Goodreads Ireland discussion
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What Are You Reading
Theresa - I have put We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves on my to read list.Tara - I recently got a decent old hard cover of Seek the Fair Land from Paperback Swap, and will eventually crack the covers as I'd really be interested in a novel about that time period.
Cathleen - I was lucky to see the Abbey Theater production of "Dorian Grey" at the Dublin Theater Festival in 2012 and it was terrific plus I has an excellent seat. However the hit of the festival and my favorite was Emma Donoghue's play about Maeve Brennan titled "Life at the New Yorker'. Everyone should read Maeve Brennan - she was a Dubliner who went to live in NY and wrote for the New Yorker. The end of her life was quite sad. She ended up penniless and suffering from dementia, and the New Yorker staff tried to look out for her.
Susan - I was determined to take advantage of the summer and do some special things including seeing The Lion King and going to Maine. Friday I fly to Chicago with my BFF (best fiber friend) for a huge knitting convention. She got a super deal on hotel and airfare - both for just over $400. I think she is in the same group as Allan who manages to find great travel deals.
@ Barbara I also saw Dorian Gray in the Abbey in 2012. We went for my best friend's birthday. In previous years they did all male productions of The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband which were also excellent.
Allan. I am so glad to hear it's over exaggerated. It's a real grim picture he paints with burning buses on the side of the road and the peelers (I feel so cool saying that) getting shot at. I actually had a few nightmares last night. I think it does mean that the officer went in his pants as he was so scared. They were being attacked by a group of thugs at the tine so he was probably just scared. I would have been.It's very interesting that underwear is called whips. I wonder how it got that name? I did notice you had no vacation updates. What's up with that?
Barbara, I am so delighted you are having a wonderful summer and doing so many things you like. If not now, when? Life is meant to be enjoyed.
Barbara, your trip on Friday sounds like it'll be one that you'll enjoy! I have to give credit for the great deals to my other half btw-I just turn up! Susan, there's nothing much to report from our holiday apart from wandering about the historic city, stopping in cafés for drinks or ice cream then wandering again. We've been to the cathedral, the castle and the Roman amphitheatre, and been on a cruise around Malaga bay. There's a lovely harbour here with al fresco dining restaurants that we've enjoyed meals in on all three nights. All good, except for the fact that I've read next to nothing the whole time I've been here!
Allan wrote: "Barbara, your trip on Friday sounds like it'll be one that you'll enjoy! I have to give credit for the great deals to my other half btw-I just turn up! Susan, there's nothing much to report from ..."
Al fresco dining sounds delightful and I imagine you are eating dinner on a Spanish schedule - 9 PM is "early". One of my favorite dining memories is a late night dinner, with a large group of Spanish friends in the Alfama (old Moorish neighborhood) of Lisbon - on a summer night. Sorry if it sounds like I am showing off. Just thinking that in our lifetime, there are memorable meals and settings:)
Boy this is really off the topic of What Are You Reading? I have to decide what books to take on my short sojourn to Chicago. I ALWAYS bring at least one "real" book and am dithering between Sweet Thursday by Steinbeck and a mystery plus my iPad mini. I won't be lugging along my current read which is a library book. No checked bags in order to save $$$ for other purchases.
I've always wanted to go to Spain so your trip sounds wonderful, Allan. I know you are having a wonderful time if you're not reading. I am so glad.Barbara, what amazes me is that you have friends all over the world. That must be so wonderful. You have so many wonderful memories. I love your system for taking books. It made me smile.
Susan wrote: "I've always wanted to go to Spain so your trip sounds wonderful, Allan. I know you are having a wonderful time if you're not reading. I am so glad.Barbara, what amazes me is that you have friends..."
Susan - much of my foreign travel is work related. It's strange but while I have few friends at my university (i.e. people I socialize with outside of work), it is completely different with my Spanish and Latin American colleagues.
Susan wrote: "That is odd."Susan - I'm not sure if your comment was a response to me. I have friends at my university who are staff and have socialized with them off campus - baby showers, birthdays etc. Faculty tend to be too competitive with each other and many of them live quite a distance from campus (up to 2 hours). I am not sure what it is or if other universities have a similar culture. I have socialized less than 5 times in 22 years with faculty and every time it was somewhat awkward and seemed forced. There is also a cultural difference. My Latin American and Spanish colleagues don't have the same division between work and home life and overall are much warmer.Also these are the longest standing professional relationship/friendships I have.
I guess that was what I was trying to get out in my short response. I really meant to write more but must have drifted off. Sorry. I was intent on finishing McKinty's book that I spaced. I wondered if it was a cultural thing. I have friends in the Latin community and they tend to socialize differently than I do. When you invite someone to a party they bring their entire family including inlaws. They always bring food and, frankly, have more fun than we do.
Susan, I hope you are enjoying Whose Body? I have about 70 pages left in One Summer which I should get through this weekend. Even though Whose Body? is the first Peter Wimsey I haven't read it yet so I'm looking forward to getting started.
This is my first Peter Wimsey book period. It's delightful. You can tell that she wrote in the same time period as Agatha Christie. I am enjoying it.
So glad you are enjoying it Susan, I do love Peter Wimsey. Monocle and all. @ Theresa I should be starting it around the same time as you.
Oh, Theresa, I have ben waiting to hear what you think about Rebecca? How's it going?
Susan - you are right about Latino cultures. Definitely warmer but the Irish come a close second except no cheek kissing.
You'll know from posts above that Susan has recently had nightmares about the Adrian McKinty novel 'The Cold Cold Ground', which depicts my childhood home of Carrickfergus, and indeed my childhood neighbourhood of Victoria, where McKinty the author himself also grew up, as a war torn wasteland. I know that to the outsider on reading it must seem so realistic, despite my protestations as to the contrary. Out of interest, I sat down there and did a little bit of research just to see how badly McKinty has actually exaggerated what the town and neighbourhood was like.
For my research, I used the book 'Lost Lives: The Stories of the Men, Women and Children who Died as a Result of the Northern Ireland Troubles' as a basis, which is seen as the definitive record of the conflict here, and details the stories of its victims.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
What I found was that, of the 3687 troubles related deaths recorded in the book between 1966 and 2003, a total of 7 occurred in Carrickfergus. Or percentage wise, that's 0.0019% of the total.
Of those, 4 of the deaths were in the early to mid 1970s, 2 were in the 1980s and 1 was in the 1990s. None of the deaths were as a result of incidents in Victoria, Duffy's home neighbourhood in the novels.
Of the 2 deaths recorded in the 1980s, when the Duffy trilogy is set, one, in 1984, was as the result of a robbery gone wrong that possibly had paramilitary connections, while another in 1986 was due to an elderly woman having a heart attack after an object was thrown through her window by youths with Loyalist sympathies.
It's horrible to think that a country this small could create a conflict which caused so much death and destruction over the years, but even so, much of the country, even in those dark days was relatively untouched, and Carrick was one of these places, despite only being 10 miles from Belfast.
Writers will write what they know, though, and as McKinty knows the town so well, he has used it to his advantage-he's just exaggerated to unbelievable proportions!
I suppose that's what fiction is all about, though! :)
Trelawn wrote: "Susan, I hope you are enjoying Whose Body? I have about 70 pages left in One Summer which I should get through this weekend. Even though Whose Body? is the first Peter Wimsey I haven't read it yet ..."I just started it last night, and it made me smile. It's all so very proper, so far, and I thought it was interesting (?) that Peter Wimsey actually could get his hands all over the crime scene and the body. Different times and practices, for sure.
Cathleen wrote: "Trelawn wrote: "Susan, I hope you are enjoying Whose Body? I have about 70 pages left in One Summer which I should get through this weekend. Even though Whose Body? is the first Peter Wimsey I have..."Cathleen, I loved the discussion of rigor mortis. It was wondering if it's results were accurate. It was like a new discovery. And who couldn't love a man who hesitates about missing a book auction? My kind of guy.
I just read Anita Diamant, who wrote the fabulous Red Tent, will have her new book released soon. It's called Boston Girl and will discuss a woman's life in Boston from 1915 on. It should be interesting.
Allan, I am so sorry that my reaction to the book was so vivid. I guess it just shows what a good writer he is. He really draws you in and makes it feel so believable. I just really got caught up in the action. Sorry that I over reacted.
Susan wrote: "Cathleen wrote: "Trelawn wrote: "Susan, I hope you are enjoying Whose Body? I have about 70 pages left in One Summer which I should get through this weekend. Even though Whose Body? is the first Pe..."That was cool, wasn't it? He goes to the crime scene but leaves a list of books for his butler (manservant?) to get at the auction. I like the feel of the book.
I'll have to read Anita Diamant at some point. I've wanted to read The Last Days of Dogtown for a long time. It's about a rugged area in the middle of Cape Ann, MA that was the refuge for widows, orphans, single women--or anyone else who didn't fit in. The women were usually accused of being witches because they were poor and did things like sell herbs to get by. A good friend of mine from high school loved The Red Tent. She still raves about it to me.
The Red Tent is a great book. They are making it into a movie for Lifetime now. I think you'd really like it.
Susan, you're completely right about McKinty drawing you in and creating a vivid picture in his Devlin novels, and you've absolutely no need to apologise, because if you read the reviews that others have written, everyone else is drawn in to them as much as you have been. I hope you don't think that I was having a go at you about this, because if you do, then it's me who should be apologising, because that wasn't the intention! The action in the books fits in perfectly with what international media perceptions were of NI at that time, and indeed to some extent may have been reflected in reality at times in some small urban areas in Belfast. Geographically, McKinty is almost forensically accurate in his portrayal of the locale, and as a result, everyone that I know of who lived / lives in Carrick that I have recommended the books to has absolutely loved them-and I've recommended them to loads of people! But as regards the town and what it was like there during the 'Troubles', they're as much based in fact as James Bond was based on the realities of Cold War spying.
Still great fun, though! :)
I'm about to start Whose's Body? on audio. How can I resist with all the good recommendations from all the Rebecca lovers. Rebecca is one of my favorite books.I just finished listening toThe Signature of All Things. I enjoyed it immensely but a good part of that was because the reader, Juliet Stevenson, was so good.
I am also going to start Whose Body? either tonight or tomorrow. I fibished One Summer this afternoon. Another fabulous read from Bill Bryson.
I've read several of bill Bryson's books and they were very entertaining.
Well I highly recommend this one, I took my time with it to enjoy all the details. It really was a busy time for America
Fiona, I totally agree with you that some of the Tahiti 'adventure' was quite vulgar and totally unnecessary. I would have rated the book higher but for that. The rest of the Tahiti trip I thought interesting and fun. It would have been nice to have had the detailed drawings.
Mod
Today I plan to finish both the Devil I Know and Fool Moon by Jim Butcher. I also plan to listen to more 11/22/63 at the gym.
I am racing through Before I Go to Sleep, a psychological thriller, which has been on my shelf since last summer. It's a compact paperback (what is called Mass Market in the US) so a great size for travel. I brought it on my trip to Chicago and managed to start it though I was super busy. Now I don't want to put it down.I will go back to The Last Girl by Jane Casey when I finish this. My summer is "over" next Monday when I return to work. Our students start classes August 25th. Though I read a lot, I wish I'd gotten more 'to read' books off my list.
Barbara wrote: "I am racing through Before I Go to Sleep, a psychological thriller, which has been on my shelf since last summer. It's a compact paperback (what is called Mass Market in the US) so ..."Your post made me smile, Barbara. The crunch is on; summer never lasts as long as I imagine it will be. I started thinking about which books I could realistically finish before my term starts (It's late this year, the Tuesday after Labor Day). I've heard good things about Before I Go To Sleep. I'll be curious what you think of it.
Cathleen wrote: "Barbara wrote: "I am racing through Before I Go to Sleep, a psychological thriller, which has been on my shelf since last summer. It's a compact paperback (what is called Mass Marke..."I want to trade jobs with you :) I really hate starting before Labor Day and we are done so early in December, it's ridiculous!
Barbara, I really enjoyed Before I Go To Sleep. I'm glad you like it. I agree with you. School has no business starting before Labor Day. It's un-American.
Barbara wrote: "Cathleen wrote: "Barbara wrote: "I am racing through Before I Go to Sleep, a psychological thriller, which has been on my shelf since last summer. It's a compact paperback (what is ..."We usually start the last week of August, so I don't know what happened to the academic calendar this year...I'm not complaining, though :)
Colleges and universities in CA tend to start in mid Sept. I think UC Santa Cruz starts about 9/20. Of course their mascot is the banana slug so they do move slowly.
I just finished Tower Lord by Anthony Ryan which was amazing so ive started Joe Abercrombies Half a King.Its my first book by the author so I'm curious to see what its like. Its his first attempt at YA but seems to be going down very well.
Jamie Lynn, I enjoy his books also. I use to listen to them on CDs on the way to work. My favorite was the Portuguese Irregular Verbs series which was laugh out loud funny.
Just finished
--- good, but a slog. Not for readers who dislike liberal use of archaic or foreign terms in the narrative. Also kept thinking throughout that Eire at that date would be more advanced [ than that Other Isle] in its acceptance of the "new religion" from auld Patrick, and also devoid of snakes. *smirk*
J.S. wrote: "Just finished --- good, but a slog. Not for readers who dislike liberal use of archaic or foreign terms in the narrative. Also kept thinking throughout that Eire at th..."
LOL. I almost got this but am one of those readers who dislike the liberal use of archaic or foreign terms in the narrative. I'll move on to something else. Thanks.
I've never read any of his books but you may have tempted me to try one Jamie Lynn. Next time I am in Chapters I shall have a look.
My favorite is the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. It's not much on plot but you've got to love Precious. I felt like an ugly American when I was surprised at how much she loved living in Botswana. It really made me open my thinking. I love she has a "traditional" figure.
Jamie Lynn wrote: "Diane wrote: "Jamie Lynn, I enjoy his books also. I use to listen to them on CDs on the way to work. My favorite was the Portuguese Irregular Verbs series which was laugh out loud funn..."I read one of Alexander McCall Smith's book--I think it was called The Sunday Philosopher's Club, and I liked it. I love this title--Portuguese Irregular Verbs--and if it's funny to boot, I'll have to look for it :)
Cathleen wrote: "Jamie Lynn wrote: "Diane wrote: "Jamie Lynn, I enjoy his books also. I use to listen to them on CDs on the way to work. My favorite was the Portuguese Irregular Verbs series which was ..."I love the Sunday Philosopher's Club series and buy them in hardcover when they come out. I can't explain why they are so special to me, but I love the main character, Isabel Dalhousie. She has such a Scottish name. I enjoy her sensibility, and her unconventional life. Edinburgh is wonderfully captured in these books. But I haven't met anyone else who loves them as I do (:
I just finished Maus I, which I started on Sara's recommendation. It was great! I can recommend it to anyone and it would make a great, first graphic novel for anyone who might be interested in taking the plunge.
Jamie Lynn wrote: [...] I don't judge the book by the cover but I love a nice cover! Yes, it's a good cover and speaks to the atmosphere of the story, much better than the usual yet- another-woman-in-a-silly-gown on the cover.
@Barbara, I really liked the Sunday philosophers Club also, and the series with dear little Bertie, and all the rest of the various series. They are pleasant, peaceful, feel good books. I never actually read any of them, but listened to them on the way to work. Each series had a reader that was perfectly chosen for that particular series.
Diane wrote: "@Barbara, I really liked the Sunday philosophers Club also, and the series with dear little Bertie, and all the rest of the various series. They are pleasant, peaceful, feel good books. I never ac..."
I'm on the lookout for the next Sunday Philosophers Club and I enjoy Bertie too.
Jamie Lynn wrote: "Diane, and Barbara, I didn't know that Bertie is in another series."Bertie is part of the 44 Scotland Street series. I just singled him out because I like the little guy so much. I'm worried about him though. Grossly overbearing mother and weak father - not a good set up. Isn't it absurd to worry about a fictional character? lol
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Theresa, I meant to look up the distance from Cornwall to Thurso in NE Scotland:) - it's 767 miles and about 13 hours of driving. My drive would have been 14-16 hours straight through but that's just not possible if I'm driving alone.