I've started "Bridge to Terebithia". The blurb claims it's a classic and the American Narnia, but I don't think it's known in the UK. What do folk think of it?
I'm a Brit who's familiar with Bridge to Terabithia, but I came across it when I was in Canada, in my early 20s. A lot of people were telling me how great it was, that it was a childhood favourite of theirs. I thought it was okay, pretty good, though I didn't think it was as amazing as others thought - maybe I would have if I'd read it as a kid. I didn't see it as similar to the Narnia books at all. I did really enjoy another book by the same author, for older kids, more YA maybe, called Jacob Have I Loved. But any Americans I've spoken to since about this book seemed to hate it, and they much preferred Bridge to Terabithia.
It was one of my favourite books as a kid, a long time ago. The book itself is realistic fiction about a friendship between two kids and an imaginary fantasy world they create for themselves, and is basically a sort of mini-Bildungsroman* for that particular time for the main character.
The author seems like an interesting person. She was born in 1932 to Presbyterian missionaries in China, yet in some ways the book seems strikingly modern.
*"a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood", says Wikipedia (the book itself also has an entry but beware of spoilers)
Just started Sue Monk Kidd's The Book of Longings, which is about Jesus' wife, but not in a cringy Da Vinci Code kind of way. Really, I think, it's about a young Jewish woman in 1st century Palestine who wants to be educated and learn and think for herself but is prohibited from doing so by the expectations her society has for women (in that way, though in a different century, very much like Rachel Kadish's The Weight of Ink that I enjoyed so much and led our Ship Book Club discussion on last month). It seems to have a very appealing, though very human, portrayal of Jesus, although so far the main character has only met him once. It's been highly recommended to me by people whose taste I trust, and I've enjoyed some of Kidd's other books (some more than others), so I'm interested to see where it will go.
I’ve just started re-reading Oliver Sacks’ The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. I actually put it on the table for my 19 year old son to read (he’s involved with a research group at uni looking at virtual reality tech in neuro rehab) but am now reading it myself as I just finished a book (All the King’s Cooks by Peter Brears, on Tudor food at the Hampton court. Lots of lists).
When I have finished it I hope to have the courage to read Laura Spinney’s Pale Rider, which is about the Spanish flu epidemic.
I loved Bridge to Terabithia when I came across it as an adult (and I was close to tears at the ending!). I was working in the Children's Bookshop in Hay at the time, so I was familiarising myself with the authors I hadn't come across as a child.
I would certainly have read it if it had been around, because of the character Leslie - there are very few books with a Leslie or Lesley in them. I remember my great joy when my mum found Lesley's Great Adventure by George Beardmore for me - the first time I'd seen my own name in print!
Just discovered a new (well, new to me) Scottish writer of historical mysteries, Lexie Conyngham. She has written three series, one set in Viking-age Orkney, another in early nineteenth-century Scotland and a third in mid-nineteenth-century Ballater (Aberdeenshire). Haven't tried the second series, but the first and third are very good - well-realised historical settings, good characterisation. The pace of the stories is rather leisurely, so not likely to appeal to someone who likes thriller-type mysteries, but I'm enjoying them. NEQ, she must be one of your local authors - she seems to know north-east Scotland very well.
Thanks for the recommendation, @Jane R I've just finished A Knife in Darkness and look forward to reading more of the series. I think I had her books recommended to me previously, but the recommender couldn't remember the author's name, and I thought she was referring to S.M Maclean, whose novels are set in C18th Banff.
Fun fact - my 3x gt grandfather was one of forty men awarded medals for bravery during the "Muckle Spate" of 1829 - the flood referred to in the book.
Wow, that's amazing. I love the sense of place in her work, but what really makes it stand out for me is the characterization. Even the relatively minor characters are well drawn.
Lois McMaster Bujold has another of her Penric and Desdemona novellas out, The Physicians of Vilnoc. (Beware, those easily triggered, it is about a plague, ironically she started writing it before the pandemic, and decided to release it anyway.) It is as wonderful sa the previous seven, and I am rereading it already,
Lois McMaster Bujold has another of her Penric and Desdemona novellas out...
Autobuy.
Strangely, I haven't yet managed to get into either her Vorkosigan or her Sharing knife series, but anything in the world of the five gods I just lap up...
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?
Little Women has been published in a number of abridged and "modernized" versions for the school market. Might you have one of those?
Wow, that's amazing. I love the sense of place in her work, but what really makes it stand out for me is the characterization. Even the relatively minor characters are well drawn.
Would you recommend the ones by S M MacLean?
It's a while since I've read any of S.M. MacLean's books, but I think if you like Lexie Conyngham you'll like Shona MacLean - the settings (Banff and Aberdeen) felt authentic to me, as did the characters.
My daughter told me that she had just finished Anne Bishop's Black Jewels trilogy and how much she enjoyed it. So, I bought the first of the trilogy (Daughter of the Blood) to see if I would like it too. Daughter-Unit was horrified! "Mom! You'll hate it! It's too dark for you!" Well, some of the things that happened in the story infuriated me, but I did get sucked into the book. I've now finished the trilogy (the other two books are Heir to the Shadows and Queen of the Darkness) and glad I read it. It's different from what I have read in the past. So, now the rest of the series is on my Nook...yes, she wrote more after the trilogy!... and last night I started the fourth book, The Invisible Ring.
It's a while since I've read any of S.M. MacLean's books, but I think if you like Lexie Conyngham you'll like Shona MacLean - the settings (Banff and Aberdeen) felt authentic to me, as did the characters.
(Checks Amazon) Ah, I have read her books (S.G. MacLean, btw). And you're right, I do like them.
One of the books I am reading now is Early Del Rey edited by Lester Del Rey. It starts with the first short story he ever sold and is interspersed with stories by him about the writing of these early works. It ts works that were not anthologized at that time.
I've just finished Elly Griffiths' The Dark Angel, in which archaeologist Ruth Galloway goes to Italy. I haven't been reading these in order - just when odd volumes turn up - so it was a surprise to find her daughter is now six! The details of the Italian hill town were fascinating, though, and reminded me of a visit to Italy some years ago (without the murder, though!).
Just about finished The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. A massive read (860 pages) but really good - as always, great, driving writing.
I loved that, as I've loved all her books. I could have spent another 860 pages with those characters.
I just got word that my library is "opening" Monday. We order what we want form the library website, they call when they have them ready, we drive to the library, pop the trunk, and they put the bag of books inside.
Whoopee! It's been hard times for me since I only read large print and many online bookstores don't carry many of them. I've reread every large print I own, I was getting desperate.
So glad, with the libraries closed, that I have a 'waiting list' of books to read at home. Getting into local history at the moment, catching up on books I bought years ago but didn't have time to read while I was still working.
Lois McMaster Bujold has another of her Penric and Desdemona novellas out...
Autobuy.
Strangely, I haven't yet managed to get into either her Vorkosigan or her Sharing knife series, but anything in the world of the five gods I just lap up...
Agreed about Vorkosigan, which I couldn't get into at all. The Sharing Knife ones are OK, but the world of the Five Gods is great! (The idea of the Bastard is particularly good, in my humble o.)
Vorkosigan is IMHO at his best in Memory and A Civil Contract. The problem of course is that these fall mid-series. It's not impossible to pick them up as single books, but a bit harder. But the earlier ones (Warrior's Apprentice and etc.) are to me just too heavy on "action stuff happens here," and much lower on the character interaction that floats my personal boat.
Having been alerted to a new Penric by this thread, I discovered there were actually three I hadn't read. Maybe I'm suffering from an overdose, but I wish the author would write some other stuff in the world of the Five Gods. Penric is ok, but seems to be becoming a superhero now.
I couldn't sleep last night, and I'd started The Secrets of Pain by Phil Rickman, one of the Merrily Watkins series, with the SAS, Mithraic temples and cockfighting, so I thought I'd read a bit more until I felt tired.
I finished it at 4.30am.....
A coronoavirus -induced look though our bookshelves uncovered some new books (notably Jared Diamond's Upheaval, which is topical non-fiction and well worth a read) and some hidden gems which had not surfaced for a while. So I'm currently [re-reading] Catch-22 for the first time in a decade. A very funny tale of the madness at the front line of most wars. Catch-22 is exemplified by the bomber pilot who can only fly in combat if he's mad, but if he's mad he can't fly at all.
I've just finished re-reading Henrietta's House by Elizabeth Goudge, which was my favourite book as a child and may even have led, indirectly, to my setting up and running a specialist shildren's bookshop for over 23 years nearly 4 decades later.
On the shelf above I found an apparently untouched Folio Society set of the novels of George Eliot, so I have begun Adam Bede which I may never have read before.
These were both in a bookcase hidden, for lack of room, behind the drop-leaf of a circular table, ever since I moved here some 20 years ago.
I just got word that my library is "opening" Monday. We order what we want form the library website, they call when they have them ready, we drive to the library, pop the trunk, and they put the bag of books inside...
I've been disappointed by the response of UK public libraries. I think that they could really have found a niche in the current circumstances. The problem, of course, is that they have no leadership...
Actually the main problem is that they have no funding, and many public library branches have been closed down or taken over by volunteers (which is fine, if you have an inexhaustible supply of inexhaustible volunteers with the right skills to run the library efficiently). Our public libraries (= the libraries around where I live) have actually done a lot, given the constraints they are operating under - expanding the e-book and e-magazine collection, offering online bookgroups and lists of useful links, etc. Doesn't help the people who can't access the Internet from home, of course, but better than nothing.
Actually the main problem is that they have no funding, and many public library branches have been closed down or taken over by volunteers (which is fine, if you have an inexhaustible supply of inexhaustible volunteers with the right skills to run the library efficiently). Our public libraries (= the libraries around where I live) have actually done a lot, given the constraints they are operating under - expanding the e-book and e-magazine collection, offering online bookgroups and lists of useful links, etc. Doesn't help the people who can't access the Internet from home, of course, but better than nothing.
Indeed, plus the fact that most of the volunteers are retired and therefore in the vulnerable group.
Yup. And given that a lot of Gen X and most millennials won't be able to retire until they're too infirm to work, the pool of able-bodied people with the time and energy to do voluntary work will be much smaller in the not too distant future.
My public libraries have a Facebook page, where library staff post videos of themselves reading children's books - I think it's a great idea, and lovely for the kids who usually go regularly to the libraries for the singsong sessions and know the staff. They've also started a Facebook group for library users to chat about the books they're reading. All of us who borrowed library books before lockdown still have these books, as we can't return them yet.
Our local library also posts storytelling. The local history librarian posts images and other artefacts from the collection, asking residents for input to identify persons, locations or other information to build a catalogue description. Regular posts also promote the online resources - ebooks, magazines, music and movies. They've just implemented a call and collect borrowing service as our lockdown eases. Some pretty creative work for a small two-branch network.
I've just finished re-reading Henrietta's House by Elizabeth Goudge, which was my favourite book as a child and may even have led, indirectly, to my setting up and running a specialist shildren's bookshop for over 23 years nearly 4 decades later.
I too loved that book as a child and re-read it many times. Somewhere over the years my copy has gone missing and I've never seen another, despite my frequenting second hand and charity bookshops. Having said that, I haven't looked online and probably should.
I'm re-reading Scarlet Feather by Joan Grant, another book which falls exactly into that category - beloved as a child, frequently re-read and then went missing for years. This one I did find and order online and to my joy it arrived in exactly the format I remember from my own copy.
I’m reading Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler at the moment. I usually scoot through her books, but am having to push myself to finish this one; I think it’s more to do with the way the lockdown has affected my reading generally than specifically this book though.
Here it is ... your shiny new reading thread! This is for general discussion of any books the Shipmates are reading this year. Share reviews, recommendations, thoughts and questions about books in this thread. This is distinct from the Book Club thread where we discuss a specific book we read together each month ... here it's a free-for-all where you can talk about anything on your bookshelves!
I have not been following this thread, but hope you don't mind my joining now to ask whether anyone has read, 'A History of the British Isles in 100 Places' by Neil Oliver. My (older) son has been reading it to me over the phone and he has just read the chapters on Edward Rutherford and Manchester University, Berwick-upon-Tweed, and the Grand Hotel in Scarborough. It is a really excellent book and every chapter makes one want to rush off and see the place or in quite a few cases as far as I'm concerned, see them again. We're up to chapter 70-something - I shall be sorry to come to the end of the book!
You're welcome to jump in on the thread at any point without having followed it from the beginning of the year! Haven't heard of that book -- how nice of your son to be reading it to you over the phone though. Sounds like a great way to enjoy a book.
I haven't read it either, @SusanDoris but I have heard of it and it's on my list of books I want to read. I love watching Neil Oliver on the TV and heard him speak live a while back.
Another Neil Oliver fan (my TV watching is mostly limited to history documentaries!) and I’ll add that to my list. I have his lovely book on war memorials called Not Forgotten.
I am sure you will all enjoy it thoroughly. There was one chapter which had so much information in it that the next time, we both decided he must read it again to take it all in!
His friend and neighbour had given it to him for Christmas because he knew from what my son had said about me that it would be just the sort of thing I'd like!
Have you read/watched Michael Wood’s Story of England? (Book and TV series). It takes one village in Leicestershire - Kibworth - and traces its history from Iron Age to present day, as a sort of paradigm of English history. It’s well chosen, not only as it is in the centre of the country, but also, since the 13th century, the landlord has been Merton College Oxford, so it is very well documented.
It’s a few years old now but I enjoyed it when it first came out and they have been repeating the TV series recently on BBC 4.
Ooh, and the Story of England is available for a year. Michael Wood's series on the Domesday book was amazing too. That one I own the book and just about remember seeing the series.
Yes, I’ve just rewatched the Kibworth series again too - wonderful! I’m looking forward to David Olusoga’s new ‘A House Through Time’ on BBC2 starting tomorrow. It’s in Bristol this time, where I grew up. My only gripe is that it’s clashing with ‘The A Word’ on BBC1 (yes, I know I can catch up with one of them later, but still a nuisance).
I'm partway through our next book group book, A Ladder to the Sky by John Boyne. It's well written and quite clever but I can't say I'm enjoying it as I find the subject matter quite painful and can't particularly take to any of the characters. The good thing about book clubs is that you end up reading things you wouldn't have otherwise and that can lead to some real discoveries. The downside is that you end up reading a lot of dross* which can be frustrating when you have a long list of books you really do want to read.
*One person's dross is another person's treasure, of course.
I've decided to read Emma Donoghue's "Room" as I think it will particularly resonate with our present restrictions. It's true, I know I am reading it in an entirely different way than I would have pre-lockdown.
Jack's gradual understanding, that what he has always known is not the only reality to be experienced, is a painful discovery, particularly for his mother - a fascinating extension of the perfectly natural 'why, why, why' questioning of a young boy, overlaid on an horrific earlier experience of a time before he was born. I really hope it has a happy ending and that they are able to emerge safely from their own peculiar lockdown into a much better life together. No spoilers please!
Comments
The author seems like an interesting person. She was born in 1932 to Presbyterian missionaries in China, yet in some ways the book seems strikingly modern.
*"a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood", says Wikipedia (the book itself also has an entry but beware of spoilers)
When I have finished it I hope to have the courage to read Laura Spinney’s Pale Rider, which is about the Spanish flu epidemic.
I would certainly have read it if it had been around, because of the character Leslie - there are very few books with a Leslie or Lesley in them. I remember my great joy when my mum found Lesley's Great Adventure by George Beardmore for me - the first time I'd seen my own name in print!
Thanks for the recommendation, @Jane R I've just finished A Knife in Darkness and look forward to reading more of the series. I think I had her books recommended to me previously, but the recommender couldn't remember the author's name, and I thought she was referring to S.M Maclean, whose novels are set in C18th Banff.
Fun fact - my 3x gt grandfather was one of forty men awarded medals for bravery during the "Muckle Spate" of 1829 - the flood referred to in the book.
Would you recommend the ones by S M MacLean?
Autobuy.
Strangely, I haven't yet managed to get into either her Vorkosigan or her Sharing knife series, but anything in the world of the five gods I just lap up...
Little Women has been published in a number of abridged and "modernized" versions for the school market. Might you have one of those?
It's a while since I've read any of S.M. MacLean's books, but I think if you like Lexie Conyngham you'll like Shona MacLean - the settings (Banff and Aberdeen) felt authentic to me, as did the characters.
(Checks Amazon) Ah, I have read her books (S.G. MacLean, btw). And you're right, I do like them.
I loved that, as I've loved all her books. I could have spent another 860 pages with those characters.
I just got word that my library is "opening" Monday. We order what we want form the library website, they call when they have them ready, we drive to the library, pop the trunk, and they put the bag of books inside.
Whoopee! It's been hard times for me since I only read large print and many online bookstores don't carry many of them. I've reread every large print I own, I was getting desperate.
Agreed about Vorkosigan, which I couldn't get into at all. The Sharing Knife ones are OK, but the world of the Five Gods is great! (The idea of the Bastard is particularly good, in my humble o.)
I finished it at 4.30am.....
On the shelf above I found an apparently untouched Folio Society set of the novels of George Eliot, so I have begun Adam Bede which I may never have read before.
These were both in a bookcase hidden, for lack of room, behind the drop-leaf of a circular table, ever since I moved here some 20 years ago.
I've been disappointed by the response of UK public libraries. I think that they could really have found a niche in the current circumstances. The problem, of course, is that they have no leadership...
Indeed, plus the fact that most of the volunteers are retired and therefore in the vulnerable group.
I too loved that book as a child and re-read it many times. Somewhere over the years my copy has gone missing and I've never seen another, despite my frequenting second hand and charity bookshops. Having said that, I haven't looked online and probably should.
I'm re-reading Scarlet Feather by Joan Grant, another book which falls exactly into that category - beloved as a child, frequently re-read and then went missing for years. This one I did find and order online and to my joy it arrived in exactly the format I remember from my own copy.
His friend and neighbour had given it to him for Christmas because he knew from what my son had said about me that it would be just the sort of thing I'd like!
It’s a few years old now but I enjoyed it when it first came out and they have been repeating the TV series recently on BBC 4.
MMM
*One person's dross is another person's treasure, of course.
Jack's gradual understanding, that what he has always known is not the only reality to be experienced, is a painful discovery, particularly for his mother - a fascinating extension of the perfectly natural 'why, why, why' questioning of a young boy, overlaid on an horrific earlier experience of a time before he was born. I really hope it has a happy ending and that they are able to emerge safely from their own peculiar lockdown into a much better life together. No spoilers please!