July books
The Gun, The Ship and The Pen, Linda Colley
Die Laughing Carola Dunn
Miss Granby’s Secret or The Bastard of Pinsk , Eleanor Farjeon
London Bridges, Jane Stevenson
The Marches, border walks with my father , Rory Stewart
From a Far and Lovely Country, Alexander McCall Smith
A Mourning Wedding, Carola Dunn
The Wintry Years, O Douglas
An Assassination on the Agenda, T E Kinsey 11th Lady Hardcastle
Fall of a Philanderer, Carola Dunn.
Quite a lot of Sherlock Holmes
I’m still re-reading and enjoying the Daisy Dalrymple books as my bedtime read. I’ve nearly reached the end of the series and then what? I always like to know what I’m going to read next. I’ve been dipping into Sherlock Holmes between books; not dipping as in choosing, because I’m making my way through the entire series. I’ve been surprised by how boring I’ve found some of it. This only applies to the longer stories in which Holmes solves a mystery and Conan Doyle then gives you the back story, which usually takes place in America or the colonies. The worst is the one which is really a long attack on Mormons; I skimmed. My brain is so fried by this ghastly heatwave that I can’t at the moment remember which story that is. The old favourites still delight, though. One of the things I like about these is how often the events occur in places I know well: Upper Norwood, Lower Norwood, Norbury, Sydenham, the Crystal Palace etc. All south of the river, you notice. How parochial we can be; I’ve never felt comfortable in north London.
London Bridges was recommended by the writer of one of my favourite blogs, Clothes in Books and it’s the best modern mystery I’ve read for a long time. A harmless, scholarly old man is murdered, accidentally, by crooks who only intended to make him ill for their own greedy purposes. In a group of connected people, each one holds a clue, if only they knew it, so the excitement lies in when they will realise this and do something about it. Only when another murder is threatened does it click with them and the ending is far more dramatic than I’d been expecting. Stevenson’s London is wonderful; the modern mixed with the Dickensian past, so that you can turn a corner and be in what feels like a different place. The book has many historical and classical allusions, all relevant but not intrusive. Very clever and I can’t think why I’d not heard of Jane Stevenson before.
I’m always mocking the repetitiousness of the No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency books but it doesn’t stop me reading them. I found From a Far and Lovely Country too short, even though it’s the twenty-fourth book in the series (I’m currently reading number twenty-three). On the Amazon page, someone says these books should be prescribed on the NHS. They might say, to counter the stresses caused by the NHS. Be thankful that I’ve spared you a rant about what my local surgery has put me through during the past month. It’s kept me quiet.
The Wintry Years is not a newly-discovered work by O Douglas (Anna Buchan). Shirley Neilson, publisher of Greyladies Books and editor of the delightful journal The Scribbler (this makes her a public benefactress), has compiled it from manuscripts found after O Douglas’s death in 1948. Part of it had already been printed as Priorsford but this is the first printing of other fragments and therefore not a coherent whole. We meet one new family but mostly find out how familiar characters are coping with the outbreak of the Second World War. For the older characters, it’s the third major war of their lifetime. It’s very short, barely a novella, so really one for aficionados.
An Assassination on the Agenda is the eleventh Lady Hardcastle book. What hooks me into these books is the relationship between Lady Hardcastle, her ‘tiny servant’ Flo and their constant banter, which is very funny. At first, I thought T E Kinsey was relying too much on this aspect and padding the book out with it. I also thought they were far too prescient about what might cause the outbreak of the coming First World War. They even speculate that one day the Thames may be too small for the ships using it and the docks will disappear! (This issue is touched on in London Bridges, by which time it had already happened.) Luckily it turns into a very exciting story.
Book of the month: London Bridges, which I need to read again very soon.