Blogging Anniversary - 10 years

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A while ago I checked when I did my first blog post, in order to celebrate with an anniversary post. Well, that day came and went without any reaction from me. Better late than never, so here a reminder of my very first blog post from 24 October 2012.  The book was New Finnish Grammar  by Diego Marani. Marani is an Italian novelist, translator and newspaper columnist. While working as a translator for the European Union he invented a language ‘Europanto’ which is a mixture of languages and based on the common practice of word-borrowing usage of many EU languages. It was a suitable book to start with, being a book about letters, languages and memories. With a beautiful prose, the novel went directly to my heart.  "One night at Trieste in September 1943 a seriously wounded soldier is found on the quay. The doctor, of a newly arrived German hospital ship, Pietri Friari gives the unconscious soldier medical assistance. His new patient has no documents or anything that can ide...
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I have missed you!

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This is not a title of a new interesting book. It is a statement from my side. I am now back home and in business again. It has been some busy weeks in Sweden helping my son install himself for the university studies. Now he is up an running and I can go back to my books.

I did not have time to read a lot but I managed to buy a lot of books, mostly second hand; 50 cents for the pocket books and 1 euro for the hardback! Unbelievably cheap. A list will come, hopefully, already tomorrow.

Crossing the bridge between
Sweden and Denmark
My challenges are totally lost for this month I think. I did not manage to finish Emma by Jane Austen in August, I did not manage to read the Gissling book for the Brontë Reading Group, not the two books for the other book club; Beloved by Toni Morrison and Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marques, so far not the two books about Hemingway for a Swedish 3xbooks challenge. It is rather depressing and I am wondering whether I should skip challenges for the time being? BUT, when I organise myself I might be able to read them after all!

In the middle of the bridge
I managed to listen to a book for the first time. I drove from Sweden to Belgium which took more or less 12 hours. I thought that this might be the time for me to listen to a book. I found a thriller called Ghostman by Roger Hobbs. I see that he got a nomination for the Edgar Prize for first novel by an American author. Hmm, I don't know whether I can agree. The story itself, or really two stories; one present and one going back five years, were rather thrilling, but for me the whole story was too technical. It looks more like a manual for bank robbers; there were endless details how to act in a bank robbery, on guns, on get away cars, on preparations, on drugs etc etc. The story sort of disappeared in all the technical details. Since I am more of a macro person then micro person it did not do it for me. However,  it kept me occupied with something during the drive.




 Will I listen to another audio book? Maybe, give it another try. I can't imagine doing it at home, but while driving for example, or out walking maybe, I can imagine to listen to a book. I still prefer to read myself.

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