Book news, reviews and recommendations
This is the latest in a series of occasional posts featuring books I read years ago about which I was wildly enthusiastic at the time, wanting to press a copy in as many hands as I could. It’s not that I don’t read any non-fiction but I review very little of it. This is only […]
Blasts from the Past: Skating to Antarctica by Jenny Diski (1997) Read More »
I used to read a lot of travel writing before it was taken over by authors carting kitchen appliances round with them as a gimmick. I blame Bill Bryson: enjoyable as his books were they seemed to foster a demand for comedy in the genre, not an accusation to be made of Adam Weymouth, I’m
This may seem an unusual post from me but I enjoy eating almost as much as I enjoy reading and would do a lot more of it were I not in fear of an exploding waistline. Travel comes a close third which makes Mina Holland’s culinary atlas an attractive prospect, all the more so thanks
The Edible Atlas by Mina Holland: A tasty little post which involves Jaffa cakes Read More »
The Telling Room’s subtitle is ‘A Tale of Passion, Revenge and the World’s Finest Cheese’ which as a connoisseur of quirkiness I found hard to resist. Michael Paterniti fell in love with the idea of Ambrosio Molinos de las Heras’ Páramo de Guzmán cheese, packed in its swanky gold and white liveried tin and selling
The Telling Room by Michael Paterniti: Cheese and Castilian charisma Read More »
I don’t read very much non-fiction, something of a yawning gap I know but there are always so many excellent novels lined up ready and waiting. When I do it tends to be short bursts of travel writing or biography and novelist Sarah Moss’s Names for the Sea neatly combines the two. Circumstances seemed to
Names for the Sea by Sarah Moss: Adventures in Iceland Read More »
Having already written the acclaimed A Fez of the Heart about Turkey and spent many years as a tour guide there, Jeremy Seal clearly has a passion for the country. Meander is a testament to that passion, charting his journey along the river which divides the district of Anatolia – the frontier between west and
Meander by Jeremy Seal: When a meander becomes a bit of a plod Read More »