Non Fiction November

 

A monthly challenge that I can get behind!

I keep setting myself laudable reading goals/challenges and then failing miserably to keep to them but Nonfiction November is right up my reading alley!

It is supposed to be a month where you try something nonfiction if it isn't a genre you often read but for me it is an excuse to think about the non fiction books I've read all year, as well as the ones from November.

Keeping detailed reading journals through various apps (I'm paranoid that one might vanish and I'll lose all the data)* I can see that so far this year 42% of the books I've read have been nonfiction and so I really don't need a dedicated month to appreciate the genre so I looked a bit deeper in to the types of book I go for...

The majority are biographies or autobiographies, and within those nature and travel writing make up a large proportion, and following this come the books about books, but like most of my reading its really hard to pin down what is 'my type' of book as I'll try most things, except true crime!

In November standout non fiction so far has been:

What I Ate in One Year (and related thoughts) by Stanley Tucci - this was a wonderfully gossipy diary from Tucci, heavily focussed on food, drink and travel so just my thing. There were a fair number of recipes dotted through it too and I made note of several of them!

A Cheesemonger's Tour de France by Ned Palmer - I've often said that my 'last supper' would be really good quality French bread, butter and cheese and this book really helped me create the cheese board aspect of the meal. I also liked the pairing suggestions of what to drink with the cheese, and which areas of France I should add to my travel list so I can try the food in the setting it was made for. 

Sapiens: A Graphic History Volume 1 which is adapted from Yuval Noah Harari's book and illustrated by Daniel Casanave and David Vandermeulen. I'd tried Sapiens before and got a bit bogged down in it but this way of story telling really broke the big ideas down. I think Mr Norfolkbookworm got bored of just how often I was bringing up things I'd learned from it - however it did give us lots to talk about while we were our walking... I'm looking forward to reading the next two parts immensely.

There's still a third of the month left so I am sure I'll read more non fiction in November but it is good to stop and thinking about what I'm reading - it will help when it comes to writing those best of the year posts in a few weeks!

*this did happen to one app I really liked and while I have a paper reading journal too I've not always marked books by genre and so looking back at them I'm sometimes not sure what books were about!

That was the year I read...

The end of the year round up for me concludes with my lists of best books for 2016.

This was a year that saw me complete (and pass) my MA and find lots of time for reading. This year the grand total was 223 books finished between 1st January and 31st December.  There are quite a few I've started and wandered away from, none of them bad enough to give up totally on - just ones that failed to engage me at the time.  With so many read I haven't broken them down (yet) into fiction/non fiction or male/female etc.

In mid December I was asked to write for the work blog and list my top reads of the year there, that list can be read here along with the choices of my colleagues. After some more reading and reflecting many of my overall choices remain the same but I have made some last minute additions and alterations - books I remembered how much I'd loved them as I added the books from my journal to my spreadsheet.

My overall top fiction book of the year does go to my friend James' The Apprentice Witch.  It was such a happy read and one that I want to share with so many people that how can it not be my top book?  Before reading it I knew nothing about the book apart from the author but I know that as a child I'd have read and reread this one loads - it ticks all of my boxes, and while it is the first of a series it is also a complete story which is wonderful.

In non fiction my top book is actually one I read last year but due to restrictions that came with it I couldn't talk about it then. Philippe Sands East West Street went on to gain lots of praise (and prizes). It isn't an easy read but by heck has it stayed with me. I'm really sad that we were away when Sands came to Norwich as I'd like to have told him in person just what a brilliant book I found this one.

The rest of my lists have been really hard to compile - it seems that I have had a really good reading year after all!

Top Young Adult Reads 

Am I Normal Yet? - Holly Bourne. This was a World Book Night title and I read it down in one sitting. The sequels are good but didn't stay with me in quite the same way.

Chasing The Stars - Malorie Blackman. In the year of Shakespeare this retelling of Othello isn't just for a young audience. Shakespeare in space worked really well.

The One Memory of Flora Banks - Emily Barr. This was one of the last books I read this year, and as it was a Netgalley book it isn't officially published until next week but it was still gripping enough that I stayed up far too late to finish it! If pushed to describe it I'd say Before I Go To Sleep for a slightly younger readership, with added snow.

Nina Is Not OK - Shappi Khorsandi. Another 'issue' book but again one that had me reading from cover to cover avidly.  Coming from a comedienne it has a nice vein of humour running throughout but this never detracts from the serious point.

Top Fiction Reads

The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen 83 1/4 Years Old - Hendrik Groen. Reviewed here.

The Infinite Air - Fiona Kidman. A wonderful tale of the first women fliers chasing records in the air.

Cartes Postales - Victoria Hislop. Reviewed here, and Father Christmas did take a hint and there was a copy of this under the tree for me!

Shtum - Jem Lester.  I read this early in the year and had almost forgotten it until I read through my journal, on seeing the title it all came flooding back - a deeply moving story about a mad dealing with a disabled child and a dying father. Put like that it sounds terrible but the writing was beautiful.

Five Rivers Met on a Wooded Plain- Barney Norris. This made many of the 2016 'best of lists' and it is again a clever novel weaving 5 stories together.

The Summer Before the War - Helen Simonson. I can't praise this one highly enough, it really did make the summer before WW1 come to life for me and show what a shock the brutalilty of the war was for many.

Mrs Tim of the Regiment - D E Stevenson.  This was my discovery of the year, all about the life of the wife of a regiment's CO in the 1920s.  Reminiscent of Diary of a Provincial Lady, I'm now on the hunt for more books featuring the delightful Mrs Tim.

Top Non Fiction Reads (incl. graphic novels and poetry)

The Old King in His Castle - Arno Geiger, tr. Stefan Tobler.  I can't really explain this book, on the surface it is Geiger recounting his father's life and battle with Alzheimer's but it is so much more than this.

Eighty Days - Matthew Goodman. Two New York women set out to see if you really can go around the world in 80 days - one goes east, one goes west.

The House by the Lake - Thomas Harding. The history of Germany since 1900 told via just one house on a lake just outside Berlin.  Since reading this I've read a couple of other books that reference this village which has been a bit weird but added a lot to those books!

A World Gone Mad - Astrid Lindgren tr. Sarah Death.  Better known as the author of the Pippi Longstocking books this was a fascinating insight into life in neutral Sweden during WW2, their ideas of shortages will make you laugh but it is a fascinating take on the war.

Frontier Grit - Marianne Monson.  The West of America is, rightly or wrongly, associated with cowboys, gold rushes and men so this book addresses this by telling the story of some of the women who opened up the West. Fascinating reading but I'm glad I can visit in the 21st century!

Food Fights and Culture Wars - Tom Nealon. A history of the world told via food stuffs as varied as carp and Bovril. Quirky and full of beautiful eillustrations from the British Library collection.

Marzi - Marzana Sowa tr. Sylvain Savoia. A graphic novel about growing up in Poland in the 1980s, before the fall of communism.

Jerusalem - Guy Delisle. I reviewed his books in general here but it is Jerusalem that has stayed with me as Delisle echoed so many of my thoughts about this troubled city.

Sentenced to Life - Clive James. This is the second year running that James has made my best of lists, and this time - to my surprise - it is his poetry book that I loved.  It is again a sad/morbid book but there is so much beauty and hope in these poems. As ever I didn't like them all but the volume as a whole was a delight.

The Print Museum - Heidi Williamson. In 2016 I got to be a shadow judge on the East Anglian Book Awards and this took me way out of my comfort zone with the reading I undertook but again, to my surprise, it was the poetry book The Print Museum that stayed with me - and I'm pleased  to say the main judging panel as it won the poetry section of the prize!

Here's hoping that 2017 will be an equally good year book wise!

Graphically speaking

Graphic Novels / Travel Writing from Guy Delisle

While I am renowned for reading anything and everything (cereal packets if there are no books) I don't often read graphic novels.  Superheroes leave me cold and have done since I was a child and never moved on from Super Ted and Banana Man so I have tended to avoid this area in bookshops and libraries as I perceive them to be full of this sort of story.

There have been exceptions, I enjoyed the historical and allegorical Maus books and was fascinated by Peresopolis for instance and so when Guy Delisle's books came up as suggestions on Goodreads I thought they might appeal to me.

So far I've raced though Burma Chronicles, Jerusalem, Pyongyang and I have just started Shenzen. They are a mix of autobiography, travelogue and cultural guide to some of the most interesting or restrictive places on the planet.

In some of the books Guy is alone and travelling as part of his job as a animator and in others he accompanies his wife, who works for Medicins Sans Frontieres, on her postings. All of the books give you some insight into the counties visited but personally I prefer the ones where Guy is with his family and trying to adjust to both a non traditional role (he is a house husband) and life in strange surroundings.

The illustrations are deceptively simple but convey so much, Guy manages to tell all sides of the story where he can and it does seem that he tries to get behind the public facade of the places he lives - perhaps it is being a Canadian (who is married to a French woman) that allows him to be both an objective observer as well as expressing his own opinions in a non-confrontational way.

The books I've read so far have all been translated from the original French but whether it is the style of the books or the quality of the translation I'd never have known. (I would credit the translator of them all as being Helge Dascher but I have returned some of the books to the library already and as is so often the case the translator is not credited on Wikipedia or Amazon for quick reference.)

I'm still not sure that I'm ever going to love graphic novels as genre as a whole but I will keep trying them as just occasionally I am going to hit gold like I did with these! If anyone can suggest more books like these I'd be grateful.