Reviews of Books
Posted in Recommended, Serious on May 19th, 2011
This book is about Patty and Walter’s marriage, but it is also about so much else; America’s involvement in Iraq, the environment, parenting, the effect of poverty on a community and individuals, etc. Here is the blurb … Patty and Walter Berglund were the new pioneers of old St. Paul – the gentrifiers, the hands-on [...]
Posted in Recommended on May 9th, 2011
As I loved The Hand That First Held Mine (read about that here), I had to read more of her work. I wasn’t disappointed. Here is the blurb … “When Alice Raike’s sisters come to pick her up at the train station, they find her wild-eyed, confused, and insistent on returning to London that very [...]
Posted in Fiction - Light, Recommended on May 5th, 2011
I was sent this novel to review (how exciting!). Here’s the blurb … Friends forever. Then he came along … Bea’s contending with a new boss, power-hungry colleagues and a stroppy teen-aged son, not to mention the anxieties of returning to the dating game. Stressed-out Kate is coping with an empty nest and the growing [...]
Posted in History, Recommended on Apr 20th, 2011
I went to a talk on ‘The Mitfords’ by Susannah Fullerton (President of the Jane Austen Society of Australia) and she recommended this book. Based on unpublished letters and diaries, “The Viceroy’s Daughters” is a riveting portrait of three spirited and wilful women who were born at the height of British upper-class wealth and privilege. [...]
Posted in Recommended, Serious on Mar 21st, 2011
This is just a quick post (more of a reminder to myself) to say I read this book, I enjoyed it, the ending was unexpected, but realistic and I shall be looking for more of her work.
Posted in Recommended, Serious on Mar 11th, 2011
A friend recommended this one. It is a book of (longish) short stories. Nine all together. I preferred the ones that had a female point of view Lohrey does a great job of getting inside her character’s heads and writing their innermost thoughts – like the sexual fantasy in ‘Primates’. The stories felt very real [...]
Posted in Recommended, Serious on Mar 5th, 2011
I selected this novel because one of the members of my Victorian Book club recommended it (we read Victorian novels). I really enjoyed it. It was like a series of short stories, but a few of the characters (like Olive) appeared in all of the stories. The novel had sad undertones and I don’t think [...]
Posted in Fiction - Light, Recommended on Feb 9th, 2011
This novel has been languishing in my pile for quite some time – at least 12 months. I am not sure why I didn’t read it earlier. I think it might be the browness of the cover. Here is the blurb … On a misty London afternoon in 1886, piano tuner Edgar Drake receives a [...]
Posted in Non-Fiction, Recommended on Feb 1st, 2011
Firstly, this is a beautiful book. The pages are thick and the photographs and illustrations (by Karl Lagerfeld) are beautiful. This was an accessible and easy to read biography. Each chapter covers a different phase/aspect of Chanel’s life. The information is well-grouped and draws attention to recurring patterns in her life that might have been [...]
Posted in Fiction - Light, Recommended on Jan 19th, 2011
This month we planned to read Ulysses but halfway through the month we revolted and chose to read Below the Styx instead. Here is the description from the publisher… Martin Frobisher has been beating close family members about the head with an epergne. Frobisher, successful publisher and community leader, is in the City Remand Centre, [...]