24DeltaQueen50
sep 30, 2019, 3:56 pm

Here we go - the final quarter of 2019! It's definitely true that the older one gets, the faster time flies - I feel like the time goes by at the speed of light for me!

Happy new thread and, yes, I too, am in the process of finalizing how my 2020 thread will look. :)

25Helenliz
sep 30, 2019, 4:04 pm

>22 Jackie_K: I'm looking forward to your tenuous theme then. If it makes you gigglie it'll be more amusing than mine. I've done castles, buildings and may be about to stretch the theme to its limits with built structures...

>23 charl08: oh go on go on go on go on go on, you know you want to. How many penguin species are there? 12 or so? Excellent, that's more than enough. >:-)

>24 DeltaQueen50: I know, it's something that only gets worse as you age (like so many things, as I'm discovering!). I think I have 2020 sorted, just a bit of finetuning of categories and I'll be ready.

26charl08
okt 1, 2019, 1:22 pm

I do want to, I'm just not sure I could do two threads :-(

27Helenliz
okt 1, 2019, 1:57 pm

Book: 67
Title: Inspector Colbeck's Casebook
Author: Edward Marston
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Audio
Categories: short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #7. Read a book where there is an embedded word of 4 letters or more in the Author’s last name

I've read a number of Edward Marston's Railway detective novels and they suffer from an increasing similarity and repetitiveness. This set of short stories has the same issue. The investigations themselves are not all that similar. but there is a lot of padding. Victor will complain about being on a train, Colbeck will be well dressed and some local yokel will throw doubt on the ability of the detectives to do their job.
They're not bad, but they're not so good that I'd encourage someone to start. They feel churned out, I'm afraid, and that's not something I find an appealing read.

28Helenliz
okt 1, 2019, 1:59 pm

>26 charl08: I can understand that. I tried to run 2 threads (in the 75 ers as well as a category challenge thread) one year. It didn't go well and I ended up dropping one of them before half way through the year.

29katiekrug
okt 4, 2019, 2:46 pm

Happy new thread, Helen!

30rabbitprincess
okt 4, 2019, 7:32 pm

>27 Helenliz: At first I read the title as "Inspector Colbeck's Cookbook" and was deeply confused.

31NinieB
okt 4, 2019, 8:08 pm

>30 rabbitprincess: Maybe that title would liven up the series!

32Helenliz
okt 5, 2019, 4:58 am

>30 rabbitprincess: is someone feeling hungry?
>31 NinieB: sadly that's not very far from the truth! A few recipes would break the thing up a bit.
>29 katiekrug: thanks, Katie!

33rabbitprincess
okt 5, 2019, 8:57 am

>32 Helenliz: I *am* very snack-motivated! :D

34Helenliz
okt 5, 2019, 4:06 pm

>33 rabbitprincess: ha! I can understand that. It's one of the things I find most productive to stop doing in order to loose some weight.

I've been a bit under the weather recently, but if I thought that would mean lots of reading, I was mistaken. There is a point at which you're too ill to even hold a book to read. Thursday was that day. bleurgh. But a day or two of feeling better, if very low on energy, sees me finish another book. And about time too, only got 2 more renwals on this (and when you consider our library gioves us 20 renewals of 3 weeks a time, you can see quite how long I've had this trilogy out of the library!)

Book: 68
Title: Swan Song
Author: John Galsworthy
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Forstye saga series read (started last year now 6/9ths done)
Categories: Classics
TIOLI:Challenge #12. Read a historical novel or work of history in which a character or characters travel between different countries

The end of the 6th novel sees the events of the last few books come to a head. Fleur remains her flighty self, with Michael doing good works where he can (the chapter about the lack of relevance of Parliament remains particularly relevant almost a century after this is set). Soames remains the tie holding the family together, at times, with his own hands. Holly & Val are seeming to prosper and finally settling down and we see more of June in this than the last few - altthough she seems to be playing the same tune as previously even if it is about a different artist this time.
The major change is Jon's return to the UK and Anne comes with him. This sets the cat amongst the pigeons and no mistake. Fleur finds out, they meet and, well, let's just say that things don't end as they might do, but not without upsetting rather a lot of people along the way. And the ending ia quite dramatic and unexpected. I can;t say I have been Soame's greatest fan, his treatment of irene was not at all forgiveable, but he proved to be rather unlucky in love, both his wives and his daughter not giving him what he needed, but seemd unable to ask for or attract.
That sees me at the end of the second collection of novels and interludes A Modern Comedy now completed. I wonder where this takes us now.

35Helenliz
okt 5, 2019, 4:25 pm

I got home today to find my next ShelterBox book club read had been delivered. So far I'm on a 100% pick rate, with 2 out of 2 going my way. So I now have Barracoon on the shelf to read.

36charl08
okt 5, 2019, 4:47 pm

Ooh, that's one I want to read too. Look forward to hearing about it.

37RidgewayGirl
okt 5, 2019, 10:26 pm

I hope you're feeling better soon. I'm also jealous of your library's renewal policy. Mine allows three weeks, two for new books, with up to two renewals, so a maximum of nine weeks for older books, six for new releases.

38Helenliz
okt 8, 2019, 4:31 pm

Book: 69
Title: True UFO stories
Author: Terry Deary
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Audio
Categories: Short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #11. Read a book set in space

I can't decide if the author of this book of UFO tales believes or not. Each tale is followed by a set of "fact files" on UFO sightings that bear a relationship to the story. Each one is based on a story that someone has related, although the telling is fictionalised. They're aimed at school boys, and are read in a suitably enthusiastic manner.
It was quick, and an interesting mixture of the story and the fact than I can see appealing to that age group.

39Helenliz
okt 8, 2019, 4:33 pm

>36 charl08: I will report back...
>37 RidgewayGirl: I'm feeling more human, thanks. Food poisioning is the quickest way I know to feel as awful as possible. No idea what it was.
Yes, I do know I have a very generous library renewals system, which I have been known to take advantage off...

40Helenliz
okt 9, 2019, 5:54 am

It's that day again - book subscription fell through the letterbox and onto the floor with a thump. >:-)
I love the detail with which they are packaged.

I know nothing about Disappearing earth, nor it's author, so that's another voyage into the unknown. How exciting. >:-D

41charl08
okt 9, 2019, 7:28 am

>40 Helenliz: Ooh, that is a lovely looking parcel. I am thinking I am going to cancel my Grant subs, but I will miss the weighty book shaped delivery!

42Helenliz
okt 9, 2019, 7:38 am

>41 charl08: I know. >:-) It actually comes in one of those cardboard wraparound book traveller thingies, but once you get inside that, you find a book wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. I love the attention to detail. And someone is very good at wrapping, as the selotape is always very neat and the paper cut just to size - no wastage going on there! I bet they're really good at Christmas parcel wrapping.

43katiekrug
okt 9, 2019, 8:22 am

>40 Helenliz: - This one is on my list after a few people here have recommended it. Enjoy!

44Helenliz
okt 11, 2019, 11:43 am

>43 katiekrug: I aim to. So far they've been picking a good seleciton, lowest score has been a 3, which I count as Good.

It's that time again, voting for the next Shelterbox book. My choice this time is:

Saraswati Park by Anjali Joseph

Famous for its electric chaos, the city of Bombay also accommodates pockets of calm. In one such space works Mohan, a contemplative man who has spent his life observing people from his seat as a letter-writer outside the main post office. But Mohan's lack of engagement with the world has caused a thawing of his marriage. At this delicate moment Mohan – and his wife, Lakshmi – are joined at their home in Saraswati Park by their nephew, Ashish, a sexually uncertain 19-year-old who has to repeat his final year in college.
As the novel unfolds, the lives of each of the three characters are thrown into relief by the comical frustrations of family life: annoying relatives, unspoken yearnings and unheard grievances. When Lakshmi loses her only brother, she leaves Bombay for a relative's home to mourn not only the death of a sibling but also the vital force of her marriage. Ashish, meanwhile, embarks on an affair with a much richer boy in his college and, not long afterwards, succumbs to the overtures of his English tutor.
As Mohan scribbles away in the margins of the sort of books he secretly hopes to write one day, he worries about whether his wife will return, what will become of Ashish, and if he himself will ever find his own voice to write from the margins about the centre of which he will never be a part

Evening is the Whole Day by Preeta Samarasan

Set in Malaysia, this internationally acclaimed debut introduces us to the prosperous Rajasekharan family as its closely guarded secrets are slowly peeled away.
When Chellam, the family’s rubber-plantation-bred servant girl, is dismissed for unnamed crimes, her banishment is the latest in a series of recent, precipitous losses that have shaken six-year-old Aasha’s life. A few short weeks before, Aasha’s grandmother Paati passed away under mysterious circumstances and her older sister, Uma, departed for Columbia University--leaving Aasha alone to cope with her mostly absent father, her bitter mother, and her imperturbable older brother.
Beginning with Aasha’s grandfather’s ascension from Indian coolie to illustrious resident of the Big House on Kingfisher Lane, and going on to tell the story of how Appa, the family’s Oxford-educated patriarch, courted Amma, the humble girl next door, Evening Is the Whole Day moves gracefully backward and forward in time to answer the many questions that haunt the family: What was Chellam’s unforgivable crime? Why was Uma so intent on leaving? How and why did Paati die? And, underscoring all of these mysteries: What ultimately became of Appa’s once-grand dreams for his family and his country?

A Girl Made of Dust by Nathalie Abi-Ezzi

A semi-autobiographical novel by Nathalie Abi-Ezzi who, like some of the characters in her story, moved to England in 1983 when Israel invaded Lebanon. The novel is written from the perspective of an eight-year-old. This point-of-view enables the portrayal of the baffled dismay that many of us naïvely feel about religious hatreds, and, sadly, it also shows us how children adapt to living in war zones, and have no concept of living in peace.
Ten-year-old Ruba lives in a village outside Beirut. From her family home, she can see the buildings shimmering on the horizon and the sea stretched out beside them. She can also hear the rumble of the shelling - this is Lebanon in the 1980s and civil war is tearing the country apart.
Ruba, however, has her own worries. Her father hardly ever speaks and spends most of his days sitting in his armchair, avoiding work and family. Her mother looks so sad that Ruba thinks her heart might have withered in the heat like a fig. Her elder brother, Naji, has started to spend his time with older boys – and some of them have guns.
When Ruba decides she has to save her father, and uncovers his secret, she begins a journey which takes her from childhood to the beginnings of adulthood. As Israeli troops invade and danger comes ever closer, she realises that she may not be able to keep her family safe.

I'm entirely undecided this time. hmmm...

45Helenliz
okt 13, 2019, 11:47 am

Book: 70
Title: An Infamous Army
Author: Georgette Heyer
Rating: ***
Where: My Shelves
Why: Heyer series read
Categories: Women author, Heyer Series Read.
TIOLI:Challenge #10: Read a book where the author's first name and surname are consecutive and in alphabetical order

First Review - Jan 2015. When this starts, set in Brussels in the spring of 1815, you just know that the Battle of Waterloo is going to feature. And feature it does. The final third of the book is a pretty intensive description of the battle, and it doesn't pull its punches. this may start looking like a regency romance, but it ends in a very different place. There is romance (not the most convincing of romances, either of them, if I'm honest), but there is a great deal of descriptive effort. Almost smacks of "I've done my research, you can read all of it". Lots of uniforms, lots of suffering, lots of guns and ordinance. I'm hard pressed to be sure if this should be recommended to a lover of romance or a military history buff - probably both would find is dissatisfying. The cast of characters is wide and varied. Some of them are more believable than others, Barbara, for example, I couldn't make out, but Judith strikes me as one of those women who supported their husbands and made them make Britain great. Not the best I've read, but it had enough to keep it interesting.

Re-read. I've been piuttng this one off, because I wasn't entirely keen on having to wade through the whole description of the battle again, but it wasn't quite as bad this time around. The first half does seem to be a gradual introduction to a cast of thousands, a significant number of whom do not escape the book entirely unscathed. And it's interesting how being in a tight spot brings something out in some people. Lord George, for instance, goes in search of his brother in a way that belies his frivolous behaviour to date. Barbara gre on me this time around as well. The match felt like less of a mis-match this time around. Still not going to increase the rating, it feels like an oddball of a combination of a book.

46charl08
okt 13, 2019, 12:57 pm

>44 Helenliz: Not read any of these, but they all sound rather good!

47christina_reads
okt 14, 2019, 11:04 am

>45 Helenliz: I agree with many of your criticisms here. As a huge fan of Heyer's romances, I was disappointed that this book focused much more on the battle than on the love story! But I think that, if I'd approached it as primarily a history book, I would have enjoyed it more.

48Helenliz
okt 15, 2019, 1:58 pm

Book: 71
Title: The Mistletoe Bride and Other haunting Tales
Author: Kate Mosse
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Audio
Categories: Women author, Short Stories
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book with a word related to Halloween in the title

Well this was a surprise. My only previous work by Mosse was Labryinth, which I thought was an awful, overblown, sprawling disaster of a book. These were nothing like that work. In the short form there is no space for the muddled multilayered story that I had read previously. In this format, she has to remain much more focussed and it does wonders for her writing. It was a revelation.
The book consisted of stories that all had an air of menace, or of the otherwordly. Usually with a protagonist at a low ebb, or vulnerable in some way. It is well done, and only in one story did I feel that she'd stretched the possible too far.

The Mistletoe Bride is narrated by the soul of a bride who goes missong on her Christmas wedding night and is only found once it is far too late.
Duet was a most unusual story that sounds a lot like a therapy session, but turns out it is not at all what you imagine
Red Letter Day is one that has her protagonist at the lowest ebb encountering something otherworldly in the haunting city of Carcassonne. Sad, but not without a certain rightness.
The Drowned Village is one of old folk myth and the fate of an island that vanished beneath the waves.
The House on the Hill is the one that I'm struggling to place.
Why the Yew Tree Lives So Long was by far my favourite. Just magical.
Sainte- Terése is set in Languedoc, but could be almost anywhere. A woman in an unhappy marriage finds solace and more in a church.
The Ship of the Dead is based on an old Breton legend, which I was not aware of. It was quite unexpected and probably the most scary of the set.
La Fille de Mélisande takes Debussy’s opera Pelleas et Mélisande and imagines how the events may have affected Melisande's daughter, born as her mother dies.
The Revenant is set not 5 miles from my home village, so this was immediately recognisable to me, the marshes I grew up with were brought to life. A crime in the past comes back to haunt the family involved. It says as much about how small communities act and react and how no event is ever entirely fotgotten.
On Harting Hill is about another place (in this case a road) that I know well. And, from the author's note, I can see exactly where she was comming from in this one. It was excellently done.
The Princess Alice is a sad tale of a family decimated by an accident and the fact that these are forgotten - not in this case, with a diary comming into the hand of an avid bookworm.
In the Theatre at Night is surely based on that child's belief that their toys come alive after bedtime. In this case it is not toys, but the costumes and props in a theatre. Lovely and gentle as a story.
The Yellow Scarf was related to the first story, making reference to it and is the least sucessful, to my mind, of the collection. In this case the future finds a way to interact with and change the past. Not for me.
The final tale is set in New York and is again about a woman at her lowest ebb, only this time it has a different ending to that in Red Letter Day.

I listened to this, read by a pair of narrators and it worked expecially well. Each was accompanied by an author's note, in which she explained the origin of the story, or the background as to how it came to be written.

This was not at all what I expected, it was far far better than that. I must have been unlucky in picking Labrynth as my first exprience of her writing. This outstrips that by a country mile.

49Helenliz
okt 15, 2019, 1:59 pm

>46 charl08: I couldn't decide, so abdicated respoinsibility - I will get what I get!

>47 christina_reads: I know, it's just such an odd mismash of a book. Not really a romance and not really a non-ficiton account of a battle. That's a cross over that's prerry unlikely and I can see why it's not been done again!

50charl08
okt 15, 2019, 3:53 pm

Fair enough! I am currently trying to resist an email invitation to sign up for an LRB bookshop box. Surprise book mail is very tempting...

51Helenliz
okt 16, 2019, 4:42 am

>50 charl08: Surprise book mail is the best - especially as my book subscription has been so very successful. No clunkers at all. This is one present I am definitely buying myself again next year.

52hailelib
okt 18, 2019, 2:14 pm

>45 Helenliz:

I rather like An Infamous Army. I first read it not long after reading a more well known novel that also described Waterloo and much preferred Heyer's version. But it is atypical of Regency romance.

53Helenliz
okt 20, 2019, 7:23 am

>52 hailelib: That's interesting. I've not read Vanity Fair, although heyer does make reference to it in her preface. Maybe I'll have to try it and then compare.

Book: 72
Title: Wide Sargasso Sea
Author: Jean Rhys
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Random CAT
Categories: Women author, 1001 list
TIOLI:Challenge #8. Read a book with either an image of leaves on the cover or the word leaf/leaves in the title

This is a brave book to write. It tries to present a possible history to the mad woman in the attic, as presented in Jane Eyre. I has a very different setting and approach. Told by different narrators in the first person, it sometimes took a while before I could identify the narrator. It is a very interesting attempt the provide a backstory that is coherrent and convincing. It presents Rochester (who remains unnamed throughout) as both victim of circumstances and a creator of them. Some of the things he does are inexplicable, calling his wife Bertha when her name is Antionetta, for example, seems to be a curious cruelty with no cause or explanation.
I am not one of those who fell for Jane Eyre as a love story, and neither is this. Love has a walk on part, but ends up shunted to the sidelines. It poses the bigger quesiton of are we trapped by our past and can we change our fate. Based on this, that would seem to be a no. It's not a cheering book, well thought out and executed, but not exactly cheery.

54lyzard
okt 22, 2019, 4:28 pm

>45 Helenliz:

I'm hard pressed to be sure if this should be recommended to a lover of romance or a military history buff

A military history buff. :)

An Infamous Army is considered (or was when it was published) the most accurate description of Waterloo ever written, such that it was used as a text at Sandhurst in place of the many non-fiction accounts of the battle. I'm not sure what the students would have thought of the romance elements, though!

It has some of the issues that plague all of Georgette's "straight" historical fiction but I think it deals with them better than her other works in that genre.

55Helenliz
okt 23, 2019, 12:50 am

>54 lyzard: It's certainly an oddity in her romances, that's for sure. Maybe the soldiers skimmed the non-battle chapters. >;-) Or maybe they learnt a thing or two!

56charl08
Redigeret: okt 24, 2019, 8:30 am

I like the idea of soldiers at sandhurst reading all the book, romance and all.
Someone told me the lectures at an army college he taught at started at 7am. The horror.

57Helenliz
okt 27, 2019, 9:59 am

>56 charl08: that strikes me as unreasonable in the extreme!

we went to a quiz last night and did very well, we won! Although I am kicking myself, we only got 9/10 on the Literature round, and I knew the right answer to the 10th one, just didn't have the confidence that it was right. Grrrr!
The packet of smarties that were the prize didn't last all that long >:-)

58Helenliz
okt 30, 2019, 2:25 am

Book: 73
Title: Brazen
Author: Pénélope Bagieu
Rating: ***
Where: My shelves
Why: TIOLI
Categories: Women author, short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #9. Read a book for the October CFF Mystery Challenge Challenge (Character shares a name with a Charlie Brown character)

This is the stories of different women who have, for one reason or another, rebelled against society, their family etc. Told in graphic format there is not a huge amount of biographical informaiton for each subject, but it is told in an engaging way and I learnt something about quite a few of these women. I suspect the target audience is teenage girl and this will be heading to my god daughter for christmas.

And with that I've managed (again) all the challenges on one page pf TIOLI. Hurrah.

Book: 74
Title: Tales of Persuasion
Author: Philip Hensher
Rating: **
Where: Library
Why: Audio book
Categories: short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #18. Read a book with a multicoloured cover for the October birthstone challenge

I'm really not sure what to make of this. The stories were a mixed bag, non particularly good or bad. It just didn't feel like many of them went anywhere. Some of them were observational, some in the first or third person. It felt like some of them were almost cruel or prurient, prying somehow. It was an uncomfortable sensation at times. I never really thought about not finishing it, but can't say I'll be rushing to read anything else by him.

59Helenliz
okt 31, 2019, 3:22 pm

Susan has invented No!vember, which is a month where you resist that thing that is getting between you and reading the books you've said to yourself that you will, by saying No! to the whatever it is. I'm putting my own spin on it and will use No!vember to get down my library book pile. I will aim to finish No!vember with no hard copy library books hanging around. I may not read them all, but I will aim to return them all.

My problem with library books is that I see a gorup read of some description and I think, "That sounds like a good idea!" and so I reserve the book from the library. Our library system is not always the most efficient and so it can be a while before the book arrives, by which time the group read has finished, or I've been distracted by something else. It doesn;t help that I can renew a book 20 times, for 3 weeks each, and do so electronically, meaning that I could have a book for over a year and not have to face up to my lack of reading...

So, my current list of library books, as of 31st october, is as follows:
Maid in waiting next book in the Forsyte series
Dear Thief orange prize shortlist for November's alphakit
Transcription book bullet
The way of all flesh book bullet
The First Circle 1001 group read
Waverley some bizarre idea to read Scott in order
We, the Living someone recommended Rand to me (I forget why)
Tom Jones Group read from the summer

60katiekrug
okt 31, 2019, 3:52 pm

Good luck, Helen! I'm pulling for you :)

61Helenliz
okt 31, 2019, 3:56 pm

Thanks! I may have bitten off more than I can chew here...

BTW - audio books don't count. I don't tend to stockpile those in the same way, what with there being a fee for each renewal.

And I've just found I have one more book just arrived, adding Beyond Black to the list.

62rabbitprincess
okt 31, 2019, 9:49 pm

>59 Helenliz: Great idea for a reading month! Good luck!

63JayneCM
nov 1, 2019, 1:00 am

>59 Helenliz: I think I will have to join you as I have the same problem. My library has no hold fees as we are rural, which would definitely help me curb my book holding behaviour. There are also no limits to the number of books or DVDs you can have out at a time - again, does not help me!

I will do the same - see a book that everyone is reading, or put one (or many!) on hold for a group read or readathon. When it arrives, half the time I have forgotten what it was for or, as you say, the readalong is over.

I have an embarrassing number of books out from the library and I always tell myself no more holds until I have returned them. But I have no self-control and my resolve always fails me.

I will join you!

64Helenliz
nov 1, 2019, 4:46 am

>62 rabbitprincess: not my idea - I blame Susan. >;-) And I'm already prevaricating, so that luck will come in handy...
>63 JayneCM: glad it isn't just me that suffers from that syndrome. Happy to share the idea around a bit.

65DeltaQueen50
nov 1, 2019, 12:22 pm

My No!vember resolution is to buy no books in November - which is going to be a very difficult challenge for me but I really don't need to add any more books to the thousands I already own. Good luck with your library books.

66Helenliz
nov 1, 2019, 1:36 pm

>65 DeltaQueen50: I wish you well with that one. I have a book ready to collect, so I know I would be unable to meet that as a target. I'm dreadful for buying books and not getting around to reading them. But I know I'm amongst friends here >:-)

67Helenliz
nov 1, 2019, 1:46 pm

As I reported back a few weeks ago, Charlotte posted about the Al Rodhan prize for books that encourage cultural understanding. It looked like an interesting shortlist, so I entered the competition & won! I never win anything. This week my books arrived in a very satisfyingly large parcel.
(see link: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/prizes-medals/nayef-al-rodhan-global-cultura...



So that's another set of books to add to the totteringly tall to-be-read tower!!

68katiekrug
nov 1, 2019, 1:49 pm

69Jackie_K
nov 1, 2019, 1:57 pm

>67 Helenliz: Oh wow, that's a prize and a half!

70VivienneR
nov 1, 2019, 3:24 pm

>67 Helenliz: Congratulations! Enough to take you through to January!

71Helenliz
nov 1, 2019, 5:58 pm

>68 katiekrug:, >69 Jackie_K: I know, I'm feeling very very lucky.
>70 VivienneR: *snort* make that June and we might be closer to the truth! I do feel obliged to get to them.

72JayneCM
nov 1, 2019, 8:47 pm

>65 DeltaQueen50: I am on a no book buying plan too. But I have one exception. I am allowed to buy books at one op shop (thrift store) in my town that have all books, all the time, for only 20c. No matter what they are. I have found some wonderful books here. The other day I spent $1.40 and had a huge pile, including two fairly recently released hardcovers. I figure if I allow myself this one indulgence, it will help me not slip up online!

>67 Helenliz: Congrats on the prize! What a great prize to win.

73charl08
Redigeret: nov 2, 2019, 12:27 am

>66 Helenliz: Looks good, Helen! Where will you start?

74Tess_W
nov 2, 2019, 9:25 am

Congrats!

75Helenliz
nov 3, 2019, 4:03 am

76Helenliz
Redigeret: nov 4, 2019, 6:08 am

Book: 75
Title: Moral Disorder
Author: Margaret Atwood
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Audio book
Categories: woman author, short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #7: Read a book where the title completes the phrase "I am thankful for..."

This is a strange cross over between series of short stories and a novel. You could easily make a case of it being a novel, but I think it is best described as a set of short stories - but it's marginal. The stories concern Nell and her family. At first a lot is not knosn about her, the first story finds her married, age uncertain, name not mentioned. The second story, she's 11 or 12 and her mother is pregnant with a baby who turns out to be a younger sister. It conerns the same woman each time, although it jumps around in time, such that it is not chronological. Some times what you learn turns what you thought you already knew on it's head. It's about the nature of families and of love, and I think, how your current state can be deceptive, but is shaped by our pasts. it's well written and, at times, evokes a world that has long past, and the trials of continued existence, in a sympathetic way.

77JayneCM
nov 4, 2019, 6:31 am

>76 Helenliz: This sounds interesting. Margaret Atwood has written so much, I think I should give her her own category in next year's challenge so I can read it all!

78DeltaQueen50
nov 4, 2019, 12:16 pm

>67 Helenliz: Wow, what beautiful books! I am looking forward to hearing about them.

79RidgewayGirl
nov 4, 2019, 4:22 pm

>67 Helenliz: Congratulations! How much fun it must have been to open that package!

80charl08
nov 5, 2019, 3:25 am

>76 Helenliz: I certainly wouldn't have predicted thos book would fit this category! Sounds really good though.

81Helenliz
nov 5, 2019, 4:06 am

> 77 I know - And what I've read of her is quite different each time, it't not the same book over and over. I have several authors I can see myself reading in order and she is one of them. but not while I have Heyer on the go - one is enough!
>78 DeltaQueen50: & >79 RidgewayGirl:. Thanks. A book parcel is always great fun >:-)
>80 charl08: I think a bit of disorder is a good thing; the status quo deserves to be challenged. Not always overturned, but certainly challenged. And it certainly makes a nice sharp note in what can otherwise be quite saccharine responses >;-)

82Helenliz
nov 13, 2019, 3:24 pm

Book: 76
Title: Barracoon
Author: Zora Neale Hurston
Rating: ***
Where: Shelterbox book club
Why: Non-fiction
Categories: woman author, non-fiction
TIOLI:Challenge #8. Read a book that has been adapted from / or into another form

This is the written account of one of the last slaves to be transported to America from Africa. It is written in dialect and preserves his way of speaking. This has it's problems as well as benefits. I found the dialect rather difficult at times. In order to work out what the word was, I had to step out of the story to work out what the words was in oder to understand the sentence. However, at times the dialect and use of word order did make this quite immediate - his declarations O Lor', O Lor' for example, spoke to a mood that a standard language presentation would not give. However, it does feel a bit odd, maybe condescending is the word I'm looking for. Left me feeling somewhat uncomfortable.
The story itself is quite short and not published at the time of writing. The story was recorded by Zora Neale Hurston in the early 1900s. The supporting information is quite extensive, but I'm not sure that it had to be half the volume of the book.
It's not actually as graphic about the period in slavery as you might imagine it would be, although it does go into quite a lot of detail of the capture of africans bu africans. It is an important eye witness account of something that has long since passed from human memory. I'm just not sure that this was the best presentation of that account.

And, yes, I did finish it in time for the book club discussion. >:-)

83Helenliz
Redigeret: nov 13, 2019, 3:46 pm

Book: 77
Title: Tales from Dead of Night
Author: Cecily Gayford
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Short Stories
Categories: short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #11: Read a book in which a profession of a drink is written

Contents:
The Shadow - E Nesbit
The Clock - WF Harvey
Pirates - EF Benson
The Crown Derby Plate - Marjorie Bowen
The Tarn - Jugh Walpole
The Haunting of Shawley Rectory - Ruth Rendell
The Cotillon - LP Hartley
The Haunted Dolls' House - MR James
Pomegranate Seed - Edith Wharton
The Phantom Rickshaw - Rudyard Kipling
The Toll-House - WW Jacobs
The Black Veil - AF Kidd
The Hedgehog - Saki

A diverse set of tales all of which have a significant hint of the supernatural. 2 of which I'd already heard, but those were well worth listening to again. In a nice touch, each story started with a short biography of the author. I like that the authors in this collection are not necessarily known for their ghost stories. E Nesbit and EF Benson are now better known for writing in a very different style.
Of the stories, I think the only clunker was the most supernatural of the lot, the Black Veil, as it just felt far too contrived. I like the inventiveness and bredth of the colleciton, it was well put together.

84charl08
nov 13, 2019, 4:03 pm

>82 Helenliz: Sounds worthwhile Helen, if not easy. Hope the book discussion is worthwhile too!

85Helenliz
nov 14, 2019, 3:40 am

Note to self. Seen someone reading N or M in Costa. In case I need it for a bingo square next year

86Helenliz
nov 19, 2019, 3:43 pm

Book: 78
Title: Everywhere I look
Author: Helen Garner
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Audio
Categories: short stories, woman authoer, new author
TIOLI:Challenge #14: Rolling Challenge – Read a book where the first letter of the title starts with one of the letters in the word Grateful

I very nearly gave up on this very early on, after all there is very little that a thrice married, 70 year old Australian grandmother and I actually have in common. The first few essays struck me as rather self centred and not terribly interesting to anyone else. But she became a lot more interesting when discussing other people. The essays were divided into seciton and that entitled "On Darkness" concerning crime and punishment both now and in the past, was the most interesting and by far the most moving of the sections. The seciton that focussed on literary fiction was very engaging and her essay on reading Jane Austen was very astute. As the essays passed either I became more attuned to her voice and her turn of phrase or she did become more engaging and open.
I've not heard of her before and while, based on this, I'm not going to actively seek out her work, I wouldn't shy away from reading some of her other non-ficiton.

87lyzard
Redigeret: nov 19, 2019, 4:05 pm

>86 Helenliz:

She's a thrice-married grandmother now but she got her start writing fairly confronting books about disaffected and marginalised young people. She has never settled into one genre and doesn't really have a single 'voice', and perhaps isn't as well known on that basis as she should be.

As far as a body of work goes she may be best known for her true crime books. I read her This House Of Grief last year...which to go back to the point you were making, is as much about her own reactions and shifting opinions as she was covering a terrible trial as the case itself. :)

88Helenliz
nov 21, 2019, 3:06 am

>87 lyzard: Thanks for the background. The essays in this collection all felt to be fairly recently written. In a couple of the essays she referenced her own work, and it is the true crime ones that would be the ones I'd be most likely to pick up. She discussed the fact that while writing about a father who was convicted of murdering his 3 children by driving into a lake she was asked in a number of interviews why it was interesting. The reaction to her response was that she was trying to find excuses for him and he was evil, an opinion with which she disagreed. I'm with her, I'm not sure it's as easy as that.

89lyzard
nov 21, 2019, 3:35 pm

>88 Helenliz:

Yes, that's This House Of Grief. It's about the case but it is also about her reaction to it and the necessity of a jury "deciding" what happened when only one person can really know for sure.

90Helenliz
nov 23, 2019, 4:19 am

Book: 79
Title: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Author: Anne Bronte
Rating: ***
Where: my shelves
Why: 1001 group read
Categories: woman author, classic, 1001 list
TIOLI:Challenge #10. Read a book by an author who has a sibling who is in the creative art

This is an interesting novel, but is not, I think, destined to be one of my favourites. The story itself is fascinating for showing a failing marriage. Helen marries Arthur Huntingdon as she believe she sees something in him and can change him for the better. This is despite the best advice of her aunt, who can see right through Huntingdon's facade from the start. Mind you we can't necessarily blamed Helen for that; which of us has not ignored advice when it does not meet with our own inclination. Thought not.
From the marriage things begin to go downhill. At first slowly, but then with increasing speed. Huntingdon is a drunk, a bully and generally behaves bady, showing a complete lack of care for his wife, who can do nothing right for him, and embarking on an affair with her friend, who has married one of his friends. It's not a pleasant portrait of life, but it is a very real one. It is, however, the behaviour towards her young son, also Arthur, that finally causes Helen to get the hell out of there and so she plots to leave Huntingdon. And this is actually where we see her first, as the new tenant of the house on the fell, calling herself Mrs Graham.
I was not convinced by the manner in which this was told. It is set as a letter from our narrator to his brother in law, and tells of how he meets Mrs Graham and falls for her. She then geives him her diary, which is then related to the letter's recipient. It just doesn;t hang together and leaves everything at third hand. while both the letter and the diary are told in the first person, they are curiously flat and distant, somehow. I never really felt for them in any immediate way.
Helen herself is a bit of an enigma, she leaves Huntingdon primarily for the sake of her son, not herself. She refuses the advances of any suitor while she is married, for the sake of their souls. Then she returns to nurse her husband. It's all very contradictory.
I'm glad that I have finally read it, and I like the way that there is no sugar coating, this is a portrait of a failing marrige, it is not supposed to be nice or much of a romance. It's a warning to others, if you like, to not be taken in by appearances and to seek something stable and satisfyng. There's enough in here to keep the interest and make you want to know where the characters end up, I'm just not entirely conviced that this was the most effective way of telling the story.

91Helenliz
nov 24, 2019, 7:21 am

Shelterbox book club update: The next book has arrived and is A Girl Made of Dust, which has a pretty cover.



This time the choices are:
By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept by Paulo Coehlo
Rarely does adolescent love reach its full potential, but what happens when two young lovers reunite after eleven years? Time has transformed Pilar into a strong and independent woman, while her devoted childhood friend has grown into a handsome and charismatic spiritual leader. She has learned well how to bury her feelings... and he has turned to religion as a refuge from his raging inner conflicts.
Now they are together once again, embarking on a journey fraught with difficulties, as long-buried demons of blame and resentment resurface after more than a decade. But in a small village in the French Pyrenees, by the waters of the River Piedra, a most special relationship will be re-examined in the dazzling light of some of life’s biggest questions

Map Of The Invisible World by Tash Aw
16-year-old Adam is an orphan three times over. He and his older brother, Johan, were abandoned by their mother as children; he watched as Johan was adopted and taken away by a wealthy couple; and he had to hide when Karl, the Dutch man who raised him, was arrested by soldiers during Sukarno’s drive to purge 1960s Indonesia of its colonial past.
Adam sets out on a quest to find Karl, but all he has to guide him are some old photos and letters, which send him to the colourful, dangerous capital, Jakarta. Johan, meanwhile, is living a seemingly carefree, privileged life in Malaysia, but is careering out of control, unable to forget the long-ago betrayal of his helpless, trusting brother.

Orphan Of Islam by Alexander Khan
Alexander Khan spent his early years as a Muslim in the north of England. But at the age of three his family was torn apart when his father took him to Pakistan.
Three years on Alex is brought back to England, but kept hidden at all times. His father disappears to Pakistan again, leaving Alex in the care of a stepmother and her cruel brother. And it is then that his troubles really begin. Seen as an outsider by both the white kids and the Pakistani kids, Alex is lost and alone.
When his father dies unexpectedly, Alex is sent back to Pakistan to stay with his ‘family’ and learn to behave like a ‘good Muslim’. Now alone in a strange, hostile country, with nobody to protect him.
A compelling account of a young boy caught between two cultures, this book tells the true story of a child desperately searching for his place in the world.

Torn between the first and last on the list. I've read The Devil and Miss Prym by Paul Coehlo (although that must have been either before LT or when I was taking a break from it, as it's not in my library) and I enjoyed the writing.

92katiekrug
nov 24, 2019, 9:42 am

I vote for the Aw book, only because it's the only one I've heard of, and I have a copy on my shelf :)

93Tess_W
nov 24, 2019, 12:39 pm

I vote for Aw, in fact I put it on my wish list!

94Helenliz
nov 25, 2019, 1:54 am

Well that's put me in a quandry. The Aw book also has the highest LT rating (3.54 vs 3.41 for the Coehlo and 3 for the Khan) but the description seemed least attractive to me.
hmmm.

95charl08
Redigeret: nov 25, 2019, 5:40 am

>94 Helenliz: Difficult (but fun) choice! The title of the Aw sounds very familiar, but no idea if I've read it (pre- LT, possibly?)

96lyzard
nov 26, 2019, 4:03 pm

>90 Helenliz:

It's important to remember when assessing The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall that at the time, a woman leaving her husband was an almost unthinkable act. This is why Helen is so annoyingly "perfect": Bronte only got away with it by making it painfully clear that she was not at fault in any way, and by making her motivation the protection of the child. Even so the book was hugely controversial and widely condemned.

In other words it's not quite the book Bronte might have written with a free hand. But it's still a brave and important work.

97Helenliz
nov 26, 2019, 4:28 pm

>96 lyzard: See, I knew you'd have some insight to offer on this. >:-)

98lyzard
nov 26, 2019, 5:16 pm

>97 Helenliz:

That I'd inevitably butt in, you mean? :D

The other point that illustrates what a risk Bronte was taking is that TTOWH was published in 1848; no other significant English novelist touched that plot until Anthony Trollope in Phineas Finn, which was published in 1867.

99Helenliz
nov 27, 2019, 2:22 am

>98 lyzard: Put it this way, if you hadn't said something I'd have come over to your thread and asked. Just getting my head back above water after our audit last week, so I hadn't quite got that far.

100lyzard
nov 27, 2019, 4:04 pm

>99 Helenliz:

In that case I'm very sorry I butted in here! - always need more visitors. :)

And if you have any remaining questions, by all means...

Ugh, audits. You have my sympathy.

101Helenliz
dec 6, 2019, 11:56 am

Book: 80
Title: Classic Tales of Horror (probably the wrong touchstone!)
Author: various
Rating: ***
Where: library
Why: audio
Categories: short stories
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (Library loan)

This comprises the following stories:
The Brazilian Cat by Arthur Conan Doyle
Evaline's Visitant by Mary E Braddon
The Leopard's Man by Jack London
The Eyes of the Panther by Ambrose Bierce
The Voice in the Night by William Hope Hodgson
Oshidori by Lafcardio Hearn
Markheim by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Black Veil by Charles Dickens
The Lame Priest by S Carleton
A Strange Goldfield by Guy Boothby
The Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe
Bone to his Bone by EG Swain
A Ghost Story by Jerome K Jerome
Sir Dominick's Bargain by JS Le Fanu
My Nightmare by Dorothera Gerard
The Hand by Guy de Maupassant
An Arrest by Ambrose Bierce
The Corpse Light by Dick Donovan
Mujina by Lafcardio Hearn

Maybe I need to recalibrate my genre boundaries, but I'm not sure that I'd describe any of these as horror. They tend to be tales of ghosts or the inexplicable rather than genuinely horrific. But that's probably for the best as I'm not a fan of being terrified. These were mostly quite enjoyable, some longer than pothers, some very different. Thise by Lafcardio Hearn both had a very different oriental setting and were probably the briefest of the collection, but amongst the most effective. In a number of them you can tell where this is going, in others it comes entirely out of left field. No real clunkers, but a number I'm unlikely to remember in a week's time.

102Helenliz
dec 6, 2019, 12:10 pm

Book: 81
Title: Dear Thief
Author: Samantha Harvey
Rating: ***
Where: library
Why: Orange prize
Categories: woman authoer, new authoer, orange prize, alphakit
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (Library loan)

I am entirely uncertain what to make of this. It is set up as a letter written by a middle aged woman to someone she hasn't seen in 15 years. Through the course of the letter, you discover who the woman is and what the absent person has stolen from her. Or did she, was it more she was allowed to steat this? It is very winding and continually uncovers layers of meaning, as the letter progresses, over months, the back story becomes more filled in, but I;m not sure it necessarily makes it any more comprehensible. On one level it was very sefl absorbed, having little considereation for the recipent, and yet it somehow kept me reading. I'm not sure any of those involved came across as terribly likeable in various ways, with the letter writer actually becomming less perfect, but more human, as the letter progressed. I'm not sure that I would want someone to disect my life in quite this much forensic detail, as I fear we would all come out of it somewhat less than we imagine ourselves. The writing was stylish, the surmise somewhat odd, the whole somewhat unsatisfying. We don't actually achoeve any resolution and I'm not sure that this helps the letter writer either.

103Helenliz
dec 8, 2019, 10:52 am

OK, I admit it, I am watching one of my favourite films of all time - Muppet Christmas Carol. It's a bit early, but it is just too good not to miss. >:-)
This year I promise myself I will actually read the book... for the first time!

104rabbitprincess
dec 8, 2019, 10:55 am

>103 Helenliz: I read the book for the first time last year and loved it!

105christina_reads
dec 9, 2019, 3:06 pm

>103 Helenliz: It's a great book, and The Muppet Christmas Carol is my favorite adaptation!

106Helenliz
dec 9, 2019, 3:54 pm

>104 rabbitprincess:, >105 christina_reads: I had a lovely time singing along. I imagine I will watch it again in the next few weeks. >:-D

107Helenliz
dec 12, 2019, 3:55 pm

Book: 82
Title: Tales of the City
Author: Armistead Maupin
Rating: ***
Where: library
Why: Audio
Categories: new author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (Library loan)

This feels unfinished, which might be as there are other books with a similar title. Marianne comes from the stick to San Francisco for a week and stays for much longer. Starting with her, it tells tales of her and her extended circle of aquaintance. It is entertaining, but has an air of (I'm struggling for the right word here) innocence or naievity in the various sexual relationships here (everyone has sex with almost everyone else with gay abandon!). It seems to be set in the second half of the 70s, prior to the Aids crisis being uncovered and so there is a freedom that would seem to be mistaken in later years. At times it is funny, at times sad, at times there is an eye roll moment. Marianne is a very safe centrepoint, and her affair is the one element that seems out of character, almost.

108Helenliz
dec 12, 2019, 4:04 pm

Book: 83
Title: The Sleeper and the Spindle
Author: Neil Gaiman
Rating: *****
Where: library
Why: Audio
Categories: short story
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (Library loan)

This is as near perfect as I can imagine a short story to be. I listened to it as a cast recording, with Julian Rhind-Tutt as the main narator and it was a superbly entertaining experience. I only picked it up as I was looking for something to occupy me for 1 commute, so that I can finish a book on my last work commute before Christmas. At just over an hour, this fitted the bill.
It is a retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, with a side order of Snow White thrown in for good measure. Although one of the quirks of this wirk is that no-one is named. it is the short drawrf, the first dwarf, the queen and so on. It leaves space for the imagination and allows the listener to make the connections. It is set in a fairytale land, with a tall but narrow chain of mountains acting as a border between two kingdoms. We start the story with the queen of one country on the verge of marriage (and not entirely convinced about what this holds in store for her). The dwarves travel through the mountains to trade for a wedding gift for the queen and discover something that needs to be reported - the neighbouring kingdom is falling asleep. And so the Queen and 3 dwarves set out to find out what is going on and do something about it.
I love the way Gaiman uses the fairy tale we know but twists it, the roles of the sleeping beauty and the old crone who is the only person left awake is a genuine surprise that I simply did not see coming.
It's not very long, but it manages to pack in so much that is familiar and yet manages to do something genuinely original with it. Just brilliant.

109lyzard
dec 12, 2019, 4:06 pm

>101 Helenliz:

I haven't read them but some of the ghost stories of Lafcadio Hearn were the basis of the beautiful and creepy film, Kwaidan, which I very much recommend if you haven't seen it. (Be aware, though: it's long.)

110NinieB
dec 12, 2019, 7:54 pm

>107 Helenliz: I gobbled up the first six books in the Tales of the City series back in the early 90s and really enjoyed them (but I did like the first one more than you seem to have). They get progressively darker as the AIDS epidemic develops, and the characters evolve quite a bit.

111Helenliz
dec 13, 2019, 3:15 am

>110 NinieB: It was OK, but not so good that I'm going to be rushing out to read the rest. It all feels so very distant and difficult to relate to 40 odd years later. It did work well as my audio book on my commute, as each chapter is quite short, such that I'm not leaving a chapter in the middle when I arrive at my destination.

112Helenliz
dec 13, 2019, 12:39 pm

Book: 84
Title: The Way of all Flesh
Author: Ambrose Parry
Rating: ***
Where: library
Why: Charlotte's fault.
Categories: new author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (Library loan)

The first in a detective series featuring a young apprentice midwife and his mentor's housemaid. They both have issues to deal with, hers is being clever and stuck in position of housemaid, his is a torbulent past that may or may not include murdering his father. It's a lot to take in at once. They join forces reluctantly in order to uncover what has bene happening to cause young women to be dying in contorted positions with evidemce of abortions. Set in Edinburgh, the place is as much a character as the people in the book.
It was fun, the pace accelerated and there was an interesting array of people, a mixture of classes presented. The only thing that annoyed me is I can quite happily work with male colleagues without wanting to jump them, so why is it any male/female double act always includes a sexual attraction. It's not necessary, really it's not! Despite that, I can see myself looking out book 2.

113charl08
dec 13, 2019, 5:31 pm

>112 Helenliz: My fault? Yikes. I did like all the Edinburgh in this. Very grimy.

114NinieB
dec 13, 2019, 6:30 pm

>111 Helenliz: It was an actual newspaper serial; that's why the chapters are short and episodic.

115rabbitprincess
dec 13, 2019, 9:27 pm

>112 Helenliz: I liked this as a straight-up historical fiction novel, more so than as a crime novel. The setting and the medical history details were great.

116AHS-Wolfy
dec 14, 2019, 6:52 am

>112 Helenliz: The only Brookmyre release I've not read so far (although it is sitting on my tbr shelves waiting). This is a second lacklustre review I've seen so it's a shame this collaboration with his wife doesn't reach his usual (at least for me) high standards.

117rabbitprincess
dec 14, 2019, 9:14 am

>116 AHS-Wolfy: I think it's a really good book, but I've come to the conclusion that comparing it to his crime novels does it a disservice, especially because it is not really a Chris Brookmyre novel. I wish I'd gone into it with more of the idea that this is a completely different author, and I think I will for the next book. My mum read this too and may have liked it more because she hadn't had (much) previous experience with Chris's work. (I think she's read One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night, or at least bought it... I haven't introduced her to Quite Ugly One Morning, haha)

118Helenliz
dec 15, 2019, 7:22 am

>113 charl08: yes, book bullet from you. Not your fault in a bad way, honest. I migbht not be raving about it, but *** is rating a book as "good" for me.

>115 rabbitprincess: I think that has some mreit, it was as much about the setting and point in history as the "crime" which might have been solved but wasn't really dealt with.

>116 AHS-Wolfy:, >117 rabbitprincess:, I've not read anything by him and didn't even know it was a double hander until I'd read the acknowledgements at the end. Certaonl;y not read anything by him alone. It's not a rave review, granted, but it was intriguing enough that I suspect I'll be reserving book 2 from the library.

And, having caught up, I can report that last night I had to propose a toast at a dinner (to the guests & visitors) and it went far too well. Deary deary me. That wasn't the plan, I intended to be just good enough to pass muster and not so good as to be asked again, Bu**er. That's the trouble with liking words and liking to put them together, it ends up sounding convincing.

119Helenliz
dec 15, 2019, 8:30 am

Book: 85
Title: A Girl Made of Dust
Author: Nathalie Abi-Ezzi
Rating: ***
Where: Shelterbox Book Club
Why: Shelterbox Book Club.
Categories: woman author, new author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (book club)

This is told through the eyes of the young girl of the family. She doesn't always understand what she is seeing, and there's a lot to take in, the family dynamic and the encroaching war. There's a lot to untangle, and I think that the impact of war as both an ever present background and an added complication to growing up is very well portrayed. Things that seem incredible are everyday, as that's just the way life is. The escalation of violence is quite startling, and yet the humanity with which people face it is heartwarming. At the end things have changed, in some ways for the better, despite the situaiton not having improved.

120Helenliz
dec 21, 2019, 9:33 am

Book: 86
Title: A Christmas Carol
Author: Charles Dickens
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Audio
Categories: Classic
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (library)

I can't quite believe that I've not read this before, but I think this is the first time I've read it (and seeing as I listened to it, you could argue I've still not read it!). It is a story that has been on screen so many times that you can't not know it. My personal favourite being the Muppet version with Michael Caine as Scrooge, which actually is remarkably faithful to the original. What they miss is all the description that Dickens packs into this small volume. It takes a good 20% for Scrooge to even meet the ghost of Marley that sets up the three further encounters. I was stuck by the fact that noth the Ghosts of Christmas Past and Present are described in detail, where as the Ghost of Christmas yet to come is barely described at all. In the midst of all the description, it's a noticable omission. The scenes presented by the third ghost are really very dark, particularly when he discovers his own future fate. The final section, on Christmas day, has a roller coaster feel about it, as if you're carrering towards a conclusion and he's running out of words to do so. It's all a bit breathless, especially after the dismal previous chapter.
Excellent and I will continue to enjoy the Muppet's version with all the good will that the season can offer.

And, in a nice bit of good planning that did actually pay off, I finished this yesterday as I drove to work for the last time this year. >:-)

121charl08
dec 22, 2019, 10:02 am

>120 Helenliz: That's impressive planning, Helen! I think I have read the original, but should probably revisit to make sure I'm not just remembering a ladybird version!

122Helenliz
dec 22, 2019, 10:18 am

>121 charl08: I have the Muppet film version as my point of reference, so you're probably as on point as I am!
If it had been a piece of really excellent planning I'd have finished it on the way home of my last commute, but alas, no.
I did, however, buy a Christmas tree on my way home, a real tree from a Christmas tree farm. You wander around a plantation, identify your tree and the man comes and chops it down with a chain saw for you! I got very muddy boots. My car still smells of pine. >:-)

123pammab
dec 22, 2019, 11:54 pm

>122 Helenliz: Do you usually get real trees? It always seemed so quaint and lovely and I had a hankering, and then I did it one year and it was much more of a mess than I expected -- still very fun but not all wreathed in golden light as I'd expected!

124Helenliz
dec 23, 2019, 5:36 am

>122 Helenliz: Yes. Always do. I leave it late to get it and put it up - none of this tree up 1st December rubbish in this house! We always had a real tree as kids and there's something about it that makes the hassle worthwhile in my mind. My car still smells like a pine tree. >:-)

I then do a number of things to try and reduce the needle drop. So if I buy a tree that is already cut, cut the bottom inch or so off the trunk and use a tree stand that means you can water the tree, that can help. They'll easily take a pint a day intiially. I sit my tree in the living room bay window, so that radiator gets turned off as well, to keep it a bit cooler. And there are some varieties that are less prone to needle drop. Although I do tend to go for the traditional looking tree and just accept I will still be hoovering up needles in March.

I've had a fake tree, when we used to visit relatives for Christmas we'd have a fake tree, but now there's no need to do that, I can indulge myself.

My tree, in all it's horizontal glory. One day I will work out how to rotate a photo taken on my phone, but clearly that day is not today!

125pammab
dec 24, 2019, 12:24 am

So beautiful. The scent is the stellar feature.... I didn't know any of those methods of keeping needles, too!

126charl08
dec 24, 2019, 2:22 am

Lovely tree, Helen. I am a fan - the smell is the thing for me too.

127DeltaQueen50
dec 24, 2019, 1:46 pm



Happy Holidays!

128Helenliz
dec 25, 2019, 2:57 am

Just wishing all my visitors a Merry Christmas, as we set out to go and ring the bells for Christmas morning service. May your day be filled with good books and love.

129VivienneR
dec 25, 2019, 9:44 am

Beautiful tree, Helen. I'm with you on real trees vs fake. The lovely smell is a major attraction for me. Have fun bell ringing for Christmas. It's a wonderful sound. Merry Christmas, looking forward to your 2020 thread.

130rabbitprincess
dec 25, 2019, 1:46 pm

Merry Christmas, Helen! :)

131Helenliz
dec 25, 2019, 4:19 pm

Book: 87
Title: Transcription
Author: Kate Atkinson
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Bookbullets from many many people!
Categories: Woman author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (library)

I don't like to start a review with the end, but I sure as anything didn't see that ending comming! There's a plot twist at about 90% of the way through, just when you think you know where this is all going, that rips the carpet from under your feet in just a few lines. It's mind boggling and brilliantly done. And yet, looking at the book with that knowledge, it remains consistent. Very clever piece of writing.
The book tells the story of Juliette, who works in an operation during the war transcribing conversations with 5th columnists in a bugging operation. In the 50s she is working at the BBC in the slightly woerth Schools programme and the story is mostly told in these two timeframes. In the 1950s story, the actions of the war have repercussions in the present.
It's worth reading the author's note at the end, as this is a work of historical fiction that has a basis in reality, but is purely invented. It is very well done and was convincingly written.

132Helenliz
dec 25, 2019, 4:20 pm

>130 rabbitprincess: thank you and the same to you! We've had a quiet day, and I've had my first cold turkey sandwich of the season, so now it can properly be Christmas. >:-D

133RidgewayGirl
dec 25, 2019, 4:38 pm

Happy holidays! Your tree is lovely and indicates an absence of cats. I also prefer a real tree, with the way it makes the whole house smell Christmassy.

134Helenliz
dec 25, 2019, 4:45 pm

>133 RidgewayGirl: Thank you, and the same to you! You are indeed correct on the lack of cats assumption. Although we had a cat as children and I don't remember her doing much more than batting at the lowest hanging decorations. Certainly I have no memory of her ever having tried to climb it.

Christmas is about all the senses and smell is one of the most evocative. There is something special about the smell of Christmas, and for me a real tree is an important part of that.

135Helenliz
dec 27, 2019, 5:35 am

Book: 88
Title: Mr Dickens and his Carol
Author: Samantha Silva
Rating: ***
Where: Library
Why: Bookbullets
Categories: Woman author, new author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (library)

I'm torn by this, I really am. It is a ficitonal account of how one of the most famous and influential Christmas stories , A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens, cam e to be written. And it is engaging enough, although it relies on its premise by Dickens being someone we can sympathise with. And therein lies my probem. Over the holidays I saw a 1 hr documentary about Dickens, Christmas and how he treated his wife, Catherine. I can summarise the entire thing in two words - not well. So I stuggle to find him an object of sympathy when he mistreated Catherine so badly - and even in this there are some elements of that mistreatment creeping in. I get that he was a man of his times and that what we would now consider nromal behaviour wasn't considered so at the time. But even taking that into account, he had some problems that remained unresolved and impacted those around him. All of which makes it difficult for me to have him as a central point of sympathy.
Putting all that to one side, this is an inventive book, taking a pinch of truth and a bushel of inventiveness to make a story about a story to be an entertaining read. It has its fair share of mystery and redemption, it has a happy ending (albeit it one we know to be temporary) and the story at the heart of this book is a rousing success. I think the success of this one depends partly on how much you can put aside the man you know and embrace the man the author wishes you to see.

136charl08
Redigeret: dec 27, 2019, 5:57 am

>135 Helenliz: I've seen mixed reviews of this one on Litsy too, so think I might pass!

137Helenliz
dec 27, 2019, 7:38 am

>136 charl08: At times it really got to me, so it certainly wasn't bad. It was the mismatch between fiction and reality that I found hard to stomach. And based on that, I can't wholeheartedly recomend it, which is a shame as it's an inventive thing otherwise.

138VivienneR
dec 27, 2019, 10:16 pm

>135 Helenliz: It's not a book I would want to read because he was such a thoroughly unpleasant man, although I rarely hear that mentioned.

139JayneCM
dec 27, 2019, 10:54 pm

>138 VivienneR: I think he was so idolised, even now, that the self-absorbed side of his personality tends to be glossed over. It seems that everyone in his life was just there as a satellite to him. I guess he was the equivalent of any number of self-absorbed modern celebrities!

140Helenliz
dec 28, 2019, 11:58 am

>138 VivienneR: I have to admit I wasn't able to put aside the facts and immerse myself in her fictional vision of him.

>139 JayneCM: the documentary I saw before Christmas had, amongst other people, a physoanalysist on, and that was very interesting. I mean it was an entertainment programme, so I'm not going to say it was an educational thesis. But it was interesting. And yes, he may be able to write men and character plots (but not rounded women) but that doesn't excuse some things.

141Helenliz
dec 31, 2019, 12:08 pm

Book: 89
Title: Platform Seven
Author: Louise Doughty
Rating: ****
Where: Library
Why: Bookbullets & local
Categories: Woman author, new author
TIOLI:Challenge #3. Read a book you have acquired (by any means) in 2019 (library)

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I picked up a book narrated by a ghost stuck on Peterborough Railway station, but it certainly wasn't something as dark as this. It goes to some pretty dark places of the human soul, and I can see this being quite distressing to some people.
Having said that, it has a lot going for it if you're prepared to follow it. For one, the geography is bang on - I know the area well enough to be able to follow hwe on her perambulations from the station, and yes, that Waitrose has an epic pastry counter! >:-p
Lisa Evans is a ghost and we first meet her when she is aware of a man who takes his life by falling under a train from Platrform Seven of Pdeterborough Railway station. We follow her as she lurks around the station, unable to leave the boundaries of the station land in the first instance. She follows the staff as they deal with the differenty stages of the investigation and thei day to day lifer. She gets tied up in their lives as a voyeur, unable to actually contact them or do anything to the living. Things change as the investigation in to the death leads to her case also being rexamined and we then discover what leads Lisa to her current state. It iisn't a mystery that she ends up under a train, but the whys that led her to that fate are tense and you find yourself willing a different ending. It covers some difficult topics, suicide, spousal and child abuse (both physicaland psycological) without, to this reader ,appearing to pull her punches. Hence this could be distressing. I found it a bit like a car crash in slow motion, you wanted to look away, but something abhout it meant I kept reading - there is something in wanting to make Lisa's death not be in vain that you have to act as witness to her life in all it's misery.
It was moving and yet had moments of great depth of emotion as well as lightness. The final thought I am elft with is that of the final chapter, which is if hope, strangely, she exponds the idea that no-one is dead while the people they have touched, the ripples of their life, if you like, remain alive. And that the people we love are with us in our love and memories even when they are no longer physically present. It's a surprisingly hopeful last note in a book that goes to some very dark places (and not just Peterborough on a wet December evening).

142Helenliz
dec 31, 2019, 12:19 pm

So, with 2019 lurching to a conclusion, it's time for the review of the year.

Number of books: 89 is more than I'd expected for the year, so I'll take that as a win.

Best and worst:
I don't hand out 5 star ratings like smarties, so reading 2 in a year is quite a lot for me. And with that we have Circe and The Lost Words. Both were beautiful visually as well as artistically. Loved both, will rave about both for quite some time to come.
I only had one DNF all year, the just overly long and far too samey Distant Voices. Just of it's time and that time is passed (thank goodness!)

Challenge 1: Women Authors. Target was 50% and I achieved 47 out of 89. Which just tops the 50% target (53% if we're counting). So that's a win.

Challenge 2: Classics: With a target of 6 and 12 completed that's another success.

Challenge 3: Non-Fiction: I managed 7, which is somewhat down on my usual rate of one a month, so that was below par. I've got quite a pile of non-fiction, sitting there, waiting for me. I'm still interested, just not picking them up. This category will not be making an appearance next year.

Challenge 4: Heyer series read: A target of 8 and having completed 5 in the year, this one is a bit below par. Part of that was being put off having to re-read An Infamous Army which remains a very odd book. Maybe I will make better progress next year - I've still got quite some way to go with these!!

Challenge 5: Orange Prize. Target 6, achieved 8. Helped by recieveing Circe as my book subscription one month, this has gone quite well. Using AlphaKit to select an author every other month seems to be working, but the library is sometimes slow to deliver (I recieved a book intended for April in November!).

Challenge 6: Short Stories. 35 in this category. With no target, these are just for fun. I'm enjoying the variety. Although I am concerned I'm gradually working my through the library's supply...

Challenge 7: 1001 List: I've now completed 12 from the 1001 list. With a range of 6 to 8, I could call this category a success. This category will have a modification for next year.

Challenge 8: Translation: With 7 books in translation finished this category is also hit it's full year target. I'm enjoying the variety here. There's so much out there once we look beyond the horizon. I've also now subscribed to Pirene Press, so that will add to the available pool of books in translation for the future.

Challenge 9: New authors. With 46 new authors out of 89 books read I'm amazed at how varied my reading has been and that this category has also far exceeded its year long target. I'm really pleased with this one. When I am stressed or otherwise unhappy, I tend to retreat into my comfort zone. That this category is running away with itself tells me something very positive about my state of mind. Very pleased with this one. The only thing is that there is an increasing pile of authors of whom I should read another book...

Challenge 10: Miscellaneous. Nothing in here, but that's not a bad thing. It just means that I've made my categories wide enough to capture almost everything!

Challenge 11: Bingo & other challenge lists: Bingo is done. I suspect I've got as far as I am going to on the other two. The remaining ones just don't really appeal, or involve too much hard work to find books that fit. I'm going to count this done having completed the Bingo card and try to resist the attraction of a list next year.

Challenge 12: CATs. Mixed results, but that's OK. 7 out of 12 in Alpha (where I only intended to read one every other month), 10 out of 12 on TBR and 9 out of 12 in Random CAT is fair enough. Next year I will do Alpha Kit, Random CAT, dip into GeoCAT and maybe see what non-fictionCAT has up its sleeve.

And with that, may I thank you for having followed in 2019 and wish you all the best fo 2020. I've set up home here: http://www.librarything.com/topic/313074

143katiekrug
dec 31, 2019, 12:20 pm

Happy new year, Helen!

144Helenliz
dec 31, 2019, 12:24 pm

>143 katiekrug: And to you, Katie, to The Wayne & Leonard. I suspect we'll not actually make it to midnight at this rate, he's gone for a nap and I'm flagging. It's twenty past five, if I make it to 10 pm, I'm going to be doing well!

145rabbitprincess
dec 31, 2019, 2:58 pm

Great wrap-up! Looking forward to seeing how your 2020 will shape up.

146JayneCM
Redigeret: dec 31, 2019, 5:40 pm

What a great reading year! Looking forward to following along in 2020.

Totally agreed with The Lost Words, a simply beautiful book and one that I often pick up.

147VivienneR
dec 31, 2019, 5:52 pm

>141 Helenliz: My local library has that one on order so I placed a hold. It might be a long wait though.

Wishing you a very Happy New Year! See you over in 2020.

148charl08
dec 31, 2019, 6:06 pm

Sounds like a good year, Helen. I'll be following along in 2020.
(I haven't read The Lost Words, but am tempted! Totally agree re Circe (although I am far more smartie-like with my ratings).