Polka Dot Rock

Claire Tomalin's Thomas Hardy: The Time-torn Man is meant to be fabulous. It's out in paperback in July, I believe

Hey ditto! So did a good deal of critics, which is why he never wrote another novel after Jude. Whoops!

I didn't, but I do read his columns every Saturday in the Guardian's Weekend magazine He's so funny! In both senses, lol. What was he like? I imagine he's quite different from the persona he uses when writing.

*Phew* Rant over! After being so utterly underwhelmed by the aforementioned book, I've decided to have a brief diversion from my TBR pile, and embark on One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson. My mum is a big fan, and I bought her this for Christmas. She started reading it on Thursday and she was so engrossed by it, she finished it this morning! So I could do with a bloody good read after being bored senseless by that book, so I'm really looking forward to it.

Well, I finished Restless this morning and I was HUGELY disappointed by it. I started off feeling unsure about it, but as I read on and started skimming more and more, I just realised it was a very poor book. I'm not keen on thrillers anyway but I thought this would be different, what with the daughter finding out about her mother's history as a spy, but I was just bored by it. It was just pages manouevres and there wasn't enough character or narrative depth for me. There was nothing whatsoever about Eva's motivations to become a spy, which I was looking forward to reading. But it just boiled down to, "Oh bum, my brother's dead and he was spy. I shall take his place. Bye dad!". Surely spies have more emotional and psychological processes than just getting on with it!! The plot was really predictable as well; I guessed very early on what was going to happen. Which kinda takes the thrill out of a supposed thriller *sigh* There was only one moment at the end that made me think "Oh". But it was a small, quiet, distinctly bored type of "Oh". A lot of critics said that they preferred Eva's story narrative to her daughter's, but after a while, I was actually relieved to get to Ruth's chapters! I was bored with the colourless spy plot that a bit of domestic hum-drum seemed more exciting! Moreover, I found the writing extrememly unconvincing: One particular niggle was Ruth's son who was meant to three yet somehow had the vocabularly of a nine-year-old! Everytime he opened his mouth, I had to take a deep breath and count to ten, lol. More significantly, I just didn't believe that Eva would write her own account in the way that she did: it was waaay too much like a supposed thriller than a autobiographical account of her life as a spy! The sex scenes especially rankled: why would anyone put them in, when they had been writing in a detached, third-person way about themselves?! I was just throughly bored and frustrated by it, and I can't understand why it's had such glowing reviews. Either I'm missing something, or William Boyd is a popular man on the literary social scene. And I'm p***ed off I spent

Bugger! Forgot these two: Maus - Art Spiegelman Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier

Ooh, please let us know how you get on it with it I quite fancy reading Far from the Madding Crowd, BUT I've been badly scalded by Jude the Obscure and Tess of the d'Ubervilles in the past If only I'd heard your mum's advice first!

I've had to re-read quite a few books because of my degree, so I'll try and think of ones where I've re-read out of personal choice: After You'd Gone by Maggie O'Farrell (about four times) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (at least twice) Animal Farm by George Orwell Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte (First time, aged 14 - had to read it for GCSE = hated it. Second time, aged 17 - read it out of curiousity = loved it. Third time, aged 20 - read it for Uni course = REALLY loved it ) The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (twice for choice, then once for dissertation) Matilda by Roald Dahl (who knows how many times!) I don't tend to re-read that much anymore, although I'd like to. I'm on a bit of a new material binge

Ooh, annoying characters are the worst! Novels can easily get away with dislikable characters (e.g. Lolita, A Clockwork Orange, the Ripley series), in fact it can often heighten their enjoyability-factor. But when characters are just plain irritating, it's unbearable! I read this novel called While England Sleeps and the protagonist was so irritating, I had an overwhelming urge to smack him all the time. Of course, he was entirely fictional so that just made the frustration worse!

Hey Judy and Liz! Hope you're both fine and dandy. Thanks for commenting It's nice to know people are checking my blog! I'm really looking forward to reading it - the Independent are producing a hardback version as part of their Banned Books promotion, but I couldn't resist the lovely Penguin version. It's such a gorgeous painting on the cover and it has preface by Michele Roberts. Plus the font is nice and spaced out. (Perhaps worryingly, these things matter to me!). I love Dickens too. It occurred to me that I haven't actually read that many of his novels: I have David Coppefield sitting and waiting to be read, but I felt I'd get around to Two Cities a lot quicker. All together now: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."

Ah, this is one of my favourite novels EVER! Definitely All Time Top 5 material for me. I really hope you enjoy it!

And I've done it again: Went out in my lunch hour and ended up in W-*cough*-stones, where they have '3 for 2' on Penguin Classics. Well, I can't resist a lovely new Penguin Classic so I now have: Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert The Mill on the Floss - George Eliot A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens ...nestled onto my TBR shelf. D'oh! Oh, I'm just thinking of it as celebrating World Book Day. Which isn't an after-thought. Honest

*nudges Paula* Go on!

What a literary office! Can I work there?

I feel like I should have a beard so I can stroke it in a philosophical thoughtful manner I agree that Maus does project hope - it's a recurrent theme throughout: Hope that your loved ones have survived somehow, both through the Holocaust and by leaving their diaries. And even if that hope is destroyed, then Maus shows people just bearing and surviving it. I also appreciate the way it shows how difficult it could/can be for children of survivors, and how, ultimately, they have the responsibility (and, occasionally, burden) of maintaining their parents' legacy. It's a huge responsibility!

Hey Paula! I now know why it took you so long to post these - they're brilliant! I think that's one of the things that makes Maus such an important and strong Holocaust narrative - because it shows that although the victims of it were 'innocent' (they did nothing wrong to warrant such appalling consequences), it didn't necessarily mean that they were all 'morally pure' people, because no-one is. It actually shows the humanity of the people caught up in the situation, e.g. that they could also be prejudiced whilst being prejudiced against. It is interesting that Vladek doesn't seemed to have learned from his own experiences tho'!

But that's why I love The Remains of the Day! It's so tragic on a small scale I think Ishiguro's talent for creating authentic voices is superb. I think he's a wonderful writer.

A bit... lost. I was going to say 'empty' but that would sound like I was disappointed by it, which I wasn't at all. I just felt a bit, "Oh. Oi! Come back! I don't want you to finish yet!" Btw, Paula - I'd like to know your opinion about something in the book: It is a wonderful book!

Hey Paula! I read The Girls and absolutely loved it - it's quite spoiled me for what to read next, as nothing seems good enough! I've written a wee bit about it in my book blog thread.

I really enjoyed it Think it was probably one of the best books I read last year. The narrative voice is incredible strong and well thought-out. Kell, I think you may be onto something: it is very thought provoking and I suppose that we don't consider the effects of *cough* and *cough cough* ( ), if those ever became a reality.

Nice exploitation of a resolution loophole

Let me know how it goes!

Well I've finished The Girls this morning and it was brilliant. One of my favourite types of novel: incredibly readable yet really thought-provoking. Also quite melancholic in tone and moving without resorting to emotional manipulation. The voices of 'The Girls' were beautifully done, and although I don't have a 'favourite' of the two, Ruby did really make me laugh sometimes! I also read it really quickly: I love it when I'm itching to read more of a book (doesn't happen often enough). Hopefully, I can keep my speed up from now on. I managed to sort my TBR shelf out yesterday, which could look intimidating, but is actually weirdly comforting. Probably going to start on William Boyd's Restless, either today or tomorrow night. Can't think of an avatar or signature for that tho'. Hmm...

Why don't you experiment with my soup that I posted previously? Chop some jalapenos and/or chillis then fry them with the onions and garlic, and add some extra cannenne pepper or chilli powder

Thanks for your comments, PP and Judy It's quite high up on my TBR list, so should be (hopefully) reading it soon. I've updated my list again: just shoved things around and added 'Wants' (yes, more...). I think my MA offer has subconsciously spurred me on to read a LOT quicker: after September, I won't be able to choose which books to read as I'll have my reading list. Which is exciting, but also a bit scary! I'm really enjoying The Girls - it's brilliantly written and there are quite a few surprising narrative twists: not something I really expected! Thus far, it's very moving without being sentimental and also inspirational: I don't think I'll ever see photos of conjoined twins and feel sorry for them, like I have done before. Got a bit behind with How Novels Work, but I imagine I'll be back on to it this weekend. My Amazon order arrived yesterday (delivered by Parcelnet - thank god!), so I inadvertantly started The Big Fat Bitch Book: I didn't realise it's actually a double sided book! On one side it's The Big Fat Bitch Book for Grown Up Girls, which is where the extracts I've been reading are from, but there's also The Big Fat Bitch Book for Girls which is like a straight-talking advice guide for teenage girls. If it's useful, I might post a thread in the Young People forum room as it could be interesting for some mums