My September Reads

The nights are drawing in, we are in the midst of university open days and personal statement revisions, and I have read some really great books this month.

Our book club choice this month is "Stoner" by John Williams, first published in 1965. William Stoner is a college professor who spends his entire adult life at the University of Missouri, first studying, then teaching English literature. His life seems to be insignificant, he lives, gets married, retires and dies. However, John Williams writes so vividly and beautifully about his story, we realise that even the most humdrum-looking lives have so much going on under the surface. The relationships Stoner has, with his colleagues, his wife, daughter and lover, are drawn with simplicity but in devastating detail. The blurb on the back of the book says it is "a novel to be savoured" and I would totally concur.

I first read "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt when it was published twenty one years ago. Since then she has only produced two more books, one of which is on my Christmas wish-list ( The Goldfinch). I decided to re-read her debut novel in preparation but also because it concerns a group of classics students, which is the subject my daughter is hoping to study next year. However, I hope she doesn't get dragged into a murder plot which is what happens to Richard Pappen when he becomes entangled and enamoured with an eccentric group at his New England university. This is a terrific book, intelligently written, darkly funny and with great characterisation. It is now on my daughter's "to read" list, I'm only hoping it won't put her off studying the lives of the ancients!

"Reconstructing Amelia" by Kimberly McCreight was an excellent, if harrowing, book. Kate Baron is a successful New York lawyer who is faced with an unimaginable tragedy. The central thesis of the novel, is how well do we know our own children, and how Kate refuses to believe the official reason behind the tragedy and her dogged pursuit of the truth, is a real page-turner. It was very well written, and I had enormous sympathy for Kate and Amelia, the ending was not obvious, and I stayed up until the very wee small hours to finish it. I cried at various points too, but maybe I was very, very tired!

Another book that had me in absolute buckets of tears was "The Light Between The Oceans" by M.L.Stedman. Tom and Izzy are the lighthouse keeper and his wife on a remote island off the coast of Australia in the 1920s, happily married but unable to have children. When a boat washes ashore containing a dead man and a very-much alive baby girl, the couple make the decision to keep her. The novel then goes on to describe the consequences of that decision. This is such a haunting book, the reader's sympathies lie with all the characters and the conclusion is so heart-breaking. One for the chilly autumn nights, make sure you have the tissues ready!

I have enjoyed Salley Vicker's previous books and "The Cleaner of Chartres" is another very good read. Agnes Morel is a a lady with a mysterious past who life is now inter-woven with those in the beautiful city of Chartres. Her story is a sad one, and I did like how all the threads came together to give an almost happy, but realistic, ending. Vickers writes quite beautifully and her description of the cathedral is very vivid. There are some excellent characters, I liked the subversive nuns in particular, and you really do root for poor old Agnes. It reminded me of some of Joanna Harris' novels in a way, no bad thing.

Finally, after such sadness, India Knight's "Mutton" had me chuckling. I wasn't too keen on her last book, "Comfort and Joy" but this was much better, not as mean-spirited. Clara is forty-six and quite comfy in her skin, until her school friend, the impossibly glamorous Gaby, moves in. Being of that certain age myself, I found the book very funny and could recognise a lot of the character's sentiments and traits! India has described some characters very well, I loved the author of "Game of Thrones" type books who had writer's block. A light read, but after all the emotional novels previously read, a bit of relief!

My August Reads

The nights are definitely drawing in, the teen is back at school and soon the lazy, sunny days of August will be a distant memory.....

I found "The Shops" by India Knight in Oxfam and at £1.69 I thought I'd give it a go. India loves to shop and this book is full of her recommendations interspersed with vignettes from her ( very interesting) family background. Although its ten years since it was published, it still seems relevant and most of the shops are still around! I like India's chatty style of writing, and I do prefer her non-fiction to her novels.

Book club choice this month is "Miss Savidge Moves Her House" by Christine Adams. I didn't really fancy this book about a lady who, when faced with her medieval house being earmarked for demolition in the 1960s, dismantled the whole thing and moved it 100 miles to Norfolk. However, I could not put it down. May Savidge spent the rest of her life putting  the house back together and left the unfinished project to her ( initially very unwilling) nephew and his wife, Christine. This is a book about resilience, love and loss, family ties and a very remarkable lady who literally never threw anything away. Christine becomes intertwined with May's world and I won't give away the ending, but it is a delightful tale and all the more remarkable for being true.

I really can't make up my mind about Sophie Hannah. I've read all her books now, and some I really enjoy and others leave me a bit cold. This is her latest psychological thriller and I'm sure if you hadn't read the others you wouldn't have a clue who all the police characters are. This book follows Amber Hewerdine, who is accused of a crime she did not commit after seeing a psychologist and muttering the words "kind of cruel" which were written on a note at the scene of an unsolved murder. The book is a good read, the character of Amber is well written and I didn't really guess who had "dunnit" until near the end. However, I am getting a bit tired of the same setting and police characters in all her books, they are just very uninteresting and as I say, could put off someone who picks up her books as a "one-off".

I enjoyed "The Weird Sisters" by Eleanor Brown, a tale of three sisters who grow up as passionate readers with a Shakespearean scholar for a father. In adulthood, they all follow very different paths but after their mother falls ill, they return home to their small mid-western American college town. This reminded me in some way of Anne Tyler in that nothing much happens but the characters are very well written and do elicit our sympathy. I loved the tag-line on the book's cover, "there is no problem a library card can't solve", I totally agree!

Finally, "A Secret Alchemy" by Emma Darwin was a book I was really looking forward to as it intertwines a modern day plot with the story of Elizabeth Woodville, the subject of the recent BBC series, "The White Queen". However, I was rather disappointed. The modern day story concerns a family who own a threatened printing press in London, Una returns to London following the death of her husband and is researching the lives of Elizabeth and her brother, Anthony. I simply could not engage with the plethora of characters who popped up in the present day story, there were so many I lost the thread of who was who. I preferred the subplot of what happened to Anthony, but I do like that era of history very much. Anthony's tale is deeply tragic and I did like the way it linked to Una in the end. This was not as densely written as a Hilary Mantel historical fiction nor as light as, say, Philippa Gregory, but I thought the modern day plot could have been a lot better and so I can't really recommend the book overall.

Very last "first-day-back-to-school"

It was back to school for my daughter this week and as she set off into Year 13 ( Upper Sixth in my world) I took my usual photo. She started school at the age of three and I now have fifteen pictures of her setting off at the start of the school year. However, this is the last "first day", next year she will have left school behind forever. Oh heck, I appear to have something in my eye.......

My July Reads

I have read some really good books this month, there is nothing nicer than a sunny patio, a cool glass of something refreshing ( have you tried Fentiman's Rose Lemonade, it is utterly divine ) and a great book.

"Where'd You Go Bernadette" by Maria Semple was a quirky delight. Bernadette Fox was once an award winning architect, now a reclusive Seattle resident with a husband engrossed in his work at Microsoft, a precocious daughter and a highly annoying neighbour. This is an account of how Bernadette disappeared, gleaned from documents given to her daughter. This is a highly original, very funny and oddly moving book from a very gifted writer. Her descriptions of the "tiger moms" and the Microsoft geeks are hilarious, but ultimately it is a book about the strong bonds that shape us and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

I read Bernardine Bishop's "Unexplained Lessons in Love" after coming across her obituary in the paper. This is a beautiful book about two women who have both had cancer and consequent colostomies. It was very refreshing to read about older characters with these, frankly unsexy, conditions and as someone who has had colon cancer, I found it absorbing and searingly honest. It is a story of family, of love and loss, never cloyingly sentimental, very funny and wonderfully written. How sad that the author is no longer here.

Our book club selection this month was "The Sisters Brothers" by Patrick DeWitt. Eli and Charlie Sisters are notorious killers for hire in the Wild West who go after a man who claims he has invented a potion that can show gold up if it is thrown in creeks. A few people in my group didn't like the violence in the book, it is very violent in parts but I thought it was quite entertaining, funny in parts and it did keep me turning the pages until the rather satisfying ending. I can imagine Quentin Tarantino adapting this for the big screen.

My vintage read this month ( and my choice for book club later in the year) was "Little Boy Lost" by Marghanita Laski, written in 1949, and republished by Persephone Books. This is a beautiful book, set in post-war France as Hilary Wainwright returns to find his young son, lost as a baby five years before. Hilary is an exasperating character at times, he vascillates and makes odd decisions but he is honest and does hold the reader's sympathy..just. He is lead to a boy in an impoverished orphanage who may or may not be his son and the scenes are full of pathos. The descriptions of the shattered countryside and people are very powerful and I won't reveal the ending, but it made me gasp aloud. 

One of my favourite books of the year has to be "Beautiful Ruins" by Jess Walter. I have seen a lot of people rave about this on twitter and I must agree with them. The action occurs in Italy in 1962 and modern day America and begins when a beautiful American film star arrives at a run down Italian hotel in the middle of nowhere, fifty years later the hotel owner turns up in Hollywood at the home of a sleazy film mogul, looking for his lost love. It is such an original story, very funny and I love how all the strands of different stories came together at the end ( which moved me to tears). This is the perfect summer read, especially as I was on holiday just south of the Cinque Terre region where a lot of the action takes place.

Anita Shreeve is an author who I like, her latest book "Rescue"was a tad underwhelming really. A young paramedic is called to the scene of an accident and he falls in love with Sheila who has crashed her car in a drunken haze, escaping an abusive relationship. Sheila is an alcoholic who cannot cope with motherhood and leaves Peter and their baby daughter. The action then jumps forward to where the now teenage daughter begins to go off the rails and Peter tries to do the right thing by reuniting mother and child. Nothing much actually happens really, a bit of a "meh" read, very nicely written though, but still rather disappointing, especially compared with the rest of this month's books.

I read two thrillers on holiday which I take then leave in the hotel ( if you ever at the Hotel Mirabeau in Forte dei Marmi, you are very welcome!). Harlan Coben and Linwood Barclay write excellent page turners that are not very demanding but nevertheless are good reads, worth taking because its not a disaster if they get covered in sand and sun cream!

My June Reads

I thoroughly enjoyed the four books I read this month ( makes a change!), must be the summer sun making me a little less critical!

My lovely friend Jo lent me her copy of 'The Book of Human Skin' by Michelle Lovric and I could not put the book down. The action is set in the late eighteenth century Venice and Peru, with the dastardly Minguillo Fasan plotting terrible things against his sister, Marcella, who is set to inherit his beloved palazzo. Some of the action is definitely not for the squeamish, in many ways it reminded me of 'Perfume' in its graphic details. The portrayal of the mad nun, Sor Loreta, is excellent, she and Minguillo are equally depraved and you are gripped with the hope they will receive their retribution. The story is told from various character's points of view and I highly recommend it.

I haven't read any of Michael Frayn's novels before and as 'Skios' was a Booker long-lister and in Oxfam, I thought I'd give it a whirl. Oliver Fox arrives on the Greek island of Skios and on a whim, decides to pose as a visiting academic, Dr Norman Wilfred. The absurd plot had me chuckling away and Frayn certainly is a master of farce. His depiction of those attending 'self-improvement' holidays with the exceedingly bored guest speakers going through the motions, is very funny as is the pseudo intellectual rubbish spouted by Oliver being lapped up by the unsuspecting audiences. The action zipped along, was very well written and I now have 'Spies' by Michael Frayn on my 'to be read' pile.

Our book club book this month was ' The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry' by Rachel Joyce. Harold receives a letter from an old friend who is dying in a hospice in Berwick on Tweed. He goes to post a reply from his home in Hampshire on the south coast, but decides that by walking to Berwick, he can delay her death. What could have been rather a twee idea, is nothing of the sort. It is poignant but also gritty and funny. As his walk continues, he attracts followers and the input of social media and the once well-intentioned 'followers' of Harold almost manage to de-rail the whole journey. I loved the ending, as it was beautifully under-stated and 'real', not a Hollywood-style reunion and denouement. The last few chapters had me in tears, and it was Rachel Joyce's lightness of touch, that made it so moving.

Finally, you MUST read 'Heft' by Liz Moore, one of my favourite reads of the year so far. Arthur Opp is a housebound recluse in Brooklyn, who is terribly over weight and socially awkward. He receives a phone call off a former student, this sets off a train of events that has life-changing consequences for Arthur and Kel, a seventeen year old boy who may or may not be Arthur's son. This was an utter delight from beginning to beautiful end, I truly cared about the characters as Liz Moore has written them so wonderfully. Again, the book moved me so much, it is a tale of being an outsider, of rejection, of trying to find your place in the world. I loved the ending and wished I hadn't read it, so I could discover it again for the first time.

The Masque of Anarchy

Manchester International Festival is in full swing, I did try to get tickets for Kenneth Branagh's "Macbeth" but I was in hospital when they went on sale, so I wasn't successful. I was luckier in getting hold of tickets to see Maxine Peake perform "The Masque of Anarchy" and I am so glad I did.

The poem was penned by Percy Shelly in response to the Peterloo Massacre, the events in 1819 where the militia charged on a peaceful gathering in Peter's Field, Manchester. The crowd of over 60,000, listening to calls for democratic reform, were charged upon by Hussars on horse back after the local yeomanry had tried to arrest the speakers. Fifteen men, women and children died and many more were injured. Shelly was in Italy when he heard of the appalling events and, outraged, he wrote the response that was banned from being published for twelve years.

The recital of the poem by Maxine Peake took place in the Albert Hall, very close to the site of the massacre. Above a bar area, currently being renovated, is an old Methodist chapel which has been closed to the public since 1969. Hundreds of candles flickered as Peake took to the platform in a ghostly white dress.

The recital was mesmeric, Peake perfectly captured the outrage, the pathos and the hope the poem brings. The final lines...

'Rise like Lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number-

Shake your chains to earth like dew

Which in sleep had fallen on you-

Ye are many - they are few'

..echo across the centuries and are as fresh today as they were in 1819. It was a truly spine-tingling night and I felt privileged to have been there.

Tales From The Tearooms: A Right Royal Tea Party

I went to visit my friend Sue in the fantastic town of Rawtenstall. The high street has many great independent shops, including the excellent "Sunday Best" boutique, as recommended by Mary Portas!

Tucked away in a side street is " A Right Royal Tea Party" a lovely little tea room that serves the best value afternoon tea I've ever had. For two people at £10.95 there is a huge pot of tea, two choices of sandwich filling, crisps, salad and a delicious coleslaw, scones with jam and clotted cream, plus two scrumptious cupcakes baked on the premises. That's all for £5.47 each, amazing!

The shop has very recently been redecorated, it's very vintage-y, a lot of Cath Kidston prints, and has an area for toddler tea parties in the rear of the shop.

I will definitely return here and if you find yourself at the end of the M66 or at the last stop on the East Lancs steam railway, do give " A Right Royal Tea Party" a twirl.