It’s the first Saturday of the month – and of 2026! – which means it’s time for another Six Degrees of Separation, hosted by Kate of Books are my Favourite and Best. The idea is that Kate chooses a book to use as a starting point and then we have to link it to six other books of our choice to form a chain. A book doesn’t have to be connected to all of the others on the list – only to the one next to it in the chain.
This month we’re starting with the book with which we finished last month’s chain (or the last book we read if we didn’t take part last month). For me, this was The Night Circus by Erin Morgernstern. Here’s how I described it in my review:
The Night Circus tells the story of Celia and Marco, two young magicians who have been selected by their mentors to take part in a very special contest. The rules of the competition are shrouded in mystery and even the two illusionists themselves aren’t sure what they have to do to win. And the venue for this magical battle? Le Cirque des Rêves, or the Circus of Dreams, one of the strongest, most vivid fictional worlds I’ve ever come across in a novel.
The Night Circus was a great starting point, with lots of options to move forward with the chain. Usually I choose books that I’ve actually read and reviewed on my blog, but instead I’m going to start with a first link suggested to me by one of my blog readers. Thanks Paul! Round the Bend by Nevil Shute (1), which I haven’t read yet, follows the story of two aircraft engineers who begin their careers with Alan Cobham’s Flying Circus. I would like to read this eventually as I enjoyed the one Shute novel I’ve read (Pied Piper) and am looking forward to reading more.
The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson (2) is set in 1919 and features a group of women who buy a damaged fighter plane to restore so that they can begin training female pilots. I enjoyed this book – it’s a fascinating portrayal of life in the aftermath of the First World War when the War Practices Act meant that many women were dismissed from their jobs to make way for the returning soldiers.
I’m going to break my own rule of only including books I’ve reviewed again, because the next book that comes to mind is one I read years before I started blogging: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig (3). It was published in 1974, although I think I read it in the 90s. It’s about a man who travels across America with his young son by motorcycle, discussing philosophy along the way. I remember finding it interesting but I probably only understood half of it and wouldn’t want to read it again today.
I want to get away from transport related books now, so I’m linking next to another novel published in 1974 – Cashelmara by Susan Howatch (4). This novel, like some of Howatch’s others, is a family saga retelling Plantagenet history in a more recent setting. In this one, Edward I, Edward II and Edward III of England are recreated as Edward de Salis, his son Patrick and grandson Ned, a fictional 19th century family. It’s not necessary to be familiar with the history, but if you can spot the parallels it makes the story even more interesting!
An author who shares a name with Susan Howatch is Susan Hill, who wrote The Small Hand (5), a ghost story in which an antiquarian book dealer begins to have several unsettling experiences where he feels a child’s small hand holding his own. I found this an eerie, atmospheric novel rather than a particularly scary one, though maybe that’s because I read it in the summer – it’s a story for a dark winter night, I think!
The word ‘small’ also appears in the title of A Small Circus by Hans Fallada (6), which brings my chain full circle this month! I usually love Fallada, but this novel, first published in German in 1931, wasn’t for me. It does have an interesting setting, describing tensions and corruption in a small German town in the period between the two world wars, but I struggled with the unpleasant characters and confusing plot. I read a modern translation by Michael Hofmann.
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And that’s my chain for this month! My links have included circuses, flying, motorcycles, books published in 1974, authors named Susan and books with ‘small’ in the title.
In February we’ll be starting with Flashlight by Susan Choi.
She Reads Novels 