Hot Reads
I was going to post today about Mary Portas and her doomed attempt to turn around a failing charity shop but thelondonpauper has said it all brilliantly already. So, having misled you twice...
What do you read in a heat wave? (No sign of it ending today here in Dorset.)
There’s something about the rare summer weather we get that makes people indulge in a Country Living English dream: a garden full of blowsy roses, meals outside (don’t say patio), Pimms, strawberries, just-picked salad leaves, cucumber sandwiches; a sort of Emma Bridgewater/Cath Kidston-fest of chunky china on flowery cloths. Katie Fforde fits the bill here. I’m currently reading Practically Perfect but it’s nothing like as good as Wild Designs, which has an older heroine, a lovely house, gardening and even the Chelsea Flower Show. Raffaella Barker’s story of upper middle class life in rural Norfolk, Summertime, could be photographed to fill an issue of Period Living. For the real thing rather than aspiration, Angela Thirkell is a good choice: try Wild Strawberries, Summer Half or Before Lunch. And you can never go wrong with a P G Wodehouse like Stormy Heavy Weather.
What do you read in a heat wave? (No sign of it ending today here in Dorset.)
There’s something about the rare summer weather we get that makes people indulge in a Country Living English dream: a garden full of blowsy roses, meals outside (don’t say patio), Pimms, strawberries, just-picked salad leaves, cucumber sandwiches; a sort of Emma Bridgewater/Cath Kidston-fest of chunky china on flowery cloths. Katie Fforde fits the bill here. I’m currently reading Practically Perfect but it’s nothing like as good as Wild Designs, which has an older heroine, a lovely house, gardening and even the Chelsea Flower Show. Raffaella Barker’s story of upper middle class life in rural Norfolk, Summertime, could be photographed to fill an issue of Period Living. For the real thing rather than aspiration, Angela Thirkell is a good choice: try Wild Strawberries, Summer Half or Before Lunch. And you can never go wrong with a P G Wodehouse like Stormy Heavy Weather.