Verity Reads Books (lots of them)
In which our heroine attempts to tame the to-read pile
I only found out about this book earlier this week and now I need to read it. This is the era of pop music that I grew up with (which you’ll hear more about in the near future) and I really want to read about the behind the scenes of it. Of course as you know my physical tbr is huge at the moment, so it may be a while before I can justify buying it but I know I’ll get there in the end. In the meantime – if anyone else has read it let me know in the comments!
Okay, this is an American thing, but there was also International Women’s Day this month. And yes, I know, I know. It’s nearly the end of March so this is super late but I’m sneaking this in under the wire because I can. And I’m going to work my way back in history, because for some reason that seems like the most logical thing to do!
Girls of Atomic City by Denise Kiernan
This is really really good. A fascinating insight into the “normal” women behind the development of the Atomic Bomb. It’s the story of a pop up city built around a project so secret that you weren’t told what you were doing, and didn’t ask what other people were doing either. A few of the chemists put two and two together, but they were a handful out of tens of thousands. Really worth reading.
Jane Austen at Home by Lucy Worsley
There are a lot of books about Jane Austen, but this is a well researched look at Jane Austen’s home life, framing it in the wider world of expectations for women in Georgian England, the restrictions on their lives and how they subverted that. When Lucy Worsley is at her best, her books are very readable and accessible. At other times, she is very dense and scholarly and it’s hard work. This is much more the latter than the former, or at least it was for me. I had thought that the readability was an experience thing, because her first book was very scholarly, but the next one – Courtiers – was incredibly easy and yet informative. I still have her Agatha Christie biograohy on my shelf – I wonder which Worlsey we will get there!
She Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England before Elizabeth by Helen Castor
And finally, lets go back to the Middle Ages, for a group biography of four women who ruled England (or tried to) between the Twelfth and the Fifteenth Century. If you’ve never come across Matilda, the daughter of Henry I and granddaughter of William the Conqueror, then you have a treat instore – especially as the period she was trying to claim the crown in is known as The Anarchy. The other women are Eleanor of Aquitaine (wife of two kings, and ruler of Aquitaine in her own right), Isabella of France (daughter of a French King and married to an English one) and Margaret of Anjou (who ruled on behalf of her mad husband and key figure in the Wars of the Roses). It’s really, really interesting – and looks at some parts of history that don’t really get taught in schools in the UK.
This time last year I did a post about Interesting Women – do go and check that out for some more reviews, including Hidden Figures, but I also wanted to flag The Radium Girls which was in a Recommendsday post a couple of years back, and Janina Ramirez’s Femina which was in a Recommendsday last year
Happy Reading!
It’s only a few weeks since I recommended Nora Goes Off Script, but I’m back with another romance that features a movie start – and I don’t care because it is so, so good. This is the book I was talking about yesterday when I talked about trying to cure a book hangover!
Ok, this plot is a little complicated – because the narrative is split between now and then. The then is the start of Chani Horowitz’s career. She’s graduated from her writing course, but instead of writing novels like her fiancé, she’s writing magazine articles. Then she’s asked to write a profile piece of Hollywood heartthrob Gabe Parker. He is her celebrity crush – and he’s just been cast as James Bond. The weekend she spends with him for the piece changes her life – it launches her career and also sets the tabloids buzzing. The now is ten years on. Chani is asked to revisit the subject of her most famous piece to do a second interview. After a decade being asked about that profile, and fresh from a divorce, Chani knows she should say no. But she has never forgotten that weekend – and it could be a chance to finally turn the page.
I loved this so much. So, so much. It’s got a long slow pine and so much yearning. And two people trying to figure out what is going on between them. There is a lot of drinking in the before part of the story – and the Gabe of the now section is fresh from rehab and newly sober. And unlike one of the books I read after this last week as I tried to get over my book hangover, you get to see that Gabe has grown and changed and is a different (and better) version of himself. And Chani is a great heroine. She’s smart and clever and fed up of her career being defined by one piece when she wants to do different things.
I bought this in my haul from Foyles earlier in the year – you can see it in the February Books Incoming – I started reading it in the shop and knew it was going to be good, which is why I’ve read it so soon (for me!). I finished it and immediately ordered Elissa Sussman’s next book which comes out later the year.
You should be able to get hold of this fairly easily – I’ve seen it all over the place since I bought it, and it’s in kindle and Kobo too. The only thing I couldn’t find was the audiobook on Audible but there does seem to be one on Goodreads so it may yet turn up.
Happy Reading!
A really good week in reading, helped by dog sitting my parents’ dachshund for three nights – a very silly dog who wants no more than to sit on your lap, or next to your lap, or maybe trying to eat your ears – but anyway a very nice excuse to spend some time reading. And I’ve made some very good progress on some of the long runners too. Fingers crossed on that front too. And I can’t believe we’re nearly at the end of March though. Where has the month gone?
Read:
Swing Brother, Swing by Ngaio Marsh
No Life for a Lady by Hannah Dolby*
R in the Month by Nancy Spain
Funny You Should Ask by Elissa Sussman
Opening Night by Ngaio Marsh
What Happens in the Ballroom by Sabrina Jeffries*
When in Rome by Sarah Adams
Eaves of Destruction by Kate Carlisle
How to Fake It in Hollywood by Ava Wilder
Started:
The Roughest Draft by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka
A Very Merry Bromance by Lyssa Kay Adams
Still reading:
The Dress Diary of Mrs Anne Sykes by Kate Strasdin*
Shadows of London by Andrew Taylor*
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
The Empire by Michael Ball*
Travellers in the Third Reich by Julia Boyd
Rogues by Patrick Radden Keefe
The Final Revival of Opal and Nev by Dawnie Walton*
A couple of books bought in a book hangover quest to find something as good as the book I had just finished. You’ll find out which tomorrow!
Bonus photo: my sleepy companion for the long weekend. Bless her paws and whiskers.
*next to a book book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley.
And so this is the third bookshop I visited in the first week of March – walking from work to the Cockpit for John Finnemore took me right past Daunt Books on Marylebone High Street so how could I resist?
And if you’ve never been in there, it’s deceptively big. Double fronted and going right back and down and up as you can see. They were setting the event space up as I was wandering, but sadly I was insufficiently vigilant to check who it was for – partly because I knew I couldn’t stay!
Anyway here’s a nice big selection of crime hardbacks and paperbacks – including a few I’ve read – like Death Comes to Marlow, The Three Dog Problem, The Christie Affair, a couple of Thursday Murder Club books, the latest Rivers of London and the Reverend Richard Coles.
There was a really good selection of crime actually – here’s another side of that same pillar with another HM the Queen Investigates, the new Miss Marple short stories and the fresh Tom Hindle that I haven’t got around to reading yet because: binging stuff I shouldn’t be.
Over in the Children and Young Adult section there were loads of books proving that the dystopian future/alternative present genre is still going strong, but also this table with the Rainbow Rowell short stories and the Agency of Scandal which I own but haven’t really seen in the wild before.
And there were some good tables of non fiction too – bookshop trips are often where I find stuff I hadn’t heard about. The Patrick Radden Keefe is actually an older book of his, reissued to look more like Empire of Pain, but I think I would basically read any of the forward-facing books in this picture. I mean if I got time for it…
And finally, as you’ve already seen the book I bought in last week’s Books Incoming, this was my first sighting in the wild of the paperback of Lessons in Chemistry – on its release day no less. I’m hoping that the fact that the table looks a little bit empty is because they’d already sold so many copies!
Have a great weekend everyone and go buy a book.
I feel like March is the month of new books from authors I really like. And as I mentioned yesterday, this week saw a new standalone book from Jacqueline Winspear. So I’m taking the opportunity to point you at my series I love post about her Maisie Dobbs series – there are plenty of them and I’m actually up to date with the series now which is a miracle given that it’s me we’re talking about. But if you haven’t read them all yet, here’s a reminder of why they’re so good. Bonus: here’s my BotW post for the first in the series.
This is a new standalone novel from the author of the Maisie Dobbs series. This is post Second World War – so further ahead in time than Maisie has got – and features a former wartime spy whose peaceful life is disturbed by new residents of the village who are also trying to escape their past. It sounds really good and I can’t wait to read it.
This Wednesday, I’m looking at short story collections as I’ve read a couple of them recently and it’s got me thinking. Obviously one of them was Scattered Showers, which has already featured as a BotW, but here are a few more for your consideration.
The Lady with the Gun Asks the Questions by Kerry Greenwood
Lets start with a collection of short stories from my favourite Australian detective – The Honourable Phryne Fisher. It only came out in the UK last year (although Australians got it sooner) so it’s even relatively recent. This collection has stories that slot in at various points during the series, including four new ones for this book. If you haven’t read the whole series, I don’t think any of them will spoil anything for you, but there are plenty of familiar faces here, including an origin story for one of her friendships. And my love of Phryne and her world is well known – it’s always a delight to get to spend any time with her.
Marple: Twelve New Mysteries by Various Authors*
This is another recent one which I’m including it because I liked *some* of the stories although it completely lost me with the last story – if you read it, you’ll probably understand why. This has new takes on Miss Marple, written by some of the biggest names in fiction at the moment including Kate Mosse, Elly Griffiths and Alyssa Cole. It does feel a little bit like Miss Marple plot bingo at times – and because they’re all done by different people there is not a lot of internal consistency. I was glad I read it – mostly because I’m a completist – and because it’s not written by Agatha Christie I’m able to ignore the bits that I didn’t like!
American Housewife by Helen Ellis
It’s been 7 years, so I think I’m allowed to mention this again now! This was my first encounter with Helen Ellis’s writing and I’ve been buying her stuff ever since. Each story peers behind the curtain of a seemingly normal American housewife and exposes the secrets behind. These are dark and darkly humorous short stories, that make for perfect bite-sized reading before bed. Its funny and quirky and you hope you never meet (or become) any of the women you meet in it!
Sweetest in the Gale by Olivia Dade
Just throwing a bit of romance in here to finish, because I can. Sweetest in the Gale has three short stories about three different couples, so you get three happy endings! There are also three different tropes – we’ve got a widowed teacher, an enemies to lovers and a marriage of convenience. They’re all set in Marysburg – which is where Tess from 40-Love is a teacher (when she’s not on holiday) as well as where Teach Me is set too. There are definite bittersweet elements to all three of them, but they are definitely romances.
Before I go, I should mention a couple of other short story collections that have been books of the week – Roxane Gay’s Difficult Women and Curtis Sittenfeld’s You Think It, I’ll Say It – and it’s only a few weeks to go before her new novel comes out, which is very exciting.
Happy Wednesday everyone!
Making a change from the last few weeks, we have the first children’s book pick of the year and it’s a lesser known classic – Antonia Forest’s The Cricket Term.
This is the eighth book in Forrest’s series about the Marlow siblings, this one particularly focussing around the twins and in particular Nicola. It’s the summer term and Nicola is as determined to win the cricket cup as Lawrie is to play Caliban in the school play. Except the mistress in charge of the play has other ideas, as does the Games Captain who has a definite down on Nicola. But soon Nicola has more to worry about than getting her team into shape – unless she can do something to change things, it could be her last term at Kingscote.
This is a masterpiece of a school story. The characters are rounded and nuanced. One of the central problems of the series is a big grown up one but there are plenty of other things the girls have to deal with and it has such depth and cleverness in the writing. I mean this is the point where it had me, and it never let go:
‘Yes I see all that,’ said Nicola unwillingly. She grinned. ‘Only I’d rather have a late cut that was exceedingly characteristic.’
‘Wimsey of Balliol stuff? Only, if you remember, what also won that match was Mr Tallboy becoming inspired and throwing straight for the open wicket.’
The Cricket Term by Antonia Forest
Yes, the climax is a cricket match. Yes, it’s as brilliantly written as the cricket match from Murder Must advertise so casually referred by Rowan and Nicola at the start. Yes, it leaves you with a happy smile on your face as all the threads are tied up and the villain gets a wonderfully dismissive final send off. Yes, I wish I had read this when I was “the right age”.
And why didn’t I, I wondered. I actually completely missed out on Antonia Forest when I was a child and I think that’s probably because my mum didn’t read them, so she wasn’t looking out for them to buy for me. The Cricket Term is actually written in the 1970s and didn’t get that many editions. So they didn’t come my way until I started getting deeper into the Girl’s Own genre as an adult. I read one of the holiday Marlows because I picked up a cheap second hand copy of a Girls Gone By edition, then I bought The Autumn Term at my first Book Conference. And it was good – really good, in fact it was a BotW. But they’re still quite hard to get hold of, and I am meant to be controlling myself, so I didn’t pick up this one until Book Conference last summer, and I’ve been saving it because I had heard it was good. And last week I decided I deserved a treat. And oh boy, what a treat.
If you want to read this, you’re probably going to have to have a hunt around for a copy – Amazon‘s prices are frankly insane to the point of suggesting they don’t have any, and Abebooks isn’t much lower, see also Ebay – I am however feeling much better about how much I paid for my copy! Girls Gone By have published an edition too – but theirs is also out of print, so you’re going to need to find a book dealer with a copy – and given that their print runs have decreased in recent years, that may be a hard ask. Good luck…
Happy Reading!
Another busy week, with last minute changes to my plans and all sorts going on. Also several nice meals – some of which I cooked myself! But March marches on and the still reading list has got even longer. But some of them are a lot closer to being finished – that’s why the finished list this week is a little shorter. But I will get there in the end.
Read:
The Nonesuch by Georgette Heyer
The Lady with the Gun Asks the Questions by Kerry Greenwood
Death by Darjeeling by Laura Childs
The Cricket Term by Antonia Forest
Tough Cookie by Diane Mott Davidson
The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels by India Holton
Started:
R in the Month by Nancy Spain
Funny You Should Ask by Elissa Sussman
Still reading:
No Life for a Lady by Hannah Dolby*
The Dress Diary of Mrs Anne Sykes by Kate Strasdin*
Shadows of London by Andrew Taylor*
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
The Empire by Michael Ball*
Travellers in the Third Reich by Julia Boyd
Rogues by Patrick Radden Keefe
The Final Revival of Opal and Nev by Dawnie Walton*
One arrived that I bought the other week, a couple of preorders paid for, and two ebooks!
Bonus photo: I started the week with a night out at the Palladium listening to some of the cast of Neighbours talking about working on the show. You weren’t meant to talks pictures inside so you get this I’m afraid!
*next to a book book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley.
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 