Booka Bookclub
Currently reading: A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
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Here is a selection of our favourite reads of the moment (titles both old and new) together with our most recent book of the month
Book of the Month - January 2012
The Art of Fielding
Review: Set against the backdrop of an American college baseball season, The Art of Fielding is big, warm hearted, absorbing and a truly rewarding read. The five main characters are all strong, but each vulnerable in their own way. The spiral of relationships between the characters develops as the season unfolds. Importantly, no knowledge of baseball is…
Read More »Book of the Month - December 2011
The House of Silk: The New Sherlock Holmes Novel
Review: With devilish plotting and excellent characterisation, Anthony Horowitz delivers a first-rate Sherlock Holmes mystery for a modern readership whilst remaining utterly true to the spirit of the original Conan Doyle books. Sherlock Holmes is back with all the nuance, pace and powers of deduction that make him the world’s greatest and most celebrated detective….
Read More »Book of the Month - November 2011
The Sense of an Ending
Review: Winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2011. The Sense of an Ending is the story of one man coming to terms with the past, his friendships and relationships, although things aren’t quite how he’d remembered them. Short, perfectly formed and precisely written, this sublime book is thought provoking and demands re-reading….
Read More »Book of the Month - October 2011
The Marriage Plot
Review Set in the early 1980’s, as the three main characters graduate from college, Eugenides twists the classic Vicorian marriage plot of one woman, Madeleine, choosing between the competing love claims of the sexy but manic depressive Leonard and the conservative but reliable Mitchell. A thoroughly enjoyable contemporary read with well crafted characters from someone …
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The Hare with the Amber Eyes
Review 264 wood and ivory carvings, none of them larger than a matchbox: potter Edmund de Waal was entranced when he first encountered the collection in the Tokyo apartment of his great uncle Iggie. Later, when Edmund inherited the ‘netsuke’, they unlocked a story far larger than he could ever have imagined… A hugely rewarding…
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The Invisible Ones
Review A hugely enjoyable and satisfying crime novel, with a new slant on the usual dysfunctional detective. Good for fans of Kate Atkinson. Louisa
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The Tiny Wife
Review A magical short novel from the author of All My Friends are Superheroes. The Tiny Wife is a quirky modern day fable. It brings together imaginative storytelling and beautiful illustrations. Small, but perfectly formed, it will charm, delight and unnerve in equal measure. A perfect gift. We love it! Carrie, Jess, Louisa & Em
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The Stranger’s Child
Review In the late summer of 1913 the aristocratic young poet Cecil Valance comes to stay at ‘Two Acres’, the home of his close Cambridge friend George Sawle. The weekend will be one of excitements and confusions for all the Sawles, but it is on George’s sixteen-year-old sister Daphne that it will have the most…
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Fire Season: Field Notes from a Wilderness Lookout
Review For nearly a decade, Philip Connors has spent half of each year in a small room at the top of a lookout tower, on top of a mountain, alone in millions of acres of remote American wilderness. His job: to look for wildfires. An absorbing and hugely rewarding read that captures the wonder and…
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The Language of Flowers
Review The Victorian language of flowers was used to express emotions: honeysuckle for devotion, azaleas for passion, and red roses for love. But for Victoria Jones, it has been more useful in communicating feelings like grief, mistrust and solitude. After a childhood spent in the foster care system, she is unable to get close to…
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