Juxtabook

A New Bookselling Website and a Reading Round-Up

Well, it has been rather a while... and I have really missed blogging. The business has been keeping me busy and one of the reasons for this you can see here - ta daa!!... the new Clhawley.com. This is my new bookselling site thanks to Daniel at Eviam. Most indie booksellers in the world of used and out-of-print books have online shops powered by an American company that used to be independent but is now owned by A... well you can guess who. I have one of those sites too, but I have been looking for something brighter and speedier and easier to use for sometime. My new site is by an independent British developer which, as I am sure you'll agree, is rather more in keeping with being an indie bookseller in the first place! It seems to be running very nicely so far, but if you notice any niggles please let me know.

Whilst working I have of course been reading so by way of a catch-up here are a few thoughts on some of my recent favourites:

The Etymologicon by Mark Forsyth is subtitled 'A Circular Stroll Through the Hidden Connections of the English Language' and that is exactly what it is.  We potter along with Forsyth teasing out the meanings, origins and associations old and new for each word before progressing to another word, like a word-association game with a PhD. Part linguistic treasure chest and part history book it is a delight from start to finish, not that you ever do really finish. I keep picking it up and going round again. I know quite a bit about words, in part because of my academic background, in part because my father collects them like other people collect stamps (actually he collects stamps too), but there was plenty new to me here. Having waded through Paradise Lost as an under-grad I closed my eyes and my mind, I think, to the linguistic richness, and the section on new words by Milton was the one that amazed me the most. How did I miss all that!

I am delighted to see from Icon's catalogue that plopped through my door last week that Mark is doing it all again in the The Horologicon: A Day's Jaunt Through the Lost Words of the English Language . As many of you no doubt know you can follow Mark via his blog and on twitter.

I have been reading some really good crime fiction recently. Favourites include the Inspector Banks series by Peter Robinson. Some of the titles have been filmed recently for the ITV series with Stephen Tomkinson , which I enjoyed, but I wish I had found the books first as they are so much better. They are set round here (Yorkshire Dales) and I am very much enjoying the local flavour.

My favourite crime fiction read so far this year though is The Stepmother by Simon Tolkien. Strangely out-of-print I thought this was an utterly engrossing book on both plot and character levels. An MP's second wife is accused of conspiring to murder his first wife setting her husband and his son against each other at the trial. Part conventional detective story, and part coming of age novel, I think The Stepmother captures the difficult relationships perfectly. Tolkien is a lawyer and much of the novel is courtroom based giving it a 'Witness for the Prosecution' layer, but it is so much more than that. I will be hunting down Simon Tolkien's other books. And, yes, he is of that family.

Edited to add: Simon Tolkien is the grandson of J. R. R. Tolkien, and the eldest son of Christopher Tolkien. I've discovered that the reason that The Stepmother appears to be out of print is that it has been renamed Final Witness and it is very much still available in that edition. There are two subsequent books too and you can read more on the author's own website here.

Last up for this little round-up is Promised Land: A Northern Love Story by Anthony Clavane. This is a wonderful book that I can see myself reading and re-reading. It is about football, but that is not the half of it and you should not let the football put you off. Promised Land is a tripart history telling, in lovely old-fashioned narrative style, the story of the arrival and rise and then dispersal of the Jewish community in Leeds; the arrival and rise of Leeds as a large commercial centre and newly minted city and its subsequent fall into depression with the other industrial towns of the north of England, and then its further yo yo economic fortunes; and the arrival and rise (and fall), (and rise), (and fall...) of Leeds United FC.

The author is a former history teacher turned sports reporter so he is well qualified on all counts. He is also a Leeds fan, which if you support any other club can prove to be irritating when he lauds the club known to the rest of us as 'Dirty Leeds'. In that sense the non-football-fan will enjoy the read more! It is however a pretty balanced account, often funny as it details the peculiarities of the managers (Don Revie getting a gypsy in to pee on the corner flags to lift a curse??), and quips that the Jewish support was so large that the Rabbi had them in the morning and Revie in the afternoon, and that's before we start on Brian Clough.

Overall it is a wonderful piece of history covering families, industry, and the wider socio-economic ups and downs of Britain. Much of what happens in football - racism, financial mismanagement, social cohesion, urban planning, stadium architecture - parallels important parts of British life as a whole. I found the chapters on the late Victorian and early twentieth century especially engaging, and if you find the social history of novels of that era fascinating then there is much here for you. Important and interesting, this is definitely not a book to ignore because you don't like football.

The Composites

I've just come across this site The Composites via SimonNRicketts on twitter and I thought you might like it. It is images created using law enforcement composite sketch software and descriptions of literary characters. Which is to say the author's physical description of the character is fed into the software and the resulting image published. I rather liked Tess from Tess of the d'Urbervilles but Edward Rochester (scroll right to the bottom) looks like the missing link. Pinkie Brown and Keith Talent are good ones. You can suggest characters for inclusion too.

Newly in for the TBR pile

My biggest influx of books for my own use (as opposed to stock) is always in December and January. Despite living in a bookshop my favourite presents are still books and with a birthday and Christmas in those months the TBR pile is always teetering at this time of year. I thought I'd share a few of the titles with you.

Firstly, in honour perhaps of Euro 2012, Mr J had a football theme to his present. I do love football (this is not one of those examples of weird male present buying) and these come highly recommended:

J. L. Carr is a favourite with many bloggers I know and I've wanted a copy of How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers Won the F.A.Cup for ages. This is the lovely Quince Tree Press editon. Quince Tree was Carr's own publishing firm and is these days run by his son.

Dirty Leeds is Robert Endeacott's fictional account of the life of a long suffering Leeds United fan and the history of the club through the Don Revie era. This is the first of a trilogy and I am looking forward to it. I know Leeds, the city, well and very much enjoyed David Peace's The Damned Utd . I am NOT a Leeds United fan though and it will be interesting to see if this book can hold the attention of someone whose footballing heart lies at the far west of the M62.

Promised Land: A Northern Love Story by Anthony Clavane is also about Leeds United and strictly speaking it is no longer on the TBR pile, except that it was so good I want to read it again! Fascinating throughout you don't have to like football, and you certainly don't have to like LUFC, to think this is a cracking read. A review will follow soon.

Mr J received one football book of his own The Anatomy of England: A History in Ten Matches by Jonathan Wilson and I might be having a read of that once he's finished. There'll be plenty of reading time once England are knocked out of the Euros early... I have had a sneaky peak and I loved Wilson's description of trying to finish a finals paper on Old English at super speed so he could make it to watch a match. Rushing your Anglo-Saxon translations, now that's dedication!

Away from football much pleasure is anticpiated from these:

Spurious by Lars Iyer was a present from an old friend Anna from 6th form days. Lars Iyer is a philosopher and this is his first novel though he has another, Dogma out later this year too. Anna reminded me that I met the author over 20 years ago when she brought him to my parents' house for a meal. She and I cooked the meal, my first ever entertaining, and I still have a photograph somewhere of our 18 year olds selves and me with long black hair as opposed to the mid-length stripy badger coloured version I sport these days. A lovely present to get, though a bit nerve-racking in the 'I hope I like it' sense.

The next two I dropped hints for (Mr J is very good with book hints). Steampunk? Well why not? There's a time for everything and this year seemed as good as any for steampunk.This anthology inventively titled Steampunk is edited by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer.

The Richard Russo, Straight Man, is one I read a glowing review of on someone's blog and now I can't remember where. The majority of my bookbuying is stimulated by Cornflower, Gaskella and ShelfLove but I can't find the Russo reviewed on those sites, so I am afraid I don't know who to credit for this. I remember leaving a comment on whichever blog it was so if you know it was your review please let me know so I can link to it.

Next up are a couple of review copies. I don't get many review copies: 90% of the books that I review I buy new, have in stock secondhand, or borrow from the library. These two I am pleased to get however.

Of the two I am most drawn to The Little Shadows by Marina Endicott. Described as "Little Women meets Water for Elephants" it is the story of three sisters making their way in the world of vaudeville before and during the First World War. It makes me think of the film Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? though that's not very Little Women.

Another comparision strapline is being bandied about for Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway, in this case "Dickens meets Mervyn Peake", and again how appealing is that? A sneaky pre-read suggests it is going to be just as frenetic, exciting and inventive as other reviews suggest.

And lastly this is a book I bought myself as a birthday treat.

The Modern Library: The 200 Best Novels in English Since 1950 compiled by Carmen Callil and Colm Toibin was reviewed by Dovegreyreader last week. She made it sound very tempting so I let myself be tempted. Despite two degrees and twenty years working with books and readers there are still many, many books in here that I've not read, or thought of reading, or read so long ago I've forgotten. The page per book format feels very luxurious and I enjoyed all the reference sections at the back - gosh it used to feel like this before blogs and wikipedia, browsing a reference book by the fire with a cuppa... I shall be returning to this frequently and it is NOT going to help my ever growing TBR pile one  bit. To be honest though, that's how I like it!

Juxtabook talking Charles Dickens and favourite books on Radio Leeds

I was taken aback by a phone call at 8.20 this morning asking me to go on Radio Leeds to talk about Dickens and my favourite books. With the school run to do before my allotted timeslot I didn't have time to worry about it too much. I had just scampered back through the door when the producer rang and we were off.

So here, in an internet first, the dulcet tones of Juxtabook are available to listen to for the next 7 days on the show dated 07/02/2012 here- I am on after about 24 minutes. I was more nervous listening to it afterwards than during the chat but apart from thinking that I say "lovely" too often it is not too bad for my first ever live interview. I fluffed my opportunity to publicise my website by stumbling over the words at that point so in case you missed it, my site is here!

Teeny tiny Red House giveaway

This post must be a contender for the tiniest ever giveaway. Going through my Mary Taylor things I discovered I have duplicates of a couple of postcards of The Red House and leaflets about Taylor and the Brontes. Bearing in mind the tiny number of visitors the house gets I am guessing most of you have never been and if The Red House does close then you'll never get the chance so it seemed right to offer these few things:

The stained glass postcard is the an image of the glass described in Shirley (the house features as 'Briarmains' in Shirley).

If you'd like them the just leave your name in the comments before the end of Wednesday. If there is more than one of you I'll draw names out of a hat.

Save The Red House Gomersall: Museum of writer, and friend of Charlotte Bronte, Mary Taylor's home

I've blogged before about the less well known Bronte pilgrimage destination The Red House, Gomersall. Though less famous than the Haworth Parsonage it is a beautiful house with a wonderful museum. As well as the Bronte connection Mary Taylor (whose home it was) is an interesting writer and early feminist in her own right.

 

Kirkless Council currently own and run The Red House and, like most councils, they need to make savings but it will be a terrible loss to the literary heritage of Yorkshire if this museum is allowed to close.

You can view The Red House's own site here and an article in The Guardian here and there is a petition to save it here.

Juxtabook's Books of 2011

This is just a quick post before it becomes too late to write it! I have three stand-out books of the year amongst the newly published and four favourites amongst the long tail, and here they are:

Like Bees to Honey by Caroline Smailes is my book of the year. It is unspeakably lovely and you can read my review here.

Edward Hogan and Jude Morgan were my favourite discoveries this year. The Hunger Trace by Edward Hogan was a great pleasure and was probably my second favourite book of those published this year. His Blackmoor however is going to go into my Top Ten Books of the Last Ten Years when I get a moment to update the list. I read Morgan's The Taste of Sorrow and Passion and Passion is one of my favourites from the already-published pile.

The last of the 2011 publications that blew my socks off was one of the last I reviewed: The Ascent of Isaac Steward by Mike French. Original. Amazing. Do give it a go.

Of the long tail I also loved The Crowded Street by Winifred Holtby and published by the lovely Persephone, but my very favourite of the older pre-2011 publications was The Youngest Miss Ward: A Jane Austen Entertainment by Joan Aiken. It is not really a sequel to Mansfield Park but a very creative spin off, inventive and with some wonderful characters.

So to summarise:

Juxtabook's Best 2011 Books:

Like Bees to Honey by Caroline Smailes

The Ascent of Isaac Steward by Mike French

The Hunger Trace by Edward Hogan

Mike French, Caroline Smailes, and Edward Hogan are all on twitter if you are on there. Click their names for the links.

Juxtabook's Best Books Read in 2011 and published earlier:

Blackmoor by Edward Hogan

Passion by Jude Morgan

The Crowded Street by Winifred Holtby

The Youngest Miss Ward: A Jane Austen Entertainment by Joan Aiken

It has been surprisingly hard to pick these books. Taking the long view, as I very much do selling used books, it seems to me that the literary novel is in fine strength, remaining as innovative and entertaining as it ever has been. Whether that can be said to be reflected in the major literary prizes is another matter!

Thank you all for sticking with me during this weak blogging year, and I wish you all, customers, fellow bloggers and fellow booksellers, twitter friends and those quiet readers who never comment, a very Happy and Book-filled New Year!

Crewe Train by Rose Macaulay #fridayreads

Denham, lounging along Charing Cross Road, jingled the coins in her pocket and decided to go again to the Zoo. She was luckier, she felt, than Audrey, wasting a fine afternoon among those awful books. What a trade it was, increasing the number of books in a world already overstocked with them! As bad as parents, who increased the number of people. There must be millions of books already that people hadn't read. If they must read, let them read those.

From Crewe Train by Rose Macaulay, which is a cracking read.

Shakespeare First Folios: on display in Washington DC, Stratford-upon-Avon, London and ... Skipton

Strange but true: our little market town has one of only four publicly displayed Shakespeare first folios. Though they've had it for many years they have only recentl got the funds to deal with the delicate task of displaying it. Our local museum, Craven Museum, has put up some film about it after Sir Patrick Stewart visited Skipton's Shakespeare First Folio last week and I thought you'd like to see:

New for the TBR pile

Congratulations to Gaskella on her blogaversary and thank you very much Annabel for the copy of The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt which was part of her anniversary giveaway.

 

 

 

Next in is a review copy of The Red House by Christopher Bowden. I very much enjoyed his previous books The Blue Book and especially The Yellow Room and so I am  very much looking forward to this.

How to make time for reading Leslie Caron style

RobAroundBooks has a post on his five reading rules which help get the most out of the teetering TBR pile that most of us have. One of his rules is to make the most of every opportunity to read. This reminded me of one of my favourite film moments: Leslie Caron reading whilst doing ballet in An American In Paris . This is not something, sadly, that I am able to replicate though I did gamely have a go at the splits  (without the book) after last watching the film. Needless to say that, pushing 40 and over 20 years after I last tried I couldn't do them, and actually I was just relieved to have received no permanent injury from the attempt!

Anyway, here's the lovely Leslie Caron. For the impatient, the reading bit starts about 1m30s into the clip. I love the way she idles against the pillar with one foot above her head...

BTW, I couldn't find an embedable clip with the proper soundtrack unfortunately.

Books wanted

Getting back into reading reviews on blogs has started the wish list growing again. I thought I'd share a few with you:

 Straight Man by Richard Russo reviewed as part of a rather nice meme by Yvette.

The Heat Of The Day by Elizabeth Bowen reviewed by Harriet.

There's lovely reminder of Richmal Crompton's William series over on Stuck-in-a-Book. I usually have a copy or two in stock but not at the moment so any re-reading will require a purchase. If, like me, you are looking to buy a Just William book can I recommend the equally lovely Stella and Rose's Books or Peakirk Books.

Have you any blogging reviews you'd recommend?

 

Hopefully normal blogging service is about to be resummed

It's been so long since I blogged that I had almost forgotten my login details. The school holidays plus being away plus the annual stock take have taken their toll on my time and I haven't even been reading blogs never mind writing my own posts. I daren't turn my blog reader on; it will be swamped. Daughter is back at school on Monday however, the stock take is finished, and so I hope I will be much more sociable from now on. I will try to catch up with all my blogging friends' posts over the next week, and I apologise for my lack of responses in the comments below.

It hasn't been all work. I have been reading this. I have also been watching this in preparation for going here next month.

Juxtabook's versions of Famous for the Wrong Book

There's a very nice piece on The Guardian by John Self called Famous for the wrong book. It points out that many authors are famous for a book that is not necessarily their best. A key example being, "why has a title like Louis de Bernières' Captain Corelli's Mandolin risen to the top, overshadowing his much better earlier novels such as Senor Vivo & The Coca Lord ?" Something with which I would agree entirely.

I am tempted to get controversial right away by suggesting that Joyce's short story collection Dubliners is far better than anything else for which he is better known, but that might be my anti-modernist prejudices so let's not go there. Mrs Gaskell however is so very much more than Cranford - Wives and Daughters is my favourite though as she did not finish that maybe it does not count. North and South is superb too.

At the other end of the literary scale, fond though I am of Stephenie Meyer's sparkly vampires, The Host is a better book than any of the Twilight series. It is psychologically fascinating and deals with the problems caused by a society being too perfect, not Stepford Wives exactly, but lacking the anger and selfishness that makes the human world interesting. Where would fiction be without conflict? The Host would make a great holiday read.

The premise works with poetry too. Whilst Sylvia Plath's "Daddy" is great for a dramatic reading to a class of 15 year olds it is by no means her best work. I much prefer "Morning Song" (the one that begins "Love set you going like a fat gold watch".) Similarly Larkin's much quoted This Be the Verse is far from his best, though as I have a reputation to maintain as Larkin's most ardent disliker I daren't offer an opinion on what is his best. If anyone would like to recommend something really, really, really good by Larkin you could ruin my 20+ years loath-affair with his work, a loathing which has given me enormous pleasure. Disliking Joyce's best known works, by comparison, is quite boring!

It occurs to me that, as many of us are put off an author after reading the best known work, perhaps we could share some lesser known highlights from well known authors. For me Anita Brookner fell dismally with Hotel du Lac. Is this really her best or can you recommend something else? Similarly I've twice read The Ghost Road by Pat Barker trying to get the point. Is there a better Barker than her Regeneration triliogy? Any thoughts there? And which writers do you think suffer for being famous for the wrong book?

An Awfully Big Blog Adventure Online Literary Festival

This weekend sees the third birthday of An Awfully Big Blog Adventure and to celebrate they're having a literary festival with a difference.

"July 9th and 10th will see us celebrating the third birthday of An Awfully Big Blog Adventure in a big way! We will be hosting the very first online literary festival organised entirely by children's authors."

They do have a good line-up and I am particularly looking forward to Lucy Coats and Adele Geras
 on the Saturday and Kath Langrish on the Sunday. You can see for yourself here. You can also follow comments on twitter using the #ABBAlitfest hashtag.

Round and About

Juxtabook is moonlighting over at the Faber blog on The Good of the Novel  (a collection of essays). There's debate from Elizabeth Baines and Paperback Reader too.

Book lovers may well be dismayed by the apparent purchase of The Book Depository by Amazon. Jane Badger has written two excellent blog posts on the subject which you can read here and here. The Bookseller reports that the OFT are inviting submissions about any competition or public interest issues and if you're concerned about the shrinking of competition you might like to comment.

lastly for lovers of children's books Peakirk Books have a 25% off code for you to use at the checkout on their own site. A good way to support an indie bookseller and have some summer reading for yourself, your children or your grandchildren. They also specialise in books on the poet John Clare.

New Books: TBR pile

I have taken in well over 1,500 books this last two weeks, the most I have ever acquired in one go. The majority are mainly for stock of course, though that's a moot point when you have to hurdle them to get to the front door. I have also lots of new books from publishers, from visits to two libraries, and from spending the last of my birthday funds on yet more; these volumes I have to hurdle to get into bed. I have photographed them on the sitting room mantelpiece as that is the about the only place left in the house not full of other books, and you will see that today's themes are trilogies and good things that Cornflower has recommended.

 

As you can see it is an eclectic mix. Simon and Schuster, through the Real Readers scheme, have kindly sent out a paperback copy of Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith together with a gorgeous limited edition hardback proof of Agent 6 signed by Tom Rob Smith. These two are the first and third in the trilogy. Next on the left hand pile we have The Far Pavilions by M. M. Kaye. Like Gone with the Wind this is one of those titles that I feel I out to have read but have not. I've borrowed this from my mum-in-law.

Next up is one I have had on my radar for a while. Twenty Thousand Streets Under The Sky by Patrick Hamilton is the umbrella name for the trilogy of The Midnight Bell, The Siege of Pleasure and The Plains of Cement. I noticed the glowing reviews for the serialisation on DVD of  Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky and the book(s) immediately went high up on my 'to be acquired' list. I saw it in the library and pounced. I shall be after that DVD next.

Jill by Philip Larkin was also a book I pounced on. I've had enormously pleasure loathing the poetry of Larkin over the years, since I did Whitsun Weddings for A-level in fact. I admire Larkin's writing but find little to like. The depth and variety of things not to like is, however, enormous. I have always wondered if I'd feel the same way about his prose. The edition I have got has a nice introduction by Larkin where he is effusive about Bruce Montgomery aka Edmund Crispin which gets us off to a more cheerful start than I was expecting. What the actual novel is like remains to be seen.

Lastly on this side of the pile we have The English German Girl by Jake Wallis Simons and Nimrod's Shadow by Chris Paling which were the two books from Fiction Uncovered that most appealed before my funds ran out. Fiction Uncovered with its promoting of new fiction seems like a jolly good thing. The first place I saw Fiction Uncovered mentioned was on Cornflower so thanks to Karen I now have these tempting two volumes.

On the other side I have a nice review copy of Gillespie and I by Jane Harris which I am thoroughly looking forward to as I have heard so much good about it, again especially from Cornflower.

The Borrible Trilogy by Michael De Larrabeiti is one that I read as a young teen. I remember that I was quite shocked by the violence and that it features some sort of demonic version of the Wombles and that it was also quite witty and not like anything else that I had read at the time. It was a library book and I had not seen it since. Having spotted the trilogy again recently I couldn't resist.

 I, Coriander by Sally Gardner is another one from the library, and again I've had my eyes open for it since I saw this review from Cornflower a couple of years ago.

Like Bees to Honey  by Caroline Smailes is Caroline's most recent book. She has a reputation for difficult subject matter and though I love her blog I suspected her early work would be too dark for my tastes. Like Bees to Honey is altogether a perkier tale I gather and I've wanted it for a while.

Rattling through the last volumes: The Cleansing Flames is the last of the wonderful St Petersberg Mysteries. Thank you to Faber for the review copy. Marcus Sedgwick's My Swordhand is Singingis a YA version of the vampire myth, with all the Eastern European trappings I gather (I think I saw this first on Gaskella). Monsieur Montespan by Jean Teule is a review copy of a historical love story from Gallic Books.

Thank you to the publishers for their review copies but mostly to Cornflower for her reviews! You'll note I've held that review of I, Coriander in my mind for four years!

Books on the Wish List and the Power of Bloggers

I thought I share some books from the blogosphere that have caught my eye thanks to some excellent reviews over the last few months:

When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman reviewed by Simon on Savidge Reads

The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson Burnett reviewed by Jenny at Shelf love

Four Meals for Fourpence by Grace Foakes reveiwed by Harriet Devine

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt reviewed by the ever reliable Annabel at Gaskella

Illyrian Spring by Ann Bridge reviewed by Simon at Stuck-in-a-Book which is sadly hard-to-find and expensive.

And I do, in the end, either buy or borrow most of the books I note down. My wish list these days is far longer than it ever was when I relied on traditional reviews.

Before the Fact by Frances Iles

Before the Fact by Frances Iles, which a few people recommended after my crime fiction post last week, is about to become a bit less hard to find. It is apparently being reissued in August which is good news.

One Book, Two Book, Three Book, Four... and Five...and Six

A little meme from Stuck-in-a-Book and also spotted at Cornflower and Harriet Devine. I am not a great meme fiend but I rather like this one as it gives a quick snap shot of reading and book buying and maybe gives some titles the light of day when they would otherwise be buried in the I-might-review-that-one-day heap. Simon has five questions and I've added a sixth. A good proportion of my reading life is spent reading aloud either to, or with, our daughter. It seems a shame to miss that side out.

1.) The book I'm currently reading:

Mansfield Park by Jane Austen. This is a re-read. Unlike some of Austen's other books I have read Mansfield Park only once and then when I was about 19. Twenty years ago so I am anticipating finding this a different book than on my previous read. This re-read is a prelude to reading The Youngest Miss Ward by Joan Aiken. See question three!

2.) The last book I finished:

 The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley. Glorious Flavia. Enough said.

3.) The next book I want to read:

 The Youngest Miss Ward by Joan Aiken which comes recommended by a friend. It is a prelude to Mansfield House hence my current re-read.

4.) The last book I bought:

I am ignoring stock purchasing. So it was More Precious Than Rubies by Joan Bellamy at The Red House Gomersall. The last work of fiction was The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest by Stieg Larsson.

5.) The last book I was given:

Dracula's Guest: A Connoisseur's Collection of Victorian Vampire Stories by Michael Sims was one of my birthday presents from Mr J.

6.) The book you are currently reading with your child/grandchild:

The Secret Mountain by Enid Blyton. Daughter is very into Enid Blyton as I was at her age. However The Secret Series is not one that I read as a child. The main characters are Mike, Nora, Peggy, Jack and a prince, Prince Paul. My favourite Enid Blyton as a child were the Adventure Series with Philip, Jack, Dinah, and Lucy-Ann, along with Jack's pet cockatoo, Kiki. We have yet to get onto those yet.

I would be particularly be interested in hearing what you read to the children in your life.