Category: Book Musings (Page 28 of 32)

Monthly Muse – October

04/11/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

Well that was a busy month, didn’t seem to stop around the house, but we now have finished three rooms downstairs and have stripped the hall and I an half through the lounge. This didn’t leave much time for reading though, so only managed to read 14 in the end.

And here they all are:

I managed to read two fiction books this month, Exit West, one on the shortlist for the Booker Prize. I have read others of Mohsin Hamid so had high hopes for this one. It was good, as he is addressing the reasons behind emigration and the problems associated with people living in a strange city, but there were certain elements that I thought jarred with the rest of the book. He Said, She Said was a domestic psychological thriller, that was reasonable, but had the odd implausible moment, but it was fast-paced and twisty.

My least favourite books this month were travel and both about Russia, Molotov’s Magic Lantern was about Rachel Polonsky’s time spent in Moscow in the apartment block that Vyacheslav Molotov had lived in and there were the remenants of his library there. The Second was Black Dragon River, where Dominic Ziegler travels down the river Amur that is the border between China and Russia. Both have their fascinating points, but they were very heavy on the history of Russia in my opinion.

Read two books that had a title beginning The Secret Life of… The first was The Secret Life of the Cow published by Faber. It was a reprint of the book by Rosamund Young and was a fascinating little story of her farm and the cows and other animals growing up on it. The other was The Secret Life of the owl by the very talented and twice winner of the Wainwright Price, John Lewis-Stempel. A delightful book on the owls around his farm and the wider landscape with the quality of prose that I have come to expect from John, and a fine addition to my growing library of natural history books.

Read three books on the UK this month, the first of which was Watling Street where John Higgs follows the path of the ancient road that stretches from London all the way to North Wales. Along it he re-discoveres the long history and contemplates the state of modern Britain post Brexit. The second was by Charlie Pye-Smith as he travelled back and forwards talking to those responsible for growing our food. The final one was Ancient Wonderings by James Canton. In this he travels to various Neolithic sites in search of the traces that are still left over. It is a really interesting read and it shows that the more we find out the less we know of their lives.

Read my third book from the Baillie Gifford shortlist, The Odyssey. It is a touching story of a father and son as they look at the life lessons from this epic tale and the author learns more of what made his father the man that he was. I was on the blog tour for The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities by Paul Anthony Jones another fine book on forgotten words from our language, with a word for each day. Really good and a must read for any etmologists.

Finally two natural history books, Wonderland, where Stephen Moss and Brett Westwood take us through every day in the year with animals, birds, plants, trees, moths and all sorts of other things to see in the natural world. A really wonderful book, and one I will be buying in paperback. The final book was As Kingfishers Catch fire by Alex Preston and some stunning illustrations by Neil Gower. This is an utterly beautiful thing to hold and was my book of the month too.

Monthly Muse – September

03/10/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

Had been hoping to read quite a lot of books in September, but only managed 17. Quite a lot, but still have somewhat of a backlog! Bar the single book, they were all really good this month. Here they are in all their splendour:

September is the month where the Royal Society Insight Investment Science Book Prize 2017 is announced. I had already read two from the shortlist of six, read one in August and that left three to read. First was Beyond Infinity by Eugenia Cheng an exploration of the mathematics behind the largest numbers that humanity can imagine. For a maths book, it wasn’t bad, but she didn’t have the clarity of someone like Marcus du Sautoy. In Pursuit of Memory by Joseph Jebelli is his personal and professional story about the debilitating disease that is Alzheimer’s. In Other Minds, (thanks to William Collins for helping me out with a copy) Peter Godfrey-Smith looks at the way that our minds have developed when compared to an Octopus and how evolution has solved the same problems in two different ways. I thought that the best of the shortlist was In Pursuit of Memory, but the prize was won by Cordelia Fine and her book, Testosterone Rex and the exploration of gender.

I had quite a UK centric month in September. Mychael Barratt has compiled a book full of facts in London: Maps of Days. Each day of the year has an event or anecdote that has taken place and all are accompanied by his artworks. From Source to Sea by Tom Chesshyre is an account of his walk from the first place that the Thames emerges from the ground to the edge of the estuary where it empties into the North Sea. Surrounding London and other cities is an area of land that has been designated Green Belt. In Outskirts, John Grindrod looks at the way this has been developed from a Victorian idea to a fundamental part of our built environment. Woven in this social history is Grindrod’s own family history and the memories of his childhood growing up on the edge of urban Croydon.

I joined Jonathan Bennett on his surfing journey in Around the Coast in Eighty Waves. I can’t surf but really enjoy reading about the lifestyle and the vibe. That was one of my #WorldfrommyArmchair reads. The other was Travels in a Dervish Cloak about Isambard Wilkinson’s time spent in Pakistan. It is a wonderful set of stories as he tries to find if the original culture is still present after the draping of Islam over the country.

Coronet kindly sent me Megan Hine’s first book, Mind Of A Survivor. She is an outdoor adventurer who has scaled mountains and survived jungles and worked as a consultant on some of Bear Grylls TV series. In this book, he looks at the ways that a learning survival methods at a weekend can be applied to everyday situations in the home and office. Ruth Fitzmaurice has her hands full. Not only does she have five, yes five children, but her husband suffers from Motor Neurone disease and is wheelchair bound and can only communicate with his eyes. I Found My Tribe is a poignant account of her family life and the tribe of women that she swims in Greystones, Co. Wicklow with to maintain some semblance of balance in her life.

Only managed to read two fiction books this month. The first was sent to me inadvertently by Granta (thank you) and was the debut novel by Eli Goldstone, Strange Heart Beating. Seb loses his wife Leda in a freak accident and in the process of grieving realises that he knew less about her than he thought. He travels to Latvia to uncover her past and find the man who sent her the letters that she never opened. Unravelling Oliver by Liz Nugent is a story about an author who is not the person people think he is. The book starts with a brutal attack, and from this savage event, his own personal life unravels as we discover the history behind his deception.

Managed to read three natural history books. A Charm of Goldfinches and Other Wild Gatherings by Matt Sewell is an art book combined with the collective names we give to all sorts of animals. So if you want to know what a load of crows or sparrows is called, then this is the book for you. Every Little Toller Book that I have read so far has been with it for the time invested and the reprint of Island Years, Island Farm by Frank Fraser Darling is no exception. For each seaon on the equinox or mid summer and winter I have been starting the series of season books published by Elliot and Thompson. They are delightful collections of themed writings of classic and contemporary work edited by Melissa Harrison. On the 21 st September I started Autumn and it met all my expectations again. Buy them if you can.

The Internet Is Not the Answer by Andrew Keen is an an interesting take on the state of the net and some of the subjects reported in the book are quite eye opening, worth reading. My miss of the month was A Mile Down by David Vann, though the description of the two storms he went through read like a thriller, but his naivety was quite shocking.

Solid month of reading there, and October is shaping up to be great too and I am endeavouring to work my way through my massive backlog of review books (and the odd library one).

Terry Pratchett Exhibition

24/09/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

I have been a long time fan of the strange Discworld that came from the mind of Terry Pratchett. A place that was familiar at the same time. I was genuinely upset when he succumbed to the terrible disease of Alzheimer’s back in March 2015. It was a tragic loss for his fans and those that he had touched in his life.

Last week Salisbury Museum opened an exhibition to celebrate and commemorate his life and achievements. And what achievements they were; Knight of the Realm, Professor, collector of doctorates, OBE, blackboard monitor and honorary brownie. He used his position to raise necessary awareness of the tragic illness that is Alzheimer’s appearing on various TV programmes and talking to people about it and asking the important question about dignity in life and death. He said that this illness made him so angry, an anger that he said could have welded steel he still maintained his humour.

Even though I never met him, and regret not taking the opportunity to do so when he was with us, I miss him and getting the latest paperback each Christmas.

I am fortunate that I have two signed books by him, both have been found in second-hand bookshops

The exhibition was full of personal mementoes, the sword he made, the letter from Tolkien, the first typewriter he had and a remake of his office as well as art by the fabulous Paul Kidby. I didn’t take any photos, as I wanted to have the memories, but I did take one of this. I might have shed a tear at that point.

If you loved STP’s work, then this you must visit this exhibition, it is sensitively done and a fitting tribute to an author has brought much pleasure to millions of readers. I thought it would be rude to leave without buying anything, so got these.

Why I Use Good Reads

11/09/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

This month the website, Good Reads, a place for book addicts and readers turned 10 years old. I have been on there since 2012 and it is a place that I visit several times every day.

There are several elements of the site that make it an essential place for all who love to read to use. It has a basic shelving system nominally based around three compulsory ‘shelves’ to read, currently reading and read. However what makes this an excellent book management system is that you can add as many shelves as you like and can call them what you want too. I have set up shelves for all manner of things, for example travel books and natural history, list of books that have been on the various book prizes that I am interested in as well as having a shelf for every year going back to 2002 listing in order (I know, I know) everything that I have read.

The to read shelf is most useful for recording everything, and I do mean everything, that I am either desperate to read or have a slight interest in. As I write this the total stands at 4583. No, I have not mistyped that number; it is 4583. Might take a while to get through those… I know that there will be some that will drop off, be deleted and actually never read, but it is a way of recording an interest in a book that I can find at any point later on. It is particularly useful when planning the next months reading, or working out a reading list for challenges and so on.

Talking of challenges, every year on the 1^st January Good Read asks if you would like to set a reading target for the coming year and who can resist a challenge? For the past three years I have set a target of 190, and in 2013 set a target of 185. This year I might just scrape through the 200 barrier, might… It is not for everyone, I know, but I like having something to aim for when thinking about what that I want to read.

There is a more though. Good Reads has a great social side to the site too. As well as being able to connect with friends, and see what they are reading, every review written on the site is publicly visible and can be liked and mostly commented on. Like other social media sites, it can suffer from the odd bell end, but thankfully they are few and far between. There is also the ability to set up and join groups to link up with like-minded readers is great. I am currently a member of several who read all manner of things from sci-fi to natural history. I am also a moderator of one called Book Vipers which is a group that reads fiction, non-fiction and classics. I also design an annual challenge for the members which seems to go down well.

Support on there has been excellent, we had a sock puppet issue in the group that I moderate, and dealt with very swiftly by the team. There are flaws with the site though, it can occasionally crash which can be frustrating, it would be lovely to add half star ratings, something that they acknowledge, but with their owners being Amazon may not happen. I am also a librarian on there with the power to change book details. I once got chastised for amending the name of an author! Apologies were sent and I think that I was forgiven.

There are other sites out there, Library Thing and Book Likes are probably the most well-known. Whilst they do things slightly differently to Good Reads, they are not as popular.

So if you love reading, want to find like-minded readers and multiply your TBR tenfold, then you cannot go wrong by signing up to Good Reads. You won’t regret it, but your bank balance might…

You can find me here on Good Reads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/11951948-paul

Monthly Muse – August

05/09/2017 / Paul / 2 Comments

Even though I had two weeks off work in August and a lovely week in Jersey, I didn’t get as much read as I wanted too. This month’s reading was a varied selection, with everything from how they built one of the fastest and highest flying jets in the world to a man who rebuilds things just for the pure pleasure of it. These are the books I read:

Managed to read four books this month for the World from my Armchair Challenge; Spain to Norway on a Bike Called Reggie, Walking Home from Mongolia, Land of the Midnight Sun and Cleopatra’s Needle. Two of the authors were cycling different ways across Europe, and Rob Lilwall decided to walk from Mongolia to Hong Kong, whilst Alexander Armstrong visited several countries that ring the Arctic Ocean. All very different perspectives and experiences of the countries that they travel through from the different authors. I much prefer Andrew Martin’s non-fiction to his novels and Night Trains lives up to expectations as he travels across Europe at night

Read a couple of science fiction books too, Touch by the very talented Claire North which was about a ghost who could travel between people at will and the search for this ghost to avenge a murder. Rule 34 was about near future police investigation into some very strange deaths, completely mad and great fun, i.e. classic Charles Stross! Turing’s Cathedral was about the very origins of computers and the men that made them, sadly there wasn’t much on Turing. The Secret Life is an investigative journalists stories about three modern day internet people, two real and one fake. Makes for interesting reading.

The science of gender is a sensitive subject, and in Testosterone Rex, Cordelia Fine looks at the issues and the stereotypes that exist. It is one of the shortlisted books for the Royal Society Prize, which is a great way of finding new authors and titles for high quality science writing. Blackbird is a compact volume about of one of the engineering marvels of the Cold War, this plane broke a number of records with regards to height and speed as well as pushing the technology in new materials for aerospace. The English Guide to Birdwatching is a novel about two authors with the same name as the authors of the book, and a stolen manuscript. There were elements that I liked, but there were several parts that I couldn’t get along with as they jarred with the rest of the book.

Gods of the Morning is the first of John Lister-Kays’ books that I have read. He has been based at the Aigas Field Centre for many years and this is a lovely little book of his observations of the natural world around him. Limestone Country is the latest addition to the Little Toller Monograph series. These are carefully chosen contemporary works that have a strong focus on either landscape or natural history. This is about four places where Fiona Sampson has lived that she has fallen in love with that all have limestone as their bedrock.

My book of the month though was Turning by Jessica Lee. An emigre from Canada to Berlin, Lee decides to swim over the course of a year in 52 of the lakes that surround the city. It is a beautifully written book that is quite astonishing for a debut author.

Monthly Muse – July

07/08/2017 / Paul / 3 Comments

Managed to read 15 books in July, which was more than I thought. Was distracted by having our kitchen and dining rooms knocked together to make a big open room. Whilst I didn’t do the structural changes and fitting, still had all the decorating and numerous other jobs to do.

Quite a big change and is already making a difference; just need the flooring to finish it now

Anyway to the reading:

Yet another varied selection with science, landscape, Laurie Lee’s classic memoirs, two books on Britain, a couple of natural history volumes and a one on a lady’s fight for justice in an authoritarian state. Even managed to read four fiction too.

Best of them was probably Until We Are Free. In this Ebadi describes how she has been hounded by the authorities in Iran to the point that they forced her into exile. It is not the easiest book to read, but it is well written and is a powerful message against those states that abhor democracy and freedom.

Really enjoyed the send and third memoirs by Laurie Lee, he is such a quality writer. Linescapes by Hugh Warwick is a book looking at the lines that we have created across the British landscape and how they can be used to revitalise the wildlife of our green and pleasant land. Signal Failure looks at it from the opposite way, Tom Jeffreys’ walks the proposed path of the HS2 from London to Birmingham and talks to those it will affect and the impact it will have on the countryside and ancient woodlands. Tom Fort took a nostalgic view of the role that the village has played in our landscape and culture and Bill Bailey’s book on his favourite birds was quite charming with his delightful little sketches throughout.

I am a big fan of China Miéville, so was really looking forward to The Census Taker. Whilst it had some charm, and some frankly quite chilling elements, it didn’t have the impact of some of his others that I have read. The Essex Serpent was good too, a gothic and richly imagined book set on the Blackwater Estuary. A Month in the Country is a story of subtle nuances about a man restoring an artwork and reflecting on his experiences spent during World War I. Ken Macleod’s The Corporation Wars was something completely different, sentient robots fighting a war against human AI. Good though.

Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs by Lisa Randell is a study of dark matter and how it has influenced our galaxy and solar system since the earliest times. My physics is a bit rusty so did occasionally struggle with this. The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu thou was really good, Charlie English tells the story of how the scholars and collectors took steps to ensure that their precious manuscripts were safe from the threat of terrorism. Beyond the Fell Wall is an immersive book about Richard Skelton in the landscape of the high fell.

Monthly Muse – June

10/07/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

Managed to read 16 books in June, which were a pretty varied selection as you can see below:

It was a close call on the best but just nudging ahead was the classic Peregrine by J.A. Baker closely followed Walking the Nile by the adventurer Levison Wood. Others of note were the terrifying dystopian The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, Long Way Back about Charlie Boorman’s road to recovery after a very serious accident and Summer: An Anthology for the Changing Seasons, another wonderful collection edited by Melissa Harrison. I managed to read two of Little Tollers books this month, they are becoming one of my favourite publishers with their focus on the natural world and the landscape. First was On the Marshes, where Carol Donaldson tells the history of the North Kent marshes, interwoven with her own personal story after a relationship disintegrated. The second was Orison for a Curlew where Horatio Clare tracks the last sightings of the Slender Billed Curlew, a bird that is thought to be, but not categorically proved to be extinct.

I managed to read three more for my World from My Armchair Challenge, Why the Dutch are Different, the story of how Ben Coates ended up in the Netherlands by accident and never left. Glass Half Full is the third in the series of Caro Feely’s trials and tribulations of running a biodynamic vineyard in South Western France and the third was the first book by Levison Wood, Walking the Nile about his tough journey walking from the centre of Africa to the Mediterranean.

Possibly the strangest book in June was To Be a Machine. In this Mark O’Connell talks to those that are looking at using technology to enhance or improve or extend their lives. Equally odd, but in a very different was Jules Evans seeks the ecstatic experience in The Art of Losing Control, which made for interesting and occasionally disturbing reading.

Also of note was Dadland, the story of Keggie Carew’s father’s secret wartime actions and his slow descent into dementia. Also learnt about Ben Fogle’s passion for the Land Rover and Gary Fildes’ obsession with the night sky. Finished the month of with a brief fantasy interlude into a Britain of the last millennium with the story of revenge. A good month of reading, looking forward to July, but as we are having the kitchen done then might not get as much read!

Monthly Muse – May

12/06/2017 / Paul / 3 Comments

Where are the days going? I though at the end of May, I’ll write this in a few days after the 31^st and bang we are all of a sudden on the 11^th June! Anyway here we are again. Managed to read 16 books in May. The majority of what I read was natural history, two or three travels books some memoirs and the odd fiction and science fiction thrown in for good measure. These are the quite beautiful covers:

For me best of the bunch was Wild Kingdom by Stephen Moss. Written in his engaging style he takes us around the UK looking at the state of the wildlife and the success stories and where things hang in the balance. Chris Packam’s memoir was a very intense read indeed, as an Asperger’s sufferer he was never really fully understood, which made for a sometimes traumatic childhood. Petley had a very different childhood growing up in post-war Kent, one that formed the person that he is today. Gurdon was a seventies child, and his obsession was with cars of any colour make and type, it did make for very funny reading though.

The Clocks in This House all Tell Different Time is Xan Brooks debut novel. Reading it was a surreal experience as you get further in you realise just what is happening to the main characters and was set in Epping Forest, tied in nicely to Strange Labyrinth which I read last month. Empire Games was one of those books that messes with your head, as all good sci-fi should do, with parallel worlds and sophisticated spy agencies. I also finished my second Anne Dillard book that I had been kindly sent by Canongate. She is a wonderful, perceptive and eloquent author and I cannot wait to read more of her work. Norman Lewis was a discovery too, I had not read any of his, and this one provided by Eland was quite special. Really enjoyed Pedal Power, a summary of all things cycling, and the Swordfish and the Star provided a very different perspective on the Cornish coast.

Where Poppies Blow was a different take on the horrors of World War One as Lewis-Stempel writes about the comfort that the soldiers took from the natural world around them. The Nature of Autumn is the second of Jim Crumbly’s books that I have read, he is a fine author as also Matt Merrit is as he takes us around the country in search of the spectacular bird displays that we have in the UK.

Favourite covers were Island home and A Sweet Wild Note, both beautifully done and stunning foil blocking to make them sparkle. Overall a great month of reading, not a single bad book amongst them.

Big Green Bookshop

11/05/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

I follow a bookshop on Twitter called The Big Green Bookshop who are in Wood Green in London. A couple of weeks ago Simon tweeted that he was seriously skint and needed to sell a whole pile of books to pay the bills that week. His post went viral and his online orders jumped from 1 or two a day to around 100! This is also the same guy who after a spat between Piers Morgan and JK Rowling decided to tweet all of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to him. 800 tweets later Morgan blocked him…

Today he had a page about him and the bookshop in the Times. He is a great guy, I’m sure he find a book to sell you 🙂 

Monthly Muse

01/05/2017 / Paul / 0 Comments

Even though it is only a day shorter than March, April just seemed to zip by. Managed to read 16 books somehow and they are here:

Best of the bunch was Bee Quest by Dave Goulson. This is his third book, and probably the best so far. His enthusiasm for his buzzy subjects is infectious and he writes with wit and a bone-dry sense of humour. Others of note were Strange Labyrinth, Hidden Nature, Floating and Mend the Living and The Otters’ Tale. Miss-Adventures was a blast and Havergey was an unusual book, Little Toller have a fine range of natural history books and this was their first venture into fiction. It was good, and a bave move for them. The only one that I was not so struck on was Everything that I Never told You, it was beautifully written, but really didn’t work for me plot-wise.

Blog Tour

I was honoured to be asked to take part in the blog tour for the Wellcome prize shortlist of books, along with other experienced bloggers! The book that I was allocated was The Gene, a story of our discovery of the essence of life and also of Mukherjee’s story of his family woven within it. Sadly, I couldn’t make the prize announcement but it was won by Maylis de Kerangal with Mend the Living. My post is here.

Lounge Books

Sam Missingham has been with Harper Collins for a while now but as of a week ago, will be parting company with them. She had this idea about a place for book lovers to congregate and find new books and this was the opportunity for her to launch Lounge Books. Anyway, on there she had posted a list of 36 book bloggers that she would recommend that people should follow right now, and I was included on that list. To say I that I was flabbergasted would be an understatement, genuinely please to be forging my own path in this online world, and to be counted alongside stars of the blogosphere such as Simon Savage.