Nollaig

I had an awesome dinner/dessert last night, ate in Costa in Killarney because my mum wanted coffee. I had a turkey/stuffing/bacon/lettuce/cranberry sauce sandwich, a slice of a really rich chocolate cake and this icy cold chocolate/cream drink. Mmmmm.

Another favourite of mine was The Caribbean Jewels Mystery by Joyce Stengel - about a 14 year old girl on a cruise who meets a boy and gets caught up with him in the search for a missing silver statue surrounded by legends and superstitions.

Well, I left my current book in Cork (whoops) so I'm re-reading a couple more of my childhood favourites while I'm here in Kerry.

I watched Jack Frost this morning - such a sad little movie!!

Oh you lucky thing! I've only seen him once, but I did meet him and get hugs and photos so it was amazing. My favourite song.... I don't know. There's a list. Not Perfect, What Was 05 For?, White Wine In The Sun, The Song For Phil Doust, You Grew On Me and mostly his non-comedy stuff like Understand It (from the doco) Drowned (movie soundtrack) and 'Sit' the album by his old band Timmy The Dog.

Wahey! I bought one of his DVDs there recently so I have that on standby anytime I'm in need of a Tim fix.

Hey, don't fix what ain't broken

You should try his newest one, "The Gates".

Well it also depends on what sort of genres he might be into. It isn't just a case of liking books or not, when you start out it's important to work out what's right for you. Maybe base it on the sorts of tv/movie genres he likes? Does he like horrors, thrillers, true stories, fantasy, sci-fi etc, and go from there. He may like decorative things and illustrations but the heart of any book is it's story, so that's kind of what's most important.

I've ated all mine

I've never read this. Now I want to. 1958....can it be downloaded I wonder?

He's James Hamilton, the new guy who quotes Monty Python all the time

1. I've met my best friend less than 10 times in the 6 years I've known him. 2. I've recently started turning into a girly girl. I used to be very unflappable and insensitive. Now everything makes me cry. 3. I lost my great grandfather when I was eight. Until he died, I used to go down to his house all the time, I used to pick up his paper and chocolate bar on a Sunday and he was the most wonderful person I knew. I don't remember anything about him, and am gutted that I never really had the chance to know him adult-to-adult. 4. I bite my nails, but I'm trying to get out of the habit. They're long at the moment. 5. My earliest memory of my nearly-nine-year-old collie/terrier cross, Holly, is bringing her home as a new born pup from the vets her litter and mum had been abandoned at. I was 13, it was Christmas, and I carried her all the way home in the palm of my hand tucked inside my jacket.

Ah fair enough. I wouldn't buy it either, I'd never buy a damaged book, but if it was the last one in the store there's no way I'd pay full price for it either.

So if a book had a tear through the front cover, ye'd still expect full price?

I have Phish Food in my freezer

I can't believe it's only three days til this opens here. I thought it was longer.

This situation is in NO WAY funny, and I'm not suggesting it is - but Michelle your wording cracked me up. I had this image of dropping a child in a store, cracking it, and having to buy it as a result.

I recently read Anna's latest novel, So What If I'm Broken, and thought it was superb. It's unusually inspired by the songs of a musician friend of hers, Jack Lukeman. It follows the lives of four fictional Jack L fans who rally together in an attempt to find a missing woman, the wife of one of their group, and explores how they end up facing their own demons along the way. It's an absolutely superb book. It follows four main characters and a few secondary characters in a cleverly interwoven sequence of plots. Elle Moore, the impulsive and carefree artist minded by her older sister Jane whose life fell apart with a teenage pregnancy, Tom Kavanagh whose wife Alexandra got off the tube one day and disappeard, and the socially detached Leslie, who is dealing with a family history of cancer. The characters are, like in her first novel, the driving force behind the story and they will all, at one point or another, make you both laugh and cry. For all the extremities faced in the novel - alcoholism, depression, self-abuse etc, I think everyone will find a little bit of themselves in one or more of the characters. McPartlin just has a natural talent for drawing the very essence of universal human experiences and emotions and locking them away in solid words, and I would defy ANYONE not to get utterly attached to these people. Each chapter title is the name of a Jack L song and contains a few lines from the song - as well as there being two songs available for download free for readers to get a tast of the inspiration. The 'soundtrack' to the book is fantastic, and really adds an extra dimension to the experience if you can get your hands on the book. Seriously, if this is your genre, go check this lady out.

Anna McPartlin. I officially love her, and chick-lit as a result of her.

Pizzaaaaaa

I've read 5 and a further 15 are on Mount TBR or my wishlist. Seemed like a strange enough list, but I never really notice when a book has been written, so I couldn't say what I'd put where exactly.