France
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Posts posted by France
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I'll second Ben Aaronovitch! My youngest daughter and I fight over who gets to read his new books first!
Have you heard of Jasper fforde? If you have a sense of the ridiculous I'd really recommend starting with the Eyre Affair which truly funny (and a mystery, albeit a very offbeat one!)
For classic crime fiction take a look at Dorothy L Sayers and Ngaio Marsh, I love both of them and they are so well written that I'm happy to reread them even though I already know whodunnit.
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Hi Amelia,
Our reading seems pretty similar though I have to admit not to getting on with Matt Haig, especially The Midnight Library but The Vanishing Half was definitely among the top books I read last year. My non-fiction reads lean heavily towards biography and history though Sapiens is in my tbr pile.
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I came to France before Susanna and Trinny hit the TV screens so never saw them though I had heard of them. The only reason I bought Ready for Absolutely Nothing by Susanna Constantine is because a)she used to live in the house in Lincolnshire my brother now rents and I was mildly curious and b)it was a dirt cheap offer on Kobo. The only reason I'm taking the time to write about it is to warn you are it's utterly dire. Boringly written, full of faux apologies for being born rich and privileged, way too much information about her problems in flushing large poos down the lavatory - even my Kobo couldn't put up with this tripe and froze until I deleted it.
Daphne Sheldrick came from a Kenyan white settler family and spent her life passionately involved with animal conservation, particularly with Elephants. Her two husbands were game wardens and she spent nearly her whole life in National reserves, her particular passion being rescuing orphans, elephants naturally, but also rhinos, zebras, impalas, even warthogs. She was the first person to successfully raise a milk-dependent baby elephant (after several heart-breaking failures) as no-one could work out what the vital ingredient was and the babies gradually sickened and died. Love, Life and Elephants is her memoir and it's fascinating, it's obvious that she's not a natural writer, it's a bit plodding in places but the content and the utter passion she had for Kenya and its wildlife come through clearly.
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I don't enjoy reading Trollope, too wordy, but listening to him being read by Timothy West is another matter entirely! Absolute enjoyment.
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On 2/16/2023 at 9:10 PM, Hayley said:
The giveaways are always open to everyone - we’ve always had members from around the world and I take that into consideration before I choose the giveaway
. Can I count you in?
In that case, yes please!
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Thank you Haley, you're so generous. Don't include me though, it's not fair to ask you to post to France.
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I've got a Kobo Libra (a present to myself from the tips I get at work) and I really like it. It's got a bigger screen than my previous Kobo which really increases my reading enjoyment, it's waterproof, easy to use and has the most brilliantly designed sleep cover which converts into a stand which was also quite expensive but one of those items that work so well that you don't regret spending so much.
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I think this is true for a lot of people!
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On 2/11/2023 at 3:44 PM, lunababymoonchild said:
I just realised that my reading rate has gone up because e-books (Kindle in my case) are shorter than print books, some by quite a way.
I also find I read much quicker with Kindle books - which is fine with detective novels but biographies etc are better in print I find.
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17 hours ago, Hayley said:
I have this book but I didn’t know it was a follow up! Do you think it works as a standalone?
Sorry, wrong word! It's not a follow up, it's his second novel and not connected to The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle at all.
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On 1/29/2023 at 1:37 PM, Madeleine said:
I love Jane Harper's books, like you any new book by her is straight on top of the tbr pile. I have the first two Chris Hammer books but still haven't read them!
You know there's a new one that came out last week? I'm so tempted to break my temporary rule of no buying any more books until I've reduced the tbr pile.
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The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea by Stuart Turton. This is the follow up to the Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle which was very strange indeed and I thought mesmerising and brilliant though I know not everyone agreed. This book takes place on a ship sailing back to Holland in the early 17th century where the governor of Batavia (a Dutch colony) is going to become a director of the Dutch East India company. Also on board are Sammy Phipps, the world's greatest detective, imprisoned for an unspecified crime, his bodyguard Arendt who is Watson to Phipps' Holmes, the governor's wife who loathes him, his preternaturally clever daughter, his mistress who is also his wife's best friend... and an apparent demon called Old Tom who is systematically killing people. Phipps is the only one capable of solving the mystery but he's in chains...
This was a bit slow to start, then it became runaway compulsively readable. It's not as original as his first book, it's difficult to imagine how anything could be and like Seven Deaths it has a slightly weak and unsatisfactory ending. However it's still an excellent read.
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How are you finding it? I've heard that reading on an iPad, phone, tablet etc is quite hard on the eyes.
I've got a Kobo which I use a lot but I do find there are some books that just don't work on it.
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On 2/10/2023 at 9:43 PM, Madeleine said:
"Black Run" by Antonio Manzini -
Is it written like the Montalbano books? I wasn't keen on the style of them though I thoroughly enjoyed the plots.
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Here are Ingie and Dino. Both are rescues.
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Kevin was found abandoned in the woods aged 7 weeks. I nicknamed him Kevin the Kitten and he was so beautiful that I was sure we'd find him a home (we already had two cats). By the time we all realised the French won't adopt black cats (silly people!) the name had stuck.
Despite her looks Sybs is 3/4 chat du rue but she's always been such a little princess that Sybil seemed to fit.
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She's gorgeous. I love black cats as you can see from my avatar who is our Kevin.
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He's lovely!
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Prepare not to do anything until you finish the Chris Hammers, particularly with first.
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I'm rather fed up with Goodreads, the listing your books is rather cumbersome (much simpler on a site like this!) and as for the reviews... Far too many gushing ones from those who were given a free copy and one star reviews from people who sometimes object to a single sentence and so slam the whole book. Example being a biography of a 19th woman that happened to mention Irish people living in conditions akin to slavery in the Caribbean which offended somebody who said that nothing could be compared to the slavery of the Africans so the book was rubbish.
I think my favourite asinine Goodreads review was for Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin (French writer, about a cemeery keeper in Northern France' was headed 'Too French for me.'
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1 hour ago, muggle not said:
4. Fairy Tale - Stephen King - 4/5 - I enjoyed this book. It was a little different from King's other books and I would really classify it as a true Fairy Tale. I believe that Stephen King enjoyed writing this book. If I were to describe the book it would probably take away from your actual reading of the book. I will say though that approx. the first 100 pages is about a young 12 yr old boy growing to 17 yrs old and the growing pains it brings as he loses his mother. The whole time you are reading the first 100 pages though you know and keep anticipating for the proverbial "stuff to hit the fan"., and it does. Again, I enjoyed the story and Stephen King's writing. Recommend the book.
Oh good! I thought it sounded interesting when I first heard about it. I'll have to wait until it comes out in paperback though.
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Kevin is the evil one (he's not really!) - I doubt he's as michievous as Pickett but I'm sure he's a lot fatter! Last time he went to the vet he had to go in a laundry basket because he couldn't fit in my old wicker cat carrier!
And the little madam is Sybil,
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I love Australian crime novels, they have such a brilliant sense of place, and for me Chris Hammer is right at the top of the pyramid, just edging Jane Harper off the top though she's in the automatically read anything she's written section. Dead Man's Creek takes place along the Murray River and starts when an environmental activist blows up a mini dam keeping water out of an ancient forest and a body is discovered at the foot of the dam. The plot ranges between an Army major who went missing in 1943, a young local who disappeared in 1973, a young girl in love with him and newly promoted detective Nell - who is the young man's niece. As ever it cracks along at an incredible pace, there's a thoroughly satisfying ending with not too much tied up neatly and a strong desire that he'll get on with writing the next book.
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15 hours ago, Hayley said:
I would like to kick off this year’s pet thread with a very cosy Lilly 😄
And here's an equally cosy Dino saying it's far too early to get up!
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France's Reading 2023
in Book Blogs - Discuss your reading!
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Bloomsbury Ballerina by Judith Mackrell Lydia Lupokova was the most famous and loved ballerina in England during the 1920s. Trained in St Petersburg she became a key member of the Ballet Russe, danced with Nijinski (whom she loathed) then in her 30s married the brilliant economist and Bloomsburyite John Maynard Keynes and was gradually forgotten. This should have been absolutely fascinating and parts of it were especially if you are interested in both ballet and the Bloomsbury set but it's much too detailed and long and I was getting distinctly weary by the end.
I was suffering from fatigue by the end of The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu too, mainly because the sheer amount of physics in it was giving me brain ache. I've never read any Chinese SF before, the theme was promising and I loved the background and the descriptions of the game even though the closed I've got to playing on-line games is Solitaire, however the characters remain pretty flat for the most part and so generally unengaging and I might have coped better with the physics if I'd been more invested in them.