OVERVIEW: 2021 highlights
It's about time I posted this, as I’m now in the process of taking down the Christmas decorations.
I didn’t post much until the tennis season, which for me was the French Open and Wimbledon. I missed out on seeing Emma Raducanu’s stunning US Open win, following it on the radio instead.
One of the reasons was that I didn’t read very much this year (about the same amount as last year). Many of those were Girls Own books, my favourite of which was Jane Runs Away from School by Joanna Lloyd, set in the Bramber Manor/Catharine (Kate) Maitland series. The worst was ‘The Clue In The Castle’, which I didn’t post about, but believe me, had the maddest plot.
Of the Big Four, I read Bosom Friends by Angela Brazil, which is subtitled ‘A Seaside Story’ and transported me to childhood summer holidays in the spring. I also reread Selma and the Abbey because I’d unintentionally bought a second copy. I didn’t post about it, but I also read ‘Jane Fills the Breach’ by Bessie Marchant, which has a spirit of ‘Girls can do anything’ and its own propulsive energy, despite ridiculous plots (I can’t believe that law enforcement in Argentina was ever as Marchant describes it), and it featured a slightly less sympathetic heroine than it could have.
The same is not true of the best book I read in 2021, The Skylarks’ War by Hilary McKay. The writing in this historical book about the pre-war era and the first world war, as experienced by young people in Plymouth, Devon was striking. I was especially taken by the loving heroine Clarry Penros, the dark horse who embodied the book’s feminist question of ‘Why not?’ to the beliefs of the day that girls couldn’t do certain things.
Daisy Dalrymple returned to a country house to help solve a mystery despite husband Alec’s misgivings in A Mourning Wedding. It wasn’t all historical fiction, I very much enjoyed the more chicklitty The Finishing Touches by Hester Browne.
Last year, I wrote ‘it may be a while yet before I get to experience the serendipities and frustrations of visiting charity shops and second hand book shops’ That was true enough, I visited one charity shop once during 2021, (I’ve been very cautious) and came out without buying anything. Instead, I’ve bought some books that I always wanted to get online, but they’ve just joined the ‘to be read’ pile so far. I didn’t go to the theatre or the cinema either. I didn’t post about any of the films that I watched on TV, but they included the powerful documentary of the making of Aretha Franklin’s live gospel album ‘Amazing Grace’, ‘Educating Rita’, which didn’t quite get away from its theatrical roots, and the Keira Knightley ‘Prde & Prejudice’. As I’ve already posted about, I enjoyed watching ‘The Great British Sewing Bee’ and, of course, 2021 was the year of the delayed 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics. Corrected a geographical error 8/1/22. This entry was originally posted at https://feather-ghyll.dreamwidth.org/191690.html. Please comment wherever you prefer to.
I didn’t post much until the tennis season, which for me was the French Open and Wimbledon. I missed out on seeing Emma Raducanu’s stunning US Open win, following it on the radio instead.
One of the reasons was that I didn’t read very much this year (about the same amount as last year). Many of those were Girls Own books, my favourite of which was Jane Runs Away from School by Joanna Lloyd, set in the Bramber Manor/Catharine (Kate) Maitland series. The worst was ‘The Clue In The Castle’, which I didn’t post about, but believe me, had the maddest plot.
Of the Big Four, I read Bosom Friends by Angela Brazil, which is subtitled ‘A Seaside Story’ and transported me to childhood summer holidays in the spring. I also reread Selma and the Abbey because I’d unintentionally bought a second copy. I didn’t post about it, but I also read ‘Jane Fills the Breach’ by Bessie Marchant, which has a spirit of ‘Girls can do anything’ and its own propulsive energy, despite ridiculous plots (I can’t believe that law enforcement in Argentina was ever as Marchant describes it), and it featured a slightly less sympathetic heroine than it could have.
The same is not true of the best book I read in 2021, The Skylarks’ War by Hilary McKay. The writing in this historical book about the pre-war era and the first world war, as experienced by young people in Plymouth, Devon was striking. I was especially taken by the loving heroine Clarry Penros, the dark horse who embodied the book’s feminist question of ‘Why not?’ to the beliefs of the day that girls couldn’t do certain things.
Daisy Dalrymple returned to a country house to help solve a mystery despite husband Alec’s misgivings in A Mourning Wedding. It wasn’t all historical fiction, I very much enjoyed the more chicklitty The Finishing Touches by Hester Browne.
Last year, I wrote ‘it may be a while yet before I get to experience the serendipities and frustrations of visiting charity shops and second hand book shops’ That was true enough, I visited one charity shop once during 2021, (I’ve been very cautious) and came out without buying anything. Instead, I’ve bought some books that I always wanted to get online, but they’ve just joined the ‘to be read’ pile so far. I didn’t go to the theatre or the cinema either. I didn’t post about any of the films that I watched on TV, but they included the powerful documentary of the making of Aretha Franklin’s live gospel album ‘Amazing Grace’, ‘Educating Rita’, which didn’t quite get away from its theatrical roots, and the Keira Knightley ‘Prde & Prejudice’. As I’ve already posted about, I enjoyed watching ‘The Great British Sewing Bee’ and, of course, 2021 was the year of the delayed 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics. Corrected a geographical error 8/1/22. This entry was originally posted at https://feather-ghyll.dreamwidth.org/191690.html. Please comment wherever you prefer to.