The Content Reader

This is a lovely and wonderful book, written by one of my Brontë friends, Leona Francombe. Leona is a very talented lady; not only does she write books but she is also a classical pianist. Inspired by the battle of Waterloo which took place on 18 June 1815, on the huge plains outside Brussels, it has survived as one of the most famous battles. Leona has found a different angle  to describe the battle and the various people involved in it. She tells it from the point of view of William, a white rabbit, today living at Hougoumont, the farmhouse which held an important stand during the battle. ”Odors that I knew well - dandelions, for example - flooded the senses. Even with my dim vision I could see why: just beyond the fencing lay an entire, hallucinatory lawn of them. Ah, yes… How well I remember my dandelion lesson. ”Life cannot be lived secondhand, William! (Old Lavender again.) ”No one can truly describe a dandelion. You must experience one yourself - even if it means taking ...

If you haven't discovered the amazing photographer and photo shopper Erik Johansson , here is the opportunity. Amazing photos! Check out his web-site. Landfall by Erik Johansson

I read another historical fiction by Lena Einhorn, some years ago. It was Siri , about Siri von Essen, the first wife of August Strindberg. It was excellent, so when I saw this book, which is about the early years of Greta Garbo, I grabbed it. It does not disappoint. Excellently and engagingly written. Lena Einhorn is a physician, with a PhD in Virology and Tumor Biology, and has also done research ranging from tumor viruses, to the question of "what it is in embryonic life that strongly inhibits the development of cancer in fetuses and newborns". In the 1990s she changed her carrier into making television programs and writing books. She has also made a documentary of Greta Garbo and now using her research into her life, to write this book. Garbo's story is rather well-known, especially her career. Here we get to know so much more about her, and I think Einhorn has managed to transfer the character of Garbo into this book. It is written with great respect for the pers...

This is what you have heard on this blog lately. I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden the real world took over most of my attention! In March, my parents came to visit for two weeks. Great fun, since we don't see each other that often. At about the same time we sold our flat in Mallorca, which generated a lot of preparations.  For Easter we went there to finalise the signing and moving out of the flat. It was sad in a way, but we will come back to Mallorca. It is a lovely place! Our plan was to buy another flat in Sweden. I knew already where and had seen the flat in a viewing some years ago. We settled down to wait for the relevant flat to come on the market, expecting to wait even a year or two. You can imagine the surprise when it came on the market this April! We went to Sweden for a day to have a look. I already knew I loved the flat, having seen it before, but the good thing was that my mister also loved it! We gave an offer and got it. So you see I have ...

Having read a while ago The Turn of the Screw and lately, What Maisie Knew and (for the second time) The Aspern Papers , Henry James is popping up as one of my favourite authors. He is never an easy read. Well, easy enough to read, but his novels always end in a state of: WHAT! What does he mean? Why don’t we get any answers? It is really amazing. A while ago I saw a movie based on his What Maisie Knew which I really liked. It was put in a modern setting, but I thought that the end would be more or less in line with James’ novel. So I was reading and reading, amazed over the characters that appears in the novel. Are any of them really sane? Some do seem so, but as mentioned above, James does not want to make it easy for us. Reading on, getting closer to the end, I was just expecting the rather happy ending that I had seen in the film. I was up for a surprise! The ending was neither happy nor unhappy, and definitely not as in the film. And then again, James leaves us with a qu...

I joined Bev's challenge at My Reader's Block  to lower the number of TBRs that seems to be a constant presence, in my home at least! I opted for Mt Everest, that is to read 100 books from my TBR piles.  I now have (after sorting out a few books I finally realised I will never read) 193 books on my shelves.  If I managed to read 100 there will be less than hundred for next year! Haha, well, if I don't buy any more in the meantime. I try to be rather strict with physical books at least for the time being. Here a first summary of my reading so far. 1. The life-changing magic of tidying by Marie Kondo 2. Our Man in Havanna by Graham Greene 3. Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut 4. The German Woman by Paul Griner 5. Under jorden i Villette by Ingrid Hedström 6. The Almost Nearly Perfect People - Behind the Myth of the Scandinavian Utopia by Michael Booth 7. The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel 8.  The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevallier 9. Amsterdam - ...

It has been a busy month for me, so as a consequence, the blogging has been suffering. First my parents were here for two weeks which was very nice. We don't meet that often. Then we were preparing documents for the sale of our flat in Mallorca. Last week saw us there, emptying the flat and finalising the sell contract. A lot of work! At the same time it was sad to leave this wonderful apartment, but it was too big for us and a lot of work. Next time we go to Mallorca we rent something and just enjoy this wonderful island, where you always discover something new. View from the Cathedral in Palma Reading has been a little bit slow as well, but I have managed to finish a few books in March. I also wrote four reviews. Reviews will come for the wonderful The Sage of Waterloo  by my Brontë group friend Leona Francombe, for an interesting audio book on Che by Björn Kumm ,  as well as What Maise Knew  by Henry James. It is not that easy to review his novels, since, once yo...