Friday reads - Those Wild Wyndhams

   

    So far, so very good: I'm finding Claudia Renton's prize-winning biography of "three sisters at the heart of power", Those Wild Wyndhams, thoroughly engrossing. It's described as "a spellbinding chronicle of the last days of Edwardian England," and while I'm still in the Victorian period with the girls as youngsters, it's gathering pace and promising much interest.

    Anyone else reading anything good just now?

Comments

[Kathleen]

I've just ordered "Notes from Walnut Tree Farm" by Roger Deakin. At the moment I'm reading Memoirs of a Highland Lady by Elizabeth Grant of Rothiemurchus.

[Cornflower]

Mr. C. enjoyed the Roger Deakin very much, Kathleen.

[Claire]

I'm reading Claire Harman's new biography of Charlotte Bronte (Christmas present) which I'm enjoying and, also, just finished this morning, the first volume of a Dance to the Music of Time. Somehow I thought it was going to be tricky but found it very readable. I'm certainly going to read the next one and see if it keeps my interest.

[Cornflower]

I'd like to read that biography.
I fell by the wayside with 'Dance' a few years ago - enjoyed the first three or four, but somehow didn't get further. I'll perhaps begin again sometime.

[B R Wombat]

I've just finished Michael Frayn's The Trick of It for the third time. Each time I read it I love it and then, as the years pass, I forget the plot but remember that it's good and have the pleasure of reading it again.

[Rebecca]

In the middle of mid-term exams, so I am enjoying the low-brow pleasures of the latest in a foolish series, the Goldy Schultz catering mysteries by Diane Mott Davidson when I can find a moment. Did just finish listening to the unexpectedly moving reflection on daughters and mothers, Glitter and Glue by Kelly Corrigan: the woman can write!

[Dark Puss]

I am about 25% of the way through the new book by Lisa Randall, Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs, which is proving very good indeed.

[Dorothy]

I've just finished the last Inspector Gamache novel by Louise Penny. It was a series of eleven books which just kept getting better. I'm about to start Cold Comfort Farm.

[cath]

Yesterday I started 14 by Jean Echenoz. Two chapters in now, I think I may have found a a very good story.

[Caroline]

Just had a few days away in Switzerland so am inspired to begin The Gilded Chalet, Off-piste in Literary Switzerland by Padraig Rooney - a Christmas present - which promises to tick several personal boxes. While away, I finished Brideshead Revisited, then read The Summer of the Bear by Bella Pollen. The former was, as I'd hoped, unforgettable - a book of a lifetime - while the latter far exceeded my unfairly low expectations and is much recommended.

[Toffeeapple]

My current read is 'The Deepening Stream' by Dorothy Canfield. It is a little hard going at present but I will stick with it.

[LizF]

Just finished The Shepherd's Life by James Rebanks which I thought was a wonderful portrayal of a very different world from mine and left plenty of food for thought.
Also reading The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins, Antonia Hodgson's follow-up to the wonderful The Devil in the Marshalsea, and delighted that it is every bit as good in the pace, storytelling and descriptions of a period of history I know little about, as the first book.
I was planning on reading Linda Lear's biography of Beatrix Potter next, as a follow-up to the Rebanks book but I also have just picked up A Notable Woman, the diaries of Jean Lucey Pratt edited by Simon Garfield from the library and note that there is a line of requests for it so I had better start that as it is a sizeable volume and I'm not sure how much reading time I will have in the next three weeks!

[Naomi]

Recently finished Exposure by Helen Dunmore, coming out any second in the UK, later in the US. It is a very well written and and engrossing story about spies in 1960's London. Just terrific.

[Cornflower]

Forgetting plots is handy!

[Cornflower]

Catering mysteries is a genre new to me, but why not?

[Cornflower]

I heard her interviewed recently, (and also watched a TED talk given by Jim Al-Khalili!).

[Cornflower]

The joy of Cold Comfort Farm!

[Cornflower]

Off to look up that one. Thank you, Cath.

[Cornflower]

I know someone who would like The Gilded Chalet, so thank you for mentioning it, Caroline.
Glad Brideshead lived up to expectations.

[Cornflower]

That sounds interesting; thanks, Toffeeapple.

[Cornflower]

The Shepherd's Life is excellent, isn't it?
I must get to the Antonia Hodgson books.

[Cornflower]

Helen Dunmore is someone I've meant to read for a long time but not yet got to, so thank you for the reminder, Naomi.

[LizF]

I would thoroughly recommend Antonia Hodgson's books - they feel as though you are in safe hands historically speaking without losing pace and storytelling.

[Toffeeapple]

It was well worth sticking with; I just needed to concentrate on the personalities a little more. I shall read it again in the future (and pay more attention).