They say never judge a book by its cover, but I have to disagree.
The Light Fantastic, Masquerade and Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett
Two were borrowed from the Short Aunty and the third was from the local library.
If things start going wrong, find yourself a comfortable corner and a Terry Pratchett. Even I, with my ‘special’ sense of humour, find them funny. There’s probably a lot more I miss too, there’s so much crammed into each page.
A most important question was: what name should she call herself? Her name had many sterling qualities no doubt, but it didn’t exactly roll off the tongue. It snapped off the palate and clicked between the teeth, but it didn’t roll off the tongue.
The trouble was, she couldn’t think of one with great rotational capabilities.
Catherine, possibly.
Terry Pratchett, Masquerade
Chocolat by Joanne Harris
Picked up in a charity shop.
Same characters as the film, same events, same setting, lots of chocolate. Completely different story. Which was surprising. I can see why they changed it for the film – made it a little lighter and sweeter – but perhaps the book was a better portrayal of life and particularly single mothers. I don’t know.
There’s something pretty about the writing itself. The style suits the setting, but it’s not overly flowery and doesn’t get in the way of the story. I’d read another book by Joanne Harris. I have Gentlemen and Players waiting on the bookshelf.
The Land Where Lemons Grow by Helena Attlee
Borrowed from the Mother.
When life gives you lemons, check which sort of lemons they are because there’s no such thing as ‘just a lemon’. Read more of my witterings on this book.
Option B by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant
Borrowed from the Mother.
Last November I read a book by Stephen Grosz which contained the following:
My experience is that closure is an extraordinarily compelling fantasy of mourning. It is the fiction that we can love, lose, suffer and then do something to permanently end our sorrow. We want to believe we can reach closure because grief can surprise and disorder us – even years after our loss.
Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant’s book is about coming to terms with this sense of disorder and working out how you interact with friends, family and colleagues so that you and they can accommodate your grief and bring it to a place of acceptance. What struck me most about the book was Sandberg’s repeated self-admonishing of her previous attitudes to people suffering to grief. There was a beautiful sense of humility at play, which is, I guess, a gift of grief.
Don’t Stop Me Now by Vassos Alexander
Borrowed from someone who pretends not to love running.
This is a story of how podgy middle-aged man became super obsessed with running, crazy sort of running, like ultra-marathons and up and down fells. It did persuade me to go out in the rain one Friday morning for a pre-breakfast run.
Running’s one of those things I think you need to do for a few months before you start to enjoy it. I first ran because someone decided to close the gym for refurbishment. I fared better than Vassos Alexander on his first run. I got more than 200m and didn’t lie to any old ladies about it.
Once you can put one leg in front of another for an extended time, however slow, then you need to go somewhere exquisitely beautiful (Yorkshire moors for example) and run cross country in a warm (but not overly hot) sunshine. At worse you ache and sweat a lot in gorgeous scenery. At best, you fly. If you can do that, I don’t see how it could be possible not to love running.
The book made me laugh. It was full of inspirational stories from various elite athletes whom Alexander had interviewed, which perhaps gave the book as a book more credibility, but it didn’t really need them because I felt Alexander’s own story was funny and informative enough.