France

Oh my, I've just looked at the latest Richard and Judy list and what a load of dross (to put it politely)! The only completely new to me title on the Goodreads list that looks interesting is the book about Josephine Baker.

They're all excellent writers and really spill a good yarn, however all three authors can be (for me) horribly violent and descriptive about it too. I can't stomach that much gore any longer.

No, not just you Willoyd. I've got to the point where I can barely be bothered to look through the list as it's so likely to have nothing I'm interested in that I haven't already noted. I have much the same reaction to Richard and Judy's book club.

Those are incredible.

I fell on The Secret Genius of Modern Life, presented by Hannah Fry which is about the technology behind everyday modern gadgets. It's absolutely fascinating and she's a brilliant presenter too.

If I really love a book I have on the Kobo I'll look out for the real life version! It doesn't help with the sheer number of books in the house.

I can't make up my mind whether Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr is brilliant or thoroughly overblown. It follows 5 storylines, Konstance, a young girl on a spaceship leaving a ruined earth in an attempt to colonise an earth-like planet, Omeir a young peasant who is conscripted into the sultan's army heading for Constantinople in 1452, Maria, an orphan living in the city who rather improbably learns to read Greek, and in the present day Zino who learned Greek from a fellow POW in the Korean war and has returned to his small home town and has made a play out of a Greek story for some grade school children, and Seymour, a troubled misfit, passionate about nature and owls. The book undoubtedly could do with some pruning and the start is very slow indeed,but once it got going it became totally absorbing. I'm still not sure if it wasn't too clever for it's own good and would be interested to know what others thought. This Charming Man by CK McDonnell is such fun. It's the second in a series set in the Stranger Times, a newspaper in Manchester that investigates the weird and wonderful, (and there's quite a lot that's weird in their offices too). This time it's vampires, which don't exist of course, so there must be some other reason for the pointy teeth and strange deaths... Funny, original, highly recommended. Shamed by Linda Costillo is about 13th in her series about chief of police Kate Burkholder and the series shows no signs of flagging. I do wonder sometimes just how many murders you can have among the Amish community, they are peaceful folk after all, but this one is an absolute cracker.

Funnily enough your post reminded me that I read O Caledonia earlier this year and forgot to include it in my reading list, which shows what an impact it had on me! Yes it was beautifully written but I couldn't warm to anything within the story, nor get particularly involved, which is probably why it slipped my memory so easily. That said, now I think about it I can recall everything which says a lot about the quality of the writing, it's just that I remain utterly unengaged.

If you like Anne Tyler then you'll probably love French Braid about various members of a Baltimore family, one character's take on events at a time. If you find her inconsequential and short on plot lines you really won't enjoy this one. I'm firmly in the first camp, I don't know what it is about her writing but she grabs my attention with the descriptions of the minutiae of family life just as keenly as any thriller writer. I particularly enjoyed this one because of all the shifting perspectives showing different sides to a story, all equally vaild. The Last One to Disappear by Jo Spain is the literary equivalent of mass produced vanilla ice cream, OK at the time but completely unmemorable.

Mmm, I wouldn't agree about the film being more entertaining than the book, I love both but in different ways and see them almost as separate entities which share a lot in common.

I learned to read with Black Beauty - my mother was reading it to me and answered the phone and I got so frustrated at the wait that I picked it up and discovered I could make out all the words. I must have read it about 20 times between the ages of 6 -10. I spent yesterday visiting my first grandchild, aged 5 days. I'm every bit as besotted as your stereotypical grandmother.

I've already expressed my opinions about Blue Monday by Nicci French elsewhere so won't repeat them, suffice to say I won't be continuing with the series. Death in the East by Akbir Mukherjee is the fourth in his series about Sam Wyndham and constable Banerjee and imo is the weakest though most reviewers don't appear to agree with me. It's a dual time line story with a murder in the East End in 1905 that was one of Wyndham's first cases and Assam in 1922 where Wyndham is trying to dry out from his opium addiction. I found it all a bit slow until the two themes converged and then it absolutely ripped along. A decent read and I'll be reading the next one. Dirt Town by Hayley Scrivenor has been lauded to the skies as brilliant Australian Noir etc etc. Parts of it are very good but it meanders about, there's too much back story in some places and a good 40 unnecessary pages at the end after the murder has been solved. Jane Harper may have called it "a stellar debut" but she's far, far better than this.

My mother in law nearly died due to low sodium levels caused by her asthma meds. She was in hospital for a week. Here in France they automatically test everyone over about 60 if they're admitted to hospital because salt deficiency is surprisingly common, especially among those who drink a lot of tea.

The Day of the Jackal was an excellent adaptation, I last saw it on TV about 25 years ago so I don't know how well it holds up.

I'm thinking about those books which you are racing through and get to the end, then think immediately, or maybe a little later, 'that wouldn't have happened' or 'Why did he/she do that?' OK I know that most fiction does not accurately reflect real life and that there really are individuals who are probably too stupid to live but reading about supposedly intelligent individuals (usually women) who ignore all the pointers screaming 'Danger!', walk into a darkened room where a maniac is hiding and then are surprised to find themselves trussed up and the next in line for a chopper drives me wild. Especially when they then overcome the maniac with the aid of a hairpin. And lets not go into some psychological thrillers where the plot revolves around people simply not noticing something vital and glaringly obvious such as there's a big family party and no-one realises that the daughter isn't there, in fact they all presume she is because they see someone with similar hair milling around who is in fact her best friend. I did not make up that little gem, it comes from a bestseller. What's got me going is finishing Blue Monday by Nicci French which I was thoroughly enjoying until I got to the end, closed it and immediately thought, 'EH? Why?' As in why was one of the crimes committed? I can accept (most of the time) obscure reasons like a phobia caused by Auntie sneezing all over the criminal which was triggered again by... but not the 'it kicked off the story and I haven't worked out why he did it so live with not knowing' type of plotting. I don't mind loose ends, I like a bit of uncertainty, but to me this smacks of laziness and I've gone from wanting to search out the rest of the series to thinking I really can't be bothered.

He had a stroke last week, fortunately my daughter had popped in to see him and discovered him in time for him to get to hospital and them to start the treatment that dissolves the clots - it has to be done within six hours or it's useless. He's recovering but is still very weak.

A quick, very quick update on read books as I have to leave soon to visit my husband in hospital. Smoke and Ashes by Akbir Mukajee is the third in his series about an opium addicted English policeman and his Indian sidekick in 1920's Calcutta. I really enjoy this series, it's well written, makes you think, highlights the downsides of colonialism without being didactic and has good plot lines. If you haven't come across these before start with the first book, A Rising Man. Murder Before Evensong by Rev Richard Coles Goodness this is total rubbish. I bought it as a Kindle cheapie because I'd heard him reading an extract and he does read very well. A waste of 99p and fours hours or so. The Bog Child by Siobhan Dowd A book group choice that I wouldn't have read otherwise. Set at the beginning of the troubles and the hunger strikes on the border between northern and southern Ireland it's a dual time story, in the present Fergus is studying for A levels hoping to become a doctor, his brother is on hunger strike and he discovered the body of a child while digging for peat. The second part is the story of the child, a neolithic girl. For me that part was less interesting but allin all a good read but probably not an author I'll search out again. The Lady of Adderley by Robert Barnard , Death Wore White by Jim Kelley , The Dead Will Tell by Linda Castillo and My Word is My Bond by Roger Moore were all picked up at a charity secondhand book sale. Roger Moore was amusng, particularly if you like fart jokes (my husband found it hilarious, Linda Castillo, set among the Amish community was good but you do wonder just how many murders can take place amongst such a small group of people, the other two were OK. 71. Blue Monday - Nicci French

I was just the same with the books but didn't see the tv series.

I love listening to audiobooks in the car and if I'm driving back after doing an evening shift it definitely helps keep me alert. I also listen to them when I'm doing complicated knitting (with straightforward knitting I can read and knit at the same time.) I would agree though that listening and reading are two different experiences, and I can read /listen to a book that I've already listened to/read and find that it almost feels like it's a new story. Just in the way that a film of a book that follows the plot quite closely is similar but very much not the same.

At the time I regretted reading The Painted Bird (at my brother's suggestion), I was about 13 and it was horribly violent and gave me nightmares. I can't think of any that I've looked back on later and though 'I wish I hadn't read that'.

Nora goes off script - Annabel Monaghan. A lesson not to be drawn into buying a Kobo cheaper by excessive praise. This was simply dire, a romantic comedy it was not. The main characters had no chemistry, they were both profoundly uninteresting, the setting did not feel authentic and "event" keeping them apart turned out to be ridiculous. Avoid! The Final Reunion of Opal and Nev - Dawnie Walton This I feel is unashamedly following the format of Daisy Jones and the Six (which I read a couple of years ago and enjoyed though it wasn't brilliant),it's the story of a pop duo, feisty Opal who can sing quite well but holds the stage even better and nerdy New, songwriter and musician told through interviews with them and those who know them. It is so much better than Daisy Jones though and a lot more powerful. It is a little slow to start but when it gets going it's really good. The Stone Chamber - Kate Ellis I'm not sure why I don't like Kate Ellis better, this is a perfectly well written detective novel featuring Wesley Peterson but I found it just a bit unexciting. (I'm afraid I feel the same about Elly Griffiths and I know loads of people love her books). Wake - Shelley Burr Australian noir. OK but doesn't come close to Chris Hammer or Jane Harper.

Ahem! I've read 46 on the list that I'm sure off including several of the books in A Dance to the Music of Time and a lot of Lee Childs so I think there's a good chance you would find book critics happily indulging in trash even though they won't admit it. I had a very interesting discussion with an editor at Mills and Boon once about the demographics of their readers and there was an astonishingly high proportion of graduates who read more than one M & B a week even though the general perception if that it's the barely educated who read those books. I would respectfully disagree about counting some of those series as one title, The Lord of the Rings is obviously one work split up into three volumes, none of them are complete entities in their own right, however His Dark Materials is three entirely separate books which are linked but still stand alone. You might well ask why Trollope is listed for Barchester Towers and not for the whole of the Barchester chronicles. Old Filth is the beginning of a trilogy that's linked just as closely as the three parts of Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy. Etc, etc.

Ahem! I've read both Lee Child and a lot of the books on that list too! I would respectfully disagree about counting those series as one book - the Chronicles of Narni

I must admit I've never had a flu jab but I have had 3 Covid jabs and unless I have to for work I'm not having a 4th, I had a strange reaction to the last one with pins and needles in my hands and feet for about 2 months afterwards so I'm a bit chary about more.

I can't remember to be honest.