read: The Exhibitionist by Charlotte Mendelson ★★★★☆ 📚
Probably the most horrible character I’ve read about for a while. Ray, old artist with faded reputation, more talented wife & screwed up children. Lots of fun, though Ray didn’t get the complete metaphorical kicking he deserves.
Category Archives: Book
Read The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller ★★★★☆ 📚
Set in the beautifully described big freeze of 1962. Two odd couples misunderstanding their partners. Echos of the war, class, everything is changing. The book ends with a tangle of unfinished threads.
the flakes skittered, twisted, seemed briefly to rise rather than fall, then fell decisively, filling the darkness with a whispering that had no clear source, no centre. They shut their eyes. They tasted it. Stone-flavoured, the tips of the sky. It filled them with a great excitement of change.
Read The Drop & The List by Mick Herron ★★★★☆ 📚
I enjoyed these more than most of his books, and they fill in some backstory to the slow horses.
Read: Half of a Yellow Sun: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie ★★★★★ 📚
First half about fairly privileged folk, second half how the horror of Biafran war played out.
Everything was moving so fast. He was not living his life; life was living him.
Read: Smoke and Whispers by Mick Herron ★★★☆☆
Read: Wild Houses by Colin Barrett ★★★★☆📚
Wild life among the low life. Very Irish. Drugs, crime & kidnap in small town Ireland. Nicely written and paces.
Read Started Early, Took My Dog by Kate Atkinson ★★★★☆ 📚
Took a while for the strands to come together, each character drawn with detail. Once I was engaged the end came too quick. Slightly confused as I came in at 4th in the series, although I’d watch the tv one long ago.
Read: The Starling: A Biography by Stephen Moss ★★★★☆ 📚
A nice read about one of my favourite creatures. History, behaviour & plenty of murmuration. Lovely old pictures too.
Our Endless Numbered Days by Claire Fuller★★★☆☆ 📚
Increasingly crazy survivalist father takes his 8 year old daughter to live in the German woods. Tells her it is the end of the world. Told from the girls POV with compulsive foreboding leading to a guessable horror on the last page.
Read: This Is What Happened by Mick Herron ★★★★☆ 📚
One nasty twist changes this in quite a surprising way. Not quite what I expected from Mick Herron.