A Bit About Britain's History by Mike Biles and Clanlands by Heughan and McTavish

Starting with the best book first we have A Bit About Britain's History by Mike Biles. It seemed appropriate to use my favorite and treasured bookmark I picked up at Cheddar Gorge back in 1999. 

This isn't a comprehensive history book yet richly detailed to keep your interest.  The writing isn't dry as one might think when conjuring up ideas of our school history tomes. The delivery of the historical information is very engaging and the humor kept me turning the pages. The time periods are broken down in eight chapters starting with ancient Britain, early medieval, Tudors, Stuarts running to the modern history.  

I loved reading about the Romans and the timeline at the end of the book breaks things down, sort of a basic crash course on which period you may want to explore more.  I learned more about Britain's history and the development of government from this book and found subjects I want to know more about. Why couldn't history classes in school/college be this delightful?!

If you have a history buff or Anglophile in your family this would make a dynamite gift for birthday or Christmas.  Mike Biles has a wonderful and informative blog as well called A Bit About Britain.

 

I enjoyed this book so much that I ordered another of Mike Biles' books.  This time I selected a Kindle version. My paper copy of the history is littered with post-it bookmarks for reference.  As soon as I have access to internet again (sigh) I will download and enjoy the holidays and high days book.

 

 

Clanlands by Sam Heughen and Graham McTavish

This book starts off quite funny but it wore thin for me after several chapters. What I expected was a history and virtual tour of important Scottish sites such as Glencoe, Inverness and Culloden as well as educating me about Scotland.  Heughan and McTavish are friends having worked on the Outlander television series together for many years. This relationship is a bromance and it certainly shows in the writing.

While it was amusing to hear Sam call Graham Lady McTavish and crack on him about how much he eats and his love of latte, likewise reading how Graham cracks on Sam about his whisky comsumption and his brand he sells, the number of times he goes shirtless, etc....after a while you want to say...C'mon guys....

I enjoyed the Outlander books but didn't love the television series.  I have a feeling this book grabbed the attention of the TV fans and I would probably give the series Men in Kilts a try.....but this book couldn't keep my attention.

Sharing with Joy for British Isles Friday and Shellyrae at Book'd Out for her Nonfiction  Challenge.

Genre/category: Travel (for Clanlands)

 

The Nonfiction Reader Challenge hosted by Shelleyrae at Book'd Out.  Check out the sign up post and info HERE. The challenge runs from January 1 through December 31, 2021. You can join in anytime!

The Heirloom Garden by Viola Shipman

 

If you enjoy books which feature gardens and flowers, you will enjoy this book.  This is a nerdy thing I like, flowers and  gardens and people who have a career taking care of great inspiring gardens. I do not possess the green thumb to succeed in a career at a botanical garden or a National Trust English garden, yet I admire the beauty of these creations.

Our main characters in this story are Iris Maynard and her tenent Abby.  Both women had husbands in the military and while Iris lost hers in WW II, Abby has her husband home but scarred by PTSD. 

Iris has a garden of flowers she has developed by cross breeding.  Most of her flowers came from the clippings her grandmother had growing in her garden next door.  Hence the title Heirloom Garden. There are some chapters dedicated to Iris in the 1940's when she was a young mother working at a Victory garden.  Hers is a sad story of loss - not only her husband but her young daughter Mary.

In present day Iris has rented her grandmother's home (next door to her) to a military family.  Abby is the bread winner working as a chemical engineer.  Her husband Cory is hanging on by a thread after being injured in Iraq and losing friends during a bombing. They have a young daughter named Lily.

Iris choses to remain hidden behind her tall fences and live with her flowers.  She doesn't want interaction but as the story unfolds, she is gradually drawn to this struggling family next door. They help heal each other.  This is a such a nice story and the background of the setting on the Michigan shore is well detailed.  You get wonderful mental images of the neighborhood, the sand dunes and water.

A surprise to me is the author is a male. The name Viola Shipman brings me images of a older woman and this is womens' fiction.  The emotional interchanges are very well captured.  I would definitely read more by this author.  

Cook, Eat, Repeat by Nigella Lawson

 I am a huge fan of Nigella Lawson and love her cookbooks.  Some more than others and I was anxious to get a copy of her latest cookbook.  Thanks to an advanced readers copy I was able to peruse her recipes and memoir style writing in Cook, Eat, Repeat.

This is a photo from the book, not my creation.  Sadly I never get the photogenic shots to do it justice.

Nigella writes about starting this book in one world and finishing in another. We all remember what it was like pre-pandemic and how things were different.  This book was produced with a foot in both worlds.

She speaks aboout self-isolation and wonders when we may dine with friends again, learning from the lockdown and daily ways to find pleasure.  She speaks about lasagna and says don't limit it to "occasions' and we ceratinly do not do that in our home.  Doug and I have it whenever we want, but mostly when the weather deems we need a hearty rib sticking meal.

There are many good recipes in this book and I of course gravitated to the chicken with orzo and lemon. My favorite flavors and ingredients...

For vegetarinan fare there are loads of recipes such as spiced bulger wheat with roasted veggies, Vegan polenta cake, Tuscan bean soup and more.

Publication date is 15 June 2021. 

Genre: Biographies and Memoirs; Cooking, Food and Wine; nonfiction

Much thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.  I was not compensated for my review and opinions are mine.

Sharing with Joy's Book blog for British Isles Friday 

The Letter by Ruth Saberton

 

This book has been on my Kindle for some time and I finally decided to give it a chance.  The setting is Cornwall and that was probably the biggest selling point for me when I purchased it.  There are two story lines here, one set in current  times and the other a romantic mystery set in 1914.

First we meet Chloe Pencarrow, a widow of two years who has moved from London to Cornwall, hoping to get away from the constant memories of her deceased husband Neil.  It's well established that Chloe is still deeply grieving for her husband who died from cancer at age 32.  

Chloe is an artist and teacher but she has put her love to paint on hold these past two years.  When she moves to Cornwall and away from looks of pity and unsolicited advice from her mother she finally has a chance to breathe.

Matthew  Enys is a historian and huge fan of the Cornwall poet Christopher "Kit" Rivers. Matt is doing restoration work at Rosecraddick manor, trying to salvage a part of Kit's life and perhaps bring his poetry to the attention and distinction of other famous war poets.  Kit's image is imortalized in a stain glassed window in the church.  Little is known about his life other than he was heir to a Rosecraddick manor and surrounding lands, a very upper class family yet a very down to earth young man. 

Chloe, with her eye for artistic detail, notices a daisy in the stained glass, something so glaringly out of place that it has to represent something very important about Kit. As she helps Matthew go through old documments and treasures she accidently stumbles upon a great clue.  In her rental there is an old floorboard which was a hiding place.  Chloe pries it up and finds a diary and letters in an old biscuit tin.  At this point in the novel we land in 1914 before the first world war.

The story of Daisy and Kit 

It's 1914. A young woman named Daisy was sent to Cornwall for health reasons.  She was visiting her godfather in Cornwall when she and Kit meet unexpectantly at the beach. They end up getting better acquainted, have a whirlwind romance and their dedication to one another was almost too much.

They keep their relationship secret, planning on spending their lives together once Kit can speak to his class conscious parents. When the war begins Kit does what every young man did then, he enlists. It was necessary to overdo the romantic dedication here, in my opinion, so you can keenly feel the loss of young women who lose their fiances and husbands. The novel then leaps back to the present day and you can see the mystery of Kit and Daisy from an entirely new perspective.

This book addresses PTSD and the consequences for those who are battle scarred physically and mentally. It addresses grieving from the families in the 1914 era and also Chloe's grief over losing her husband to cancer at a young age.

I would certainly read more by this author and I found the book very engaging.

Sharing with Joy's Book blog for British Isles Friday and Marg at The Intrepid Reader for the 2021 Historical Ficion Challenge.

The Olive Farm by Carol Drinkwater

I am revisiting a great book by Carol Drinkwater as I've started one of her other books in this series.  Expatriates-in-paradise genre – One of my favorites!

I have long been a fan of Irish actress Carol Drinkwater. She was my favorite Helen in the series All Creatures Great and Small, a series I very much enjoyed.  That’s where we got our son’s name, from the character Tristan Farnon.  She left that series in 1985.

When I read the books, after seeing some of the BBC television shows, it was her voice I heard when Helen was speaking.

When Carol wrote The Olive Farm  I was delighted to learn it would be a trilogy. Combining a favorite genre (expat-lit genre) with Drinkwater’s writing style makes for a winning combo. This is the first book in her bestselling trilogy, all of it set on her Provencal olive farm.

Carol met her husband Michel while they were involved in making a movie in Australia . He proposed to her on the first date and they married four years later.  Eventually they bought this gorgeous ruin of a villa built in 1904, located in Provence . The villa is named Appassionata – meaning passion – and very appropriate for Carol and Michel as they fall heels over ears in love with the place.

“I am in the south of France , gazing at the not-so-distant Mediterranean , falling in love with an abandoned olive farm,” Carol Drinkwater writes. “The property, once stylish and now little better than a ruin, is for sale with ten acres of land.”

After investing all the money she has they are able to move into their new home, devoid of electricity and water. French law is a different animal altogether from British and American laws as Carol learns while sifting through the endless paperwork and awaiting the many appointments to sign one or two papers. Finally, Appassionata is theirs!

Carol, Michel and his teen daughters Clarice and Vanessa arrive one extremely hot afternoon, with the promise of a swim in the pool. Alas….no water and the pool is a pit of sticks and branches. Carol struggles to make it a positive experience and tries to speak her limited French to the girls. The stepdaughters can speak English but make Carol work at communicating. Eventually they become a close knit family….. along with a number of stray dogs and good friends among the local citizenry.

The experiences she writes about were fascinating to me and she clearly has a better work ethic than I do. Restoring an old villa like that is hard work. HARD work! They uncovered ancient Roman looking steps and tiles. They found some of their olive trees were over 500 years old…..it’s an expat’s dream IF you don’t mind hard work – both physically and culturally.

Carol took language classes to improve her French, quickly becoming fluent. An engaging book about France , olive harvesting, conquering cultural barriers and love. Above all…love.

If you like the works of Peter Mayle and Frances Mayes I feel certain you would enjoy Carol’s musings about Appasionata and her love of southern France .

To learn more, check out the links below:

Carol Drinkwater
Home Hunts
It Shouldn’t Happen to an Olive Farmer!

Food: Caponata and Tahini Hummus on toasted baguette

The inspired dishes from this book include eggplants, caponata and tapenade. The little bites of appetizers you might enjoy sitting in the shade of Carol Drinkwater’s patio, the hot breeze licking your cheek as you sip an ice cold glass of white wine and nibble bruschetta.

Eggplants from the southern Mediterranean area would have a different taste from what I can lay hands on in Northern Florida but….still a wonderful treat.

An Irish woman starring in a BBC production landing in France.  Very International.

Linking up with Shelleyrae at Book'd Out for the Nonfiction challenge. Genre: Travel

I will be posting about Carol's other books verry soon.

Nonfiction Reader Challenge hosted by Shelleyrae at Book'd Out.  Check out the sign up post and info HERE.

 

In Times of Rain and War by Camron Wright

 

This is a historical fiction set in London during WW II. Our main characters are Wesley Bowers and  Audrey Stocking.  Wesley is an American Marine who is assigned to the British military learning about unexploded bomb disposal. 

Audrey has her secrets; she is a German Jew who is living in London using a false identification. She meets Wesley when he's sent to defuse a bomb.  Audrey is trying to blend in and survive all the while missing her family in Germany. She and Wesley form a friendship and develop an attraction to one another but their relationship may never have chance to develop. Wesley's chance of surviving his bomb disposal detail  is an average of 10 weeks. Audrey is hiding her identity but military intelligence officers may discover her.

It's harrowing to think of the life expectancy of the soldiers who performed these duties. Such self sacrifice and bravery, much to be admired. This novel addresses PTSD and what war can do you  emotionally as well as physically. 

As a side note, if you ever get an opportunity to watch a Masterpiece Theater program called Danger: UXB starring Anthony Andrews, it's very good. There is a more up to date movie about bomb disposal called The Hurt Locker and both can have you on edge during the crucial bomb defusing scenes.

Publication date is 6 April 2021 by Shadow Mountain Publishing.  Genre: Historical Fiction.

Much thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.  I was not compensated for my review and opinions are mine.

Sharing with Joy's Book blog for British Isles Friday and Marg at The Intrepid Reader for the 2021 Historical Ficion Challenge.

House of Correction by Nicci French

 

The setting is Okeham England, a little coastal village where Tabitha Hardy lived as a child.  She returned to start life anew, buying a fixer upper and hoped to put her dreadful past behind her.

This starts out with Tabitha arrested and jailed for murder.  She doesn't think she's done it but she has memory losses. The evidence points to her as a body was found in her shed and she is covered in blood. 

The dead man is Stuart Rees and he sexually abused her when she was fifteen years old; he was her teacher. There is certainly motive but on further investigation there were quite a few people Stuart alienated and screwed over in the small village.

This is hard book to review. As I start to write my opinions, I stop and think....did I like this book? There was a question posted on Goodreads by someone who abandoned it yet wanted to know the ending because she was curious. I was never tempted to abandon it.

Tabitha is hard to like. She has a caustic personality yet I kept reading because you could understand why she was so closed off to people.  She was bullied as a child and teen, she was taken advantage of by a trusted teacher, one who gave her some of the only positive attention in school and that turned out poorly. The descriptions of the correctional facilty will chill you as you read about the cells, the awful food and officers who can make your life a misery.

I'm really selling this book, huh?! LOL The story is divided by the prison life, the upcoming trial and defense then the epilogue. Tabitha represents herself as her court appointed attorney suggests she plead guilty to manslaughter to get a lesser sentence.  Yes, the evidence is overwhelmimg but hang in and watch as Tabitha researchs the case and finds flaws in the investigation.  Not loopholes, but a sloppy investigation and, in my opinion, flawed crime scene info.  It was clear the authorities just felt it was a slam dunk conviction.

This was written by the English husband and wife team Sean French and Nicci Gerrard. I prefered the Frieda Klein series to this novel but I will read more by these authors in the future.

Sharing with Joy for British Isles Friday.

 

Harbour Street by Ann Cleeves {Book 6 in the Vera Stanhope series}

The book starts with a murder on a stalled Metro train. The setting is northern England,  Christmas time, snow causing delays for all the travelers.  Sgt. Joe Ashworth is trying to get home with his daughter when the train stops. The lights go out and in that short time an elderly woman is murdered - it's Joe's young daughter Jess who discovers the body as she tries to awaken the woman.

I like the character Joe Ashworth and am pleased how his role is developing in this series. Vera is not an easy woman to work for and has some annoying traits but she is mellowing. 

The investigation begins on Harbour Street where the murdered woman lived and through the questioning, it appears there are shady connections with residents of the street. There is another mystery and murder which will  relate to an unsolved case from decades prior.

This is book 6 in the Vera Stanhope series.  I love the detective Vera for her flaws, for not being the well dressed, elegant beautiful detective star so many series have.  Vera can be ill tempered and impatient, a loner who imbibes too much some days, a woman who exudes confidence yet is scarred by her father Hector's verbal abuse when she was a child. That's a side she never shares publicly. 

Onward to the last three in this series and I will be caught up.

Sharing with Joy for British Isles Friday.

 

Dispatches by Michael Herr

  

This is an incredible accounting of a time period about the Vietnam War, told with such descriptive clarity by journalist Michael Herr.

The journalist conveyed the horror using such descriptive language you could smell the fear, feel empathy for these children who wore the uniform of of military. He descrobed the young men as young but their eyes were old, old before their time having witnessed horrors no one should ever see.

He rode in choppers that were under fire and those filled with bodies of dead marines. He had humorius stories about the converstions with the men and frightening moments when they were targeted by incoming missles. Drugs, drink, death and sadness.  

“I went through that thing a number of times and only got a fast return on my fear once, a too classic hot landing with the heat coming from the trees about 300 yards away, sweeping machine-gun fire that sent men head down into swampy water, running on their hands and knees towards the grass where it wasn’t blown flat by the rotor blades, not much to be running for but better than nothing.”

Herr didn't have to be in Vietnam and soldiers and Marines who realized this were gob smacked.  One Marine stated once he was back in the States his own mama could be sent over and he'd never come back.

It took him years to write the book Dispatches as he came home with crippling depression. Writing this was probably theraputic.

The Nonfiction Reader Challenge hosted by Shelleyrae at Book'd Out. 

 This is for the category Wartime Experiences.

 Check out the sign up post and info HERE. The challenge runs from January 1 through December 31, 2021. You can join in anytime!

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

 

In a nutshell: A surplus of self entitled rich people, the setting a remote and eerie Irish island (the destination wedding for handsome Will and beautiful Julia) plus a plethora of stereotyped school bullies now in their late 30's. What's not to like? Well, there's a bit not to engage you at first but...it grows on you. There are a few characters I liked very much and wish their stories had continued.

This book is very similar to her previous novel The Hunting Party.  There are quite a few characters in this novel and multiple points of view; I found myself intrigued by the back stories and wondered who would end up murdered.  I hoped for one of the shallow creeps but no spoilers from me here.

In addition to the remote location, one which requires a boat to access, there is an old ghostly cemetery and peat bogs which can (and do) pull a person in just as quicksand would. Lots of danger, secrets and suspects. 

The setting is very well described and you can picture the crashing waves against the shore, feel the cold winds and imagine the insidious bogs which nearly claimed one wedding guest.

I will read more by Lucy Foley but I have to say that The Hunting Party was a better book, in my opinion.  Again, it's a similar template to her previous book but by the end of The Guest List, it was hard to have empathy for many of the characters. For what it's worth, I liked Hannah and Olivia very much so if you read this one, let me know your thoughts on the major players.

Also, last but not least, I personally did not figure out the murderer's identity until it was revealed.  I saw a few reviews where the reader stated they did but I was not one of those :-)

Sharing with Joy for British Isles Friday.

 

The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave

When Hannah met Owen she wouldn't have any reason to think he was hiding a secret.  They had a good marriage and while it was a challenge to get his daughter Bailey to warm up to her, life was good.  Then a young girl from Owen's school arrives at Hannah's home with a note from Owen which simply stated, Protect Her. A mysterious note and big bag of cash for Bailey sets us off on a mystery of sorts.

Hannah and Bailey find common ground while searching for Owen. They both love him but it's clear he kept a part of his life a secret from them both. 

This story has multiple timelines which adds to slowly revealing the story.  There is an FBI investigation, tensions and a slow develpment of the main characters.

This is more of domestic suspense, not an action thriller. I don't read reviews until I have finished a book but I see now most readers were very positive and seemed to love the storyline.  While it was interesting to me I did not find myself all that engaged with the characters and would lose my train of thought.  Clearly I am in the minority here.

Publication date is 4 May 2021; the genre is women's fiction.    Much thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.  I was not compensated for my review and opinions are mine.