On Tanabata’s book blog, In Spring it is the Dawn, she challenges her readers every month to do something Japanese. Each mini-challenge has guidelines and January’s was “try something Japanese that you haven’t tried before”, which I did. And it was most certainly an experience…
Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years
by Sue Townsend
Oh, Sue Townsend, you never let me down. I’ve been struggling to read much lately but as soon as I opened this book I was tearing through the pages, laughing out loud and loving reconnecting with the characters that are so familiar they are like extended family…
I come from an active family and I have a health condition that requires me to maintain my fitness so as not to fall to pieces, so it is with great regret that I admit that I am frankly pretty rubbish at doing exercise. I have good intentions but I don’t follow through with them…
David Golder
by Irène Némirovsky
translated from the French by Sandra Smith
This was another book club pick, in fact this one was my choice, so I was pretty nervous before the meeting. I’d chosen it based on Némirovsky’s brilliant final work Suite Française but this was a much earlier novel of her’s, with no guarantee of the same brilliance. What if everyone hated it? Or was bored by it? What if it failed to generate any discussion…
So you might have noticed that this site was down for a few days. I finally decided to abandon my non-WordPress-friendly host and sign up elsewhere. I may have been in too much of a hurry to do this properly…
Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination
by Helen Fielding
This is a bit of a mishmash of a novel, combining hapless heroine, chicklit, rollicking adventure and post-9/11 paranoia. It doesn’t entirely work…
Hunger
by Knut Hamsun
translated from Norwegian by Sverre Lyngstad
A few months back I went along to a new book group at a local pub. I only found out about it a few days beforehand and didn’t even know which book they were discussing, so that was an odd start to the evening but it was a great night. I met some new people, found out more about my adopted city and talked a lot about books. The chosen book turned out to be Hunger, which was already on my TBR, and the discussion about it inspired me to dig it out and give it a try…
