“To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.” – W. Somerset Maugham I recently came across this quote and it got me thinking. You often hear it said that reading is a great tool for escapism; just pick up a book and be […]
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DNF: Did Not Finish. Three words I never like to say about my reading choices. I can be quite selective when deciding on a book, which means that those three little letters weren’t really a reality for me. BUT a few recent dreary reads (some I couldn’t even be bothered to review) have made me […]
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From a book festival to a blog tour, I’ve had quite the bookish June! I also managed to read some highly enjoyable books: Peril at End House by Agatha Christie The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness Happier Thinking by Lana Grace Riva Not Working by Lisa Owens The Chalk Man by CJ […]
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Last weekend I went along to the Greenwich Book Festival – in the exquisite University of Greenwich buildings – and had a fantastic day in the company of a varied group of authors. I started my morning listening to journalist Lucy Mangan in conversation with Katherine Woodfine (herself a children’s writer who hosts a podcast […]
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The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. Book One in the Chaos Walking Trilogy. Opening sentence: “The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don’t got nothing much to say.” Published in 2008, quite a few people have recommended this book (the whole trilogy in fact) […]
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Recently, I was chatting to my friend, Cat, about books and she was lamenting that plodding through The Count of Monte Christo was doing nothing for her (and it is a loooong book – quite a time commitment to make), so I simply advised that she stopped. My opinion is that life is too short for […]
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Just as I prefer not to read from a kindle (for me, there is something incomplete about the experience of reading like that, no turning of pages or feeling the weight of the book move from one hand to the other as you read…) I was not drawn to the idea of an audiobook. That is, […]
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