"We must be very nice to him," said Mrs Braithwaite, looking up at her daughter with large blue eyes. "Nice to him!" echoed Miss Braithwaite in surprise. "Well, of course we'll be nice to him. I mean, why shouldn't we?" On the 1st September 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Two days later France and England declared … Continue reading The English Air | D. E. Stevenson #1940Club
Opening Lines: The pool is located deep underground, in a large cavernous chamber many feet beneath the streets of out town. Some of us come here becasue we are injured, and need to heal. We suffer from bad backs, fallen arches, shattered dreams, broken hearts, anxiety, melncholia, anhedonia, the usual aboveground afflictions. For about a … Continue reading The Swimmers | Julie Otsuka #USAnovella
Epigraph: In the economy of Nature nothing is ever lost. Gene Stratton-Porter The end of this quote from Stratton-Porter's Jesus of the Emerald (1923) is, "I cannot believe that the soul of man shall prove the one exception." I'm not sure where Arnott stands on the whole idea of souls, but it is clear that … Continue reading Limberlost | Robbie Arnott #AUSfiction
Sydney, 1971The American family rented the house without having seen it - how could they have, halfway around the world? - so they did not know what it meant. Tablo Tales is a new Melbourne-based imprint in the hands of Jemma Birrell (some of you might know of Jemma as the Artistic Director of the … Continue reading A Dream Life | Claire Messud #AUSnovella
There was 'nothing for him' in England. The trouble with reading faster than one is blogging, is the backlog of reviews and trying to remember what I wanted to say about each book. I currently have eight books waiting to be reviewed. Thankfully I jot down notes as I go along and I underline interesting … Continue reading My Phantoms | Gwendoline Riley #GBRfiction
When I was ten, I would have devoured this gem of a book, several times over! The Secret Library of Hummingbird House features a mysterious old house, a secret book and time travel (amusingly, back in time to the 1970's when I was ten)! What's not to love?Especially when it's all wrapped up with a very … Continue reading The Secret Library of Hummingbird House | Julianne Negri #AWW
The rave reviews are the hardest, aren't they? It took me a few chapters to fall into this story, but when I fell, I really fell! The Dutch House turned out to be one of those wonderful, rich reading experiences that you wish would never end. Part gothic fairy tale and part psychological study of two … Continue reading The Dutch House | Ann Patchett #20BooksofWinter
I fell in love with Karen Foxlee's writing in 2014 when I read and loved Ophelia and the Marvellous Boy.A Most Magical Girl confirmed her ability to move me with her words. So much so, that I acquired her YA backlist to read...one day...!So I was thrilled to discover recently that she had a new … Continue reading Lenny’s Book of Everything by Karen Foxlee
Smile and Sisters have been two very popular books at work with 11-14 year old girls. Now I see why. Raina Telgemeier has created two very personal, engaging stories from two significant events in her pre-teen years. Smile details her rather horrific orthodontic work, while Sisters not only features her relationship with her younger sister, … Continue reading Smile & Sisters by Raina Telgemeier
E. M. Delafield was the thinly disguised pseudonym of Edmée Elizabeth Monica Dashwood, née de la Pasture. Look closely, I’m sure you’ll work out the family joke here all by yourself! Delafield was born in Sussex on the 9th June 1890 and died 2 December 1943, heartbroken after the death of her son Lionel in 1940. … Continue reading The Diary of a Provincial Lady | E. M. Delafield
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