chesilbeach

Hello Melody I've read a few Esther Freud books and I've really enjoyed them, but haven't read Love Falls, so hopefully you post a review of it once you've finished.

Well, now you've laid down the gauntlet for Kate to think of ones to tell us!

I agree - I would love to be a Book Organiser!!!

Ooh, not quite that bad, I meant 400 books not 400 pages! It's over 400 books spread across 20 wishlists

George Bernard Shaw - my favourite of his plays is Arms and the Man followed closely behind by Candida, although I love Mrs. Warren's Profession as well!

No, I didn't. I did get about half way through, but just didn't pick it up again for ages and ended up giving it away to the charity shop. It is, however, a Kindle free ebook, so maybe I'll download it at some point and try again.

Thoroughly enjoying Ciao Bella, especially as the first part has been in Florence, a city I've visited and absolutely adored so it's bringing back lots of lovely memories.

Hi Paula, happy reading in 2013!

Excellent! I think you'll really enjoy it Laura

As if! Mwah ha ha - if I had a moustache I'd be maniacally twirling it now

Tonight we will be having whatever OH is cooking.

I think you'd enjoy it Paula. There are seven in the main series, and then there are three more books in the Ellie Chronicles which follow on I believe.

I did try to ignore the dialogue, and it was only a slight niggle really, but I did just feel it took me out of the story a couple of times as it was a bit too modern. Great holiday read though, and I felt the same about the other of his I've read - The Ghost. I'd be more than happy to read another of his books on a relaxing holiday!

Rumbled

Fletcher Moss Park - Matthew Halsall

I dream of a wishlist that small - mine currently stands at just over 400!!!! I blame frankie, poppyshake, vodkafan, Chrissy, Janet, lauraloves, Michelle, chaliepud et al.

^ I've had Insatiable on my wishlist for ages - it came out in the States over a year before we got it, and then it wasn't available on Kindle or was extortionately expensive, so I still haven't got round to getting it yet. Will look forward to hearing your thoughts on it!

Funnily enough, I was listening to a radio programme with a sort of review of the book year for 2012, and they were talking about this book, and one of the contributors made a comment about the abusive theme in the book, pointing out that it's hardly a new theme in fiction and said at least the hero doesn't have his mad wife locked in the attic like Rochester in Jane Eyre!

I've read all thirteen(!) books in the series, and although I did enjoy them to start with - I personally didn't think they were depressing - but I have to admit, by the tenth book, I'd sort of had enough and they were too samey. I was determined to get to the last book though, just to find out if it was a happy or even sadder ending!

This was exactly how I felt too! I remember after one of the twists, I actually gasped, "NO!" out loud and came straight on here to mention it, as I just never saw it coming at all!

Jacket potato

I finished Molly by M. C. Beaton at lunch, and made a start on Ciao Bella by Helena Frith Powell. Trying to decide whether to buy the book on offer on the Kindle Daily Deal today

So many good books on your TBR, but these jump out at me as being excellent! American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld So pleased to see someone else reading Sittenfeld (I know poppyshake is reading American Wife at the moment) The Laura Ingalls Wilder books I'm thinking of re-reading these at some point. I read them when I was little, and again about 15 years ago, but they've been cropping up in a few places recently, and they're back on my radar again now And these are all marvellous: Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer Girl with the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier Little Women by Louisa May Alcott A Room with a View by E. M. Forster

Hello Kate! This is a lovely friendly place, so I'm sure you'll enjoy it here.

Sightlines by Kathleen Jamie Synopsis (from amazon.co.uk): The outer world flew open like a door, and I wondered - what is it that we're just not seeing? In this greatly anticipated sequel to Findings, prize-winning poet and renowned nature writer Kathleen Jamie takes a fresh look at her native Scottish landscapes, before sailing north into iceberg-strewn seas. Her gaze swoops vertiginously too; from a countryside of cells beneath a hospital microscope, to killer whales rounding a headland, to the constellations of satellites that belie our sense of the remote. Written with her hallmark precision and delicacy, and marked by moments in her own life, Sightlines offers a rare invitation to pause and to pay heed to our surroundings. Review: It's difficult to try and pigeon hole this book. Is it travel? Is it natural history? Is it memoir? Yes, yes and yes! It's a combination of all three, but told in a poetic yet down to earth style, with some fascinating accounts of the authors various journeys both within her own country and abroad to northern lands, as well as encounters with nature from her own home. Jamie's previous book Findings was one of my favourite reads of last year, so I'd decided to make this follow up my first read of this year. It was soon clear, however, that this was one to savour, so I rationed myself to one chapter per day. The writing is so wonderful, her powers of descriptions bring the landscape and her experiences to life. In one chapter, she tells of her first experience of an archaeological dig, a summer away from home after her exams. I'm not usually that interested in archaeology as a subject, but this will give you an example of how immersive her style is, with a tactile quality to it, talking about her trowel: "In the right hands it was a sensitive tool - you learned to feel, or hear, the grind of an earth-hidden stone or pottery shard before you saw it. Sometimes a little pebble tumbled away as the trowel edge passed over it, but a larger stone, as yet hidden, just beginning to emerge, sent a tiny seismic thrill along your arm." In another favourite chapter about watching a lunar eclipse, there is a beautiful, contemplative passage about the passing of time, and you can't help stop and consider time, and our tiny experience of it in the lifespan of the universe. An absolutely wonderful book, and I'll be very surprised if this isn't among my top five by the end of the year.