Tag Archives: August

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Snapshots: August 2018

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Featuring European Championship festivities, a trip to Pollok House and Country Park, and quite a lot of books.

Music: ‘Pu Ert Solin’ by Olafur Arnalds | ‘The Mansion’ by Manchester Orchestra

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Document Your Life: August 2017

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Featuring some books, some beautiful sunsets, and gig footage from Conor Oberst, whom I *finally* got to see live this month.  Keep your eyes peeled for another August Document Your Life video, from my holiday in France and Belgium.

Music: ‘Devil in the Details’ by Bright Eyes

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Book Haul: August 2017

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I had planned not to buy any books in August; needless to say, that did not quite go to plan, despite my being on holiday for a fortnight!  I purchased two books on my Kindle, received two for review for the first time in what feels like an absolute age, and also bought one for a forthcoming book club read.  That was before I found a wonderful seller on AbeBooks, who had priced almost everything at 78 pence with free delivery; needless to say that I stocked up my shelves!

9780812994865My Kindle books come first, as they were the first which I purchased.  I chose the Collected Works of Willa Cather as there are a couple of her full-length books which I haven’t read to date.  I also bought one of the daily deals, Naoki Higashida‘s autism memoir, The Reason I Jump.  I have read this already, and whilst I found it fascinating in places, it was a little underwhelming in its simplicity and repetitiveness.  The two books which I received for review – Keeping Henry by Nina Bawden, which has just been reissued by Virago, and Stella Duffy‘s chilling The Hidden Room – were both great, and I would highly recommend them.  Full-length reviews for both novels are forthcoming on the blog, so do stay tuned!  My book club has altered of late, and is now running around the idea of geographic locations.  Thus, my choice was a free one, provided it was set in Bosnia.  I chose The Delivery Room by 9781472108685Sylvia Brownrigg, which looks fascinating.  I also ended up ordering a secondhand copy of Catherynne M. Valente‘s Deathless, as I have been seeing so many positive reviews of it of late.

Now, on to my huge AbeBooks haul!  I have very little self-restraint when paperbacks are so heavily discounted, and true to form, I selected over twenty of them.  A few of them are applicable as book club tomes, and others will work for the Around the World in Eighty Books Project, which I am starting in January.  Rather than group these rather diverse books together, I am simply going to type them up in a long list below.

  • The Testament of Gideon Mack by James Robertson
  • Diary of an Ordinary Woman by Margaret Forster
  • The Human Stain by Philip Roth
  • Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azer Nafisi
  • The News Where You Are by Catherine O’Flynn
  • Oleander Jacaranda by Penelope Lively
  • Innocence by Penelope Fitzgerald
  • The Boy Who Loved Anne Frank by Ellen Feldman
  • Christmas Stories, edited by Diana Secker Tesdell
  • Dogrun by Arthur Nersesian
  • True Things About Me by Deborah Kay Davies
  • Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin
  • Thomas Hardy: The Time-Torn Man by Claire Tomalin
  • The Rehearsal by Eleanor Catton
  • Cat Stories, edited by Diana Secker Tesdell
  • Treveryan by Angela du Maurier
  • The Girls’ Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank
  • War Crimes for the Home by Liz Jensen
  • The Paper Eater by Liz Jensen
  • My Dirty Little Book of Stolen Time by Liz Jensen
  • Charms for an Easy Life by Kaye Gibbons

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In September, I am going on holiday to Florida and the Caribbean for two wonderful weeks.  Whilst I am not planning to buy books, I am going to allow myself a tome or two if they are difficult to get hold of in the UK. This is a reader’s prerogative, surely?

Which of these books have you read?  Which have piqued your interest?  Which books did you buy during August?