I read seven books in December.
Everything I Never Told you by Celeste Ng
This is second Celeste Ng book I’ve read (the first being Little Fires Everywhere which was adapted into a series by Reece Witherspoon). Everything is her debut novel, although the term is meaningless when the writing is so accomplished.
Sixteen-year-old Lydia’s body has been found the town lake. So, this is a crime novel but oh so much more. Her father is Chinese, her mother American. She’s the eldest child, with a brother and a sister. It’s the 1970s in small-town Ohio. As the family try to trace Lydia’s last movements (and discover how little they knew her) the reader finds out her parents’ back-story, their ambitions for their clever daughter and their heartbreaking attempts, as a mixed-race family, to be accepted in their community.
House of Eyes by Patricia Elliot
Written for 9-13-year-olds – I guess I fall somewhere in-between … J
In a dark house in Edwardian South Kensington, Connie Carew investigates what happened to her baby cousin, Ida, who went missing years before. Can the beautiful young woman who claims to be the long-lost child be telling the truth?
I bought the book because I met the author. Loved it – it has everything: a delightful heroine, atmosphere, danger, history (suffragettes, séances eg) and a very satisfying conclusion.
Dorita Fairlie Bruce
I went to an all-day event at the University of Edinburgh, a symposium Investigating Irish & Scottish Writers of Children’s Literature 1750-1940. Part of Scotland’s Early Literature for Children Initiative. So interesting!
One of the speakers, Jane Sandell, gave a presentation on Dorita Fairlie Bruce (1885-1970). A writer mainly known for her school stories, Bruce was hugely popular in her day, especially with her ‘Dimsie’ series which alone sold half a million copies by 1947.
What Jane likes particularly about her work is that she treats Scotland as a place where people just live normally and are not defined by bagpipes, haggis or other clichés but, having said that, the author describes the Scottish west-coast landscape beautifully.
When I got home, I looked out three DRB titles from my shelves and reread them – three ‘Springdale’ titles. Dimsie, you’re next.
They Called Her Patience by Lorna Hill
Lorna Hill is another writer who describes landscape beautifully – in this case the Northumbrian border with Scotland.
As it’s very hard to come by, I was very happy to acquire this from a friend of a friend who was downsizing her collection of children’s books (although sadly my copy does not have the lovely dust jacket shown here). I’ve got the second (of two) Patience books (It Was All Through Patience) already.
Patience (her name is really Fleur and she’s definitely not patient) has a will of iron. Though she is much younger than her adored half-brother David and his friends, plus she has recently been very ill, she is determined to join in everything they do whether that’s riding, camping or getting up to mischief.
So after my very happy visit to the blue remembered hills, I picked up
Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris
and read about the Restoration of Charles II to the throne in 1669 and the ‘Act of Oblivion’ whereby everything that had happened leading up to the execution of Charles I was, in effect, to be forgiven and forgotten – except for the 57 signatories to the King’s death warrant.
The regicides were to be hunted down and dispatched slowly and cruelly. This is mostly the story of two of them who managed to escape to America, to the aptly named ‘New England’ where it was very hard to hide in the small settlements and to travel between them.
A page-turner, and the book ignited an ambition to read some non-fiction about the Civil War and its aftermath. Tune in next month …
