Beyond the Roundels

What I've Finished Reading

Mostly unexpected things!

A few months ago, my friend (the v kind one who takes me to libraries and hospitals, depending) lent me The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katerina Bivald, which is about a Swedish bookworm who goes to a tiny town in the mid-West US to visit a pen-friend who turns out to be dead. I'd tried looking at it before and just got a headache, but with the weirdness of this illness, I suddenly knew I could read it, and I did. Much too fast. I got a headache again, but for reading it in less than three days instead of looking at the first page. It's really sweet and wish-fulfilling and all about books making a difference, and I can see why my friend lent it to me. (I just need to see her again now so that I can tell her that I have READ it and, yes, I loved it. I may need my own copy, but I'd like one with kinder sized print, though for less-headaches on re-reads.)


Then, in my Magic Free Bookshop, I found a copy of Home by Julie Myerson, a book which I own and have read many times and love but grudgingly (I have mixed feelings), and it was a so much nicer edition than my C-format Hbk-in-disguise-as-a-pbk one that I took it. And then when I looked at it, it had extra bits and letters in the back and I was so ridiculously happy about this and had to re-read the whole thing before I could read the new bits.

Home is basically the book I wish somebody would write about tracing your family tree, except it's about tracing the history of a house and everyone who lived in it. (My mixed feelings are due to: I don't always like the fictionalised segments, and while I get while they're there - the book is also partly about the concept of home on a very personal level - I don't care about the bits where she revisits her old homes). Anyway, it had extra stuff from the people who lived in the house at the back! I am embarrassed by how delighted I am by this. Also, it is a much prettier book and my love for it is immediately a whole lot less grudging than it used to be, because clearly I am shallow like that.


And on Sunday, also possibly by magic, because I don't get post on Sundays, a book dropped through my letterbox. It was Bookworm by Lucy Mangan, and it was my birthday present from my friend G, which I knew immediately as it could be from no one else. (This is very early for G; usually I get my birthday present about six months later. It's not that she's disorganised, it's just that she takes birthdays very seriously and has to get the perfect present and often that takes time!)

Anyway, Bookworm (which had very kind type but which I also read too fast and gave myself a headache) is one of those autobiography-through-books books, but this focuses on childhood and the author is three years older than me and G, and also British, so her experiences correspond very closely to mine (although I took the path that led to Middle Earth and other fantasy novels and she didn't. Diana Wynne Jones is her biggest omission.) It's not uncritical of things that warrant criticism but it's very fondly written, sometimes beautifully, too, on what is so effective about the books she highlights, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. She's pretty good on seeing what's good about the books she didn't take to - her loss, our gain.) It's also a very pretty book in itself, and of course, made me think about where my experience was the same and different. (That was what gave me the headache, really. I start writing imaginary blog posts of all my thoughts; it's exhausting, and then you have absolutely no spoons left to write even coherent sentences on anything of the kind.) It was also the most G-like present possible!


I did also read A Viking in the Family by Keith Gregson, which is a small book of very short family history stories from various people, which was nice to dip in and out of. I think I could have lived with the stories being a little longer in places and the how to all kept to the section at the back, but I enjoyed it anyway.


What I'm Reading Now

On the NF (Family history) side, I am note-taking from Poor Jack by Ronald Hope about Merchant Seamen, which is interesting and accessible (mostly via contemporary accounts), but for my purposes has very little about coastal seaman, and even though it's about Merchant Seamen, it's amazing how often you still find yourself in the Navy.

I am not reading anything else properly at the moment, as I am waiting for the last Sarah Caudwell book to arrive, and it is resolutely not arriving. I'm mildly reading The Wills of Our Ancestors by Stuart A. Raymond, which is actually what you would expect and pretty helpful. (Pen & Sword have a whole series of these kind of books and they mostly are, although some more than others.)


What I'm Reading Next

*stares at the letterbox*

*obstinately ignores piles and piles of books in room*