Old English Rose Reads

February Review

Now, I know that the end of January slipped by without a review post, but I decided that if I don’t start writing them now I never will.  I like the idea of having a proper summary of what I’ve read each month, particularly for months like this when I’m so very far behind.  It’ll also help me to keep track of incoming and outgoing books now that I’ve removed the TBR tab from my blog.  It was proving too difficult to maintain, so I’ve decided to stick with keeping my TBR pile on LibraryThing where it’s much easier to track.  I will still be doing the TBR lucky dip each month from there.

With a few notable exceptions, February has been a distinctly unremarkable reading month.  I’ve read 17 books this month, a lot of which have been enjoyable at the time but largely forgettable.  There’s nothing wrong with reading books like this, but I’m hopeful that March will contain more books which are better than ‘quite good’.  February’s books are:

1. Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town by Paul Theroux
2. The Crystal Prison by Robin Jarvis
3. Wolfwatching by Ted Hughes
4. A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr
5. The Final Reckoning by Robin Jarvis
6. Marie by Madeleine Bourdouxhe
7. Elfland by Freda Warrington
8. Up the Junction by Nell Dunn
9. The Rivals by Sheridan
10. How Obelix Fell into the Magic Potion when He Was a Little Boy by Goscinny and Uderzo
11. Lucia in London by E. F. Benson
12. The Diary of a Nobody by George and Weedon Grossmith
13. Tam Lin by Patricia Dean
14. The Victorian Chaise-Longue by Marghanita Laski
15. City of Glass by Paul Auster
16. Miss Buncle’s Book by D. E. Stevenson
17. Through England in a Side-Saddle by Miss Celia Fiennes

The stand-outs by far were A Month in the Country and The Victorian Chaise-Longue both of which I loved, although they’re very different books: one is cosy and nostalgic and the other is claustrophobic and intense.  Although I didn’t manage to participate in Persephone Reading Weekend, this publisher was well represented in February’s reading, as Miss Buncle’s Book was also very enjoyable and I look forward to reading more by D. E. Stevenson in the future.  I read 12 new authors this month, everyone but Robin Jarvis, Ted Hughes, E. F. Benson and the fantastic duo of Goscinny and Uderzo being people that I had never read before, so it’s good I’m trying new things even if they’ve proved to be a little underwhelming at times.

Now onto the scary bit: the incoming books.

From Amazon: I buy books from Amazon quite rarely; as a rule I only tend to buy a book from here when I want/need (and you know how easy it is to confuse these two when it comes to books) to read it immediately, and then it’s usually from the Marketplace.  The Rivals by Sheridan was a book I needed in a hurry as I booked last minute tickets to see the fabulous production at the Haymarket and wanted to read the script first.  I ordered Prospero Lost by L. Jagi Lamplighter as the March read for the Women of Fantasy Book Club.  Andrew Lang: A Critical Biography by Roger Lancelyn Green isn’t one that I want to read right now, but I know I’ll want to read this book as I’m currently working my way through the gorgeous reissues of Lang’s Fairy Books from the Folio Society and the man is so interesting.  It’s out of print and Amazon only had a few copies so rather than wishlisting it, I went ahead and ordered it already.

From Ebay: This year I’ve decided to revisit the Asterix books as I enjoy them so much, reading them in series order for the first time.  I already own most of them, but I picked up How Obelix Fell into the Magic Potion when He Was a Little Boy, the prequel to the series, and Asterix and the Golden Sickle to go towards completing my collection.

From BookMooch: Despite having over 700 books on my wishlist, it went very quiet towards the beginning of the year, but it’s picked up again this month (unfortunately for my TBR pile).  Country of the Pointed Firs and Other Stories by S. O. Jewett was one I only listed this month after seeing it recommended on LibraryThing, but a copy was available straight away.  Geek Love by Katherine Dunn turned up courtesy of a lovely newbie BookMoocher.  I finally managed to get hold of a copy of Riddle of the Seven Realms by Lyndon Hardy, the third part of a trilogy that I’vehad on my shelves for ages.  Sex with Kings by Eleanor Herman is added to my pile of non-fiction books for the year.  I obtained a copy of Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat entirely because I want to read Connie Willis’ books and get the inside jokes.  The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ by Philip Pullman joins my small collection of books in the marvellous Canongate Myths series.  I periodically search for Virago Modern Classics just to see if any have been listed and this month I was able to mooch a copy of Precious Bane by Mary Webb.

From charity shops: I’ve done incredibly well from charity shops this month, partly because I have to walk past the Bloomsbury Oxfam bookshop once a week and partly because I had to go into a nearby town at the weekend to do boring bank stuff and it was only fair to reward myself with a nuff in the charity shops.  I struck gold in the Bloomsbury Oxfam though, as I not only did I obtain my £2.99 copy of The Victorian Chaise-Longue by Marghanita Laski (which I read instantly) there, I managed to pick up two particularly special copies of books for £3 each: a copy of Penguin Lost by Andrey Kurkov signed and with a penguin drawing by the author, and a copy of A Game of Hide and Seek by Elizabeth Taylor with a dedication inside from Nicola Beauman to Ismael Merchant!  From my own town I obtained The Woven Path by Robin Jarvis, Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote, Ivy by Julie Hearn and The Lagoon by Janet Frame from the shop where books are 2 for £1.  Also for the princely sum of 50p each I acquired The Science of Harry Potter: How Magic Really Works by Roger Highfield and a 1923 hardback of a book called The Winding Stair by A. E.W. Mason (I have no idea what this one is about but I look forward to finding out).   In the slightly more expensive shops, I paid £1 each for a lovely old hardback edition of Village School by Miss Read, Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, W. B. Yeats: The Love Poems, a pristine copy of Tove Jansson’s A Winter Book and the Persephone edition of Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski which I’m especially looking forward to after my first experience with this author.  See, I may acquire a lot of books but I’m far from profligate.

From The Book People: This company proves fatal to the sternest of resolves not to buy too many books (and my resolve was always a long way from being stern) because their books are just so cheap!  I acquired The Vintage Maugham Collection of ten beautiful books from an author I’ve been meaning to read for ages.  I also bought the lovely Penguin English Journeys box set, containing twenty slim volumes all of which I’m dying to read (and one of which I succumbed to right away).  Finally, I bought the complete eight book set of the Penguin Pocket Sherlock Holmes.  I’ve already read the first two and I owned another three of them but it was still cheaper to buy the entire set of eight books than to buy the remaining volumes that I needed to complete the set.  This company is going to be dangerous, I can tell.

Finally, in non-bookish but most exciting news, February also saw the purchase of a wedding dress!  That doesn’t make me look and feel like either a tragic heroine from a Victorian novel or an extra from My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding!  I can’t post any pictures or give any hints as to what it looks like, but suffice to say that it is beautiful and I love it and I cannot wait to marry the Old English Thorn while wearing it.  It’s only six months to go now and I am so excited!

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