January Round Up #RoundUp

Yey! The longest month of the year (it's about 150 days right?) has ended.

During those 179 days I was lucky enough to read The True Story of Hansel and Gretel by Louise Murphy. A retelling of the classic fairy tale set against the backdrop of occupied Poland during World War Two. It had all the elements of the fairy tale and then some. What a blinder to start the year with!

198 days in and I was reading (devouring) The Sixth Wife by Suzannah Dunn. A historical fiction book about Henry VII's sixth wife that surprisingly didn't include Henry. I really enjoyed it, as I do with most books in this genre.

My socks were blown off by the fantastic ending of Changeling by Matt Wesolowski on day 222. My first Blog Tour of the year and book number three in the Six Stories series. Wesolowski just gets better and better.

Cull by Tanvir Bush was my last Blog Tour for the month taking me to day 356. This disturbingly believable book featured a blind protagonist, a fabulous guide dog and a villain brilliantly named, The Good Doctor Binding. An interesting read.

By day 483 I had read and fallen in love with The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. The Book Club's #BookOfTheMonth it was awarded a solid 8 and I could practically quote the whole book the writing was so good.

Read of the Month.

It has been an absolute brilliant start to 2019 (best ever?) making it difficult to choose a #ReadOfTheMonth. Changeling comes close, The Thirteenth Tale stole a special place in my heart but The True Story of Hansel and Gretel for blending fairy tale and war drama seamlessly whilst still being true to both just edges it. It's also probably not on a lot of peoples radars and I love shining a spotlight on books that might otherwise have passed you by.

Added to my shelf

Dear Husband,

It really isn't my fault when I head out to Book Club with one book and return home with 9 more. Blame my lovely friends at Book Club, and our daughter for whom 8 of them are for, and Matt Wesolowski for mentioning The Cliff House has a Tamzin in it (spelt differently BUT a Tamzin non the less) and our book shelves for not being big enough to keep them all on, and...........

Love Your Wife.

Comments

Mount by Jilly Cooper #inbetweeny

I'll start this blog with a warning, this post does contain spoilers. So if you haven't read the book then please don't read this blog, yet. Of course you should read this post just wait a little while until you've read the latest installment of Rupert Campbell Black (RCB). Warnings out of the way I'll begin. I was massively looking forward to reading this book having hugely enjoyed the previous ones. RCB is my (not so) secret trashy pleasure and has been for many years. This book had all the ingredients of a classic, pages of wonderfully named characters, a few tortured souls and of course RCB with all his horses, dogs and now grandchildren. The book got off to a good start full of characters from old but also plenty of new ones to mix it up a bit. The horse's really played a starring role in this book but I also really loved Gav and at first Gala. Yep only at first as she went strongly down hill and I bet you can guess why. RCB. Here is where I fell o...

Stitch Up (A Best Defence Mystery) by William McIntyre #BlogTour

OK hold on everybody for MY FIRST EVER BLOG TOUR!!!!!!!!! Did I like it? Did I manage to read it in time? Did I forget to post my review when I should have done? Yes, yes and (thankfully) no! Stitch Up is the ninth in the Best Defence Series featuring Scottish defence lawyer Robbie Munro. As a solicitor not a policeman who successfully runs his own law firm, is recently married and has a daughter the book immediately set itself apart from your standard crime thriller. The book begins with Robbie's ex girlfriend asking him to investigate the apparent suicide of her new boyfriend (awkward!). At the same time a convicted child-murderer is attempting to have his conviction quashed (if I remember the term correctly Mr McIntyre?) claiming Robbie's dad ex sergeant Alex Munro planted key evidence at the scene of the crime (double awkward!). I liked the two stories running along side each other which kept the pace of the book moving swiftly forwards. In real life McIntyre is ...

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray and a 30 a day habit.

Nothing like challenging oneself in the New Year and rather than giving up alcohol and only eating steamed kale the Book Club decided on reading the 900 odd page doorstop that is Vanity Fair . I ordered it at once and (using something vaguely like maths) worked out I needed to read 30 pages a day to have it read in time for the meeting. I was surprisingly undeterred by this and thought if nothing else I could use the book as a dumbbell when working off the chocolate orange. I found I actually liked hitting my 30 a day target (much like all the other New Years' resolutioners like hitting their ten thousand steps) and it motivated me to just squeeze a few more pages in here and there so I was ahead of target. I haven’t really approached a book this way before but then it is longer than my copy of War and Peace and there are over 50 books on my bookshelf waiting to be read (now in 'to read' order due to much prating about over Christmas). I didn’t kno...

Cramlington Book Club

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