- The Savage Garden by Mark Mills. Have just literally started reading this, think I saw it reviewed on a blog and it sounded good
- Gold by Dan Rhodes I'm a huge Dan Rhodes fan in all his various guises. If you fancy something funny and easy holiday reading try The Little White Car by him written under the name Danuta de Rhodes, it's hilarious. This is a proof copy I found in that great Oxfam shop on Marylebone High St. It's very, very funny.
- Out of Breath by Julie Myerson. She is one very dark lady! Last year The Story of You had me crying on a sunny beach in Sicily while clutching my precious girl to my bosom and Matt asking me why do I insist on reading such heavy going material on holiday? I love Myerson's writing, but there is always a chilling undercurrent linked to children that since becoming a mother I find quite hard to cope with. I swore off her books after Sicily, but obviously not enough to stop my buying this one in hardback. I'm about a third into it. Sleepwalking still remains my favourite book of hers.
- A Novel About my Wife by Emily Perkins. I liked this, it's set in and around where we live and that always draws me in to a book. Lots of unresolved questions for me though around the ending, I think I may have got a bit distracted and missed a bit (the monkey was waking in the night again when I was reading this so don't think I was totally functioning.)
- The Experience of Breastfeeding by Sheila Kitzinger. If only midwives and medical professionals could speak as much common sense as Sheila. Rebecca gave me this because I was considering becoming a breastfeeding counsellor.
- Spiral bound book of baby pictures of Olive. Matt put this together at Christmas time and I love looking at it.
- Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisa Pesel. Now I loved this to begin with. Then it felt a bit too much like A Secret History. Then it just seemed a bit silly. So I started skipping to the end.
- The Cleft by Doris Lessing. Doris, oh Doris, I do love you so. Especially cos you swore when winning the Nobel Prize! I've read most of her books, but The Cleft is not one of my favourites.
It takes Matt such a long time to read anything, as he's usually so shattered he's asleep before his head hits the pillow. Plus he's studying for some regulatory exams at the moment - FSA and derivatives, enough to put anyone to sleep! The book on Mao that is hiding in there has been on hid pile for a number of years now!
While we are talking books I'm looking for some holiday reading suggestions. We are off to France in a few weeks and I'm not sure what to take with me. I ripped out a review of a book Matt will like a thriller by the guy who wrote Kitchen Confidential but I need some goodies for myself. I'd really love some suggestions please. What have you been reading lately that's good, or what's on your wish list for your summer hols?
PS Apologies for not including any links. I can't cut and paste into the links box and the Amazon ones are so long it's tedious to do it manually. Not sure if this is because I use a mac or not.
1 comment:
I can't believe how many books you have on the go at one time. I think I'm showing my lesser intellect that I can only concentrate on one at a time.
Holiday reading - although not a book, I always, always take the latest copy of Vanity Fair - that's the only mag I buy for reading versus browsing. I read one in Byron Bay earlier this year, a real holiday read, not high brow at all, it was at the house we rented - I'll try and find it because as far as holiday reads with children go - snippets, easily picked up, this was good.
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