Library Books

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I went to the library today for the first time in months. I got The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (I enjoyed A Thousand Splendid Suns but for some reason have never got round to reading this one), The Moonlit Cage by Linda Holeman and The Rendezvous and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier.


1970s Afghanistan: Twelve-year-old Amir is desperate to win the local kite-fighting tournament and his loyal friend Hassan promises to help him. But neither of the boys can foresee what will happen to Hassan that afternoon, an event that is to shatter their lives. After the Russians invade and the family is forced to flee to America, Amir realises that one day he must return to Afghanistan under Taliban rule to find the one that his new world cannot grant him: redemption.

The fourteen haunting stories collected here span the whole of Daphne du Maurier’s writing career and explore every human emotion: an apparently happily married woman commits suicide; a steamer in wartime is rescused by a mysterious sailing-ship; a dull husband breaks loose in a surprising fashion; a con girl plays her game once too often; and a famous novelist looks for romance, only to meet with bitter disappointment. Each meticulously observed tale shows du Maurier’s mastery of the genre and provides pleasure for a variety of moods.


The Moonlit Cage is the spellbinding story of Darya, a young Afghan girl, cursed, worthless and despised by her husband and her family, who embarks on the journey of a lifetime – one that takes her from the unforgiving valleys and mountains of her homeland to 1850s London, the heart of the mighty British Empire.

Great Books

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These are my reviews of the very best books I’ve read. In other words, the books that I would give a sixth star to if I could.

The books may be new to me or they may be old favourites, they may be fiction or non-fiction, borrowed books, library books, long books, short books…but I can guarantee that all of them are great.

I will list my Great Books below as I discover or rediscover them.

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
The Far Pavilions by M M Kaye
Watership Down by Richard Adams

Flashback Challenge

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The Flashback Challenge will run from January 1, 2010 – December 31, 2010 and will be hosted by Aarti and Kristen M.

You can sign up for the following levels:
Bookworm – Up to three books
Scholar – Four to six books
Literati – Over six books

Within these levels, we have mini-challenges! These are:

1. Re-read a favorite book from your childhood
2. Re-read a book assigned to you in high school
3. Re-read a book you loved as an adult

I love re-reading books and this challenge will tie in perfectly with my new Great Books feature, so I’m signing up for the Literati level.

I would like to re-read any or all of the following books, though my list will probably change during the year as I have so many other books I want to re-read too!

Watership Down by Richard Adams (childhood)
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (childhood)
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (school)
Shogun by James Clavell (adult)
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (adult)
The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough (adult)
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (adult)
The Far Pavilions by M.M.Kaye (adult)

Books read for this challenge (updated 2 April 2010)

1. The Far Pavilions by M.M. Kaye
2. Watership Down by Richard Adams

2010 A to Z Challenge

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I’ve signed up for the 2010 A-Z Challenge hosted by Becky. The challenge runs from January 1, 2010 to December 31, 2010 and there are 3 options to choose from:

Authors – Read alphabetically by author. Commit to 26 books.
Titles – Read alphabetically by title. Commit to 26 books.
Authors & Titles – Commit to reading 52 books.

I’m going to try 26 books alphabetically by title.

Books read for this challenge (updated March 30 2010)

A – Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin
B
C – The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole
D – The Divine Sacrifice by Tony Hays
E – The End of the Alphabet by CS Richardson
F – The Far Pavilions by M.M. Kaye
G
H
I – In a Far Country by Linda Holeman
J
K
L – Lean on Pete by Willy Vlautin
M – Madame Verona Comes Down the Hill by Dimitri Verhulst
N
O – O, Juliet by Robin Maxwell
P
Q
R
S – Spring Bear by Betsy Connor Bowen
T – The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte
U
V
W – The White Queen by Philippa Gregory
X
Y
Z

New Book Arrivals – 16th November 2009

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I recently read The Quincunx by Charles Palliser and loved it, so I ordered a used copy of The Unburied from play.com. It arrived this week and is now near the top of my TBR pile.

When Dr Courtine is invited to spend the days before Christmas with an old friend he is keen to accept, even though it is twenty years since they last met. On the night Courtine arrives, Austin tells him the story of the town ghost, a story of deadly rivalry and murder two centuries old. Courtine’s real reason for the visit is to pursue an even older mystery. For, if he can track down an elusive eleventh-century manuscript, the existence of which only he believes in, he hopes to dispose of a deadly rivalry of his own. So intent is he upon these ancient mysteries that he fails to notice the malign conspiracy into which he is being lured…

Musing Mondays: Books for Christmas

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This week’s MUSING MONDAYS post:

With the holiday season now upon us, have you left any hint – subtle or otherwise – for books family and friends might buy you for Christmas? Do you like to receive books, or do you prefer certificates so you can choose your own?

I love receiving books for Christmas – in fact I would probably be quite happy if I received nothing but books! My family don’t like buying me books without asking first, as they wouldn’t know if I’d already read them, so I usually have to choose the books myself. My Amazon wishlist is growing longer by the day so I always have plenty to choose from!

Review: Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain

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I chose to read this book as part of the Women Unbound Reading Challenge. I selected this book for Women Unbound because it is the memoirs of a woman who lived through World War I and it’s considered an important example of feminist literature.

I don’t read many non-fiction books or biographies/autobiographies so this was something different for me.

Vera Brittain was born in 1893 and grew up in Buxton, Derbyshire. Her father was the owner of a paper mill, therefore she had a comfortable, privileged childhood. Vera was well-educated and ambitious and longed to break away from what she frequently refers to as her ‘provincial’ life in Buxton. She already considered herself to be a feminist and wanted more out of life than just to leave school and get married like most of the other girls she knew. Her father finally agreed that she could go to Oxford University, but just as she was beginning her studies, war broke out in Europe. With her fiance Roland, brother Edward, and two close friends fighting on the front line, she was unable to concentrate on her studies and decided to enlist as a V.A.D. nurse.

It was fascinating to read a personal account of the effects the war had on one woman’s life and on society as a whole. Reading this book made me realise how little I actually knew about World War I. A lot of the places and events mentioned in the book were unfamiliar to me and left me wanting to find out more.

Rather than just relying on her memory, Brittain uses a number of different sources, including her private diaries and correspondence and verses from poems, some of which were written by Roland or Vera herself. As I read about all the pain and sorrow she was forced to endure, I became completely absorbed in Vera Brittain’s story. I found it very inspirational that despite having her entire world torn apart by the war, she was still able to go on to build a successful career for herself as a novelist, feminist and pacifist.

Although Testament of Youth was a long, demanding and often heartbreaking book, I’m glad I read it and I feel I learned a lot from it.

Highly Recommended

Genre: Non-Fiction (Autobiography)/Pages: 640/Publisher: Virago/Year: 1933/Source: borrowed a copy