Now reading...

[Head Man]

What's a Trot?

Shorthand for someone with very left-wing views.....

[Leeway]

Well-crafted, erudite, often enigmatic, enjoyable stories. 

[jlhoots]

Cotterill: Six And A Half Deadly Sins

Edited August 17, 2015 by jlhoots

[A Lark Ascending]

Finally finished:

Not an easy read. Very dense and quite hard to keep your brain on the overview - Bickers gets caught into all manner of minutiae on the way (especially memorials built to commemorate fallen comrades and their propaganda intent). But gives a very clear impression of how the West (Britain as the focus here) bullied and manipulated its way into China using the cloak of free trade as a way of pursuing avarice.

Now onto a easier to read book with a much better sense of ongoing narrative:

  

Back in '72 when I was studying the English Civil War for my 'A' Levels I was completely taken by a quote from a Colonel Rainborough at the Putney Debates (1647). "For really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he; and therefore truly, sir, I think it’s clear that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under…”.

This book tells the story of the family in the mid-17thC - merchants, fighters against Barbary pirates, settlers around Boston in the New World, soldiers and political and religious radicals. Fascinating stuff.

As it happens I stayed in a hotel on Putney Bridge over the weekend - just over the bridge was the church where the Putney Debates took place (with the quote above inscribed on the wall). Well worth a trip if you are in and around London - you now enter the church through an excellent coffee shop.

Superb! In the previous novel of the series (no 13) pregnant Inspector Lynley's wife is gunned down and killed at her front door. You end the book utterly devastated and hating the perpetrators. What George does in this sequel is turn the whole situation on its head by tracing how one of the people involved in the murder, a 12 year old, came to that point. A harrowing tale of a life of chaos in poverty stricken North Kensington. The way the young boy is trapped into a sequence of events in his efforts to protect his younger brother is brilliantly traced. One of those books that haunts you long after you have finished. 

The main characters of the series only have the slightest of walk on parts. Interesting to read the reviews on Amazon where some readers really struggled with the absence of those characters.  

[Matthew]

The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer.  Interesting read, and a despicable history of crimes committed in the name of freedom.

[A Lark Ascending]

The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer.  Interesting read, and a despicable history of crimes committed in the name of freedom.

Like the look of that. Always like reading books about the Cold War from particular angles. Came across some of this in Tim Werner's book on the CIA.

 

I've read a fair few books on the Napoleonic era navy in recent years - this give a much broader context. 

[Leeway]

Keen depictions of working in a used bookshop (I have several years of such experience) and most scarifying accounts of being hard-up for money since Gissing. 

 

[BillF]

Keen depictions of working in a used bookshop (I have several years of such experience) and most scarifying accounts of being hard-up for money since Gissing. 

 

Fine book!

[A Lark Ascending]

Keen depictions of working in a used bookshop (I have several years of such experience) and most scarifying accounts of being hard-up for money since Gissing. 

 

Fine book!

I read that as a 15 year old...had a big impact on me. 

[BillF]

Impressive.

[Leeway]

ORWELL: THE AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY - Michael Shelden.

Overall, this seemed to me a "fair and balanced" approach to telling Orwell's life. 

[BillF]

ORWELL: THE AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY - Michael Shelden.

Overall, this seemed to me a "fair and balanced" approach to telling Orwell's life. 

Years ago I read Bernard Crick's biography of Orwell, which seemed OK.

[Leeway]

ORWELL: THE AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY - Michael Shelden.

Overall, this seemed to me a "fair and balanced" approach to telling Orwell's life. 

Years ago I read Bernard Crick's biography of Orwell, which seemed OK.

I believe the Crick is pretty good. It was the previous "authorized" bio, until Sonia Orwell decided to take legal action against it (and failed). Shelden was able to interview a few more people, and find a few more documents, than Crick, and most of all, didn't have to deal with Sonia Orwell. Mostly, I went with Shelden because I had a copy of the book handy. 

[BillF]

ORWELL: THE AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY - Michael Shelden.

Overall, this seemed to me a "fair and balanced" approach to telling Orwell's life. 

Years ago I read Bernard Crick's biography of Orwell, which seemed OK.

I believe the Crick is pretty good. It was the previous "authorized" bio, until Sonia Orwell decided to take legal action against it (and failed). Shelden was able to interview a few more people, and find a few more documents, than Crick, and most of all, didn't have to deal with Sonia Orwell. Mostly, I went with Shelden because I had a copy of the book handy. 

Yes, Sonia Orwell's "gold digging" stayed in my memory, as well as the extraordinary late-in-life phase on the remote Scottish island of Jura where 1984 was written. Another reason why I find these final years (1945-50) so fascinating is that, athough I was only aged  from 5 to 10 at the time, I can remember the quality of life and day-to-day events in post-war Britain quite well. I found the last volume of Orwell's Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters really interesting for this reason.

Edited August 26, 2015 by BillF

[paul secor]

 

 

 

The Now Reading thread is fixed for me. Thanks for whatever was done. Please ignore the above quote headers. I tried a number of things to try and post here and the headers didn't go away.

[ejp626]

Yes, it is fixed!  I am just about to launch into Elizabeth Taylor's A View of the Harbour.

[BillF]

Yes, it is fixed!  I am just about to launch into Elizabeth Taylor's A View of the Harbour.

Recommended.

[paul secor]

Russell Hoban: Turtle Diary

 

[jlhoots]

John Burdett: The Bangkok Asset

[ejp626]

Yes, it is fixed!  I am just about to launch into Elizabeth Taylor's A View of the Harbour.

Recommended.

Enjoying it so far.  I thought her A Game of Hide and Seek was well written from a technical perspective, but not actually particularly compelling, as I had no real interest or sympathy in the main characters.  I like this one better.

Through a weird glitch in the library reserve system, I am about to get 12 books all at once.  The ones highest in demand (and thus that I can't renew) will be read first.  That includes Urquhart's The Night Stages and Bulawayo's We need new names in addition to Neil Smith's Boo and Barbara Comyns' The Juniper Tree.

[BillF]

Yes, it is fixed!  I am just about to launch into Elizabeth Taylor's A View of the Harbour.

Recommended.

Enjoying it so far.  I thought her A Game of Hide and Seek was well written from a technical perspective, but not actually particularly compelling, as I had no real interest or sympathy in the main characters.  I like this one better.

 

Always something there with Taylor - in her small-scale way.

[A Lark Ascending]

Still sailing round the world with the British navy, imposing our will on everyone and nicking anything that comes to hand - just got to the American War of Independence. 

Alongside:

 

Which is fascinating. I'm not sure how it was written but the style gives the impression of Richards yakking and ghost writer James Fox putting it together - I might be doing Richards a disservice there. Very good on the childhood years - the strength of family and the disappointments at school (some astonishing successes as a choir boy and boy scout patrol leader!!!!). Captures the change from the 50s into to the 60s very well. Have just got to 1963 + and the point where the madness kicked in.   

[kinuta]

Still sailing round the world with the British navy, imposing our will on everyone and nicking anything that comes to hand - just got to the American War of Independence. 

Alongside:

 

Which is fascinating. I'm not sure how it was written but the style gives the impression of Richards yakking and ghost writer James Fox putting it together - I might be doing Richards a disservice there. Very good on the childhood years - the strength of family and the disappointments at school (some astonishing successes as a choir boy and boy scout patrol leader!!!!). Captures the change from the 50s into to the 60s very well. Have just got to 1963 + and the point where the madness kicked in.   

I liked it too.

[jlhoots]

Lisa Gornick: Louisa Meets Bear

[Matthew]

The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer.  Interesting read, and a despicable history of crimes committed in the name of freedom.

 The story of the Dulles brothers, the Congo, and Patrice Lumumba is about as low as you can get...