willoyd

Yes, more often than I like to think. It's usually if a book takes a bit longer than usual, either because it's longer or a more challenging read. I can run out of steam or need some light relief, and then I don't get back to the original. Funnily enough, it happened to me with The God Delusion too.

Didn't mean to - although it does read a bit like that in hindsight! I actually love to be challenged with my reading sometimes, and part of my envy is the fact that you can do this reading as part of your work, whilst all too often when I'm reading, especially during termtime, I have that niggling feeling that I should be working!

Day 7: Most underrated book Not so much a single book, as an author. To be honest, there are several that immediately jump to mind, but this is one that I particularly find difficult to understand: Margaret Elphinstone, whose bookThe Sea Road was my opening book of this year, going straight into my favourites list. I also read Voyageurs in July, and that wasn't far behind. In both cases, Elphinsone evokes both time and place superbly, developing characters that fully come to life even though (in these 2 cases) they are far removed historically. The plot lines are pretty good too (although The Sea Road is based on the Icelandic sagas, it's seen from a completely different perspective, that of Gudrid Thorsbjorndottir). And yet, none of her books reach even a hundred readers on Library Thing, and she barely features in book shops - you really do have to hunt her books down. Even in the Edinburgh Waterstones 'Scottish writers' section earlier this week, I could find just one copy of one book - Hy Brasil (which I bought). She's not totally ignored, having won various minor awards and had The Sea Road included in List magazine's 100 Best Scottish Books, but I am really surprised at how little her work seems to be known or read. Definitely underrated!

Wow - now that's what I call getting into a book!

An interesting challenge Frankie - one I've only recently picked up from the posts on your reading thread. I'm tempted, but there's quite a lot on here that I've tried and really, really don't want to have to read (Samuel Richardson and Marcel Proust jump immediately to mind - I really do want to have a life!!): what are the rules (if any) about incompleted books? In the meantime, it looks as if I've completed 99 of the titles you list at the start (with a few others incomplete, and one or two read - usually in my teens - but can't remember a thing about them). Here they are, with the star ratings that I use for all my reading (1 = hated, 2=disappointed, 3=solid read, 4=good, 5=pretty much unputdownable, 6=on my favourites list). 6 stars in blue as well, 1 stars in red. Pre-1700 1001. Aesop’s Fables – Aesopus *** 1700s 985. Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe ** 971. Candide – Voltaire **** 1800s 940. Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen ****** 938. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen ****** 937. Mansfield Park – Jane Austen ***** 936. Emma – Jane Austen ***** 933. Persuasion – Jane Austen ***** 932. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen ***** 913. A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens *** 906. The Count of Monte-Cristo – Alexandre Dumas ***** 905. Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray ****** 904. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë ****** 902. Wuthering Heights – Emily Brontë ****** 900. Mary Barton – Elizabeth Gaskell ***** 896. Moby-Dick – Herman Melville ****** 892. Cranford – Elizabeth Gaskell **** 890. Bleak House – Charles Dickens ****** 880. The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins ***** 876. Great Expectations – Charles Dickens **** 875. Silas Marner – George Eliot *** 868. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll **** 866. Journey to the Centre of the Earth – Jules Verne *** 863. Little Women – Louisa May Alcott *** 862. The Moonstone – Wilkie Collins **** 857. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy ****** 854. Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There – Lewis Carroll **** 853. Middlemarch – George Eliot ***** 848. Around the World in Eighty Days – Jules Verne *** 839. Return of the Native – Thomas Hardy **** 833. The Portrait of a Lady – Henry James **** 831. Treasure Island – Robert Louis Stevenson ***** 825. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain **** 822. Kidnapped – Robert Louis Stevenson ****** 820. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – Robert Louis Stevenson **** 811. La Bête Humaine – Émile Zola **** 804. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ***** 803. Diary of a Nobody – George & Weedon Grossmith * 797. The Time Machine – H.G. Wells *** 794. Dracula – Bram Stoker **** 1900s 781. The Hound of the Baskervilles – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle **** 777. The Riddle of the Sands – Erskine Childers ****** 761. A Room With a View – E.M. Forster ***** 743. The Thirty-Nine Steps – John Buchan **** 699. The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald ** 698. Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf ****** 695. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd – Agatha Christie *** 686. To The Lighthouse – Virginia Woolf ****** 676. Lady Chatterley’s Lover – D.H. Lawrence * 675. Orlando – Virginia Woolf **** 667. All Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Maria Remarque ** 660. The Maltese Falcon – Dashiell Hammett **** 650. Cold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons ***** 632. The Nine Tailors – Dorothy L. Sayers *** 611. The Years – Virginia Woolf ****** 610. The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien *** 601. Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day – Winifred Watson ****** 599. The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler **** 586. Farewell My Lovely – Raymond Chandler **** 579. The Outsider – Albert Camus * 566. The Pursuit of Love – Nancy Mitford ***** 564. Animal Farm – George Orwell ** 547. Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell ** 542. Love in a Cold Climate – Nancy Mitford ***** 539. I, Robot – Isaac Asimov *** 527. Foundation – Isaac Asimov *** 521. The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway ** 511. The Long Goodbye – Raymond Chandler **** 510. The Go-Between – L.P. Hartley ** 508. Lord of the Flies – William Golding **** 506. The Story of O – Pauline Réage * 494. The Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien ****** 488. Justine – Lawrence Durrell * 456. To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee ****** 450. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark **** 430. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold – John Le Carré ** 428. The Graduate – Charles Webb *** 400. The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov **** 389. 2001: A Space Odyssey – Arthur C. Clarke *** 379. The Godfather – Mario Puzo *** 375. Slaughterhouse Five – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. * 339. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – John Le Carré ****** 301. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams ***** 293. The Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco ****** 288. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie ****** 265. Waterland – Graham Swift ***** 247. Hawksmoor – Peter Ackroyd ****** 210. Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – Douglas Adams **** 209. The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul – Douglas Adams **** 157. Smilla’s Sense of Snow – Peter Høeg **** 153. The Crow Road – Iain Banks **** 141. A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth ****** 116. The Reader – Bernhard Schlink * 95. Enduring Love – Ian McEwan * 89. The Hours – Michael Cunningham ****** 72. Cryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson ****** 2000s 49. Life of Pi – Yann Martel *** 29. The Story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor ***** 19. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Mark Haddon *****

Much as I love the classics and demanding reads, that's quite a tough list of 18C work. I think you're right to start with P&P - to my mind comfortably the best book in the list (not least because Miss Austen is one of the best writers, if not the best!). I have to say I find 18th century literature very difficult to read - and Sterne and Richardson pretty much unreadable. Moll Flanders is OK readingwise, but I thought it somewhat overrated (Alex Kington was wonderful though!). To my mind, Tom Jones is definitely the pick of that bunch. An interesting mix though. Quite envious in fact!

I think that sums her writing up perfectly for me. She's an ideal writer for the Kindle too, as she's just the sort of writer to read whilst travelling etc (which is when I use mine mostly).

Same here. I never quite understand why Pride and Prejudice is so often people's favourite Austen. For me, S&S definitely has the edge - one of my top 3 books of all time.

Day 6: A book that makes me sad Quite a few books that make me sad and which I'd love to have listed, I can't really list without effectively giving the plot away. But one of my favourites, where I don't think it does, is The Doomsday Book by Connie Willis This is the first of a series of books that Connie Willis has written based on time travel (although it was preceded by a short story, The Fire Watch), where Oxford history students of the late 21st century are able to travel back in time to research their subjects. In this, Kivrin Engle goes back to the time of the Black Death. I won't say much more about the plot other than it ratchets up the tension nicely, with parallel action in both early 14th and late 21s centuries, and is a gripping read, almost unputdownable (with one caveat), but what I appreciated most is the atmosphere that Willis creates as the Black Death takes its grip and Kivrin struggles to cope - almost mesmirising. Willis is generally classified as a science fiction writer, but this is more historical fiction. OK, the caveat! Willis is an American writer, and it shows on occasions, with unfortunate Americanisms creeping into the characters' vocabularies and lives - that dread word 'gotten' appears all too often, and it's almost laughable how everybody seems to wear 'mufflers'. But that aside, a great read. I've also really enjoyed the other books in the series. Indeed, To Say Nothing of the Dog was on my shortlist of books that make me happy - a complete contrast in style even if using the same conceit. I'm currently reading her latest 'duology' in the series, two books telling one story: Blackout and All Clear. A bit overblown maybe, the reviews being understandably mixed, but I enjoy books that are as intricately plotted as this. Almost spoiled by some glaring holes in her detail that do stick out like sore thumbs on occasions, e.g. WW2 characters paying 5p for a phone call. Sloppy, which is a pity and only needed a reasonably knowledgable London historian to pick up most of them really quickly at the editing stage. Still worth reading though.

Germania by Simon Winder ** Like the author, I have an abiding fascination with Germany, and have spent quite a few holidays exploring the country (mostly on the back of a bicycle), often without hearing an English voice for days on end. It's not the most popular of our tourist destinations, which really goes to show how deeply the last war is buried in psyche, because it's a great holiday destination. However, good books on Germany are hard to find. Plenty of history books about the dozen or so years of Nazi rule (some excellent), but not much else. What is available is generally pretty ropey: I'm thinking of various books by Ben Donald, Roger Boyes, Cathy Dobson et al. John Ardagh produced an excellent insight (Germany and the Germans) a while ago, which is sadly a bit dated now, but otherwise not much at all. So I was really looking forward to reading Simon Winder's personal history of Germany, taking it with me to read on our latest bike tour, along the Rhine. And on the whole it is highly readable, if long winded, although I unusually did need a dictionary on standby. However, I have to say that, whilst I managed to read to the end (and I did wonder whether I was going to make it on more than one occasion), this has joined the ever growing pile of disappointments. A pity, as it could have been brilliant. So why wasn't it? Each chapter was split up into seperate subsections. Each one of those subsections was effectively a separate mini-essay on some aspect of the approximate time period covered by the chapter. They were mostly unrelated to each other. Indeed, Winder warned that this would be particularly so in the early chapters, when things are so incoherent. Within each essay, topics and names (and some German names are essays in themselves!) without any introduction or explanation or attempt to relate to any other aspect covered. And when you're covering a period of history when it wasn't Germany, but 300 plus ministates, some sort of attempt at contextualisation would help. All too often the reader would be asked to jump from one topic to another, one part of Germany to another, with no connection (other than the approximate time period) and no idea where this place actually was (there are no maps and virtually no illustrations). All in all, I landed up thoroughly confused, and pretty much don't remember where anything happened (and as a geographer, I'm usually quite good at that sort of thing). There were some excellent passages. Most of these were later on, when we were able to concentrate on fewer states (eventually virtually a single nation!), such as his background to the build up to the world wars. They weren't particularly deep (they weren't meant to be), but I certainly got a whole new angle on some elements of German history, and new insights into how things happened. Unfortunately, it was all very patchy, and we'd all too often then dive off at a tangent. I didn't get on particularly well with his style either, but then I don't with all too many of these 'personal view' writers. It wasn't his opinions - far from it, I thought these were amongst the more interesting elements, but the 'humour'. But then, I don't particularly like Bill Bryson either (at least his travel books - others of his are much better), and find most 'humorous' travel and history writers tedious. So, all in all, potentially a really interesting book that for me failed to hit the mark - too many assumptions, too little context, too disconnected, and too keen to be jolly by half. But...unlike the other authors cited above, I would actually try others of his books. It all depends on whether he gets a decent editor, which is ironic as he is a well regarded editor for Penguin (I've just started dipping into Tim Blanning's book The Pursuit of Glory, only to find Simon Winder almost the first acknowledgement!). 2 stars out of 6 (almost 3/6).

Yes, I've just bought that too, yesterday, as part of a 3 for 2 on all fiction at the Edinburgh Waterstones.

Day 5: A book that makes me happy Oh dear - there are loads that satisfy both this and Day 6, so to help narrow things down I'm going to add one or two extra rules to this challenge: (1) Try to avoid repeating authors and/or books. (2) Try to avoid plot spoilers. I might add more later! On that front, to say whether a book makes me happy or sad will quite often act as a plot spoiler. But I don't think the following is giving much away! So my nomination for this is going to be pretty much any of the Regency novels by Georgette Heyer, one of the best known being The Grand Sophy: Not your typical reading for a man, I know, but I was introduced to these by my mother, who was a great fan, because she knew how much I enjoyed history, especially that period. Not a book I took to school though! I loved the history, loved the adventures (there's always an adventure!), and somehow they always landed up with the right result on the very last page. I haven't read one for a few years now, but they were always guaranteed to put a smile on my face, and provided exactly the sort of light reading that could lift me out of a touch of the glooms.

Day 4: Favourite book of your favourite series Difficult one, as the Brunetti series is remarkably consistent (so far - I've not read all yet). Indeed, I'd say that no one book would rate amongst my all time favourites - it's the series that is so good, in the way that the reader gradually gets 'into' the main protagonists and their relationships, both with others and the setting itself. For me the series is a six star series (maximum!). Individually, the books are no more than 4, occasionally 5 (still very good in my ratings!). However, one does nudge itself forward: Fatal Remedies. In this, Paola is the one who commits the opening crime, an act of vandalism on a travel agents. You soon learn why! Up to now she's been a little bit of a supporting act - now she comes to the fore, and a lot of book focuses on her relationship with Guido. The whole family starts to become so much more rounded for the reader. If one didn't realise how important they were in Brunetti's life before (and that's not a mistake readers of the series are likely to have made, but you never know!), you certainly do now! It's also a good crime story too!

I've avoided the TV programmes, as they've all been episodes I've yet to read (at least the ones I've seen) - but hope to pick them up once I have read them. I've read Domingo Villar's Water Blue Eyes - enjoyable fairly light read, certainly good enough to want to read more, but not quite as good as, for instance, Camilleri. At least IMO!

Yes it is, and it's a good example to try. I have to admit I do include the Scandinavian countries in my definition of Eurocrime, so that broadens the field somewhat. I can't say I've tried all, given the monumental flood that has washed into the bookshops here, but I am really enjoying the Wallander series (and the Krister Henriksson films/programmes), and have read and loved others by Hoeg, Theorin, Larsson and Vida (if the latter can count as a crime novel - Let The Northern Lights Erase Your Name), with others in my TBR boxes (no room on the shelves). Again, I've spent a fair bit of time in Scandinavia over the years, although sadly not yet in Finland, and enjoy the settings, which these authors generally evoke really well. I like some UK crime, Sarah Dunant and Lauren Henderson jump to mind, but am not a great fan of the more traditional style, having gone through a phase when much younger but now find it wanting (I can't stand the Agatha Raisin novels that others go on about). Having said that, I am a great fan of Georges Simenon, so it must be something more to do with the settings and/or styles than the content.

Day 3: Your favourite series The first of the hard ones! I once read somewhere that men and children much prefer to read series of books. I suppose that once you know you like an author, it's easier to lap up everything they write, and a series encourages that. There are quite a lot I like, but I can whittle it down to three reasonably straightforwardly, but after that....? I'll go with the one from which I've read most books. So it has to be the Inspector Brunetti series by Donna Leon. I enjoy crime, particularly Eurocrime, quite a bit, but the thing I love about this series is (a) the setting - Venice - which we tend to visit most years in the autumn and (b) Guido Brunetti himself, one of the most 'normal' detectives in fiction. None of your Morse- like gloom or Wallander-like depression here (I do like both series though!), and not just Guido, but the rest of his family (Paola especially). I also enjoy the ways that Brunetti works round/within what appears to be quite a challenging system in Italy, not without humour! I don't know how realistic this all is - although the settings are very real and comfortably traceable (we even found the Brunetti home last time - at least the building (!) - just as we envisaged from the books). And this is "we" too - this is a series that both OH and I have enjoyed - it's not overly often that our paths cross bookwise, but this is one of them. Oh -and the other two series in contention? The closest contender was Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey and Maturin series, a series I enjoy so much, I'm not too sure why it didn't get first slot, other than the reason I decided on for the final split, and Andrea Camilleri's Inspector Montalban series, which is growing on me steadily.

Mrs Dalloway was my first experience of Virginia Woolf (encouraged into it after watching The Hours). It took me a couple of goes too. I do agree, I think you're making laife harder for yourself by trying to read something else at the same time - she requires all my energies - I struggle to even read some of her fiction during termtime as even that is too distracting! Same here! I recently bought the complete letters (all six volumes!!) through ebay, and, as I said last time, am gradually collecting her essays. I don't think a writer has quite grabbed me like this before, certainly since discovering Jane Austen as a teenager (whose work I still adore). As Janet said, it's probably not the place to go into this too much (at least by me - you can write what you like in your blog!), but OH and I have just got back from an extended cycling tour through Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands. We didn't see any of the overprotectiveness there that we so often see here. Indeed, the numbers of youngsters out on their bikes in the Netherlands was really refreshing. So much of British society is tied up in this, including our infrastructure (of course it's safer for children in the Netherlands - we hardly ever needed to ride on the roads!). One of the things I push with my (Year 5) class is reading for sheer pleasure, with emphasis on reading time, opportunities to tell the rest of the class what we are reading, what we enjoy reading etc etc. It doesn't work for all children, but every year there are one or two non-readers who are turned on by the end of the year. The boys especially always seem to be a bit amazed that a man actually enjoys reading, and fiction at that (although I do read a lot of non-fiction too!). The problem here, though, is that reading is taught at far too early an age to those who aren't ready......

Thank you. It's great to hear of someone else who enjoys her writing - I'm already looking forward to your review, as that's one I've yet to read.

Day 2: A book I've read three times I don't think I've read any adult book three times. A few twice, but none three times. So this has to be a children's book, and then it could be any one of a dozen or more. But I'm going to choose Puck of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling. Kipling is so often associated with all things Empire, Raj etc etc, and he was according to my grandmother, who knew him, a very funny/odd sort of person (she wouldn't or couldn't elucidate more!). I suppose this is somewhat in the same sort of mould, harking back to some sort of mythical England, but as a child I just adored the stories, rereading them rather more than three times, and they were a significant factor in my developing a love of history. Kipling was certainly an outstanding story writer, especially short stories. The sequel, Rewards and Fairies was equally well loved and equally heavily read.

Day 1: My favourite book from last year. I think it has to be The Years by Virginia Woolf. I read this soon after rereading Mrs Dalloway, during which some sort of penny dropped, and I found myself absolutely loving every word. I found it fascinating how Woolf could evoke so much through actually writing so little: it's a family saga, yet each scene until the final party (which occupies a quarter to a third of the book) is almost just a snapshot, and the snapshots are often taken years apart. Yet it's so easy to fill in the gaps, whilst those snapshots are so vivid. Woolf is not a light read (!), demanding concentration, but she is thoroughly rewarding. One to be reread soon, but not at bedtime!

I said on Poppy's 30-day challenge thread, that I'd give the challenge a go myself when I got back from holiday, so will start it today. For my easy reference, the questions are: Day 01 – Best book you read last year Day 02 – A book that you’ve read more than 3 times Day 03 – Your favourite series Day 04 – Favourite book of your favourite series Day 05 – A book that makes you happy Day 06 – A book that makes you sad Day 07 – Most underrated book Day 08 – Most overrated book Day 09 – A book you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving Day 10 – Favourite classic book Day 11 – A book you hated Day 12 – A book you used to love but don’t anymore Day 13 – Your favourite writer Day 14 – Favourite book of your favourite writer Day 15 – Favourite male character Day 16 – Favourite female character Day 17 – Favourite quote from your favourite book Day 18 – A book that disappointed you Day 19 – Favourite book turned into a movie Day 20 – Favourite romance book Day 21 – Favourite book from your childhood Day 22 – Favourite book you own Day 23 – A book you wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending Day 28 – Favourite title Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked Day 30 – Your favourite book of all time

Three books read whilst away on holiday (mostly on the Kindle as I've been on the back of a touring bike most of that time - the Kindle was brilliant for that, especially as also had dictionaries and guide books loaded as well). I'm currently finishing off a fourth, (Germania by Simon Winder). Roseanna by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo *** Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo were a husband and wife team who were amongst the first writers of police procedurals, a 10 book series about a Stockholm detective, Martin Beck. Henning Mankell, amongst others, has acknowledged his debt to them, and they are generally regarded as one of the founders of, or at least precursors to, Scandinavian noir crime fiction. The book itself was a good read - an absolutely classic procedural, with the pace nicely built up to the climax. However, whilst it was probably ground breaking at the time, in the context of what has followed, it doesn't really stand out much beyond that. Worth reading as it is a decent story, and worth reading to see how Wallander (and others!) came about, and worth reading as an end of term switch off (which is what I wanted!), but if you're looking for anything a little bit different, definitely not the book to reach for. In spite of that, I'll almost certainly want to read the rest of the series - there is something about the style (maybe the translation?) that whilst taking a little adjusting to, really appeals to me - a bit stark, lean, matter of fact; I can certainly see where Mankell developed his style from. In the meantime, 3/6 stars for a good, solid read. Voyageurs by Margaret Elphinstone ****** I read The Sea Road earlier this year, and thought it brilliant, so bought this on the back of that. There are many points of similarity - an historical novel where the main protagonist makes a voyage to the Americas to the limits of western exploration. At that point the books start to part company. Voyageurs is a much bigger book than The Sea Road and yet focuses on a shorter time span. Indeed, the plot is simple enough: Quaker and Cumbrian farmer, Mark Greenhow, travels to Canada to look for his sister who has disappeared in the wilds, and goes in search of her. But to leave the summary at that does the book no justice - Elphinstone is brilliant at evoking the time and the place, and 18th century Canada really comes to life, as Greenhow gradually makes his way well beyond his comfort zone and learns a totally different way of life through encounters with other Quakers, settlers, the military, trappers and native Americans, and the wilderness itself. The book is rich with detail and atmosphere, and I found myself completely wrapped up in it from start to finish. I can imagine that if plot is your first love, that this book would drag a bit - the detail of Mark's journeys even struck me as possibly in need of an editor's touch - but if, like me, you are into characters and setting, there is plenty to get your teeth into. Of the two, I'd say that The Sea Road has the edge - just that bit more tightly written - but Margaret Elphinstone is definitely a writer who deserves to be much more widely read. 5 stars out of 6 (but could get promoted at a later date!). Later edit: the more I think about it, the more this book is a six star read. Even months later the book still remains as vivid as ever Swiss Watching: Inside Europe's Landlocked Isle by Diccon Bewes *** From the Amazon review: "Swiss Watching is a revealing journey around Europe's most individual country. From seeking Heidi and finding the best chocolate to reliving a bloody past and exploring an uncertain future, 'Swiss Watching' proves that there's more to Switzerland than banks and skis, francs and cheese. This is a picture of the real Switzerland, a place where the breathtaking scenery shaped a nation not just a tour itinerary, and where tradition is as important as technology. It's also the story of its people, who have more power than their politicians, but can't speak to one another in the same language - and who own more guns per head than the people of Iraq. As for those national stereotypes, well, not all the cheese has holes, cuckoo clocks aren't Swiss and the trains don't always run exactly on time. My thoughts: I chose this to read whilst cycling through Switzerland. It's a fairly light hearted and sympathetic book written by an English journalist who now lives in Switzerland. I enjoyed it, even though I didn't always appreciate the humour (but then I often don't!), and learned some fascinating stuff from it, which certainly explained and illuminated things I came across whilst touring. It was perhaps a little too ready to eulogise (even though I wish we would take a good long hard look at the way they do some things, and start learning rather than thinking we're better than everybody else), and I would have liked a bit more depth, but as an introduction to the Swiss, as opposed to Switzerland, it was a worthwhile read. 3 stars out of 6.

I'd have to agree about reading him - definitely smaller doses improves the taste! I have to say that whilst I thought the original Eyre Affair was the best, I loved The Big Over Easy, and thought as good as or better than most the Eyre Affair sequels. Just catching up on some thread reading - loved reading through your 30-day challenge in its entirety. I've not read Carnavale yet, but loved The Floating Book - another set in Venice. Quite a meaty read. Unless it's very different in style, I'm surprised that such a high proportion of your group were so anti - you always get some, but only you in favour?!

I've just been reading your conversation about Virginia Woolf (I'm just catching up on things on returning from holiday). I do hope you don't mind my butting in, but it rang so many bells with me. I've only recently 'discovered' Virginia Woolf for my self, and have to say I'm completely hooked. Like Frankie, I found her very daunting initially, but have begun to realise that, whilst very demanding (especially of concentration - no bedtime reading here!!), she is an absolutely fabulous writer. I came to her initially via the film 'The Hours' (one of my all time favourites), reading Mrs Dalloway first. Initially I found it difficult to follow, not least because it is so character and setting driven, but reading it a second time I was able to follow threads so much more clearly. That second reading was bout 15 months ago, and have since read The Hours itself (superb!), The Years, Orlando, To The Lighthouse, Mrs Dalloway's Party and some of her essays, along with Hermione Lee's biography. On the latter, I can only confirm what you have heard before Poppy, that it is outstanding - a serious contender for the best biography I've yet read - again very demanding on concentration, but I tend to prefer my books like that. Although there is a chronological structure, it takes a theme at a time, which can take a bit of getting used to, but does actually make aspects and phases of her life easier to trace. It certainly helped me understand the books I've read to date, not least the phenomenal craftmanship that has gone into them. Another point is that Lee is not so black and white about VW's sexual relationships either with Leonard or with her half-brothers. I know that a lot of people reckon that Orlando is her most accessible, and of those I've read I'd probably agree, but I have to say it's the one I enjoyed the least. I think it's because I have so loved immersing myself in her stream of consciousness style, and this is more a 'story'. Of the other three full length novels I've read, I'd be hard pressed to say which was my favourite, but perhaps just marginally To The Lighthouse. However, I do think The Years is very underrated - it is up there with the others in spite of the fact that it is so much less well known, and might even challenge for the number one spot. I love the way she develops the family saga through such small vignettes - so much is said in such a short space. I've got a couple of volumes of her essays, and have started dipping into these. From what little I've read of these and her diaries, she's perhaps even better relatively at this - I've read somewhere that she is one of the great diarists, and I can see why. All in all, as you can see, I'm turning into a bit of a fan - I'd even go so far as to say that she's challenging for the spot as my favourite writer (up to now it's been Jane Austen ever since I was a teenager), but even so, I can see why people find her difficult/daunting/not very readable. A bit of a marmite author, but I do think she's more frightening in the prospect than in the actual reading, as long as one is prepared to slow down and accept the fact that she needs time. On a completely different note, I've also just read your review of Swallows and Amazons. Ransome was the first author I ever collected: I remember in my pre-teens buying hardback copies of his books, dustjacket-less, for 2/6d at a time - hard earned pocket money, lovingly spent. Favourite was a toss up between Secret Water, We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea and Winter Holiday. I've spent many a happy hour exploring the sites which Ransome used for his book, including the island itself - it's all there just as he describes. (Talking of biographies - the Hugh Brogan biography of Arthur Ransome is excellent - much better than the more recent one by Roland Chambers). Incidentally, you're right about it being a different age. I grew up in the 60s and 70s, and it was much more closer to how Ransome describes things in the 30s then than it is to now (although there is, of course, a degree of idealisation!) - I went off camping on my own with friends and younger brothers at 14, caught the train up to London (we lived in Surrey) at 13, etc etc. The present day paranoia over protection and regulation of a child's life is one reason why (in very generalised terms) so many of our children and young people are increasingly so dysfunctional and lacking in self responsibility, in spite of all their street wiseness, something I've seen increasingly, working as a sports coach, uni lecturer and primary teacher. BTW Thanks for some brilliant reviews - I love reading this thread.

Some American authors have substance, some don't. Same with English writers (and other nationalities too). The last American author I read was in November last year, it being Mark Twain, immediately preceded by Donna Leon. Since then have read English, Scottish, Italian, Belgian, Swedish and Anglo-Egyptian authors. I don't think their nationality has had any impact on the quality of their writing.