What I read
Finished Eight Miles High (Cat Caliban #8): downsides the possible lack of former editorial hand noted in previous volume, also the move out of the community Cat's normally operating within; upside is the amount on Women Airforce Service Pilots of WW2, though one feels possibly Borton was stretching a bit to find a mystery to go with ( Read more... )

What I read
Well, mostly it was The Children's Book, and I don't think my opinions have changed much since my previous post. (Though I note on re-reading that it's actually 'essays' by Trotter that are mentioned, rather than book as such.) I still think it works as having echoes and resonances of various known people and tales without being obvious ( Read more... )

What I read
Finished Revolutionary Imaginings in the 1790s, which was very good, given that not my period and somewhat outwith my usual academic disciplinary interests. The pdf format a bit irksome ( Read more... )

What I read
JD Robb, Brotherhood in Death (2016) - which is no 42 in the series, phew.
And then following this recommendation in a post from
( Read more... )

(No, not really, the weather is just too uncertain at the moment for me to be a beach-bunny.)
On Immunity: An Inoculation by Eula Biss review - an enthralling, deeply personal book: medical historian picks nits - either the author or the reviewer does not understand why vaccination was different from preceding forms of smallpox inoculation, which ( Read more... )

(Early July, I think.)

( Litfic )

Chambers, Helen (1879-1935), pathologist and cancer research worker: a few selections:
Four years later [1908] she gained her MD (London) for her thesis, ‘Observations on pathology of the thyroid gland’. About the same time she won a newly founded scholarship in cancer research at the Middlesex Hospital* where she worked with Sidney Russ, the ( Read more... )

Next Thursday is, apparently, World Book Day (only one day? for some of us it's every day): Lucy Mangan thinks about this. May I say (and I am sure, dear readers, that many of you will concur) that black t-shirts saying 'Fuck Off, I'm Reading', would be a totally brilliant idea - though alas, probably would not deter that class of person who is so ( Read more... )

I suppose that 'not a happy bunny' is a phrase that is going to recur in reviews of Alison Uttley's diaries. We have already recently been alerted that she was not a sweet cuddlesome old lady, and she does sound fairly toxic, but probably not particularly above the average for noted children's authors. (And being me and interested in women in ( Read more... )

Five words from
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