Verity Reads Books (lots of them)
In which our heroine attempts to tame the to-read pile
A lot of the advance copies I have waiting for me on the kindle now are Christmas books. As ever I’m planning on getting the Christmas reading suggestion post done early this year. And also as ever I suspect it will never happen. But what I do want are your recommendations for your favourite Christmas-set books. Not new ones, the old favourites you return to year on year. Please and thank you!
For today’s recommendsday I have a selection of country house-set books of various kinds for your entertainment.
Summer Lightning by P G Wodehouse
I’m going to start with a comedic classic. Summer Lightning is the fourth of the Blandings books but I think it’s my favourite. It has all the ingredients you want: Lord Emsworth and his prize pig, Lady Constance trying to manage him, a pair of lovers and the Honorable Galahad writing his memoirs and setting the town in a stir. Oh, and the Efficient Baxter. You don’t need to have read the others in the series, and you should be able to get hold of it nice and easily.
Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
It’s not often that I recommend a classic is it? And now I’ve given you two in one post. If you haven’t ever read Waugh’s tale of Charles Ryder’s entanglements with the Flyte family, then you really should – even if you start off only doing it because it gets referenced (whether you know it or not) in other things! It’s not my favourite of Waugh’s – but I have returned to it a a few times now, not least because I have the audiobook which is read in wonderfully soothing tones by Jeremy Irons – who starred in the famous TV adaptation.
Death in Fancy Dress by Anthony Gilbert
The Secret Service are trying to catch a blackmailer. There’s a been an increase in the number of suicides that seemed initially unconnected, but where on investigation the dead person had all the appearance of being a blackmail victim. Tony is a young lawyer who finds himself entangles in the mystery when the unpopular Sir Ralph is young dead the night after failing to appear at a house party being held at the house of a young woman who has just tried to break of her engagement to another man so she can marry Ralph – seeming under duress. Who killed him – and who is the blackmailer? This is an interesting mystery, with a clever premise but is not always the clearest in its writing with a set of male characters who could feel a little interchangable. Or maybe that was just me! I still enjoyed it though – and when I read it it was in Kindle Unlimited too.
To be honest I’ve written about scads of books set in country houses – you could also add The Austen Playbook, the Cazalet series, several of the Roderick Alleyns – notably A Man Lay Dead and Death and the Dancing Footman – as well as a whole bunch of Georgette Heyers like The Unknown Ajax or the gothic My Cousin Kate.
Happy reading!
It’s all got even more complicated over the last few days. But I’m working on getting normal service back underway as soon as I can.
Yeah. It’s been another one of those weeks. Work has been crazy busy, I’m exhausted and some impulse purchasing may have taken place. 2022 is really proving to be quite something.
Read:
Make It Sweet by Kristen Callihan
Marple: Twelve New Stories by Various authors based on Agatha Christie’s character
Something Fabulous by Alexis Hall
Death and the Brewery Queen by Frances Brody
Round Up the Usual Peacocks by Donna Andrews
Coq au Vin by Charlotte Carter
Bats in the Belfry by E C R Lorac
Started:
A Step so Grave by Catriona MacPherson
Still reading:
Godemersham Park by Gill Hornby*
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
Another Time, Another Place by Jodi Taylor
Going With the Boys by Judith Mackrell
Mercury Pictures Presents by Anthony Marra*
Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid
The Inverts by Crystal Jeans
Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn
One book in Waterstones Piccadilly, a couple more from Amazon and two preorders appeared too. I said the restraint wouldn’t last!
Bonus photo: a little mews near where I was staying last week. Charming.
An * next to a book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley.
…it’s been another mad week. I promise normal service will be resumed at some point soon!
So it’s been a restrained month after the excesses of August. One of these was a gift, one was an impulse buy in Foyles, one a preorder I’ve been telling you about for months and the rest… well, just my natural habit of acquiring books!
For this week’s Friday post, after a repost of the royal related books yesterday, I wanted to remind everyone about the Royal Spyness series.
I wrote a whole post of books related to the monarchy back in the early summer before the Platinum Jubilee – if you’re following what’s been going on in the UK in the last week, then do go back and read it – you can find it here.
Another month, another batch of Kindle offers for you all to enjoy.
Let’s start with one I’ve recommended already this year: A Fatal Crossing by Tom Hindle is 99p – I suspect to coincide with that paperback release which I mentioned the other day in Books in the Wild. In things I read, but longer ago, there is The Ex Hex by Rachel Hawkins, Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld and former Book of the Week V for Victory by Lissa Evans – although as that’s the third of three connected novels, you’ll get the most out of it if you read the others first. Recommended even longer ago is Rosie Effect by Graeme Simision – which has reminded me that I need to read the final book in that trilogy too!
There are a couple of other recent releases too – I’ve read Infamous by Lex Croucher*, which is billed as Bridgerton’s rowdy little sister – but I haven’t got to Ten Years by Pernille Hughes yet, although it is waiting on my kindle. Also waiting on my kindle is The Funny Thing about Norman Foreman by Julietta Henderson which came out last year originally.
In old favourites, there’s one of my very favourite Katie Fforde books at 99p this month Stately Pursuits must be nearly 20 years old now, but a lot of the tropes you’ll find in it are still among my favourites: a grumpy brooding hero, something that needs saving (in this case a big old house) and a heroine who just throws herself into tackling any problem in her path.
In series I love, Tales from the Folly by Ben Aaronovitch – the short story collection that ties in to Rivers of London is 99p this month, and I don’t remember seeing it this cheap before. In other series with books on offer, MC Beaton Death of a Bore in the Hamish Macbeth series is 99p. I’ve only read a few JD Robbs, but I know they’re hugely popular and the series is really long – so always good to pick them up on offer. This month it’s Judgement in Death, the 11th in the series
Some of the Georgette Heyer novels now seem to be dropping out of copyright and appearing in random editions (or at least I think that’s what they are) but in terms of the editions that I know are proper and well formatted etc, this month it’s Spanish Bride on offer for 99p. This is one of the less traditional Heyers – it’s got all the battle description that I find the least interesting bit of Infamous Army and is based on a true story. Spoiler: The marriage happens very early. The £1.99 Heyers are the aforementioned Infamous Army, Pistols for Two (the short stories collection), my beloved Devil’s Cub and another slightly more obscure one – Beauvallet.
And finally in non fiction, Andrew Lownie’s The Mountbattens is 99p – I haven’t read this yet, but I very much enjoyed his book Traitor King this time last year. And Burnout by Emily Nagoski is also on offer. I read this before the pandemic, but I think the help and advice it offers is needed more now than ever.
Hopefully there’s something here for you somewhere. Have a good Wednesday.
Back next week – I hope!
