But wait, there's more...

The next batch of books is when I was still stuck on the couch, but had my wonderful mother staying with me. One of the best books in this batch was recommended by her. I will start with that book as I know some of you don't read the whole blog!

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett.

This was a wonderful epic story to get lost in. Fascinating story of science, mythical tales and adventure - and beautifully written. Other Ann Patchett stories that I have read and loved include Bel Canto (brilliant) and Run (good, but not as good as Bel Canto). I really enjoyed State of Wonder  - 4 ****.

The next books in this instalment, were  / are all very popular but they didn't resonate with me - not sure whether because I wasn't in the mood (due to injury etc) or they just weren't for me.

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion.

This was a very sweet, romantic story and I know others (K Buckley I'm looking at you) who have loved this book so please read it and judge it for yourself. My rating - 2/12 **+ stars.

Five Days by Douglas Kennedy

I have read other Douglas Kennedy books that I really liked (The Moment) and others that left me feeling disappointed (The Women in the Fifth). Sadly this one falls in the latter category and I'm not sure I will rush to read another one of his novels. Only 2** stars for me.

The hand that first held mine by Maggie O'Farrell.

To be perfectly honest, I had to go and reread bits of the book to remind myself what this one was about. Written by the same author as 'The vanishing act of Esme Lennox' (which I loved), this one did not grab me and I didn't love the women depicted in it and obviously my brain has completely wiped out any knowledge of the book! Once again, only 2** stars for me.

The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton.

Kate Morton writes consistently good, easy reading novels. I have really enjoyed all her books that I have read - The Distant Hours, The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden (follow the link to see my earlier review). They are not challenging to read and have a lovely old-fashioned quality to them. 31/2 stars - ***+.

Lastly, Looking for Alaska by John Green

Ok probably not the best one to read when you are feeling emotionally frail but beautifully written. John Green also wrote The fault in our stars which I reviewed earlier. These books are supposedly aimed at teenagers but I found them very intense and sad but once again it could just have been in the emotional state I was in at the time. I also found it hard to believe that young adults would actually talk they did in the book - intrigued? Maybe you should try reading it and let me know what you think. 3 *** stars for me.

The next instalment I definitely steered away from anything deep or sad, so if you like your books light and easy to digest, please check in again soon.

Diminishing book stack

Yes I'm still reading....just not writing about it so much! After spending all day on the computer at work, I'm finding it hard to motivate myself to sit down to the computer again at night.

I've read quite a few books since my last post (not surprisingly considering how long ago that was) - I received books for Christmas and birthday, so I've been making my way through quite an impressive book pile. I won't write much / any on some them as some were too long ago to do justice to any proper review and some were purely designed for an easy beach read.

These are in no particular order (and do not include the easy beach reads!):

The Happiness Project: I really loved this book and I've tried to implement many of her ideas into my life - just to make life a little more easy and a little more 'happy'. The book is the end result of the blog written by Gretchen Rubin on trying to actively make herself happier - there is nothing particularly new or earth shattering in her discoveries on what makes people happy, but sometimes we need to be reminded to focus on these things rather than being consumed by our daily routines.

The first project I adopted was clearing out a lot of clutter - it was very cathartic and it did reduce stress which in turn did make me feel happy!

There are other little 'happiness' projects I've embarked on from inspiration in the book, but I encourage you to read this book and use it as your own inspiration to squeeze any extra happiness you can out of every day.

1Q84: What a bizarre but brilliant book. It took me a while to get into the book - written from the perspective of two quite different characters - but once I got going I thought it was amazing and I couldn't put it down.

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes was beautifully written and I can see why it won the Man Booker prize. It really makes you think about your memories and your own interpretation of them. I'm sure many of my memories have been embellished or altered to fit what I would have liked to happen or how I would have liked to think I would have behaved. Food for thought.....and a great book.

Death comes to Pemberley by PD James is set in 1803 and it a nostalgic look at life in the 'big house' from the perspective of the lord and lady of the house. It is a slow, beautiful and easy read with a bit of old-fashioned mystery thrown in. There are some great characters in the book and I could have kept reading about their lives and their connections - but I can't believe that women used to think and live like the ones depicted in the story. They obviously did, but it seems so archaic and patronising. Lovely book and I think its making the book club rounds.

I am about to start an intriguing book - The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks -so off to bed I go.
Would love to hear any recommendations of books to add to the pile.....

The Travel bug

Yes I know its been ages.

I haven't been feeling like writing for a while now as I've been sad. When I'm sad I'm not very good at writing (unless you all want to hear my morbid thoughts), running, cooking, sleeping or parenting - so its been an interesting few weeks but I'm beginning to feel the sun on my face and the joy of the simple things again.

So this post (and probably the next couple too!) are a retrospective look at some of the books I've read since October....

When we returned from our amazing trip to Africa I had been inspired by this lovely lady, Sue - we met on a sunset cruise on the Zambezi (as you do) - who told me that she was a travel writer and was writing a piece on travelling through Zambia and Botswana with her mother. Well - of course that seemed like a dream job and anyone who knows me, knows that I love a new career idea and I went into full research mode as soon as we came back to Australia.

Two books were recommended to me - firstly, Lonely Planet's guide to travel writing (recommended by Sue when I stalked her via email) and secondly, Travel Writing 2.0 - Earning money from your travels in the new media landscape by Tim Leffel (which was highly recommended by Book Depository).

Lonely Planet's guide to travel writing is a fantastic read about how to go about the business of travel writing, the styles to adopt, what to avoid and many, many useful tips.

Travel writing 2.0 on the other hand was a practical look at the realities of the 'business' of travel writing and promptly brought my idea crashing back to earth. It is a very difficult, competitive business with only a handful of writers around the world truly making a decent living out of it (my new friend Sue being one of them).

The realities of my life are of course that we are very settled in our home town, husband's business is here (and without which we couldn't travel!) and most importantly our children are settled here.

Instead I will indulge my love of travel and adventure sporadically. I just no longer expect to make any money out of the venture!

I do have lots of lovely ideas for places to visit in South Africa with children, so please don't hesitate to pick my brain....

A mixed bag

I've read a real mixed bag of books lately and whilst on holiday to South Africa so now that I'm back I thought I should briefly mention the ones I loved (there have been a few that I only just got through so I won't bother writing about them as well).

Firstly, The Moment by Douglas Kennedy. This book was a fantastic story about a writer, writing his travel books, his history, his romances, combined with a fascinating insight into life in East and West Germany before the Wall came down.

'Thomas Nesbitt is a divorced American writer in the midst of a rueful middle age. Living a very private life in Maine - in touch only with his daughter and still trying to reconcile himself to the end of a long marriage that he knew was flawed from the outset - he finds his solitude disrupted by the arrival, one wintry morning, of a box postmarked Berlin. The return address on the box - Dussmann - unsettles him completely. For it is the name of the woman with whom he had an intense love affair twenty-six years ago in Berlin - at a time when the city was cleaved in two, and personal and political allegiances were haunted by the deep shadows of the Cold War. '

There were so many parts of this book that I loved - it was very sad as well as stunningly written. It was mostly about not realizing that we are in 'the moment' - whatever that might be and how wonderful it is and the rest of your life can be shaped by it.

I don't want to give too much away as I think its a brilliant book and I highly recommend it to all.

Next post: 'Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness'.

Bounce

What a brilliant book. Thought provoking, fascinating and probably a bit controversial too..

Bounce by Matthew Syed is a book on a theory that champions are made not born. That champions are created from circumstance, practice and determination. It was a fascinating book that everyone should read - I'm sure not everyone would agree with the theories, but it did make me think. Some of his insights into what motivated children - even to do well in a maths test - really made me consider how I approach encouraging my children to keep trying at challenging tasks and how I praise them for any 'jobs well done'.

In Bounce Matthew Syed - an award-winning Times columnist and three-time Commonwealth table-tennis champion - reveals what really lies behind world-beating achievement in sport, and other walks of life besides. The answers - taking in the latest in neuroscience, psychology and economics - will change the way we look at sports stars and revolutionise our ideas about what it takes to become the best. From the upbringing of Mozart to the mindset of Mohammed Ali - via the recruitment policies of Enron - Bounce weaves together fascinating stories and telling insights and statistics into a wonderfully thought-provoking read. Bounce looks at big questions - such as the real nature of talent, what kind of practice actually works, how to achieve motivation, drugs in both sport and life, and whether black people really are faster runners.


This book would make an interesting choice as a book club read. Its not your normal book club type of choice, but I think it would invoke a great deal of debate. THere were bits of the book that were a bit tedious to get through, but the theories and examples he gives are all brilliant. The book would make an interesting companion book to Andre Agassi's autobiography too.


Read.


Fascinating - thanks Kate for the lend of the book.

The Long Song

I do still exist.

I am still reading.

I am now back in the corporate world and work is putting a very unwelcome dent in my free time to read and especially, to write about it!

The number of books I have been getting through has also therefore sadly been reduced, but I am trying to get back into the habit.

The last book I finished was The Long Song by Andrea Levy - she is also the author of a Small Island.

Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and longlisted for the Orange Prize, THE LONG SONG is breathtaking, hauntingly beautiful, heartbreaking and unputdownable You do not know me yet. My son Thomas, who is publishing this book, tells me, it is customary at this place in a novel to give the reader a little taste of the story that is held within these pages. As your storyteller, I am to convey that this tale is set in Jamaica during the last turbulent years of slavery and the early years of freedom that followed.


As described, the book sets out the story of July - a house slave upon the Amity sugar plantation in Jamaica in the early 19th century.  July is conceived when her slave mother Kitty is raped by overseer Tam Dewar.  After a traumatic birth, July is fortunate to live with her mother for some years, helping in the fields to bring water to the field slaves.  That is until the arrival upon the plantation of Caroline Mortimer, plantation owner John Howarth’s widow sister, who takes one look at little July and steals her from her mother to be her personal companion within the grand plantation household.  It is a theme that will continue throughout the book.. It tells her story, in her words and her voice, of growing up in the last years of slavery in Jamaica.


I usually tend to find books about slavery and the associated history fascinating - and this was no different. However, I really struggled with the narrator, July's voice. It is appropriate that it is written in her language and from her viewpoint, but I found the language and her tone to be very grating and it did not create a feeling of sympathy or understanding with me.


The book has been shortlisted for numerous prizes so once again I feel like I missed something. I realise that an extraordinary amount of research must have gone into the book and it is a fascinating, well written story  - but I just didn't like the lead character which made it very hard to get engrossed in the book. I did want to know what happened to her throughout the story and I did finish the book, but I wouldn't be rushing to recommend it to my friends.

The Shifting Fog

Summer is upon us here in Australia (41C for new year's eve!). So, what better time to lie around and read - any excuse I say!

I have just finished Kate Morton's The Shifting Fog. It took longer than it should of but only because I was constantly interrupted by mince pies, gin & tonics, pavlovas and children - perfect holiday mix.

The Shifting Fog was a lovely read. It ambled along with just the right amount of suspense, intrigue and romance. It was beautifully written and was basically just a very pleasant read that I would definitely recommend, especially to those with a touch of romance in their souls.

Summer 1924: on the eve of a glittering Society party, by the lake of a grand English country house, a young poet takes his life. The only witnesses, sisters Hannah and Emmeline Hartford, will never speak to each other again. Winter 1999: Grace Bradley, 98, one-time house-maid of Riverton Manor, is visited by a young director making a film about the poet's suicide. Ghosts awaken and memories, long consigned to the dark reaches of Grace's mind, begin to sneak back through the cracks. A shocking secret threatens to emerge; something history has forgotten but Grace never could. Set as the war-shattered Edwardian summer surrenders to the decadent twenties, The Shifting Fog is a thrilling mystery and a compelling love story.

Kate Morton is an Australian author (she was born in South Australia in fact) and is one of those horrible people who are beautiful and young (born in 1976), have a wonderful talent (writing) and are raising children to boot! Yes, jealousy is a curse...

I look forward to reading some of Kate Morton's other books now too. The Shifting Fog was her first published book back in 2006. The Distant Hours is next on my list of her books, but only once it is released in paperback - very hard to hold a heavy book up whilst drinking aforementioned gin & tonics and pretending to watch the children practise their bombing in the pool!

Now I have NOTHING to read - quelle horreur!!! I am currently forced to read trashy magazines which will do very nicely for a week but then I will definitely need something more substantial. Any recommendations???

Tinkers

Tinkers by Paul Harding is the story of two "tinkers" - George, the son, who "tinkers" with clocks. And his father Howard, who is an itinerant tinker, leaving each morning from home with his horse and wagon, and returning each night from his futile attempts to make a living. 

The story is well-told, moving back and forth between George, who is dying in a hospital bed in his living room, and Howard, an epileptic, who tries to keep his infirmity from his children (although I have to admit I did get a bit confused at times as to which character was being discussed, but this was due to my need to rush through the book without slowing down to allow the book to unfold as it should).

The book is full of wonderful language (each word is critical to create a scene or feeling), although at times I found myself skimming through the description and musings and descriptions of epileptic seizures to get to "what happens next." Despite the sometimes tedious language and descriptions of types of clocks, I found myself moved by the two stories. 


This book was full of smells, nature, beauty and death. Three generations of men experiencing confusion and amusement are fused together with words of nature, grief and soul. There are probably depths I couldn't actually grasp or understand, as it was hard for my brain to consistently concentrate on the story and descriptive narrative. 


Despite the hard-going nature of the read I can still appreciate that the book is wonderful. I wouldn't normally choose this sort of writing as I don't have the patience for it. But this is a book to be read slowly, take the time to absorb the poetry and use of the words, savour the images created and allow the book to take you on a journey.


Winner of the Pulitzer Prize 2010, this is not an easy read (thinking of death is never easy), but is a beautiful book that felt more like a long, very descriptive and unusual poem. 

Finally!

Most of you have probably already read this book, but I have to admit that this book took me two attempts to complete. The first time I started to read it, I didn't give the first couple of chapters enough of my attention and by the third, I had no idea who was who, why there were so many 'Thomas's and generally had lost the plot (literally).

The book was put down and forgotten.

But then, I kept hearing from all my well read friends how much they had LOVED the book and they all seemed to have found it fascinating and brilliant and it also won the Man Booker prize 2009! I was obviously missing something....

The book was relaunched in the last couple of weeks and, what with Christmas shopping, pretending to work and kids finishing school, I have only just finished it!

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel is a truly epic story.

England, the 1520s. Henry VIII is on the throne, but has no heir. Cardinal Wolsey is his chief advisor, charged with securing the divorce the pope refuses to grant. Into this atmosphere of distrust and need comes Thomas Cromwell, first as Wolsey's clerk, and later his successor. Cromwell is a wholly original man: the son of a brutal blacksmith, a political genius, a briber, a charmer, a bully, a man with a delicate and deadly expertise in manipulating people and events. Ruthless in pursuit of his own interests, he is as ambitious in his wider politics as he is for himself. His reforming agenda is carried out in the grip of a self-interested parliament and a king who fluctuates between romantic passions and murderous rages.


I'm really glad I persevered with the book and did end up really enjoying it. It reminds me a lot of 'The Other Boleyn Girl' by Phillipa Gregory - which I found a much lighter read but still historically fascinating.

Apparently, now I need to watch 'The Tudors' and my history lesson will be almost complete.

Christmas list

Its beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.

I love giving or getting books for Christmas. It is so hard to know what to buy for kids to read. It always seemed easier when they were into picture books - I just looked for ones with a story I would enjoy reading at least twenty times with beautiful pictures to keep them entertained. Now it seems to be a lot harder - and there seems to be a definite gap in the book market for boys age 10 and up!!

I thought I would start the ball rolling though and tell you about the books that my boys (aged 8 and 10) have read during the year and would recommend. It's not a long list, but I'm hoping others out there have many more brilliant ideas and are happy to share...

All books listed (and photos) can be found at http://www.bookdepository.co.uk. (I should be getting a commission!)

The 10 year old is a mad reader but this is just a selection of his favourites:

• Eragon, Brisinger and Eldest by Christopher Paolini.

• Once, Then and Now by Morris Gleitzman.

Reviewed in Good Chapters here

• The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. (Ok I did give him this to read and he did enjoy it, but not perhaps as much as his mother!)

• The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. (Ok I also gave him this to read and he did enjoy it, but not perhaps as much as his mother!)

• The Legends of the Guardian: The owls of Gahoole series by Kathryn Lasky. We have all enjoyed this series and there are 10 books in the series so it has lasted a long time.

• The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes collection by Bill Watterson.

• The Guiness Book of Records - hours of fascinating reading for all.

The 8 year old has been mainly listening to stories read by his Dad (the ones that the 10 year old has already read but loved).

In addition to these, he has enjoyed:

• The 'How to train your dragon' series by Cressida Cowell

• The 'Boy vs Beast series by Mac Park

Aren't boy books delightful?

Sarah's Key

Another book that I can highly recommend. I loved this book (right up until the end, but I'll get to that) - it was a great page turner and an easy read on a topic that still haunts and fascinates me - the holocaust.

Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay is the story about two women Sarah and Julia separated by sixty years. Sarah's story is based in Paris 1942 during the war - her story is compelling, horrifying, fascinating and haunting (I felt drained through each of her chapters, but couldn't stop reading). Her story is interwoven with Julia's story also based in Paris but 60 years later. Julia's story is much lighter and easier to read but I was disappointed in the ending of her story and its predictability and unlikeliness (I won't spoil the book for you).

"Paris, July 1942. Sarah, a ten-year old girl, is taken with her parents by the French police as they go door to door arresting Jewish families in the middle of the night. Desperate to protect her younger brother, Sarah locks him in a bedroom cupboard - their secret hiding place - and promises to come back for him as soon as they are released.


Sixty years later, Sarah's story intertwines with that of Julia Jarmond, a journalist investigating the round-up. Sarah's Key is an emotionally gripping story of two families, forever linked to, and haunted by, one of the darkest days in France's past."


Although it was hard to read (bit reminiscent of 'Boy with the striped pyjamas' type of angst) it was a fascinating story of an event I knew nothing about - the great Velodrome d'Hiver round-up that took place on 16 July 1942, in the heart of Paris. The story highlighted the evilness of the human race along with extraordinary braveness, kindness and compassion. It still terrifies me that something this awful could have occurred only 70 years ago - and the people were capable of inflicting such misery on people just like themselves and more frighteningly, on children.


Julia's story was welcome relief between the chapters of Sarah's story  - a bit of a detective, drama and love story - but they didn't grip me in the same way and I felt really let down by the end of her story - I'm not sure what I expected but it was a bit too predictable and saccharine after the emotional roller-coaster of the rest of the book.


My better half tells me (and I've confirmed through the trusty internet) that they have already made a movie of this book and Kristin Scott Thomas plays Julia and Melusine Mayance plays Sarah. All the reviews I have read say the movie has stayed quite true to the book - which makes me wonder whether I could watch Sarah's story without dissolving into a mess of tears.

I do recommend you read this book as I thought it was brilliant and fascinating and its a story that we should not forget. "Sakhor, Al Tichkah. Remember. Never forget. In Hebrew."

A Reliable Wife

My new book arrived on Tuesday. It is now Thursday. What the hell happened to Wednesday? It went something like this...I woke bleary eyed from going to bed too late (started the book), got nothing done all day (reading the book), stayed up way past my bedtime (engrossed in the book) and now am writing about the book instead of working!

Wow - what a great story - it's passionate, gripping, sensual, exciting and beautiful. I couldn't stop reading it and when I put it down, I couldn't stop thinking about the characters. What a great way to lose a day of your life....

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick is the story of two people Catherine Land and Ralph Truitt and how their pasts have influenced the decisions they are currently making that will profoundly affect them both in ways neither of them have planned.

'He placed a notice in a Chicago paper, an advertisement for a 'reliable wife'. She responded, saying that she was 'a simple, honest woman.' She was, of course, anything but honest, and the only simple thing about her was her single-minded  determination to marry this man and then kill him, slowly and carefully, leaving herself a wealthy widow. What Catherine Land did not realise was that the enigmatic and lonely Ralph Truitt had a plan of his own.'


The story is brilliant - it has intrigue, it has sex (yes, sex!), it has twists, it has sadness, brutality and death and it also has a gripping story line that I was instantly addicted to. I can't tell you too much about the story for fear of ruining its brilliance, but I would describe it as a mixture of a mystery and romance.


I like what the author has said about his four main characters - 'I think the only thing that matters in life is goodness. It is all we have to leave behind us when we go, all we will be remembered for. It is our soul's wallet. These characters are not good people.'


Read it.


Loved it.

Island Beneath the Sea

Isabel Allende has been a prolific writer and I have only read a handful of her books - 'The House of the Spirits', 'Of Love and Shadows', 'The Infinite Plan' and 'Paula' (I think that's all). Each of her book that I've read, I've really enjoyed as they take you on a journey to another country and another time and I always emerge from the book believing I've learnt something about each.

Island Beneath the Sea is another epic novel that spans 1770 through to 1810 in Saint-Domingue, (what is now known as Haiti), Cuba and New Orleans following the life of Zarite - known as Tete.

From the sugar plantations of Saint-Domingue to the lavish parlors of New Orleans at the turn of the 19th century, Isabel Allende's latest novel tells the story of a mulatta woman, a slave and concubine, determined to take control of her own destiny in a society where that would seem impossible. Born a slave on the island of Saint-Domingue, Zarite - known as Tete - is the daughter of an African mother she never knew and one of the white sailors who brought her into bondage. Though her childhood is one of brutality and fear, Tete finds solace in the traditional rhythms of African drums and the voodoo loas she discovers through her fellow slaves. 


When twenty-year-old Toulouse Valmorain arrives on the island in 1770, it's with powdered wigs in his trunks and dreams of financial success in his mind. But running his father's plantation, Saint Lazare, is neither glamorous nor easy. Against the merciless backdrop of sugar cane fields, the lives of Tete and Valmorain grow ever more intertwined. When the bloody revolution of Toussaint Louverture arrives at the gates of Saint Lazare, they flee the island that will become Haiti for the decadence and opportunity of New Orleans. There, Tete finally forges a new life - but her connection to Valmorain is deeper than anyone knows and not so easily severed. 


Spanning four decades, Island Beneath the Sea is the moving story of one woman's determination to find love amid loss, to offer humanity though her own has been so battered, and to forge her own identity in the cruellest of circumstances.


As described above, the novel is an epic and a long story but well worth the effort. I found it fascinating (and horrifying) to read about the conditions of slaves in that time - and the abuse they suffered under various different occupying forces. I know the story isn't true, although I'm sure there is a lot of truth in the historical aspect, but I  was always terrified for the children in the story and intrigued at the lengths parents will go to and the bravery required, to improve the lives of their children. One example of this, was when slaves got pregnant they attempted to forcibly abort the babies so that they wouldn't have to grow up in slavery - ok, that's a very extreme example and doesn't really improve the child's life, but it stuck in my mind.


Fascinating story, a bit long in places, but as I said before, well worth the effort.

The Children

Staying with family during the holidays can often bring back childhood tensions, memories and bonds. I do not know of any family that is without it's issues - resolved or usually, unresolved and simmering. The dynamics and personalities within each family is so different and unique, but all are equally fascinating to me.

Whilst staying for a week with my parents (plus my two boys) I read, 'The Children' by Charlotte Wood. I haven't read any of her books before and really enjoyed the easy style and gentle moving pace of this book.

'You bring your children up to escape sorrow. You spend your best years trying to stop them witnessing it on television, in you, in your neighbours' faces. Then you realize, slowly, that there is no escape, that they must steer their own way through life's cruelties. In The Children, Charlotte Wood one of Australian fiction's rising stars, delivers a short, sharp shock of a novel that takes us into the heart of a family as normal, and as broken, as any other. When their father is critically injured, foreign correspondent Mandy and her siblings return home, bringing with them the remnants and patterns of childhood. Mandy has lived away from the country for many years. Her head is filled with images of terror and war, and her homecoming to the quiet country town - not to mention her family and marriage - only heightens her disconnection from ordinary life. Cathy, her younger sister, has stayed in regular contact with her parents, trying also to keep tabs on their brother Stephen who, for reasons nobody understands, has held himself apart from the family for years. In the intensive care unit the children sit, trapped between their bewildered mother and one another.'

I really enjoyed this book and found it an easy and quick read- although it was slightly depressing and real - but the events and the characters appealed and kept me turning the pages. I can't explain too much about the book without giving too much away but I do recommend you read it.

Bird by Bird

Have you got a story in you that's just dying to get out? Have you ever wondered whether you could write a book and be the next JK Rowling? Maybe its just a short story, an article or even a poem.

If your inner writer is trying to be heard, you should definitely read this funny, clever, humbling and inspiring book Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott.

I'm not sure whether this book has inspired me (and my little story wanting to come out) or provided me with a very real wake-up call. Every now and then I think writing a book wouldn't be that hard and then I read something like Bird by Bird and realise I haven't got a clue and the most beautiful books are extremely cleverly composed by very talented writers - and I am not one of them.

Anyway the journey continues and I highly recommend reading this book to anyone interested in the art of book writing - whether you dream of writing your own or just appreciate the skill required and are interested in finding out more about how it is done.

Bookshelf choices

I thought I'd write a quick entry on some of the books that have stayed on my bookshelf over the years and are usually on my list of recommendations for a good read.

Staircase bookshelf - isn't it a fantastic idea!

Over the last couple of years I've been requested to give recommendations to friends who have not been well, are leaving children for long periods, wanted a good holiday read or just wanted to read something a bit different.

There are many books I've read and loved over the years but:
(a): I've forgotten their titles and / or their authors, or
(b): I've forgotten I've read them, or
(c): My list would be too long if I listed them all.

I read most of these over the last few years, so I haven't retrospectively reviewed them merely listed them - I'm happy to tell you more about them if you want more info.

So here is a very random and incomplete selection of what is still in my bookshelf (hence making it easy for me to remember their titles, etc!) and I would recommend as good reading (in no particular order):

1) Q&A by Vikas Swarup (plus Six Suspects by the same author)

2) The Map of Love by Ahdaf Soueif (have realised I did review this book earlier in this blog!)

3) Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry (plus A Fine Balance by the same author)

4) The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

5) The Famished Road by Ben Okri

6) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (plus Run by the same author)

7) The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy by Stieg Larsson

8) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

9) Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood (plus The Blind Assassin and also The Handmaid's Tale)

10) March by Geraldine Brooks (plus People of the Book by the same author)

All images courtesy of the book depository

What are you reading at the moment? Are you enjoying it or finding it a struggle? Would love to hear some recommendations....

Little Bee

Brilliant. Compelling. Different. Memorable. Read it....

Little Bee by Chris Cleave is an amazing book that I could not put down for the last few days and I don't think the story will leave me for a lot longer.

Little Bee, a young Nigerian refugee, has just been released from the British immigration detention center where she has been held under horrific conditions for the past two years, after narrowly escaping a traumatic fate in her homeland Nigeria. Alone in a foreign country, without a family member, friend or pound to call her own, she seeks out the only English person she knows. Sarah is a posh young mother and magazine editor with whom Little Bee shares a dark and tumultuous past.

The book is written with unpredictable moments of humour and horror - you just want to keep turning the page to see whether the next event will the former or the latter. The characters were great - although I did struggle with the maturity Little Bee displayed for a 16 year old - I suppose though, after what she had endured in her youth, her level of life experiences is more than any of us could comprehend. I really can't say too much about the book without spoiling the unfolding story but I highly recommend this book.

Once again I seem to have selected a book that makes you think about your contribution to the world - sorry to get deep again, but I really like what the author says about human rights at the end of the book:

(I know this quote is long but I couldn't shorten it without losing its impact)

' Evil is not going to be vanquished. Our job is to resist it, and to plant the seeds of further resistance so that goodness never entirely vanishes from the universe. There are degrees of resistance. It starts when you give a dollar to a homeless person and it escalates to the point where people give their lives, as Gandhi did or Martin Luther King, Jr. One person can make a difference by travelling as far along that continuum as they feel able.'