Bev's bookshelf: all en-US Wed, 07 Aug 2024 19:49:53 -0700 60 Bev's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Twenty Years After (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #2)]]> 7184
Twenty Years After (1845), the sequel to The Three Musketeers, is a supreme creation of suspense and heroic adventure.

Two decades have passed since the musketeers triumphed over Cardinal Richelieu and Milady. Time has weakened their resolve, and dispersed their loyalties. But treasons and stratagems still cry out for justice: civil war endangers the throne of France, while in England Cromwell threatens to send Charles I to the scaffold. Dumas brings his immortal quartet out of retirement to cross swords with time, the malevolence of men, and the forces of history. But their greatest test is a titanic struggle with the son of Milady, who wears the face of Evil.]]> 845 Alexandre Dumas 0192838431 Bev 0 to-read 4.06 1845 Twenty Years After (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #2)
author: Alexandre Dumas
name: Bev
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1845
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Around the World in Eighty Days]]> 54479 252 Jules Verne 014044906X Bev 4 3.95 1872 Around the World in Eighty Days
author: Jules Verne
name: Bev
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1872
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Master Butchers Singing Club]]> 790393 388 Louise Erdrich 0066209773 Bev 0 to-read 3.97 2003 The Master Butchers Singing Club
author: Louise Erdrich
name: Bev
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Shipping News 7354
A vigorous, darkly comic, and at times magical portrait of the contemporary American family, The Shipping News shows why E. Annie Proulx is recognized as one of the most gifted and original writers in America today.
(back cover)]]> 337 Annie Proulx 0743225422 Bev 4 3.88 1993 The Shipping News
author: Annie Proulx
name: Bev
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1993
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/10/31
shelves:
review:

]]> Lady Chatterley's Lover 49583709
With her soft brown hair, lithe figure and big, wondering eyes, Constance Chatterley is possessed of a certain vitality. Yet she is deeply unhappy; married to an invalid, she is almost as inwardly paralyzed as her husband Clifford is paralyzed below the waist. It is not until she finds refuge in the arms of Mellors the game-keeper, a solitary man of a class apart, that she feels regenerated. Together they move from an outer world of chaos towards an inner world of fulfillment.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700Ěýtitles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust theĚýseries to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-dateĚýtranslations by award-winning translators.]]> 400 D.H. Lawrence 014303961X Bev 4 3.48 1928 Lady Chatterley's Lover
author: D.H. Lawrence
name: Bev
average rating: 3.48
book published: 1928
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Paris Review Interviews, II: Wisdom from the World's Literary Masters (The Paris Review Interviews, 2)]]> 596060 The Paris Review was founded in 1953, it has given us invaluable conversations with the greatest writers of our age, vivid self-portraits that are themselves works of finely crafted literature. From William Faulkner's determination that a great novel takes ninety-nine percent talent . . . ninety-nine percent discipline . . . ninety-nine percent work, to Gabriel García Márquez's observation that in the first paragraph, you solve most of the problems with your book, The Paris Review has elicited revelatory and revealing thoughts from our most accomplished novelists, poets, and playwrights. With an introduction by Orhan Pamuk, this volume brings together another rich, varied crop of literary voices, including Toni Morrison, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Graham Greene, James Baldwin, Stephen King, Philip Larkin, Eudora Welty, and more. A colossal literary event, as Gary Shteyngart put it, The Paris Review Interviews, II, is an indispensable treasury of wisdom from the world's literary masters.]]> 528 The Paris Review 0312363141 Bev 0 to-read 4.39 2006 The Paris Review Interviews, II: Wisdom from the World's Literary Masters (The Paris Review Interviews, 2)
author: The Paris Review
name: Bev
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/31
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Year of Wonders 4965
Through Anna's eyes we follow the story of the fateful year of 1666, as she and her fellow villagers confront the spread of disease and superstition.

As death reaches into every household and villagers turn from prayers to murderous witch-hunting, Anna must find the strength to confront the disintegration of her community and the lure of illicit love.

As she struggles to survive and grow, a year of catastrophe becomes instead annus mirabilis, a "year of wonders."

Inspired by the true story of Eyam, a village in the rugged hill country of England, Year of Wonders is a richly detailed evocation of a singular moment in history. ]]> 304 Geraldine Brooks 0142001430 Bev 4 4.00 2001 Year of Wonders
author: Geraldine Brooks
name: Bev
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/07/30
shelves:
review:

]]> Someone to Run With 60364
When awkward and painfully shy sixteen-year-old Assaf is asked to find the owner of a stray yellow lab, he begins a quest that will bring him into contact with street kids and criminals, and a talented young singer, Tamar, engaged on her own mission: to rescue a teenage drug addict.

A runaway bestseller in Israel, in the words of the Christian Science Monitor: "It's time for Americans to fall in love with Someone to Run With."]]> 343 David Grossman 031242194X Bev 0 to-read 4.18 2000 Someone to Run With
author: David Grossman
name: Bev
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Two Lipsticks and a Lover 582094 280 Helena Frith Powell 1903933676 Bev 4 3.46 2005 Two Lipsticks and a Lover
author: Helena Frith Powell
name: Bev
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/06/01
shelves: about-or-set-in-france, my-top-shelf
review:

]]> 84 Charing Cross Road 2727537
"84, Charing Cross Road" is a charming record of bibliophilia, cultural differences, and imaginative sympathy. For 20 years, an outspoken New York writer and a rather more restrained London bookseller carried on an increasingly touching correspondence. In her first letter to Marks & Co., Helene Hanff encloses a wish list, but warns, "The phrase 'antiquarian booksellers' scares me somewhat, as I equate 'antique' with expensive." Twenty days later, on October 25, 1949, a correspondent identified only as FPD let Hanff know that works by Hazlitt and Robert Louis Stevenson would be coming under separate cover. When they arrive, Hanff is ecstatic - but unsure she'll ever conquer "bilingual arithmetic." By early December 1949, Hanff is suddenly worried that the six-pound ham she's sent off to augment British rations will arrive in a kosher office. But only when FPD turns out to have an actual name, Frank Doel, does the real fun begin.

Two years later, Hanff is outraged that Marks & Co. has dared to send an abridged Pepys diary. "I enclose two limp singles, I will make do with this thing till you find me a real Pepys. THEN I will rip up this ersatz book, page by page, AND WRAP THINGS IN IT." Nonetheless, her postscript asks whether they want fresh or powdered eggs for Christmas. Soon they're sharing news of Frank's family and Hanff's career.

"The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street" is a memoir of the author's visit to London following the publication of "84 Charing Cross Road." It is based on diary entries written during her stay and chronicles the events she attended, the people she met, and her impressions of a city she had long dreamed of experiencing.]]> 220 Helene Hanff 0860074382 Bev 4 4.20 1970 84 Charing Cross Road
author: Helene Hanff
name: Bev
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1970
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/09/21
shelves:
review:

]]> The Firecrackers of Lilliput 13201920 409 Michael Martin Bev 0 to-read 3.76 2020 The Firecrackers of Lilliput
author: Michael Martin
name: Bev
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[History of Germany 1918-2008 Third Edition]]> 6114556 A History of Germany traces the dramatic social, cultural, and political tensions in Germany since 1918.
Offers a persuasive interpretation of the dynamics of twentieth-century German history Treats German history from 1918-2008 from the perspective of division and reunification, covering East and West German history in equal depth Covers the self-destructive Weimar Republic, the extremes of genocide and military aggression in the Nazi era, the division of the nation in the Cold War, and the collapse of communist East Germany and unification in 1990 New edition includes updates throughout, especially covering the Nazi period and the Holocaust; a new chapter on Germany since the 1990s; and a substantially revised and updated bibliography]]> 402 Mary Fulbrook 1405188146 Bev 5 3.69 1992 History of Germany 1918-2008 Third Edition
author: Mary Fulbrook
name: Bev
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1992
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/04/15
shelves:
review:

]]> fourW twenty-nine NEW WRITING 42962165 144 Various Bev 5 4.00 fourW twenty-nine NEW WRITING
author: Various
name: Bev
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2021/03/26
date added: 2021/03/26
shelves:
review:
Difficult to write an impartial review when I was one of the writers selected for publication in this book, but, seriously, this book contains fabulous writing. There is so much talent represented in this anthology.
]]> Lost Memory of Skin 17328480 Lost Memory of Skin is the story of The Kid, a young sex offender recently released from prison and forced to live beneath a South Florida causeway. When The Professor, a man of enormous intellect and appetite, takes The Kid under his wing, his own startling past will cause upheavals in both of their worlds. At once lyrical, witty, and disturbing, Banks’s extraordinary novel showcases his abilities as a world-class storyteller as well as his incisive understanding of the dangerous contradictions and hypocrisies of modern American society.]]> 352 Russell Banks 184668577X Bev 0 to-read 3.25 2011 Lost Memory of Skin
author: Russell Banks
name: Bev
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Small Great Things 29955414
Ruth is shattered and bewildered as she tries to come to terms with her situation. She finds different kinds of support from her sister, a fiery radical, and her teenage son, but it is to Kennedy McQuarrie, a white middle-class lawyer, to whom she entrusts her case, and her future.

As the two come to develop a truer understanding of each other's lives, they begin to doubt the beliefs they each hold most dear. In order for the privileged to prosper, they come to realise, others have to suffer. Racism takes many forms, and is reinforced and underpinned by the structures of our society.

In gripping dramas like Nineteen Minutes, My Sister's Keeper and The Pact, Jodi Picoult has explored the big issues of our time through characters whose lives resonate with us. Here we see once again her unrivalled ability to immerse us in a story whose issues will linger with us long after the final page has been finished.]]> 470 Jodi Picoult 1760110493 Bev 3
"Small Great Things" has powerful messages, but that goes without saying. It does have the power to make the reader uncomfortable as we are faced with the tiny, teeny, almost invisible signs of racism that pop up constantly in our comfortable white societies. For all of us who adamantly assert, "Hey, not me. I'm not racist", there are things in this book that are difficult to read, little pointers that we don't want to follow. Few who read this book would recognise themselves in the bigoted, ugly, white supremacists we meet on these pages spewing their hatred and ignorance. Those people would not read this book. If they did buy it, they would probably find it offensive and condemn it to the rubbish bin. This isn't a book for them; it is a book for liberal thinking, open-minded, non-racists, and it has the power to make us uncomfortable.

Jodi Picoult is just so reliable. Her research is exhaustive and commendable, and her writing never in doubt. Her ability to tell a story, to focus on an issue that, perhaps, we never consider until it comes along and slaps us in the face, is superb. As I said, powerful messages, and so worth reading to take on board those messages.

]]> 4.24 2016 Small Great Things
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Bev
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2016/01/01
date added: 2020/08/11
shelves:
review:
Before making any comments about this book, I confess that, for me, "My Sister's Keeper" is the best book that Jodi Picoult has written. As I said, that is "for me". It's my opinion only, but that's what these comments are.

"Small Great Things" has powerful messages, but that goes without saying. It does have the power to make the reader uncomfortable as we are faced with the tiny, teeny, almost invisible signs of racism that pop up constantly in our comfortable white societies. For all of us who adamantly assert, "Hey, not me. I'm not racist", there are things in this book that are difficult to read, little pointers that we don't want to follow. Few who read this book would recognise themselves in the bigoted, ugly, white supremacists we meet on these pages spewing their hatred and ignorance. Those people would not read this book. If they did buy it, they would probably find it offensive and condemn it to the rubbish bin. This isn't a book for them; it is a book for liberal thinking, open-minded, non-racists, and it has the power to make us uncomfortable.

Jodi Picoult is just so reliable. Her research is exhaustive and commendable, and her writing never in doubt. Her ability to tell a story, to focus on an issue that, perhaps, we never consider until it comes along and slaps us in the face, is superb. As I said, powerful messages, and so worth reading to take on board those messages.


]]> Shantaram 228378 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780312330538

"It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured."

So begins this epic, mesmerizing first novel by Gregory David Roberts, set in the underworld of contemporary Bombay. Shantaram is narrated by Lin, an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of a city where he can disappear.

Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter Bombay's hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.

As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city's poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power.

Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas---this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart. Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature.]]> 936 Gregory David Roberts Bev 0 to-read 4.18 2003 Shantaram
author: Gregory David Roberts
name: Bev
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/05/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Dry (Aaron Falk, #1) 27824826 A small town hides big secrets in this atmospheric, page-turning debut mystery by award-winning author Jane Harper.

In the grip of the worst drought in a century, the farming community of Kiewarra is facing life and death choices daily when three members of a local family are found brutally slain.

Federal Police investigator Aaron Falk reluctantly returns to his hometown for the funeral of his childhood friend, loath to face the townsfolk who turned their backs on him twenty years earlier.

But as questions mount, Falk is forced to probe deeper into the deaths of the Hadler family. Because Falk and Luke Hadler shared a secret. A secret Falk thought was long buried. A secret Luke's death now threatens to bring to the surface in this small Australian town, as old wounds bleed into new ones.

]]> 336 Jane Harper Bev 0 to-read 4.04 2016 The Dry (Aaron Falk, #1)
author: Jane Harper
name: Bev
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/05/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Sense & Nonsense in Australian History]]> 2201758 336 John Hirst 097507699X Bev 5 university
Have already read this wonderful gem for an earlier university unit, and was over the moon that it pops up again as certain chapters being required reading for another unit. Whatever preconceptions you have about Australia's convict past, this book will light a bomb under. It is without doubt one of the most readable, enjoyable, conversation-inspiring books you could read and I recommend it highly. Oh, and did I mention I love Hirst's writing? No? Okay, then, I love Hirst's writing. Why can't all historians write in such an engaging manner??????]]> 3.36 2005 Sense & Nonsense in Australian History
author: John Hirst
name: Bev
average rating: 3.36
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at: 2013/11/23
date added: 2019/09/02
shelves: university
review:
For AUS11

Have already read this wonderful gem for an earlier university unit, and was over the moon that it pops up again as certain chapters being required reading for another unit. Whatever preconceptions you have about Australia's convict past, this book will light a bomb under. It is without doubt one of the most readable, enjoyable, conversation-inspiring books you could read and I recommend it highly. Oh, and did I mention I love Hirst's writing? No? Okay, then, I love Hirst's writing. Why can't all historians write in such an engaging manner??????
]]> <![CDATA[A Concise History of Australia (Cambridge Concise Histories)]]> 800445 356 Stuart Macintyre 0521601010 Bev 4 3.77 2000 A Concise History of Australia (Cambridge Concise Histories)
author: Stuart Macintyre
name: Bev
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/09/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism]]> 399136
Anderson explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialization of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time. He shows how an originary nationalism born in the Americas was modularly adopted by popular movements in Europe, by the imperialist powers, and by the anti-imperialist resistances in Asia and Africa.

This revised edition includes two new chapters, one of which discusses the complex role of the colonialist state's mindset in the develpment of Third World nationalism, while the other analyses the processes by which, all over the world, nations came to imagine themselves as old.]]> 224 Benedict Anderson 0860915468 Bev 5 4.13 1983 Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
author: Benedict Anderson
name: Bev
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1983
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/09/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism]]> 82408
The full magnitude of Benedict Anderson’s intellectual achievement is still being appreciated and debated. Imagined Communities remains the most influential book on the origins of nationalism, filling the vacuum that previously existed in the traditions of Western thought. Cited more often than any other single English-language work in the human sciences, it is read around the world in more than thirty translations.

Written with exemplary clarity, this illuminating study traces the emergence of community as an idea to South America, rather than to nineteenth-century Europe. Later, this sense of belonging was formed and reformulated at every level, from high politics to popular culture, through print, literature, maps and museums. Following the rise and conflict of nations and the decline of empires, Anderson draws on examples from South East Asia, Latin America and Europe’s recent past to show how nationalism shaped the modern world.]]> 240 Benedict Anderson 1844670864 Bev 0 4.04 1983 Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
author: Benedict Anderson
name: Bev
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Orientalism 5427
In this wide-ranging, intellectually vigorous study, Said traces the origins of "orientalism" to the centuries-long period during which Europe dominated the Middle and Near East and, from its position of power, defined "the orient" simply as "other than" the occident. This entrenched view continues to dominate western ideas and, because it does not allow the East to represent itself, prevents true understanding. Essential, and still eye-opening, Orientalism remains one of the most important books written about our divided world.]]> 432 Edward W. Said Bev 0 4.05 1978 Orientalism
author: Edward W. Said
name: Bev
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1978
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Reflections on a Ravaged Century]]> 52136 336 Robert Conquest 0393320863 Bev 0 3.79 1999 Reflections on a Ravaged Century
author: Robert Conquest
name: Bev
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/01
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Age of Extremes, 1914-1991]]> 308060 627 Eric J. Hobsbawm 0679730052 Bev 4 4.29 1994 The Age of Extremes, 1914-1991
author: Eric J. Hobsbawm
name: Bev
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1994
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/09/01
shelves:
review:

]]> The Coming of the Third Reich 22588406 Richard J. Evans Bev 5 4.50 2003 The Coming of the Third Reich
author: Richard J. Evans
name: Bev
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/09/01
shelves:
review:

]]> Breaking Badly 46029653
Within a year Georgie was unemployed, back living with her parents and suffering such crippling anxiety that she ended up in a psychiatric hospital.

Breaking Badly is the story of a nervous breakdown in slow motion � a life that fell apart and what it took to put it back together again. Brutally honest and warmly engaging, it’s a must-read for anyone who sometimes feels close to the edge.

â€Funny, shocking, beautifully written â€� a fascinating account of one woman’s hand-to-hand combat with her own mind.â€� Annabel Crabb

â€A magnificent writer â€� Read this if you have ever suffered from anxiety, from mental illness, from perfectionism or from feeling inadequate.â€� Lana Hirschowitz]]> 288 Georgie Dent 1925712788 Bev 0 to-read 3.93 Breaking Badly
author: Georgie Dent
name: Bev
average rating: 3.93
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1)]]> 338691
But Gamache knows that evil is lurking somewhere behind the white picket fences and that, if he watches closely enough, Three Pines will start to give up its dark secrets...]]> 293 Louise Penny 0312948557 Bev 4
It is rare to find a writer who manages to combine a well crafted plot and intriguing characters, and particularly one who ties it up beautifully with skillful writing, but Ms Penny does just that. The result: a page turner you savour for the writing as much as the storyline. Oh, and the added bonus is that you do get a bit of an education regarding the whole Francophone/Anglophone divide that exists in Canada.

]]> 3.86 2005 Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1)
author: Louise Penny
name: Bev
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves:
review:
What a gem; the perfect holiday read. I had never heard of Louise Penny, but thankfully came across her via one of those daily Kindle deals. I now have three more of her books in my queue.

It is rare to find a writer who manages to combine a well crafted plot and intriguing characters, and particularly one who ties it up beautifully with skillful writing, but Ms Penny does just that. The result: a page turner you savour for the writing as much as the storyline. Oh, and the added bonus is that you do get a bit of an education regarding the whole Francophone/Anglophone divide that exists in Canada.


]]> <![CDATA[The Rosie Result (Don Tillman, #3)]]> 41018628 I was standing on one leg shucking oysters when the problems began�

Don and Rosie are back in Melbourne after a decade in New York, and they’re about to face their most important project.

Their son, Hudson, is having trouble at school: his teachers say he isn’t fitting in with the other kids. Meanwhile, Rosie is battling Judas at work, and Don is in hot water after the Genetics Lecture Outrage. The life-contentment graph, recently at its highest point, is curving downwards.

For Don Tillman, geneticist and World’s Best Problem-Solver, learning to be a good parent as well as a good partner will require the help of friends old and new.

It will mean letting Hudson make his way in the world, and grappling with awkward truths about his own identity.

And opening a cocktail bar.

Hilarious and thought-provoking, with a brilliant cast of characters and an ending that will have readers cheering for joy, The Rosie Result is the triumphant final instalment of the internationally bestselling series that began with The Rosie Project.]]> 376 Graeme Simsion 1925773477 Bev 0 to-read 3.99 2019 The Rosie Result (Don Tillman, #3)
author: Graeme Simsion
name: Bev
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Cat Who Went to Paris (Norton the Cat)]]> 158902 Ěý
“An entertaining romp that leaves no doubt that Mr. Gethers and his cat have a most remarkable relationship.”—Kiki Olson,Ěý The New York Times Book Review
Ěý
At one time in his life, Peter Gethers, publisher, screenwriter, and author, was a confirmed loner and cat hater. All that changed when a Scottish Fold kitten named Norton entered his life.
Ěý
Peter opened his heart to Norton and soon they were inseparable. Together they rode the ferry to Fire Island, traversed the subways of Manhattan, traveled on the Concorde to Paris,Ěýdated beautiful women, and even dined in the world’s finest restaurants. Norton knows how to impress simply by being himself—an amusing and intelligent companion who understands silence, enjoys the thrill of the chase, and gladly accepts the devotion of man and womankind. He also teaches his fallible owner how to live, love, andĚý beĚý a compassionate human being.
Ěý
The Cat Who WentĚýtoĚýParisĚý proves that sometimes all it takes is paws and personality to change a life.]]> 208 Peter Gethers 0449907635 Bev 0 to-read 4.08 1991 The Cat Who Went to Paris (Norton the Cat)
author: Peter Gethers
name: Bev
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1991
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft]]> 10569 (back cover)]]> 320 Stephen King 0743455967 Bev 0 on-bookshelf 4.33 2000 On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
author: Stephen King
name: Bev
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Chef Q in Paris: The Fall Collection]]> 30987987
As fall arrives, let’s change more than just our wardrobes—let’s reinvent our cooking with seasonal products! Too difficult or time-consuming? Not with these tips and quick and easy recipes from chef Didier Quémener. Didier’s cooking is all about seasonal ingredients (no strawberries on Didier’s table in November). He grew up in the French countryside, picking fresh fruit and vegetables in his grandmother’s garden and preparing flavorful meals at her side. Today, Didier brings that love for seasonal products to his guests and to you. As a result, your meals will be tastier, easier to make—and less expensive.

Is this a purely French cookbook? No! Didier, who’s traveled throughout the U.S., Europe and China, is greatly influenced by his voyages, and his cuisine is the perfect reflection of this. So if you like cookbooks with a seasonal and international touch, you’ll find this one especially delightful!]]> 82 Didier Quémener 099776760X Bev 0 to-read 4.26 Chef Q in Paris: The Fall Collection
author: Didier Quémener
name: Bev
average rating: 4.26
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Anything but Ordinary: The Nine Lives of CĂ©cile]]> 2526805 320 Cecile Dorward 1863682945 Bev 0 3.17 2001 Anything but Ordinary: The Nine Lives of CĂ©cile
author: Cecile Dorward
name: Bev
average rating: 3.17
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: currently-reading, on-bookshelf
review:

]]> Truth (Broken Shore, #2) 5290996
Villani’s life is his work. It is his identity, his calling, his touchstone. But now, over a few sweltering summer days, as fires burn across the state and his superiors and colleagues scheme and jostle, he finds all the certainties of his life are crumbling.

Truth is a novel about a man, a family, a city. It is about violence, murder, love, corruption, honour and deceit. And it is about truth.]]> 287 Peter Temple 1921520914 Bev 1
I suppose, also, that the writing style isn't really my thing. The book seems to be 80 per cent dialogue, indeed, in some parts there is nothing but dialogue, and so at times it almost feels as though you're reading a movie or TV script rather than a novel. No wonder his books translate so well for the screen.

I'm sure other people will jump on me for such negative comments, but if we all liked the same books there would be very few published authors in the world. And I did give it way more than my customary 10% - I carried on for half the book, but just could go no further.]]> 3.74 2009 Truth (Broken Shore, #2)
author: Peter Temple
name: Bev
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2009
rating: 1
read at: 2019/08/17
date added: 2019/08/16
shelves:
review:
I so wanted to love this book, but for me it is simply too ugly. And by that I'm not referring to the violence but to the way people speak and relate to each other, to the mood of the book. I have dated policemen, and don't accept that they find it impossible to speak more than a couple of sentences without using the c-bomb, which is what this book would suggest I've also worked typing up transcripts of police interviews, and even the most vicious crims didn't swear as much, or use that particular word, as much as Temple's cops do.

I suppose, also, that the writing style isn't really my thing. The book seems to be 80 per cent dialogue, indeed, in some parts there is nothing but dialogue, and so at times it almost feels as though you're reading a movie or TV script rather than a novel. No wonder his books translate so well for the screen.

I'm sure other people will jump on me for such negative comments, but if we all liked the same books there would be very few published authors in the world. And I did give it way more than my customary 10% - I carried on for half the book, but just could go no further.
]]> <![CDATA[Me, Myself and Lord Byron: A Woman, a Poet and a Quest to Reclaim the Zest for Life]]> 10329934 256 Julietta Jameson 1741966450 Bev 3 on-bookshelf 3.36 2011 Me, Myself and Lord Byron: A Woman, a Poet and a Quest to Reclaim the Zest for Life
author: Julietta Jameson
name: Bev
average rating: 3.36
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2019/08/16
date added: 2019/08/16
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:
Bought at the Perth Writer's Festival, 24 Feb 12.
]]> One Hit Wonderland 217137 336 Tony Hawks 0091882109 Bev 2 3.58 2002 One Hit Wonderland
author: Tony Hawks
name: Bev
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2002
rating: 2
read at: 2019/07/18
date added: 2019/08/16
shelves:
review:
I had hoped for something as wonderful and entertaining as "A Piano in the Pyrenees", but this just didn't hit the mark for me. Overall, the book is enjoyable enough, and with some really amusing anecdotes.
]]> Prague 92488 400 Arthur Phillips 0375759778 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.05 2002 Prague
author: Arthur Phillips
name: Bev
average rating: 3.05
book published: 2002
rating: 1
read at: 2018/11/08
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
Gave it my standard 10%, but even that was a struggle. Pretentious in the extreme, but, hey, that's just my opinion. Moved on to Bel Canto - a wise decision.
]]> <![CDATA[Early Modern Europe, 1450�1789 (Cambridge History of Europe)]]> 201539 510 Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks 0521005213 Bev 5 university 3.81 2006 Early Modern Europe, 1450–1789 (Cambridge History of Europe)
author: Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks
name: Bev
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at: 2013/05/23
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: university
review:

]]> The Tax Inspector 6753932 � Boston Globe

Granny Catchprice runs her family business (and her family) with senility, cunning and a handbagful of explosives. Her daughter Cathy would rather be singing County & Western than selling cars, while Benny Catchprice, sixteen and seriously psychopathic, wants to transform a failing auto franchise into an empire � and himself into an angel. Out of the confrontation between the Catchprices and their unwitting nemesis, a beautiful and very pregnant agent of the Australian Taxation Office, Peter Carey, author of Oscar and Lucinda, creates an endlessly surprising and fearfully convincing novel.

"[Carey's] work has a wild, chance-taking quality that seems to put him in harmony with the spirit of this age. If he keeps on as he has, he will prove to be one of its finest novelists."

� Chicago Tribune

]]> 279 Peter Carey 0702224243 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.38 1991 The Tax Inspector
author: Peter Carey
name: Bev
average rating: 3.38
book published: 1991
rating: 1
read at: 2009/08/28
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:

]]> The Line of Beauty 139087
As the boom years of the eighties unfold, Nick, an innocent in the world of politics and money, finds his life altered by the rising fortunes of this glamorous family. His two vividly contrasting love affairs, one with a young black clerk and one with a Lebanese millionaire, dramatize the dangers and rewards of his own private pursuit of beauty, a pursuit as compelling to Nick as the desire for power and riches among his friends.

Richly textured, emotionally charged, disarmingly comic, this U.K. bestseller is a major work by one of our finest writers.]]> 438 Alan Hollinghurst 0739464469 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.76 2004 The Line of Beauty
author: Alan Hollinghurst
name: Bev
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2004
rating: 1
read at: 2010/06/22
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
Tried, tried, tried to like this book. Failed, failed, failed to like this book. Managed almost 100 pages and gave up - too much good stuff out there which does appeal to spend time with characters I don't care about and stories which don't grab.
]]> The Slap 5396496
This event has a shocking ricochet effect on a group of people, mostly friends, who are directly or indirectly influenced by the slap.

In this remarkable novel, Christos Tsiolkas turns his unflinching and all-seeing eye onto that which connects us all: the modern family and domestic life in the twenty-first century. The Slap is told from the points of view of eight people who were present at the barbecue. The slap and its consequences force them all to question their own families and the way they live, their expectations, beliefs and desires.

What unfolds is a powerful, haunting novel about love, sex and marriage, parenting and children, and the fury and intensity - all the passions and conflicting beliefs - that family can arouse. In its clear-eyed and forensic dissection of the ever-growing middle class and its aspirations and fears, The Slap is also a poignant, provocative novel about the nature of commitment and happiness, compromise and truth.]]> 485 Christos Tsiolkas Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.26 2008 The Slap
author: Christos Tsiolkas
name: Bev
average rating: 3.26
book published: 2008
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:

]]> A Visit from the Goon Squad 7331435
We first meet Sasha in her mid-thirties, on her therapist’s couch in New York City, confronting her long-standing compulsion to steal. Later, we learn the genesis of her turmoil when we see her as the child of a violent marriage, then as a runaway living in Naples, then as a college student trying to avert the suicidal impulses of her best friend. We plunge into the hidden yearnings and disappointments of her uncle, an art historian stuck in a dead marriage, who travels to Naples to extract Sasha from the city’s demimonde and experiences an epiphany of his own while staring at a sculpture of Orpheus and Eurydice in the Museo Nazionale. We meet Bennie Salazar at the melancholy nadir of his adult life—divorced, struggling to connect with his nine-year-old son, listening to a washed-up band in the basement of a suburban house—and then revisit him in 1979, at the height of his youth, shy and tender, reveling in San Francisco’s punk scene as he discovers his ardor for rock and roll and his gift for spotting talent. We learn what became of his high school gang—who thrived and who faltered—and we encounter Lou Kline, Bennie’s catastrophically careless mentor, along with the lovers and children left behind in the wake of Lou’s far-flung sexual conquests and meteoric rise and fall.

A Visit from the Goon Squad is a book about the interplay of time and music, about survival, about the stirrings and transformations set inexorably in motion by even the most passing conjunction of our fates. In a breathtaking array of styles and tones ranging from tragedy to satire to PowerPoint, Egan captures the undertow of self-destruction that we all must either master or succumb to; the basic human hunger for redemption; and the universal tendency to reach for both—and escape the merciless progress of time—in the transporting realms of art and music. Sly, startling, exhilarating work from one of our boldest writers.]]> 274 Jennifer Egan 0307592839 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.70 2010 A Visit from the Goon Squad
author: Jennifer Egan
name: Bev
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2010
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan]]> 9581417
Kim Barker is not your typical, impassive foreign correspondent—she is candid, self-deprecating, laugh-out-loud funny. At first an awkward newbie in Afghanistan, she grows into a wisecracking, seasoned reporter with grave concerns about our ability to win hearts and minds in the region. In The Taliban Shuffle, Barker offers an insider’s account of the “forgotten war� in Afghanistan and Pakistan, chronicling the years after America’s initial routing of the Taliban, when we failed to finish the job.

When Barker arrives in Kabul, foreign aid is at a record low, electricity is a pipe dream, and of the few remaining foreign troops, some aren’t allowed out after dark. Meanwhile, in the vacuum left by the U.S. and NATO, the Taliban is regrouping as the Afghan and Pakistani governments floun­der. Barker watches Afghan police recruits make a travesty of practice drills and observes the disorienting turnover of diplomatic staff. She is pursued romantically by the former prime minister of Pakistan and sees adrenaline-fueled col­leagues disappear into the clutches of the Taliban. And as her love for these hapless countries grows, her hopes for their stability and security fade.

Swift, funny, and wholly original, The Taliban Shuffle unforgettably captures the absurdities and tragedies of life in a war zone.]]> 320 Kim Barker 0385533314 Bev 3 on-bookshelf
A really interesting read, but tends to add great dollops of cynicism to one's view of international politics and the players in the game.]]> 3.45 2011 The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan
author: Kim Barker
name: Bev
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2012/04/08
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:
Bought at the Perth Writer's Festival, 24 Feb 12. Looks fantastic.

A really interesting read, but tends to add great dollops of cynicism to one's view of international politics and the players in the game.
]]> The Electric Michelangelo 955117 340 Sarah Hall 0571219292 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.62 2004 The Electric Michelangelo
author: Sarah Hall
name: Bev
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2004
rating: 1
read at: 2011/03/31
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
Didn't pass the 20 page test for me - even the last page could provoke no interest. Discard pile for me.
]]> <![CDATA[Black Ties, Red Carpets, Green Rooms]]> 13250622 254 Richard Wilkins 1742571042 Bev 3 on-bookshelf
Just be aware, this book is not a biography but more a discussion about famous people Wilkins has met or has been involved with. The writing does let it down at times, and there are passages which are almost confusing as they jump around without any seemingly logical sequence, and timelines are so blurred as to become non-existent.

A pleasant enough book to start off 2012 with, though, before moving to a book where the writing is actually an element]]> 3.74 2011 Black Ties, Red Carpets, Green Rooms
author: Richard Wilkins
name: Bev
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2012/01/10
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:
Not a brilliant read, but a good little insight into the characters of some of the many famous musos who Richard has come to know, or to at least interview. As such, I found it really interesting.

Just be aware, this book is not a biography but more a discussion about famous people Wilkins has met or has been involved with. The writing does let it down at times, and there are passages which are almost confusing as they jump around without any seemingly logical sequence, and timelines are so blurred as to become non-existent.

A pleasant enough book to start off 2012 with, though, before moving to a book where the writing is actually an element
]]> <![CDATA[The Sound of One Hand Clapping]]> 484124 425 Richard Flanagan 0802137849 Bev 1 on-bookshelf, didn-t-finish 3.78 1997 The Sound of One Hand Clapping
author: Richard Flanagan
name: Bev
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1997
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: on-bookshelf, didn-t-finish
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Yellow Pearl: Eighteen Short Stories from the Stringybark Australian History Awards]]> 21650094 Thaiter grinned and finished tucking his clean shirt into his trousers. “It’s me birthday. I’m off ta the Cosmopolitan for a couple.�
“Your birthday?� Lachlan laughed.
“You’ll note. I’m done right. Clean and shaven.� Thaiter did a spin and twinkled his eyebrows. “I might get lucky tonight.�


� from "Done Right" by Donna Fieldhouse


The postman dropped a bundle of mail and there’s a letter with the AIF crest, I recognised the same rising sun symbol from Uncle John’s slouch hat. Nanna concentrated for a long time, holding the thin paper out at arm’s length as if any closer would risk infection by a terrible disease hidden there. She stretched her old thin arms away from her as if trying to bring the important words into focus.


� from "Water or Speed" by Karen Lethlean


Raise the term â€historyâ€� in a conversation in any group and half the participants will glaze over and talk about something else. Why? Is it because they think that history is a collection of dates or stories about musty, dusty, kings? Perhaps. Or perhaps they have never come across an anthology like this one â€� full of good writing and intriguing plots. Knowing that a story is true or based on truth always adds a little more spice to a tale, than a straight fiction piece can ever engender. Here are eighteen unique, short stories, chosen from the Stringybark Australian History Awards. Each provides a fascinating insight into Australian history.]]> Sophie Constable 1476403422 Bev 1 2.50 2012 Yellow Pearl: Eighteen Short Stories from the Stringybark Australian History Awards
author: Sophie Constable
name: Bev
average rating: 2.50
book published: 2012
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A History of Modern Europe: From the Renaissance to the Present]]> 471003 1365 John M. Merriman 0393979105 Bev 5 university 3.87 1996 A History of Modern Europe: From the Renaissance to the Present
author: John M. Merriman
name: Bev
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at: 2013/05/24
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves: university
review:
An essential for the shelves of anybody with an interest in European history, and particularly those undertaking studies in history.
]]> <![CDATA[The Voyages of de Villehardouin - Cruising French Waterways]]> 41958424
Valerie and Geoffrey buy their boat which they christen "de Villehardouin" and set off on the Canal du Midi, drawing and writing about their journey as they meander along the two hundred year old canal.

They revel in the slow pace as they enter a world of welcoming ports, canalside markets, ancient sites and chateaux, delicate wildflowers and, in the Camargue, medieval jousting and pink flamingos. The various regional cuisines introduce them to gastronomic delights and memorable wines.

Tackling the mighty RhĂ´ne River with its awesome deep locks in their small boat presents a challenge. Valerie and Geoffrey accept this with their usual humour. Once the RhĂ´ne is conquered, they find time to enjoy the ever-changing scenery of the canals as the dream unfolds.]]> 284 Valerie Helps 178465454X Bev 1 3.71 The Voyages of de Villehardouin - Cruising French Waterways
author: Valerie Helps
name: Bev
average rating: 3.71
book published:
rating: 1
read at: 2019/07/11
date added: 2019/07/20
shelves:
review:
I have removed my comments in total as, even after editing, I worried that they may have come across to the author as too brutal. My star rating says enough.
]]> <![CDATA[Unimagined: A Muslim Boy Meets the West]]> 823811
At age one, Pakistan-born Imran Ahmad moved to London and grew up torn between his Islamic identity and his desire to embrace the West. In this endearing memoir, Imran recalls his childhood in a series of vivid snapshots: outrage as deserved victory is snatched away from him in the Karachi Bonnie Baby contest by third world corruption and injustice; bitterness as he is tricked out of his collection of Tarzan bubble-gum cards by junior con artists; the heady taste of success in the Metropolitan Police schools quiz; joy at passing the entrance exam to the local grammar school; uncertainty as he seeks to become a doctor; bewilderment as he tries to learn about women at university; and shock at experiencing racism in its many forms. As he grows, Imran stumbles though life encountering colorful characters, philosophical dilemmas, and theological threats.ĚýWill he really be “left behindâ€� if he doesn’t embrace Jesus Christ as his personal saviour? Will he be sent to Hell for having coffee with girls (especially non-Muslim ones)? Is there a correlation between studying and passing exams, or is it entirely the will of God?ĚýIs it okay to beĚýWestern and Muslim, or are the two irreconcilable?ĚýAnd what about America, that alluring land of many contradictions? Eventually Imran embarks on a determined quest to become the quintessential English gentleman: tie perfectly knotted, shirt pristinely ironed, hair neatly combed. Like most boys, he has a parallel obsession with cars and girls: he yearns to drive off into the distance in a Jaguar XJS and encounter danger, adventure—and a vivacious young woman (preferably brunette, but any kind considered). Today Imran continues to write on his website and his blog . A book of the year pick by both The Guardian and The Independent, this is a deliciously funny and painfully insightful look at a life lived between two worlds.]]> 280 Imran Ahmad 1845132289 Bev 1 on-bookshelf
I am left with a question, though: why do so many people like it? Does the author have a lot of friends, or ???? The writing style waivers between the tone of a 3 year old and that of an adult pretending to write like a youth but with a voice that is totally unconvincing. Unfortunately, both voices are totally unconvincing, and totally lacking in charm because of that. If you are going to write a book about your childhood, accept that you're writing it as an adult and don't use almost-baby talk in some places and adult conversation in others. It's a real skill, but not one that this author has mastered.

Urgh, too much time wasted on this one.]]> 3.59 2006 Unimagined: A Muslim Boy Meets the West
author: Imran Ahmad
name: Bev
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2006
rating: 1
read at: 2019/07/06
date added: 2019/07/13
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:
I really need to revert to my old rule of allowing 10% of a book as the decider of whether or not to carry on reading. I can't believe I carried on for almost half of this book before adding it to the growing pile of books to donate to the local charity shop.

I am left with a question, though: why do so many people like it? Does the author have a lot of friends, or ???? The writing style waivers between the tone of a 3 year old and that of an adult pretending to write like a youth but with a voice that is totally unconvincing. Unfortunately, both voices are totally unconvincing, and totally lacking in charm because of that. If you are going to write a book about your childhood, accept that you're writing it as an adult and don't use almost-baby talk in some places and adult conversation in others. It's a real skill, but not one that this author has mastered.

Urgh, too much time wasted on this one.
]]> Love in a Cold Climate 5293858 249 Nancy Mitford 014103744X Bev 4 ]]> 3.66 1949 Love in a Cold Climate
author: Nancy Mitford
name: Bev
average rating: 3.66
book published: 1949
rating: 4
read at: 2009/08/25
date added: 2019/07/06
shelves:
review:
Why have I waited so long in my life to read this wonderful little gem? It's just so delicious, a pure delight. A comment on the back cover says it is "... a wickedly funny satire, brilliantly lampooning upper-class society". They don't mention that you will laugh out loud on public transport while reading it, or that you are torn between racing through this confection at high speed it or devouring it slowly to savour and enjoy every little morsel. Highly recommended reading, and I look forward to following the characters into other of Ms Mitford's works.

]]> <![CDATA[Dark Continent: Europe's Twentieth Century]]> 50079
"[A] splendid book." � The New York Times Book Review

Dark Continent provides an alternative history of the twentieth century, one in which the triumph of democracy was anything but a forgone conclusion and fascism and communism provided rival political solutions that battled and sometimes triumphed in an effort to determine the course the continent would take.

Mark Mazower strips away myths that have comforted us since World War II, revealing Europe as an entity constantly engaged in a bloody project of self-invention.ĚýĚýHere is a history not of inevitable victories and forward marches, but of narrow squeaks and unexpected twists, where townships boast a bronze of Mussolini on horseback one moment, only to melt it down and recast it as a pair of noble partisans the next.]]> 512 Mark Mazower 067975704X Bev 4 university 4.02 1998 Dark Continent: Europe's Twentieth Century
author: Mark Mazower
name: Bev
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2019/06/30
date added: 2019/06/30
shelves: university
review:

]]> Matthew Flinders' Cat 2338 611 Bryce Courtenay 0670910619 Bev 3 3.85 2002 Matthew Flinders' Cat
author: Bryce Courtenay
name: Bev
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2002
rating: 3
read at: 2019/06/29
date added: 2019/06/30
shelves:
review:
Damn, I wish we had the option for half stars. This book, like so many of Bryce Courtenay's books, is overlong simply because he tries to teach his readers about so much, and there is, unfortunately, so much padding. Take away the padding and the overly-lengthy lessons, and it would be so much more enjoyable.
]]> <![CDATA[An Englishman Ă  la Campagne: Life in Deepest France (Englishman series)]]> 884169 192 Michael Sadler 0743492404 Bev 4 3.24 2004 An Englishman Ă  la Campagne: Life in Deepest France (Englishman series)
author: Michael Sadler
name: Bev
average rating: 3.24
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/06/25
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Road Wench - It's a Tour, Not a Holiday]]> 12048156 0 Shannon Meadows Bev 3
The book is certainly a pleasant enough read, but I think it would put most people off the idea of doing a coach tour.]]> 3.00 2010 Road Wench - It's a Tour, Not a Holiday
author: Shannon Meadows
name: Bev
average rating: 3.00
book published: 2010
rating: 3
read at: 2019/05/08
date added: 2019/06/25
shelves:
review:
All I can say is thank goodness those bus tours of Europe never appealed to me when I was younger. They were, however, undertaken by quite a few of my friends (I preferred to simply move to Europe, not to hurtle around seeing 15 countries in 10 days), and so I spoke to a few of them about this book. None of them had experiences like this. What a boozy bunch of badly-behaved yobs - the sort that give Australians such a bad reputation in Europe.

The book is certainly a pleasant enough read, but I think it would put most people off the idea of doing a coach tour.
]]> <![CDATA[Roller-Coaster: Europe, 1950-2017]]> 38470225
Europe was now a divided continent, living under the nuclear threat in a period intermittently fraught with anxiety. Europeans experienced a 'roller-coaster ride', both in the sense that they were flung through a series of events which threatened disaster, but also in the sense that they were no longer in charge of their own destinies: for much of the period the USA and USSR effectively reduced Europeans to helpless figures whose fates were dictated to them depending on the vagaries of the Cold War. There were, by most definitions, striking successes - the Soviet bloc melted away, dictatorships vanished and Germany was successfully reunited. But accelerating globalisation brought new fragilities. The impact of interlocking crises after 2008 was the clearest warning to Europeans that there was no guarantee of peace and stability.

In this remarkable book, Ian Kershaw has created a grand panorama of the world we live in and where it came from. Drawing on examples from all across Europe, Roller-Coaster will make us all rethink Europe and what it means to be European.]]> 666 Ian Kershaw 0241187168 Bev 0 to-read 4.15 2018 Roller-Coaster: Europe, 1950-2017
author: Ian Kershaw
name: Bev
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/06/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Atonement 1601100 Atonement follows through the chaos and carnage of World War II and into the close of the twentieth century.
(back cover)]]> 480 Ian McEwan 0307388840 Bev 4 3.77 2001 Atonement
author: Ian McEwan
name: Bev
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/05/20
shelves:
review:

]]> The Godfather 826445 595 Mario Puzo Bev 1 didn-t-finish 4.40 1969 The Godfather
author: Mario Puzo
name: Bev
average rating: 4.40
book published: 1969
rating: 1
read at: 2019/04/28
date added: 2019/04/28
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
I only have about 100 pages to go, but just can't face any more of it. I kept going, waiting for the "Yes. Yes. Yes" moment to occur. It didn't.
]]> Bridge of Clay 39217968 Bridge of Clay is about a boy who is caught in the current - of destroying everything he has, to become all he needs to be. He's a boy in search of greatness, as a cure for memory and tragedy. He builds a bridge to save his family, but also to save himself. It's an attempt to transcend humanness, to make a single, glorious moment:

A miracle and nothing less.]]> 592 Markus Zusak 176055992X Bev 2 on-bookshelf 3.87 2018 Bridge of Clay
author: Markus Zusak
name: Bev
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2019/04/10
date added: 2019/04/28
shelves: on-bookshelf
review:
I wanted to love this one the way I love "The Book Thief". I didn't.
]]> Les Misérables, tome I/3 380728 512 Victor Hugo 2080701258 Bev 0 to-read 4.39 Les Misérables, tome I/3
author: Victor Hugo
name: Bev
average rating: 4.39
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/04/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[French Spirits: A House, a Village, and a Love Affair in Burgundy]]> 26960 304 Jeffrey Greene 0060934107 Bev 4 about-or-set-in-france
There are so many books by or about ex-pats setting up house in France. Some are fantastic, some are good, some really are an example of how not to write a book. This one was a delight to read, and I highly recommend it.]]> 3.43 2002 French Spirits: A House, a Village, and a Love Affair in Burgundy
author: Jeffrey Greene
name: Bev
average rating: 3.43
book published: 2002
rating: 4
read at: 2019/03/31
date added: 2019/04/03
shelves: about-or-set-in-france
review:
I loved this book; it was everything I had hoped "Paris to the Moon" would be, but wasn't. Perhaps it's because the author is a poet that he managed to paint such vivid pictures of the village and those who people it that it was all so real, so almost tangible, to me. And perhaps, also, because we know that area of France a little - and love it - that I came to the book with that lovely feeling of visiting an old friend.

There are so many books by or about ex-pats setting up house in France. Some are fantastic, some are good, some really are an example of how not to write a book. This one was a delight to read, and I highly recommend it.
]]> Notes From a Big Country 9437436
Of course there were things Bryson missed about Blighty but any sense of loss was countered by the joy of rediscovering some of the forgotten treasures of his childhood: the glories of a New England autumn; the pleasingly comical sight of oneself in shorts; and motel rooms where you can generally count on being awakened in the night by a piercing shriek and the sound of a female voice pleading, 'Put the gun down, Vinnie, I'll do anything you say.'

Whether discussing the strange appeal of breakfast pizza or the jaw-slackening direness of American TV, Bill Bryson brings his inimitable brand of bemused wit to bear on that strangest of phenomena - the American way of life.]]> 399 Bill Bryson Bev 0 didn-t-finish 3.82 1998 Notes From a Big Country
author: Bill Bryson
name: Bev
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1998
rating: 0
read at: 2011/09/05
date added: 2019/03/25
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:

]]> Clara Callan 241664
While Nora embarks on a glamorous career as a radio-soap opera star, Clara, a strong and independent-minded woman, struggles to observe the traditional boundaries of a small and tight-knit community without relinquishing her dreams of love, freedom, and adventure. However, things aren't as simple as they appear -- Nora's letters eventually reveal life in the big city is less exotic than it seems, and the tranquil solitude of Clara's life is shattered by a series of unforeseeable events. These twists of fate require all of Clara's courage and strength, and finally put the seemingly unbreakable bond between the sisters to the test.]]> 432 Richard B. Wright 0060506075 Bev 0 to-read 3.88 2001 Clara Callan
author: Richard B. Wright
name: Bev
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/03/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Blazing World 18764829 Presented as a collection of texts, edited and introduced by a scholar years after the artist's death, the book unfolds through extracts from Burden's notebooks and conflicting accounts from others about her life and work. Even after she steps forward to reveal herself as the force behind three solo shows, there are those who doubt she is responsible for the last exhibition, initially credited to the acclaimed artist Rune. No one doubts the two artists were involved with each other. According to Burden's journals, she and Rune found themselves locked in a charged and dangerous psychological game that ended with the man's bizarre death.
From one of the most ambitious and internationally celebrated writers of her generation, Hustvedt's "The Blazing World" is a polyphonic tour de force. It is also an intricately conceived, diabolical puzzle that addresses the shaping influences of prejudice, money, fame, and desire on what we see in one another. Emotionally intense, intellectually rigorous, ironic, and playful, this is a book you won't be able to put down.]]> 379 Siri Hustvedt 1476747245 Bev 0 to-read 3.66 2014 The Blazing World
author: Siri Hustvedt
name: Bev
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century]]> 33917107
On November 9th, millions of Americans woke up to the impossible: the election of Donald Trump as president. Against all predictions, one of the most-disliked presidential candidates in history had swept the electoral college, elevating a man with open contempt for democratic norms and institutions to the height of power.

Timothy Snyder is one of the most celebrated historians of the Holocaust. In his books Bloodlands and Black Earth, he has carefully dissected the events and values that enabled the rise of Hitler and Stalin and the execution of their catastrophic policies. With Twenty Lessons, Snyder draws from the darkest hours of the twentieth century to provide hope for the twenty-first. As he writes, “Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism and communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience.�

Twenty Lessons is a call to arms and a guide to resistance, with invaluable ideas for how we can preserve our freedoms in the uncertain years to come.]]> 127 Timothy Snyder 0804190119 Bev 0 to-read 4.24 2017 On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century
author: Timothy Snyder
name: Bev
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/03/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Year of the Angry Rabbit 2335676
Sir Alfred—who engineered Fitzgerald's election to prime minister—calls Fitzgerald one evening with a complaint: his Bludgerton property has been infested with rabbits that are immune to myxomatosis. Fearing another rabbit epidemic, Fitzgerald tasks Professor Welch and his scientists with inventing super myxomatosis, or Supermyx, to control the growing rabbit population. They test the first batch of Supermyx on a male and female rabbit, with disastrous results: Supermyx does not kill rabbits, and merely makes them savage, as if infected with rabies. Supermyx is, however, instantly lethal to humans, as demonstrated when Sir Alfred is brutally killed by the test cases, which then escape and turn the entire rabbit brood into flesh-rending Supermyx carriers.]]> 180 Russell Braddon Bev 5 3.71 1964 The Year of the Angry Rabbit
author: Russell Braddon
name: Bev
average rating: 3.71
book published: 1964
rating: 5
read at: 2019/03/03
date added: 2019/03/06
shelves:
review:
Extracts from this book popped up on a reading list for a university course I'm currently undertaking. Naturally, I googled the book to find out what the whole, rather than just a couple of extracts, was about. Ah, of course: a giant man-eating rabbit; an Australian scientific invention so terrible that the whole world ended up under the control of this land down under; a tale terrifying and hilarious all at the same time. How could I not be intrigued? Fortunately, I didn't have to shell out the $100 or so needed to find a (rare) secondhand copy but was able to get one through the uni library. Insane, amazing, a book that could only have been written while the world was in the grip of the chilliest/hottest days of the Cold War. I finished it yesterday. I think that, in a week or so, I'll revisit it. I can't wait.
]]> Paris to the Moon 1342369 348 Adam Gopnik 0099772019 Bev 2 about-or-set-in-france 3.72 2000 Paris to the Moon
author: Adam Gopnik
name: Bev
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2000
rating: 2
read at: 2019/03/04
date added: 2019/03/06
shelves: about-or-set-in-france
review:
I'd been looking forward to this book for so long. I finished it, but ... and, oh, it's so American. Ah well, you can't win them all.
]]> <![CDATA[British Images of Germany: Admiration, Antagonism & Ambivalence, 1860-1914 (Britain and the World)]]> 15794028 415 Richard Scully 0230301568 Bev 0 to-read 3.67 2012 British Images of Germany: Admiration, Antagonism & Ambivalence, 1860-1914 (Britain and the World)
author: Richard Scully
name: Bev
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/03/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Icarus (Benny Griessel, #5) 24886599
A week before Christmas, a young photographer discovers a plastic-wrapped corpse amidst the sand dunes north of Cape Town. The only thing found on the corpse is a dead iPhone, but it doesn’t take long for the police to identify the body as that of Ernst Richter—the tech whiz behind MyAlibi, an internet service that provides unfaithful partners with sophisticated cover stories to hide an affair. Meanwhile, Benny Griessel is called to the scene of a multiple homicide involving a former colleague, and four years of sobriety are undone on the spot. He emerges from his drunken haze determined to quit the force, but the take-no-sass Major Mbali Kaleni, now his boss, wants Griessel on the Richter case. The high-profile murder has already been the subject of fierce media speculation, with questions swirling about the potential for motive: could the perpetrator be one of the countless jilted spouses? An aggrieved client?

Before the week is out, an unexpected connection to a storied family winery comes to light, and Griessel’s reputation is again on the line. Mounting towards a startling conclusion, Icarus is another exceptional novel from the “King of South African Crime.”]]> 352 Deon Meyer 0802124003 Bev 4 4.03 2015 Icarus (Benny Griessel, #5)
author: Deon Meyer
name: Bev
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2019/03/01
date added: 2019/03/04
shelves:
review:

]]> The Drowner 1975139 352 Robert Drewe 186207108X Bev 5
Forget the idealistic young English engineer, Will Dance, a drowner at heart; forget the beautiful self-centred and damaged actress, Angelica; forget Inez, the young Melbourne socialite now cleaning maggots from the wounds of miners on the Goldfields; forget the visionary C.Y. O'Connor whose pipeline brought water hundreds of miles from the coast to Kalgoorlie, and who was then driven to suicide by public ridicule; forget Felix Locke, the poetry writing, hypochondriac undertaker. Forget them all, because the main character of this book is water, in all its splendor and terror, its over-abundance and absence, its ability to give life or to take it away.

Think of water and you think of the soft words: fluid, flowing, mellifluous. Such is the writing of this book - it seeps and creeps, it finds its own level, it fills spaces of irregular shapes. Even at its harshest, it is simply beautiful.]]> 3.50 1996 The Drowner
author: Robert Drewe
name: Bev
average rating: 3.50
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at: 2010/04/05
date added: 2019/02/24
shelves:
review:
Superb, lyrical writing, such that you almost hear the Moody Blues' Seventh Sojourn playing in the background, this is a book that takes you back to those deep, meaningful/less metaphysical discussions of your youth.

Forget the idealistic young English engineer, Will Dance, a drowner at heart; forget the beautiful self-centred and damaged actress, Angelica; forget Inez, the young Melbourne socialite now cleaning maggots from the wounds of miners on the Goldfields; forget the visionary C.Y. O'Connor whose pipeline brought water hundreds of miles from the coast to Kalgoorlie, and who was then driven to suicide by public ridicule; forget Felix Locke, the poetry writing, hypochondriac undertaker. Forget them all, because the main character of this book is water, in all its splendor and terror, its over-abundance and absence, its ability to give life or to take it away.

Think of water and you think of the soft words: fluid, flowing, mellifluous. Such is the writing of this book - it seeps and creeps, it finds its own level, it fills spaces of irregular shapes. Even at its harshest, it is simply beautiful.
]]> Insufficiently Welsh 21211727 200 Griff Rhys Jones 1909844691 Bev 0 currently-reading 3.31 2014 Insufficiently Welsh
author: Griff Rhys Jones
name: Bev
average rating: 3.31
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/02/23
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Kingdom Where Nobody Dies 320487 The Kingdom Where Nobody Dies is an exploration of grief, responsibility and repercussions, and the way childhood actions can echo throughout our lives.]]> 248 Kimberley Starr 0702234745 Bev 2 3.10 2004 The Kingdom Where Nobody Dies
author: Kimberley Starr
name: Bev
average rating: 3.10
book published: 2004
rating: 2
read at: 2019/02/23
date added: 2019/02/23
shelves:
review:

]]> The Fourth K 22031
President Francis Xavier Kennedy is elected to office, in large part, thanks to the legacy of his forebears� good looks, privilege, wealth–and is the very embodiment of youthful optimism. Too soon, however, he is beaten down by the political process and, disabused of his ideals, he becomes a leader totally unlike what he has been before.

When his daughter becomes a pawn in a brutal terrorist plot, Kennedy, who has obsessively kept alive the memory of his uncles� assassinations, activates all his power to retaliate in a series of violent measures. As the explosive events unfold, the world and those closest to him look on with both awe and horror.]]> 479 Mario Puzo 0345476735 Bev 1 didn-t-finish 3.59 1990 The Fourth K
author: Mario Puzo
name: Bev
average rating: 3.59
book published: 1990
rating: 1
read at: 2019/02/16
date added: 2019/02/16
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
I gave this one more than my usual 10% before discarding it, simply because I have read other works by Puzo's and thoroughly enjoyed them. This one just did not do it for me. I found some of the characters super annoying, and frightfully American, almost to the point of caricature, and realised I didn't care at all what happened to them. If I don't care about them, why spend time reading about them? I have less years of reading in front of me than behind me; I'm not going to waste them.
]]> Agent 21 (Agent 21, #1) 9942091
Zak becomes Agent 21. What happened to the 20 agents before him he'll never know. What he does know is that his life is about to change for ever . . .]]> 355 Chris Ryan Bev 0 didn-t-finish 4.12 2010 Agent 21 (Agent 21, #1)
author: Chris Ryan
name: Bev
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at: 2019/02/12
date added: 2019/02/14
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
I picked this book up not realising that it was for children. Oops. I wondered why the prose seemed so simple compared to other of Ryan's books I've read. So, the fact that I discarded it is in no way a reflection upon the book or the writing, simply on my lack of observation. I think if I was a kid, I'd love it.
]]> The Stranger House 2608033 416 Reginald Hill 000719482X Bev 0 didn-t-finish 3.60 2005 The Stranger House
author: Reginald Hill
name: Bev
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at: 2019/02/10
date added: 2019/02/10
shelves: didn-t-finish
review:
10% and gone. I have far less reading years ahead of me than those behind me; I want them to be wonderful. If a book doesn't grab me within 10% of the page length, it's relegated to the op shop box.
]]> The English Spy 27428892 496 Daniel Silva 0732298946 Bev 4
And for those who know very little about The Troubles and the IRA (including it's connection to Middle Eastern and North African terrorist organisations), this book can teach you a lot. Highly recommended.]]> 4.16 2015 The English Spy
author: Daniel Silva
name: Bev
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/07
date added: 2019/02/10
shelves:
review:
No wonder Daniel Silva is my sister's favourite author. This is one fantastic page-turner, and the amount of research that has gone into it is amazing. Silva isn't John le Carre, and he isn't Gerald Seymour either, but, oh goodness, he's certainly not far off those two favourites of mine, and I am so looking forward to picking up another of his books.

And for those who know very little about The Troubles and the IRA (including it's connection to Middle Eastern and North African terrorist organisations), this book can teach you a lot. Highly recommended.
]]> The Outsiders 231804 The Outsiders is about two weeks in the life of a 14-year-old boy. The novel tells the story of Ponyboy Curtis and his struggles with right and wrong in a society in which he believes that he is an outsider. According to Ponyboy, there are two kinds of people in the world: greasers and socs. A soc (short for "social") has money, can get away with just about anything, and has an attitude longer than a limousine. A greaser, on the other hand, always lives on the outside and needs to watch his back. Ponyboy is a greaser, and he's always been proud of it, even willing to rumble against a gang of socs for the sake of his fellow greasers--until one terrible night when his friend Johnny kills a soc. The murder gets under Ponyboy's skin, causing his bifurcated world to crumble and teaching him that pain feels the same whether a soc or a greaser.

Librarian note: This record is for one of the three editions published with different covers and with ISBN 0-140-38572-X / 978-0-14-038572-4. The records are for the 1988 cover (this record), the 1995 cover, and the 2008 cover which is also the current in-print cover.]]> 208 S.E. Hinton 0670532576 Bev 0 to-read 4.13 1967 The Outsiders
author: S.E. Hinton
name: Bev
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1967
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/02/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Transcription 37946414
Ten years later, now a radio producer at the BBC, Juliet is unexpectedly confronted by figures from her past. A different war is being fought now, on a different battleground, but Juliet finds herself once more under threat. A bill of reckoning is due, and she finally begins to realize that there is no action without consequence.]]> 343 Kate Atkinson 031617663X Bev 2 3.44 2018 Transcription
author: Kate Atkinson
name: Bev
average rating: 3.44
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2019/02/05
date added: 2019/02/05
shelves:
review:
For me, this was a real disappointment. It was a Christmas gift, and a book I had so looked forward to reading, and I was hoping for the Kate Atkinson who gave me "Emotionally Weird", "Behind the Scenes at the Museum", and the wonderful "Life After Life". Sadly, it left me feeling much the same as I felt after "A God In Ruins" - almost guilty for not enjoying somebody whose writing I usually love. But really, I ended up just resenting the time spent on this one.
]]> We Were the Mulvaneys 5204 454 Joyce Carol Oates 0452282829 Bev 1 on-bookshelf, didn-t-finish ]]> 3.75 1996 We Were the Mulvaneys
author: Joyce Carol Oates
name: Bev
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1996
rating: 1
read at: 2019/01/26
date added: 2019/01/30
shelves: on-bookshelf, didn-t-finish
review:
I gave this one more than my customary 10% before discarding it because it is a book loved by so many people. But oh dear, this is padding taken to extremes. I literally would have spent my time better sitting out in the backyard and watching the grass grow.

]]> <![CDATA[The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks]]> 7672904 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poorĚýblack tobacco farmer whose cells—taken without her knowledge in 1951—became one of the most important tools in medicine, vital for developing the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, and more.ĚýHenrietta's cellsĚýhave been bought and sold by the billions, yetĚýshe remains virtually unknown, and her family can't afford health insurance. This phenomenal New York Times bestseller tells a riveting story of the collision between ethics, race, and medicine; of scientific discovery and faith healing; and of a daughter consumed with questions about the mother she never knew.]]> 362 Rebecca Skloot 0307589382 Bev 0 to-read 4.15 2010 The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
author: Rebecca Skloot
name: Bev
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/01/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Victorian and the Romantic: A Memoir, a Love Story, and a Friendship Across Time]]> 36950013 History meets memoir in two irresistible true-life romances--one set in 19th century Rome, one in present-day Paris and London--linked by a bond between women writers a hundred years apart

In 1857, English novelist Elizabeth Gaskell completed her most famous work: the biography of her dear friend Charlotte Bronte. As publication loomed, Mrs. Gaskell was keen to escape the reviews. So, leaving her dull minister husband and dreary provincial city behind, she set off with her daughters to Rome. There she met a dazzling group of artists and writers, among them the American critic Charles Eliot Norton. Seventeen years her junior, Norton was her one true love. They could not be together--it would be an unthinkable breach of convention--but by his side and amidst that splendid circle, Mrs. Gaskell knew she had reached the "tip-top point of [her] life."
In 2013, Nell Stevens is embarking on her PhD--about the community of artists and writers living in Rome in the mid-19th century--and falling head over heels for a soulful American screenwriter in another city. As her long-distance romance founders and her passion for academia never quite materializes, she is drawn to Mrs. Gaskell. Could this indomitable Victorian author rescue Nell's pursuit of love, family and a writing career?
Lively, witty, and impossible to put down, The Victorian and the Romantic is a moving chronicle of two women each charting a way of life beyond the rules of her time.]]> 272 Nell Stevens 0385543506 Bev 0 to-read 3.60 2018 The Victorian and the Romantic: A Memoir, a Love Story, and a Friendship Across Time
author: Nell Stevens
name: Bev
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/01/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Good Jihadist 11980877 372 Bob Shepherd 0857208802 Bev 2 3.74 2007 The Good Jihadist
author: Bob Shepherd
name: Bev
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2007
rating: 2
read at: 2019/01/23
date added: 2019/01/26
shelves:
review:

]]> Roar 41952990 From the bestselling author of P.S., I Love You, a fiercely feminist story collection that blends fables with magical realism--perfect for fans of Roxane Gay.

In this singular and imaginative story collection, Cecelia Ahern illuminates the myriad ways in which women overcome adversity with wit, resourcefulness and compassion. Exploring dilemmas and aspirations that women everywhere will relate to, these unforgettable tales blend magical realism and familiar scenarios with startling and often hilarious results. In matters ranging from marriage and childrearing to politics and career, the heroines of these thought-provoking stories confront problems both mysterious and mundane: one woman is tortured by sinister bite marks that appear on her skin; another is swallowed up by the floor during a mortifying presentation; yet another resolves to return and exchange her boring husband at the store where she originally acquired him. As they wrestle with obstacles of all kinds, their reality is shaped by how others perceive them--and ultimately, how they perceive the power within themselves.

By turns sly, whimsical and affecting, these 30 short stories are an inspiring examination of what it means to be a woman today.



]]> 289 Cecelia Ahern 1538730952 Bev 0 to-read 3.70 2018 Roar
author: Cecelia Ahern
name: Bev
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/01/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (Virago Modern Classic)]]> 4799979 205 Elizabeth Taylor 0385279213 Bev 4 4.03 1971 Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (Virago Modern Classic)
author: Elizabeth Taylor
name: Bev
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1971
rating: 4
read at: 2019/01/02
date added: 2019/01/02
shelves:
review:

]]> The Summer Without Men 10223697
"And who among us would deny Jane Austen her happy endings or insist that Cary Grant and Irene Dunne should not get back together at the end of The Awful Truth? There are tragedies and there are comedies, aren't there? And they are often more the same than different, rather like men and women, if you ask me. A comedy depends on stopping the story at exactly the right moment."
Ěý
Mia Fredrickson, the wry, vituperative, tragicomic poet narrator of The Summer Without Men, has been forced to reexamine her own life. One day, out of the blue, after thirty years of marriage, Mia’s husband, a renowned neuroscientist, asks her for a “pause.� This abrupt request sends her reeling and lands her in a psychiatric ward. The June following Mia’s release from the hospital, she returns to the prairie town of her childhood, where her mother lives in an old people’s home. Alone in a rented house, she rages and fumes and bemoans her sorry fate. Slowly, however, she is drawn into the lives of those around her—her mother and her close friends,“the Five Swans,� and her young neighbor with two small children and a loud angry husband—and the adolescent girls in her poetry workshop whose scheming and petty cruelty carry a threat all their own.

From the internationally bestselling author of What I Loved comes a provocative, witty, and revelatory novel about women and girls, love and marriage, and the age-old question of sameness and difference between the sexes.

]]> 182 Siri Hustvedt 0312570600 Bev 4 3.48 2011 The Summer Without Men
author: Siri Hustvedt
name: Bev
average rating: 3.48
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2018/12/23
date added: 2018/12/26
shelves:
review:
I wish I could give this four and a half stars. I wouldn't call it "amazing" but it does deserve more than "I really liked it". What a gem of a book, one that - as so often happens - I picked up in an op shop for $1. I love books where the narrator is simply holding a one-on-one conversation with the reader, and that is exactly what this book is, a conversation. I'm not going to say more than that, except to say that it really was a fabulous conversation.
]]> Grace 636992 418 Robert Drewe 0241141729 Bev 2 2.93 2005 Grace
author: Robert Drewe
name: Bev
average rating: 2.93
book published: 2005
rating: 2
read at: 2018/12/10
date added: 2018/12/10
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Diary of a Bookseller (Diary of a Bookseller, #1)]]> 35512560
In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in the book trade, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff, who include the ski-suit-wearing, bin-foraging Nicky. He takes us with him on buying trips to old estates and auction houses, recommends books (both lost classics and new discoveries), introduces us to the thrill of the unexpected find, and evokes the rhythms and charms of small-town life, always with a sharp and sympathetic eye.]]> 310 Shaun Bythell 1781258627 Bev 0 to-read 3.76 2017 The Diary of a Bookseller (Diary of a Bookseller, #1)
author: Shaun Bythell
name: Bev
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/12/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Bel Canto 33816409 Alternate cover edition for 9780060188733

Somewhere in South America at the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of Mr. Hosokawa, a powerful Japanese businessman. Roxanne Coss, opera's most revered soprano, has mesmerized the guests with her singing. It is a perfect evening, until a band of terrorists breaks in, taking the entire party hostage.

But what begins as a life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different. Friendship, compassion, and the chance for great love lead the characters to forget the real danger that has been set in motion and cannot be stopped.

Ann Patchett has written a novel that is as lyrical and profound as it is unforgettable. Bel Canto is a virtuoso performance by one of our best and most important writers.]]> 318 Ann Patchett Bev 2 3.84 2001 Bel Canto
author: Ann Patchett
name: Bev
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2001
rating: 2
read at: 2018/11/28
date added: 2018/12/02
shelves:
review:
This seems to be one of those books that people either love or hate. For me, it fell into neither of those categories but was simply "okay". Basically, I didn't dislike it, but it left me totally unmoved and I found I didn't really care either way what happened to the characters. It wasn't something I would give up after my standard 10%, and I was determined to finish the book (even though, as is my usual practice, I read the last page before beginning the book), but I found the ending rather unsatisfactory. Oh well, I have read other of her work and thoroughly enjoyed it, so this won't put me off but I am glad to now move on to Robert Drewe's "Grace".
]]> <![CDATA[Harbour Street (Vera Stanhope, #6)]]> 18743339
But when the train is stopped due to the bad weather, and the other passengers fade into the swirling snow, Jessie notices that an old lady hasn't left the train: Margaret Krukowski has been fatally stabbed as she sat on the crowded train. Nobody, including the policeman himself, sees the stabbing take place. Margaret's murderer is seemingly invisible; her killing motiveless. Why would anyone want to harm this reserved, elegant lady?

Arriving at the scene, DI Vera Stanhope is relieved to have an excuse to escape the holiday festivities. As she's standing on the silent, snow-covered station platform, Vera feels a familiar buzz of anticipation, sensing that this will be a complex and unusual case. Soon Vera and Joe are on their way to the south Northumberland town of Mardle, where Margaret lived, to begin their inquiry.

Then, just days later, a second woman is murdered. Vera knows that to find the key to this new killing she needs to understand what had been troubling Margaret so deeply before she died - before another life is lost. She can feel in her bones that there's a link. Retracing Margaret's final steps, Vera finds herself searching deep into the hidden past of this seemingly innocent neighbourhood, led by clues that keep revolving around one street... Why are the residents of Harbour Street so reluctant to speak?

Told with piercing prose and a forensic eye, Harbour Street explores what happens when a community closes ranks to protect their own - and at what point silent witnesses become complicit.]]> 400 Ann Cleeves 1447254465 Bev 4 4.04 2014 Harbour Street (Vera Stanhope, #6)
author: Ann Cleeves
name: Bev
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2018/11/26
date added: 2018/11/26
shelves:
review:

]]> Mr Wigg 17408906
It's the summer of 1971, not far from the stone-fruit capital of New South Wales, where Mr Wigg lives on what is left of his family farm. Mrs Wigg has been gone a few years now and he thinks about her every day. He misses his daughter, too, and wonders when he'll see her again.

He spends his time working in the orchard, cooking and preserving his produce and, when it's on, watching the cricket. It's a full life. Things are changing though, with Australia and England playing a one-day match, and his new neighbours planting grapes for wine. His son is on at him to move into town but Mr Wigg has his fruit trees and his chooks to look after. His grandchildren visit often: to cook, eat and hear his stories. And there's a special project he has to finish ...

It's a lot of work for an old man with shaking hands, but he'll give it a go, as he always has.]]> 304 Inga Simpson 0733630197 Bev 4 4.12 2013 Mr Wigg
author: Inga Simpson
name: Bev
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2018/02/01
date added: 2018/11/15
shelves:
review:
This is the book for anybody who needs some respite from difficult times. It is like a lovely, gentle tonic, without doubt one of the sweetest books I've read, without sinking into the dreaded melodrama. Not something I would go back to, and, unlike my sister, not in my top 10, or even on my "top shelf" of books, but an absolutely delightful read nevertheless. And the things you learn about fruit!
]]> <![CDATA[The Black Echo (Harry Bosch, #1; Harry Bosch Universe, #1)]]> 32508 482 Michael Connelly 0446612731 Bev 0 to-read 4.11 1992 The Black Echo (Harry Bosch, #1; Harry Bosch Universe, #1)
author: Michael Connelly
name: Bev
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1)]]> 23014874
But Gamache knows that evil is lurking somewhere behind the white picket fences and that, if he watches closely enough, Three Pines will start to give up its dark secrets...]]> 352 Louise Penny 1250068738 Bev 0 to-read 3.80 2005 Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1)
author: Louise Penny
name: Bev
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Cuckoo's Calling (Cormoran Strike, #1)]]> 16160797 456 Robert Galbraith 0316206849 Bev 0 to-read 3.88 2013 The Cuckoo's Calling (Cormoran Strike, #1)
author: Robert Galbraith
name: Bev
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Islands 5768912 483 Di Morrissey 140503856X Bev 2
First comment: it's just too long. I can't understand why books have to be such great doorstoppers, as so many are, almost as though the author is telling three stories in one. Now, one thing I did really like is how much I learnt about the people of Hawaii and their feelings regarding the take-over of their country by the USA and their loss of sovereignty, right up to their modern day attitudes towards the US presence, and particularly the navy, in their islands. That is something that I had no knowledge or appreciation of, and so for me that is a huge bonus from reading this book. I suppose my main grumble about the book is the super quick, super fast way everything ties up so neatly at the end, and, I have to say, in a pretty predictable way. I think I knew on page 1 (or was it 2?) who Catherine would end up married to. I found that ending totally unsatisfying.

Now I've said all that, this is a book that I know many people will enjoy (am definitely passing it on to a couple of family members who will, I know, love it), and they will have the bonus of learning so much about Hawaii while doing so.

]]> 3.60 2011 The Islands
author: Di Morrissey
name: Bev
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2011
rating: 2
read at: 2018/11/07
date added: 2018/11/14
shelves:
review:
My reaction to this book is tempered by the fact that it's not the type of book I normally read. Having said that, I recently saw Di Morrissey interviewed on ABC Breakfast and I found the interview interesting and she came across as charming, down to earth, and a writer whose work I believed it was time to check out. Thus, The Islands.

First comment: it's just too long. I can't understand why books have to be such great doorstoppers, as so many are, almost as though the author is telling three stories in one. Now, one thing I did really like is how much I learnt about the people of Hawaii and their feelings regarding the take-over of their country by the USA and their loss of sovereignty, right up to their modern day attitudes towards the US presence, and particularly the navy, in their islands. That is something that I had no knowledge or appreciation of, and so for me that is a huge bonus from reading this book. I suppose my main grumble about the book is the super quick, super fast way everything ties up so neatly at the end, and, I have to say, in a pretty predictable way. I think I knew on page 1 (or was it 2?) who Catherine would end up married to. I found that ending totally unsatisfying.

Now I've said all that, this is a book that I know many people will enjoy (am definitely passing it on to a couple of family members who will, I know, love it), and they will have the bonus of learning so much about Hawaii while doing so.


]]> <![CDATA[Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts]]> 522525 Renowned social psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson take a compelling look into how the brain is wired for self-justification.

Why is it so hard to say “I made a mistake”—and really believe it?

When we make mistakes, cling to outdated attitudes, or mistreat other people, we must calm the cognitive dissonance that jars our feelings of self-worth. And so, unconsciously, we create fictions that absolve us of responsibility, restoring our belief that we are smart, moral, and right—a belief that often keeps us on a course that is dumb, immoral, and wrong. Backed by years of research, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) offers a fascinating explanation of self-justification—how it works, the damage it can cause, and how we can overcome it.

This updated edition concludes with an extended discussion of how we can live with dissonance; learn from it; and perhaps, eventually, forgive ourselves.]]> 292 Carol Tavris 0151010986 Bev 0 to-read 4.01 2007 Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts
author: Carol Tavris
name: Bev
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The One Memory of Flora Banks 30849412
I look at my hands. One of them says FLORA BE BRAVE.
Flora has anterograde amnesia. She can't remember anything day-to-day: the joke her friend made, the instructions her parents gave her, how old she is.
Then she kisses someone she shouldn't, and the next day she remembers it. It's the first time she's remembered anything since she was ten.
But the boy is gone. She thinks he's moved to the Arctic.
Will following him be the key to unlocking her memory? Who can she trust?]]> 306 Emily Barr 0141368519 Bev 0 to-read 3.41 2017 The One Memory of Flora Banks
author: Emily Barr
name: Bev
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Girl on the Page 39726936
Amy Winston is a hard-drinking, bed-hopping, hot-shot young book editor on a downward spiral. Having made her name and fortune by turning an average thriller writer into a Lee Child, Amy is given the unenviable task of steering literary great Helen Owen back to publication.

When Amy knocks on the door of their beautiful townhouse in north-west London, Helen and her husband, the novelist Malcolm Taylor, are conducting a silent war of attrition. The townhouse was paid for with the enormous seven-figure advance Helen was given for the novel she wrote to end fifty years of making ends meet on critical acclaim alone. The novel Malcolm thinks unworthy of her. The novel Helen has yet to deliver. The novel Amy has come to collect.

Amy has never faced a challenge like this one. Helen and Malcolm are brilliant, complicated writers who unsettle Amy into asking questions of herself - questions about what she values, her principles, whether she has integrity, whether she is authentic. Before she knows it, answering these questions becomes a matter of life or death.

From ultimate book industry insider, John Purcell, comes a literary page-turner, a ferocious and fast-paced novel that cuts to the core of what it means to balance ambition and integrity, and the redemptive power of great literature.]]> 371 John Purcell 1460710746 Bev 0 to-read 3.62 2018 The Girl on the Page
author: John Purcell
name: Bev
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/10/31
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Tatiana 21203509 322 Martin Cruz Smith 1471132544 Bev 3 3.38 2013 Tatiana
author: Martin Cruz Smith
name: Bev
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at: 2018/10/27
date added: 2018/10/27
shelves:
review:

]]> The Travelling Cat Chronicles 40961230
An instant international bestseller and indie bestseller, The Travelling Cat Chronicles has charmed readers around the world. With simple yet descriptive prose, this novel gives voice to Nana the cat and his owner, Satoru, as they take to the road on a journey with no other purpose than to visit three of Satoru's longtime friends. Or so Nana is led to believe...

With his crooked tail—a sign of good fortune—and adventurous spirit, Nana is the perfect companion for the man who took him in as a stray. And as they travel in a silver van across Japan, with its ever-changing scenery and seasons, they will learn the true meaning of courage and gratitude, of loyalty and love.]]> 281 Hiro Arikawa 0735235244 Bev 0 to-read 4.35 2012 The Travelling Cat Chronicles
author: Hiro Arikawa
name: Bev
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/10/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Weight of Ink 40776163 An intellectual and emotional jigsaw puzzle of a novel for readers ofĚýA. S. Byatt’s Possession and Geraldine Brooks’s People of the Book.

Set in London of the 1660s and of the early twenty-first century, The Weight of Ink is the interwoven tale of two women of remarkable intellect: Ester Velasquez, anĚýemigrant from Amsterdam who is permitted to scribe for a blind rabbi, just before the plague hits the city; and Helen Watt, an ailing historian with a love of Jewish history.Ěý Ěý

As the novel opens, Helen has been summoned by a former student to view a cache of seventeenth-century Jewish documents newly discovered in his home during a renovation. Enlisting the help of Aaron Levy, an American graduate student as impatient as he is charming, and in a race with another fast-moving team of historians, Helen embarks on one last project: to determine the identity of the documentsâ€� scribe, the elusiveĚý“Aleph.”ĚýĚýĚ�

Electrifying and ambitious, sweeping in scope and intimate in tone, The Weight of Ink is a sophisticatedĚýwork of historical fiction about women separated by centuries, and the choices and sacrifices they must makeĚýin orderĚýreconcile the life of the heart and mind.]]> 704 Rachel Kadish Bev 0 to-read 4.12 2017 The Weight of Ink
author: Rachel Kadish
name: Bev
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/10/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Sacrifice 22206741 New York Times bestselling author Joyce Carol Oates returns with an incendiary novel that illuminates the tragic impact of sexual violence, racism, brutality, and power on innocent lives and probes the persistence of stereotypes, the nature of revenge, the complexities of truth, and our insatiable hunger for sensationalism.

When a fourteen-year-old girl is the alleged victim of a terrible act of racial violence, the incident shocks and galvanizes her community, exacerbating the racial tension that has been simmering in this New Jersey town for decades. In this magisterial work of fiction, Joyce Carol Oates explores the uneasy fault lines in a racially troubled society. In such a tense, charged atmosphere, Oates reveals that there must always be a sacrifice—of innocence, truth, trust, and, ultimately, of lives. Unfolding in a succession of multiracial voices, in a community transfixed by this alleged crime and the spectacle unfolding around it, this profound novel exposes what—and who—the “sacrifice� actually is, and what consequences these kind of events hold for us all.

Working at the height of her powers, Oates offers a sympathetic portrait of the young girl and her mother, and challenges our expectations and beliefs about our society, our biases, and ourselves. As the chorus of its voices—from the police to the media to the victim and her family—reaches a crescendo, The Sacrifice offers a shocking new understanding of power and oppression, innocence and guilt, truth and sensationalism, justice and retribution.

A chilling exploration of complex social, political, and moral themes—the enduring trauma of the past, modern racial and class tensions, the power of secrets, and the primal decisions we all make to protect those we love�The Sacrifice is a major work of fiction from one of our most revered literary masters.]]> 320 Joyce Carol Oates 0062332996 Bev 3 3.40 2015 The Sacrifice
author: Joyce Carol Oates
name: Bev
average rating: 3.40
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2018/10/19
date added: 2018/10/19
shelves:
review:

]]>