The Victorian Chaise-longue by Marghanita Laski Doc by Mary Doria Russell The Bertie Project by Alexander McCall Smith (many spoilers)
Books
My Reading for 2016
This year I have done reasonably well with the number and spread of books I have read - mainly historical fiction, some classic fiction, a few non-fiction and some literary fiction including a handful definitely outside my comfort zone. This list, naturally, does not include the number I have started but not finished which were … Continue reading My Reading for 2016
My Reading – December 2016
A Bluestocking in Patagonia by Anne Whitehead Habits of the House by Fay Weldon By the Sword by Alison Stuart
My Reading – November 2016
Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh All that man is by David Szalay Do not say we have nothing : a novel by Madeleine Thien
One Minute Book Review – Umbrella by Will Self
I picked this book up after hearing that it dealt, in fictional form, with similar experiences to Oliver Sach's Awakenings. I put it down after a single page as I had no desire to force myself through 400 pages of unpunctuated stream of consciousness. Months later I came across the audiobook (someone else had done … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Umbrella by Will Self
My Reading – October 2016
His Bloody Project : Documents Relating to the Case of Roderick Macrae by Graeme Macrae Burnet The Wife's Tale by Christine Wells Hot Milk by Deborah Levy The Sellout by Paul Beatty Save
One Minute Book Review – Angelica by Arthur Phillips
This is an unsettling novel where reality and the supernatural blend together. Set in London in the 1880s, it the story of a family on the verge of breakdown. Angelica has spent the first four years of her life sleeping in her parents’ room. When her father, Joseph Barton, moves her into a room of … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Angelica by Arthur Phillips
My Reading – September 2016
Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwen The Scorching Wind by Walter Macken (There are few reviews and I was unable to a detailed review that didn't completely give the plot away.) Still she wished for Company by Margaret Irwin A Room with a View by E M Forster (Spoilers) The Happiest Refugee by Anh Do Save
One Minute Book Review – The Darkest Hour by Barbara Erskine
Barbara Erskine is one of my favourite writers of popular time-slip fiction. The modern narrative in this novel concerns art historian, Lucy Standish, who is writing a biography of wartime artist, Evie Lucas, about whom little is known. The historical narrative begins in the summer of 1940 at the start of the Battle of Britain … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – The Darkest Hour by Barbara Erskine
One Minute Book Review – Soul Catcher by Michael White
Set in the period just prior to the Civil War, Soul Catcher follows the dangerous journey of professional slave hunter, or soul catcher, Augustus Cain to bring back two runaway slaves of wealthy plantation owner Eberly to whom Cain has gambling debts. The prose is descriptive and evocative with its greatest strength in characterization. Cain … Continue reading One Minute Book Review – Soul Catcher by Michael White
