feather_ghyll

I read a couple fewer books than last year (47, I think.) As usual, the vast majority were by women and new to me. Most of the children’s books I read were of a higher standard than last year, probably because I’d bought them online (mainly in 2021-22) with greater intentionality than when I physically went into charity shops or second-hand bookshops.

I only read one book by any of the big four, ( Read more... )

Day four: ( Read more... )

Day five: ( Read more... )

Day six involved ( Read more... ) I caught even less of day seven.

Day eleven: ( Read more... )

Day twelve: ( Read more... )

Day thirteen: ( Read more... )

Day fourteen: ( Read more... )

Day fifteen: ( Read more... )

Day six: ( Read more... )

Day seven: ( Read more... )

I got Discovery+ (grumbling at the greed of the IOC) to be sure I got to see the tennis, basically. But I watched the opening ceremony on the BBC. ( Read more... )

But to the tennis:

Day one: ( Read more... )

Day two: ( Read more... )

Perfect Scoundrels: Ally Carter Orchard Books 2013

First an admission and a note to myself, it was probably too long since I’d read the previous book in the ‘Heist Society’ series, so there were a few references to the preceding two books that I knew I wasn’t appreciating properly. (I checked and it was almost four and a half years ago! Definitely too long!) Still, I enjoyed this book overall, so it’s just up to me to get the next book more swiftly and read it more promptly.

I’ve pretty much said before that this series reminds me of Ocean’s Eleven, if Danny Ocean were a teenage girl. Katarina ‘Kat’ Bishop ( Read more... )

A Time to Dance: Robina Beckles Willson, Collins 1962

It’s not often that a book leaves a song playing in my mind, but this one did. Its title comes from the passage in Ecclesiastes, reminding us that there is a time for everything. So, from when that passage is read at a wedding and becomes a mottod for one of the characters, the Byrds ‘Turn! Turn! Turn! For every season’ has been in my head.

I have a ‘let’s start a school’ tag, in honour of The School at the Chalet as much as anything, well, here’s a subgenre: let’s start a ballet school. ( Read more... )

The Purple Valley: Malcolm Saville Girls Gone By Publishers, 2017.

Having reread ‘Three Towers in Tuscany’, I turned to its sequel, the second in the Secret Service/Marston Baines series. Simon Baines, the main character of the first book, is ( Read more... )

Uncommon Criminals: Ally Carter Orchard Books, 2012

The second in the Heist Society series, and fifteen year old Katarina ‘Kat’ Bishop ( Read more... )

Heist Society: Ally Carter, Orchard Books 2011

Before my increasing disillusionment with Ally Carter's 'Gallagher Girls' series got really bad, I'd bought a copy of 'Heist Society', the first in another series. Having finished the Gallagher Girls books, it was time to turn to this. I hoped, at least, that she'd written it having learned about what it takes to write a series of books. I can now report that, ( Read more... )

(Lightly edited on 20/4/22.)