Exciting Times

I've been looking forward to today for ages. I am venturing out of Norwich and down to London for the afternoon and evening and it is going to be a very bookish day.

This afternoon a colleague and I are going to Penguin HQ. I've been a couple of times before, doing some consultancy work, back when I worked for Waterstone's. This time E and I are going in our library capacity, to talk about how libraries work, how we buy books, how we monitor popular titles and how we can work more closely with publishers.

After this we are meeting some friends for drinks before going on to the Puffin 70th Birthday Party.

At the library we've been celebrating Puffin books for a while - getting people to vote for their favourite Puffin titles of all time, we also held a book club birthday party where we played lots of games based on Puffin books. Unsurprisingly our games based on Charlie and the Chocolate Factor are the most popular.

I loved Puffin books as a child, but sadly I was never a member of the Puffin Club, Mr Bookworm was and thanks to eBay we now have a nearly complete collection of the early magazines. I am about to become Auntie Bookworm and I am very excited to see that the Puffin Club has been restarted. You're never too young for books after all...

As for picking my favourite Puffin title? Not possible I'm afraid. Who could chose between Arthur Ransome, Roald Dahl, Charlie Higson, Rick Riordan, CS Lewis, Raymond Briggs...

I have to catch a train now but in the mean time I leave you with this:



this:



and of course the Puffin Blog.

No Puffins, Penguins or Pelicans were harmed in the making of this blog post!

Books, books everywhere but not a title to read

Well the title is slightly misleading, but once more I am in a reading dilemma.

Through many and varied (and gratefully received) sources I have recently acquired a lot of proof and review copies of books. All of them look good and even if they aren't normally my 'thing' all of them certainly look appealing enough to at least try.

The problem is that I feel a bit overwhelmed, I don't know where to start.

Well that isn't quite true either as I've started several of them. One in the bedroom, one in the living room, one at work, and so on. I don't know which to continue first. And then there are the ones that I haven't event started yet. They are sitting in a pile sending out 'read me' vibes and making me feel guilty that they don't have my attention.

Sitting next to this pile however there are another two stacks. One of recent purchases and another of library books that I've reserved after reading reviews elsewhere. Sam I feel you and your Summer Read and the coverage of the Hay Festival being shown on Sky Arts are predominantly to blame for this, however there are some cracking books being reviewed all over the blogosphere at present.

I am currently reading two books:
One is Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce. I have a review copy of this and it is just a plain red book, no hints as to content at all. I've got about half way through it so far and I think I've worked out the plot twist. If I have I am a bit disappointed that a book with so much more to offer than a lot of books from genre is so easy to guess, if I'm wrong I will be astounded at the talent of the author.

I'm avoiding reading too much about the book as I don't want it to be spoiled but the author is on a blog tour this week and started over at Chicklish where you can find out more.

The other is a manuscript from a friend, it is very well written and very different from much of the teen literature out there. Definitely more Philip Reeve than Stephenie Meyer. I'm getting towards the end of this one now and there are a lot of loose ends to tie up - I'm just hoping that it does end properly and not with those dreadful words 'to be continued'. I don't think Abbie would do that to me but you can never be certain!

Enough procrastinating.
I shall take both of these books, a glass of something cold and a comfortable chair into the garden as I try to avoid my usual reading habit when I am overwhelmed by choice - rereading comfort books!

Happy Birthday!

Wow - I really can't believe that I've had a blog for a whole year.

It has been a busy year, lots of travel, lots of reading and a new job and I haven't quite managed to average a blog post a week. Perhaps next year I'll get to this.

I'm actually quite proud of myself for managing to keep going with the blog as most of my diaries seem to peter out by June.

Right now I am reading an impulse book - Up in the Air by Walter Kirn. I haven't seen the film but the book is really enjoyable. After that I have a few proofs to look at and then I have the enjoyable job of choosing holiday reading. I'm really not sure what to take for my two weeks on a Greek Island so if you've read anything recently and think I might please do let me know.

Now on to more birthday cake I think!


Picture of the incredible cake taken from http://www.inspirations-cakes.co.uk/ - I wonder if I drop enough hints Mr Norfolk Bookworm will get me one of these for my next birthday?

Lost in Translation

One of the projects that I started through work was an International Literature Group.

Over the past 5 months a small group of us have attended monthly meetings where a lecturer from UEA has come along and taught us all about translating. Rather than all reading a set book we've all then been reading any book that has been translated into English and thinking about it using the guidelines given in the session. It has been great fun and I've really read my way around Europe this winter and spring. It has also been nice to think in more depth about what I'm reading, rather than just reading for pleasure. I miss studying sometimes.

May's challenge was a little different, our group was shadowing the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. We'd been sent 4 of the six books to read, talk about and then review.

None of the four books was an easy read, and we had only limited time to read the four titles. I managed to get through 3 of them:

Philippe Claudel's Brodeck's Report (translated from the French by John Cullen.)
This was my favourite of the 3 read. On the face of it this was a simple book about a very rural village trying to put itself back together after WW2 and a dramatic event. The more you read however the deeper the story went and it really was like an onion - each layer was good but taken as a whole it was fantastic.
The themes covered were not easy and despite the apparent simplicity this was a book that had to be read slowly so that none of the detail was missed.

Julia Franck's The Blind Side of the Heart (translated from the German by Anthea Bell)
On the face of it this was the most appealing book, from a retail view point it looked like the most commercial too. Sadly it didn't live up to the cover.
The story starts with a most dramatic event - a mother abandons her child on a railway platform in what will become Russian East Germany, and then we go back into the mother's past to find out how she could do such a thing.
The problem with this one was that none of the characters captured me, it was obvious from the subject matter that none of them were nice, but they all remained flat on the paper and never came to life. The writing was also dull and the story stagnant. This could have been so good, and I was disappointed as it had won many prizes in Germany.

Alain Mabanckou's Broken Glass (translated from the French by Helen Stevenson)
This one was really not my cup of tea at all and even though I persevered for about 100 pages I'm still not sure what it was about.
The translation of this one really impressed me for not once in the text is there a full stop. To have the skill to translate a story with only commas for punctuation and keep it readable is a huge talent I feel.

I also had a copy of Rafik Schami's The Dark Side of Love (translated from the German by Anthea Bell) but although I do want to read this one it is a massive 853 pages long and I just ran out of time to read it before the prize was announced.

The prize was announced at a ceremony on Thursday, sadly our shadowing group wasn't picked as one to go to this party, and the winner was...

Brodeck's Report

The next time our group meets, in June, we are going to discuss this one further and with our 'critical translation' hats on, rather than our 'should this win a prize' hats!

Thanks go to the Reading Agency for the chance to participate in this project.

Piles of books and some disappointments

I've had lots of books reserved at the library and typically it seems that all of them have become available at once.

Luckily the housework is pretty much up-to-date (don't faint mum!) and the weather is nice enough that I can spend my days off in the garden reading.

We've recently discovered the Lake Woebegone podcast and have had great fun listening to these, so I decided to try some of the books. As luck would have it there is a new one just out, Pilgrims. This one is set in Rome, a city I have visited so I thought I'd really enjoy it. Being a new book there was a bit of a wait on this title so while I was waiting I read Pontoon.

This was a book that made me laugh out loud a couple of times. I wouldn't say that it was a great book but it was a pleasant interlude and really made me want to read Pilgrims. Sadly it didn't live up to my hopes, I knew I wasn't going to enjoy it as soon as I realised the author had written himself into the book and as a serious character not a cameo. The plot was a farce too far for my taste too. The Telegraph reviewed the book a couple of months ago and this is a pretty good summary of the book although I enjoyed it less than the reviewer I feel!

I shall have to listen to a few more podcast episodes to rid myself of the after-taste left by the book. There is the saying "he has a face for radio" personally I think that Garrison Keillor has plots that are best suited to the radio.

Now back to that stack of new books. How can I chose which to read first - the new book by a local author, the new travel biog, something topical like Eating Animals or a nice comforting old favourite....

Oh Dear

Oh dear, it has been over a month since my last post and the lack of updates really haven't been because I haven't been reading. In fact in March I read more than 20 books, most of them good or excellent.

The problem is my eReader.

I love it. I can now dip in and out of all those classic children's books that I love but don't own, as well as slowly making my way through some of the great adult classics of all time.
Then there are the collections of myths and legends...I say "oh I'll just read one" and before I know it an hour has passed. Ooops.

Now I'll be honest here. I really didn't expect to have this reaction to the eReader. We treated ourselves to the BeBook mini last autumn and while I have downloaded some books on to it during the winter I haven't really played with it at all.

Then we went on holiday and had a very small luggage allowance. I cut down to the bare minimum on clothes (and I really do mean this it doesn't mean I only took 5 pairs of shoes rather than the usual 10 etc.) but when the books were added in - one a day each plus spares - we were well over the limit. I panicked.

Then I remembered the BeBook.

It was great. It took a while to work out just how far down the page I should be before I 'turned over' as there is a delay but once that was sorted I flew through the books an didn't event notice the slight flash as it went. I read books that I wouldn't normally take (short books and kidlit) and thoroughly enjoyed the variety.

I did read quite a few paper books too but this was a wonderful addition to the case and only needed charging once in the week. I was pleasantly surprised how I took to eInk and the reader in general and now I am not so bothered by the iPad when it finally comes despite being an Apple geek.
Roll on the next holiday so I can do it all over again!


For those interested we went to Lanzarote and I read 14 books in 8 days!

In Flander's Fields

A Rose for the ANZAC Boys

I've just finished this book in pretty much one sitting and it has me an emotional wreck.

It starts in modern times with a young lad being mildly embarrassed at a Service of Remembrance as he has push his deaf great grandfather in a wheelchair, he can't understand why the service is so important, and he can't understand why his 'Pa' is making him take part - the war was years ago after all.

The plot then goes back in time to 1915 and we meet the three heroines of the book, Midge, Ethel and Anne at their school. All three are itching to do more for the war effort and when one of the girls receives a telegram stating that a loved one is missing in action they decide to do something about it. Ethel's father is a grocer he supplies the girls with all they need to set up a canteen, in France, for the troops.

All three girls have different reasons for their actions but it is Colonial Midge that we follow the most and throughout the book her bemusement, bravery and determination shine through, right down to her last brave decision.

This is a work of fiction, but the author is very clear to state that although none of these characters existed all of their adventures did happen to real people. I have read many books about World War One, fiction and non, but this just leaves many of them in the dust. I cried from about half way through and wasn't surprised to read in the afterword that Jackie French had found this the hardest of her books to write. It is incredible.

It tells a well rounded story of war, it touches on other topics such as the Suffragettes and the problems of Empire, but ultimately it is about how pointless the slaughter of the trenches was - bit how important it was at the time. French's afterword and glossary really adds to the book and I love the recipe for ANZAC cookies that is included here.

The ANZAC point of view made a nice difference to the topic, and the importance of the Australian and New Zealand contribution should not be overlooked.

This really should become a must read for anyone who like historical fiction.

The Australian War Memorial, Canberra

Books, Blogs, Bookshops and Libraries

Reading Matters

I love the internet, I love the worlds it has opened to me - especially when it comes to finding new things to read.

There are some great review sites (personal and media) out there and my horizons have really expanded over the past few years.

When I worked in the bookshop this was expensively dangerous as I'd read about another new book that I'd want to read and find myself plucking it off the shelf (or ordering it in) and buying it straight away. Quite a lot of the time I didn't enjoy the book as much as I'd hoped.

For a while I didn't think about the library for these brand new books, to my shame I didn't realise just how many new books are available on publication in Norfolk's libraries. (I know better now I work for them!)*

Probably 90% of books reviewed that are produced by British publishers are available as soon as they are published, it is saving me a fortune. It doesn't matter if the review turns out to be better than the actual book - I haven't spent any money on it.

I'd like to say that I don't spend as much money on books now but it isn't quite true.
I now spend my money on books from America/Canada/Australia as well as building my antiquarian collection but I am buying less books. In fact Mr Norfolkbookworm has purchased far more books than me this year (probably by a 2:1 ratio so far) but he might not actually own up to this so I'll whisper it!

Perhaps I should now stop reading so many blogs and reviews and start reading the books they talk about. Then write about them.

Now where did I put my library card...



* I should add that this blog isn't sponsored by the library and it is just my thoughts not propaganda or advertising. Just happiness that I can get my hands on so many books and save some money for my other love - travel!

And the Winner is...

The winner of the 2010 Waterstone's Children's Book Prize has been announced and I am so happy at the result.

Finally books written for the younger and newly emergent readers have been victorious with Katie Davies' The Great Hamster Massacre.

This was a truly great addition to the WCBP shortlist. It was funny, sad, cute and revolting all in one. I read it, my husband read it, my sister read - oh and her stepson read it. It amused us all.

A real winner.

Legacy of Hope

Holocaust Memorial Day 2010



Blogging about something like Genocide is virtually impossible, but at the same time Holocaust Memorial Day should not go unmentioned.

January 27th has been picked as HMD for it marks the day that the Red Army liberated Auschwitz, and 2010 marks the 65th anniversary of this action. Sadly this act didn't see the end to genocide and countless millions have died since.

There are many books, fact and fiction written about the Jewish Holocaust. Many have been written for children, in fact I studied many of them in the course of writing the dissertation for my M.A. Not all of them are good but the important thing is that they are there. Hopefully if such actions aren't brushed under the carpet they will occur less and less. What we must not do is pretend such things never happen.

First They Came - Pastor Martin Niemoller

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialist
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

Australia Day

Antipodean Writing.

January 26th (which it already is there!) is Australia Day and so time to celebrate the wonderful writing that comes from Down Under.

As a child I was lucky enough to be sent lots of books from Australia by relatives living their. The Muddle Headed Wombat was a great favourite, to the extent that when my sister and I left home we fought over our copy and had to have another one sent to us to stop the bloodshed! Then there was Shy the Platypus, Cuddlepot and Sugglepie and We of the Never-Never. As we got older classics by Mary Grant Bruce and Ethel Turner arrived. I've reread and cried over Seven Little Australians many times!

Australian authors are still writing cracking good fiction, Garth Nix, Jaclyn Moriarty, Melina Marchetta, Morris Gleitzman and Randa Abdel-Fattah are my particular favourites.

However if I could only keep one book Australia it would have to be:



This is not only the one Australian book I would save but also the one picture book. I can only try to explain how much I love this book.

Part of it is to do with where I first came across it.
In the autumn of 2005 I went to Australia and spent some time travelling with my sister, one of the first places she took me was the fabulous children's department in Dymocks bookstore in the centre of Sydney. This book was new then and had a lovely display. We then went to Taronga Zoo and I got to come face to face with a wombat. It was love at first sight.

The other reason I love the book is how it is written, the words are good but without the pictures it would be quite dull, it really is a visual delight.

The best bit? A sequel has just come out...

... oh and my parents arrive in Australia in a couple of weeks and have promised to bring me a copy home!

Award season

It is the season of the book prize again.

I am mostly interested in prizes which are aimed at or include children's books although I do enjoy seeing all of the lists.

The Costa Book Award category finalists have been announced and the overall winner will be announced on January 26th. The children's category winner is a strong contender this year and although I haven't read the book a lot of people I respect have read and loved it. Sam at Books, Time and Silence has a fabulous review, and I will be taking Ness's books on my next holiday.

The leading American children's book awards are due very soon but for me these aren't the awards I am most interested in.

The Waterstone's Children's Book Prize shortlist was announced today. From 2006 to 2009 I was really closely involved with this prize and I was privileged enough to read the long list for 2010. I've been waiting with baited breath for this shortlist and I haven't been disappointed at all.

The nine books making the shortlist are incredible:

1. Flyaway by Lucy Christopher

2. The Great Hamster Massacre by Katie Davies

3. The Girl Who Could Fly by Victoria Forester

4. Seven Sorcerers by Caro King

5. Love, Aubrey by Suzanne LaFleur

6. The Toymaker by Jeremy de Quidt

7. Desperate Measures by Laura Summers

8. Superhuman: Meteorite Strike by A.G Taylor

9. The Crowfield Curse by Pat Walsh

Of the nine books I only disliked one and one made my top 5 books of 2009. My favourite five books from the long list all made this shortlist.

Picking the winner is tough though. Flyaway was an incredible book - it didn't suffer at all from second book syndrome and was just as powerful at Stolen. Superhuman: Meteorite Strike is written by someone originally from Norfolk and so that has a soft spot in the Norfolkbookworm's heart and then the Great Hamster Massacre is a truly great book for newly independent readers and these never seem to win awards.

I could go on and justify why 8 of the 9 should win but I am going to be loyal to Love, Aubrey it was one of my top reads from 2009 after all and even on the third re-read it moved me just as much as the first time.

Now all I have to do is wait until February 10th for the winner to be announced.

I had planned on writing about all of the exciting books I've already read this year - being snowbound has worked wonders on that lost mojo - but the excitement of the award season means that post is on hold for a few days.

So that was 2009

So that was 2009.

It was a pretty mixed bag of a year both personally and in a reading sense and while it did have some high spots I can't say I'll be sorry to see the back of it. 2010 is already looking like it will be exciting and so I shall look forwards not back.

Well I will once I've listed my top books of 2009!

Now like many book bloggers out there I am going to cheat horribly on this. I have two Top 5 lists, one for books aimed at adults and one for books aimed at teenagers! Some of them I have bogged about already, some of them I read before I started blogging. Thank heavens I've kept a reading diary though!

Norfolkbookworm's Top 5 Adult Books (in no particular order)

Click on the authors' names to be taken to their homepage or a review of the book

American Wife - Curtis Sittenfeld



American Adulterer - Jed Mercurio



19th Wife - David Ebershof



The Rights of the Reader - Daniel Pennac



The Lord Edward Corinth Mysteries - David Roberts


Norfolkbookworm's Top 5 Books (ostensibly) for Children

Again click on the author name to be taken to either a review of the book or an author website.

Revolver - Marcus Sedgwick



Love, Aubrey - Suzanne LaFleur


Stolen - Lucy Christopher



Saving Raphael - Leslie Wilson


Devil's Kiss - Sarwat Chadda

So there it is, my top 10 books of the year. A mixed bag. My top non fiction titles had to be Sisters in Arms, Paradise Lost: Smyrna, It's a Dons Life and Pompeii.

Well I suppose that as it has taken me well over 3 hours to go through my reading diary and narrow my choices down 2009 can't have been such a bad year book wise. Here's hoping that 2010 will be just as good!

All I Want for Christmas...

...is my reading 'mojo' back.


Sometimes it takes a blog post from someone else to highlight a problem, and my friend Sam over at Books, Time and Silence has really hit the nail on the head. Leaving book retail has really changed my reading habit.

I've been keeping a reading diary for nearly 10 years - incidentally the only diary I've managed to keep - and on average I've tended to read about 350-400 books a year. Many of them were children's books (although I never counted picture books), lots of them were books I'd re-read but many of them were new books for that year. I am blessed with the ability to read fast (this can be a curse on journeys and holidays when my luggage is always twice as heavy due to the sheer quantity of reading matter) but even with that quantity of books I do retain the plots. Ask my husband he has tested me!

However this year I left the world of book retail, okay I now work in a library, but like Sam I no longer see the book on its journey from publisher's catalogue to customer's hand. I am now a browser not a hunter. This year I've read a scant 250 and many of them were comforting rereads at times when life has been more stressful. I know that this still seems an awful lot of books to have read, but for me it is a significant drop and I am having to remind myself frequently of the rules and I am trying not to feel guilty about this. It isn't even as if I have Sam's reason that the books I have read have been 'harder' than usual and have slowed me down.

Oh well my Christmas list was full of book requests and we have recently treated ourselves to this which I am rapidly filling with books so hopefully in 2010 I will rediscover my reading mojo and a whole heap of new authors!

And yes I will be jumping on the blog bandwagon and be posting my books of the year soon!

On going saga of Adrian Mole

Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years

I've been a fan of Adrian Mole since I was a teenager, in theory we don't have a lot in common -I'm female for a start but from the very beginning I was hooked. In recent years there have been additions to the series and they didn't live up to my memories. This one bucks the trend.

I really couldn't put it down, it was well past midnight before I realised that I had to stop reading and I was up again just past six frantically trying to finish it before work.

Adrian's life is still overly complicated, he is dogged by bad luck and makes some truly diabolical choices but this book has the sparkle and wit that I found in the first two books all those years ago.

All the old characters seem back on form too. Pandorra is still around but seems to have lost some of her sharp edges, is she being nice to Adrian or does she want something? Adrian's parents infidelities are still causing ripples - will we ever know all that they got up to? Adrian himself is still convinced that he will become a famous literary figure before long, but is time for this ambition runningout faster than he thought?

Not all of these questions are answered in this book, and for once I am hoping that there is a sequel sooner rather than later.

The thing that made me sit up and think the most though is that since I first read this I've imagined Adrian as being from a totally different generation than me - doing the maths here he is infact only 7 3/4 years older than I am.

This is a fun comic read, but it has enough underlying seriousness to really keep you hooked even when you think that Adrian has gone one step too far.

Guilty Pleasures.

Biography.

Even the most unobservant blog follower will have noticed that it has been nearly a month since my last post. I've been reading during that time and as ever some books have been good, some bad and shock horror there is one that I am actually reading really slowly because it is so detailed and beautifully written that I am savouring every page.

However I feel slightly guilty about the bulk of my recent reading as it is a genre that is really looked down upon.

The celebrity biography.

There I've said it. In a public place. Now I'll go for a cleansing shower.

No I won't. I refuse to feel ashamed of my reading choices. This time of year the bookshops are full of s'leb biogs. They aren't always very good, they aren't always very illuminating and sometimes they aren't even very enjoyable. Yet every year I am drawn to read at least a few of them.

The ones I've perused this year have been pretty run of the mill (and no I'm not going to open myself up to more ridicule by actually telling you whose they were) but they've made me smile and have made those first few weeks after the clocks change seem far far brighter.

I've had my fix for now tho' and I'm back on the hard stuff, more of which to follow.

Oops I Did It Again.

Sequels (again)

I did it again. I read an 'official' sequel to a childhood favourite. Why do I keep doing this to myself?

I've loved the stories and characters from Winnie the Pooh for years. Tigger is my favourite, and I did queue for an hour at Disney for the chance to meet him. I'm not even that bothered by the Disney version of the characters although I do prefer the original illustrations by E H Shepard.

I knew that there was an authorised sequel to the original books coming but having been disappointed by sequels already this year I hadn't pre-ordered the book anywhere except the library.

Wise move. I won't be buying it.

Again I'm not sure if it is because I am reading it as an adult but there was something missing. Magic I think. The stories were too knowing, the wonder, and the imagination, was missing. Milne would never have had Rabbit talking about the Romans or Christopher Robin referring to the Trojan Horse. The character would have made up far better references in the original, the biggest 'enemy' in this book is the thesaurus - it doesn't quite measure up to the Heffalump does it?

The illustrations are also just a touch too modern, I can't quite put my finger on it but they are just not quite *it*.

The best chapter was the one where the characters learn to play cricket and Tigger scores 27 runs. Two of my favourite things mixing - hurrah.

In summary I suppose that there is nothing wrong with the book, the stories read pretty well and the illustrations capture the words pretty well, it is just when the introduction, sorry Exposition, is the best bit you know the book isn't quite as magical as you'd hoped.

Dangerous Places

Airports are dangerous places, not because they involve huge security and airplanes but because of the bookshops.

If you are addicted to reading you stand no chance of escaping without buying something. Even if you know that you have a book, a spare book and a just-in-case book in your hand luggage there is always that underlying fear that if there is a delay you'll run out of reading material.

Then in the UK there is the added attraction of the airport edition. Who can resist a paperback version of the brand new hardback you've been coveting on high street?

Well I certainly can't and on a recent trip I indulged in new books on both legs of the journey, and unlike on so many previous occasions I actually regret neither book.

Leaving the UK I treated myself to Sadie Jones' Small Wars an it kept me engrossed throughout the 8 hour flight, although a book that has a tendency to make you weepy is probably best not read in public.


However it was the book I chose on impulse in Canada that was the real treat - Stuart McLean's Vinyl Cafe. I was drawn mostly by the appearance of this book and then the back cover blurb but it really didn't disappoint.
I'll use the description from the website to explain more fully the attraction:

The Vinyl Cafe stories are about Dave, owner of the second hand record store, and they are collected in books and on CD. The stories also feature Dave's wife, Morley, their two children, Sam and Stephanie, and assorted friends and neighbours.

The motto of Dave's store - and of the radio show - is "We May Not Be Big, But We're Small".

The books contain lots of short vignettes about Dave and his friends and family, they are gentle, heart warming stories which I am not surprised to find started life as radio broadcasts. This is in fact the Canadian version of Garrison Keillor's tales about Lake Wobegone and in my opinion is far superior to the American version.

Books in Canada are not that cheap but I do feel that this was certainly money well spent and I am now hooked on the series, the podcast and the website. Luckily there are a few volumes in circulation in the Norfolk library service but I can see that these books will be featuring highly on my Christmas list this year.

70 Years On

Kisses on a Postcard - Terence Frisby

I've read a lot about this book in various places and I've been waiting for my library reservation to arrive for a couple of weeks. What better way to spend the weekend - curled up savouring a long awaited book.

It didn't quite work out like that. This book was so good I tore through it, there was no savouring to be had!

What drew me to this one was that Terence Frisby acknowledges that nearly 70 years on there is no way that he can remember everything accurately but that this is the memoir as he remembers it.

Terence and his brother were very lucky in that they struck gold with their foster parents, many didn't. This is a happy memoir and even the sad occurrences are threaded with humour.

I think that what I liked most was how the narrative is all linked together with train and railway anecdotes. Not only did it help the reader travel through the book it was a nice way for Terence to remain in touch with his parents back in Kent, as Dad was an essential railway worker.

I did want to savour this book but I couldn't. I do now want my own copy to add to an already large collection of books about the Second World War.

Of Sequels and Prequels

Wishing for Tomorrow - Hilary McKay.

I think that gods of reading are conspiring against me at the moment and it isn't a nice feeling.

I love the idea of sequels and prequels to my favourite books and series, they aren't always strictly in keeping with the originals but I still leap on them as soon as they are published. I am usually disappointed. Very rarely can a book be as good as the original.

When sequels to classic books are written then too much of the modern world creeps in and they books just don't have the right 'feel' to them. Often they descend into pastiche. Yet I still read them all.

I had high high hopes for Wishing for Tomorrow. Hilary McKay's previous books have all been wonderful. So good that I even buy them in hardback on publication because I know I will want to reread them many times. A Little Princess was also my favourite Frances Hodgson Burnett book as a child. What could be a better combination?

Well in all honesty pretty much anything.

Wishing for Tomorrow had none of the wit that McKay usually provides and none of the magic that Hodgson Burnett gives. It had no depth of style, content or character and didn't, for me, evoke any of the original at all. I know that as an adult you are never going to have the same experience reading a children's book as you have when you read it as a child but I recently reread A Little Princess and it still moved me. I fell headlong into the story and really felt I was living at Miss Minchin's Academy with Sarah and co. Wishing for Tomorrow didn't do this, I felt like a bystander watching a mediocre entertainer, I didn't want to keep reading but embarrassment kept me going.

I know that every time I read a prequel or sequel I am a little disappointed but this was in a different league. I think that perhaps the problem is that A Little Princess really didn't need a sequel. It was perfect as it stood.

I don't like being this negative but I was really underwhelmed with this one. I will continue to buy and read prequels and sequels as some of them are excellent, for example the Chalet School continuations published by Girls Gone By Publishing and the excellent Before Green Gables by Budge Wilson, but I don't think I will ever look forward to them with such enthusiasm again.