Random Jottings

Current reading and recently received

Had. a trip to Cambridge this week. Collected some shoes which the shop would not post to me or let me purchase over the phone. This was something to do with 'data protection' I gather. Don't ask.   Still, I never mind going to Cam even if only for a few hours so I collected my shoes, went to EAST whose clothes I love and bought some stuff for my upcoming cruise - I have never bought so many clothes in my life as I have in the last few months - they will last me for yonks afterwards, and then hied me off to Waterstones where I had a coffee. And looked at some books. And bought a couple. Natch.

When I came back my lovely postman had left a note for me that he had left packages in my cupboard which harbours my electricity meter and he often leaves stuff in there for me. Knows me well now with all the parcels he delivers. So I collected them and decided to post today about the books I have awaiting my attention. I like to do this as I am not sure when I will get round to reading all of them and feel that as they have been sent to me, I should flag them up.

Here we go.

The Red Ribbon by Lucy Adlington. I have started reading this and know that I am going to find it difficult. Not because it is badly written, au contraire, but because of its setting. Fourteen year old Ella is a prisoner at Auschwitz and she is a dressmaker. No ordinary workshop for her. Every day is a fight for survival as she tries to forget the horrors surrounding her as she works amongst fabrics, silks and sewing thread.

Published 21 September

Train to Nowhere by Anita Leslie, a war memoir. Anita was the daughter and cousin on WInston Churchill and the joined the Transport Corp as a fully trained mechanic and ambulance driver during WWII. She served in Libya, Syria, Palestine, Italy France and Germany.

First published in 1948 and now republished by Bloomsbury 24 August. looking forward to reading this.

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell sounds a tad creepy featuring a locked room containing a 200 year old diary hinting and the house's dark past.   Got to get stuck into this one as Laura, who I discover, lives in Colchester is giving a chat at our Waterstones in a week or so and I would like to turn up and ask intelligent questions.

No comments at the back please....

Publication date 5 October 2017

Land of Plenty by Charlie Pye-Smith is flagged as a Journey through the Fields & Foods of Modern Britain. The author has travelled around the UK visiting indoor dairy units producing millions of litres (what is wrong with pints I ask myself??) to small old fashioned farms making cheese with twenty or thirty cows. I have been dipping into this with great enjoyment as apart from being really interesting, it is a rather lovely book, with that smooth paper that makes you want to stroke it and packed full of photographs. This is already published on 27 July and I think you will love it.

John Suchet - Verdi. Another gorgeous book which is eminently strokeable with stacks of great pictures and illustrations. I adore Verdi's music, my neighbours have, over the years, had to listen to me singing O Patria Mia from Aida in the bath and the Drinking Song from Act one of La Traviata amongst other gems. They are very forgiving as they also have to listen to me yelling and shrieking when Wimbledon is on and last Saturday when the John Wilson Prom of Oklahoma was on telly, had to suffer my rendition of Oh What a Beautiful Morning.

I digress. Last year I read John's book on the Strauss family, another lavishly illustrated (love that word lavish) tome and just so interesting and so easy to read. I always listen to John on Classic FM, he is one of their best presenters and he loves Beethoven as well so no further recommendation is needed.  Publication date 5 September

The Mistresses of Cliveden - Natalie Livingstone. I have already read this but did not have a copy but now have courtesy of the Literary Festival at Cliveden committee. You will remember if you have read my post here that I recently attended a superb tea and visit to discuss the book festival and we all came away with this book. A wonderful read and I highly recommend it. It led me on to reading more about Nancy Astor, not a lady I am sure I would like to share a cup of tea with, but fascinating and formidable. Now available in paperback.

I am not discussing every single book in this heap but simply have to mention this one which I have already gloated over. A Week on the Broads - Four Victorian gents at sail on a Norfolk gaffer in 1889 by S K Baker. The author was a keen diarist and artist and recorded their travels in watercolour. Just look at this delightful book, I mean just look at it. How can you resist? Already published and available

This is published as a facsimile and I shall be reviewing in more detail later as I know I am going to love it.

So a few for you and me to be getting on with.

Go on and buy and order

You know it makes sense....

2015 Reading and Random Book of the Year

Finally able to spend some time on writing a post. I have had a difficult time recently and then Christmas took over and I am currently at home trying to regain some peace of mind and have a rest.   I am sorry that Random has had to take a back seat but my brain was so scrambled I needed to leave you on your own for a bit. Anyway, I am now hoping to get back to some kind of normality and to that end have gone through my reading list to choose my books of the year.

They are in no particular order. Where there is a link to a review I have inserted it - hopefully the links will work though in my current state there is no guarantee...

A War of Flowers - Jane Thynne. Set in pre-war Berlin this series about a British actress spy in the heart of the  High Command gets better and better

Sophie and the Sibyl - Patricia Duncker. Stunning book about George Eliot. I was lucky enough to attend a talk given by the author at Bloomsbury and to meet her. She was great.

Death of Anton and Quick Curtain - Alan Melville. Two from the wonderful British Library Classic Crime series. Both witty and amusing and great fun.

Crooked House - Agatha Christie. I re-read a lot of Dame A this year and this title is, in my opinion, one of her best. It is stand alone, no Hercule or Miss Marple and it has a chilling ending.

After the Fire - Jane Casey, Latest in the Maeve Kerrigan police series. After a slow start this series gets more and more compulsive. Excellent stuff with a real male chauvinistic pig of a police officer who has a soft heart underneath it all and is totally sexy and gorgeous.

Watchmaker of Filigree Street - Natasha Pulley. A magical book. Another winner from Bloomsbury.

The Last Waltz - the Strauss Dynasty by John Suchet.  Loved this book. A big glossy glam book which not only looks good but is beautifully written by one of my favourite Classic FM presenters.

London War Notes - Mollie Panter Downes. Published by Persephone and a must for everyone who has read her One Fine Day. Wonderfully captivating and full of the daily minutiae of life during the war. Full of pathos, bravery and wit.

Road to Little Dribbling - Bill Bryson. Another journey through Great Britain twenty years after Notes from a Small Island. I read this with tears of laughter streaming down my face and had to have regular breaks to allow my ribs to recover and stop aching. Priceless.

Charlotte Bronte - Claire Harman. Do we need another biography of Charlotte was my reaction to this title. Well, as an avid Bronte Maniac I can assure you that this is a simply terrific book to add to the long list of those written about this endlessly fascinating family. I have not had time to review this fully but take it from me, it is wonderful and reinforces my view that Emily was a selfish pain in the butt Anne is still shamefully underrated and Charlotte must have been a very difficult employee indeed.

Mistresses of Cliveden - Natalie Livingstone. I am currently reading this but am adding it to this list as it is hugely enjoyable and totally readable. I will write more in the New Year but this is social history at its most intriguing.

The Carey family novels by Ronald Welch. I read all of these as a teenager and was delighted when Slightly Foxed decided to reprint the entire series. It is ongoing and I have them all and reading my way through them. I am putting them here on my list of Books of the Year as they are a must purchase. The story of the Carey family starting with the Crusades and coming up to the First World War.  Go and order the lot. I have spoken.

AND my book of the year for 2015 is a clear winner. The Golden Age of Murder by Martin Edwards. A simply marvellous exploration of the lives of the authors who churned out an endless stream of murder and mystery books in the 1930s. We have all heard of Christie, Sayers, Marsh and those well known names but Martin Edwards in what is obviously a labour of love, brings lesser known and forgotten authors back to our attention. I loved every word of it and am simply delighted to say that Martin will be speaking about this title at the Felixstowe Book Festival in 2016, alongside Rob Davies from the British Library who is responsible for their Classic Crime series of titles. An event not to be missed by all crime aficionados.

Before I close I have to mention the reissue of several adult titles by Richmal Crompton. These are e-books published by Bello, the eprint arm of Pan Macmillan. Engrossing, immensely readable and highly recommended by me. Tracking down books by Richmal Crompton has always been difficult, I have about thirty old battered editions I have found in various second hand bookshops over the years, but they are expensive and some of them have been elusive to say the least. So thrilled to bits that Bello has produced several and will be doing more in the future. Do keep an eye out for them.

In between these books listed I have read loads of other brilliant books and fun books and sloppy books and some downright awful books (yes James Patterson I am referring to you) and have enjoyed them all in varying degrees.

I already have my eye on various titles due to be published next year and pre-orders in and grovelling emails to publishers sent. Lots to look forward to.

Hope to be back before the year ends but as I am hoping to fit in a visit to Star Wars in the next day or so, I am making no promises.

May the Reading Force be with you.

 

The Last Waltz - John Suchet

My favourite broadcaster on Classic FM is John Suchet. I find he has a light touch and a non-intrusive manner and, even more importantly as far as I am concerned, he gives the ending of a piece of music the grace of a few seconds silence before he makes any comment. There are various other presenters on Classic FM who would do well to do the same...

I have found over the last year or so that I listen to John a lot when I am driving along the North Circular to see my grandchildren. Colney Hatch, Henley's Corner, Neasden, all these glories are helped by listening to his programme in the morning and, when I have been stuck in a traffic jam, his mellifluous tones calm me down. 

Another reason for being fond of John is his love of Beethoven. If I was told that I could only listen to one composer for the rest of my life then Beethoven would be the one so I feel a kinship with him as I listen along.

Now he has written this lovely book, The Last Waltz, The Strauss Dynasty and Vienna, and when my friendly postman dropped it off last week, I sat down and started it immediately even though I was still in my dressing gown and hobbling round trying to get my dysfunctional leg on the move. Cup of tea to hand and I was off.

I remember years ago being enchanted by a TV series on the Strauss family, I think it was back in the seventies, and all I can recall of it now was a scene in which a young girl in a white dress with hair in ringlets waltzed on her own in front of Johann Strauss the Elder and he fell in love with her. Romantic at the time but when I read about this domestic life and that of his son, you soon realise that it wasn't all waltzes and whipped cream.

But oh how I love Vienna and anything to do with it. It is a city I simply have to get to see and there seems to be an air of enchantment about it that my soul responds to. I am pretty sure that it is not all Strauss and coffee houses but its history is fascinating. When I was a teenager I read The Lonely Empress by Joan Haslip and thought Empress Elizabeth was hard done to and married to an overbearing Emperor. Of course, I now know differently. I also realise that much though I loved the film Mayerling, with my pin up Omar Sharif as Rudolf the Emperor's son, it was total fantasy but overall it added to this glorious picture in my mind.

If you want to read all about the political history of Austria at this time, there are plenty of resources, if you wish to read about the Strauss family, also easy but this book marries the two so we have the life and career of the Strauss family put into a historical context.  It makes for engaging reading and the narrative style is very beguiling and draws the reader in very quickly.  I could not put this down once I had started it and, with a bad leg as the perfect excuse, spent an entire morning in the company of Johann the Elder, Johann the Younger, Josef and Eduard.

I was totally appalled to find out that in 1907 Eduard Strauss, who had made enquiries of oven manufacturers and incinerator plants in Vienna, transported several hundred kilos of waste paper which he wanted to get rid of. The factory owner, on looking at the papers, noted that it was manuscript paper covered in staves and musical notes and knew that he was looking at compositions of the famous Strauss family. When he raised the matter with Eduard asking is he had made a mistake, Eduard assured him this was indeed the paper he wanted burned. It took five hours to incinerate it all and Eduard stayed and watched it be destroyed.

He said that it was to prevent the papers falling into the hands of unscrupulous persons who might try to pass the works off as their own but I am not sure that this can be the real reason. Thousands of letters, articles and compositions all destroyed. Too awful to contemplate.

While reading this book and indeed, while writing this post, I am listening to Strauss. I never ever tire of hearing the music no matter how many times I listen. Some composers I have to have a rest from every now and then as they can get a bit too much, but never Strauss. The Blue Danube, Tales from the Vienna Woods, Emperor Waltz, Music of the Spheres, so many favourites.

As many of you know, I adore Wagner's music and was delighted to see the following quote from him re Strauss:

"A single Strauss waltz, as far as gracefulness, refinement and musical contents is concerned, towers above the majority of the often laboriously procured foreign-produced creations"

This book, as well as being immensely readable, entertaining and beautifully written, is also beautifully produced. The paper is of a high quality, the kind that you want to stroke, the illustrations are superb and the layout of the whole book is a joy. 

I loved it.

And a final word from Andre Rieu, when asked what is it about the music of Johann Strauss that beguiles and bewitches - his response "Simple" he said "Strauss makes you happy"

And so does this book.