Archives - February 2007 archives -- index by author -- index by category -- favorite books -- links

Search Now:

I skipped booklogging for February, as I was too busy for most of the month to do more than keep a list of what I read, but I thought I'd post the list anyway, with just a few scattered comments.

• Fiction:
  • Ann Brashares, Forever in Blue
  • Emma Donoghue, Kissing the Witch: a wonderful collection of short stories based on fairy tales -- I loved the elegant writing and strong women and the clever way she connected the stories.
  • Lynn Flewelling, the Nightrunners series (Luck in the Shadows, Stalking Darkness, Traitor's Moon)
  • Margaret Forster, Private Papers: This novel has to do with a woman discovering and reading her mother's accounts of her life and interjecting her own accounts and interpretations of what happened, and Forster does a nice job showing both sides and creating sympathy for both characters.
  • Alan Garner, Red Shift
  • Philippa Gregory, The Constant Princess, The Boleyn Inheritance: I generally liked The Boleyn Inheritance, but the split narrative (among Anne of Cleves, Katherine Howard, and Jane Rochford) didn't really give enough time to any of them. Given that it's next to impossible to make Jane Rochford a sympathetic character, I thought Gregory could just as well have left those bits out and concentrated more on the other two.
  • Guy Gavriel Kay, Ysabel
  • Marghanita Laski, The Victorian Chaise-Longue
  • Amy Levy, Reuben Sachs
  • Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler's Wife: I really liked the beginning: interesting concept (genetic time travel!) and structure, and the love story got me to start out. By the end, though, I disliked Henry so intensely that I really didn't care what happened to him (though I did about Clare); disliking Henry so much really spoiled the romance plot, too; he was so repellently amoral that it was honestly hard to believe anyone could love him that much.
  • Mollie Panter-Downes, One Fine Day
  • Robert B. Parker, High Profile
  • Agnes Sligh Turnbull, Gown of Glory
  • Connie Willis, Passage: too long. I loved the first two-thirds, about investigating near-death experiences -- fascinating subject, great characters, as usual -- but the last third consisted mostly of some of the characters racing around trying to figure out what another character (and thus the reader) had already figured out. The pacing and suspense were very good up until that point, but most of the rest was just not up to the beginning. I'd still probably recommend it, but with reservations.
• Non-fiction:
  • Noel Riley Fitch, Sylvia Beach and the Lost Generation
  • John Saumarez Smith, ed., The Bookshop at 10 Curzon Streets: Letters Between Nancy Mitford and Heywood Hill 1952-73
  • Alison Weir, The Six Wives of Henry VIII
• Rereads:
  • Jennifer Crusie, Charlie All Night
  • Philippa Gregory, The Other Boleyn Girl

Total books read this month: 22
Total books read this year: 52

Last updated 16 July 2007. All text and photographs © George Mitchell and Margaret Johnston, unless otherwise noted Comments, questions, suggestions to margaret@lonelymountain.net.