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1923:The Mystery of Lot 212 and a Tour de France Obsession by Ned Boulting |
Boulting commentates on Grand Tours. During Covid he bought a damaged Pathé news reel and had it repaired, discovering it shows part of a stage of the 1923 Tour de France. He obsessively researches the leading rider and the stage. Despite 1934 being between the wars, Boulting describes on-going political unrest and acts of aggression, concluding that the stage marked the end of WW1 hostilities and started the build up to WWII. Interesting and well researched/written.
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Non-Fiction) |
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A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler |
Anne Tyler has been a prolific writer and has many fans. This was my initial foray. Unfortunately, I feel it will be the last too. It has been said before that this is a story of ordinary people, living ordinary lives, but the writing makes it special. It was well written but, for me, that didn’t lift it out of being ordinary. I found it dull and most of the characters somewhat annoying.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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Brotherless Night by V V Ganeshananthan |
A very well written book about siblings in the Sri Lankan Civil War. I knew little of this war despite being the same age as these siblings, studying for A and O levels, and learnt a lot. It gives historical and political perspective but also tells very human stories of how individuals cope when unimaginable horror visits their young lives. It attempts to explain, without condoning, why people sometimes turn to terrorism.
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Fiction) |
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Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin |
A great read and reviewed previously (bwl99). It is about life, death and love, but I was so lulled into a sense of the poetic by the gentle, caring nature of Violette, the cemetery keeper and gardener, and her friends, and the epitaphs starting each chapter, that I was startled when, about half way through, the hard-edged life of Violette and her estranged husband feature. Life is like that, is it not? Not all roses.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon |
This book is set around a grizzly event in the Peloponnesian War (412 BC) when the Syracusians starved to death their Athenian prisoners of war, in disused quarries. Two out of work potters, who speak in Dublin vernacular, take to offering food to prisoners who can recite Euripides, eventually deciding to put on a play and hatch a daring plan to free the stars of the show. Quirky, uncomfortable in places but engrossing.
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Fiction) |
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Horse by Geraldine Brooks |
One of the best books I’ve ever read. You don’t need to be ‘horsey’ either. It is about a famous, American, mid-19th century racehorse called Lexington, and his black trainer. It is about racism and slavery, the American Civil War and the legacy of a painting of Lexington. There is also a contemporary aspect when a scientist studies Lexington’s bones to understand its speed, when current day racism in Washington DC rears its ugly head.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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Kairos by Jenny Erpenbecj |
I read this book because I was interested in the experiences of East Germans as the Wall came down. I struggled to finish it, persevering because I thought that an International Booker Prize winner must be good. Very little of the book is about how the political situation affected ordinary people. Most of it covers, at tedious length, the extra-marital affair between a late fifties man with double standards and a nineteen-year-old woman. Most unpleasant controlling behaviour.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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Life After Life by Kate Atkinson |
Ursula lives several versions of her own life. At times, the deaths came a little too thick and fast, but overall, the concept worked well, covering much of the interwar years and into the mid twentieth century. The wartime blitz sections made me realise how little I had thought behind the statistics to what that carnage was like and how it was dealt with practically. A clever and engrossing read.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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My Father's House by Joseph O'Connor |
In occupied Rome an Irish Monsignor in the Vatican, which remained neutral, runs an escape line for allied soldiers, disguised as running a choir. It is based on a true story. During the relatively short Roman occupation (Sept ’43 to June ’44) the Gestapo’s actions were horrific. The risks taken by the ‘Choir’ are immense and the suspense is gripping, building to a climax at Christmas ’44. I couldn’t put it down
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Fiction) |
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People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks |
Another great book from Geraldine Brooks. This one is about the Sarajevo Haggadah, a fourteenth century illustrated Sephardic Haggadah. This book exists and some of its history is known. This story fills in the gaps with the life stories of fictional people involved in saving the book from the ravages of real events across Europe through the centuries, including World War II, the Bosnian War and the Spanish Inquisition. It also features fascinating investigative book renovation.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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Silk:A history in three metamorphoses by Arathi Prasad |
This fascinating and meticulously researched book describes the silk-making capabilities of the silk worms, molluscs and spiders of the world, thus the three metamorphoses of the title. It charts the cultural use of silk by civilisations ancient and modern and tells the stories of the attempts by pioneers to harness this natural process. It has elements of history, natural history, ethnobiology, medical and physical sciences and probably more.
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Non-Fiction) |
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The Colour Storm by Damien Dibben |
This is a tale of painters and their patrons in Renaissance Venice. A painter searches for a new pigment and becomes embroiled romantically with his patron’s wife. I found the adventure rather farfetched but enjoyed the description of the painter’s workshop, his relationship with other painters and his apprentices and of daily life in Venice with plague an ever-present threat.
(bwl 116 Spring 2024 - Fiction) |
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The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry |
This book has a couple of reviews already (bwl 83 and 86) so I’ll skip the plot and just say that it was not for me. I found the characters much too twee and without much depth. This is a surprise given that the book deals with the important issues of domestic abuse, controlling behaviour and the devastating effects of bullying. I did find the romantic aspect believable.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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The Fair Botanists by Sara Sheridan |
There should have been plenty here of interest; historic Edinburgh c1822, botanic gardens, scent making and strong women. Whilst the social influence of a new town in Edinburgh and preparations for a visit by George IV are well represented and interesting, the two main characters were uninspiring. Selfish vandalism does not make for ‘strong’ in a good way. There is an old woman in her dotage that I liked but she’s a sideline. Moreover, the writing style grated on me.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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The Flight of the Maidens by Jane Gardam |
I loved Gardam’s Old Filth Trilogy and her depth of understanding of human nature comes through in this tale of three young women in the Summer of 1946 prior to them going to university. I enjoyed the book although it was a bit like Old Filth meets Enid Blyton.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Fiction) |
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The Glassmaker by Tracy Chevalier |
A history of Venetian/Murano glassmaking from the 15th Century to the present is told through the experiences of a fictional family. It is impeccably researched and, unusually, follows one female who ages about 10 years for every century, justified on the basis of Venetian art being timeless. Odd but effective. Interesting for one person to experience the plague and Covid. I didn’t always have empathy with the characters but enjoyed the history and atmosphere.
(bwl 116 Spring 2025 - Fiction) |
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The Wisdom of Donkeys: Finding Tranquillity in a Chaotic World by Andy Merrifield |
I agree with the previous review at bwl 47. However, whilst Andy’s bonding with donkey Gribouille on their trek through the Auvergne is gentle and lovely, reinforcing what a wonderful creature a donkey is, his descriptions of mistreated donkeys in Egypt and Morocco and reviews of similar atrocities in the literature make for hard reading. A book of contrasts and I can’t make my mind up about it.
(bwl 117 Summer 2025 - Non-Fiction) |
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