Books 89 & 90 of 2015: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald & As kingfishers catch fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins

I am so late with this post tonight. I'm blaming Saturday's trip to the mainland, what with the film and the washi tape, I was so excited to post about it all that I totally forgot to schedule this post. So I'm hanging out in bed with a packet of Maryland cookies for supper and a hot chocolate while I watch Scrubs. It's a good night.

First up is book 52 of the 2015 Reading Challenge; a book you started but never finished. That would be The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

It's the story of Jay Gatsby and the woman he loves, Daisy Buchanan, set during the 1920's. It fit the bill because it was a book I was assigned to read in Fifth Year; I made it to the end of the second chapter before I gave up and rebelled.

My teacher at the time, Mr L., had selected me and two of my friends to read it out of everyone else in the class, like it was some sort of a treat. And we hated it. I made it the furthest before we gave up and told Mr. L. that we were definitely not reading it. He was kind of disappointed and let us switch. The following year the same thing happened with The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, except that time he sat down with us and completely changed our minds.

I can't help but think he kind of wanted us to give it a go and argue our thoughts and so years later I decided I would try it again, and yet that never happened. Which was why when this Challenge week came up, I decided to give it another go.

I actually quite enjoyed it, which surprised me. In fact, I got through it a lot quicker than I was expecting. I started it on the 27th of December and finished it on the 30th. I was sure that it would tide me over to New Year's Eve and it meant I had to scramble to find a follow up to see me through to the end of the year.

In the end I actually felt sorry for Jay Gatsby. It turned into a different book from what I was expecting, what with Mr and Mrs Wilson and the events with the car. I can kind of see why Mr L. wanted me to read it and I do wish I'd given it more of a change so I could find out a little more about his thoughts on it.

By the time the book ended, I kind of wanted a little more. I did want to hear more about Gatsby.

It may be a book that I revisit at some point in the future. In the meantime, I'm glad that I read it so it's another one I can cross off my 'classics' list.

I couldn't end the year without a book to read. And I hate ending the year on an unfinished book, so that meant that whatever I chose would have to be short. In the end I picked one of the Penguin's Little Black Classics, and decided to go with number two, As kingfishers catch fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins.

It's a little collection of poetry and it was perfect to tide me over until midnight when I could start my first book of 2016.

His views on nature made me kind of think of Tolkien. There was something about the way which he used language and I couldn't help but be reminded of him, even if I couldn't pinpoint the exact reasons why. Of course, the reminder was reinforced when I reached one of his poems which described Oxford.

I couldn't help but think that there was an almost Old English style to the poems because of the use of alliteration. I was slightly confused about the accents on some of the words. I thought it might have had something to do with where the stress was supposed to fall but I'm not entirely sure about that.

I don't really read as much poetry now as I did when I was younger. I guess I'm a little picky about it now, whereas when I was younger if it had a good meter and rhyme structure I was happy. I think little books like this are a good idea though, it allows you to get a taster without going all out on a whole book and it's almost certainly one I'll revisit in the future.

And now, I'm off to bed!

Books 87 & 88 of 2015: The Secret of Annexe 3 by Colin Dexter & A Christmas Carol & The Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens

These books see me reaching almost the end of my Reading Challenge for last year. This year I didn't bother taking part in a reading challenge (and I've read a lot less as a result of that) but I'm on the fence about taking part next year.

Week 51's book was 'a book based on or turned into a TV show', coincidentally Mr Click had recently finished reading Colin Dexter's The Secret of Annexe 3 which is from the Inspector Morse series, which seemed like as good a choice as any. Although it wasn't directly adapted for the TV series, it was used for inspiration for one of the episodes.

In this story, Inspector Morse is called to solve the mystery of a death at a hotel. One of the visitors to a New Year's Eve party doesn't get up the next morning, leading to a whole host of mysteries for Morse to unravel before he can learn the truth about what's happened.

I enjoyed this one a lot more than the last Morse book that I read (The Riddle of the Third Mile). I think this is mainly because although it was a rather complicated case, with a costume ball and people not being who everyone thought they were, it was still fairly easy to follow what was going on.

It also didn't hide too much from the reader, so you could follow along with the crime and try to solve it yourself. As you'll be aware from my previous book reviews, being able to solve the crime yourself is really important to me in detective/crime books.

I was pleasantly surprised to discover that there wasn't the usual high body count that you often get in Morse books. I don't remember seeing the TV adaptation that this one inspired, but Mr Click and I are planning on watching the complete series at some point in the future.

I was definitely reading it at the right time of year. It's all set around a New Year's Eve party and I started it on the 19th of December, finished it on the 23rd. This was entirely accidental, but it was pretty cool. I tend to read Christmas books in the run up to Christmas, there's not really many books set at New Year though.

This was also a good choice because it didn't take too long to get through. I was a little worried that I wouldn't have time to read my traditional Christmas read, A Christmas Carol, before Christmas.

But I did.

On one of my trips to the mainland I managed to find a copy of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol and The Cricket on the Hearth which I had in the Children's Classics collection that my grandparents got me as a child. Last Christmas I decided that this was the version I should read, since I like to try reading a different version of the book each year.

This edition has the traditional story of A Christmas Carol (I don't need to recap that for you, do I?) as well as a short story at the end, The Cricket on the Hearth. It's another Victorian Christmas story, in which a mysterious man shows up at the Peerybingle home and stays with them. Meanwhile May, the girlfriend of a man named Edmund who has been missing for some time, is preparing to marry a miser, but the mysterious man might put a stop to that.

It didn't take me very long to finish A Christmas Carol. I started it on the 23rd and finished it on the 24th, whilst sitting at work, watching the Disney film of A Christmas Carol. At one point it was kind of race to see how far ahead of the film I could stay.

Although A Christmas Carol was a reread, The Cricket on the Hearth was a first time read for me. I did try reading it once as a child, in this edition nonetheless, but I gave up on it then. This time around I found it a lot easier to read. I suspect my issue before was a combination of the language and the fact that the story wasn't as familiar to me. I really enjoyed the way that this story ended.

I really love reading A Christmas Carol each year. It's as much a part of Christmas to me as putting up the tree and decorations, or listening to Christmas music. Although it begins in the festive season, I don't see The Cricket on the Hearth as quite such a Christmas story; I'll probably not reread it again this year, though next time I pick up this edition to read, I'll give it another go.

Books 85 & 86 of 2015: Creepy Christmas by Jaimie Admans & Memoirs of Fanny Hill by John Cleland

For the last couple of years, when November hits, I start going through my free Kindle Christmas books and select my reading material from them. I'll alternate these with book-books right the way up to Christmas Day.

Which is how I came to read Jaimie Admans's Creepy Christmas at the beginning of December last year. It's a children's Christmas story about a girl named Kaity whose parents are separated. Her mum has a new boyfriend and Christmas this year just isn't going to be same as usual; especially as there are some very strange things going on in her home town as Christmas approaches.

Not going to lie, I totally picked out this book because of the cover when I saw it as a free download. How cute is that Santa? I don't think I realised right away that it was a kids story and then I started reading it, realised it was narrated by a ten year old and figured that I might as well finish it.

As it turns out, it's a nice quick read. I was done in a couple of days and I imagine that it would have been even more up my street had I been about twenty years younger. It's the sort of book that confident young readers could read alone, or less confident readers could share with a sibling or parent.

At times I thought Kaity, the narrator, sounded a little older than she was supposed to be, but on the whole she was a fairly likeable character. Often I find in books with children as the narrators the kids are a little too sickly sweet or annoying, but Kaity came across as a well-balanced kid.

I cold almost imagine this book as a made for TV movie. The sort which plays on the Christmas 24 channel or Channel 5 in the run up to Christmas. Something with a low budget but which once you sit down to watch it is fairly enjoyable once you get past the wooden acting. The Santa in this story reminded me of all the Santas in virtually every cheesy Christmas film.

Although I've not yet found anything else by this author, I would be interested in reading more. I felt like she had a nice style and strong voice in her writing. If you're looking for something a little bit festive for your inner child, I'd give it a go.

I followed this up immediately afterwards with Week 50 of the Reading Challenge: a banned book. I did quite a lot of searching to select the right book, which saw me scanning through lists of banned books from around the world. Ultimately I selected Memoirs of Fanny Hill by John Cleland using my usual criteria for choosing books for the challenge; it was shorter than most of the alternatives.

This book was banned for obscenity when it was originally published. It follows the life of the titular Fanny Hill as she rises through the class ranks whilst working in brothels, all the while hoping to find a man to love. And there's quite a lot of sex.

I was honestly surprised at how explicit this story was, considering when it was written. Apparently Fifty Shades of Grey isn't so original after all!

Despite its length it took me a while to read, mainly because it wasn't really the sort of book I felt I could sit and read in the canteen at work. It's a pretty short story really though, if I'd been reading it somewhere less public and could've saved my blushes, I would've gotten through it a lot quicker.

I did find it a little strange to think it was written by a man. His descriptions of what a woman feels were pretty interesting and there were a few times when I wondered what on earth he was going on about. It was funny in places just because of the way that things were described.

It's probably not the sort of book that I'll reread in the future. I did kind of enjoy it and I'm glad that I did read it because now I can say I've read it Another one I can check off the list of classics.

Books 83 & 84 of 2015: New England Witch Chronicles by Chelsea Bellingeri & The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare

By the beginning of December last year I was struggling to get caught up on the Reading Challenge as I'd fallen behind a little. It was about this point that I made the decision to just read what I felt like reading this year, I didn't like the pressure of having to find a book that ticked each of the criteria on the list and then feeling like I wasn't going to be able to complete it right at the end.

For Week 48 the book was one written by an author with your same initials. The obvious choice here was Charlotte Bronte. I have Jane Eyre sitting up on my bookshelf, but I wanted something shorter, less heavy going and I was determined to go for something off of my Kindle.

In the end I selected New England Witch Chronicles by Chelsea Bellingeri. I should add that the cover below does have the author's name down as Chelsea Luna, but my copy is under the name Chelsea Bellingeri.

I think that I pretty much picked this by sorting all my Kindle books into alphabetical order by author and scanning through all the authors whose surnames began with the letter B. In the end, out of all of the books on my device, I think there were two with the initials CB. I don't remember exactly how I picked this one to read; I suspect this was the shorter of the two, that's how I seemed to choose most of my Reading Challenge books last year.

This book is about a teenage girl, named Alex, whose seventeenth birthday brings some weird dreams at right about the same time a girl is murdered after apparently messing with witchcraft. It looks like there might be a witch hunter in Hazel Cove.

It clocks in at around 343 pages but I managed to get through it surprisingly quickly. Part of that was because it was a fairly easy read. It's aimed at teens and I was able to just switch off my brain and lose myself in it, which was exactly what I needed for my book of the week. I got through this in just four sittings.

On the whole I enjoyed it, though I couldn't help but be reminded of Twilight in places. I think it was inevitable with the supernatural elements; you can't help but draw parallels when these things crop up in teen fiction now. But also the Peter/Alex/James love triangle too.

Another, and rather surprising, comparison that I found myself drawing was between this book and the Kathy Reichs books. I think it was because for a large chunk of the book Alex is trying to figure out what was going on, then someone was out to get her which led to her being attacked during the last eighth of the book. It's the classic Tempe Brennan formula.

I wasn't entirely satisfied with the ending. It builds up to a point and then breaks off to make way for the next book. It's a good hook but I would've liked a little more resolution, especially as I wasn't sure I was going to go on to read the next book (spoiler: I haven't yet).

I followed this up with Week 49's book: a play.

I had a lot of choice here. I've got plays left over from my various OU courses (should I have fancied a reread), I've got a couple on my Kindle, I've got some I've picked up in random bookshops and haven't gotten around to reading yet.

Once again, time and energy won out. I looked for the shortest recognisable (to me) play on my Kindle. I went with The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare (because 127 pages). Interestingly, it was first published in the First Folio text, one of which currently resides not a million miles away from where I sit writing this review. Neat, right?

It's in a similar vein to Hamlet, but it's a sort of mix of tragedy and comedy. Leontes is convinced that his pregnant wife has been having an affair with Polixenes, leading to the latter escaping the country. Things generally go downhill from this point. But it's okay because it's kind of funny too.

I really enjoyed this. I always remember at school everyone groaned when we had to study Shakespeare, but I've always loved it. When I was fifteen, the only thing I wanted for my birthday was a copy of the Complete Works of Shakespeare. I carried that (massive) tome everywhere with me (including a school trip to M&Ds) and it still resides upstairs on my bookcase.

My greatest dread was always that moment when everyone would be assigned a 'role' in the text and we'd have to read it aloud. I was going to say that certain types of writing sound better when they're read aloud, but I think that's inaccurate. You could read the list of ingredients off the side of a cereal box and it could sound beautiful. It's about the way you say the words, the way you feel them in your mouth, how you play with the letters on your tongue. I think I have some synaesthesia thing going on with my relationship with words (and that's probably another blog post entirely).

In short, bored teenagers reading Shakespeare aloud, does nothing to make the text feel beautiful and exciting.

Which is why I've always much preferred reading these books alone.

Basically what I was getting at here is that I loved the language and I really didn't have any trouble following what was going on or was being said. Sure the language use is pretty archaic in places, but in others it's fairly unchanged all these years later.

I was reminded of The Duchess of Malfi and The Tempest in equal measure. The former because of Hermione, the woman who is powerless against the forces of the men in her life; the latter because of the abandonment of Perdita on the beach and her being raised by the shepherd. I'd love to see it performed on the stage to see if how I was picturing it is accurate to a performance.

Bits of it were quite funny. I especially enjoyed seeing the famous 'exit, pursued by bear' stage direction. I always like it when I get to see things which have become part of the cultural consciousness firsthand, it makes me feel like I'm in on the joke now too.

Books 81 & 82 of 2015: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien & Christmas, A Happy Time by Alicia Catherine Mant

I've reviewed The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien so many times on this blog that there's really no reason to do it again.

But I'm not going to let that stop me.

That's what the edition I read last year looked like. It's Tolkien's own illustration which I think is wonderful because it gives you a glimpse into the way that he saw the world he created.

It took me a really long time to read this book because I read it during the time that I lost the twins. On the one hand I didn't feel much like reading and on the other hand it was comforting to visit a place I've been visiting since I was six years old. I retrod the same paths I've been walking over for over twenty years and I was surrounded by familiar faces.

The downside to this is that rereading it again in the future is probably going to make me feel a little sad because now my Hobbit memories will feature a new set of memories. I'm going to have to make sure that next time I reread this it's during a positive time to balance out the sad with some happy.

This edition does seem a lot thicker than many of my other copies (with the exception of my full illustrated one, which obviously has lots more pages and lots more pictures). I didn't realise why until I got close to the end; it has the beginning of The Fellowship of the Ring in it. I always feel torn when books do that. I want to read the book from cover to cover and I feel compelled to keep going, but I also want to stop when I get to the end of the story. It's always a tough call.

What with the films, I do find myself picking out specific scenes and quotes which are used in the films. I also find myself expecting things which are in the films only, like I was waiting for Radagast to show up on this read through and felt a little surprised (momentarily) when I realised he wouldn't.

By the time I finished The Hobbit we were well into December and I was ready for Week 47 of the Reading Challenge: A book set at Christmas. Well, I love nothing better to dip into a Christmassy book in the run up to Christmas, so I dug around on my Kindle and found Christmas, A Happy Time or to give it its full title Christmas, A Happy Time, A Tale Calculated for the Amusement & Instruction of Young Persons by Alicia Catherine Mant. Snappy title!

It was a fairly short little tale about a family of children at Christmas time. The boys have come home from school and the girls are excited to have their brothers back for the holiday season. I honestly remember very little about this book after all this time, and searching on Goodreads hasn't helped refresh my memory as apparently no one else is admitting to having read it!

It's definitely a product of its time. At points it comes across as both sexist and classist. On the one hand, it's pretty funny but it's also sad as well. There's a bit where the children want to give their clothes to the poor and their mother tells them not to because they must dress as a reflection of their father and besides, to give their nice things to the poor wouldn't help them. It's a story about knowing your place in the world, and staying there.

I managed to read this book in about half an hour before work, which was part of the reason why I picked it, I wanted to get caught up on my reading and short books were the best way to do that.

While it did annoy me, often, it was a nice little Christmas read and felt suitably old-fashioned which seems to go hand in hand with a Christmas story. I couldn't help but be reminded of Little Women with the girls in the story and the way they behaved.

I wouldn't say it was a bad book. It's probably worth a read, especially with Christmas approaching.

Books 79 & 80 of 2015: Sealed With A Christmas Kiss by Rachael Lucas & Mrs Rosie and the Priest by Giovanni Boccaccio

Week 45 of the 2015 Reading Challenge called for a book set in your home town. I had actually intended to nip into our local bookshop and pick up a book by a local author. There's someone who writes books set on the island and the whole way through the challenge I'd been planning on doing this.

But I just never got around to it and in the build up to Week 45 I'd been having fertility treatment and then getting pregnant and there just wasn't any energy left over for buying books.

So I turned to my Kindle, bent the rules slightly and picked up a copy of Sealed With a Christmas Kiss by Rachael Lucas.

This is a short follow up story to Lucas's previous book, Sealed With a Kiss. Both stories are set on the fictional island of Auchenmor which seems to be heavily based on Bute. In this story Kate and Roddy are working to prepare 'the big house' as a five star wedding venue and are putting on a wedding to kick off their business. Of course, not everything is going to go to plan.

One fantastic thing about this story is that not only is it basically set on my island, it's actually set on the estate where I live. It seemed like there were a number of little nods to Mount Stuart, allow me to illustrate:

"The rhododendrons were still wild, but the worst of the potholes on the driveway had been repaired, so the overall impression was of an artfully unkempt rather than dilapidated stately home. Or at least that's what we keep telling ourselves, thought Kate, as they lurched over an unexpected bump."

This amused me because until recently when you drove onto the estate you passed a row of crazy rhododendron bushes and, until last week, swerved round a bunch of potholes to preserve your car's suspension.

"'This place has seen better days, hasn't it?'

Kate felt herself rising up slightly, in defense, 'Kilmanen used to be one of the most popular holiday destinations in Scotland, back in Victorian times.'

'And it's not seen a lick of paint since, by the look of it.' His smile was superlicious."

Um, Rothesay was also one of the most popular holiday destinations in Scotland, once upon a time, and the lick of paint comment is one which has been made by many.

"'I've checked the CalMac website, Kate. There's no ferry this morning.'"

Story of my whole life!

To people who haven't been to my little island, it's some nice storytelling and scene setting. To people like me, it's like a little nudge and a wink to let you know that you're both in on the secret.

I did really enjoy this short story, perhaps even more than the original book because there was none of the set up of the place and characters. It was understood that if you were reading this story, you already knew who everyone was and why Kate was there.

The story was a little obvious from the start. I kind of guessed that the ending was going to happen the way it did, but I think that's kind of the point with these sorts of stories. It's like the chick flick films where you know the bickering couple on the poster will be hooking up before the end!

Despite that, or maybe because of it, it was a nice, fun, quick little read. I normally start reading Christmassy books around about the start of November but I was late starting because pregnancy! So this was a good way to ease myself into it. I think this would be the perfect one to read in one sitting, on a cold winter's day, snuggled up with a nice warm jumper and a mug of hot chocolate. I'm thinking I might even crack it out again in the next couple of weeks for my early Christmas reading.

One thing though, Christmas Eve wedding? Copy cats! ;-)

I follows this one up with Mrs Rosie and the Priest by Giovanni Boccaccio for Week 46 of the Reading Challenge: a book that was originally written in a different language.

This is a short collection of stories about husbands who are played by their wives, priests who are more interested in their female parishioners and men who just aren't too smart. It was translated into English from Italian by Peter Hainsworth.

I should really stop having such low expectations for older books, but I found it quite funny for its age. The stories in this book probably wouldn't really be that far out of place in some gossip magazines today. They're pretty bawdy and I think most of them are to do with sex in one way or another.

My favourite story was 'Ricciardo da Chinzica loses his wife' which was about a man who uses religious days as an excuse not to have sex with his wife. Of course, she gets a bit fed up with this and takes matters into her own hands, or rather someone else's hands.

'Patient Grimelda' was my least favourite and was the darkest. A man systematically psychological tortures his wife over many years to see how devoted to him she is. And she just sits back and takes it because she loves him or whatever. He told her he was killing her child, I don't think that's the sort of thing you should just sit back and take, but maybe that's just me.

The language in this was very informal, like it was a spoken conversation. That made me wonder about whether there are other translations that I might be able to see sometime, just to see whether that conversational style is something which is in the original or has been adopted for this telling.

Books 77 & 78 of 2015: Dracula The Undead by Dacre Stoker & Ian Holt & Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funke

The first of today's two books is Dracula The Undead which is the official sequel to Dracula, written by a descendant of Bram Stoker, Dacre Stoker, and Ian Holt.

The sequel to Bram Stoker's Dracula follows Quincey, Mina and Jonathan Harker's son, as he heads for the stage. Quincey winds up in a production of Dracula which is being directed by Bram Stoker himself. Meanwhile, someone is out to get the original party who took down Dracula. Could it be that the Prince of Darkness himself is back?

The fact that the first time I picked this book up from a freebie table at work someone told me that he couldn't let me read this book because it was awful really should have been my first clue. Alas, I did not take his advice and the second time it popped up as a freebie, I took it. It then sat on my bookshelf for months and months until last October I finally picked it up to give it a go.

This was not a good book.

I really struggled to get through it and I pretty much only finished it because I couldn't stand reading it any more. By the time I was about a quarter of the way through I was ready to be done with it. I could almost have left this one unfinished, something I haven't done in over five years!

Dracula isn't an easy book to read, but it's a classic and for the most part, I enjoyed reading it. Dracula The Undead is not Dracula. This book just butchered the characters from Dracula. I hate that no one made it out alive and none of them really bore much resemblance to the original book. They were just caricatures of the source material.

Personally, I think it probably would've made a halfway reasonable fanfic but for an original novel it was a let down. Too much was twisted to make it fit the story they wanted to tell, rather than building on the original story and making something worth reading.

Probably the only highlight of this book was that Sir Henry Irving got a couple of mentions. He's a distant ancestor on my Nan's side, so that was nice. Otherwise, take my advice, don't bother with this one.

At the time I was reading Dracula The Undead we were preparing for our first frozen embryo transfer so Mr Click gave me strict instructions that I was to read something 'nice' when I was done with it. I think if I'd taken too much longer to finish the book, he would've confiscated it.

I followed it up with a book off my 'children's bookcase'. One which I picked up in Dunoon quite some time ago and which also fulfilled Reading Challenge Week 44, a book you own but have never read.

The valley were a host of dragons live is under threat of developers so one brave dragon, named Firedrake, ventures out into the world to find a mythical place where it's believed they can live safely. Along the way he picks up Ben, an orphan, as well as making a lot of new friends, whilst trying to escape from the man who wants to capture Firedrake.

I was a little surprised to find that I didn't enjoy this book so much. It felt quite slow. I felt like there was a lot of time travelling from place to place without very much actually happening along the way. Then again, I think that probably does lend it well to a bedtime story since the chapters are fairly well contained. It is just very, very long.

One of Firedrake's companions on the journey is Sorrell, a brownie. Sorrell mostly just annoyed me through most of the book. And apparently Sorrell's only power was spitting on stuff. Why did it have to be magical brownie spit? I wish she'd been able to do more than just spitting on stuff. Perhaps it's just because spit kind of grosses me out, but really?!

I did really like the premise of the story; dragons leaving the place they've called home because they're under threat and trying to find the mythical place that they could call home, but which may not exist, sounded like a brilliant story. I just would've liked to have seen more of the dragons along the way, not just Firedrake.

Then again, there is a special place in my heart because while I was reading this we had our embryo transfer. Despite not really enjoying it, I did spend a lot of time lying in bed, reading it out loud to the embryos. It obviously helped because a couple of days after I finished it, I got my positive pregnancy test.

Books 75 & 76 of 2015: Fushigi Yugi The Mysterious Play, 1. Priestess by Yuu Watase & The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle

Way back at the end of October last year I was pretty busy. I was a solid month into a new role at work, and I was gearing up for our first frozen embryo transfer. My friend at work discovered that I'd never really read a graphic novel or any Manga and so set about trying to educate me.

The first of these two books that she lent me was Fushigi Yugi: The Mysterious Play, 1. Priestess by Yuu Watase, which I decided to read for Week 43 of the Reading Challenge, under a book by an author you've never read before (because I'd definitely never read anything by this author before).

Miaka finds a mysterious book and somehow ends up inside the pages in the Universe of the Four Gods. Suddenly she's a Priestess and she has to round up her Celestial Warriors, all the while dealing with the fact that there's a guy she likes and she's just a regular Earth girl really.

I found this book easier to read than I was expecting. I'd already had a primer from Hannah on how to actually read this book (i.e. back to front compared to the books I usually read) but the book came with a helpful diagram on the back so you knew what you were doing.

It was 208 pages long but it didn't take me too long to read. I read a few pages in bed before I switched out the light, then read the rest in about an hour and a half the following morning when I couldn't sleep.

To be honest, Miaka was a little bit annoying, but then again, she's probably a fairly realistic fifteen year old. She was pretty obsessed with guys and how everyone else saw her, so a teenager.

I've seen Manga and Manga-style images before online, I do quite like the Manga versions of Harry Potter characters. There was a mix of cartoon styles in this book. Most of them were what I think of as Manga, but then there were some smaller images smattering the pages in what I think is a Chibi style. I preferred the regular pictures to the cutesy ones. I'd love to see this book on glossy paper and in colour.

Hannah did warn me when she gave me this book that it was the first in a series, but I still think it's kind of sneaky how it sets up all the story and then ends, leaving you to get the next book in the series to find out what comes next. Then again, I think that's how they were originally published, it's kind of like the old Victorian stories in The Strand where they're serialised to keep you buying.

Throughout the story are little notes from the author, which felt like little blog posts as she checked in on her readers. I'm not sure if it's just the translation but in a couple of them she came across as a little bit smug. Then again, she was a young writer/artist who had got her work published, so she's allowed to be smug.

I followed this up with The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle. It was originally a novel but it has been adapted into a graphic novel by Peter B. Gillis, illustrated by Renae De Liz and Rey Dillon. This book is about the last unicorn in the world who sets off on a mission to save all the other unicorns who have been caught and held prisoner by the Red Bull.

I really love the pictures in this book. They were so beautifully drawn that it was almost like watching a movie. Case in point:

I was aware that there was a film, thanks to my friend and her sister gushing about it, but it wasn't until I actually read the graphic novel that I discovered there's an original novel as well. I really feel like I need to read this some time. Apparently Christopher Lee was a massive fan and lent his voice to the film when it was made. He has a habit of doing that with his favourite books I've noticed.

I will admit that I found this book a little tricky to follow in places. I think it'd be easier to follow if you were already familiar with the story through the novel or the film. I can't help but feel that this is a comic which is written for the fans more than anyone else.

My two favourites in this story were the character of Schmendrick, he's just sort of sweet, and the butterfly at the beginning, with his poetry and Shakespeare references. I can't actually remember what the poetry and references were to now, but I made a note in my book journal that I liked him for them.

This book has made me curious about other graphic novels. I know that there's one of The Hobbit that I've always kind of avoided, but now part of me would really like to get my hands on it. It's got Tolkien's name on the cover so no doubt it will happen sooner or later. I'd also like to read the source novel for this story and perhaps some of Beagle's other books as well.

On the whole, I really enjoyed this one. It's always nice to discover something new.

Books 72 & 73 of 2015: The Silent Lady by Catherine Cookson & Dinotopia by James Gurney

I'm actually pretty glad that my reading pace has slowed down this year, I'm guessing because I'm not participating in any challenge this year, but it's allowing me a chance to get all caught up on my review posts.

Way back at the start of October last year I was handed a book by my Mum-in-Law who suggested I might like to read it. I'm always up for a recommendation, and feel compelled to read all books which come my way from cover to cover. So I gave this one a go.

The Silent Woman by Catherine Cookson is a story which spans many years. A dishevelled woman shows up at a London solicitors firm and is revealled to be a woman who disappeared from a wealthy family almost thirty years ago. What follows is a look into her life during those missing years the friends she made during that time.

This was my first time ever reading a Catherine Cookson book. She's one of those authors that you always hear about but I've never bothered picking up one of her books until this one crossed my shelf. This is apparently her last novel. I liked the main bulk of the story which dealt with Irene's life at Bella's house, but I kind of felt like the beginning and end took away from the rest of the story. I think I might have been happier if we'd never truly found out who Irene was.

Honestly, I liked the character of Bella best. It sort of felt like her story at points. She was definitely more interesting than most of the other characters. Then again, it was interesting how Cookson built up the character of Irene/Reenee when she barely spoke. In a way that was why Bella was the best character, because you needed her to be Reenee's voice.

I think you get a good sense of the time period that this story is set in. My understanding is that Cookson is good at this time period setting; I love books where you can really feel the era they're set.

I didn't like the way that all the characters ended up getting together at the end. It just comes across as a little unnecessary and convenient. They were all living in the big house and its grounds which just felt a little unrealistic. Given the tone of the rest of the book, I think it needed a rather more sober ending.

Book 73 was for Week 42 of the Reading Challenge, a graphic novel. A friend had offered to lend me a graphic novel but it wasn't available in time so I improvised with a novel which has a lot of pictures, Dinotopia written and illustrated by James Gurney.

This is a truly beautiful book (which I received as an 8th birthday present from my grandparents), about a man and his son who find themselves shipwrecked on a strange island where humans and dinosaurs live together in (relative) harmony. You may be familiar with it from the awful TV series that was on Sky some years ago. The book is better.

Seriously, look at this:

I think when a book is filled with pictures like this, it definitely counts as a graphic novel. I honestly spent as much time examining the pictures as I did reading the text.

I've never actually realised that this book is the first in a series. It never dawned on me that it ended so abruptly because there was another book to follow it. I really want to get my hands on the rest of the series, but I guess unless I stumble across any of them in a charity shop, that's not likely to happen any time soon. I would love it if they could just release all of them in a single volume edition. I would treasure it as much as my illustrated The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

I'd love to know more about Dinotopian culture, language and the way of life. It's such a richly imagined world that I'm sure it's covered in the later books.

And like I said before, it's just beautiful.

Books 70 & 71 of 2015: The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger & The Tiny Wife by Andrew Kaufman

I like that there's kind of a theme in the books I'm reviewing this week. That was completely unintentional when I read them and I never even noticed it until now!

Both books were read for last year's reading challenge, The Time Traveler's Wife (how I long to include that extra 'l') by Audrey Niffenegger was for Week 40, a book that makes you cry.

Henry and Clare are a couple who meet when Henry is in his thirties and when Clare is a child. They get married many years later when both are in their twenties. This happens because Henry is a time traveler, as far as he knows the only one of his kind. It's kind of a medical condition which leads to his displacement in time and space and in this book the pair tell the story of how it shapes their lives.

And it is beautiful.

And it is guaranteed to make me cry.

So when there was a question of which book I would pick for this week's challenge there was really no choice.

This copy is the one which I sent around a book tree I took part in many years ago. Unfortunately my original copy got lost somewhere along the way so I only have comments from a handful of readers in it, but I'm harbouring a secret desire to send it on to some other people in the future for them to read and add notes to before sending it back to me.

I've read it at least once since I got it back but this time I read the whole book with pen in hand, adding my own thoughts and notes to those left by the last readers. I like that it's kind of made it into a scrapbook of my thoughts as I've read. I'd kind of like to get a tatty film copy of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit to do the same thing in those.

I love this book so much and when I read it back at the start of October last year it'd been a while since I last read it (I suspect it was probably back when I first received it back from the book tree). There were whole chunks of the story which had just slipped completely out of my head.

As with all books that you read time and time again, you can't help but relate to different bits at different times of your life. I think when I first read it in my early twenties I was relating more to Henry's feeling of constant displacement. This time I couldn't help but identify with Clare during her attempts to have Henry's baby. Reading it when I did, several months after our full fresh IVF cycle and as we geared up for our first frozen cycle, there were several parts where it felt so familiar it hurt. I expect I'll get that feeling again on future reads.

Once again, this book set me off crying at the end, as well as making me weepy earlier in it as well. I had been taking it in to work to read in my breaks but knowing what was coming I ended up staying up far too late to finish the book. The alternative would've been finishing it in the canteen at work where I would've broken down into snotty tears. I'm glad I lost a bit of sleep rather than doing that.

After the emotional pummelling I got from The Time Traveller's Wife, I knew I wanted something a little lighter going for my book with magic in Week 41. I'd been tempted to go for one of the children's books on my shelf, or perhaps throw caution to the wind and begin another reread of the Discworld books.

As luck would have it, Andrew Kaufman's The Tiny Wife was next on my bookshelf to read, and it fit the bill perfectly.

This tiny book, illustrated by Tom Percival, tells the story of the people who are involved in a very strange bank robbery. Whilst waiting in line at the bank, a thief charges in and demands that everyone there give him the most valuable thing in their possession. He doesn't want money or diamonds or posh watches; he wants family photos, a calculator, a payslip. And from that moment on strange things begin happening to the people he stole from; a woman's tattoo comes to life and tries to eat her, a woman finds that she is made of candy, and Stacey Hinterland begins to shrink.

I love books in the magic realism genre so I figured this would suit pretty well for my book with magic in it. It was doubly perfect because it clocks in at only 88 pages so it's nice and easy to read in an evening before bed.

The beauty of magic realism is that it's a little like fairy stories for grown ups. You are reminded of a time when all these magic things could actually happen, except in books they can still happen. As I was reading it, I kept on thinking of people who would enjoy this (Mum, you would like this).

It was also the perfect follow up to The Time Traveler's Wife. Both have their fantastical elements. I could almost imagine them both happening in the same world, after all, if you can have a man who travels through time and space, why not have a thief who can steal stuff which makes babies poop money.

Random aside, the description of the thief made me think of Gavin from The Boat That Rocked:

Mainly because he's described as wearing a flamboyant purple hat so this is automatically how I pictured him. But you can also see the similarities here:

I do kind of wish we knew a little more about the thief. How did he do the things he did? Why did he do them? Where did he come from? What did he do next? What happened to everyone else after the book ended? But it's one of those things that you just have to accept that you'll never know, the speculation is half the fun.

The book could honestly have gone on a lot longer because it did mention similar things happening in other places. I loved reading about all the weird and wonderful things that happened in the book, so I'd have loved for it to be more than 88 pages so I could find out about all the other people as well.

As of now I've not actually read anything else by this author, but I'd really like to. There were moments where The Tiny Wife reminded me of Neil Gaiman, which is never a bad thing. The world could always use a little more magic in it.

Book 68 & 69 of 2015: The Children of Hurin by J.R.R. Tolkien & The Yellow Wall-Paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

My first book review is pretty apt considering I'm planning to read a Tolkien book next (just as soon as I'm finished reading the three Pottermore mini-ebooks).

Back at the end of last September I cracked open my copy of The Children of Hurin for a reread, opting for my paperback version rather than the hardback for easy portability.

This is the expanded version of a story from The Silmarillion. Hurin is taken by Morgoth who then exerts is influence over Hurin's son and daughter, Turin Turambar and Nienor. Separated as children, doom seems to follow them wherever they go and even when they are unknowingly reunited they cannot find happiness.

When I started this book I was literally just starting a new role at work and that, combined with a hospital trip, slowed me down a little, but I made a fast start to it. I find this one a much easier read that The Silmarillion, but that doesn't stop it from being a wee bit heavy going in places and I couldn't help but feel just a smidgen too tired for it that week.

Honestly I felt really sorry for Nienor and Turin in this story. Turin made some bad decisions, but so did pretty much everyone else and at the end of the day all the bad things that happened to them were because of the 'fate' that was preordained for them by Morgoth. I suspect that even if they had done things differently, the outcome would have been just as miserable for them.

In the months prior to picking up The Children of Hurin I'd read The Simarillion and Unfinished Tales but I was glad that I'd had a reasonable break between them and picking up this book because this story features in both of the other books. It was still familiar to me, but it saved me from feeling as though it was repetitive.

I followed this up with The Yellow Wall-Paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman which was one of the books in the Penguin Little Black Classics series.

This is actually three short stories; 'Old Water', 'The Yellow Wall-Paper' and 'The Rocking Chair'. The title story is about a woman who is sent to the country to rest as she is unhappy with motherhood and her marriage, whilst confined to her room she gradually becomes increasingly obsessed with the yellow wallpaper in her room.

I did enjoy these stories. There was something delightfully creepy about them; particularly in 'The Yellow Wall-Paper' when I couldn't quite decide whether there was actually something going on in the room or if the narrator was experiencing some sort of breakdown. Personally 'Old Water' was my favourite for its dark sense of humour at the end. 'The Yellow Wall-Paper' was the weirdest of the three and 'The Rocking Chair' was just spooky.

I don't think that I've ever read anything by Charlotte Perkins Gilman before but based on these three short stories I definitely would read more by her in the future.

During the Weekly Challenge I tried to start and finish books within a week and this was my 39th Week's book (a book with a colour in the title). I'm glad I went with this rather than my original choice (The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear) because I was running a little behind on my target and this short read (only 57 pages) gave me a chance to get caught up.

Books 64 & 65 of 2015: Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro & The Dwarves by Markus Heitz

Before I start reviewing books, can we please just take a moment to celebrate the fact that this blog post celebrates a small landmark?

The official finishing of the Black and Red notebook I got for free from work, and the moving on to my snazzy emerald Leuchtturm lined notebook which I bought with some winnings from a sweepstake at work. Despite actually finishing the notebook last September, I wasn't actually officially able to retire it (read: label it and move it onto my bookshelf with my other books) because I was still using it for these blog posts. Until now... or rather, last week. Whatever.

You're probably here for the book review, not the inane waffling about which notebook I'm writing my book reviews in, right? Side note: if you blog about which notebook you write your book reviews in, share the link in the comments, I would read the heck out of that post!

Firstly there was the book I read for Week 36 of the reading challenge; a book with a love triangle. For that one I selected Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.

This is set in a sort of alternative version of Britain where cloning has been perfected. These clones are raised to donate their organs to the people who need them and the story follows Kathy, Tommy and Ruth, beginning in their school years where they attend a rural boarding school as we, and they, gradually learn what waits in store for them in their adult years.

I first read this book as part of a 'book tree' many years ago. I immediately fell in love. I don't remember right now, without checking my notes, just how quickly I read it, but it didn't take me long. I devoured it. I kept on looking out for a copy of my own and in the end I wanted it so badly that I put aside my book snobbishness and went ahead to get the movie cover copy in a charity shop.

I still love this book but it does kind of frustrate me too. But in a good way. In the same way that Harry Potter frustrates me. Because I love the world that has been created here and I would like to know more about it, but all you have is what's given to you in the pages of this book. It doesn't stop me from wondering how the donor system works, what the other homes are like and how the world reached this point, but it frustrates me that I'll never really know.

The way that the story is told is really clever. You get little dribs and drabs of information which gradually build everything up. I've seen the film a couple of times and read the book a couple of times too and now I know how everything goes together. Back when I read it for the first time this approach made me feel like I had to know everything right now! And that's what made me get through it so quickly.

I also like the way that Kathy narrates the story. It's like she's speaking to another carer, donor or guardian, which is why she doesn't need to explain everything, because she expects them to already know. This adds to my feeling of wanting to reach into the book and ask her tell me more because I don't know all of these things.

At the same time, I can kind of relate to Kathy and the way that she sees the world. The way that she sees the world is not dissimilar to the way I view the world. That makes me like her a lot.

This reread (back at the beginning of September last year) made me want to watch the film again. As of this point (almost exactly a year later), I'm still yet to do that. I really must pick up a copy of it someplace. I'm fairly certain that the film stayed close to the book but I feel like a rewatch (and after all this time, perhaps another reread) to be sure.

One of my other minor issues that aren't really an issue with this book is the way it ends. It just ends. It's perfect for the story, of course, it just doesn't help me much with all my unanswered questions.

I follows up Never Let Me Go with a book which took me F.O.R.E.V.E.R. to read.

The Dwarves by Markus Heitz is this massive, high fantasy tome which is about warring factions of a race of Dwarves. There's something about electing a new leader and the main character, Tungdil, was abandoned as a child, raised by humans and isn't really sure where he fits in. Honestly, most of the time, I wasn't really sure what was going on in this book.

It was lent to me by a colleague at work who knew I was a big Lord of the Rings fan and I guess had read and enjoyed this. Or he was playing a cruel prank on me.

Dwarves aren't really my favourite of the races in Tolkien's works (though I'm not entirely sure why, I guess mainly because they don't come across as very likeable in The Silmarillion and in The Hobbit they're largely interchangeable) and I think they're severely underrepresented in fantasy fiction. You can't throw a stone without hitting an Elf or a Half-Elven creature, but this is the only book I've ever seen where Dwarves are the protagonists.

And these guys are Dwarves in the Tolkien sense of the word; none of your Disney Dwarfs here, thank you.

I really did want to enjoy it because I thought it would fill a gap left by The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. I wanted to see someone else's take on the lifestyle and culture of the Dwarves. It really didn't live up to my expectations though.

It did have a few nods to Tolkien though, such as this:

Both sides of the alley were crammed with timber houses whose upper stories jutted out dangerously, almost meeting overhead. The uneven cobblestones never saw daylight. All in all, it wasn't dissimilar to an underground gallery, except for the stench of sewage and detritus. Mounted on one of the bulging walls was a sign showing a prancing pony; they had found their address.

Not a 'pony rearing on its hind legs' or anything like that. We can see what you did there Mr Heitz.

The book seemed to go on for an awfully long time without much happening. It was very much written in a 'tell, don't show' style. So you knew why people were doing what they were doing (to a degree) but you couldn't say what they looked like, what the places they inhabited were like, or how their outward emotions were covering their inward ones. Perhaps this is a side effect from it being translated from German. Who knows.

It probably seems like a bit of a petty complaint as well, but the names of the Dwarves and other characters didn't really tell you anything about the race they belonged to. I guess I've been spoiled by Tolkien where you know that Rory Burrows is likely to be a Hobbit, Shagrat is definitely an Orc and Thranduil has a definite Elven feel to his name. As I regularly forgot who characters were, it would've been useful to be able to use their names as a bit of a reminder so I knew at least which race they belonged to.

On the whole there were a lot of cliches and an overwhelming sense that I was reading a video game. A video game populated by an awful lot of fantastic conveniences.

It's the first in a book series and it took me eleven days to slog through it. I'm in now kind of a hurry to try the next one.

Books 52 & 55 of 2015: Her Majesty's Wizard by Christopher Stasheff & The Awakening and Selected Short Stories by Kate Chopin

Wow, it's been a while since I wrote a book review. Not counting Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, of course.

Both of today's books were Reading Challenge books; the first, Her Majesty's Wizard by Christopher Stasheff was picked for Week 29, a book published the year you were born.

In this story, an average guy stumbles across a mysterious text which, upon reading it, transports him to a strange new world. He then discovers that his ability to quote verse, and make it up on the spot, endows him with certain magical powers. It's not long before he finds himself the wizard to a young royal and swept up in an epic quest.

I picked this book for two reasons, firstly, it was published the year I was born, and secondly, it was cheaper than Howl's Moving Castle (which was my initial choice for a book published in 1986). The premise appealed to me and there was something about the cover which reminded me of the Robert Asprin Myth books.

On the whole, I liked the premise. I enjoy books where someone finds themselves out of time or out of their world. And I enjoy poetry, so I liked the idea of it being a way to create spells in this world that Matt gets transported to.

The beginning was good as it established the character of Matt and then threw him into a strange new place. It was fun seeing him discover his powers, meet a dragon and adopt his new role.

But then it sort of got long and drawn out.

It was essentially parodying the epic fantasy format, but I couldn't help but lose interest as they went from one situation to another until Matt figured out the right way to word things to get them out again.

I also didn't really appreciate the way that women were described. I'm guessing that part of it was to highlight Matt's character, but the focus was always on women's busts whereas I didn't know what the other characters looked like.

It was a pretty good book to start with, but towards the end my interest was dwindling and I'm not planning on reading the others in the series any time soon.

The book I read for Week 31, a book with bad reviews, was Kate Chopin's The Awakening and Selected Short Stories. Chosen because it was available as a free ebook and which seemed the most appealing when I ran through a list of books which had bad reviews on publication.

'The Awakening' has a strong feminist message, with a housewife becoming a liberated woman; hence the bad reviews in the late 1890s. The other stories address themes such as racial prejudice.

Initially I found 'The Awakening' slow to start. I'd not really read much about it aside from the fact that the story got bad reviews, so I didn't really know what to expect. After a while I got into it and I did quite enjoy it.

It's the sort of story that I could imagine studying in English class at school so it didn't come as a huge surprise to see that it cropped up on some syllabuses. As I was reading it, I felt like I should be taking notes for an essay on feminism.

As I said above, I didn't read too much about it before I started, so I didn't know when it was published. Once I'd started reading it I had it pegged at around the 1910s or 1920s. It was quite the surprise to learn it was from 1899. Definitely ahead of its time!

My favourite story in the collection was 'Desiree's Baby' which was set in Louisiana. A woman, Desiree, who was abandoned as a baby marries a man named Armand and together they have a baby. And the baby turns out to be mixed race, which Armand is not happy about and throws Desiree out, only for there to be a twist at the end of the tale.

After I finished this, my Kindle recommended that I might like to read The Yellow Wallpaper, which was a convenient suggestion because I had picked it up as one of the Penguin Little Black Classics, so read it shortly afterwards.

Books 49 & 50 of 2015: Locked Rooms by Laurie R. King & The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud by Ben Sherwood

Locked Rooms by Laurie R. King is the third book in the Mary Russell series; a series of books which look at Sherlock Holmes's life after he retires to Sussex. The previous two books saw Mary meeting and falling for Sherlock, then marrying him and along the way they become embroiled in solving crimes. This book sees Mary and Sherlock heading to San Francisco and trying to unravel some of Mary's mysterious past.

I have to admit that I liked this book a lot more than the first two in the series. I felt as though the first book could've been a lot shorter and the second one, while better, again took a very long time for things to happen. I got into this book a lot quicker and then whizzed through it in less than a week.

There was a mix of point-of-views in this book. Parts of it were written in first-person point-of-view which focused on Mary Russell but others were written from third-person perspective. The third-person sections were my favourite, perhaps because, despite liking this book more than the previous two, I still don't like Mary Russell as much as I'm probably supposed to.

One thing that I did really like about this book was the setting. I liked seeing Sherlock Holmes in a new setting. The San Francisco earthquake had cropped up in something else I'd read or watched about the time I read this so it prompted me to look up the quake and subsequent fire online after I'd read it. I liked how the mystery gradually unravelled in this one as well.

I'm not sure I'll be picking up the next one in this series any time soon, but this one did make me feel slightly more inclined to pick up the next one than the last two did.

I followed up Locked Rooms with another Reading Challenge book, this Week 28: A book with antonyms in the title. In an effort to read books on my bookshelf that I hadn't read before, I selected The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud by Ben Sherwood. It's one which I picked up in a book giveaway at work and yet never actually managed to get around to reading.

It's the story of Charlie St. Cloud, a guy who died for a short time as a teenager in the car accident which killed his brother. Since then he's been unable to move on, not least because he can now see the dead people inhabiting the local cemetery where he works. And one of those dead people is his little brother. Meanwhile, Tess is getting ready for a sailing trip but after some unexpected bad weather, suddenly Charlie seems to be the only one who can see her.

Warning: here be spoilers!

I really wasn't sure what to expect from this one but I did really enjoy it. In a way it kind of reminded me of The Frighteners but without all the scary stuff. Where I can, I try to go into a book without any expectations, so that everything is a surprise. I was really grateful that I went into the book without any expectations. In this case it was the magic realism aspect which came as a pleasant surprise; I love magic realism.

I guessed pretty early on that Tess would be near death when she met Charlie. I couldn't help but think that it was fairly obvious which direction the story was going to go in, but that didn't stop me from enjoying the journey along the way. It had a nice framing device as well, with the narration from Florio at both the beginning and end.

And it had a happy ending which made me happy too.

Since then I've not seen anything else by Ben Sherwood, but if I happen across any more of his books, I'll be sure to pick one up.

Books 47 & 48 of 2015: Vet Behind The Ears by Christopher Timothy & How a Ghastly Story Was Brought to Light... by Johann Peter Hebel

This week I'm review two pretty short books, both of which I was able to read in a single day and both of which were selected for the 2015 Reading Challenge.

First up is Vet Behind The Ears by Christopher Timothy, the star of TV series 'All Creatures Great and Small'. This book was selected for Week 26: A memoir; it recounts his time in the TV series beginning with getting the role and going through some of the ups and downs of filming.

As I mentioned above, this wasn't a long read (I'll admit, this was part of my reason for choosing it, I'd fallen a little behind on my challenge reads and was keen to find a few books to get me back on track). It clocks in at about 128 pages and I happened upon it by chance in a charity shop some time ago.

This was an interesting book and I enjoyed learning more about Christopher Timothy, who is pretty much the person that I picture when I think of James Herriot, thanks to the TV series. When I was reading the James Herriot books, it was Timothy who I was picturing in my head as I read. It was also nice to hear about the making of All Creatures Great and Small, especially as I've been to the James Herriot Experience in Thirsk and been able to see the sets described in the book.

I did find that the narrative jumped around a little, so you'd be reading about one thing and then the next minute it had moved on to something else before going back again. It was a little jarring at times but didn't make the book unreadable.

Personally, I would have liked a few more anecdotes about the making of the TV series. It began going right back to Timothy's childhood and then hurried forward to the series. I'd have liked to read the usual things you get in these books; funny stories from set, near disasters, changes which had to be made and the like. It's not that you didn't get them, there just weren't quite enough for my liking.

I'd definitely recommend this one to anyone who's a fan of the TV series. If you've only ever read the James Herriot books, wait to read this one until you've seen the show.

I followed up Vet Behind the Ears with one of the books from the Penguin Little Black Classics collection, the rather lengthily titled How a Ghastly Story Was Brought to Light by a Common or Garden Butcher's Dog (which certainly qualifies as the longest titled book I read last year). This is by Johann Peter Hebel and was originally published in 1811.

This was my selection for Week 27 of the Reading Challenge: A book you can finish in a day. It's not one I'd read before but I knew that at 55 pages, I'd not have any trouble steaming through it. If I'd had a chance to pick up a copy I probably would've gone for Esio Tror by Roald Dahl, which I used to read in one go any night that I couldn't get to sleep as a child.

It's a little collection of very short stories which deal mostly with criminals, fraudsters, murder and disaster and honestly I think it is probably my favourite 'little black classic' so far. Of the whole book I had two favourites 'One Word Leads To Another' and 'The Lightest Death Sentence' though I won't elaborate on them here because they're really not long and I don't want to spoil them for future readers.

I felt like this was the perfect format for these short books; they seem really well suited to these little collections of short stories. And some of them were very short, not more than a page or two. But it worked well and you felt like you were getting a nice mix of stories in a compact little book.

My one complaint with this book, which I understand is entirely due to its age and the time when it was originally written, is the anti-Jewish sentiment in several of the stories. On the whole the stories are enjoyable and they usually come bundled with some sort of moral lesson for the reader.

Books 45 & 46 of 2015: Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett & Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Getting on for about a year ago now, Pempi @ Pempi's Palace heard that I hadn't read Terry Pratchett's Raising Steam and offered to send me a copy. I held on to it until we started on the IVF because I figured that a little Terry Pratchett would help get me through the long hours of appointments, travelling and waiting.

Raising Steam is the fortieth Discworld book which returns to Moist von Lipwig's story arc. Having turned the Post Office into a roaring success, securing a formidable portion of the Disc's communication network through his relationship with Adora Belle Dearheart, and coining the Ankh-Morpork Mint, von Lipwig's got a new project; now there's a new invention on the Disc and he's responsible for getting it all on track.

I took a lot longer to get through this book than I ordinarily would for a Terry Pratchett book though that had nothing to do with the book and everything to do with all the IVF stuff. I was reading this book through egg retrieval and embryo transfer so I quite often found my mind wandering when I was trying to read it. And during that my Mum and stepdad came to visit so I was preoccupied with them too.

I did kind of struggle with it and didn't enjoy it quite as much as I wanted to. I think that this was for a number of reasons. One was because I found it hard to focus on the story with all of the other big important things going on around me. That might explain the other reason why I struggled with it; I found it a little disjointed and didn't always feel like I followed what was going on, but again, that could have been due to the fact I kept picking it up and putting it down.

After reading Going Postal I felt in love with the character of Moist von Lipwig and I was thrilled that he got his own story arc (I'm still a little sad that the girls from Monstrous Regiment never got a further arc of their own). This book also has Vimes in it, who is another of my favourite Discworld characters, I loved that they get a final outing in this book.

I just couldn't help but feel sad as I was reading, realising that Terry Pratchett is gone and there won't be any more books. I still have The Shepherd's Crown to read but I'm sort of putting it off as long as I can because the longer I wait, the longer it is until it all has to end. I feel like there are just so many more stories that Discworld had to tell.

I followed up Raising Steam with Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy for my Reading Challenge. This was for Week 25: A book you should've read in school. Technically this is a book that I started reading at school but then set aside and never returned to after my English teacher died.

Tess is the oldest daughter of the poverty stricken Durbeyfield family, who is sent out by her mother to meet with her 'cousin' Alec d'Urberville. She leaves the d'Urberville home in shame and delivers a short-lived illegitimate son, ultimately leaving home and falling in love with Angel Clare. For Tess, however, she seems destined to live a tragic life.

Warning: Here be spoilers!

When I read this the first time I made it a lot further through than I remembered. I kept on finished chapters thinking 'right, this is where I got to last time', then I'd read another chapter or two and realise that there was another one I'd read. I remember finding it a bit of a slow read last time, though it was a beautiful edition (this time I was reading it on the Kindle). I found it a surprisingly quick read, getting through it in well under a week.

I did enjoy this book, until the end. Tess killing d'Urberville was really strange and unexpected for me. I actually ended up reading that bit late at night and going back and reading it again to double check that I hadn't misunderstood what had happened. After all the bad things that happened to Tess, I was really hoping for a happier ending. On the other hand, the fact that I got so involved in the book, that I felt that way, shows how much I enjoyed it.

I really felt for Tess. Both Alec and Angel both did a serious number on her. She was a poor, naive young woman who was trying to do what her family wanted her to but who ended up in a situation outwith her control. I realise that it's reflective of the time period when it was written, but it still made me angry that she could end up in the situations she did and it was still seen as her fault. Stupid men.

I've heard people complain about Thomas Hardy's style of writing, but I really liked it. I'm definitely going to try more Hardy in the future, I've got at least two more books on my Kindle waiting to be read.