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XML Feeds23/04/09
31/03/09
Tea Time Morsels by Marit Meredtih
A delightful collection of short stories each a snippet from everyday life, covering the ages of Man from childhood to second childhood and beyond. Invisible friends, childhood isolation, teenage crush begets teenage love, unstated and understated marital discord, remembering, forgetting, ageing and regressing; it’s all there in these fine tales.
25/03/09
Tea Time Morsels
Reading this book is rather like being invited to a tea party and being faced with plates of biscuits and fancy cakes. I’m sure you will find your favourites among the collection of 36 short stories by Marit Meredith but the difficult part is to choose which one to pick first.
16/03/09
Another HairCut?
The anthology entitled: Another HairCut? sprung into life as a challenge that was met by this website’s www.freewebs.com/annareiers enthusiastic contributors. This down-to-earth compilation of hair-raising experiences about – well – hair, quickly materialised into a variety of poems and stories. The intent and purpose of the publication is to bring a smile to your face and donate all proceeds to: The Children's Chronic Arthritis Association.
28/02/09
The Haunting of Melmerby Manor
Written by our very own David Robinson, The Haunting of Melmerby Manor centres on a paranormal investigation involving a dicey poltergeist and even dicier crooks who make Del Boy look positively angelic.
15/01/09
A Fishy Story
Crockers is the ironmongers on our High Street, where they have recently added haberdashery to the amazing mix of things you can buy there. Outside is a secondhand bookstall where you take what you want and put your money in a slot that will eventually benefit our public library, or so it says.
One day I was browsing and my eye was caught by that extraordinary book that everyone was talking about last year. (Or was it the year before? Quick check to find publication date was 2007.)
13/11/08
Inspirational Books
I don’t recall reading anything by Julia Cameron before. But a few weeks ago I acquired two books she authored from a good friend who says she gets a great deal of pleasure trawling second-hand book stores for writing books for me. I take them as a favour so she can continue to feel her pleasure. They sit at the top of my office bookcase until I’m stuck for something to read and take one down.
05/09/08
Kate Morton's Books
Reading The Forgotten Garden inspired me to hunt down its author’s earlier novel, The House at Riverton, which I’ve just finished.
Kate Morton is already a master of her chosen genre, writing about families and their secrets. She’s taken it a step further than the prolific Phyllis Whitney, of whose books I was once an avid reader so that I was disappointed when I could no longer find new ones.
The House at Riverton has a long cast of characters and it is a measure of Morton’s ability that the reader can keep tabs on all of them. (At least I could and I’m assuming I’m an average reader.) It also flits regularly between the present and the past, a technique that can be irritating but works well here. And it certainly engages your curiosity, building up a puzzle and fitting the last piece in place right at the end.
For me, though, her second book is the favourite. I believe she has learnt from the experience of the Riverton book, reducing the number of important characters and putting the narrative firmly in the third person, while taking us into different heads. The first book is written as a story told by one person, who was a servant and therefore an “invisible/insignificant” observer in the eyes of most of the other characters. When there is a section about an intimate love affair and scenes in which she was not present, she has to resort to explaining that the story had been told to her later. Although all this was very cleverly thought through and presented, it did sometimes seem a little awkward.
But there are many similarities between the two books. Although the second book begins in the author’s home country of Australia, both of them feature the grand home of an aristocratic English family and the degeneration of both the family and a building connected with it. The author also retained the family secrets theme, and takes the reader backwards and forwards in time, gradually unveiling the black secrets of this family.
I won’t reveal more because I recommend you read the books, if you haven’t already. But, if you can, read them the opposite way round, taking The House at Riverton first and then The Secret Garden. And then take a look at the website http://www.katemorton.com/
Happy reading.
17/08/08
Running a Writers' Circle
Simon Whaley’s excellent book, Running a Writers’ Circle, takes the stress out of setting up and running a writers’ group. Using his considerable experience as chairman of a writers’ circle, Simon has set out everything a prospective group needs to consider.
03/05/08
An Addictive Read
When I won a copy of Magdalena Ball's Sleep Before Evening as the prize for coming runner up in the writelink wet, wet, wet flash fiction contest, I was really worried I might not like it. The novel was written by not only a fellow writelinker but someone who had judged my own writing so highly. What would I say if I disliked it but was asked what I thought? As it turns out, I needn't have fussed, as the novel is addictive in more than just its subject matter.
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