Author Archives
Blogger, theatre goer, nature lover and an avid reader of books.
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BOOK REVIEW: The Extraordinary Life of A A Milne
While The Extraordinary Life of A A Milne will undoubtedly delight fans, it should also appeal to anyone with even a passing interest in the author and his famous teddy bear.
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BOOK REVIEW: The Unrivalled Transcendence of Willem J. Gyle
Writer, James Dixon, has created an offbeat protagonist in Willem Gyle.
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BOOK REVIEW: Love
Love is an intelligent, compassionate, if melancholy tale, which demonstrates what can happen if we become too internalised and fail to be mindful of those we love most.
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BOOK REVIEW: Aphra Behn: A Secret Life
Behn is celebrated for being one of the first English women to earn a living from her pen. She courageously shattered many cultural conventions of her day, while in some ways remaining in step with her times.
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BOOK REVIEW: In Search of Nice Americans
The result of Geoff’s 2016 sabbatical is the light-hearted In Search of Nice Americans, subtitled, Off the Grid, On the Road and State to State in Trump’s America, a disorderly but entertaining drive across the USA.
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BOOK REVIEW: Hortense and the Shadow
A delightful Christmas gift for a young person with a lively imagination.
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BOOK REVIEW: In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley is remembered above all for creating a monster – the grotesque but perceptive creature from her 1818 novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.
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BOOK REVIEW: A Chill in the Air: An Italian War Diary 1939–1940
Iris Origo was known to me as being one of the finest diarists of the 20th century for her moving and compassionate journal detailing Italy’s disastrous involvement in the same conflict.
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BOOK REVIEW: House of Fiction: From Pemberley to Brideshead, Great British Houses in Literature and Life
Phyllis Richardson is the author of several books on architecture and design, and in this, her latest compendium, she writes knowledgeably about the great fictional British houses we have come to know intimately over the last four hundred or so years.
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BOOK REVIEW: The Tattooist of Auschwitz
In late 1942, when Ludwig (Lale) Sokolov passed through the most notorious gates in modern history, he was a healthy, bright, outgoing young man with a penchant for the company of women.
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BOOK REVIEW: Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore
Author Matthew J. Sullivan, a bona fide Denverite, has set his debut novel in the Lower Downtown district of Denver, Colorado, and the City is as much a character in his story as the patrons of the Bright Ideas Bookstore.
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THOUGHTS ON: Novel On Yellow Paper
I rather like Pompey Casmilus, the narrator of this slightly off-kilter stream of consciousness novel.
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BOOK REVIEW: Shooting Stars Are the Flying Fish of the Night
What a fabulous title, was my initial reaction to receiving Shooting Stars are the Flying Fish of the Night from Linen Press.
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THOUGHTS ON: Life After Life
It is difficult to know how to define Life After Life, Kate Atkinson’s 2013 Costa Book Award winning novel.
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THOUGHTS ON: Grimm’s Fairy Stories
Taken from the East European oral tradition, these stories were originally collated and published in Germany by the Brothers Grimm.
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THOUGHTS ON: Zennor in Darkness
The British poet, novelist and children’s writer, Helen Dunmore died of cancer at the age of 64 on 5th June 2017.
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THOUGHTS ON: Nightmare Abbey
Set in a former abbey whose owner is host to an eccentric gathering of visitors.
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THOUGHTS ON: Cat’s Eye
I reflect on Atwood’s 1988 Booker-nominated novel about a controversial artist grappling with the tangled knots of her life.
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THOUGHTS ON: Me Again: Uncollected Writings Of Stevie Smith
Florence Margaret Smith (1902-1971), known to friends and readers as Stevie Smith, was a highly witty English writer, most famous for her perceptive, clever little poems.
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THOUGHTS ON: The Awakening: And Other Stories
This short but impassioned novel, first published at the turn of the 19th century, portrays a new way of thinking; a dissension among the women of North America and Europe, which caused excitement and consternation in equal measures.