feather_ghyll | Entries tagged with historical setting: between world wars

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/147099.html

I've mainly been reading:

To Davy Jones Below: Carola Dunn

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Under a Cornish Sky: Liz Fenwick

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Clover Cottage: Frances Cowan.

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The League of the Links: E. M. de Foubert

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And I got a bundle of Angela Brazil books for a reasonable price per book.

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/140281.html

Magic Flutes: Eva Ibbotson Picador 2009

I didn’t get as emotional this time as I did when first reading this, but there was certainly a moment where Tessa is so giving that made me catch my breath.

When looking up the chronology of Ibbotson’s books to see what came after ‘A Countess Below Stairs’, I discovered it was ‘Magic Flutes’, which I think was one of the last of Ibbotson’s books for adults - although it’s to be found on teenage fiction/young adult shelves now - that I came across, and that this book has won the Romantic Novel of the Year award in the early eighties. Now, I can’t claim to have read all the books in contention, but I can see why.

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Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/135000.html

Swallows and Amazons (2016) (PG)
Directed by: Philippa Lowthorpe
Adapted by: Andrea Gibb
From the book by: Arthur Ransome
Starring: (Grown-ups): Rafe Spall, Kelly Macdonald, Andrew Scott
(Swallows): Dane Hughes, Orla Hill, Teddie-Rose Malleson-Allen, Bobbie McCulloch,
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1227183/?ref_=nv_sr_1

This feels a little like a natives’ take on the adventures of the Swallows and Amazons. ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/133711.html

I have been watching the Olympics, but to a much lesser degree than was the case in 2012, because of the time difference. It took me a little while to realise that I could catch some of the sports – there had been so much emphasis on how the premium athletics would be on in the wee small hours.

But after a couple of days, ( Read more... )

Styx and Stones: Carola Dunn

This is an ultimately breezy mystery for Daisy to solve (with help) and was most interesting for me because of ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/133274.html

Last week, I went away for a few days and these are some of the books that I read then:

The School on the Moor: Angela Brazil

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Reread: A Countess Below Stairs: Eva Ibbotson

(I think I will reread all my Ibbotsons as a project.)

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Penelope’s Prefects: Judith Carr

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Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/132955.html

First Class Murder: Robin Stevens (A Murder Most Unladylike Mystery) Corgi 2015

I say, old things, I jolly well ought to put Mrs Christie’s ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ on my ‘to reread’ pile!

This is the third adventure of the Detective Society, comprised of that paragon Daisy Wells and her erstwhile Watson Hazel Wong, and this time, they are ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/122275.html

Arsenic for Tea: Robin Stevens, Corgi, 2015

The second Wells and Wong mystery and sequel to Murder Most Unladylike is set at Fallingford, Daisy’s home – I suppose another murder at Deepdean school really would have led to its closure – where Hazel is holidaying and observing upper-class English life at close quarters. For Daisy’s fourteenth birthday, there is going to be a party, but, as we know from the outset of the book, it is going to be marred by murder.

Stevens is therefore tackling the country house murder mystery through the eyes of clever 1930s schoolgirls, with references to Daisy’s beloved detective stories.

”I,” said Daisy, ‘can do anything. And even though she doesn’t like to mention it, so can Hazel.”’ (p 324).

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Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/121391.html

Beswitched: Kate Saunders (Marion Lloyd Books – Scholastic) 2013 edition

This is the story of Flora Fox, who, when we first meet her, is ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/112413.html

Wings: Aprilynne Pike

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Damsel in Distress: Carola Dunn (one of the Daisy Dalrymple Mysteries)

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The Cornish House: Liz Fenwick

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Skate School – On Thin Ice: Kay Woodward

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I think Damsel in Distress was my favourite out of that quartette, actually.

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/108373.html

Murder Most Unladylike: Robin Stevens Corgi 2014

Before Daisy Wells and narrator Hazel Wong have had a change to get bored of their secret Detective Society at Deepdean School, ( Read more... )

Thanks to callmemadam for drawing my attention to this book!

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/96144.html

Happy New Year!

I am home after the Christmas holidays. Determined to travel yesterday, I had to change my travelling plans, but all ended up well.

You know how you notice something and then other examples of it keep cropping up, like buying clothes in a striking colour and then seeing people wear it all the time, well, these holidays, with me, it was books that don’t just have chapter titles, but each page has a relevant heading. I’ve probably got other books that do that, but I hadn’t really noticed them.

In Margery Merton’s Girlhood by Alice Cockran, they include ‘SECRETS AND TENDER THOUGHTS.’ (p25), ‘CRYING AND LAUGHING.’ (p112), and ‘A COLD FAREWELL.’ (p.213). In Miriam’s Ambition by Evelyn Everett-Green, they include ‘A TERRIBLE STORM.' (p26), ‘AT DINNER.’ (p113), and ‘A REWARD FOR BRAVERY.’ (p214)

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I also read the third in Carola Dunn's Daisy Dalrymple mysteries. Only six months had elapsed since I read the previous book. Requiem for a Mezzo. ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/88404.html

The Winter Garden Mystery: Carola Dunn Robinson 2009

It’s been a while, almost a year and a half, since I read the first Daisy Dalrymple book – click on the author’s tag for the review – and taken longer than I’d have liked to read this one.

The Hon. Daisy Dalrymple is off again, ( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://feather-ghyll.livejournal.com/66405.html

Continuing the skating theme, in a way...

Death at Wentwater Court: Carola Dunn. Robinson 2009.

I'd been curious about the Daisy Dalrymple series and decided to read the first book for myself and make up my mind about it. ( Read more... )

Conclusion: Although I'll be quite happy to read more of Daisy's mysteries, I'll be waiting to buy them second hand as they come my way.