Renniemist

Hi Ronny I got this book out of the library because I had read a couple of other books by Roddy Doyle. So Far it is quite different and much darker.

It sounds as if it will be a lovely read PP.

What is Fluffy about PP? Thanks Amy. I have Persepolis on my wish list. I am hoping that some kind person (son or daughter) will get it for me for Mothers Day.

I have finished On Beauty by Zadie Smith and I really enjoyed this book. Admittedly it was very slow to start with and I was beginning to wonder if I liked any of the characters, but it most definitely improved and was very funny in parts. I read White Teeth by Zadie Smith last year and I enjoyed it as well. I have now started on A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle. Born in the slum of Dublin in 1901, his father a one-legged whorehouse bouncer and settler of scores, Henry Smart has to grow up fast. By the time he can walk he is out robbing, begging, often cold always hungry, but a prince of the streets. At fourteen, already six foot two, Henry is in the General Post Office on Easter Monday 1916, a soldier in the Irish Citizen Army, fighting for freedom.

Well now I am really confused. Only thing to do is to read it and make up my mind. Thanks everyone I will read it soon.

I am going to have to have another look at this book, because I did not notice the fish either. Now if only I could bend down and reach the bottom shelf where I placed it. (need a stiff smilie with a walking stick) Ah well maybe tomorrow:)

Thanks:lol: :lol:

Oh dear! It is on my TBR pile and I was thinking about reading it soon. Perhaps I will put it to the end.

Judy I would be interested to know how you get on with Half a Yellow Sun. I read Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie last year and really enjoyed it. Half a Yellow Sun is on my wish list which is getting longer and longer.

I read all the books in a row as well Nici. I discovered The Clan of The Cave Bear just before I went on holiday one year and then I was so pleased to find a shop, whilst on holiday, which had the others. At first I just bought the next two, but then I had to go back and buy 4th and 5th one before coming home. I still have them all because I did not feel I could part with them. It is a while since I read them so another look at them may be in order. Has Jean Auel started writing another book?

I have now finished reading The Complete Maus. I enjoyed it very much. I found it easy to read and will certainly read other Graphic Novels. I would like to compare this one with how others are written. I have now started On Beauty by Zadie Smith. Set in New England mainly and London partly, On Beauty concerns a pair of feuding Families

HI Gyre Initially I had thought that the prologue was included to show the difference between fleeting friendships and those of real friends who would put themselves in danger for you. However as I read more I could see that in a great many instances there was no such thing as "friendship". So you are right when you say that there are worse things that friends can do. I also think that it shows how Vladek related everything back to the war.

I am not very good at this but here are my thoughts so far. This is my first time reading a graphic novel and I like the format. It is as easy to read as most text based books. I like the style of writing. Occasionally I have to stop and re-read something but that is usually because it is in the father

I am glad you are enjoying The Bookseller of Kabul. Your reactions are very similar to mine when I read it last year. I think you are right about the cultural differences. However I would recommend reading My Forbidden Face by Latifa. It is an interesting non-fiction book written by a young Afghan girl at the time of the Taliban.

I have now finished An Artist of the Floating World. It was a good read. I really like Kazuo Ishiguro

I bought it at Tescos this afternoon. I had not intended reading it for a while but if it is on Richard and Judy next week I may just give it a go.

Hi Amy Have been saving The Remains of the Day because everyone says it is great. Waiting for the right moment

I also really enjoyed Never Let Me Go. So much so that I have gone on to read many others by Ishiguro. None of of them have been as good as Never Let Me go however.

I have now started on An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro. It is 1948. Japan is rebuilding her cities after the calamity of World War II, her people putting defeat behind them and looking to the future. The celebrated painter Masuji Ono fills his days attending to his garden, his house repairs, his two grown daughters and his grandson, and his evenings drinking with old associates in quiet lantern-lit bars. His should be a tranquil retirement. But as his memories continually return to the past

I finished the Reading Circle book The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell. I enjoyed it and at sometime this year and will read the next book in the series. I have now also finished Slow Man by J M Coetzee. Paul Rayment is on the threshold of comfortable old age when a calamitous cycling accident results in the amputation of a leg. Humiliated, his body truncated, his life circumscribed, he turns away from his friends. He hires a nurse named Marijana, with whom he has a European childhood in common: hers in Croatia, his in France. Tactfully and efficiently she ministers to his needs. But his feelings for her, and for her handsome teenage son, are complicated by the sudden arrival on his doorstep of the celebrated Australian novelist Elizabeth Costello, who threatens to take over the direction of his life and the affairs of his heart. I enjoyed this book also. Although it is a pretty depressing subject you have to keep reading to see if Paul is going to cope.

Oh my goodness I read those Delderfield books years and years ago. They were wonderful books. I think I will have to read them again. Thanks for reminding me about them.

The Tasting Room is excellent. The food is very good and well presented. They have an option for you to have 8 courses with a different glass of wine at each course. We opted to have just 4 courses after our day of wine tasting but we thoroughly enjoyed everything. We also thought that Warwick was great wine. I only hope we can go back someday.

That is such a coincidence. We arrived about lunchtime on the 3rd having come from Hermanus. We ate in the bistro on our first evening and in the Tasting Room on our second evening. We had a full days wine tasting (with a driver) on the 4th so were not around the hotel a much as we would have wanted. Ideally we would have liked to stay there longer. We did have a wonderful lunch on the terrace of the Grand Roche at Paarl on the day we left. I feel quite nostalgic.

Andy we stayed in Franschoek in Le Quartier Fran

We had a Graham Beck Pinotage from South Africa this evening.