Six in May

I read six books in May.

Bookish: How Reading Shapes Our Lives by Lucy Mangan

A book about books – what’s not to like? I enjoyed Bookworm which covered Lucy Mangan’s childhood years of not wanting to do much else other than read (a girl after my own heart then).

Of course, though, adulthood does have its compensations – an income to buy books and a house (and a specially built ‘shed’ in the garden, of which I am very jealous)’) to put them in. Oh, and a husband who’s equally bookwormish, and a child who provides a reason to reread favourites and to find new ones.

So this book ranges wildly and wonderfully (as anybody’s reading material should) from Library Lion to 1990s bonkbusters such as Lace, to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight with much (much) in between.

I had the pleasure of seeing her recently being interviewed under the auspices of the wonderful Toppings bookshop in Edinburgh and got this lovely signed copy.

 

 

Free, Coming of Age at the End of History by Lea Ypi

Read for book group. I knew next to nothing about Albania; it was so interesting to hear about its recent history through the eyes of Lea Ypi, born there in 1979 and now a professor at the London School of Economics.

Albania, the last Stalinist outpost in Europe, was a difficult place to live in for many reasons – but it was Lea’s home and all she knew. But in December 1990 political upheaval meant everything changed. There was freedom at last which seemed wonderful to begin with but it came with many downsides for everybody and, for Lea, some startling family revelations.

Fascinating.

 

 

Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty

Something extraordinary happens on a flight from Hobart to Sydney – an elderly woman called Cherry goes down the aisle telling each passenger (including children) and crew members when and how they are going to die.

Thereafter, the book focuses on some of these people and what effect their prediction has had on them (especially when they find out that some of the predictions have come true)  – and we find out Cherry’s very plausible backstory too. Riveting. I particularly enjoyed Leo’s and Ethan’s stories – Leo, the family man with a toxic boss, and Ethan, hopelessly infatuated with his rich, glamorous housemate. I still think about them actually …

 

April Lady by Georgette Heyer

Yay – the Christian Aid book sale was back this year in Edinburgh after a couple of years’ hiatus. Among my (very restrained) purchases were two GHs I’ve never read before. April Lady won’t go into my top five but it was very enjoyable all the same.

 

 

Death at the Sign of the Rook by Kate Atkinson

A joy to catch up with Jackson Brodie again.

A painting has apparently been stolen from the Yorkshire home of a deceased woman but her unpleasant offspring are reluctant to involve the police. Our hero, rather reluctantly, takes on the case – which leads to a stately home, an array of characters straight from the Golden Age of crime writing, and a Murder Mystery Weekend. Hope that’s not the last we see of JB – I’m still cross that the television series was cancelled.

You can’t see from the image but my copy (also purchased in Toppings but this time the St Andrews branch) has sprayed black edges, a special edition for independent bookshops.

 

 

Shy Creatures by Clare Chambers

After I read Small Pleasures by CC a few years ago, I read through her backlist of six books, one after the other.

Shy Creatures, her latest, is terrific. Set in the 1960s, in the environs of Croydon, it was inspired by the true story of a man discovered in a house he hadn’t left in forty years – a man with wild hair and beard and an astonishing talent for art.

Helen, an art therapist (embroiled in an affair with a charismatic married colleague in the psychiatric hospital) becomes entangled in the man’s mysterious past.