Book news, reviews and recommendations
By March I’d usually have been talking about spring but even my perennial Pollyanna tendencies had been flattened by a pandemic winter, dank and dreary with few bright days to enjoy. One of the novels that kept my mind of things was Claire Fuller’s Unsettled Ground which explores the darker side of rural life through …
I failed miserably to find a link between titles for the first batch of September’s paperbacks but this one could be described as about relationships. I’ll begin with friendship and Sigrid Nunez’s What Are you Going Through which explores grief through a terminally ill woman who asks her friend to help her to die, promising …
Paperbacks to Look Out For in September 2021: Part Two Read More »
I like to have a theme running through these preview posts, a pleasing link between one title and the next but this first batch of September paperbacks is made up of such a disparate bunch of books I’ve given up, kicking off with one that I have hopes for despite a string of disappointments. Unsurprisingly, …
Paperbacks to Look Out For in September 2021: Part One Read More »
When I first started this year’s Booker Prize wish list, I found it a bit of a struggle. Several of the books I’ve loved most this year have been translations – Jhumpa Lahiri’s Wherabouts, for instance – and obviously those don’t qualify. Then I read a novel I wanted to include at the last minute …
Hard as it may seem to credit, it’s already nearly time for the announcement of The Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist: Wednesday, 10th March is the date to add to your jam-packed diary. Only novels written by women in English published between April 1st 2020 and March 31st 2021 qualify. Over the past few years …
My Wishlist for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021 Read More »
I’m taking one more look over my shoulder at the end of this strangest of years with a meme that lots of blogger friends posted around mid-December. Like Annabel over at Annabookbel, I’m sticking to books I’ve read in 2020, most with links to reviews on this blog and I’ve also nicked her Covid question. …
The last quarter of the year brought both increasing hopes of a vaccine to liberate us all from Covid’s grip plus the somewhat nervous excitement of an American presidential election together with six more bookish delights for me. September proved to be my best reading month with three treats all from authors whose previous novels …
Summer saw a return to more serious reading after spring’s escapism, perhaps because we were experiencing a little respite from the pandemic in the UK. Coincidentally, both June choices overlapped in terms of their unusual theme, exploring the repercussions of nuclear fission. The first was Stuart Evers’ The Blind Light, a little daunting in its …
Strange to remember writing my books of the year posts for 2019 last December, blissfully unaware of the surreal year that lay ahead for us all. I’ve been one of those fortunate people whose concentration didn’t take too much of a pandemic hit instead burying myself in reading and blogging, finding solace in books and …
Slim pickings for November’s paperbacks with just five that stand out for me, two of which I’ve already read. I’ll begin with one of my favourite books from last year which saw the return of the irascible yet essentially warm-hearted Olive Kitteridge, familiar to fans of Elizabeth Strout’s eponymous Pulitzer Prize-winning book published in 2008. …
Not a huge selection of paperbacks for October but enough to merit two posts I’m pleased to say. I’ve read three of the first batch already including one which at first sight seemed to be a piece of opportunistic publishing. Originally published in the US back in 2011, Tayari Jones’ Silver Sparrow was released here …
Paperbacks to Look Out for in October 2020: Part One Read More »