Cornflower Books

Long time no see!

    I don't know where the time has gone - I certainly did not mean to be away from here for this long - but before the year is out, here's a quick look at my reading highlights of 2023. In no particular order:

    A Fortunate Woman, Polly Morland

    The Bookseller of Inverness, S.G. MacLean

    The Waters under the Earth, John Moore

    And a Dog called Fig, Helen Humphreys

    The Covenant of Water, Abraham Verghese

    The Improbability of Love, Hannah Rothschild

    The Secret Hours, Mick Herron

 

    Wishing you the best in books and in all things in 2024!

The reading year

   A few highlights:

    Dara McAnulty and Mark Shand,

    Rosemary Sutcliff and Daphne du Maurier,

    Adrian Tinniswood and Julie Summers,

    and let's not leave out DE Stevenson!

Books of the year

    Six novels, a biography, a memoir, these are my 'best of 2019':

    In a world where the term is overused, David Nott is a true hero; his War Doctor will open your mind and your heart.

    Ursula Buchan's biography of her grandfather John is a fine book about a fine man.

    Diane Setterfield's Once Upon A River cast a wonderful spell.

    The Redeemed concluded Tim Pears's West Country Trilogy - each novel a small masterpiece.

    Niall Williams's This Is Happiness will move you to laughter and tears and have you marvelling at its author's way with a story.

    Elizabeth Goudge appears twice on my list (for the second time), charming with The Little White Horse and soothing with The Herb of Grace.

    Dorothy Dunnett's The Game of Kings was a late highlight: a tour de force with the promise - in the shape of the rest of the series - of great pleasure to come.

                                                     ~~~~~

    Thank you for stopping by, for taking an interest, and for sharing your thoughts and discoveries. Here's wishing you health, happiness and much good reading in 2020!

Cornflower Blues, 2018

    My books of the year list is a shorter one this time (here is last year's for comparison).

    In non-fiction, Henry Marsh makes a reappearance, this time with Admissions his second volume of memoirs, while Laura Freeman - an outstanding newcomer - shares top spot for The Reading Cure.

    In fiction, Dear Mrs. Bird came along at a very difficult time, but A.J. Pearce's perfect pitch helped me through; Anne Youngson, showing that you're never too old to begin a new career, is a worthy Blue with her debut Meet Me at the Museum (which is getting the wider recognition it deserves), and joining them on the podium are two old hands, Kate Atkinson for Transcription, and William Boyd for Love is Blind.

    If you have a moment, perhaps you'd share your reading highlights of the year.

Books of the year

 

   Looking back on the reading year, here are my highlights (all links are to posts on the books).

 

Favourite novels:

    The Horseman, Tim Pears

    The Lark, E. Nesbit

    The Fortnight in September, R.C. Sherriff

    La Belle Sauvage, Philip Pullman

 

Best biographies/autobiographies:

    Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death, and Brain Surgery, Henry Marsh

    The Country Child, Alison Uttley

    The Last Englishman: The Life of J.L. Carr, Byron Rogers

    I Was A Stranger, John Hackett

 

Other outstanding non-fiction:

    In the Artist's Garden, Ronald Blythe

    Waiting for the Albino Dunnock, Rosamond Richardson

 

    I haven't read a great deal this year - my slow-ish pace is deliberate - but the books listed above would stand out in a much larger crowd, I think.

    There is another title which deserves to be included but I've omitted it because as yet there's no post on it and it requires more than a mention in passing; perhaps I'll come back to it another day.

It's been an odd reading year ...

   

    ... in that usually, around this time, I can produce a list of a dozen or so books read over the preceding twelve months which deserve to be put centre stage again and from which two get the laurels, but this year has somehow been 'off'. Whether it's that my interests have changed - and I think that is so - or whether the novels I've read have simply not elicited the deeper feeling of connection I look for over and above their technical merits, there are few I'd award a Blue, so 2015's is a very short list.

    Elizabeth Goudge comes closest to what I've been seeking with The Dean's Watch and The White Witch almost but not quite matching The Runaways for sheer enjoyment. In non-fiction, James Rebanks gets an honourable mention for The Shepherd's Life, while Linda Lear's detailed biography of Beatrix Potter impressed me enormously and held my attention throughout. And that's it - not many, but distinguished nonetheless.

    As the year nears its end, I'm looking forward to heading in a new direction reading-wise, for some of the time, at least. I think the journey will be both fascinating and fun.

Old books of the year

       
   
    My post of a couple of weeks ago was concerned with new books, but some 'old' ones have given as much pleasure or more and have earned their Cornflower Blue too.

    In no particular order then come Cynthia Harnett's The Wool-Pack (I read it here), Mary Stewart's The Crystal Cave (it turns out I knew Lady Stewart's editor), The Silent Traveller in Oxford by Chiang Yee (a man after my own heart), Rumer Godden's In this House of Brede (which many of us enjoyed), and although I've yet to finish it, The Runaways by Elizabeth Goudge. Each is special in its own way.

Cornflower Blues - books of the year, 2014

   

    This has not been a vintage reading year for me; I've read fewer books than usual, and of them only a handful stand out, so the number awarded the Cornflower Blue in 2014 is tiny compared to last year, say, but still, the honoured five are up there with the best of them.

    Esteemed runners-up in the fiction category are Bodies of Light by Sarah Moss (there's a post on it here), Little Egypt by Lesley Glaister (post here), and The Stories by Jane Gardam.

    The outright winner in non-fiction is Margaret Forster's My Life in Houses (see this post), and my novel of the year - no surprise to assiduous readers of this blog - is History of the Rain by Niall Williams (for the reasons given here and in the longer piece to which I've linked).

    My thanks to all those writers for the pure reading pleasure their work has given me, and for being true 'class acts', worthy of our respect and admiration.

Cornflower Blues 2013 - the best of the best

  

    We've had the books of the year parts one and two, and now to conclude, here are the best of the best in fiction and non-fiction.

    Hermione Lee proves the art of literary biography is alive and well in her superb life of Penelope Fitzgerald, and Kate Atkinson has given us a tour de force in her complex, highly original novel Life After Life.

    Thank you, ladies, for such rich reading.

Cornflower Blues 2013 - the books of the year, part 1

   

    Decisions, decisions.

    Separating the cream of this year's reading from 'the top of the milk' is a tough job, and inevitably there are at least a handful more books I could add to the list, there's so little to choose between them, but I have chosen and I give you the 'Cornflower Blues', my books of the year:

 

    Best biographies:

Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life by Hermione Lee

C. S. Lewis: A Life - Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet, The Story of the Man who Created Narnia by Alister McGrath

 

    Best 'old' novels:

The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim

The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

The Heir by Vita Sackville-West

The Shooting Party by Isabel Colegate

Girl With a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier

 

    Best first novels:

The Night Rainbow by Claire King

Amity & Sorrow by Peggy Riley

Meeting the English by Kate Clanchy

The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon

Mr Penumbra's 24-hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan

 

    Best non-fiction:

The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase by Mark Forsyth

Magical Tales: Myth, Legend and Enchantment in Children's Books edited by Carolyne Larrington & Diane Purkiss

 

    Best new novels:

Motherland by William Nicholson

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

The Promise by Ann Weisgarber

Last Friends by Jane Gardam

The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

Bellman & Black by Diane Setterfield

 

    Still to come, the best of the best.

Cornflower Blues 2012 - the best of the best

  

    John Saturnall's Feast and The End of Your Life Book Club: one novel, one memoir, two books which are 'the best of the best' I've read this year.

    Take a bow, then, Lawrence Norfolk and Will Schwalbe; your work has engaged the brain and touched the heart, provided a stimulating literary delight on the one hand, and on the other, a very moving personal story which will resonate with anyone to whom books matter. Thankyou, gentlemen!

Cornflower Blues 2012 - the books of the year, part 2

       


    I talked the other day about the 'Cornflower recommends' logo (a pipe dream), and of course my 'Blues', my books of the year, would be the first to feature it. We had novels yesterday, today it's the turn of non-fiction, and there are fewer books here simply because that category is less well-represented in my reading. As with yesterday's list, not all the books here have been published this year, but I have read them in the last twelve months.

    I'll begin with The Music Room by William Fiennes, a memoir of family and home which I wrote about here. " ... Fiennes is such an observant, sensitive narrator. He is the custodian of so many memories, and it is the texture of those remembered times, the layered details which shape and colour a moment, which his gift for language brings out. Lucid, restrained, accepting, tender - that's the mood of the piece, and it gives much to savour. If you're drawn to contemplative writing and to understated poignancy, then this essentially sad but ultimately uplifting book should touch and impress you, and will undoubtedly make you think."

    Four Hedges: A Gardener's Chronicle by Clare Leighton featured several times over on the other blog as I quoted passages which struck me as particularly well-observed. This account of the creation of a garden in the Chiltern Hills was first published in 1935, and the current edition - illustrated with the author's beautiful engravings - has an introduction by gardening writer and broadcaster Carol Klein. You'll find extracts here, here and here.

    Mrs Robinson's Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady by Kate Summerscale is the story of a real-life Madame Bovary and her scandalous divorce. It's meticulously researched and is a textbook example of the management of material. Read more about it here and see pictures of some of the book's Edinburgh locations here, and if you've read the book already and are looking forward to more from Kate Summerscale, her next work is to be The Electrical Boy, "a portrait of the murder of a Victorian woman by her son"; taking in working class life in London's East End, the Old Bailey, Holloway Prison and Broadmoor and the battlefields of World War One and Australia, it "illuminates changing attitudes towards criminal responsibility, mental illness, and the possibilities for a murderer of redemption."

    The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot by Robert MacFarlane (who is to chair the judging panel of next year's Man Booker Prize, by the way) is perhaps best summed up in one of the book's own lines: "Stories, like paths, relate in two senses: they recount and they connect." A book about walking, thinking, observing, perceiving, going out in order to 'go in'. Precise and evocative writing complement scholarship and a poet's eye for the natural world. You'll find short extracts here, here and here.

    The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe is another very moving but equally uplifting memoir, and a book about "the importance of books as manuals for life, of reading as comfort and joy, as a means of understanding others and sharing experiences." Read all about it and about my conversation with Will here, then read the book itself - you will not keep a dry eye, but that's just as it should be.

Cornflower Blues 2012 - the books of the year

            

         

                      

                                   

    Beginning with the fiction but in no particular order, here are the books I've awarded a 'Cornflower Blue' for being the best of the year* (click on the descriptions to go to the full post on each one):

    The Coward's Tale by Vanessa Gebbie, a story whose cadences rise and fall with a lilt and a rhythm that make it irresistible.

    The Secret Intensity of Everyday Life by William Nicholson, beautifully balanced and intelligently played out, marvellously entertaining and sparklingly done.

    Alys, Always by Harriet Lane, a novel of skill, elegance and flair.     

    Waiting for Sunrise by William Boyd, a thrilling spy story and a portrait of Europe at a time of enormous change, a bildungsroman and a picture of the human psyche under pressure, a book springing from intellectual heft and virtuoso narrative technique - it's too good to miss.

    Sidney Chambers and The Shadow of Death by James Runcie, a gentle, romantic book with a lovely period feel, and at its heart a charming character and a purity of thought that is very appealing.

    The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers, ingenious and cleverly plotted, great dramatic entertainment.

    Painter of Silence by Georgina Harding, a fine book whose understatement and restraint lets it speak and ensures it will be heard.

    A Lady Cyclist's Guide to Kashgar by Suzanne Joinson, a tightly folded story gradually unfurls in very pleasing form.

    The Colour of Milk by Nell Leyshon, stands out for the sheer economy of its prose, its near-perfect idiom, and for the significance of its subject matter and the themes which are worked out so skilfully in so few words.

    John Saturnall's Feast by Lawrence Norfolk, encompasses myth and legend, allegory and arcane knowledge, love, war and entrancing storytelling, combining these ingredients to make no mere culinary conceit or kickshaw but a readers' feast of the highest order.

    Bel Canto by Ann Patchett, shows her gift for ideas and for working so creatively with her raw material that the end product is superb.

    The Knot by Jane Borrodale, an engrossing narrative moving with the shifting seasons makes this a fine work, and one whose atmosphere lingers in the mind.

    Rook by Jane Rusbridge, an exquisitely sensitive story, an affecting work, closely woven, beautifully tempered.

    High Rising by Angela Thirkell, a highly entertaining comedy, such a fun book and a diverting one.

    Archie by Domenica More Gordon, a terrific picture book with real charm - something to leave on the coffee table where adults as well as children will pick it up and be delighted by it.

 

    Non-fiction to come next.

 

*That is, of those I've read this year.

Cornflower Blues 2011: part 3 - more fiction

 

    When I drafted this post I wrote a long rigmarole about criteria for inclusion, giving what I thought might be helpful analogies and definitions of 'best' as it applies to my choices here.  On reflection I've scrubbed all that as we can do without it, so following on from Friday's first batch of fiction, here's my choice from the second half of the year, listed in the order in which I read them:

 

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller - original, fresh and beautiful, this superb re-telling of the story of Achilles and Patroclus is a stunning novel.

The Kashmir Shawl by Rosie Thomas - lush, romantic fiction, an escapist treat of a book.

Drowning Rose by Marika Cobbold - a novel about guilt, but one which brings light and warmth to the subject; perceptive, compassionate, atmospheric, optimistic and highly readable.

Ghastly Business by Louise Levene - stylish, witty and great fun!

The Translation of the Bones by Francesca Kay - a work of great poise, sensitivity and intelligence about faith, belief, loneliness and love.

The Double Shadow by Sally Gardner - ingeniously complex, dark and richly imagined, a novel for older teenagers and adults.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt - for me, the best of the book group books this year.

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen by Paul Torday - this novel hasn't had a post of its own (though its author has), but it's laugh-out-loud funny, very sad, most cleverly structured, and enormously entertaining.

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey - no post yet for this one either, as I finished it only yesterday and feel quite lost without it now. A beautiful, magical book - thoughts on it soon.

Cornflower Blues 2011: part 2 - the first of the fiction

   

    Oh, the agonies of deciding which novels will make the 'books of the year' list and thus which others will not! I've whittled down my long list of 24 to a more manageable dozen or so, but with my current reading looking as though it will join the chosen few, it's still 'fluid'. 

    I can give you the first batch now, arranged not hierarchically, but simply in the order in which I read them:

The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald - "A miniature piece of perfection", I called it when the book group read it back in January.

The Blackhouse by Peter May - utterly gripping, this crime novel set on the Hebridean island of Lewis shows how the dramatic should be done.

House of Silence by Linda Gillard - an intricately plotted story for which you'll put everything else on hold.

Night Waking by Sarah Moss - "impressive and enjoyable in equal measure", a multi-dimensional, blackly comic novel set on a Scottish island. A writer to watch.

Half of the Human Race by Anthony Quinn - a beautifully modulated, moving book set in the early years of the twentieth century. (The paperback will be out in January).

Gillespie and I by Jane Harris - an ingenious, bravura work about an artist and a lady who befriends him. All is not what it seems! (Again, the paperback will be out next month).

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett - I've been going on about this book, but so have many others; it's a work of integrity and clarity with compassionate intelligence behind it; it's a story which holds the reader long after the final page has been turned, and it poses questions of ethics to exercise the intellect. Wonderful. (I do like the paperback cover - it won't be out 'til June, though).

The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson - a Jo Malone fragrance in book form, this novel about "the unquiet life of old houses" is a real treat.

    That's enough to be going on with, but there will be more soon.

Cornflower Blues 2011: part 1 - non-fiction

 

    The first of a series of posts on the Cornflower Blues, my books of the year - the best of those read, but not necessarily published, in 2011 - looks at non-fiction. This is the easiest category to cover as there is less to choose from to start with, but with or without huge competition the five which have made the cut have truly stood out. Of course, this is all subjective, but I'm choosing books whose scholarship and writing have impressed me, where the breadth and depth of the subject matter has opened up worlds to me, and whose style and spirit have entertained me.

    In no particular order other than as pictured from the left, Romantic Moderns: English Writers, Artists and the Imagination from Virginia Woolf to John Piper by Alexandra Harris - a long title for a vibrant, accessible book, stimulating and exciting, and covering a rich assortment of people, places, ideas and more (there's a post on it here).

    Next comes Amanda Vickery's Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England (post here), a very engaging look at domestic life in the period, full of fascinating detail which shows the Georgians as real people, not museum mannequins.

    My third book is undoubtedly the best known as it has been featuring on the bestseller charts and winning prizes, so you won't be surprised to hear that it is Edmund de Waal's The Hare with Amber Eyes (there's a new illustrated edition). A family memoir, original in style, beautifully executed (there's more on it here).

    Molly Peacock's The Paper Garden: Mrs. Delany begins Her Life's Work at 72 is a lovely, warm account of the life of a lady who achieved what we might call celebrity status, but at an advanced age. Mary Delany produced a vast and remarkable collection of botanically accurate paper collages, her work beginning by pure chance - read more about it here.

    Last of this group, Anne Scott's 18 Bookshops, a personal look at special examples of those places which can be the gateway to so much; thoughtful, quiet, written from the heart, its post is here.

Cornflower Blues 2010 - part 4: all human life is here

    A further clutch of my books of the year, and these are three novels which were enjoyable and impressive in equal measure.

    Why on earth is Robertson Davies' The Cunning Man not in print (though by following that link you can get copies very cheaply)? Reading this novel is like listening to "the scintillating conversation of an eloquent, intelligent raconteur; it's stimulating, engrossing, wide-ranging and it never flags" (I said in my post on it). If Santa were to leave another Robertson Davies (a trilogy, perhaps?) under the tree for me, I'd be very pleased indeed.

    What more can I say about To Kill A Mockingbird? I re-read it back in the summer and yet again Harper Lee's much-loved novel made a deep impression on me. I could scatter superlatives here but I'd be wasting words - just read it!

    Last of the lot today, Hilary Mantel's Fludd. Recommended by Juxtabook, this was another highlight of my reading year: unusual, brilliant, thought-provoking and fun.

Cornflower Blues 2010 - part 3: long ago and far away

    My favourite historical novels this year take us from the Japanese island of Dejima in 1799 to the Highlands of Scotland in 1692 and to the Danish court some sixty years earlier. They range from the large-scale, bold and brilliant to the more intimate, introspective and quietly impressive. All three set their scenes impeccably, recreating time and place so expertly that the reader's imagination easily takes over where the words on the page leave off, their recreated worlds peopled with full characters in well-realised situations.

    Booker contender The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet by David Mitchell is a big book in more ways than one, complex, clever and a fascinating account of an outpost of the Dutch East India Company in the closed society of Japan (impressions here).

    Susan Fletcher's Corrag is "like a cloudscape reflected in water - subtly shaded, shifting, depths within depths". A unique voice and an unusual perspective on the Glencoe Massacre - more on it here.

    Something is rotten in the State of Denmark, and not just in Hamlet: in Rose Tremain's Music & Silence, things go awry at the court of King Christian IV, but they do so in "a glittering spider's web of a book ... rich and beautifully rendered" (post on it here).

Cornflower Blues 2010 - part 2: a fine romance

     Three romantic novels make up my next batch of books of the year, all of them warm, witty, elegant - books to which to escape:

    Rosy Thornton's The Tapestry of Love was a highlight of my summer reading, Diane Meier's The Season of Second Chances was one of the most accomplished debuts I've read, while Deborah Harkness's A Discovery of Witches is a love story with a difference! Read any one and you'll feel you're in safe hands; their characters are appealing, their plots well-paced and punctuated with both the dramatic and the sort of everyday, domestic detail I enjoy, and within their pages that elusive balance of art and craft is expertly achieved.

Cornflower Blues 2010 - part 1: a breath of fresh air

    It's time to choose my best books of the year, the Cornflower Blues 2010. This is always a difficult process as there are more strong contenders than space here allows, but tough as it is to exclude some gems, I have to make the cut.

    I shall be listing the books over several posts but I'm beginning today with my first category which I've called "a breath of fresh air" as the three books in it are vibrant, invigorating, original, and are all written in a major key, if you see what I mean.

    I'll start with Michael Faulkner's The Blue Cabin: Living by the Tides on Islandmore which I read back in February - that post will tell you all you need to know, but Mike's account of his and his artist wife Lynn's major life-change is warm, open and engaging, and it may make you want to find your own island hideaway.

    A book which went down very well with the CBG was John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley: In Search of America. I loved Steinbeck's voice and his perceptive portrait of the American landscape he saw and the people he encountered on his journey, as also the view of himself and his canine companion which his distinctive narrative affords the reader.

    My third book today is not unrelated to the other two - there are similarities in tone and mood, sometimes in subject matter, also in location. Sarah Orne Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs (post on it here) was a real pleasure to read and as I noted, one of its strengths seemed to be the author's feeling for the inner life that informs so much of human character and behaviour.

    All three books here are good-natured, respectful, considered, and there's an integrity to them which appealed to me strongly.