Didn’t January Drag? As ever. And making it to February means that I can look back over the month of reading and acquisitions and think that a book-buying ban is never going to happen… Even though I did by a few, more importantly, I passed a load on and 43 books left the house to find new homes.
So firstly here is what I read in January:
Books Read
Hemingway’s Chair – Michael Palin – 2 Stars
And The Mountains Echoed – Khaled Hosseini – 2 Stars
Endurance: 100 Tales Of Survival, Endurance And Exploration – Ed. Levison Wood – 3 Stars
A Local Habitation – Norman Nicholson – 3 Stars
Ravilious & Co: The Pattern Of Friendship – Andy Friend – 3.5 Stars
The Turning Tide: A Biography Of The Irish Sea – Jon Gower – 3.5 Stars
On Writing and Failure – Stephen Marche – 3.5 Stars
Cornerstones: Wild Forces That Can Change Our World – Benedict Macdonald – 3.5 Stars
Elixir: In The Valley At The End Of Time – Kapka Kassobova – 4 Stars
Vuelta Skelter: Riding The Remarkable 1941 Tour Of Spain – Tim Moore – 4 Stars
Abroad in Japan: Ten Years In The Land Of The Rising Sun – Chris Broad – 4 Stars
Blue Dahlia, Black Gold: A Journey Into Angola – Daniel Metcalfe – 4 Stars
Book(s) Of The Month
Local: A Search for Nearby Nature and Wildness – Alastair Humphreys – 4.5 Stars
Top Genres
Travel – 6
Fiction – 2
Writing – 1
History – 1
Natural History – 1
Biography – 1
Poetry – 1
Top Publishers
Bloomsbury – 2
Arrow – 1
Harper North – 1
Head Of Zeus – 1
Eye Books – 1
Thames & Hudson – 1
Sort Of Books – 1
Jonathan Cape – 1
Bantam – 1
Vintage – 1
Faber & Faber – 1
Methuen – 1
Review Copies Received
Utter, Earth: Advice on Living in a More-than-Human World – Isaac Yuen
Doomed Romances: Strange Tales of Uncanny Love – Ed. Joanne Ella Parsons
Library Books Checked Out
A Line In The World: A Year On The North Sea Coast – Dorthe Nors
Homesick: Why I Live in a Shed – Catrina Davies
God Is An Octopus: Loss, Love and a Calling to Nature – Ben Goldsmith
Books Bought
Pages From My Passport – Amelia Dalton
Tyneham – The Lost Village of Dorset – Andrew Norman & Mary Hurst
The Museum of Cathy – Anna Stothard
Ultra-Processed People: Why Do We All Eat Stuff That Isn’t Food … and Why Can’t We Stop? – Chris van Tulleken
Aromabingo – David Gaffney
Cranborne Chase – Desmond Hawkins
Scenes from Prehistoric Life: From the Ice Age to the coming of the Romans – Francis Pryor
Professor Stewart’s Casebook of Mathematical Mysteries – Ian Stewart
Scotland the How?: The Hows and Whys of Scottish History – John and Noreen Hamilton
From a Persian Tea House: Travels in Old Iran – Michael Carroll
Pottery – Penny Copeland-Griffiths
Riding the Magic Carpet: A Surfer’s Odyssey in Search of the Perfect Wave – Tom Anderson
The Anthology of Scottish Folk Tales – Various
Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India – William Dalrymple
Throwim Way Leg: An Adventure – Tim Flannery
The Cruise of the Snark – Jack London
A Stroke of the Pen – Terry Pratchett
The New Poacher’s Handbook – Ian Niall
So any from that huge list that you have read, or now seeing them, now want to read? Let me know in the comments below.
Homesick is a very good book – I bought my copy in the indie bookshop in Penzance, to add extra poignancy to it. And hooray for Local being your book of the month, I so enjoyed it and think it likely to be on my books of the year list. Well done for passing along so many, too!