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Monday February 29, 2016

Books in February

  • A Study in Murder by Robert Ryan
    BOM-AStudyInMurder.jpg Another interesting dive into history, created with such imaginative realism you would feel the author had experienced it.
    This time it's built around the POW camps - a subject much explored in respect of WW2 but realised I knew little about the camps in WW1. In fact the descriptions of the deprivations (unrelenting cold and pathetically small rations - which may seem relatively mild in the context) as experienced by the elderly Watson were very affecting and made me much sadder than the more overt horrors of that war.
    The ending left me hoping that what unfolded was not really the case and that matters would be somehow reversed - akin to the resurrection by Doyle of Sherlock Holmes himself.

  • X by Sue Grafton
    BOM-X.jpg Nearly at the end of the sequence now, but Kinsey and her landlord are as fresh as ever. There were a couple of plots running side by side - and some of the side-story was a bit less obvious to a naive English person with UK council-funded rubbish collections (putting your rubbish in someone else's dustbin would be a little impolite but... a criminal offence?).
    However the main plot was pretty scary and the repercussions maybe... resurfacing in another story?
    X.

  • By Its Cover and Falling in Love by Donna Leon
    BOM-ByItsCover.jpg BOM-FallingInLove.jpg
    Surprised to find that it was well over six months ago I rediscovered the splendid writing of Donna Leon. These are the next 2 Brunetti novels, and just as wonderful as ever.

  • BOM-DeadGirlWalking.jpg Dead Girl Walking by Christopher Brookmyre
    [read by Angus King and Kate Bracken]
    More library dowloads. It's a Jack Parlabane novel - an old favourite so good to see what he's up to.
    This was a bit of a departure - the book is written in two voices hence two readers, and it's all about a rock group, (and a murder!). I am assuming that music is a love of the author's (often the case with writers) and he conveys a great sense of the magic of the performing arts.

  • Rumpole.jpg Rumpole
    These stories make perfect short radio plays. Rumpole (made flesh for me by Leo McKern on the TV) is Maurice Denham. I drifted into looking at Mrs Rumpole - there were 2 TV actresses, but Margot Boyd played opposite Maurice Denham - though she was probably more reknowned on radio for playing Mrs Antrobus on the Archers (in an era when I listened to it...).

  • WyrdSisters.jpg Wyrd Sisters
    Most enjoyable (mainly owing to Pratchet's humorous dialogue scrambling up Macbeth and Hamlet) radio dramatisation from 1995 - stars Lynda Baron, Deborah Berlin, Sheila Hancock, Andrew Branch, John Hartley, Ian Masters, Kristin Milward.

Posted by Christina at 7:18 PM. Category: Books of the Month

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