What's On Your 2020 Bookshelf?

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  • Two questions (perhaps worthy of a separate thread(s) so I apologise in advance):
    1) I was looking for it yesterday, and couldn't find it... my copy of Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year. Must be in storage. Has anyone else been moved to (re-)read it in The Current Situation?
    2) I was having a conversation with a friend over pints (pre-plague shutdown) recently and we were singing the praises of the novella, and why it should be more popular than it is. The first one I read was Alexei Tolstoi's The Vampire. I haven't read it in decades, but in retrospect it was the perfect form for the intentions. Thoughts?
  • finelinefineline Kerygmania Host, 8th Day Host
    Certainly Journal of a Plague Year has popped into my head as something that might be interesting to reread now - I believe it's on Project Gutenberg, so would be easy to put onto your ereader, if you have one.

    I haven't read The Vampire, but I enjoy and read a lot of novellas.

    I'm currently reading Linda Grant's novel The Dark Circle, which feels somewhat relevant to these times - set post WWII, when the NHS was new, and about 19-year-old working class twins who contract tuberculosis, and get sent to a sanatorium in Kent, where all other patients are of a much higher social class, and the working class are seen as parasites for getting free health care. And the twins are also incredibly bored and feel very confined in this sanatorium, as they are used to a colourful, busy life in London.
  • I’m currently rereading Wolf Hall, I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed it first time round.
    Kid A bought me the Mirror and the Light for Mother’s Day, so I thought I might as well start again at the beginning of the trilogy. It’s not like we’ve got much else to do....
  • Now that I've discovered Aliette de Bodard I am intrigued by her. Both the Palace and the Tea Master were disconcertingly alien to me (which is good in sf) but I wondered if this was because she was using concepts from Vietnamese culture, that I'm not familiar with.

    On the other hand, her name doesn't suggest she is Vietnamese, nor do the names of all the people she thanks for helping her. She works in Paris but, even though Vietnam used to be a French colony, that isn't enough to make her an expert. How do others react to her?
  • TrudyTrudy Heaven Host, 8th Day Host
    I’m currently rereading Wolf Hall, I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed it first time round.
    Kid A bought me the Mirror and the Light for Mother’s Day, so I thought I might as well start again at the beginning of the trilogy. It’s not like we’ve got much else to do....

    I did this, and was really glad that Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies were fresh in my mind when I read The Mirror and the Light.
  • Now that I've discovered Aliette de Bodard I am intrigued by her. Both the Palace and the Tea Master were disconcertingly alien to me (which is good in sf) but I wondered if this was because she was using concepts from Vietnamese culture, that I'm not familiar with.

    On the other hand, her name doesn't suggest she is Vietnamese, nor do the names of all the people she thanks for helping her. She works in Paris but, even though Vietnam used to be a French colony, that isn't enough to make her an expert. How do others react to her?

    She's Vietnamese, by heritage if not by citizenship. You might want to look at her website to find some of her short stories, which are many of them available online for free. They are a bit more accessible, I think.

    Names don't really tell you a whole lot about ethnicity with Vietnamese. Most of the Vietnamese I know, even first generation, use "American" names at least part of the time. My husband is a rare refuser--his attitude is "You'll either learn to like my name or lump it." But I think a lot of folks get tired of having to spell it out and pronounce it for people--especially since the Vietnamese use of the Roman alphabet is about as weird interesting as Welsh.
  • As always, very helpful @Lamb Chopped. Thank you.
  • EigonEigon Shipmate
    Jane R - I enjoyed Zen Cho's Sorcerer to the Crown as well. Another author I've enjoyed is Jeannette Ng - Under the Pendulum Sun is very good.
  • CaissaCaissa Shipmate
    I am in the middle of reading 2084. It is a bit of an homage to 1984.

    https://www.europaeditions.com/book/9781609453664/2084-the-end-of-the-world
  • Now reading Ursula Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness. I find the world-building interesting, although I'm not sure that I'm following the plot particularly well. I'm not a regular reader of SF, although I kind of like the idea of it, if that makes sense?
  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    I just started the N K Jemisin new book, The City We Became. It's about New York City becoming alive, and the avatars of the five boros must defeat the evil forces seeking to prevent it.
  • A combination of earlier convalescence and now lockdown has led me back to hard-copy reading with a vengeance.
    Most recently in non-fiction I have devoured a massive memoir by Kerry O'Brien, one of Australia's most tenacious political journalists, followed by The Lost Pianos of Siberia by Sophy Roberts, which was eminently readable, and now launching into Jewish ANZACs by Mark Dapin.
    On the fiction side Gary Bell's crime novel Beyond Reasonable Doubt was the first in the recent reads, followed by Book of Colours by Robyn Cadwallader, a historical novel on the theme of the art of illumination in the turbulent years of Edward II. Beside the bed at the moment is Platform Seven by Louise Doughty, which seems to be developing into a modern-day ghost story.
    I still have a massive pile of to-be-reads, so continuing lockdown may have its advantages.
  • @Barnabas62, the list of books I want to read never gets any shorter!
  • Currently I'm rereading the Little Women quartet, which I haven't touched for decades. Rather to my surprise the second book, Good Wives, seems to me to stand head and shoulders above the rest, although the first book is the famous one. They're all good fun though.

    Also, there are various episodes I remember that are missing from this version. (At least, I think there are. I haven't got my childhood copy any longer.) Do different texts exist?
  • AravisAravis Shipmate
    There are a lot of abridged versions of Little Women and Good Wives (in the US, GW is simply part 2 of LW).
    Little Men deserves to be better known; it has some extraordinarily innovative ideas for its time.
    The main French translation of LW is significantly different from the original. The translator didn’t approve of Mr March being a chaplain in the war and decided he was a doctor instead; the book is actually renamed “Les quatre filles du docteur March”. It also made Laurie more conventionally masculine.
  • Robert ArminRobert Armin Shipmate
    edited April 2020
    If what I've got is an abridged version I wish Kindle had made that clear! What I want is the complete text (with any book).

    And Little Men, even more so Jo's Boys, seem to stray into wish fulfillment to me. LW2/GW largely avoids that.
  • EigonEigon Shipmate
    I've moved on to How Long 'til Black Future Month, short stories by NK Jemisin. The first one is an answer to Ursula Le Guin's famous story The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas - this one is called The Ones Who Stay and Fight. The second story in the collection is The City Born Great, which may be an origin of The City We Became.
    I also noticed that the extras in the back include the beginning of Rosewater by Tade Thompson. He was going to be a Guest of Honour at EasterCon this year, and his Rosewater series has been nominated for the Hugos - something to go on my wanted list, I think.
  • I have been meaning to reread Little Women for a couple of years, and all the more so since watching the recent film, which I loved, but suspect would have failed to understand if I'd not read the book. I've never read Little Men or Jo's Boys, but do intend to at some point. I suppose they are probably accessible online now. I also have a copy of March by Geraldine Brooks, a recent novel about the girls' father. I think I will just have to read the whole lot in one go at some point!
  • I have been meaning to reread Little Women for a couple of years, and all the more so since watching the recent film, which I loved, but suspect would have failed to understand if I'd not read the book. I've never read Little Men or Jo's Boys, but do intend to at some point. I suppose they are probably accessible online now. I also have a copy of March by Geraldine Brooks, a recent novel about the girls' father. I think I will just have to read the whole lot in one go at some point!

    I modelled my life on Jo, the tomboy. Way ahead of their time, in many ways.

    Just getting into 'An awfully big adventure' by Beryl Bainbridge. Set in 1950 and based around a stage play. I'm in the mood for something retro, but not too distant.
  • Would be curious to know what you think of the Bainbridge. I rented the movie a while ago (with a cast including Hugh Grant, cast very much against type, and Alan Rickman) and it was rather strange.
  • I got the complete Alcott quartet on Kindle for 99p. However, I know suspect it's been abridged, so it's not as good a bargain as I thought.
  • SparrowSparrow Shipmate
    Recently on another forum I was recommended to read the short story "The Gardener" by Rudyard Kipling - the person commented that "the last six words never fails to make me weep."

    I agree.

    http://www.greatwar.nl/books/gardener/gardener.html
  • @Robert Armin you can get the complete works of Louisa Alcott on Kindle for free if you look carefully. There are some really twee little numbers in amongst the more familiar stuff.
  • NenyaNenya Shipmate
    Now reading Ursula Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness. I find the world-building interesting, although I'm not sure that I'm following the plot particularly well. I'm not a regular reader of SF, although I kind of like the idea of it, if that makes sense?

    I read that fairly recently and found the world-build kept catching me out. I expected it to be totally "other" and then it talked about cars. I believe it's meant to have a profound message but I think I missed it.

    I reread "Little Women" and "Good Wives" every so often and much enjoyed the recent film (in spite of some discrepancies with the books that I disagreed with).

    I recently came by a copy of Annie Dillard's "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" which I've just started and am loving. I've had to set it aside to remind myself of my current book club book - "The Secret Keeper" by Susan Lewis - which I read very quickly weeks ago when the copies were first circulated and can't be said to have made a lasting impression on me.
  • A few days ago I bought "The Near Witch" by VE Schwab, an author I've never heard of before. I bought it because a review on the cover called her, "The natural successor to Diana Wynne Jones," an author I loved. Well, I'm roughly halfway through and I've given up. Gloomy and slow, it's the antithesis of Jones. I wonder if the full quote began with the words, "She isn't"....

    VE Schwab is the name she uses for her adult stuff whilst the YA / children's stuff is under the name Victoria Schwab. The Near Witch is one of the first books she wrote and was out of print for ages - it suddenly reappeared when her other stuff started doing well. Can't think why. :wink:

    The Cassidy Blake and Shades of Magic series are a better place to start and are probably closer to DWJ. Fantasy, great world creation, UK based and strong characters. Both are brilliant (IMO, but I'm currently re-reading Malory Towers so may not be best placed to judge). But any half way decent female fantasy writer gets compared to DWJ now so I always take that one with a large bucket of salt.
  • Firenze wrote: »
    Tubbs wrote: »
    I've been reading the Bryant & May books. I love the idea of crime solving eccentrics of pensionable age ... And, frankly, given the state of the world, I'm not looking for improving literature but escapism.

    I had an almost obsessive run of reading those a while ago and then suddenly didn't want to any more.

    Currently Mr F and I are revisiting our collection of 'techie Greats - Christie, Hare, Allingham, John Dickson Carr.

    Interspersed on my part with Kindle re-issues of 'Golden Age' authors who have fallen into obscurity. Deservedly so for the most part.

    I'd started so I was finishing.
  • Tubbs wrote: »
    A few days ago I bought "The Near Witch" by VE Schwab, an author I've never heard of before. I bought it because a review on the cover called her, "The natural successor to Diana Wynne Jones," an author I loved. Well, I'm roughly halfway through and I've given up. Gloomy and slow, it's the antithesis of Jones. I wonder if the full quote began with the words, "She isn't"....

    VE Schwab is the name she uses for her adult stuff whilst the YA / children's stuff is under the name Victoria Schwab. The Near Witch is one of the first books she wrote and was out of print for ages - it suddenly reappeared when her other stuff started doing well. Can't think why. :wink:

    The Cassidy Blake and Shades of Magic series are a better place to start and are probably closer to DWJ. Fantasy, great world creation, UK based and strong characters. Both are brilliant (IMO, but I'm currently re-reading Malory Towers so may not be best placed to judge). But any half way decent female fantasy writer gets compared to DWJ now so I always take that one with a large bucket of salt.

    That is really useful. I love Jones' work, and have it all in hard copy and much on Kindle too. (I also have her autograph as I was taught by her husband. My aim was an invitation to tea, but I had to settle for a book being signed.)
  • AravisAravis Shipmate
    I downloaded the complete works of Louisa May Alcott some time last year and read some of the lesser known novels. “Hospital Sketches” is interesting as a direct depiction of wartime nursing, but the style felt somewhat contrived. “An Old-Fashioned Girl” is a good read (though not a patch on Little Women). “Work” is well worth reading: an exploration of how a young woman at the time could make enough money to keep herself fed and clothed, if she had no family support - and what happened when she couldn’t. It deserves to be better known, despite the unrealistically happy ending.
  • I couldn't find much Victoria Schwab on Kindle. Shades of Magic was only there as a graphic novel, which doesn't work well electronically for me. However I have now read the first two books of the Everyday Angel series, which are definitely American. (Tangent. Are all American schools as unpleasant as they appear in films, novels and on TV? Or is this dramatic exaggeration?)
  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    I finished The City We Became, which it turns out, is to be the first in a trilogy. But the others aren't out yet, so I'm going to Jemisin's earlier works, starting with The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    edited April 2020
    Ha! I presented/published a paper on Defoe some years back, and remember thinking Journal of a Plague Year was one of his more rewarding works - not sure what I'd think now, and life's probably too short to find out.

    But I popped in here to ask about Kazuo Ishiguro's When We Were Orphans. According to my LibraryThing account I read it about two years ago, but have no recollection of it - which makes it unsurprising that I grabbed it to read again. Halfway through I still have almost no recollection! I reviewed it for LibraryThing noting that apart from the narrator it seemed to have zero character development - probably including him. Reading it again I'm wondering if that's the point (I'm actually wondering if I reached the end last time, though LibraryThing says I did ... the narrative is gaining momentum now and I have no recollection of that happening at all!).

    Which may be the point? Is the absence of character development precisely the point Ishiguro is making and d'uh I missed that last time? Is Christopher so great a Trum narcissist that there is no space in has narration for self-knowledge of awareness of anyone else? He certainly is a more despicable turd than I recall. (In which case who was the dull one :anguished: ?)

    Any thoughts from those who have read it? Spoilers won't matter.
  • MaryLouiseMaryLouise Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host
    @Zappa, what I found with When We Were Orphans (and I have read most of Kuzuo Ishiguro) is that it was a literary experimental novel masquerading as a 1930s detective classic. Christopher Banks is a detective uninterested in solving anything to do with a 'case'. He is obsessed with his Shanghai childhood (echoes of JG Ballard) and what makes the novel so plotless and unsatisfactory is that Christopher is an unreliable narrator. While I enjoy both the Golden Age of detective fiction and experimental fiction, I'm not sure I cared for this combination of two genres.
  • TubbsTubbs Admin
    edited April 2020
    I couldn't find much Victoria Schwab on Kindle. Shades of Magic was only there as a graphic novel, which doesn't work well electronically for me. However I have now read the first two books of the Everyday Angel series, which are definitely American. (Tangent. Are all American schools as unpleasant as they appear in films, novels and on TV? Or is this dramatic exaggeration?)

    Try here. That seems to have everything.

    One of my biggest regrets is that when DWJ did one of her rare author visits to the library I worked in, I was too sick to go.
  • Basically I love Ishiguro, but some of his stuff is so experimental I find it hard to follow. The most confusing, for me, was his latest sort of Arthurian novel. There I had no idea what was happening at all.

    And @Tubbs, many thanks for the link. I'll explore it later.
  • Zappa wrote: »
    But I popped in here to ask about Kazuo Ishiguro's When We Were Orphans. According to my LibraryThing account I read it about two years ago, but have no recollection of it - which makes it unsurprising that I grabbed it to read again. Halfway through I still have almost no recollection! I reviewed it for LibraryThing noting that apart from the narrator it seemed to have zero character development - probably including him. Reading it again I'm wondering if that's the point (I'm actually wondering if I reached the end last time, though LibraryThing says I did ... the narrative is gaining momentum now and I have no recollection of that happening at all!).

    Which may be the point? Is the absence of character development precisely the point Ishiguro is making and d'uh I missed that last time? Is Christopher so great a Trum narcissist that there is no space in has narration for self-knowledge of awareness of anyone else? He certainly is a more despicable turd than I recall. (In which case who was the dull one :anguished: ?)

    Any thoughts from those who have read it? Spoilers won't matter.

    Apparently when Ishiguro was asked for commentary when it failed to win the Booker he said something like "well, it wasn't one of my best books...."

    I read it when it first came out and then re-read it a few years ago. It has its moments, but I think it just doesn't really hang together very well. A lot of instantly recognizable Ishiguro technique (unreliable narrator, etc.) that just seems overblown and not very organic in relation to the actual plot.

    I keep meaning to read The Buried Giant but I haven't gotten around to it yet.

    I've been reading/re-reading Jonathan Coe's UK trilogy (The Rotter's Club, The Closed Circle, and Middle England). About a third of the way through Middle England now. He was kinder to his characters in the first two books - now everyone just seems cynical and disillusioned. Perhaps a metaphor for how he sees Brexit-era UK. (Mind you I haven't finished reading the book yet.) Pretty unsparing about how UK politics have developed over the last 50 years - it gives me a bit of a perspective on the Ship's UK politics threads, actually.



  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    Oh well, I'll finish When We Were Orphans in drips and drabs (it tends to be my insomnia reading at the moment) and then head elsewhere.
  • TukaiTukai Shipmate
    With fortuitous timing, just before such things got closed down for the dreaded lurgy, my wife and I bought a dozen or two second-hand books at our giant annual local bookfair - it's the main fundraiser for Lifeline, and also borrowed another dozen or so from the public library. So we're reasonably well off for unread reading matter, especially as there another few hundred books on our shelves, some of which have not been read for a long time. Some of those on the shelf are classics but too depressing to re-read this year, e.g. On the Beach or All quiet on the western front.

    First up in my lock-down reading was Voss . It's listed for the Ship Book Club later this year, but it's a long book and I am usually a slow reader. I'll say more later, but in short it was worth ploughing through.
    One of those plucked fairly randomly from the library shelves proved intriguing: Cooking the books by Bonnie Calhoun. It looked at first glance like any other crime novel (my favourite genre for light reading), but close inspection of the blurb revealed that it was also classified as "Christian fiction", a genre I had never heard of. This book however is not overtly "christian": not many prayers (except "thank God, that shot missed me"), but it did have no sex scenes (which I did not miss) , and did have an awful lot of little old ladies carrying concealed hand-guns with which to shoot at the baddies. A very American view of "Christian"?
  • Have you met my Mother's Union?
  • Jane RJane R Shipmate
    Little old British ladies carry tungsten knitting needles. Guns are for sissies. :-)
  • Do not take on the MU. Stick to easy targets, like East End gangsters.
  • SarasaSarasa Shipmate
    Tubbs wrote: »
    One of my biggest regrets is that when DWJ did one of her rare author visits to the library I worked in, I was too sick to go.
    I'm sure I've already told the story of inviting DWJ to my school library book week event. The drama teachers and I were big fans and we took her back to the station with the senior teacher driving her in the front of his van while the junior teacher and I bumped around in the back. I had hopes of a relationship with said junior teacher till I twigged he and senior teacher were in a relationship. It was lovely to meet her though.
    Chorister wrote: »
    Just getting into 'An awfully big adventure' by Beryl Bainbridge. Set in 1950 and based around a stage play. I'm in the mood for something retro, but not too distant.
    I'm not that big a fan of Bainbridge, but I really enjoyed that one.

    I've just re-read Old Baggage by Lissa Evans. It's the book I've most enjoyed in the last few months. Very funny, with some well drawn characters. Not quite sure of the ending though. I recommended it to our fledgling zoom book group that my writing class has started during lockdown. It'll be interesting to see what the others thought.

    I intend to read The Mirror and the Light sometime, but not sure if I can face re-reading the others first. I'll think I'll stick to my Tana French Dublin murder squad mystery for the time being.

  • TrudyTrudy Heaven Host, 8th Day Host
    I've really only been able to re-read and not tack
    NicoleMR wrote: »
    I finished The City We Became, which it turns out, is to be the first in a trilogy. But the others aren't out yet, so I'm going to Jemisin's earlier works, starting with The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.

    The City We Became is the only new book I've been able to read since The Mirror and the Light in early March (which mentally doesn't really count as a new book since it was just continuing on with the characters, setting, and writing style I was already familiar with from the first two books of the series. I think I said somewhere further up in this thread that I've only had the mental energy for rereading old favourites -- first the Catherine Fox Lindchester books, then The Weight of Ink for the book club here, and finally my ultimate comfort-read go-to books: the entire Lord Peter Wimsey series. But I noticed (mid-Wimsey) that my library had a special seven-day, no-waiting offer of The City We Became, and it's the first new book in a month that's pulled me in.

    I'm really glad, because I love the themes and ideas of all Jemisin's writing (I've read the whole Broken Earth trilogy and only The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms out of the other trilogy) but I've always found her actual writing style a little off-putting -- something about it seems to keep the characters at arms' length so I can't really get into their heads and get involved in the story. But City just completely drew me in; I love all the characters and I'm really invested. Plus, while it has nothing to do with plague and pestilence, thematically it feels really appropriate right now to read a novel about New York City fighting an epic battle to survive.
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    Do not take on the MU. Stick to easy targets, like East End gangsters.

    Mafia's okay, too
  • Zappa wrote: »
    Do not take on the MU. Stick to easy targets, like East End gangsters.

    Mafia's okay, too

    Yep - tell a mafia boss you fucked his mum before you tell the MU that their sponge cake isn't to your liking.
  • Marsupial wrote: »
    Would be curious to know what you think of the Bainbridge. I rented the movie a while ago (with a cast including Hugh Grant, cast very much against type, and Alan Rickman) and it was rather strange.
    I wondered how it would work as a film, as much of the commentary is thought rather than spoken. Not sure how the director would have been able to get that across.
    The main character is rather strange, but all is revealed in the final sentences of the book. Then much of what has gone before makes sense. Whether the film faithfully follows the plot of the book, I cannot say.

    I have Bainbridge's 'The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress' to read next, but think I'll try something else first for variety. I can't remember if I have read 'Man and Boy' by Tony Parsons, before, so will read (or re-read) that first, it will certainly be completely different!

  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    Chorister wrote: »
    Marsupial wrote: »
    Would be curious to know what you think of the Bainbridge. I rented the movie a while ago (with a cast including Hugh Grant, cast very much against type, and Alan Rickman) and it was rather strange.
    I wondered how it would work as a film, as much of the commentary is thought rather than spoken. Not sure how the director would have been able to get that across.
    The main character is rather strange, but all is revealed in the final sentences of the book. Then much of what has gone before makes sense. Whether the film faithfully follows the plot of the book, I cannot say.

    Thanks. I might look up the book one of these days to see how it compares. I rented the movie a few years ago on the basis of a vague recollection of a positive review I'd read when it first came out (25+ years ago?). Turned out I was right in my recollection of the review, but it was pretty much the only positive review.

    I finished reading Jonathan Coe's Middle England. I think it improves as it goes. He is good at capturing some of the ambiguities of political-social-economic change in Western countries (especially the UK, of course) since the 1970s, and nicely interweaves the broader socio-political story he is telling with the personal stories of his characters.

    I was going through a box of random books a few weeks ago and found my old copy of a book of memoirs written by the Canadian journalist Robert Fulford in the late 1980s. Fulford has had an interesting career - he dropped out of high school (basically out of boredom it seems) and got himself a job on the bottom rung of one of the big Toronto papers, eventually working himself up to the position of editor of Saturday Night, a respected (though continually impecunious) Canadian magazine of politics, arts, and culture (no longer with us, unfortunately - it kept losing money until it ran out of rich people to lose money for). He was basically self-taught, centre-right in politics, I think basically a pragmatist at heart but also conversant in wide range of culture, including jazz, film, and modern art. He also had the unusual experience of being Canadian pianist Glenn Gould's neighbor and best friend growing up. Anyway an interesting personal account of an important period in Canadian cultural history.



  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Have you met my Mother's Union?

    I like the sound of this. Who is the author please as I can't find it in my library.
  • Marsupial, I'd somewhat disagree with your assessment of Fulford. I'd say that he was centre-right, but after he moved over to The National Post, he 'got religion' politically speaking. I'm not saying that once at the Post that he conformed to the party line cynically or disingenuously, only that his conservatism become more strident - less tory and more reactionary. A friend of mine in the industry, and closer personally and political to Fulford than am I, agreed with this lefty's take on him.
  • NenyaNenya Shipmate
    Nenya wrote: »
    ... my current book club book - "The Secret Keeper" by Susan Lewis - which I read very quickly weeks ago when the copies were first circulated and can't be said to have made a lasting impression on me.

    Doing our book club online was moderately successful. None of us had thought much of "The Secret Keeper" so we moved swiftly on to talk about books we had recently enjoyed and ones we had lined up to read next. I always have a long list of books-in-waiting and even more so at the moment. At the end of February I stayed for a couple of days with someone who was downsizing her amazing book collection and invited me to take what I wanted. I could have half-emptied her shelves but in a stunning feat of self control came away with a mere 16.
  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    Marsupial, I'd somewhat disagree with your assessment of Fulford. I'd say that he was centre-right, but after he moved over to The National Post, he 'got religion' politically speaking. I'm not saying that once at the Post that he conformed to the party line cynically or disingenuously, only that his conservatism become more strident - less tory and more reactionary. A friend of mine in the industry, and closer personally and political to Fulford than am I, agreed with this lefty's take on him.

    I agree. I’m not intimately familiar with his work for the Post, but based on the samples I’ve seen it is more hard-edged ideologically and not as interesting. I think he will be remembered more for his earlier work.
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