Micro Reviews 16 & 17

 

The Island & One August Night by Victoria Hislop

I read The Island years ago, possibly not that long after it came out and absolutely loved it. Novels in set in Greece are always going to catch my eye and then to discover that this one was set somewhere I'd visited was even better. 

Mr Norfolkbookworm & I visited Spinalonga (and stayed in the village near by) on our very first holiday together back in the late 1990s, although on returning a few years ago we didn't go back to Spinalonga, it was far too windy & rough! As an aside the one thing I don't think that Hislop did capture was just how darned cold it can get in Crete out of tourist season - we had snow!

Although parts of The Island had stuck in my mind since I read it when I heard there was a sequel coming I knew that I had to reread it first - and again I discovered that it was actually the book shadow that had stuck. I remembered the broad sweep of the story but very little of the detail, but as soon as I started reading I felt relaxed and happy to be back with an old friend.

I moved straight on to One August Night and unlike the curse of many sequels I'm pleased to say that I loved this book as much as the first one. It was like the feeling I always get when I step off a plane in Greece and take that first breath of warm air - scented with aviation fuel and herbs - knowing that I am back in my happy place.

The sequel touches very briefly on one of the plot strands from The Island but is definitely a new story, that being said I am glad I reread The Island first as I am not sure that it would work quite so well as a stand alone but it was a great book and just what was needed in the autumn of 2020.

Revisiting Potter

Harry Potter series by J K Rowling

There has been a lot of hype about Harry Potter (again) recently, this time because JK Rowling has written a new story, although it is a play rather than as a novel.  As yet I haven't managed to get tickets to the two part play but I do have a copy of the script on order and I thought I'd reread the 7 novels in advance of this.

The books were a huge part of my bookselling life. The second book had just come out when I started working in a bookshop and as I gravitated to the children's section from the start I read the two books very soon after starting (product knowledge!) and I know I shared them with Mr Norfolkbookworm. We both loved them and both bought into the hype of reading on publication day from book 3 -which incidentally embargoed until 3.45 so that no one would skive school to get the book.  I'm not even sure that there were that many fans at that point!

Since then I was involved in every launch with midnight parties getting every more elaborate and the need to avoid spoilers ever more important - especially when you are at work selling the book and not at home reading it!

However after racing through the books at publication I hadn't really returned to them at all so was looking forward to my mega-reread.

I wasn't disappointed in the main.  Reading them all together I could see how cleverly they were plotted right from the start and just how complete the world Rowling created was.  I raced through books 1-4 (this surprised me as I (mis)remembered no.4 as being very weak) but then really got stuck on no. 5.  After this blip I read the final two really quickly and was once more impressed by the scope of the books, even if I don't like the epilogue to the final book - however this may be important with the new play I gather...

I did wonder if I'd been swept up in the hype of the time, and then nostalgia, with my rosy view of the series but I wasn't. They are, in the main, damn fine books and however much it pains my sister as soon as my nephew is old enough I will be introducing him to this magical world.

Ps - should anyone have a spare ticket the the two plays please do think of me!