Beyond the Roundels

What I've Just Finished Reading

Since the start of the year, I have read four Daisy Dalrymple books, which are good fun and easy to read 'cosy' crime books set in the 1920s, exactly what I needed. Daisy writes articles about stately homes for magazines but everywhere she goes, she falls over bodies, much to the annoyance of her love interest/fiance/husband DCI Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard. His superior sends them both out of the country on an extended honeymoon of sorts to try and escape the Daisy-related body pile-up, but naturally people just get pushed overboard on the boat on the way over. Alec is even less impressed than usual at this because he was having a bad enough time contending with seasickness as it was. (Daisy says, though, in her defence, that the first time she ever found a body was the first time she met Alec, and it's not her fault. Nobody else buys this for a minute.)


What I'm Reading Now

I'm still light on brain, so I'm sort of idly reading several things at once (or not reading them) and not going back to the harder things I was already in the middle of. I will report back on which ones I'm actually reading next time when it's clearer which ones will take.

I am, though, going on from research I was doing before Christmas for a Yuletide treat, still reading/skimming through a book on Jasper Tudor by Terry Breverton. It has a lot of useful info in it, but it is terrible! It needs severe editing, much trimming down, and I would say less bias, except the most fun bit is when he's going Up the Welsh and Down with the English! (I may be English but a big enough part of me is Welsh to approve, or at least enjoy it a lot. Quite.) It's a shame it's quite so rambling and random, though, because Jasper Tudor was a very interesting person, being the one major player in the Wars of the Roses who made it from the start to the finish, never changed sides, and who must be in line for the Best Uncle Ever award. (Also, he was Welsh. Do you want to know how Welsh? ;-p) I do appreciate the sketching in of what's known of Owen Tudor's origins and family history in some detail, though.

But, yeah. I'm glad my Margaret Beaufort book by the same publisher (but not the same author) was a good deal shorter and more accessible and to the point, or my Yuletide treat would never have happened.


What I'm Reading Next

I don't know, but a friend is coming to take me to a different library tomorrow (about 10 mins drive away), and I have hopes (having checked the catalogue) of another Daisy book and maybe a couple more Regencies for fluff to carry me through till brain is forthcoming. We shall see!