Today's challenge is a little easier because there is less competition! A book you did not finish I generally finish my books! Not all. Not always. More often because of time pressures than choice. And I am taking this challenge to be a book that I chose not to finish. Books still to be started… Continue reading 30 Day Book Challenge: Day Three!
Category: Book Reviews
Blood Rites and Dead Beat, Jim Butcher
I'm going to review these two together quickly: everything you'd expect from Jim Butcher and Harry Dresden is here and in abundance. Sixth and seventh entries into the Dresden Files, following the exploits of Chicago's only professional wizard, if you've been reading up to this point, you know what you're getting into! Blood Rites for me… Continue reading Blood Rites and Dead Beat, Jim Butcher
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Lethal White, Robert Galbraith
Let's play a game. A Robert Galbraith bingo. A Robert Galbraith drinking game. Take a drink every time one of the following happens: Cormoran Strike is described as being pube-headed; Robin Ellacott is described as beautiful; Robin's breasts are mentioned; Strike doesn't tell Robin how he feels; Robin doesn't tell Strike how she feels; Matthew… Continue reading Lethal White, Robert Galbraith
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The Winter of the Witch, Katherine Arden
Disclaimer: I was provided with an ARC / Proof Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. How exciting! My first ARC review! My first ARC review! My first ARC review! This is the third in Arden's Winternight Trilogy which commenced with The Bear and the Nightingale and The Girl in the Tower,… Continue reading The Winter of the Witch, Katherine Arden
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Everything Under, Daisy Johnson
There were many things about this book - shortlisted for the Man Booker this year - which drew my attention: its narrator, Gretel, is a lexicographer and I love words; it is a re-imagining of a myth and I do like me a good mythologising; and it revolves around a childhood that took place upon… Continue reading Everything Under, Daisy Johnson
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The Mystery of Three Quarters, Sophie Hannah
Hercule Poirot. Arrogant and dandy and moustache firmly in place. An extended cast of somewhat two-dimensional characters. A convoluted and contrived plot - very contrived in this instance. Very contrived. Let's face is, when the plot of a novel revolves around the construction of a battenburg cake, that novel is - for fear of being… Continue reading The Mystery of Three Quarters, Sophie Hannah
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The Mars Room, Rachel Kushner
I am not a fan of prison drama. Orange Is The New Black? No thank you. Shawshank Redemption? I just don't like the prison setting. It may have something to do with an innate suspicion of large numbers of people being together; it may have something to do with having been a criminal barrister and… Continue reading The Mars Room, Rachel Kushner
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The Overstory, Richard Powers
"Let me sing to you, about how creatures become other things" I was brought up - and still live - very much in the countryside. A safe, British countryside. I know my oak from my elm for my yew. I am currently harvesting apples and blackberries from the garden, looking forward to the walnuts being… Continue reading The Overstory, Richard Powers
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Snap, Belinda Bauer
It's that time of year again, the Man Booker Longlist has been released and I do try to keep.up to date with them - as I do with the Costa and Women's Prize lists. Sometimes they can be a bit hit-and-miss, sometimes a little pretentious, but generally a good addition to my TBR list and… Continue reading Snap, Belinda Bauer
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Home Fire, Kamila Shamsie
With two stories in the news today - Safir Boular, at 18, being the youngest girl to be convicted of terrorism offences; and Alia Ghanem speaking of her son. Osama bin Laden - about terrorism and the legal system and family, the importance and relevance of a book like Home Fire is painfully apparent. The… Continue reading Home Fire, Kamila Shamsie
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Faithful Place, Tana French
Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series is a delight, but has sometimes only vague connections to the eponymous Murder Squad. In The Woods, the first novel, centred on it; but the follow-up The Likeness, centred on Cassie Madox from the first book who is now in Domestic Violence rather than murder and being supervised by… Continue reading Faithful Place, Tana French
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Touch, Claire North
Poor Claire North. She brought out The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August as I read Kate Atkinson's Life After Life; I pick up Touch just after reading A Skinful of Shadows by Frances Hardinge. And both times, she comes a slight second in similar and comparable fantasy scenarios. Imagine being able to switch your… Continue reading Touch, Claire North
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The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau, Graeme Macrae Burnet
Graeme Macrae Burnet came to my attention through the Booker Prize: I loved his His Bloody Project novel with its multiple voices and setting, evocatively recreating the brutality of life in Scottish crofting communities. It was on the strength of that that I picked up this, the first of his Detective Gorski novels and -… Continue reading The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau, Graeme Macrae Burnet
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The Sleeper and the Spindle, Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell
There are times when I love my job. Some. On rare occasions. One of those times came today when I spotted a copy of The Sleeper and the Spindle on the side in the library and I was asked to have a read of it over night and see whether I thought it was suitable.… Continue reading The Sleeper and the Spindle, Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell
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The Muse, Jessie Burton
I adored The Miniaturist! It was one of those books which had stayed with me: the cold of her repressed Amsterdam, the sweetness of marzipan, the claustrophobic house. The hint of the supernatural. The difficult, prickly bond between the women. So it was with pleasure and anticipation that I began The Muse and it took… Continue reading The Muse, Jessie Burton
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The Betrayal of Trust and A Question of Identity, Susan Hill
Ahhhh Lafferton. Possibly even more dangerous than Midsomer or a dinner party with Jessica Fletcher and Jane Marple! The serial killer centre of England. I've lost track of the numbers of serial killers in the Simon Serrailler series: they've targetted women for medical reasons, abducted young children; they've targetted weddings and, now, the elderly in… Continue reading The Betrayal of Trust and A Question of Identity, Susan Hill
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The Word Is Murder, Anthony Horowitz
Sometimes you want to like a book just so damn much that it feels like you're the failure when you end up not liking it. So it was for me with this novel. Now there is no doubt that Horowitz can plot a cracking crime story: Midsomer Murders, Foyle's War, Magpie Murders are all testimony… Continue reading The Word Is Murder, Anthony Horowitz
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Weekly Round Up: 19th June 2018
Oh dear. Weekly Round Up. Weekly Round Up. After only two weekly round ups on the blog, I missed one already! *le sigh! Still, my blog, my rules... I'm not fretting about it! My reading over the last couple of weeks has primarily been focused on the unseen original genius manuscripts of teenagers, produced in a paltry… Continue reading Weekly Round Up: 19th June 2018
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Within the Sanctuary of Wings, Marie Brennan
Sometimes we just need the familiar and the comfortable, don't we? A warm cuddle of a book. The Natural History of Dragons series by Marie Brennan, of which Within the Sanctuary of Wings is the fifth and, it would appear final, installment, is one of those series. It's not challenging; it's a tad formulaic by… Continue reading Within the Sanctuary of Wings, Marie Brennan
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See What I Have Done, Sarah Schmidt
Lizzie Borden took an axeAnd gave her mother forty whacks.When she saw what she had done,She gave her father forty-one. Oh, Sarah Schmidt can write! What a strange strange thing to start a review with! But there is writing and there is writing and Sarah Schmidt can write! Not only can she create a plot and move… Continue reading See What I Have Done, Sarah Schmidt
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Crime and Punishment
Hmmmm.... So my Year 11s sat their GCSE English Language examination today: Paper One, Imaginative Writing. I wouldn't normally comment on something like this but I am irked. The text given was a translation of Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. A translation. Of a Russian text. In an English Language exam. I am concerned. The students have… Continue reading Crime and Punishment
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The Black Book of Secrets, F. E. Higgins
Every year, I determine to teach at least one text which is new to me that year - which with a shrinking pool to choose from at GCSE becomes harder year-one-year - and that is why I have stumbled upon F. E. Higgins' The Black Book of Secrets. It is an odd little book -… Continue reading The Black Book of Secrets, F. E. Higgins
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Tsotsi, Athol Fugard Analysis
So these are the ideas which I have been discussing with my class.
Tsotsi is set in 1956, give or take, in Sophiatown, a township on the outskirts of Johannesburg, South Africa. It was written by Fugard in the early months of 1960 after Sophiatown had been destroyed by the white community in Johannesburg and, therefore, there is an inevitability to its destruction. This inevitability is expressed in the gangs of slum clearance workers and in the language where, for example, the remnants of broken houses are described as Being like”skulls”.
Our main character is Tsotsi, the eponymous (anti) hero. He is “the one they called Tsotsi” which makes it clear that it is a title or label rather than a name; and a label that means simply “thug” when translated. It is not a name given to him with love by his mother, it does not connect him to…
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Tsotsi, Athol Fugard
Finished reading this now, waiting for students at school to catch up! If only some damn fool of a teacher just let them read it instead of teaching it and making them do work on it! Oh well!
This is an outstanding book! The quality of the writing literally glitters on the page and the novel reads more as a poem than a novel: I have never read such a lyrical piece of writing.
The novel revolves around the character of Tsotsi, a young man who is the leader of a gang of four thugs in Sophiatown, Johannesburg, South Africa in the 1950s. The name Tsotsi itself means “thug” or “gangster” and we are told in chapter one that it is a nickname: he has no recollection of almost any part of his past including his own name. Identity is a huge part of this novel: Tsotsi’s lack of identity…
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The Bear and the Nightingale and Girl in the Tower, Katherine Arden
I feel terribly guilty reviewing these books two at a time. They are too good to be treated like this! They are a delicious treat and parcelling them up together simply for convenience and to save time feels wrong. But, I'm still doing it. These novels are two parts of a mythic fairytale set… Continue reading The Bear and the Nightingale and Girl in the Tower, Katherine Arden
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