Random Jottings

Last day of the Year

Time for a sit down, a think and a round up of the year.  Glad to see the back of 2010 as have just rounded it off by attending my Auntie Kit's funeral at Brighton yesterday.  Drive down was in freezing fog, three sets of road works on M25 and an accident on M23 so by the time I arrived I was feeling fraught. Whole day was a horrid one as two ladies who had rather taken over my aunt and her life, also tried to take over the funeral and relegate my sister and I to the fringe of it all, as they greeted everyone and acted as chief mourners.   Their behaviour was unbecoming and pushy but I just smiled and smiled and was so polite and charming that I could not believe I was doing it. But as my brother in law pointed out, they had been good to my aunt and we did not have to see them after today, so I got through it all.

Glad to be at home and in the warm on a grey raw day and looking forward to 2011.  Kathryn has just sent me a picture of her at Sydney Harbour watching the fireworks and seeing in the New Year and it will not be long now before I am there and I am so looking forward to it though a tad nervous about all the travelling.

I have already listed my books and Book of the Year so this post is really a rambly one just cogitating on my reads of 2010.  I have read a lot of detective/thrillers  as I find them a soothing read and have not felt able to take on anything too heavy with all the emotional turmoil going on around me.  I have discovered many new authors in this genre and intend to continue reading more in 2011.  I appear to have read about 250 books but as I have also been reading some chicklit and Mills & Boon as well which I have not listed, I reckon there are about another 25 or so which could be listed, but I have forgotten their titles, many of them were so unmemorable.....

Still they helped pass an hour or two and made me relax for which I am grateful.

Most of my reading is fiction but I do like biography and history and this year have managed to read 25 or so non-fiction, among them the final journals of L M Montgomery which make heartbreaking reading, and a biography of Louisa May Alcott which made my top ten.  I have quite a few non-fiction tomes on my shelves which have been sitting there for a bit so perhaps I might try and read some of them this year.

BUT I have no particular reading plans or patterns lined up. I just dip in and out and read whatever comes my way.  One thing, however, I have decided I will try and do and that is to read more Anthony Trollope in 2011.  I re-read most of the Barchester Chronicles in 2010 and loved them all over again and this time I think I am going to try and read some of his earlier works, all of which I have on my shelves and see how I get on.  But that is the only target I am going to set myself.

As I said I am sitting indoor on this cold, bleak day with the curtains drawn and lamps on and feeling comfortable and warm.  I have a pile of new books awaiting my attention and Radio 3 is just broadcasting a performance of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis which I regard as the greatest choral work ever written so I am feeling content.

I have a lot to be grateful for, my health and a wonderful family and, not least, all of my lovely friends who I have made through Random Jottings.  Every year that passes I reap more and more enjoyment and satisfaction from posting here and the support you have all given me through this rather emotional year has been simply overwhelming.

I end 2010 on Random by saying thank you all and I wish everyone a simply marvellous and Happy New Year

xxxx

General Ramblings

I hope everyone had a good Christmas and are managing to avoid the lurgy which seems to be doing the rounds, comprising of sore throat, swollen glands, hacking cough and general feeling of wanting to lie down and do nothing (perhaps the last symptom is one's usual outlook so ignore that one), and managed to survive the festivities.

Drove up to London on Christmas Day. Freezing fog most of the way so lights on and drive carefully and watch, with my usual bewilderment, as cars shot past me at the speed of light and being impatient and cutting me up.  No need for this at all as the roads were practically empty and doing a ton past a little red Nissan Micra was a total waste of time.  Ah well.

This was the first Christmas without my mother, the first Christmas without my daughter Kathryn but the first Christmas with Florence which made up for it and she was a joy, as always.  She seemed to genuinely be interested in all her toys, but homed in on the smallest and cheapest one there - a pair of maracas which she waved about with gay abandon, nearly knocking my eye out at one stage.  She also enjoyed playing with the wrapping paper...

Helen and James gave me a Kindle for Christmas which was exactly what I wanted for my trip to Australia and was thrilled to bits when I opened it up.  Loads of articles in worthy newspapers about the ebook v the paper book and I cannot understand why this sort of journalism gets people het up.  Surely one will not replace the other, there is no compulsion to buy an ereader if you don't want one and the two can live together quite happily side by side.  The joy of opening the pages of a book will always be my main love but nothing wrong with the Kindle being employed where it is most convenient and useful.

On the way back from London I dropped into PC World and came out with a little notepad, another piece of technology which is coming with me to Australia as I intend to post and blog about my journey while I am out there.  No, you are getting no relief from Random - didn't think you were going to get away from it did you?

I have just been watching the cricket highlights from Melbourne so can now go to bed a happy woman but just wanted to drop by to let you all know that I will be absent for most of the week as I have my lovely Auntie Kit's funeral to attend in Brighton. I will be back on New Year's Eve to wish you all a Happy 2011.

Au reservoir

 

Merry Christmas

May I wish all readers and visitors to Random Jottings a wonderful and joyous Christmas.  I will be spending the day with my family and will be with Florence for her first Christmas which will be wonderful, but also will be tinged with sadness at the absence of loved ones who cannot be with us.  We shall raise a glass in their memory and hugging my granddaughter will fill me with happiness.  My thanks to all you lovely people out there who have helped me so much this year.

God Bless us every one!

xxxxx

Round up and Book of the Year on Random

As you will have noticed I have got through shed loads of thrillers and detective novels this year.  I am not a lover of Booker/Orange/Costa lists et al as I usually find when I look at them that I wish to instantly rename them List of Books I have No Intention of Reading.  Call me shortsighted if you wish, many have already done so, but I am old enough now to know my reading preferences and habits and though I have tried to expand my reading since the birth of Random, I am not sure I have succeeded entirely though I now tend to try more books in different genres than I used to.

Sounds an oxymoron to call thrillers relaxing reading but I find they are and this year I have had no mental strength left over to cope with deep analysis and contemplating what I call 'worthy' books.  It has been a very emotional twelve months, starting joyously with the birth of my utterly beguiling and hearbreakinglgy gorgeous Florence, but since then my darling mum left us, Kathryn departed to Australia and then my lovely Auntie Kit has gone and I will be attending her funeral next week.  I just feel I have been beaten about the head and am still feeling somewhat fragile and prone to bouts of tears, one of which I had this morning after I received an email from Kathryn about the timing of the Christmas Day phone call. It struck me that this is the first time in her, and my, life that neither she nor my mum will be here and it just set me off big time.   Luckily I was visiting a friend for coffee and I wept all over her and then I went to another friend for lunch and wept all over her and having flooded Colchester am now home and feeling a tad better.

ENOUGH of this rambling and wittering and back to the subject - because I have been writing about thrillers publishers seem to have cottoned onto this and I have started receiving parcels of detective/spy novels which plop through my letter box on regular basis.  Shows that blogs are read and noticed as on a couple of occasions I have mentioned a title which sounds good and lo and behold it turns up a few days later. BIG thanks all round.

I have discovered Peter James (quite by accident as I thought I had brought home a PD James) and am now working my way through them. Set in Brighton, a town I know well, which adds to the enjoyment. Discovered Tess Gerritsen - her stand alone books are more romantic thrillers and fun, but the Rizzioli and Isles series are the real deal and am loving them.   I was sent a Janet Evanovitch Stephanie Plum book back in the spring. Knew nothing of these and after reading Sizzling Sixteen and weeping with laughter throughout, I then went on a Plum Binge and read them all. Wonderful.

Lots of Reginald HIll, more Donna Leon and Camilleri, discovered Wallender and other Nordic crime fiction, have also read some crap which was sent to me but will not disclose names of same, Simon Hall and his TV detective carry on getting better and better and in between all this I have re-read some Christie, lots of Ngaio Marsh and of course, the utterly wonderful DL Sayers.

So my book of the year this year, streets ahead of all other contenders by dint of it pinning me to the sofa one afternoon from whence I did not move until read, is AMERICAN DEVIL by OLIVER STARK.  A debut crime novel and one of the best first books I can recall reading.  A second in the series is due out in the spring and I simply cannot wait.  If you are a lover of well written, tightly plotted, thrilling and breathlessly tense thrillers then this one is for you. Quite wonderful.  So thank you for that Oliver and look forward to my review copy of next title.......'hint' 'hint'

Most of my reading is fiction but have managed to read quite a lot of non-fiction as well and will be writing about that in the New Year. Some of them have made my Books of the Year list and my non-fiction choice has to be the heartbreaking but totally absorbing Journals of L M Montgomery, creator of Anne of Green Gables.  

Will drop in tomorrow but then will be taking a Christmas Blog Break.

Night everyone.

The 12 Books of christmas - Telegraph

1 The gospels according to St Luke and St John, Authorised King James Version

via www.telegraph.co.uk

This is a gorgeous article and had to pass it on. Christmas = Books for me as well. Always used to get the School Friend annual each year and the latest Enid Blyton. I remember the year I was given a copy of Ballet Shoes and oh how I loved it and how I wanted to be Pauline (never Posy thought she was too full of herself). Every Christmas I always make sure I have a book saved especially for the holiday season no matter what. And this year I am taking a boxful of books to London for my darling Florence.

Some of these are books she will enjoy in the next few years, others such as The Secret Garden and Wind in the Willows will await her pleasure and mine as I will want to read them to her.

To paraphrase the opening of Little Women 'Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without any books'...

Random Jottings - Books of the Year (2)

OK next tranche coming up. Again, in no particular order.

1. Mrs Harris goes to Paris - Paul Gallico.  Another gorgeous reprint from Bloomsbury. Delightful book, warm hearted but with an underlying sadness.  Be warned - do NOT buy the DVD of the film. I did. It is awful. Angela Lansbury in cheeky cockney mode and Omar Shariff phoning in a performance. Has now gone to a charity shop.
2. Maestro's Voice - Roland Vernon. This was right up my alley.   Opera setting and the tenor bears a more than passing resemblance to Caruso. 
3. The Strange Case of the Composer and his Judge - Patricia Duncker.  A slightly weird, creepy off the wall book which really grabbed me. Beautiful writing.
4. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand - Helen Simonson.  Copy came from publishers complete with a packet of Darjeeling tea and a packet of shortcake biscuits.  The perfect accompaniment to this delightful book.
5. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy and Smiley's People - John le Carre.   Only read these this year as I realised that though I knew the story inside out, I had never read the books.  So this was remedied and they are quite quite brilliant.  Ditto the Perfect Spy which I also read after borrowing the DVD from my daughter. Peter Egan in this - a stunningly good performance.
6. American Devil - Oliver Stark.   One of the best debut thriller novels I have ever read. I have raved about this, interviewed the author here and here and given away copies courtesy of the publisher and Oliver and have done my best to spread the word.   When the paperback edition of it arrived I was thrilled beyond words to find I was quoted inside.
7. The Diaries of Duff Cooper edited by John Julius Norwich.  Totally fascinating light shed on the times of Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson.  Duff was right in the heart of it all and did not miss a nuance. This review is in a round up with a few other titles so you will need to scroll down the page a little
8. Louisa May Alcott - Harriet Reisen.   Brilliant biography of one of my favourite authors.  By the time I finished reading this if Bronson Alcott had been alive I would have murdered him.  Another idealist, quite happy to use his family to support him while he swanned around full of himself and...but I must not start.   .
9. My Life in France by Julia Childs.  Read as an antidote to the utterly ghastly and self obsessed Julie and Julia about which I can say nothing good.  They are both reviewed together and was so glad to see all the comments on this one
10. The Journals of Lucy Maud Montgomery.   I have been reading this off and on for the last three years but 2010 was the year I read the last three right the way through.  Heartbreaking reading and a must read for anyone who is interested in this author.

Summing up of my reading year coming up next plus my choice for Random's Book of the Year.

Random Jottings - Books of the Year (1)

Have had time to think about this list as I have spent the last few days in bed with hacking cough and sore throat and now that I am back in the land of the living, decided it was time to get myself going again even if Random Towers is snowed in, which it is.  I have just watched a neighbour park his car and it took him about twenty minutes of slipping and sliding before he managed it.  Don't think I will be venturing forth for a bit.

So, here we go.  My books of the year are those I have enjoyed the most in varying ways. They have to keep me pinned to my seat, give me hours of sheer reading pleasure and just grab me.  There is no critical analysis here, no deep thoughts on motivation, no stream of consciousness, no high falutin' descriptions - not that you ever get that anyway, but just thought I would make that clear....

I am spreading my thoughts out over a few days as I am still feeling a tad wobbly and not sure my woolly brain can encompass all my choices in the next hour or so.  I will link each title to my review, fingers crossed that it works.   These are in NO particular order at all.

1. The Woodcutter - Reginald Hill.   A stand alone book by this author, not part of the Dalziel and Pascoe series and quite quite brilliant.
2. Mr Rosenblum's List - Natasha Solomons.  A quite delightful book. Sags slightly in the middle but heartwarming and has that feel-good factor.
3. Tapestry of Love - Rosie Thornton.  The sort of book that makes the reader want to abandon everything and go and live abroad and live off the land and weave and potter until you realise, or I do anyway, that I would be useless at this kind of life as I like my creature comforts.  Happy to read about it though.
4. The Whicharts - Noel Streatfield.  Her first novel, now happily back in print, and a must for all lovers of htis author and, in particular, Ballet Shoes as this book was obviously recylced later on by Noel Streatfield, only the characters in this version are a little bit naughtier than Pauline, Posy and Petrova and their lives not as clear cut as in the later book. 
5. Butterfly's Shadow - Lee Langley.  So what happened after Puccini left us all with Madame Butterfly committing suicide and the dastardly Pinkerton taking his son back to the US with his American wife?    The author took up this idea and gives us a fascinating read.
6. The Wasteland - Simon Acland.  A first novel by this author, enormous fun as well as a serious historical novel about life in the Crusades.   A second is planned and I am looking forward to it already.
7. Henrietta Sees it Through - Joyce Dennys.  One of the books republished by the Bloomsbury Group and a follow up to Henrietta's War.   Sheer delight from start to finish, funny and sad and witty. Please note that this review was prior to its reprinting - I had purchased an old copy via the internet but my comments are, naturally, the same.
8. The War Workers - EM Delafield.   An imprint available through Amazon (oh bless their name) of one of EMD's earlier novels.   Lovers of Diary of a Provincial Lady, of which I am most definitely one, will recognise characteristics and behaviour of some of the protagonists some of which are very similar to The Provincial Lady goes to War.   EMD has an eye for human foibles and conceits and is quite merciless.
9. My Last Duchess - Daisy Goodwin.  Simply loved this book, a great chocolate box lush read.  Anyone who has read The Shuttle by FH Burnett or the Buccaneers by Edith Wharton will recognise the Edwardian scenario of American heiresses arriving in search of a title.
10. Evil on the Wind - Diney Costeloe.  Had to psych myself up to read this one as it is set in WW2 and tells of the awful trials and tribulations of the Jews in Germany, a subject I always find deeply disturbing to see or read about.  A fine book.

OK more to come but that is it for today.

A message to you, Judi Dench

Both the glory and the sadness of stage acting is that it is so ephemeral. Great paintings last for centuries, great books will always be there to be read, great musical performances have been recorded for almost a century. With theatre, however, a great stage performance has gone for good once a show closes, unless it has been filmed – and that is a recent and still relatively rare phenomenon, and no video recording can quite do justice to the “liveness” of theatrical performance.

via www.telegraph.co.uk

The greatest stage actor ever according to a poll run by the actor's newspaper Stage. Not arguing with No 1, Dame Judi and am also delighted to see the peerless Dame Maggie as No. 2

Grand Dames - Redux

Three years ago I posted about my mother and my Auntie Kit and headed the post Grand Dames because that is what they were. Link to this earlier piece is here.

As you know my lovely mother died earlier this year and now, last week, I received a call to say that Auntie Kit had also left us.  I am beginning to feel that 2010 is fated and, apart from the shining light that is the arrival of my darling Florence, it has been a horrid one.  I am very much looking forward to 2011, the continuing joy of watching Florence grow (she is now crawling and oh my goodness we are going to have to watch her now), and visiting Australia and spending time with Kathryn. 

A few weeks ago I was staying with a friend in Horley and one morning drove to Brighton to see Auntie Kit.  We had a simply lovely visit, we were helpless with laughter as always, she saw photos and videos of Florence and it was wonderful to be with her.  If the snow had fallen a week earlier I would not have paid my visit and I would have missed seeing her for the last time.  I cannot help but feel that God was watching.

Today I have cancelled what must be my fifth or sixth visit to London for various reasons - today is because I am in bed with sore throat, hacking cough and headache and here I am going to stay.  If Richard Armitage turned up on my doorstep and professed undying love for me I would probably shut the door in his face the way I feel at the moment.   The smell of Vick might put him off as well!

So to distract me, I am here with laptop and am going to start thinking about my Books of the Year and also rejoicing at the thought that my mum, Auntie Kit and Uncle Tim (who had the most wonderful marriage) are all together somewhere and are going to have a cracking good Christmas.....

Recent Arrivals

I had a sort through my TBR pile today deciding what to read next and what looked interesting and also pulled out some that I know I am never going to read as I have read a few pages and know they are not for me.  I am a little more circumspect about this than  I used to be as I have come dangerously close to missing a humdinger because I have discarded too soon, but there were a few that I just knew would have to go and they have been put to one side.

Still have a lot to go and here are the titles lined up for the next couple of weeks:

A Noble Killing by Barbara Nadal.  A thriller set in Istanbul and featuring Inspector Cetin Ikmen.  I know nothing about this author or her detective but as it comes from Headline who sent me American Devil this year which is a simply terrific book, this is going to be well worth reading so looking forward to that one,

Love Always - Harriet Evans.   Read a book by this author when on holiday one year, had been left behind by another visitor to the hotel and I picked it up, started to read and found I was really enjoying it.  The cover was the usual pastel pink/lilac/green colour with stick people on the front and I normally pass these by (with exception of Katie Fforde who I love), but glad I found this one as Harriet Evans has an engaging style.

The Oracle of Stamboul - Michael David Lukas. A debut novel set in the final days of the Ottoman empire and seen through the eyes of a little girl, Eleonora Cohen.  Sounds interesting and such a gorgeous cover too.

The Pink Hotel - Anna Stothard.  A seventeen year old girl flies to Los Angeles for the funeral of her mother Lily from whom she was separated in childhood.  She spends her summer travellilng around Los Angeles in a bid to track down the men who knew her mother.

An Object of Beauty - Steve Martin. I only know Steve Martin from the movies, but knew he wrote novels so was pleased to be sent this title and I shall be intrigued to see what I make of it.  Seems to be set in the New York art scene so lots of double crossing I am sure.

A Discovery of WItches - Deborah Harkness.   The blurb says 'prepare to be mesmerised, beguiled and spellbound. You are about to enter an extraordinary book; a fantasy world of breathtaking imagination where history, science, magic and romance are woven into an intoxicating tale'.    Ooo-er missus.  Sounds good!

And finally, those lovely people at OUP who always send me lovely books, have just sent me a new edition of Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson, complete with the original wood engravings.  This is the kind of book you just want to stroke, the paper is so beautiful and the wood engravings sheer delight.  I read this many moons ago and will thoroughly enjoy reacquainting myself with it once more.  If you have seen the sanitised, mud free TV version you will have to forget this when reading the book.  The resemblance between the two is very faint indeed.  

So enough to keep me going for a bit methinks.....