chesilbeach

Same here.

No rain today, and quite mild, so doesn't really feel very Christmassy at the moment … more autumnal.

Slow reading week this week, but I did read a couple of short stories, and I'm about a third of the way through Alexander McCall Smith's retelling of Jane Austen's Emma. I still don't like Emma as a character (and I know that's intentional), but I do like his Mr Woodhouse more and how's he's set the modern day story, although it's very wealthy society that doesn't bear much relation to any families I know! It is taking a long time to get going, and we haven't really met George Knightley yet, so I'm reserving judgement on it as this stage.

I thought the final, particularly the first programme, was a bit underwhelming. The judges choices weren't great, and I'd be happy to see that format change next year. I want to see their best performances again, or at least ones that the couples really enjoyed watching, not dances that they struggled with earlier in the series. The show dances were ok, but nothing that will stick in my mind as any sort of spectacular performance. I also don't like that the eliminated couple don't get to dance their last dance, and would prefer to see a return to the early series format of favourite ballroom, favourite latin, then eliminated couple dance the show dance as their final dance, before the others perform theirs in competition for votes. Although Georgia was my favourite for most of the series, I wouldn't have minded any of the finalists winning, as on the night, all had good and not so good dances (none worth a 40 though), but I actually thought Jay winning was a foregone conclusion. I think the boy band affect does still have some impact on the voting, and had he performed that jive again (which, lets face it, was the dance everyone wanted to see again) there would have been no doubt in my mind that he would have won, but I've seen lots of comments that most people thought he'd win from week 3 when he danced it anyway. I wanted to see his salsa again too, so I've just had to watch the video of it from Blackpool again! I'm sad to see both Ola and Aliona leave, and I have nothing to base this on, but I wonder how much longer Kristina and Natalie will stay. Again, I don't want to see either go, but I have a feeling they might decide it's time to move on soon too.

I'm surprised by that James, as I thought the English curriculum had always included novels, plays and poetry. Way back when I was at school, we studied three plays - Arms and the Man by George Bernard Shaw, A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney and our obligatory Shakespeare was The Merchant of Venice. We watched a video of stage performances of the first one, a film adaptation of the second and had a school trip to London to see a Shakespeare production (although not the one we were studying). I enjoyed studying the plays more than the novels and much more than the poetry, and GBS remains one of my favourite playwrights, and I often dip into a book I have which includes four of his plays. I've also been lucky enough to see a few performances of some of his plays which I probably would never had done if we hadn't studied plays at school, so I for one am more than happy to see them included in the English curriculum of schools.

I finished reading The Bees by Laline Paull this morning - it's for my book group meeting this week. Think I'm going to try Emma by Alexander McCall Smith next.

I finished book 164 this morning, but I expect to top 170 by the end of the year. Most years I read around 140 books, so this has been a better than average year.

Great to see you enjoyed Dark Matter. I love Paver's writing - she writes about the natural world so well. We read it for my book group a while back, and one of the members had visited the place where it was set, and said it was incredibly accurate in its description, and felt that added even more to her reading of the book. I first came across Paver as a children's writer, and her series The Chronicles of Ancient Darkness are fantastic.

The old orchard stood besieged. The Bees by Laline Paull

There's lots of talk on social media of getting rid of the dance off again next year after both the Jamelia/Peter Andre dance off decision and then again this weeks Katie/Anita decision, putting it back in the control of the public vote which is independently verified. Obviously, the judges scores would still count and would have influence that way, but the couple with the lowest score and vote combined would go home each week. I'd be in favour of this, as it might also mean we could go back to a shorter, but live, results show on Saturday night, which would save the spoilers of the results being available. It's fine if people want to know the spoiler, but I've seen lots of fans being targeted on social media and spoilers being sent to them direct when they'd wanted to wait and see the results show for themselves. Personally, I think we need a big shake up for next year. I'm a traditionalist and would like to see less props, no extra dancers and if there is a theme week, not trying to shoehorn a dance to fit a song and/or theme. I'd also like to see a change to the judging line-up, perhaps bringing in another ballroom/latin professional. I'd actually like to see Arlene back, and perhaps another female judge such as Erin or Karen - both have experience of judging professionally as well as experiencing Strictly itself. Back to the final … I'm still waiting to find out what everyone will be dancing again, but my favourite is Georgia, although I'd be happy for Jay to win too. Having said that, I'm open minded and both Kellie and Katie could pull out all the stops on Saturday and wow me, and I could be persuaded by either of them too. My head says that I think Jay will win, because he's never been in the dance off and I suspect as a boy band member, he has huge support from his fans that the others don't have, but again, I'm willing to be proven wrong.

I keep my wish list on Amazon, and categorised so that I can easily pick a book depending on my mood if nothing in my TBR takes my fancy. It shows you how many books are in each wish list, and in total I now have 156 on mine. I actually had a cull of my list earlier this week, and removed about 50 books that have been there for over five years and I've not been inclined to buy them so far, and don't appeal any more. Some of the books on the list haven't been published yet either, but are there as a reminder for when they are due to be published.

We had our annual viewing of Love Actually the other night. I can't believe I didn't like it much the first time I watched it … it grows on me more each time I watch it now. Funnily enough, Emma Freud (Richard Curtis' partner) wrote an article about her and Richard and two of their two children going to a midnight showing of the film in New York and the experience of watching it again. Worth reading if you're a fan of the film … http://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/expatlife/12049406/Emma-Freud-The-night-the-Curtis-family-watched-Love-Actually-in-New-York.html (she actually live tweeted it, then turned it into an article afterwards )

The last one was probably The Crimson Petal and the White which I ended up rationing out chapters so that I didn't rush it and finish too soon!

It's not been a great start to December … I've been poorly for a couple of weeks, but didn't want to stay off work as I knew I had holiday coming up for Christmas, so I think it's lingered longer than it would have if I'd just had a couple of days tucked up in bed. Almost back to normal now, and I'm finished work for Christmas, so hopefully things will look up for the rest of the month! Somehow, I've managed to do all my Christmas shopping and write all my cards, but haven't posted them off yet, and need to get everything wrapped soon. Hoping to get it all done this weekend, and the only job I'll have left after that is to ice the cakes.

I totally agree about the series getting stronger as it goes on. I've read book 5 as well now, and I loved where he went with the story. Just a shame we have to wait until next summer before book 6 is out!

My absolute favourite author is Ali Smith. She writes like no one else and I become lost in her writing whenever I read her books. I think she stands head and shoulders above my other favourite authors, and she's even someone I'm prepared to buy her books in hardback editions as I can't wait for paperbacks to be released, or I will pay full price for the ebook for and then buy a hard copy later when the paperback comes out.

Just read your review of Birdsong and I agree with a lot of what you've said. I've read a few books by Faulks now, and I've come to realise that I find all his characters remote and I fail to connect with most of them, and never come to care about them through the book, so it makes it hard to take the story to heart. I think the most successful of his books for me was Human Traces, but most others have left me wanting more of a connection with the characters.

I'm still not getting on well with the audiobook. I think I might have to read it myself as then the children's voices might not sound so earnest in my head! At the moment, it's all very dated - even the narrator seems to have a very old fashioned RP delivery. I think the problem is that I'm finding it hard to associate myself with these characters at all, but I will persevere.

Sorry it's taken me so long to respond, Kay. My new phone had arrived when I got home, and ended up engrossed in setting it up and playing around with it and then had loads of work to catch up on when I got back to the office, and now I've been poorly for the last couple of weeks and haven't felt up to much. We did have a lovely catch up, didn't we? The Waterstones cafe wasn't as exposed as I thought it would be, and it's lovely to be able to chat in amongst all those books! I'm almost back to normal now, but still not 100% and haven't wanted to spread my germs among everyone else, so might not be able to meet up this month, but I'm sure we'll sort something out soon.

Stephenie Meyer to produce The Rook TV series

Freezing. First time this winter I've had to scrape the ice off my car this morning

Totally agree. Even the audience knew it was the wrong decision. Disgusting. Perhaps the tabloids reporting Ola saying it's fixed are right after all. I take most things "reported" about Strictly with a pinch of salt, but those judges votes seem like valid evidence that it could be true. Agree again, although Anita spent far too much time being flung around the floor for my liking. If she'd been on her feet more and danced more steps, I might have put it above Georgia. I'm in the minority though, and I'm not a fan of Gleb … give me Aljaž any day instead.

Although not necessarily similar, I would definitely recommend the following out of the ones I've read over the last couple of years: Katherine Rundell - Rooftoppers and The Wolf Wilder Ross Montgomery - Alex, the Dog and the Unopenable Door and The Tornado Chasers Emma Fennell - Shiverton Hall and Monsters ​(although Monsters is top of the age range really, closer to YA)

Great review of Frost Hollow Hall, Noll. So pleased you enjoyed it. Just wanted to say, it's actually middle grade (MG) not YA, so aimed at 9-12 year olds. There are some great writers for this age range now - what I love about them is that, just like YA, they write fantastic stories that aren't too childish, but written in a deceptively simple style that you don't notice because the stories are so good.

Sunny but cold … a perfect wintry day.