mostly about books

Diamond in the Sky by Malcolm Saville

2011-11-23T23:04:00.001+01:00

The last in Malcolm Saville's Buckingham series, set in Amsterdam, which makes this one of the more exotic settings for his highly enjoyable adventure stories for children. The usual ingredients of a mystery plot, gutsy and clever children outwitting sinister adults, kindly and non-interfering parents, not forgetting the Saville trademark: terrific descriptions of place, are all there.

What struck me with Diamond in the Sky, and I have read a great many of Saville's books, is the place accorded to the young women, although I couldn't help but smile at the fact that of the four described, three are plucky and determined British girls and one is a nice, but rather pathetic, Dutch girl. Malcolm Saville had obviously got round to absorbing women's lib a little, but for British girls only - can't expect those foreigners to be as advanced...

I am an enormous fan of this children's author, who, in my view, should be far better remembered than he is. It's so nice that his most famous series, the Lone Pine books is currently being published in very nice paperback editions by Girls Gone By Publishers. I hope that they bring out all 20, and then tackle the Marston Baines, Buckingham, Jillies, Nettleford and Susan & Bill series...

Le tableau du Maître flamand de Arturo Perez-Reverte

2011-11-23T22:24:00.001+01:00

La partie d'échecs de Peter van Huys, donc un vrai tableau d'un vrai maître flamand offre le cadre de ce polar original. Les protagonistes sont une belle restauratrice d'art (sauf qu'elle fume au moins une cigarette par page, et que ses doigts et dents jaunis sont passés sous silence mais bon...), deux de ses amis : une cougar qui ne vieillit pas très élégamment et un antiquaire homo, son confidant depuis qu'elle est toute petite. Viennent s'y ajouter un joueur d'échecs génial et a-social, le propriétaire du tableau mélomane, un marchand d'art delicieusement vénal. Sans oublier le policier qui cumule corruption et stupidité.

Et bien, je n'ai pas deviné l'identité du coupable... Et je n'ai pas bien compris le retour au XVème siècle des deux ou trois pages de la fin mais je ne pense que cela soit bien grave...

Just Kids by Patti Smith

2011-11-09T08:06:00.002+01:00

I wouldn't have picked up this book if it hadn't been recommended and I wouldn't have gone to a Patti Smith concert if I hadn't been invited, but both happened recently, and I enjoyed both experiences hugely.

The concert first. It was a small intimate affair at the Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, and I went because my work is closely involved in the current exhibition there: Mathematics - A Beautiful Elsewhere. Patti Smith is one heck of a performer, with incredible stage presence. She was accompanied by long time music companion Lenny Kaye on the guitar and vocals and her daughter Jesse Smith on the piano. Not sure I will rush out and buy her songs (the only one I could name before going to her concert was her single, Because The Night, which she co-wrote with Bruce Springsteen, and no, she didn't sing it, it would have been way off key in this "unplugged" sort of gig), but I really enjoyed her performance.

At one point, she started reading a text by a mathematician from my work, Misha Gromov, and then improvised around it. She read it beautifully, not lugubriously like in the recording she made of that same text reading for the exhibition and it was wonderful to hear the poetry I had not guessed in a text I was very familiar with (it is included in a rather lovely book, The Unravelers - Les Déchiffreurs in the original French, of photos of scientists from IHES). What came across really clearly is that Patti is a true poet.

Which brings me to her memoir, Just Kids, because she writes prose pretty well too! I just loved the description of the New York "scene", the beautiful and bitter-sweet story of her and Robert, rebellion channelled into creation, the charting of artists in the making. I now know where she cut her teeth in performance and audience interaction, I have now seen her poetic nature in the flesh.

Together, the book and the concert have introduced me to a true artist and free spirit.

2011-10-27T07:53:00.000+02:00

It should be depressing, to read about someone grieving for a loved one. But weirdly, this book isn't. It is the very powerfully told story of what happens to the author when she loses her partner of forty years to a massive heart attack.
There are no easy answers, no cheap comforts, no silver linings, and yet the book is wonderfully, and strangely, uplifting. I think it's the lucidity of the narration that actually gives meaning to such tired clichés as "death is part of life" or "time heals everything". It may well be that writing that writing this book was therapeutic for Joan Didion - I hope it was - but I'm pretty sure it has helped other bereaved people too.
An unexpectedly good book. Given the topic, I would never have picked it, had it not been warmly recommended.

Haussmann, or the distinction by Paul Lafarge

2011-10-22T20:05:00.001+02:00

A rather dry I'm-writing-with-cynical-detachment-but-sophisticated-readers-can-read-through-that-and-appreciate-my-prose style rather spoiled this book for me. I think I would have enjoyed it very much more with a more straightforward narrative approach.

The subject matter was interesting and the story was captivating in its way. I liked the ambiguity, the gaps and the uncertainties in the storytelling, which were dotted about the novel. I also liked the sense of flux induced by the emergence of the Paris to come that Haussmann was creating, mingled with anticipatory regret for the Paris that was.

Overall, an interesting, rather than an enjoyable read for me.

Giving up ironing, yes we can - A guide for the reluctant beginner

2011-09-24T18:59:00.003+02:00

This is my story. I am telling it because I think it might help other women like me.

I used to iron everything, well nearly. Not underwear, but everything else, towels, serviettes and bedclothes included. Then, I had a baby. The towels went unironed and so did the bedclothes. Then I had another baby, serviettes stayed crumpled and bibs never had a chance to be anything else. Along the way, plenty of people (husband, friends ...) told me that I should really consider doing less ironing. But it seemed important, I was in a job where people "noticed" freshly ironed clothes, I'd always done it, and I didn't want to lower my standards any further... Also, nannies did a bit of ironing as well as looking after the two girls, so...

And then I moved to an enormous house in the suburbs, where somebody helps me with the (far more considerable amount of) housework that needs to be done, and she doesn't iron. And she's finally persuaded me that there are plenty of more useful things I could be getting on with.

So this is my current state in my fight against addiction to ironing: I iron

none of the girls' clothes
my husband's shirts and nothing else of his
blouses, shirts and some trousers of mine
NOTHING else

OK, so I sometimes have relapses. On a bad day, I might decide that the girls' trousers need ironing or that I'm fed up with crumpled pillowslips. These are momentary illusions that are quickly dispelled.

And if you're still hesitating to take the plunge, below is a handy fact and fiction guide to help you. You'll thank me one day, yes you will.

FACT: Whatever precautions you take, you can do terrible damage to a child's favourite garment with a transfer picture AND to the iron.

FICTION: "You can always tell when something hasn't been ironed". WRONG. After ten minutes of being worn (two minutes in public transport), a freshly ironed garment will be uniformly limp on the flat bits and crumpled around elbows, knees, waists etc and look identical to a non-ironed one.

FACT: It is physically impossible to iron T-shirts: the side seams are skewy. I am reliably told that Petit Bâteau, who were the only ones who used to make T-shirts with straight side seams because they used high-quality cotton, no longer do (it's called costcutting, and they've probably relocated somewhere cheaper too ...) so this fact now applies to ALL T-shirts. (And I know you might have trouble believing that some people actively look for straight side-seamed T-shirts, but I assure you some do.)

FICTION: "It is worth slaving away for the pleasure of slipping into a bed with freshly ironed sheets/duvet cover." WRONG. The pleasure lasts four seconds. You spent forty minutes ironing them. Think about it.

FACT: People who comment on the fact that your clothes are crumpled lead very very sad lives.

Hell, Dorothy L. Sayers's translation of Inferno by Dante Alighieri

2011-09-24T18:02:00.000+02:00

I knew that Dante's The Divine Comedy was one of our great European literary canons and it had been on my "to be read one day" list. And, just in the same way that I finally read Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell this summer, I recently read Inferno, the first part of The Divine Comedy, after a series of fortuitious conversations with a theoretical physicist at work.

Our conversation went from mushrooms (it was mushroom picking season) to Dorothy L. Sayers (The documents in the case, the book she wrote with Dr Robert Eustace), to Sayers's work (not just the Lord Peter Wimsey novels) and then to Dante. Sayers translated Hell and Purgatory and died before she could complete Paradise (her friend Barbara Reynolds finished the job). The physicist I was speaking to offered to lend me a copy of an English-Italian edition, the English text being a prose translation dating from the 1940s. We agreed that verse translations ought be be banned and I went away happy with the book. I tried it and simply could not get into the swing of it, as the English was flat and dull, and I don't have anywhere near enough Italian to make sense of the original.

So I bought Sayers's translation, quickly deciding that only bad verse translations ought to be banned and that Sayers was incapable of poor work (if you had not worked this out, I am a big fan of hers.) And I was not disappointed. Although I found some of the vocabulary a little old-fashioned, the rhythm and colour provided by the verses made all the difference. I zipped through the 34 cantos, reading the very helpful intros before each one, and the barest minimum from the notes, to make a little sense of the people encountered and the terrible sins they had committed. Terrific stuff.

Concerning the actual content, I very much enjoyed reading the careful description of the geography of the place, following Dante's physical and emotional journey, keeping a respectful distance from stern and steady Virgil, and both pitying and recoiling in horror from the writhing, smothered, frozen, itching, burning, deformed tormented souls.

The book was written when the desire to escape hell and reach heaven after death was a major driver in European societies, underpinning much of the economic system (think tithing, rich monasteries etc, the basic deal being "we pay, you pray for us and save us"). Mainstream Christian churches today have completely got rid of the image of grimacing demon with pitchforks in hell or angels, fluffy clouds and harps in heaven. It seems to me that heaven is now a completely abstract notion, a place of your choosing where you can find your loved ones again and meet God/Jesus, according to your fancy. And hell has apparently been dispensed with altogether. I'm not advocating a return to "rule through fear" approach for today's churches, but I do think that some sort of representation of the consequences of transgression might be no bad thing.

Le mec de la tombe d'à côté de Katarina Mazetti

2011-09-13T06:58:00.000+02:00

L'auteur de ce livre est l'enfant spirituel d'Anna Gavalda et Arto Paasilinna, ce qui en fait pour moi une conteuse par excellence, très agréable à lire.

Il s'agit d'une histoire d'amour juste assez décalée pour ne pas être gnangnan, avec des vignettes drôles et des héros touchants, chacun à leur façon. Elle est bobo, intello, sympa et paumée. Lui est sensible, rustre, sympa et paumé.

Impossible de dire davantage que "boy meets girl" sans dévoiler l'intrigue. Sachez simplement que vous vous régalerez sauf, évidemment, si vous êtes le genre de personne qui vous dites d'avance que non, jamais vous ne pourriez prendre plaisir à lire un roman un peu léger. Et puis si, même si vous êtes luné comme ça, essayez quand même, je suis sûre que la loufoquerie (une qualité scandinave ? ils ont l'air gentiment dingues ces gens-là) vous séduira.

Décidément, je ne suis pas d'accord avec les critiques de Le Masque et la Plume

2011-09-08T19:23:00.009+02:00

J'écoute régulièrement Le Masque et la Plume sur France Inter et suis systématiquement en désaccord avec les critiques invités quand ils discutent d'un livre que j'ai lu, surtout si je l'ai apprécié. Et plutôt que bouder le programme, je continue de l'écouter, pour orienter mes lectures dans le sens strictement opposé aux appréciations des Michel, Nelly et autre Jérôme.

Dernier exemple en date : la discussion, dans l'émission du 31 juillet dernier que je viens d'écouter en podcast, sur Un été sans les hommes de Siri Husdvedt (voir ici mon avis sur ce livre; en résumé, j'ai aimé).

Alors, oui, c'est un livre qui parle avant tout de femmes et en particulier d'une femme, trompée par son mari, Mia. (Son nom est mal prononcé tout au long du programme. Avec un accent français, ça pourait se transcrire "Milla", "Miya", ou simplement "Mia" d'ailleurs, mais certainement pas "Maya". Ces petits détails qui agacent quand on n'est pas déjà d'accord avec ce qui est dit ...) Malgré les efforts répétés de Jérôme Garcin, qui n'arrêtait pas d'interpeller ses invités avec des "C'est quand même un livre contre les hommes, hein?"- une phrase qui se veut être une question mais qui donne déjà le ton à la conversation - on ne peut vraiment pas dire du tout que ce soit un livre anti-hommes.

Ce qui n'empêche pas une bonne dose de machisme dans les commentaires d'Arnaud Viviant : franchement, lui aussi, il la tromperait cette Mia, pensez-donc, une "poétesse de cinquante ans", c'est d'un chiant. D'ailleurs, il s'est demandé si Paul Auster (le mari de Siri Hustvedt) ne s'était pas lui aussi offert "une petite récréation" avec une Française. Forcément. Michel Crépu, quant à lui, trouve que le livre a été "vampirisé par la psychanalyse" (c'est à dire?) et est trop "abstrait". Je trouve au contraire les récits de l'épisode psychiatrique, de la colère de Mia, et du flou autour des histoires dans le groupe des adolescentes très convaincants.

Ajoutez Nelly Kapriélan qui s'offusque de la nationalité française de la maîtresse du mari, en y voyant un commentaire désobligeant du style "une Française, c'est bien comme pute, mais il vaut mieux avoir pour femme une américaine". C'est à mon sens une interprétation totalement erronée de ce qu'écrit Siri Hustvedt. Jugez en plutôt : "La Pause (c'est comme ça que Mia surnomme la maîtresse de son mari, ce dernier ayant annoncé qu'il souhaitait faire "une pause") était française, elle avait des cheveux châtains plats mais brillants, des seins éloquents qui étaient authentiques, pas fabriqués, d’étroites lunettes rectangulaires et une belle intelligence." En tant que Française, je lis la nationalité de la Pause comme une de ses qualités énumérées par Mia, qu'on sent remplie de rage, mais peut-être aussi d'un rien d'approbation pour le bon goût en conquêtes féminines dont fait preuve son mari trompeur.

En plus, la description de cette femme, qui, si mes souvenirs sont bons, est la seule qui lui est consacrée dans tout le livre, et qui tient dans une seule phrase, est quand même trop longue pour les critiques, puisqu'ils la résument à plusieurs reprises aux seuls "seins éloquents". Pourtant, ils ne sont pas seulement "éloquents", ils sont aussi "authentiques, pas fabriqués", complément d'information visiblement important pour la narratrice. Il est vrai qu'il vaut mieux ne pas attendre de certains hommes à ce qu'ils voient plus loin que l'éloquence des seins ... (Toujours au chapitre détail, "conséquents" aurait traduit le "significant" de la version originale avec certes moins d'éloquence, justement, mais plus d'exactitude ... Après tout, les seins ne bavardent pas, a priori ...)

Seule Patricia Martin avait quelque chose de positif à dire sur ce livre, dommage qu'elle ait parlé en premier, son avis a été noyé dans les hostilités des autres. En tout cas, j'espère qu'elle saisira un jour l'occasion de glisser "alias Monsieur Siri Hustvedt, n'est-ce-pas, Jérôme?" pour présenter Paul Auster sur Le Masque et la Plume... Patricia, je compte sur vous !

A visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

2011-08-29T13:28:00.003+02:00

There were two chapters I really enjoyed in this book: chapter 4 - Safari, which I'd read in The New Yorker, not realising it was part of a novel, and chapter 12 - Great Rock and Roll Pauses, written in the form of a Powerpoint presentation, which I thought very clever and amusing in a poignant sort of way. But basically, I would have been content with those two chapters as stand-alone short stories.

I found the non-linear story telling, which I usually enjoy, over the top and a distraction to the stories told. It's a shame, because I thought the book had a lot going for it, but that it kind of lost the plot, as it were, as it went madly along.

Vingt ans après d'Alexandre Dumas père

2011-08-26T20:37:00.000+02:00

J'ai trouvé le deuxième volet de l'histoire de Porthos, Athos, Aramis et d'Artagnan moins drôle, moins enlevé que Les Trois Mousquetaires.
Mais c'est toujours du grand Dumas...

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonsen

2011-08-26T20:34:00.000+02:00

This was a refreshing read, with nice characters in it, unconventional enough to be interesting yet believable. The not quite so nice characters are ordinarily nasty, not really bad, apart from one insane person. It's a pretty everyday sort of setting and story, but it's intelligently told. A romantic interest between older people makes a change, and forms the basis of the plot. The whole thing was rather sweet, and engaging.

The summer without men by Siri Hustvedt

2011-08-25T01:53:00.004+02:00

As my April to August book catch-up goes on and on, as I remember more stuff I've read, I've decided to just go for one book per post. That way, whenever I think of a book, hey presto, I shoot off a little post about it, without racking my brains trying to think what else I've forgotten...

This one was recommended to me by my work book club colleague, who had also recommended The ballad of the sad cafe, by Carson McCullers. Whereas I had thought that one too nasty, The summer without men, whilst not strictly speaking a bundle of laughs, was one I really enjoyed.

If I said to you: menopausal woman going through marital crisis teaches a poetry writing course to a group of mostly catty adolescent girls, you might think "uh-oh", well, un-think that thought. High on oestrogen, certainly, introspective, yes but everything sensitively handled and quite convincing. The "I'm too angry to be self-pitying and I'm damn well going to be heard" flavour helped turn what could have been depicted as one long wail into a journey of discovery, to coin a rather trite phrase.

what I read between April and August 2011 (3)

2011-08-23T18:45:00.003+02:00

The holiday period provided me with wonderful places to inspire further reading. An inevitable purchase, for instance, was Death in Venice, currently queued up on my Kindle. Holidays also provided me with some time to catch up on podcasts I hadn't listened to, and which have made me a fan of Mariella Frostrup. I just loved the interview with Sebastian Faulks (Open Book presenter on Radio 4 ) where she grilled him on the absence of heroines (as opposed to heroes) in his TV series on the novel. The discussion starts off in a very polite and reasonable manner, then Faulks slowly gets edgier and tenser. I mean to say, saying Marian Halcombe doesn't make the grade as a hero. Is it because she's not pretty, hey, Seb? Yah! sisters unite.

Rome, July 2011 - Photo: Richard Wilkinson

Caleb's Crossing by Geraldine Brooks. I realised after having read this that this was the author of a book I read a few years ago (with book club N°1 - am going to have a name for this one, American book club? We're not quite all American. Expats book club? Ditto. Jewish book club? Ditto. OK, book club N°1 it is, and the other one is work book club). I'd read March, which was one of those sequels to a famous book written by another author, in this case Little Women. Book club N°1 members re-read Little Women as well as reading March (the only one who read it for the first time was a man). I was apalled to realise what a domineering "mother sees all and mother knows all your secrets, darling" kind of mother Mrs March was.

Anyway, coming back to Geraldine Brooks's Caleb's Crossing, I was very luke warm about it. Quite nice but not brilliant. Girl, minister's daughter in 17th Century America meets Native American, who ends up in Harvard. That's about it. I saw some reviews saying "Beware! This will challenge your faith". But I fail to see how, unless you're more fundamentalist than the most extreme of the Pilgrim Fathers, AND your faith is so lightweight that a little interchange with someone from another culture/religion threatens it ...

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell, which I had intended to read in 1984, but that year came and went and I read many other books, not that one. I won't go into the detail of what George Orwell would make of our society today but I was utterly captivated by the Newspeak and Doublethink concept, and the technicalities of it. I would be the one who is helping compile the 11th edition of the Newspeak dictionary but is too clearheaded about it... I haven't really been able to listen to the news since without laughing hollowly...

A few Agatha Christies, re-reads for most of them: N or M? Good old Tommy and Tuppence and I can give you a huge clue in 5 letters... The Man in the Brown Suit, one of my favourites, unashamed light hearted romance, The Moving Finger, 4.50 from Paddington, A Carribean Mystery, all jolly good stuff.

what I read between April and August 2011 (2)

2011-08-21T16:15:00.005+02:00

I though I'd start the second instalment of my blog catch-up by telling you about my current misadventure with the washing machine and launderette, or the difficulties associated with the finer points of child-rearing (the essentials are tough enough: feed, clothe, provide sufficient sleep time and 100% attention per child during waking hours, so just think what the finer points we impose on ourselves, such as healthy eating or a bilingual/bicultural upbringing, entail). But no, the proper place for that is Facebook. More on social media in a separate post, or possibly even on a page. Hold your breath everyone.

St Peter's, Rome - Photo: Richard Wilkinson

The photo was taken during our fantastic three week holiday in lovely Italy. But for now, more books, lovely books.

Maths à mort, de Margot Bruyère - Livre publié initialement sous le titre Dis moi qui tu hais (je te dirai qui tu aimes...) A mon avis, ce livre ne présenterait pratiquement aucun intérêt pour quiconque n'aurait pas travaillé à l'IHÉS. D'ailleurs, il est assez difficile à trouver. Mais c'est amusant de lire l'Institut à travers le regard très personnel, et donc sans doute très biaisé, d'une personne qui y a travaillé longtemps.

The fall of giants by Ken Follett. I was in Rotterdam station one day, didn't have my Kindle, didn't want to pay ridiculous roaming charges on my iPhone, so I did the un-green thing and bought a paper version of a book I knew I'd only read once (it has since found what I hope is a good home in the housing estate where visiting professors at my work live). The impression I retain was that it was a sort of Downton Abbey (TV series) Gosford Park (film) Remains of the Day (book by Kazuo Ishiguro) combo. In fact there were elements of Remains of the Day plot, with the informal dinner at some Lord's pad in Wales, bringing together his various relatives and acquaintances, who conveniently combine into a neat representation of the political situation in the 1910s. I liked the miner, Dai-with-Jesus, to whom you are introduced first, but couldn't sustain that level of interest for the other characters in various countries. Good read, but won't be rushing out to buy the next two volumes.

Cathedral of the Sea by Ildefonso Falcones. Ken Follett leads to Pillars of the Earth, reviewed elsewhere on this blog, and from there in one easy hop, to Cathedral of the Sea. A very similar book to Pillars of the Earth, probably lighter on technical cathedral building aspects, but even heavier on social issues. Set in Barcelona in the 14th Century. Nice Christians, Jews and Muslims. Nasty Christians, Jews and Muslims. Plenty of plucky women. Slightly idiotic but heroic and strong men. Plenty of action, treason and lurve. What's not to like?

The purple valley and Three towers in Tuscany by Malcolm Saville. At last, I'm enjoying the treat I had saved for myself for so long (bought the books in October, they sat on my shelves till June, such self restraint!) and discovered another series, Marston Baines, by my favourite ever children's author. There are no real surprises, the books are hugely enjoyable. The key Saville hallmarks are there: the main characters are incorruptibly good, the main baddies largely foreign, but hey; locations for the action are as accurately and feeling presented as in other books by this largely neglected classic author. This particular series, Marston Baines, represents an attempt by Saville to reach out to older readers, by dealing with such contemporary issues in the seventies as drugs. Every word he writes about that particular topic still ring true (see also When in Rome by Ngaio Marsh or Murder must advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers, yes I know, my references are hopelessly old-fashioned). Can't wait to read the third one I bought at the Malcolm Saville Society event in Church Stretton last October, but I have to wait till my mother's finished reading it.

catching up - what I read betweeen April and August 2011 (1)

2011-08-21T12:53:00.002+02:00

OK, so it's been a while, a long while. I had it in my head that my last post was from the end of May and I find that it was actually at the end of April, and even then, only consisted of photos (admittedly worth a thousand words each, but still). The last post about books was in March, yikes!

So here goes, to help me remember what I've read, I'm relying partly on my Kindle, and partly on my memory... The list is likely to be incomplete and definitely not in strict chronological order. Right, disclaimers written, tick, various household and garden chores done, tick, husband and daughters otherwise occupied, tick, prevarication is officially OVER.

Blogging in the garden - Photo: Richard Wilkinson

What I read

Les Colombes du Roi Soleil, tomes 1 à 4, de Anne-Marie Desplat-Duc, livres recommandés par ma fille de 10 ans. C'est une série d'histoires romantiques pour filles (pré-ados), où des jeunes filles intelligentes, belles et bonnes, bravent tous les interdits pour des jeunes gens mièvres et pas très intéressants, mais bien faits de leur personne. Les jeunes filles en question sont pensionnaires de la Maison Royale de Saint-Louis à St Cyr, créée à la demande de Madame de Maintenon, épouse secrète de Louis XIV. Les références historiques correctes (me dit-on) assurent également le succès de cette collection, les parents ne pouvant s'empêcher de dépenser jusqu'à douze euros par tome (oui DOUZE euros pour ces livres qui sortent d'abord en grand format) pour instruire leurs filles sur cet aspect de l'histoire française. Et tant pis si, une fois encore, elles apprennent en fait que trouver l'amour avec l'Elu compte plus que tout...

The ballad of the sad café, by Carston McCullers, recommended by a colleague and co-founder of the work book club. I only read The ballad of the sad café in the Penguin edition of seven short stories by Carston McCullers and hated it. Dark, dark, and twisted. Not just depressing like Zola or Steinbeck (bless them). I spoke about it to the person who recommended it, who said that was what appealed, which I kind of understand: I know someone who said the same sort of thing about Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller - "You can feel the despair and pain this person is going through", they said. Fine, but I don't enjoy that experience. In the same way, I never choose to go and watch a horror film, or a really scary one, and can only take violence if there is a "point" to it, as in the fist fight in On the Waterfront, for instance. In fact, I can swallow any amount of squalor, misery, gore, nastiness etc, so long as there is some kind of redemption at the end, or at least some kind of clear illustration about what this nastiness is about (e.g. Ruth Rendell's A Judgement in Stone - see below). But a book or film that is just horrible from A to Z, with no other message than "life's shit" turns me off. Yes, I need escapism (I think we all do, really.)

A Judgement in Stone by Ruth Rendell, which was the first work book club choice. I had read this many years ago and "loved" it. It is truly nasty, with a completely amoral character, and a mad one. The "nice" people are tragically self-centered and blind. The crime is sordid. It is also all plausible and, against all the rules of classic whodunits, it gives the name of the culprit and the reason for their crime in the first sentence of the book. Which leads to this profound sense of unease, as the inevitability of the (announced) crime becomes ever more obvious. It is also a very interesting piece of work on the problem of illiteracy, which I have witnessed a couple of times in my career. To me, the book is a perfect example of "nasty, but interesting".

Wisteria season

2011-04-20T08:56:00.004+02:00

Something knitted

2011-04-11T20:56:00.003+02:00

Well, this has made it on another blog, so I guess I'd better post it here too.

It's a knitted copy of a Hugh MacLeod drawing.

On the joy of bookclubs

2011-04-11T08:19:00.002+02:00

I am now the proud member of not one but two book clubs. The first has been going for several years and consists mostly of American expats. I was invited to it by a former colleague and have never stopped going since, even after I left Paris (where the vast majority of the book club members live) to move to the suburbs, three years ago. The second is a recent creation, at my work, with two of us deciding to launch a "cercle de lecture" and meeting with a very positive response to the idea from a select (i.e. small) but enthusiastic group.

The secret of book clubs is not really a secret at all. It's a self evident thing that if you love books and reading, you love talking about them. And what joy when you are introduced to a book you had never heard of, and you love it. And what disappointment when you conscientiously plough through the next book club meeting book, and you hate it. And what amazement when people don't share your views.

To date, the book that has divided opinions most passionately, as evidenced by the views expressed in both my book clubs, is L'élégance du hérisson by Muriel Barbery. We had a lengthy and impassioned debate about it in the Paris book club, and a brief but no less animated discussion in the work one, and both groups were split fifty-fifty. I am firmly in the haters camp, but I have to admit that the lovers camp has its ardent followers too...

To anyone out there who is hesitating, don't, join or create a book club. Stimulating discussions with book lovers guaranteed.

What I read in March 2011

2011-04-02T03:17:00.004+02:00

L'immeuble Yacoubian de Alaa El Aswany. J'ai beaucoup aimé ce livre, tant par son style que par le coup de projecteur qu'il donne sur la société égyptienne contemporaine. Fascinant, et on se demande si El Aswany portera le même regard sur son pays dans quelques années, vu les événements récents.

Purge by Sofi Oksanen. I didn't enjoy this as much as I felt I should have done. The story was a good one and the characters engaging, but a certain flatness in the narration put me off. I have come to the conclusion that I dislike the present tense in novels, as the same flatness struck me in other books written in the present. It's probably a completely subjective thing, and I did enjoy quite a lot of the book, which talks about a country (Estonia) and an episode of history I know little about.


Emma turned six this month. Photo: Richard Wilkinson

I re-read Swish of the Curtain by Pamela Brown, which I bought in a new edition. I was thrilled to discover that this was a longer version than the one I had read previously, as the book must have been abridged at some point. I just bought a new copy because my old one was very tatty and finding almost an extra chapter was a real bonus. Will re-read Golden Pavements and Maddy Alone again too, which I also bought again, but I suspect they will be the text I have read before because I have early editions of those. They are bringing out Blue Door Venture too, which I have pre-ordered. I live in hope they bring out Maddy Again, which is the only one of the series I haven't read, and which is going for £250 on the second hand market. Also re-read Lone Pine London by Malcolm Saville, in the recent (but original, unabridged text, Girls Gone By Publishing edition.)

March was also the month I very nearly reconstituted my collection of Misty comics which got lent and not returned (grrr..) many years ago. Only one to go!

Oh, and wonderful hubby has bought me the Knit Your Own Royal Wedding pattern book by Fiona Goble, the ultimate in kitsch memorabilia... Needless to say, all my other current knitting projects have been put to one side.

What I read in January and February 2011

2011-02-25T07:44:00.004+01:00

At Home by Bill Bryson, which I enjoyed as I do all his books, comedy or not. This was one of his non-comedy works, and used a tour of his English ex-vicarage home as a pretext for a whizz through history as told by the evolving use we make of the various rooms in our homes, and their contents. The only thing I regretted slightly was that this was a very partial history (by which I mean European/American), which is fine; however, I would have welcomed a chapter or so on how the basic concept of home and daily living differ across geographies and cultures and not just over time.

Les paupières de Yoko Ogawa. Une autre série de nouvelles que j'ai beaucoup aimée, mais pas autant que La Mer. Il se dégage de ce recueil comme un air un peu malsain, ou au moins inquiétant et trouble.

Un aller simple de Didier van Cauwelaert, que j'ai également beaucoup aimé, comme tous les autres que j'ai lus de cet auteur, qui décidément me plaît bien. Cétait le choix de mon club de lecture parisien (il faut en effet désormais que je le distingue de l'autre club de lecture auquel j'appartiens, que nous venons de lancer avec une collègue au bureau) et il a fait l'unanimité. On a tous aimé l'histoire loufoque, et ce type sans famille qui s'en trouve une, après un voyage dans un pays qui est (peut-être) celui de ses ancêtres mais pas de ses origines.

Depuis, j'ai commencé Vingt ans après, d'Alexandre Dumas, encore un régal, et Tendres paupières de Yoko Ogawa, idem. Que des bonnes lectures en ce moment, le bonheur.

What I read in December

2010-12-26T08:34:00.005+01:00

Well, this may be a first but I don't think I finished a book in December! Work, a cold and cough I refuse to call flu but that's going on and on, Christmas-cum-surprise-40th-birthday-party-for-hubby preparations and a little knitting definitely got in the way of enjoying books. Oh and joining Facebook too...

I did read Coroner's Pidgin by Margery Allingham in November, which I didn't mention in the November post and I'm finishing Tiger in the Smoke by the same author. Of course, there are five days left in December so I may well yet finish a book this month after all...

I don't know why I don't love Margery Allingham as much as I should, given her Queen of Crime status, and the fact that she is mentioned alongside Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie, and the other greats of the golden period of crime writing by British female authors. I tried her books several years ago, looking forward to acquiring another favourite crime author, but was disappointed. When a friend lent me another two Campion books recently, I though I'd give her another try. I did race through Coroner's Pidgin, the silly aristocratic lady being quite well done, and something about the prevailing atmosphere in war period described pretty well. But I am ploughing through Tiger in the Smoke, with its long "cour des miracles" bit. Even the good Uncle Avril and the beautiful and virtuous Meg don't arouse my interest much.

Something about Allingham's writing style feels a little dry to my mind and Albert Campion does not do it for me. Too understated and quiet, probably.

On joining Facebook

2010-12-26T08:20:00.003+01:00

I've finally done it. I've joined Facebook, after saying for years that I was too old for it and didn't have the time. One week after joining, I haven't really changed my mind .. OK, so there are very different age groups on there, but I think that the communication style is essentially one that belongs to young people. The immediacy, the baring of all, the virtual posse, hood, clique, whatever that becomes so important it IS the posse, hood or clique, they really all seem to fit people with a teenager mindset (bearing in mind that the number of years you actually clock does not necessarily match the "expected" or "usual" behaviour for that number).

It seems to me that Facebook is constituted of trivia for 95%. Certainly, that is my experience so far, but the remaining 5% is an exception so important that it justifies my having joined Facebook (I learned bad news from a friend I am in regular contact with, but hadn't been in touch with for a while).

I do see the point of sharing news and photos quickly, but it's not that obvious to make these relevant, entertaining or interesting to all your friends. For my part, I prefer taking my time to either write a completely tailored message to a particular person or to try and compose a more measured piece for the internet community at large in this blog (I know, I know, two people read it, but I mean the discerning internauts at large...) Also, being a rather cautious person, "Do I need to be careful what I share with work colleagues?" "Will I offend so and so" "Does that comment make me sound a busybody or terminally middle aged?" goes through my head.

Care, one of the charities I support, was one of the organisations whose page I added to my profile or wall or whatever (not familiar with all the terminology yet). I commented on the fact that I didn't want to vote for the story I most wanted to read about, which is what they are doing in the run up to 2011. Someone from Care helpfully commented back that it wasn't about voting for the "best" story. I understand, but still don't like the "vote" idea synonymous with mindless TV programmes. I'll find a person to have an off-Facebook email exchange about this, but will keep Care on my Facebook. On the other hand, I've "unliked" Nina Hagen's page. She made great music but is as offensive and ranting as ever. 70s punk is dead Nina, and I don't think you're making a lot of sense now.

Finally, some people clearly have a talent for short, pithy and humorous posts and I really enjoy those. But I'm definitely a more wordy person! So I'll give it till the end of 2010 to see whether I stick around and contribute or just sit there as a Facebook non-participating squatter.

As to Twitter, shouldn't it just become a new emergency service?

What I read in November 2010

2010-11-21T00:31:00.005+01:00

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

This was the latest book read and discussed by our book club. It was unanimously appreciated. For my part, I loved finding out more about one war I knew nothing about, not even its occurrence. I do remember the terrible pictures of children in Biafra dying of famine as one of the few momentous events which filtered down to my consciousness as a child (others were two men shaking hands with a third man grinning between them and that being a big deal - Begin and Sadat, in case you were trying to work it out - and a bit later, asking my parents what difference it would make if Monsieur Mitterrand rather than Monsieur Giscard d'Estaing were elected President). However, I discovered to my shame that I had no idea that the Nigerian-Biafran war preceded/caused the famine.

I thought that the novelisation of that war-torn period worked extremely well, with a wide range of different actors of the war (willing or otherwise) convincingly depicted. The twin sisters are obviously strong characters, in keeping with their book heroine status, as well as their respective menfolk, although "strong" is perhaps not the mot juste to describe idealistic Richard, with his tendency to impotency except in infidelity, and his inability to write the book he initially set out to write. Village people are very present too, both those who live with educated and/or rich townies, mostly as servants, and those who are still in their village and in abject, rather than relative, poverty.

The story runs through the tragedy of war and does it with enough gruesome detail to satisfy the urge for anger at the horror and the folly (that severed head being carried in a basket by the mother who can't stop looking at her daughter's beautiful braids..) but also with beautiful storytelling around the lives and loves of the protagonists, which stops the book being just a documentary with a little human interest.

What I loved most of all was the depiction of middle-class Nigerians with Western-style education, trying to build something new and fairer in the postcolonial period of the 60s. I appreciated the description of the wigs of the fashionable Nigerian woman of the time. I wanted to know more about the palm wine carrying ceremony, in fact I wanted to be invited to one. I felt bizarrely grateful, somehow, that in the midst of war, a mother still worried about her child catching lice. And the book did leave me wondering whether an Oxbridge education wasn't another insult to add to the long list of evils perpetrated by the colonial powers in the "Scramble for Africa" (which I haven't read, but don't think I have the stomach for, having scanned a few paragraphs).

Here is Adichie's TED talk:

Hors de moi de Didier van Cauwelaert que j'ai acheté en même temps que d'autres livres de cet auteur, ayant déjà lu L'éducation d'une fée et Rencontres sous X, que j'avais appréciés tous deux. J'ai lu ce livre très vite, avec plaisir. Cette histoire d'identité usurpée n'est peut-être pas follement originale, ni même analysée en grand détail, mais le récit est enlevé et pas idiot.

What I read in October 2010 (part 2)

2010-11-13T20:05:00.005+01:00

Photo: Richard Wilkinson

Grey, wet and windy weather is perfect for curling up with a book, without having to pretend that it would be a healthier and better use of leisure time to go out for a walk. So, here are the books I read to the accompaniment of branches lashing against the window panes and the sky turning from ink black to varying shades of grey:

Greenmantle by John Buchan. Having really enjoyed watching a film remake of The 39 steps recently, I was inspired to buy myself a copy of the book, and found out by browsing the Kindle store that there were actually four Richard Hannay stories. So having finished reading Greenmantle, I'm not throwing myself on the other two, too gung-ho and simplistic about fighting the good fight, and not much suspense in this one.

Peter and Paul by Susan Scarlett, which was the author's second pen name, her first being Noel Streatfeild, the name with which she wrote many well-known children's books still popular today. Ballet Shoes, for example, was made into a really excellent film starring Victoria Wood, Emma Watson and Richard Griffiths a couple of years ago. Anyway, about Peter and Paul, the blurb on the back of the book mentions that it is "A charming love story, originally published as a magazine serial in 1939" and that just about says it all. A "light romance" would be another way of describing it and I'm ready to bet that the serial was published in Woman's Weekly... The story is about twins, one plain and kind and one beautiful but without feelings, leaving their country home for a dress shop in London. The shop has a young, handsome and very eligible owner-designer and a wicked, older, manipulative woman. You guess the rest. The writing style is very flat compared to practically all Noel Streatfeild's books. I suppose that you don't expect the characterisation to be particularly believable in a children's book (although...), so maybe that's part of the explanation. But if you compare Peter and Paul, for example, to A Vicarage Family, Noel Streatfeild's autobiography, which I'm assuming was intended for adults as well, you'll find that the latter has real bite. The sharp descriptions of her family members, school friends and scenes from her daily life in an Edwardian English vicarage are absolutely captivating. The same can not be said of the description of Peter and Paul's adventurettes.

Les paupières de Yoko Ogawa. C'est une autre collection de nouvelles de cet auteur que j'adore, dans une version plus macabre cette fois-ci. J'ai beaucoup aimé. Ce livre est le quatrième que je lis de Yoko Ogawa; je pense que La petite pièce hexagonale reste mon préféré pour l'instant. Je songe même à inclure ce dernier dans mon hit parade des livres ...

And just for the heck of it, in no particular order, here is a list of books that I've started and not finished over the past few months:

Hors de moi de Didier van Cauwelaert
Un aller simple de Didier van Cauwelaert
The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
At Home by Bill Bryson

Infinite in All Dimensions by Freeman J. Dyson

La Consolante de Anna Gavalda

Coroner's Pidgin by Margery Allingham

Passion Lippi de Sophie Chauvin

Cette histoire-là de Alessandro Barrico
J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye by Sarah Graham

Le plus grand des hasards - Surprises quantiques de Jean-François Dars et Anne Papillault
Les arpenteurs du monde de Daniel Kehlmann

When Heaven Invades Earth by Bill Johnson

At this point in time, I estimate that I'll finish half of these...

What I read in October 2010 (and where I went)

2010-10-05T12:25:00.003+02:00

This month started with a first for me: attending one of the events organised by the Malcolm Saville Society. I thoroughly enjoyed my trip to South Shropshire. We had a walk around the Stiperstones on the Saturday, followed by a hog roast in a pub in Bishops Castle that evening. We were meant to walk on Offa's Dyke the next day, but very heavy rain stopped us (see picture! it also temporarily stopped the Ryder cup, which was taking place in the same part of the world). Instead, time was spent very pleasantly chatting at the house of one of the members, who very kindly let us take over her home for a few hours, and also produced a lunch out of thin air.. .We had an afternoon of talks at Church Stretton after that, which was also very enjoyable, and which I thought was surprisingly well attended. It was also yet another opportunity to part with cash on hard to find out-of-print copies of Malcolm Saville adventure stories. So of course I came back with three more. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing, and mostly enjoyed meeting people who are so enthusiastic about the books by Malcolm Saville, which I have loved ever since I first read them.

Anyway, here are the books I've finished since my last post:

Le goût de la Grande-Bretagne, édité par Anne-Marie Cousin, que j'avais commencé il y a un certain temps et délaissé pendant l'été. J'ai plutôt aimé cette sélection d'extraits très courts d'auteurs britanniques célèbres, la trouvant plutôt astucieuse dans sa diversité. J'ai pourtant été un peu décontenancée en arrivant à la fin du livre de découvrir qu'il existait une collection importante de livres "Le goût de (tel pays ou ville)". Il y en a tellement que je me suis demandée si leur édition consistait en quelques heures de travail sur Google pour chaque volume... Si tel est le cas, l'éditrice a eu la main heureuse sur celui-ci en tout cas, même si on reste un peu sur sa faim avec des textes si courts, (serait-ce une question de gratuité de droits d'auteurs sur des extraits suffisamment brefs?)

Réussir sa mort - Anti méthode pour vivre de Fabrice Hadjadj, également commencé il y a pas mal de temps. Cet auteur m'a été recommandé chaleureusement par un grand mathématicien et fervent catholique. J'ai choisi ce livre en particulier, séduite par son titre, qui prend à contrepied l'injonction débile et omniprésente que nous recevons de toute part de réussir. Il faut réussir la rentrée, la retraite, ses vacances, son dîner etc. Réussir sa mort est un essai intéressant, fort érudit, assez mordant. Je tombe complètement d'accord avec les opinions exprimées en ce qui concerne le suicide, qui m'a toujours semblé être un acte profondément égoïste, (même si je conçois que la détresse qui pousse un être à se détruire est très grande) et m'oppose farouchement à celles qui concernent l'avortement.

Day & Night by Teddy Newton. There isn't much to read in this picture book but I adore looking at it. It's based on a short cartoon I absolutely loved when I saw it before Toy Story 3 (also very good). It's the kind of drawing I particularly like.

What I read in September 2010

2010-09-29T13:00:00.003+02:00

What I read

The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole. What a load of tripe! I quite enjoyed it though. So this is a gothic novel? OK, so gothic = old fashioned but readable tripe, gotcha. I thought Ivanhoe by Walter Scott a load of hooey, but found it reasonably enjoyable trash. Is that a gothic novel too, by any chance? I guess not, though, because there is nothing spooky in there.

Les trois mousquetaires de Alexandre Dumas. C'était le choix estival du club de lecture franco-américain auquel j'appartiens : nous choisissons traditionnellement (je peux dire "traditionnellement", parce que notre club de lecture a maintenant plus de quatre ans) un livre plus long, puisque nous ne nous voyons pas pendant deux bons mois, et je me suis de nouveau régalée. Ce livre était le préféré de mon grandpère, et il l'avait raconté tant de fois et avec tant de détails à ma grandmère, qu'elle m'a dit ne jamais avoir éprouvé le besoin de le lire. Quant à moi, je l'ai lu pour la première fois il y a une dizaine d'années et étais déjà tombée sous son charme. Ce qui m'avait surtout plu, et ce plaisir ne s'est pas émoussé à la deuxième lecture, c'est la dôlerie à chaque page. Un vrai régal.

Life on the Refrigerator Door by Alice Kuipers. I believe that this is considered to be a young adult's book, which of course it is. It's certainly enjoyable by older adults too. I liked it very much, but found that it did read a little like a cancer nurse's handbook. I guess that that doesn't take away anything from it.
I heard about it from French friends, one of whom lent me their daughter's school library copy, in French of course, and I instantly downloaded it in English on my Kindle (well on my iPhone actally, because I was in a car at the time, isn't technology wonderful?) On comparing the two versions, I was horrified to read in the postscript that "Thank you to Margaret Buckmaster, whom I never had time to meet" had been translated into French like this: "Merci à Marguerite Buckmaster, que je n'avais jamais le temps de voir". In French, the reader has the impression that the author was always too busy to meet Margaret B., whereas the inference in English is clearly (in my view, thoughts anyone?) that the said Margaret had passed away, probably of cancer. I hope that the rest of the translation is better...

What I listened to

Villette by Charlotte Brontë on good old BBC7. Just wonderful. How I love audio productions of books...

What I watched

An adaptation of John Buchan's 39 steps written by Lizzie Mickery, directed by James Hawes. I loved this.

A couple of episodes of that new take on Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes by Guy Ritchie with Robert Downey Jnr and Jude Law, which I rather like.

What I read in June and July 2010

2010-08-10T04:27:00.006+02:00

Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby. This has nearly knocked A Long Way Down off my fave Nick Hornby perch. How does he manage to create pathetic characters you still manage to empathise and engage with? As usual in his books, the woman character is rather less pathetic than the man and it's a bit as if Nick Hornby were saying to us "Yes, I know we men are a bit useless, but bear with us, OK?"

Caught by Harlan Coben. I read this just a few weeks ago and I barely remember anything about it! I didn't actively dislike it while I was reading it, it just didn't make much of an impression. Usual kind of Coben stuff, but without the usual page-turning factor.

Mes amis mes anours de Marc Levy. Comme toujours, c'est agréable à lire, mais ça ne va pas chercher bien loin. En fait, je pense que Marc Levy est Anna Gavalda au masculin, en plus gnangnan; conclusion je pense que ce sera le dernier Marc Levy que je lirai, alors qu'Anna Gavalda me donne encore envie de lire son prochain bouquin.

L'échappée belle d'Anna Gavalda justement. J'ai bien aimé. Pas autant qu' Ensemble, c'est tout, mais autant que Je l'aimais et que J'aimerais que quelqu'un m'attende quelque part. Par contre, déception avec La consolante (on m'avait prévenue). C'est comme si elle essayait de s'approprier un style qui ne lui appartient pas. J'ai abandonné ce livre rapidement.

Hand in Glove and Death at the Bar by Ngaio Marsh. I thought I'd read all the Ngaio Marsh novels but I was thrilled to discover I hadn't, so that's one up for Kindle, because that's where I found them. Hand in Glove was a disappointment for me, one of the rare Marsh books I haven't enjoyed, but I felt right back on familiar and well loved territory with Death at the Bar.

Armadale, Poor Miss Finch and No Name (a re-read) by Wilkie Collins. Take one headstrong but virtuous young woman, one virtuous but wimpy young woman, one evil scheming older woman, one virtuous young man, one evil young man, place all the afore-mentioned in Victorian England, add a moral problem with far-reaching consequences for the virtuous young people and hey presto, you have a Wilkie Collins. I think that the recipe works a lot better in The Moonstone and The Woman in White, which I have both read many times, but I still enjoyed reading these three in quick succession on a sunlounger in Aix.

The Secret Adversary and The Big Four by Agatha Christie. The first is a Tommy & Tuppence mystery, but I much preferred N or M? also featuring the T&T couple. The second is Agatha Christie having a go at writing The 39 Steps with Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings tracking the baddies. Not a classic body-in-the-library plot, but plenty of action and really good fun.

The joy of reading good books in a sunny garden

2010-06-06T10:21:00.004+02:00

Having moved out to the burbs a couple of years ago, there is very little I miss about Paris a) because I go there quite often b) because there are so many things I enjoy here, like a garden. (By the way, for those of you who were anxious to hear the latest developments about the blue tits, they seem to have flown the nest - anyway, all is quiet, it's been over a month since they hatched, and having checked their breeding habits on Wikipedia, they'll have flown off by now.) So, the hammock and the loungers are out most days, and are extremely conducive to reading and/or a nap...

Of course, as I write, the weather has turned rainy and stormy (as forecast) but yesterday was glorious and so I disappeared in the hammock with my Kindle (which is perfect with its special whatever screen in strong light) and had a go at a review of Catcher in the Rye, which I bought by mistake instead of the novel itself. It's OK so I'll probably finish it.

I also took with me La consolante by Anna Gavalda. I'm aware that it's not meant to be her best effort, but I wanted to read it anyway and was just waiting for the smaller paperback to come out. (French bestsellers don't tend to come out in big hardback format before the paperback version like in the UK. Instead, publishers bring out big paperbacks, before the small paperbacks which is perhaps marginally more environmentally friendly, but still annoying.) I haven't started it yet. The sunshine filtering through the trees and the tweeting and chirping sent me to sleep before I picked it up...

I'm starting to get a little disappointed with the choice of ebooks availble on Kindle. After the initial euphoria, I am discovering that apart from the latest releases and past-the-copyright-date classics, there is really quite a limited choice. For instance, I'm listening to Daphne du Maurier's Frenchman's Creek on the radio at the moment, and thought I would get the book on Kindle, but no joy, even Rebecca isn't available. Neither are any of the Salinger novels or the Harry Potter books. I wonder whether this is to do with rights issues or are down to publishers' decisions or what. I still love the Kindle as object/concept but would love a little more choice of books, and of course, books in French too.

No hammock today, will just have to read indoors.

What I read in May 2010

2010-05-28T10:15:00.001+02:00

Time to be in earnest by PD James

An autobiography in the form of a diary over a period of one year (1997/1998). As always, I find it interesting to get insight into the life of authors I admire. But I wish she had just written an "ordinary" autobiography, because the diary-as-an-excuse-for -reminiscing ploy sometimes feels a little clunky. Still, I enjoyed this.

Notting Hell by Rachel Johnson
This was lent by a fellow book club member and was a fun read. "Witty, sharp, outrageous and cringingly real. I was riveted" says Sophie Kinsella on the front cover and I more or less agree with her. It left me with the feeling that haing the moeny to live in a place like Lonsdale Gardens would be a very mixed blessing.

What I read in April 2010

2010-04-30T17:16:00.002+02:00

The pillars of the earth by Ken Follett

This one, warmly recommended by a fellow book club member, is about cathedral building in the 12th Century. I know it's probably not a great literary work, but it's a hugely enjoyable read. I loved reading the Brother Cadfael books by Ellis Peters a while back, so I already knew a bit about the historical background to the Empress Maud and King Stephen's drawn out tussle. And cathedrals are fascinating things, so it's nice to get a little insight in how these amazing buildings were erected nearly a thousand years ago.

As you like it by William Shakespeare

I saw this with my sister recently, in English (which you don't get to see that often in Paris), directed by Sam Mendes, and we both really enjoyed the show, so I read it afterwards. I thought there was some great acting and it was generally easy on the brain, despite it being by the Bard. Reading the play having watched it first, I was once again struck by how much easier it is to understand (well, for me to understand at any rate) Shakespeare's plays acted rather than read. The language gap of a few centuries is largely erased with the clues provided by the actors' and the director's skills.

What I read in March 2010

2010-04-06T10:54:00.004+02:00

Are Women Human? by Dorothy L. Sayers (see the "Crime books I love" page on this blog)

These two essays are quick and easy to read. They are also very entertaining and 95% relevant today.

La formule préférée du professeur de Yoko Ogawa.

J'ai acheté ce livre parce que j'avais adoré cet auteur (voir l'article "What I read in July & August 2009" sur ce blog) et à cause du titre (je travaille dans un endroit où il y a beaucoup de grands mathématiciens). Le roman met en scène trois personnages: un professeur de mathématiques qui a une mémoire de 80 minutes seulement, suite à un accident, son aide-ménagère, et le fils de cette dernière. Leurs interactions, centrées autour des mathématiques et du baseball (l'autre passion du professeur), font l'objet du livre. Certains passages sont très réussis, comme l'admiration de l'aide ménagère pour une belle formule, qui lui permet d'entrevoir la profondeur et la beauté des mathématiques. Cependant, je n'ai pas été complètement emballée par ce livre. Je me demande si, plus court, il n'aurait pas fait une nouvelle admirable, comme La petite pièce hexagonale.

Au bonheur des ogres de Daniel Pennac.

J'avais bien aimé Merci et Comme un livre, donc le livre choisi par notre club de lecture pour sa prochaine réunion devait être une lecture au moins agréable. Elle l'a été, en effet, mais comme disait un ami, on a envie de demander à Monsieur Pennac "Quand écrirez-vous un livre sérieux?" Ce roman date de 1985 et il accuse bien son quart de siècle... Le terrorisme est toujours d'actualité, mais les cercles sataniques sont beaucoup moins en vogue. Sinon, on retiendra du livre cette idée amusante de bouc émissaire séculaire des temps modernes et certains personnages. Parmi eux, la figure ambigüe du grand frère/père/amant parfait m'agace profondément; manque de bol, c'est le héros de l'histoire. Je préfère la soeur mystique et le chien.

The Apothecary's Daughter by Julie Klassen

I wasn't going to own up to having read this, but this is a warts-and-all blog, and I did read it to the end, so it must have contained some of the essentials of story telling. It is incredibly soppy and sentimental and 19th Century apothecaries were clearly a weird lot. Oh, you wanted to know what it was about? A young girl, whose father is an apothecary, whose brother has learning difficulties, whose mother has disappeared, and whose friend has epilepsy, goes to London to live with wealthy relatives. She has several suitors, including a boy back home, and doesn't know which to choose. She comes home, discovers dark family secrets and chooses the Right Man.

The Private Patient by PD James

No apology required here to say that I enjoyed this very much. It's vintage James. All the ingredients are here: brilliantly drawn characters from different social backgrounds, classic it-can-only-have-been-an-inside-job intrigue, beautiful location, a compassionate and highly intelligent police force in the shape of Dalgliesh and his team and the continuing love story. I found James pretty vitriolic in some of her side comments on British society today, but hey, she's allowed her opinion.

Un autre gadget pour lire (entre autres)

2010-03-08T13:04:00.005+01:00

Ca y est, j'ai craqué pour l'iPhone. Malgré mes hésitations (j'ai déjà deux iPod et un téléphone, comment est-ce que je peux justifier cet achat?), je me suis laissée convaincre : pour les aspects écologiques, les iPod seront facilement recyclabes à terme entre nos deux filles et peut-être que le téléphone aussi. (Sauf qu'on me dit que d'ici à ce que l'aînée y ait droit, le dit portable sera d'une obsolescence qui, si par malheur il s'allumait encore, plomberait à jamais l'indice de coolitude de la petite chérie au collège.) Et puis, il y en avait assez de ne rien pouvoir synchroniser correctement avec le Mac, surtout mon carnet d'adresses et mon agenda. Les choses vont vraiment vite dans le monde de la technologie : à part un écart vite regretté, je suis restée fidèle à Nokia depuis mon premier portable, pour cause de facilité d'utilisation. Maintenant que je suis convertie à Apple (ordis à la maison, iPod et maintenant iPhone dans le sac à main), Nokia est totalement éclipsé. Bon, passons.

La GRANDE nouvelle, c'est que le nouveau gadget fonctionne très très bien avec Kindle et que la lecture sur ce petit écran est tout à fait agréable, même si le Kindle proprement dit offre un autre confort. Moralité, le Kindle format livre restera sur ma table de chevet plutôt qu'alourdir mon sac à main, ce qui n'est pas plus mal. Et donc, tous mes achats de livres électroniques sur Amazon se retrouvent automatiquement à la fois sur mon Kindle et sur mon iPhone, que du bonheur.

Ajoutez à cela les petites applis téléchargeables qui oscillent entre utiles (RATP, météo, Allociné etc) et complètement inutiles mais fun (la vache qui fait meuh, idaft, Fluid etc) avec KnitMinder (pour rerpétorier ses projets de tricot) quelque part entre les deux, et vous avez de quoi passer des heures scotchée à votre nouveau gadget indispensable.

The joy of knitting

2010-02-28T15:07:00.010+01:00

When I started this blog, I considered posting about not just books but also about knitting, which I love. I even had a naff name all ready for it: "Scribbles and yarns". But I soon gave up the knitting side, intimidated by the high quality of the many knitting blogs I have seen. So I thought any old idiot could write about the books they have read with the hope that it might interest other like-minded bookish idiots...

As far as I can see, the only good that has come out of the fairly recent resurgence of knitting as a cool rather than a grandma-ish activity is that there are now even more wonderful yarns and some great patterns to buy. Otherwise, do you really need daft titles like Stitch 'n' Bitch to sell knitting books? (Actually that particular book by Debbie Stoller is rather good).

Deciding what to knit, how to adapt that perfect jumper - you want with no hood and a different stripe pattern - for one of the girls, wondering whether that little scarf pattern might be a good way of using up left-over yarn (the answer always being no, it's perfect to knit up three quarters of the scarf, which ends up being so sweet you just have to hunt for the missing yarn, which is no longer produced in the right colour, and so it goes on), is almost as fun as knitting. So I spend money and time on knitting books, a prelude to spending larger amounts of money on yarn and eons of time on actually knitting. But of course, spending too much time and money is a pre-requisite for any hobby.

In a Starbucks in Geneva, 2010 - Photo: J-F Dars

What I read in January and February 2010

2010-02-01T18:51:00.000+01:00

Special topics in calamity physics by Marisha Pessl, lent to me by a bookclub friend. I really enjoyed this, even if the general craziness, heavy use of capitalised expressions and in-your-face kultshur left me a bit gasping for air sometimes. However, it really had something. A Good Read.

Her life in crime by Joanne Drayton, a biography of Ngaio Marsh (see one of the top left pages for a mention of this great crime author).

Well, this certainly filled certain gaps left in Marsh's Black beech and honeydew autobiography for me. I was particularly interested in the much more detailed information on her crafting of the detective stories she is most famous famous for (outside New Zeland). It was also pretty fascinating to get an insight into her financial affairs , with her tussle with tax issues, and to get a feel for what what must have often been a punishing travel schedule and constant upheavals and house moves between the UK and New Zealand. The description of the theatrical ventures doesn't disappoint either.

Her private life remains pretty much private, and her sexual orientation, although I think probably lesbian, remains uncertain. She doesn't have very sympathetic portrayals of gay men in her books, whatver that means. At the same time, the Alleyn-Troy story love story in her detective novels, although interesting and involving two very engaging characters, never struck me as being altogether a thing of joy. Tellingly, Agatha Troy admits to being "scared of .... the physical side" during the courtship.

I always take myself to task for reading biographies ("it's the work that counts, not the life") but mostly enjoyed that one.

Le Petit Nicolas de Sempé et Goscinny, que j'ai lu suite à la recommandation chaleureuse de ma fille aînée (huit ans). C'est vrai que c'est mignon... J'ai cru comprendre que le film récent n'a pas fait l'unanimité, mais les enfants que je connais et qui l'ont vu ont beaucoup aimé. Je ne devrais vraiment pas tenir compte du Masque et de la Plume (que j'aime bien par ailleurs, tant que je ne me fie pas à leurs recommandations. Depuis qu'ils ont descendu en flêche Malavita de Tonino Benacquista, je mesure précisément l'écart qui sépare leur critique de la mienne...)

Mon chapitre préféré? Celui qui met en scène le papa qui bousille le vélo tout neuf de Nicolas ...

Something that can't be found in any bookshop or on Amazon... the Malcolm Saville Society (more on this children's author also in one of the pages top left) short story competition entries (c. 5000 word short stories and c. 500 word "micro stories" to be precise). I was part of the judging panel, and although "the results are in", they are not official yet, so hush...

Richard III by William Shakespeare - I picked it up, prompted by listening to it on BBC7 first. I loved listening to the women screeching and cursing, Richard being devious, and most of the other blokes being feeble, as far as I could tell. I enjoyed reading the play too. I've bought a hard copy, because my Kindle edition has no notes, which I do find useful for proper Shakespeare appreciation. (The English language having evolved much more since his time, than say the French language since Molière's). I'm not complaining though: at 3.44$, I reckon the complete works of the Bard is still very good value, even with Société Générales "zone hors euro" ridiculous surtax!

So having read the actual play on my Kindle, I read the introduction in the New Penguin Shakespeare edition, which calls Richard III "an apprentice-piece compared with Shakespeare's best tragedies". This has prompted me to have a further go at the man from Avon, as I have only read a few plays and that was a fairly long time ago. My Mum has given me some tips, so I'll try her suggestions.

In praise of my Kindle

2010-01-11T12:50:00.012+01:00

I do love my new toy (thank you again, Richard). Main plusses of my brand new e-book reader is that it's easy to hold and read, a good size (I have the 6" one) and illustrations are nice and sharp. Bypassing wifi with the wireless reading device is also very helpful (says she who comes from a household where the network used to play up, much to the despair of very IT-savvy hubbie... And before you ask, yes we've had all the wires changed from the nearest exchange right into our house after a variety of France Telecom engineers scratched their heads and ended up replacing the lot, unplugged everything and plugged it all back again in varying orders, we're onto third Livebox. However, there is light at the end of the tunnel, the new all-singing all-dancing router seems to work.) It's also very easy to start using, and, as with all things Amazon, far too easy to start buying...

Minor gripes in case anyone from Amazon is out there (and guys, you need to watch out, iSlate is coming), or indeed anyone considering purchasing one:

When is the colour version coming out? (colour for illustrations only is fine - I'm thinking of knitting patterns especially here...)
When is there going to be loads more content in lots of languages, not just in English?
When can I start buying ebooks via amazon.fr not .com, and therefore pay in euros and avoid "out of euro zone" charges?
Any chance of backlighting, to avoid using one of those naff clip-on lamps when you want to read in bed without keeping your beloved awake?

And it looks like the modern disease of poor proofreading is as prevalent on Kindle content as on printed material, but then I guess that's not really a Kindle issue...

All in a day's work

2010-01-07T21:16:00.020+01:00

Morning. I've dropped the girls off at school. I get to work, using the side gate into the site. A magical winter wonderland scene : deer tracks in the snow, no other sign of life. Trees eerily quiet on either side of me as I make the first footsteps in the powdery snow. I'm one of the first to get here, as I live within walking distance...Work.

Lunchtime. I decide to pop back home quickly to fetch the camera. Spend ten minutes taking more pictures of our garden. Had taken some this morning but it was with a flash and it was snowing (quite fun photos actually, might do for next year's home made Christmas card...) Get back to the office and take loads of pictures of the park. The light is beautiful, there is plenty of sunshine, but not the harsh light you sometimes get with snow. Work.

Afternoon. A robin just outside my window makes me reach for the camera again. It's Christmas-card perfect, feathers puffed out to protect it from the cold, perched on a snowy branch. There are usually blue tits out there too, but today I saw a wren instead. Carry on working.

Walk to the girls' school and pick them up from after-school activities a bit earlier than usual, so that we can all avoid freezing too much, as the temperature drops quickly after the sun sets. Make a detour on my way out from my office to take more photos of the park. It's quite dark already, although the days are getting a little longer now. Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue wafts from the piano in the foyer of our conference centre. It is being played by two physicists, who like to give little concerts on such occasions as the Christmas staff do. I'm pretty sure they could both make a living from piano playing equally well as from researching gravitational waves and what have you...

Some days are good.
Sorry, just wanted to gloat.

What I read in November and December 2009

2009-12-15T19:35:00.000+01:00

The Help by Kathryn Stockett. This was one of my first Kindle content purchases and I really really enjoyed it, which is a lot more than can be said of:

Midnight in Madrid by Noel Hynd, which I don't think I'm going to finish.

I selected them using a lazy but simple criterion: they were both high up in the Amazon fiction bestseller rankings. I ended up being delighted by the one and very disappointed by the other.

Somewhere along the middle of that loved/hated spectrum was my third Kindle purchase: A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore. I really liked bits of it, but I didn't enjoy the feeling I got that there were several pretty unconnected stories going on here.

Les contes de la Bécasse de Guy de Maupassant que j'ai lus plusieurs fois - la première fois en cours de français en 4ème ou en 3ème, c'est à dire il y a une éternité, et je les ai relus depuis plusieurs fois, pour resavourer (si c'est le terme) la cruauté si bien vue.

The lost symbol by Dan Brown. Mmmm, well, maybe the breathless dash through a city solving clues is reaching its limit as a concept here; it was pretty obvious to me where Robert Langdon and his equally dim female acolyte of the moment should be heading for from the start! And I probably missed the whole deep philosophical point the book was perhaps trying to make, but I got a real "so what?" feeling at the end of the book and felt completely cheated out of a decent thriller ending. Sorry, Mr Brown, not your best effort by a long chalk.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. A lovely cozy read.

Dial M for Merde by Stephen Clarke - much like the others by him. I would probably enjoy these books more if the Paul West character (and the author?) didn't make it quite so clear he thought he was God's gift to all women...

What I read in September and October 2009

2009-10-15T00:21:00.000+02:00

White Tiger by Aravind Adiga. Gripping and disturbing. I hope his depiction of India is a deliberately shocking one...I would like an Indian person's opinion on how much of an exaggeration it represents. Mind you, if 10% is true to life, it's pretty dire anyway...

Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome. I would have been a lot more entertained by this classic children's book, for which I had high hopes, if sailing or boats held any real interest for me... Recently, there was quite a lot in the news of Ransome's life as a spy. I enjoyed reading about that rather more than reading this book. Malcolm Saville was seen as following on from Arthur Ransome but he is to my mind a much more exciting children's book writer. Mind you, I've read dozens of Malcolm Saville's books and only one of Arthur Ransome's...

Les champs d'honneur by Jean Rouaud. Not sure about this one. Some of the descriptions were a bit wordy, but I didn't mind that too much, or the rather disjointed construction, even though I kept losing track of who Joseph was. It's just that I couldn't be bothered to go back and check how he related to everyone.

Mr Pip by Lloyd JonesMmm. OK but not a gripping read. The rhythm picked up at the end when the violence, which was clearly latent throughout the story, started. Although the book had its moments for me, overall, my impression was that it was a bit flat and colourless.

Oedipe roi by Sophocle
Ah, the force of destiny.

What I read in July and August 2009

2009-08-15T19:10:00.000+02:00

La petite pièce hexagonale and La Mer by Yoko Ogawa. Reading these two books and discovering this author was one of those moments when you think "Wow! That's what writing is all about." I absolutely adored these and am really looking forward to reading La formule préférée du professeur. I've read all these in French, Actes Sud published them and my respect for this publishing house increases all the time. If I ever try and learn Japanese, one of the major reasons would be to read these books in the original version (and if I ever learned Russian, I just wouldn't know where to start: Gogol, Tolstoy or Turgenev??)

A Harlan Coben, Long lost I think. Good holiday read. Enough said.

The one about stealing eggs in Leningrad in WWII. A page turner but I hope/trust all the atrocities of that awful time were concentrated in one story...

Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates - my book of the summer. Loved loved loved this. For once I'd seen the film first and I must say that the film was a very faithful adaptation and that the lead actors both did outstanding jobs. I'm very grateful to this film (despite having chosen a Valentine's night to go out with my husband on one of our rare cinema trips - I can't think of a less suitable Valentine's night out, really... All the disillusionment of broken dreams in one fraught couple...) because I'd never heard of the novel and it really is wonderful.

Hoped to be as enthused by The Reader by Bernhard Schlink, on the grounds that Kate Winslet might have starred in two films based on exceptional books. I enjoyed it but nowhere near as much, mostly because I guessed what the heroine's problem was early on, and I thought it a little unbelievable that the hero/narrator hadn't. I haven't seen the film, so can't compare it with the novel.

Mal de pierres by Milena Agus. This was highly recommended to me but I was a little disappointed. I think that by this point I was a little fed up with neurotic women...