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Reading date - July 2020 I read Rebecca when I was at school during the winter time and I loved it.  Obviously, when at school, you don't read on your lunchbreak so I used to read this book when I got home.  I feel that du Maurier's work is best appreciated when it's cold and bleak outside.  I really liked Jamaica Inn.  I wish it was colder when I read it, I tricked myself into thinking it was all moody and broody outside when reading this as I read it in the dark of night, mainly. The story follows an orphaned girl who goes to live with her aunt at Jamaica Inn (a real place which is now a tourist trap thanks to this book but was pretty isolated when du Maurier lived here for a bit).  The aunt is no longer the fun aunt the girl remembers and harbours a dark secret.  I figured out the plot twist pretty early but nonetheless, I enjoyed this book. I would recommend it, it's full of suspense and good for a bit of escapism.

Reading date - July 2020 I have heard so much about how great the work of Mr Coates is so I bought The Water Dancer when it was the kindle daily deal.  I am loving this kindle thing, I'm reading more and more books but having no space taken up.  Sadly, I still miss having an actual book in my hand so this will not be a long term thing. You know sometimes when something is so hyped up that you buy into the hype and expect it to be so amazing and it isn't? That is how I feel about this book.  It is a good story, it is emotive and takes you on a proper journey. The book is one that has periods where I just could not put it down, then boring bits when I struggled to get through it.  I liked it...but it wasn't as great as it was made out to be.  I also don't see the point of the conduction stage. Would I recommend it? Yes. Is it as groundbreaking as they say? Yes.  Is it as amazing as it's been made out to be? Not for me.  If I had to give it stars, it woul...

July 9 2020 So, the lockdown is pretty much over.  The only things that remain closed are offices (we work from home), the theatres and cinemas.   *update* As of July 24th, you can't go shopping without a mask. It is already compulsory to wear them on the tube but now you have to wear them everywhere apart from when you go out to eat or drink..which I think is really stupid but we need to get back to some kind of normality. I'm still reading so I'm going to carry this blog on with the books I read but there's no way I will get through books as fast as I have been doing for the past three months.  As I write this, my current book is The Water Dancer, of which I am halfway through.  I took a trip to Poundland the other day and found them selling more than kid's books. Apparently, this is nothing new.  I picked up The Nix (wanted it for ages) and a book by a Punjabi author I had never heard of.   *updates to this*: I have finished The Water Dancer an...

Reading date - June 2020           This is the last book I would say I read when we had an official lockdown.  As I finished, it the pubs and barbers were going to reopen (on July 4th, stupidly called Super Saturday).  The pubs re-opened at 6 a.m. and the gammons were out in force lining the pockets of that Poundshop Worzel Gummidge known to most of us as Wetherspoon. Lining up for a pint of shit beer from Spoons ain't it.  Now if it was Disrepute..then you'd be talking.  What's annoying me, however, is that piercing places, tattoo shops and waxers are still closed.  I need a wax and I need a new piercing ASAP. *update*: tattoo and piercing places are now open (14 July 2020), eyebrows are allowed to be done from 1 August 2020.  I think i may keep a note about this..in an actual notebook. Anyway, let's get to the book.  This book is pure poetry.  It is so beautifully written.  I am unsure if this account is a memo...

Reading date - June 2020 This is the first book where I'm writing the review as I am reading it.  For someone who says they don't read a lot of books on kindle, I seem to have gone out of my way to prove how untrue that is.  However, these are uNpReCeDeNtEd TiMeS and all is most definitely not well in Gotham City.   (This is the first book I'm reading on my actual kindle..not my iPad.  My kindle is 8 years old and I'm going to start using it a lot more as I'm quite precious about my iPad). This was a "by chance" purchase. I had no plan to buy this but then saw it was on offer.   My main critique of this book is the way in which the author constructs sentences.  Second, the form.  I am not sure where the author learnt how to form sentences but this is the first book I've ever read where the sentences are weird, I have had to read more than five of them more than twice to figure out what she actually means.  It's not just me, either, I sen...

Reading date - June 2020 It was free on kindle, why not? Jack London is an American who comes to the east of London to see what the slums are like.  The book is grim and horrible so it gives you a good idea what it must have been like to be destitute back then.  It was a tough read because it was really dry. I wouldn't suggest it unless this was something you were super super super interested in or if you needed to read it for a disso.

Reading date - June 2020 This book was not one I had any urge to read.  I got this in a bundle of books, the main book I wanted was The London Nobody Knows..this came with it, amongst some others.  I think I got some decent ones in the batch, I seem to remember one being a DH Lawrence.  They are all old Penguins, the ones that were released years ago so they have that old book smell.  The edition retails for a lot more than what I paid for it..but then I don't buy books for re-sale value.   As usual, I asked around about this, put it on my insta story and about 99.9% of the people who have read this book are men.  Men who read it as boys at school.  My best friend remembers the boys reading it at school and I remember all the books I read..this wasn't one of them. A few pages in, I could see why they made boys read it.  It's a proper boy's book..and an English teacher's dream - it's full of symbolism and a breeding ground for essay questions....

Reading date - June 2020 This little number is from HMV.  I think it's a crying shame that it's not *that* well known that HMV sell books.  And they're not expensive! I THINK you can get two for eight quid, or a fiver each.  I bought this with Girlfriend in a Coma..and carried it home in a cloth bag when it was absolutely chucking it down.  It's a wonder either book survived; my coat got so wet I had to dry it with a hairdryer on a Sunday night so it was dry enough for me to wear to work on Monday. I saw the Northern Soul film but my love of Frankie Valli was present even before then, thanks to my dad so I didn't fall in love with the mystery song as a result of the film.  The film was very good though, I suggest it to anyone who loves music. I thought this book would be fine.  Thought it would be of mild interest to me as I was interested in the history of Northern Soul, as I am with most music. What I found was a powerhouse of a book.   I am a great ...

Reading date - May 2020 It is no secret that I am a massive Oscar Wilde fan girl.  I fell in love with him the first time I read The Picture of Dorian Gray and to this day, it remains my favourite of all his work.  There are so many phrases in that book that resonate with me... Oscar Wilde was a homosexual..and when things turned sour, his boyfriend got his dad involved which resulted in Oscar being put on trial for (and convicted of) gross indecency. De Profundis is a love letter which I read over and over again because it is beautiful and heartbreaking in equal measure.  It was written by Oscar to the aforementioned boyfriend Lord Alfred Douglas, who he called Bosie.  Bosie's dad came up with the Queensberry Rules, the rules that govern modern day boxing, in case you wanted to know.  The letter was one of those letters you write to get your feelings out but you never intend to send.  One of the prison guards decided that it would be better for Oscar to wr...

Reading date - May 2020 Another one I got on my Kindle.  A departure from the normal Wilde material.  For starters, there were no dandies throwing themselves onto beds and sofas (nobody sits in his work, read it and tell me I'm lying). This is the book where the heavily over-used phrase "to live is the rarest thing in the world.  Most people exist, is all" comes from. This is the kind of "book" (it's actually an essay) where I find I only get the best from it when I pore over every single word and sentence.  Of course, they're just words that you can read at a mile a minute but who really gets any satisfaction out of that when they are reading a book??  My dad says that the only thing I speed read is instructions..and then I have to go back and speed read again (he's right, it's practically my only vice). The essay is not a description of how we would function under socialism, more a view on how we are suffering under capitalism.  How we are all ...