chesilbeach

I think he means the likes of me! I've change to a Whovian avatar in honour of the news that Mr Tennant and Ms Piper will be returning to the show for the 50th anniversary special, and I think Raven has changed to what I believe may be Simon Pegg from the new Star Trek film? Of course, I could be completely wrong.

Hello

Hello Mallow!

Thanks guys. No. I had this as my username on the internet before he chose to use it, and have grumbled ever since his book came out, as he's one of the authors I've least enjoyed reading! Chesil Beach is my favourite place to be, which is why I chose the username, and can never forgive McEwan for choosing it for his novel.

Pointless

My favourite author has to be Ali Smith. I've loved every single book she's written, and Girl Meets Boy is my favourite book ever. Her short stories are stunning, but the most wonderful aspect I find in her writing, is often the sense of joy. Not all of her books are joyous, but Girl Meets Boy is the most glowing example I've ever read.

I've not read any of Kathleen Jamie's poetry, Brook, but I have read both her travel/nature books, Sightlines and Findings and thought they were absolutely beautiful. I'd highly recommend both.

I've recorded both episodes but haven't watched either yet. Might be a while before I get around to it though - they're quite long!

Pasta with a tomato and basil sauce

I can't even remember why we started supporting them, but it's probably been a good 10 years since we started. Not having a great season this year, just hoping we can avoid relegation at this point, although the gap between us and the bottom three does seem to be widening.

We only use ours to make and prove the dough, mostly for pizza bases, but sometimes for rolls, but always cook them in the oven rather than in the bread maker itself.

I don't watch a lot of sports, but I do have some favourites. The only football we ever watch is Spain's La Liga, and our team is Osasuna too, emelee! I also root for Barcelona at the moment, just because I used to love their ethos with regards to shirt advertising (they refused for years, and then rather than accepting a sponsorship deal, sported the Unicef logo on their shirts for a while) and now they play such fantastic football, and who could not love watching Xavi, Villa and Messi? That might change though, as I've flitted between Real Madrid and Barcelona depending on their players and style of football in the past, but we don't really support either as such. Apart from that, I follow the England cricket team, then for any other sports, we just pick a favourite in each game we watch - for example, we were watching the curling world championship the other night, and were cheering for Sweden.

Excellent news muggle - I know others have had some problems when faults occur just after the one year warranty expires, but Amazon were brilliant when mine broke at around the same time, and replaced it immediately too.

What sort of Kindle do you have, muggle? I've got the older keyboard model, and I know that leaving the Wireless switched on tends to drain the battery. I leave mine off and just switch it on when I've bought some books and I want to download them.

Listened to Alan Bennett reading his book, The Uncommon Reader today while getting on with other things, and most enjoyable it wa too! Also started listening to Stephen Fry reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - I think I'm upto chapter 9 so far.

I'm currently on a book spending freeze, so I'm only downloading free Kindle books at the moment. I've still got a handful of books on my TBR pile, plus I've always got bookshelves full of OH's books that I've never read that I can dip into if I want to, so it's not too much of a problem! Finished a murder/mystery/rom/com last night called Armed and Fabulous by Camilla Chafer, which is the first in a series and was being offered free, and I enjoyed it a lot.

Well, it's the end of the month today, and I think we've had a pretty good discussion on the book, with varying levels of enjoyment of reading it, and the whole discussion of the different translations. Thanks everyone for your contributions, although the discussion thread does stay open, so if anyone who hasn't finished the book yet, or comes to it at a later date and wants to share their thoughts, feel free! Thanks again everyone, I've enjoyed reading and discussing the book with you all.

I'm currently on a spending freeze, so looking for free books for the Kindle, and I noticed that there are a lot of Sherlock Holmes ones in the list, but I'm also not a crime fan generally and look for something a bit different if I'm going to read in that genre, so reading your comment makes me think I should maybe try some of the Sherlock books too.

I can't tell you how pleased I am that you enjoyed it, James - it's my favourite book ever!

I've read that one, Sue, and it's lovely. Lots of humour which made me chuckle!

I'm in almost the same situation, Sue. I finished Beyond Black but only because it was for my reading group, and I really disliked it. It has put me off all her other books, no matter how good others say they are, I just don't want to pick up another (although I can almost guarantee Wolf Hall will come up at my book group at some point in the future, but I won't be reading it).

While I appreciate it's a BIG anniversary and David and Billie remain my favourites, I still sort of wish they wouldn't keep bringing people back. I've got less enthusiasm than usual for the new episode tonight, but I always hope to go back to the heady heights of new series two, and I hope that since they are bringing back my favourite pairing, the story will justify it and fingers crossed for a cracking celebration. Otherwise, for me, it will just tarnish the memories of their greatest adventures together.

http://blog.waterstones.com/2013/03/waterstones-week-in-books-quiz-29th-march-2013/ I got 6/10 this week, and they were six known answers, not guesses for a change!

I've started that challenge myself! I've a few on the shelf waiting to be read, and I'm partway through Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski at the moment which is book number 28, and the sixth book of the catalogue that I've read.

I want to watch this at some point -Mads Mikkelsen is one of my favourites at the moment. A Royal Affair was probably my film of the year last year.