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| An Interior With A Woman Reading - Carl Larsson |
Just so you know that I'm not dead in a ditch - just rather wiped out from a cold that doesn't feel like going away - I thought I'd ask you all what you're reading at the moment?
I've just finished a very gripping modern novel (more anon) and started Hallucinations by Oliver Sacks, who is being reliably fascinating so far.
And over to you!
Wishing you a speedy recovery, Simon. I'm currently reading The Tale of Raw Head & Bloody Bones by Jack Wolf and War and Peace by Tolstoy (finally!)
ReplyDeleteI’m finally finishing 1Q84 by Murakami (took me a while) and also reading More Women Than Men from your 50 books list.
ReplyDeleteHope you will feel better soon!
Best wishes for a speedy farewell to the lurgey. I'm finishing Roger Deakin's Waterlog and starting two new cookbooks that are good reads as well as good cooking: Yotam Ottolenghi's Jerusalem and Deb Perelman's Smitten Kitchen. Very cheering in this freezing weather to read about kitchens full of lemons and sunshine!
ReplyDeleteFeel better soooooooon! I'm currently reading 'The Life of Pi', the second part of 'The Fellowship of the Ring' and 'The Stranger' by Albert Camus. xxx
ReplyDeleteI'm reading The Fountain Overflows, by Rebecca West; Macbeth; and lots and lots of gardening magazines...
ReplyDeleteHope you feel better soon!
I'm just about to pick up a new book and am debating between Mariana by Monica Dickens or a re-read of The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford. As I can't decide, I decided to pop online and look at some blogs instead!
ReplyDeleteI'm reading The Heat Of The Day by Elizabeth Bowen, which is fab. Just finished another one by her, To The North, which was possibly even better. Speedy recovery :)
ReplyDeleteI just finished Heat of the Day! Have "World of Love" and "Little Girls" in the library pile for tomorrow....
DeleteJust finished A Passage to India and am perusing the shelves for what's next. I'm thinking it may have to be the PL after the previous post! Best wishes to you for a speedy recovery. I appear to be trying to come down with something myself, so I'm putting the kids on notice that if I go down I'm going to hide behind a pile of books. :)
ReplyDeleteLovely painting, Simon! I am reading Maeve Binchy's final book, A Week in Winter, and enjoying every page of it as I try to build up enthusiasm to return to Orderly and Humane, a history of the brutal mass evictions of ethnic Germans from Eastern and Central European countries after WWII. Yes. It is as much fun as it sounds.
ReplyDeleteHope you're feeling better soon! I'm reading The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov for my book group. From what I've read so far, it's a very strange book.
ReplyDeleteStill reading Trollope 'The Warden' and Robert Harris 'Lustrum' for book groups and Monica Dickens 'The Angel in the Corner' from personal choice. Also, just located the half-read Anne Michaels 'The Winter Vault'(lost over Christmas), so that will go back on to the 'current reading pile'. Golly, that's 4 at once - a lot for me!
ReplyDeleteRight now I'm working on Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn. It's a psychological thriller, it's really good! I'm only a few chapters in right now and I'm hooked.
ReplyDeleteA View of Downshire Hill, Elizabeth Jenkins' memoir. The Tortoise and the Hare is one of my favorite 20th century novels.
ReplyDeleteI've read all of Louise Penny's beautifully written mysteries about Inspector Armand Gamache ... re-reading Elizabeth Taylor's novels.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone read Elizabeth Daly's series from the 1940s and 1950s, reissued by Felony & Mayhem press? So good!
ReplyDeleteYes! I have and I love them!! I love vintage mysteries!!
DeleteI am reading Elizabeth Bowen's 'The House in Paris', and have 'Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day' next in the line-up. It's a Persephone edition which brings a little brightness to this long winter. I hope you feel better soon.
ReplyDeletesorry I kept reposting, I thought they didn't go through. Right now I'm reading The Quest by Daniel Yergin. I had a book collection for a couple of years and then decided to donate them all to the city library, now after a year I've decided to start a home library again. I currently have 23 books, I'd love to know what you think about them: www.mixnode.com/profile.php?username=nariman
ReplyDeleteI'm just finishing Let Me Finish by Roger Angell. He is the best baseball writer ever, the son of Katherine White - a founding editor at The New Yorker - and the stepson of E.B. White. He grew up in New York in the 1920s and 1930s and is a wonderful writer. I'm really enjoying it. I hope that cold hits the road soon!
ReplyDeleteHeather, I am a huge fan of E.B. White and have read Katherine White's 'Onward and Upward in the Garden'. I am familiar with Roger Angell's baseball writing (I am a life-long Yankees fan)but was unaware of this memoir. Thanks for the tip. I look forward to reading it.
DeleteIf you like the Whites, you might want to read "The Story of Charlotte's Web" by Michael Sims. It is a lovely tribute to Mr. White and how he came to love animals and nature and to write about Charlotte.
having fun with The Wolves of Willoughby Chase for Cornflowers Reading Group. Very recently enjoyed Sufficient Grace by Amy Espeseth a fascinating first novel set in rural Wisconsin in a Pentecostal community. Not to forget Inthe Light of Amsterdam by David Park. Rest up and recover!
ReplyDeleteJust finished Marcia Muller's latest Sharon McCone mystery (love this series. I've been reading them since the early 80s) & started James Hilton's Lost Horizon at lunchtime. Hope you're feeling better soon.
ReplyDeleteI've just started William Boyd's Ordinary Thunderstorms, and am also reading Agatha Christie's Nemesis. Hope you feel better soon -- poor you!
ReplyDeleteNorth and South for teaching purposes, The Truth by Terry Pratchett for podcasting purposes, the letters of Rose Macaulay (various edns) for research purposes, and I'm trying to read the Literary Review to see if I want to subscribe to it, but someone has moved it from where it was put down last .... Feed a cold, starve a fever.
ReplyDeleteHope you fight that cold off soon! The two main ones on the go are a re-read of Elizabeth Peter's The Mummy Case (historical detective fiction set in, perhaps obviously, Egypt); and Paris Under Water (Jeffrey Jackson), non-fiction about the great flood in Paris in 1910. I *should* be re-reading Cheerful Weather for the Wedding, of course.
ReplyDeleteI've just finished my re-read of 'The Shipping News' by Annie Proulx, and am now loving 'Mrs Bridge' by Evan S Connell. It could be the 1950s diary of a provincial American lady...
ReplyDeleteI assume you don't want a list of technical books on RF amplifiers, Engineering at the LHC etc. In terms of fiction I'm nearing the end of "An Instance of the Fingerpost" by Ian Pears (the CBG book for February)and I have just started a book also recommended by Cornflower recently, "When Nights were Cold" by Susanna Jones.
ReplyDeleteHope that cold goes away soon!
ReplyDeleteI'm halfway through Rendezvous with Rama which is classic science fiction by Arthur C. Clarke. I've also just started two books of letters - the Nancy Mitford, Evelyn Waugh volume and Up the Country by Emily Eden which is letters from India from the 1840s.
Glad you aren't submerged in mud somewhere, Simon, and hope you feel better soon. I sympathise as I'm recovering from something similar.
ReplyDeleteJust finished a selection of George Orwell essays and am now getting towards the end of Pnin by Nabokov which is quite wonderful!
I've just finished reading 'Perfume - Patrick Süskind'. Recommended to me by a work colleague, I'm almost ashamed to admit I've never heard of it before then! One of those books that just grips from the 1st page - now snapping up any copy I can find in second-hand book shops to pass on to friends.
ReplyDeleteReading Hothouse Flower by Lucinda Riley at the moment, sorry to hear you are having spam problems.
ReplyDeleteI'm reading "Howard's End is on the Landing: A Year of Reading From Home" by Susan Hill. I like the short chapters as it is perfect for dipping in and out of and am enjoying gaining a perspective on her reading as well as my own. I will be revisiting my own shelves for forgotten and overlooked treasures next I think. I'm also reading "Look Back With Love", the first volume of Dodie Smith's autobiography, which I am thoroughly enjoying.
ReplyDeleteI'm new to your blog (I've been reading for a few weeks) so hope it is ok that I've just jumped into the conversation like this. I thought I might feel less like I'm a Peeping Tom if I actually said hello.
"Howard's End....." has been on my TBR pile for ever, I must get it out & read it!
DeleteSorry to hear you're unwell. I've heard a lot about Oliver Sacks but never been tempted to join the ranks - hallucinations are a fascinating topic though so I might have to start!
ReplyDeleteI'm reading Hangman's Holiday by Dorothy L Sayers - an excellent little short story collection.
I hope that cold, Simon, is just enough to keep you from running around and not enough to keep you from reading.
ReplyDeleteCurrently I'm picking up and finishing all (most of) the books on my Intend-to-Finish list carried over from 2012. Have just finished reading The Motorcycle Diaries by Che Guevera and Priorsford by O.Douglas. Still reading Writing the Revolution by Michele Landsberg.
I've reached the 1980s in Letters Between Six Sisters. Mitfords, of course. That's been a long long read, because I can't just go straight through it, but have to put it down from time to time. Amazing how among them they were connected to virtually every 20th c. mover and shaker in the western world. Two degrees of separation.
I'm reading House-Bound by Winifred Peck. I just finished Mariana by Monica Dickens and liked it a lot. My goal is to read all the Persephone books I own by March 31st so that when I come to London in April, I can go to the store and buy some more. I've already worked out how I'm going to take an extra (empty) carry-on bag and check the one I used on the trip over. @:-)
ReplyDeleteScrummy! What nicer than a visit to Persephone with an empty bag to fill :)
Delete"Wolf Hall" by Hilary Mantel. I've got a ticket to see her at the Oxford Literary Festival so thought I'd better get up to speed!
ReplyDeletedacia maraini an italian writer oft mentioned as a potential nobel winner ,all the best stu
ReplyDeleteI'm half-way through The Handmaid's tale, by Margaret Atwood,mentioned on a brief discussion about dystopian novels on this mornings Today programme, along with Orwell's 1984. I will also soon start Kamila Shamsie's Burnt Shadows for a reading group meeting next Monday, and following that will be Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus - my first Angela Carter read. A nice varied list.
ReplyDeleteHope you're feeling better soon.
ReplyDeleteI was just getting into "Home" by Marilynne Robinson, but then I also got a cold and so have switched to an easier read: "Ghost Knoght" by Cornelian Funke (a children's novel), which I'm enjoying. Commenting from a mobile, which won't let me easily correct the typos above, so sorry about that.
Kirsty
I'm reading a Christmas present: "High Rising" by Angela Thirkell and am absolutely loving it. She is so sharp and the prose so elegant. A perfect read if you have a cold, and if you haven't. Get well soon.
ReplyDeleteJust finished The Acceptance World by Anthony Powell, and Matilda by Roald Dahl. Going to continue on with Lady of Hay by Barbara Erskine. I am trying to read things inbetween the Powell series because I don't want to just drink them down in one huge gulp.
ReplyDeleteAgatha Christie's 'Murder in the Mews' which contains four novellas starring the inimitable Hercule Poirot is my bedtime reading. Just finishing up 'Counting My Chickens' by the Duchess of Devonshire.
ReplyDeleteSorry to hear you're not well. Hope you will feel better again soon. I am currently reading three books: “Teacher Man” by Frank McCourt, "The Turkish Woman" by Martin Mosebach and "A Foreign Affair" by Valerie Barnes. Enjoyoing all of them tremendously.
ReplyDeleteKate Atkinson "Case histories" (2004), a detective story set in Cambridge and it's brilliant. Who would have thought there was a way to write original detective stories any more? Or to write about Cambridge without reverting to the style of Dexter's Inspector Morse? But Atkinson does both: she makes a detective who is human and fails to grasp much of what actually happened, and a Cambridge peopled by the homeless and by survivors of another age.
ReplyDeleteKate Atkinson! Pretty darned awesome, isn't she?
DeleteA zöld kalap.
ReplyDeleteIt's The Green Hat by Michael Arlen in Hungarian. :)
Hope you feel better soon.
The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers and am soon to start The Third Reich by Roberto Bolano. It's my first book by Bolano.
ReplyDeleteThanks for asking!
Judith (Reader in the Wilderness)
Just finished Indian Horse by Richard Wagamase, and almost finished The Age of Hope by David Bergen. Both finalists in Canada Reads 2013; this is the year I'm actually going to read all of the darned books we'll be hearing so much about for the next month on CBC Radio. Also re-reading Eric Nicol as my just-before-sleep bedside table short-and-sweet secondary reading: The Roving I, Shall We Join the Ladies, In Darkest Domestica.
ReplyDeleteThe Grapes of Wrath, which I'm finding upsetting. Hope you feel better soon.
ReplyDeleteA brilliant short biography of Virginia Woolf by Alexandra Harris. Makes me want to read or reread all the novels. Get well soon! Deb
ReplyDeleteRight now I'm reading Interventions by Kofi Annan. I had a book collection for a couple of years and then decided to donate them all to my school's library, now after a year I've decided to start a home library again. I currently have 23 books, I'd love to know what you think about them: www.mixnode.com/profile.php?username=nariman
ReplyDelete