This Week I are mostly reading (contd)

Reading "fly fishing" by J.R.Hartly. boring as f**k but I want to get it read before they make a film about the advert.

Two books since I last posted here:

The Notebook by Ágota Kristóf

The first in a series of three short novels following the story of a pair of twins, sent to live with their grandmother during wartime.
This is written in an almost fairy tale manner, with really short sentences, two-page chapters and very plain, unflowery prose. Virtually none of the characters are named, instead they are known by a descriptive, e.g. The shoemaker, the officer etc. Even the country in which it is set and the ongoing war are not named, though both are easily deduced. The more shocking or violent passages are given the same flat-prose treatment as the mundane, leading to an unusual but highly satisfactory read. I look forward to reading the other two books. Disconcertingly, each of the three books has a different translator (from the original Hungarian) but hopefully the style will remain consistent.

Black Swan Green by David Mitchell

This is my third Mitchell book , after The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet and Ghostwritten, and Black Swan Green is quite different from those titles. This is a coming-of-age novel revolving around a thirteen year old named Jason Taylor. It's set in 1982 and has tonnes of references to the era, I would imagine that anyone who has grown up at that time (in Britain ideally but we had UK TV here then also) would get a nostalgic kick from these. I found this a solid, if unspectacular read. Interestingly there has been a Corkonian in all three of the Mitchell books I've read so far, he lived (lives?) in Cork so the dialect and slang are spot on.

Finished Under A Blood Red Sky and enjoyed it a lot.

Now it's on to A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki - I've read good review of this so looking forward to it a lot.

Reading Contested Will by James Shaphiro - about the reasons people seek an alternative author/s for Shakespeare's works.

Don't seem to be able to read fiction at the moment though I have a big pile that I want to read.

Frank McGivney wrote: »

My First Post here, I constantly reading, so great to find someplace with other readers. I just about finished "The testament of Mary" by colm Tobin which is so well written and thought provoking and I about a third of way through "A star called Henry" by roddy doyle which is such a brillant book i think

I love Toibin's descriptions of the apostles as a bunch of ne'er do wells, it is a very interesting take on the most well known story of all.

I also loved A Star Called Henry, quite funny and also a good and fairly accurate historical yarn for those who wouldn't have a great deal of knowledge of that decade particularly now during the upcoming centenary celebrations.

I finished the Rwandan Cycling book "land of second chances" last night, excellent sports/human interest story. I bought the eamonn Dunphy book the other day so will probably start on that tonight but something else on my shelves might grab me instead.

8mv wrote: »

Currently re-reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak before the film comes out. I'd forgotten how good it is. The film trailer looks kind of ordinary - no mention of the books narrator - Death.

They left out the core of the story in that case