REVIEW: Long Lankin, by Lindsey Barraclough (4.5*)

(The Bodley Head, 2011)

This amazing debut novel opens with the ballad of Long Lankin - a tale of murder, witchcraft and supernatural menace that immediately sets the tone of the story to come. Cora and her little sister Mimi aren't exactly thrilled when they're sent to live with their great-Auntie Ida at the creepy old Guerdon Hall, but with their mother falling apart and their father unable to cope they have little choice in the matter. Things get even worse when they arrive on her doorstep and are met with a barrage of threats, warnings, rules and the bitter knowledge that she wants them gone as soon as humanly possible.

But what Cora doesn't know is that there is a dark evil lurking in Bryers Guerdon - an evil that has been haunting the village for hundreds of years and has ripped her family apart down the generations. Why are the children forbidden from visiting the old church, and who is the man in black in the graveyard? Why do all the doors and windows have to be kept permanently locked, and what are the long scratches marking more than one local door? Together with her new friends Roger and Pete, Cora must uncover the mystery of Bryers Guerdon before it's too late for her little sister - maybe even for them all...

Although this is a young adult book, for me it bordered on Stephen King-esque in the way it preyed on my mind and used psychological thrills to build tension.  Barraclough excels at creating unbearable fear in the reader using tantalising clues, a slow reveal of the truth, and terrifying glimpses of the menace on the marshes, skilfully bringing the whole story to a macabre and gritty climax in the inevitable final encounter between Lankin and the last of the long-suffering Guerdons.

I can't recommend this highly enough. It is an outstanding first novel that had me absolutely gripped, weaving a complex tale that spanned centuries yet never felt dull or over-written. It captures post-war rural England beautifully, and has a refreshing thread of humour through it that owes much to Barraclough's wonderful eye for the little things children say and do that always make adults smile! The Long Lankin ballad is a haunting theme that preys on our deepest fears, and I raced to the end of the book, heart pounding in my chest, winding up absolutely exhausted, weeping, as I finished the final chapter. Read it!

Said my lord to my lady, as he mounted his horse:

'Beware of Long Lankin that lives in the moss.'

Said my lord to my lady, as he rode away:

'Beware of Long Lankin that lives in the hay.

'Let the doors be all bolted and the windows all pinned,

And leave not a hole for a mouse to creep in.'

The doors were all bolted and the windows all pinned,

Except one little window where Long Lankin crept in...

Source: Many thanks to Random House Children's Books, who sent a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

REVIEW: How Reading Changed My Life, by Anna Quindlen (4*)

(The Library of Contemporary Thought, 1998)

When I picked this book up, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Was it going to be a serious discourse on certain key books, like Francis Spufford's The Child that Books Built? Perhaps a few bookish essays in the vein of Anne Fadiman's Ex Libris, or a sentimental autobiography about hardship and bookish redemption? Actually, it is none of those things.

Instead, what Quindlen offers us is an extended essay on books and reading, split into sections and garnished with bookish quotes from the likes of Thoreau and Whitman. In delicious prose that exudes enthusiasm, Quindlen meanders skilfully across a range of topics including the feeling of a being a book-lover in the midst of others who just don't 'get it', book snobbishness, academic elitism, book clubs, libraries, how men and women read differently, banned books and coming-of-age reading. Perhaps the most telling part is that on the future of the book and the rise of modern technology. This book was published in 1998, and Quindlen seems to find the idea of e-readers and online reading a bit of a curiosity, comparing it to the old fantasy films in which we were all eating capsule meals by the year 2000. I guess it just goes to show how quickly technology is leaping forward these days...

Though the final result bears little resemblance to what I'd expected from the rather self-centred title, this was even better than I'd hoped - a marvellous, well-reasoned look at the world of books, with enough of an 'every woman' feel to the anecdotes and examples to make it more inclusive and therefore more enjoyable to read. There is also a section at the back of the book with 'top ten' reading lists like '10 Books That Will Help a Teenager Feel More Human' and '10 Mystery Novels I'd Most Like to Find in a Summer Rental', which is a nice touch and added a few more titles to my wishlist... Highly recommended!

Source: I bought this book from a seller on Amazon Marketplace.

Chekhov for Infants

Yesterday a tiny girl, perhaps five or six, came into the shop with her mum and dad.  When they first arrived I was in the office making a cuppa, but Mum said the man turned to the little girl and said, "Right, now, you're not allowed to talk in this shop, or they'll pick you off with an air rifle."  "We're not that bad!" Mum replied.  "Well, I told her it was electric shocks in the last shop!" he laughed, before escorting the poor kid off down to the children's corner.

Back out on the counter, I was ready and waiting when they returned with two children's books.  The dad sighed and shook his head."I don't know why I bother," he said sadly as his wife handed over a note.  "Last week I bought her the complete works of Anton Chekhov and what did she do?  Scribbled all over The Cherry Orchard, made crayon marks right through A Marriage Proposal...  Evidently she's destined to grow up illiterate and never go to a good school."

"That's a bit harsh," I said.  "Perhaps she just doesn't like the Russians - have you tried her on Dickens?"

As they left the shop, I heard a dull thwack as he swiped her over the head with his tourist map, and his voice drifting back from outside, "I'm going to beat literature into you!  Just see if I don't!"

REVIEW: Perfume, by Patrick Süskind (4*)

(Penguin, 2006)

This book had what I call the 'Madame Bovary effect' on me. That is, while I appreciated the plot, the prose and the social history, I wasn't that bothered about the characters and got to the end of the novel thinking, 'Actually, I didn't really like it that much...' I found myself comparing it to Laura Esquivel’s Like Water for Chocolate, with its slightly blunt, spare translation, its intense sensory descriptions and its surreal exaggeration of reality - except that I was blown away by Like Water for Chocolate and wasn't by Perfume.

That said, I can't deny that this is a very accomplished novel. It tells the story of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a young man with an incredible nose who can tease apart the threads of scent in even the most hectic of city streets, differentiate between tiny gradients of fragrance, and discern odours that other people can't sense at all. The most elusive and desirable fragrance he encounters is the scent of a young virgin, and his obsessive pursuit of this ideal, his single-minded determination to create the ultimate perfume distilled from unblemished young women at the height of their perfection, leads him on an sinister quest to find the means to that exquisite end. He’s a hideous character, twisted and frightening in his genuine belief in his own crusade, but at the same time you can’t help admiring his genius and feeling some empathy for him despite his own complete lack of it.

The overwhelming level of olfactory description is definitely the main thing that stays with you as you close the book. Every scent, from flowers to humans to mountain air, is described in a flamboyant and exuberant swell of language. Unlike similar descriptions of taste, for example, or sound, I found it harder to ‘experience’ them as I read, and found that those passages veered from being sublime to, well... a bit much. In fact, that pretty much sums up my feelings about the book as a whole. Sometimes the description was divine, sometimes it was too much. Sometimes the process of perfume distillation and creation was fascinating, sometimes it was too much. Sometimes the more far-fetched or surreal aspects of the plot were deliciously compelling, sometimes they were... yep, you guessed it, too much. This is a novel of excess, of ambition, of genius, with threads of theatricality and black humour running through its pages – and I think every reader will respond differently to the sensory tidal wave. There’s only one way to find out for yourself – strap on your armbands and get swimming!

Source: I bought this book from a local charity shop.

REVIEW: Beach Babylon, by Imogen Edwards-Jones and Anonymous (4*)

(Bantam Press, 2007)

This book was such great fun! I read Hotel Babylon on holiday years ago, but I think this one was even better. In this exposé the anonymous whistle-blower is once again a manager in the hotel industry, but this time of a luxury island resort rather than a London establishment - and it takes things to a whole new level! As in the other Babylon books, all the people, places and madcap events that appear in the book are real, but names and locations have been changed (obviously!) and the bizarre situations the manager finds himself having to cope with have been condensed into one crazy 'week in the life'.

The reader is swept into a world of incredible luxury and privilege. This is a resort where the villas can cost up to $6000 a night, and the guests are so wealthy that they can afford to blow $20,000 on a afternoon's entertainment or $1,500 on a bottle of champagne without batting an eyelid. Not only does our intrepid manager have to cosy up to each and every one of his guests and bend over backwards to keep them happy, but he must also deal with their more outrageous requests, make sure the isolated island has everything it needs on a daily basis, and try to keep his staff functioning and content in the face of daily difficulties.

This is a wonderful piece of escapism, managing to capture both the little bubble of island life, with its daily champagne parties and beach barbeques and celebrity guests, and the all-consuming nightmare of trying to keep such a large resort in the impossibly perfect condition expected by the demanding clientele. Despite the 'world apart' nature of the island, the characters will be painfully familiar to anyone who's ever been on holiday! It's funny, it's dry, it's cringeworthy - and it's brilliant!

Source: I borrowed this book from our shop shelves.

REVIEW: Tipping the Velvet, by Sarah Waters (4.5*)

(Virago, 1999)

The quote from The Independent on Sunday that graces the back of my edition, which describes the novel as 'a sexy and picaresque romp through the lesbian and queer demi-monde of the roaring Nineties', pretty much sums it up! It follows the fortunes of Nancy Astley, a Whitstable oyster girl whose life is turned upside down when she sees 'masher', or male impersonator, Kitty Butler performing at her local music hall and falls head-over-heels in love. Before she knows it she is employed as Kitty's dresser, and when an opportunity arises to go to London with her, she seizes it with both hands.

And so Nancy's new life begins. As she and Kitty become closer and closer, living together in a theatrical boarding house, she finds herself performing alongside her new sweetheart as a masher in a top-billing act, under the stage name Nan King. But betrayal is just around the corner, and from there Nancy's story is a whirlwind that takes her through the depths of despair into a career masquerading as a Soho renter, a spell as a spoilt and much-lauded 'kept boy' to a wealthy mistress, and finally on to contentment and happiness amongst the 'toms', or 'women-lovers', of the East End.

This was one of those books that I made a conscious effort to read carefully, slowing down and savouring the historical detail, the complex relationships between the wonderful characters, and the slow unfolding of Nancy's tale. The writing is superb, moving effortlessly between delicious description, earthy conversation and risque sexiness. Waters has obviously done a massive amount of research but wears her knowledge lightly - reading the book is like reading a classic novel, thoroughly comfortable in its period style and voice. It may have been my first Sarah Waters, but it definitely won't be my last!

Source: An old friend bought me this book as a birthday present.

REVIEW: Bloodstream, by Tess Gerritsen (4.5*)

(HarperCollinsPublishers, 2004)

This was my first Tess Gerritsen and one of my first forays into crime writing – and wow, I was impressed! Gerritsen delivers a taut medical thriller that had me glued to the pages from the start. When the teenagers of the ironically-named lakeside town of Tranquility, Maine, are gripped by a wave of murderous violence, new town GP Claire is determined to find out what’s behind the almost superhuman levels of aggression in the seemingly possessed adolescents. Casting aside the arguments of the locals, who seem to be more intent on holding onto their town’s image as a haven for tourists than saving their children, Claire must do everything in her power to find a medical cause for the crazed killing and mindless fighting - particularly since her fourteen year-old son Noah is at risk too. Is it drugs? Some local pathogen? A chemical spillage of some kind? And could it be linked to the spate of similar violence that the town has been trying to forget for nearly fifty years? Whatever it is, the race is on to put a stop to it before it’s too late…

I found the novel haunting, chilling and utterly compelling from start to finish. Every time I had to set it down to do something else, I found myself thinking about the terrible events that had happened so far, and trying to piece together all the clues to work out what was happening. It is a testament to the book’s strength that it pervaded every waking moment so thoroughly, and I found myself completely caught up in the excitement as the pages flew by, gasping with shock one moment and welling up with tears the next. At the same time, Gerritsen balances the horror of the town’s predicament with a dry humour, which was very refreshing and helped keep the story feeling grounded and human; it stopped it – and the reader – from getting too swept up in its own darkness. Highly recommended!

Source: I borrowed this book from our bookshop shelves.

REVIEW: The Shallows - How the Internet is Changing the Way We Think, Read and Remember, by Nicholas Carr (5*)

(Atlantic Books, 2010)

Every once in a while a book comes along that changes your life. You suspect it by the end of the first chapter, and by the time you close the book it’s assured. First came Naomi Klein’s No Logo, urging us to look beyond the gleaming images of big-name brands. Then there was Joanna Blythman’s Shopped, pulling us behind the benign faces of Britain’s most successful supermarkets. And now I can add Nicholas Carr’s The Shallows to the list, this dazzling polemic exposing the uncomfortable truths behind the all-powerful reign of the Internet over our modern lives.

Like No Logo and Shopped, The Shallows is hard to summarise in any meaningful way because its argument is so complex and sweeping. This is not a book to devour whole – it is a book to be carefully read, considered and absorbed. Carr isn’t a nostalgic professor yearning for the old days of leather-bound tomes and quill pens. But while he readily admits that the Internet has become a vital, entertaining and useful tool in his everyday life, he was also beginning to worry about the unseen effects of his online life. This book is the eloquent sum of his extensive and thorough research.

It’s quite a ride. In exploring his subject, Carr reaches way back into the history of intellectual technology, considering the impact of early innovations such as maps, clocks and the book on human life. From there he moves into the age of the computer, from the earliest machines through to the all-pervasive use of the Internet we see around us today. The last few decades, he explains, have raced by in a blur, and suddenly the World Wide Web is our medium of choice for almost everything we do.

But what about the biological impact of the Internet? Here is where things get really interesting. Modern neurobiological studies have shown that the brain’s neuroplasticity allows it to change with each experience, each path to learning we take. And thanks to the Internet, our brains really are shifting, away from paths that allow deep reading and reflective thought, and towards a chemistry geared to process the distraction and rapid-fire information that the Internet represents. Carr shows how even reading a simple page containing links and hypertext is a far cry from reading a page in a book, requiring us to stop, however fleetingly, to process the meaning of the link (What does it link to? Does it sound interesting? Will it be relevant to me?) and demonstrably disrupting our absorption in and thus our understanding of the text. In fact, it uses a different area of the brain entirely, one geared towards problem solving rather than comprehension. A little scary given the way schools and other institutions are already throwing out their books and replacing them with PCs and e-readers, isn’t it?

I could keep going forever, but the point of the matter is this: the Internet can be damaging. And as the future entwines itself more and more tightly with the virtual world, it makes sense to be savvy enough about its effects to be able to use and enjoy it without allowing it to destroy the things we value: our attention, our concentration and our ability to understand and process information that requires a little more involvement to fully grasp. Go, buy the book. It may just turn out to be one of the most timely and vital books of the decade. Open your eyes, open your mind – and maybe it’ll change your life too.

NOTABLE QUOTABLES:

• "My mind isn't going - so far as I can tell - but it's changing.  I'm not thinking the way I used to think.  I feel it most strongly when I'm reading.  I used to find it easy to immerse myself in a book or a lengthy article.  My mind would get caught up in the twists of the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I'd spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose.  That's rarely the case any more.  Now my concentration starts to drift after a page or two.  I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do.  I feel like I'm always dragging my wayward brain back to the text.  The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle."
• "Between the intellectual and behavioral guardrails set by our genetic code, the road is wide, and we hold the steering wheel.  Through what we do and how we do it - moment by moment, day by day, consciously or unconsciously - we alter the chemical flows in our synapses and change our brains.  And when we hand down our habits of thought to our children, through the examples we set, the schooling we provide, and the media we use, we hand down as well the modifications in the structure of our brains."

Source: I borrowed this book from my local library.

REVIEW: To Touch a Wild Dolphin, by Rachel Smolker (4.5*)

(Souvenir Press, 2002)

Sometimes a book comes along that manages to balance a range of genres with such perfection that you close it having smiled and cried, experienced new places and lifestyles, and learned more than you realise, all without ever having left the comfort of your sofa. To Touch a Wild Dolphin definitely fulfills that description.

Monkey Mia, in Shark Bay, on the West Australia coast, is known for its friendly wild dolphins, who come right into the shallow waters and interact readily with humans. These days they are a huge tourist draw, but when Rachel Smolker first discovered them in the early eighties, hardly anyone knew about them. For Smolker, a marine biologist, they provided the perfect opportunity to study dolphins in the wild, learning to identify individuals, recording dolphin communication, and observing all the different elements of dolphin life, from courtship to hunting. For fifteen years she and her fluid team of colleagues and assistants spent huge swathes of time at Monkey Mia getting to know the dolphins, sharing their joys and sorrows, and reaching ground-breaking conclusions about their previously mysterious existence.

Reading this book and sharing the dolphins' lives felt like a real privilege, and it was utterly absorbing from start to finish. Smolker is a wonderful writer, moving effortlessly from lyrical descriptions of the beautiful Shark Bay area, through profound thoughts on the links between humans and dolphins, to accessible and concise information on all areas of dolphin society, without ever losing the thread of her narrative. She superbly captures the nuances of each of the key dolphins' personalities so that the reader grows as close to them as they would to any character in a novel, and experiences their happiness and their losses all the more deeply. She describes life in the rough camp by the beach, and offers anecdotes about interaction with the dolphins that range from the sublime to the horrific. And alongside all of this, Smolker distils everything she and her team learned from their time with the dolphins of Monkey Mia, from foraging techniques and courtship rituals to communication and male bonding, offering a complete and reverential picture of the wonder and complexity of the dolphins' lives.

This is a tour de force of nature writing, bringing together elements of science, natural history, ecology, autobiography and travel writing. It will make you laugh and cringe and cry, and leave you with a new respect both for dolphins and for the people who have dedicated their lives to studying them and working to develop our understanding of these amazing creatures. Read it!

NOTABLE QUOTABLES:

• "My mind still in that floating, receptive state of the recently asleep, I settle down on the deck to admire the spectacle: the phosphorescent comets below and the Milky Way above.  The magnificence of the scenery pulls me far above and beyond myself.  Shark Bay is a tremendous, wide-open expanse, jutting out into the Indian Ocean.  Distant from any city lights, it is a place where the night skies offer up a slowly rotating banquet of constellations, pulsating multicolor planets, bright clouds of star clusters, and dark, eerie nebulae."
• "I reached out slowly and tentatively and touched her side.  She watched me intently but did not flinch or move away.  I was stroking the side of a wild dolphin.  Her skin was silky smooth, slightly rubbery, and surprisingly warm for a creature living in the ocean and resembling a fish.  I felt suddenly aware of how odd my long, gangly arms, with all those independently moving digits, must seem to her.  She was sleek, a torpedo."

Source: I borrowed this book from my local library.

REVIEW: Seasons of Life - The Biological Rhythms that Living Things Need to Thrive and Survive, by Russell Foster and Leon Kreitzman (4*)

(Profile Books, 2009)

Foster and Kreitzman's first book, Rhythms of Life, explained the importance of the circadian, or daily, rhythms that animals and plants live by. This second venture shifts the time span outwards and delves into the complexities of circannual, or seasonal, rhythms.

The first chapter is devoted to plants, and the way in which they use circannual rhythms to initiate flowering and other vital events in their yearly cycle. There are chapters on circannual rhythms in animals and birds, including the timing of conception and reproduction, hibernation and migration. These chapters clearly set out the latest research on why and how these rhythms operate, how they contribute to species survival, and demonstrate the way all of nature is connected in a giant web of interdependent species and individuals.

Finally there are chapters on the effects of circannual rhythms on humans. This includes such fascinating topics as the prevalence of certain illnesses at different times of year, birth and death patterns in different seasons, and a chapter on SAD, including research and ideas on its prevention and treatment.

This was definitely not what you would call an easy read. The chapters on animals and plants are very detailed and there is a fair amount of biological terminology to get your head around, as well as diagrams that take a little time to study and understand. That said, Foster and Kreitzman have done a great job at explaining things for the lay reader and making the book as accessible as possible without losing its scientific rigour. The chapters on human circannual rhythms are much easier to understand anyway, approaching the subject on a more sociological basis to reflect both the effects of complex social issues on our lives and the relative lack of knowledge about our human internal clocks. A very worthwhile and interesting read!

Source: I borrowed this book from my local library.

REVIEW: The Chrysalids, by John Wyndham (4*)

(Penguin, 2008)

This was my first John Wyndham novel and I had no idea what to expect. I wasn't even sure what it was about! I needn't have worried, because it entirely lived up to Wyndham's reputation as a classic science fiction writer.

The plot revolves around a group of children living in a dystopian society obsessed with 'God's True Image'. Anyone and anything that is seen to be 'wrong' is immediately stamped out as an agent of the devil. If a field of crops is less than perfect, it is burned. If a cow is malformed in some way, it is killed. And any human found to be different is stripped, sterilized and sent out into the 'Fringes', an area filled with exiled deviants, to live or die as they will. By taking these measures, the people of Labrador hope to appease God and rebuild the incredible society that existed before the Tribulation that turned the Badlands to deadly black lakes of burnt land and wiped out the 'Old People'. These children, who can communicate with a kind of advanced form of telepathy, know it's only a matter of time before their secret deviation is discovered and they'll have to fight for their lives...

I found this novel to be beautifully written and deeply thought-provoking. The obsession with the 'right' attributes that make someone human reminded me of the Nazi Aryan race, and was quite disturbing to read. There were elements of religion and philosophy, with characters musing on life and spirituality, and the real meaning of humanity. There were messages of tolerance, friendship and love. And behind all this there was a cracking good post-nuclear-apocalypse science-fiction story. With writing this good and plots this fascinating, this certainly won't be my last Wyndham - I think I might have to loan my houseplants out to someone and read 'The Day of the Triffids' next!

NOTABLE QUOTABLE:

• "The essential quality of life is living; the essential quality of living is change; change is evolution: and we are part of it.  The static, the enemy of change, is the enemy of life..."

Source: I borrowed this book from my local library.

REVIEW: Notes on a Scandal, by Zoë Heller (4*)

(Viking, 2003)

Hmmmm. This is one of those books that would be wonderful for a book group - so much to discuss, so much to say! - but when it comes to writing a review, it's hard to know where to start. This extraordinarily accomplished novel focusses on two teachers, Barbara and Sheba, and their unlikely friendship. While Barbara is a retirement-age spinster, traditional and set in her ways, Sheba is a younger, free-spirited pottery teacher, new to the school and to the profession. The book is entirely told through Barbara, in the form of a kind of journal of her relationship with Sheba and the fall-out from her new friend's passionate affair with a student at the school.

Despite the scandal of the title relating to Sheba, her illicit relationship is almost a secondary concern, forming the centrepiece for the whole book yet never really feeling like its true heart. It's not glossed over exactly, but it's not as important as I'd expected. Instead, the novel is very much about Barbara. She is one of the most complex, unpleasant yet strangely sympathetic characters I have ever had the privilege to encounter. I think everyone knows someone like her. Her 'notes' on Sheba are almost sinister in their obsessive detail. Every conversation, every circumstance, is painstakingly transcribed, mulled over, analysed and ultimately reflected back onto herself in a sickening display of self-importance. She is the prying curtain-twitcher, the pompous grandmother, the unreasonable old lady that everybody loves to hate. Yet underneath all this, the reader gets a glimpse of a lonely and slightly bitter woman who is, at some level, very much aware of her own faults, even as she tries to deflect them away in blind denial. There is a self-pity and naïvety underlying everything she 'writes' that makes it hard to truly dislike her as a character, even as the reader instinctively shies away from her. She is what makes the novel so compelling yet so strangely painful to read.

I can't believe it's taken me so long to finally read this book. It's not as easy a read as it seems on the surface, with its compulsive attention to detail and thought-provoking themes, and it's definitely not a book that leaves you with a smile on your face and a sense of having really enjoyed it - yet it is absolutely superb in its execution and deserves every ounce of praise that has been flung its way. And on a personal note, reading it at last means I can finally watch the movie adaptation, which has been sitting in its cellophane for months! Highly recommended.

NOTABLE QUOTABLES:

• "I have never been a big fan of firework displays.  All that brightness falling, the sad, smoke smell, the finale that is never quite as magnificent as it should be...  Yet appreciating fireworks is one of those things by which one is judged on one's child-like delight in life.  It is perfectly acceptable to hate the circus.  But to admit that one finds fireworks tiresome is to render oneself a pariah."
• "People like Sheba think that they know what it's like to be lonely.  They cast their minds back to the time they broke up with a boyfriend in 1975 and endured a whole month before meeting someone new...  But about the drip drip of long-haul, no-end-in-sight solitude, they know nothing.  They don't know what it is to construct an entire weekend around a visit to the launderette.  Or to sit in a darkened flat on Halloween night, because you can't bear to expose your bleak evening to a crowd of jeering trick-or-treaters.  Or to have the librarian smile pityingly and say, 'Goodness, you're a quick reader!' when you bring back seven books, read from cover to cover, a week after taking them out.  They don't know what it is to be so chronically untouched that the accidental brush of a bus conductor's hand on your shoulder sends a jolt of longing straight to your groin.  I have sat on park benches and tubes and schoolroom chairs, feeling the great store of unused, objectless love sitting in my belly like a stone until I was sure I would cry out and fall, flailing, to the ground.  About all of this, Sheba and her like have no clue."
• "There are certainly people in whom you can detect the seeds of madness - seeds that have remained dormant only because the people in question have lived relatively comfortable, middle-class lives.  They function perfectly well in the world, but you can imagine, given a nasty parent, or a prolonged bout of unemployment, how their potential for craziness might have been realized - how their seeds might have sprouted little green shoots of weirdness."
  

Source: I THINK I bought this book in a charity shop.  I don't remember, it was so long ago!

These are a Few of my Favourite Things: The scent of tomato vines

Mmmm, there is just something about that scent!  Look at those fuzzy vines and that light powdering over each tomato - can't you just smell it?  We don't have a greenhouse any more so now I buy Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Vittoria tomatoes on the vine, just because when I open the carton they smell like tomatoes should, fresh and green and delicious.  They taste pretty darn good too!  I've even discovered a 'tomato vine and bergamot' shower gel for sale somewhere - the RSPB charity Christmas range I think - and Mum's bought me one for Christmas so I can see how it measures up.  Maybe the bergamot will overpower the vines, I don't know, but it sounds yummy anyway.  Now, excuse me, I think I need to go eat a tomato or two and hang my nose over the carton for a minute!

REVIEW: Wesley - The Story of a Remarkable Owl, by Stacey O'Brien (4.5*)

(Constable, 2009)

I am a huge barn owl fan, so I knew I had to buy this book as soon as I saw it! I've already adopted a barn owl called Gilbert from the National Falconry School, and see him most weekends at their display outside our bookshop (and yes, I do talk to him!), so a whole book about someone who raised a barn owl from a baby sounded wonderful!

Stacey O'Brien's life changed forever the day she was given the opportunity to adopt a baby barn owl from Caltech's owl research department, where she had been working for about a year. The owl was only four days old, looked a bit like a baby dinosaur and hadn't even opened its eyes yet, but she fell head over heels in love and agreed to take it home. Although Wesley had an injured wing and could never be released into the wild, he settled right into life with his new mum. This is their story...


Wesley is a wonderful character, and the intense bond between human and owl shines out from every page. I giggled at so many of O'Brien's stories - of Wesley's first attempts to fly and his outrage when she dares to laugh at his tangled crash-landings, of his unprecedented love for water (which gets particularly interesting when he decides he wants to share her bath), of his attempts to woo her by building her nests and trying to feed her mice - and teared up a few times too. O'Brien really knows her stuff, so on top of the Wesley's story there is a whole lot of interesting information about owls, as well as a few wider titbits from the natural sciences as a whole and a tantalising insight into what it's like to work for a big research institute like Caltech.

Wesley and Stacey learned a lot from each other over the nineteen years they spent together, and their close partnership helped bring about a new understanding of elements of barn owl life that had never been accessible before. It is a charming, heartwarming and amusing story, as well as an informative look at the world of the barn owl, and it might just be one of my favourite books this year!

NOTABLE QUOTABLE:

• "Like all barn owls, the baby smelled like maple syrup but not as sweet, something closer to butterscotch and comfy pillow all in one.  Many biologists at Caltech, where I both worked and took classes, would bury their faces in their owls' necks to breathe in their delicate, sweet scent.  It was intoxicating."
• "... owls mate for life, and when an owl's mate dies, he doesn't necessarily go out and find another partner.  Instead, he might turn his head to face the tree on which he's sitting and stare fixedly in a deep depression until he dies.  Such profound grief is indicative of how passionately owls can feel and how devoted they are to their mates."
• "His 'tribe' had been here, probably living very close to where we were at that moment, for some 1.6 million years.  What really blew my mind was that, in all that time, every single one of his ancestors had successfully bred and had a baby survive to breed.  For 1.6 million years.  There wasn't a single break in the chain, or he wouldn't have been here.  Of course, this is true for every one of us who is on the planet - which seems like an incredible miracle."

Source: I bought this book from Amazon UK.

These are a Few of my Favourite Things: Gerbera Daisies

Well, look at them...  They're sunshine in a vase!  A friend gave me a beautiful bunch for my birthday a few years ago and I've never looked back.  They can lift my spirits and put a smile on my face even on the worst of days!