The Content Reader

  This week's book is a very interesting nonfiction account on Susan Swingler's quest to find out why her father left her (and her mother) when she was four. A fascinating account of family drama and the search for a father's love. The House of Fiction by Susan Swingler "Susan Swingler is the step-daughter of one of Australia's most revered writers - the English-born Elizabeth Jolley. But behind that simple statement is a lifetime of family lies and deceptions that started when Susan's father, Leonard Jolley, left his marriage and four-year-old Susan to make a new life with Elizabeth in Australia. Susan had no inkling of what had happened until she came across perplexing revelations at the age of 21. The House of Fiction tells the story of Susan's quest to discover the truth about her father. As she traces clues to a better understanding of Leonard, she inadvertently unravels a intricate fiction created by Elizabeth to deceive Leonard's family back in E...

Friday again! The weeks go so fast nowadays, and Friday has already passed when I realise I did not participate in this memes, hosted by Rose City Reader and Freda's Voice . Therefore, I am writing this on a Tuesday. This week I will choose the book I am currently reading; The Survivors  by Jane Harper. A favourite author and this is her latest. I am only just in the beginning, but it is promising. "A body on a beach.  Secrets that have been waiting to be uncovered for twelve years. And a family torn apart by guilt and trauma." Rose City Reader hosting Book Beginnings on Fridays "Prologue She could - almost - have been one of The Survivors." "Chapter 1 Kieran hoped the numbness would set in soon. The ocean's icy burn usually mellowed into something more neutral, but as the minutes ticked by he still felt cold. He braced himself as a fresh wave. broke against his skin." Freda's Voice hosting The Friday 56 "Kieran could see Lyn trying very ...

A while since I posted here, but now it is time to join hosts Rose City Reader  with Book beginnings on Fridays and Freda's Voice  with The Friday 56. Today's book is The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. A review will come soon.   Book beginnings on Fridays "Well, let's start with Elizabeth, shall we? And see where that gets us? I knew who she was, of course; everybody here know Elizabeth. She has one of the three-bed flats in Larkin Court. It's the one on the corner, with the decking? Also, I was once on a quiz team with Stephen, who, for a number of reasons, is Elizabeth's third husband." The Friday 56 "'A nun? That was very good.' 'I didn't have much time to think,' says Joyce 'If pushed, I was going to say someone had touched me,' says Elizabeth. 'You know how hot they are on that these days. But a nun is much more fun.'"

It was quite some time since I wrote a post about book beginnings and pages 56. These two memes are hosted by Rose City Reader and Freda's Voice . I have recently been to Norway and visited Tromsö. There you will find the very interesting Polar Museum which highlights the impressive polar adventurers history of Norway. Two of the most famous ones are Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen. I couldn't help myself buying a book about them - The Lives of Nansen and Amundsen by Hans Olav Thyvold. There are more in-depth books about their achievements but this is a shorter one highlighting the most important things in their life. A very interesting book and a review will come soon. BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS From Preface by Hans Olav Thyvold "Polar heroes are not like other heroes. Not in Norway, in any case. In a country where skiing is treated with almost religious enthusiasm, skiers are national icons. With all due respect to the femmil , the dreaded fifty-kilometre cross-count...

  This week's book I have not yet read. However, I have seen references here and there and I am really excited to start The Disappearing Spoon  by Sam Kean. Here the summary. "Why did Gandhi hate iodine (I, 53)? How did radium (Ra, 88) nearly ruin Marie Curie's reputation? And why is gallium (Ga, 31) the go-to element for laboratory pranksters? The periodic table is a crowning scientific achievement, but it's also a treasure trove of passion, adventure, betrayal, and obsession. These fascinating tales follow all the elements on the table as they play out their parts in human history, finance, mythology, conflict, the arts, medicine, and the lives of the (frequently) mad scientists who discovered them.   The Disappearing Spoon masterfully fuses science with the classic lore of invention, investigation, discovery, and alchemy, from the Big Bang through the end of time." Does it not sounds intriguing? Can hardly wait to start this book.   Book Beginnings on Fridays ...

It is some time since I posted here on two of my favourite memes or challenges, but now it is time. I recently read W. Somerset Maugham's The Moon and Sixpence  which I found wonderful. These memes are hosted by Rose City Reader and Freda's Voice. Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader I confess that when First I made acquaintance with Charles Strickland I never for a moment discerned that there was in him anything out of the ordinary. The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice I had said all I had to say on the subject that had brought me to Paris, and though I felt it din a manner treacherous to Mrs. Strickland not to pursue it, I could not struggle against his indifference. It requires the feminine temperament to repeat the same thing three times with unabated zest.   Do we discern a little bit of sexism in the last sentence? A wonderful book, my review under link above. 

  This week's book beginning and page 56 is taken from the biography The Lonely Empress, a biography of Elizabeth of Austria  by Joan Haslip.  Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader "We were eight children and each one of us had our Christmas tree." The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice "She was even prettier than he remembered and in his enthusiasm he wrote off to his mother, 'I can never thank you enough for having laid the foundations of my happiness', adding, 'every day I love Sisi more and more and am more convinced that no one could be better suited to me'. Seen in her own environment, Elizabeth was at her most enchanting, a gay, excited little girl rather than a future Empress, proudly showing him off in front of her brothers and sisters, all of whom, including Helen, gave him a tumultuous welcome. " How little did they both know what their marriage and lives would be like?   

  This week I have ventured back to an old classic. Maybe being influenced by the latest challenge I have joined; Back to the Classics . It is George Sand's A Winter in Mallorca. George Sand and her lover Fredrick Chopin visited Mallorca during the winter of 1838/39. They stayed in Palma and in the monastery in the picturesque village of Valldemossa. Still today you can visit the apartment they stayed in, although it is not exactly the same rooms and the same furniture. But it is a beautiful place. Unlike most people who visit Mallorca, George Sand was not over-enthusiastic about the place and the people.  Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader This quote is from the 4th paragraph of Chapter One.  "Without quite the same claims to immortality as Jean-Jacques and in search for something that I could achieve, I thought that I might perhaps become as famous as the two Englishmen in the valley of Chamounix and claim the honour of having discovered Mallorca. " T...

Friday coming up! I am just wondering where the time goes? Tomorrow the sun is promised, so I hope we can go out for a walk. Very windy here in Sweden now. On the other hand, bad autumn weather is a good excuse to stay at home and read a good book. Therefore I have chosen one of my favourite authors for this week's beginning and page 56, Sebastian Barry's Days Without End. "Time was not something then we thought of as an item that possessed an ending, but something that would go on for ever, all rested and stopped in that moment. hard to say what I mean by that. You look back at all the endless years when you never had that thought. I am doing that now as I write these words in Tennessee. I am thinking of the days without end of my life. And it is not like that now ..." Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader "The method of laying out a corpse in Missouri sure took the proverbial cake. Like decking out our poor lost troopers for marriage rather tha...

It has been a while since I posted here. Maybe because, since I now live in Sweden, I read more books in Swedish. We have excellent libraries here and that means I don't have to put more books on my already over-full TBR shelves. My local library has a shelf with new books, or new translations or just themes they want to promote. There I usually find good books. They also have a shelf with themed books related to events, time of the year etc. Now they have a shelf with horror books or at least spooky books. It is not my favourite genre, but I was attracted by this particular book; Thin Air by Michelle Paver. " The higher you go the darker it gets."  "The Himalayas, 1935 Kangchuenjunga. Third-highest peak on earth. Greatest killer of them all. Five Englishmen set off from Darjeeling, determined to conquer the sacred summit. But courage can only take them so far - and the mountain is not their only foe. As mountain sickness and the horrors of extreme altitude set in, ...

  This week's book is a non-fiction book I have had on my shelves for quite some time; Darwin's Sacred Cause, Race, Slavery and the Quest for Human Origins  by Adrian Desmond and James Moore. I have not yet read it, but it is an interesting subject in more ways than one. Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader "No 'evil more monstrous has ever existed upon earth'. So said the leading anti-slavery campaigner Thomas Clarkson on celebrating the end of the slave trade. Clarkson was supported and part-financed by Charles Darwin's grandfather, the master potter Josiah Wedgwood. But the words could equally have been Darwin's - or those of his other grandfather, the libertine, poet and Enlightenment evolutionist Erasmus Darwin. For all of them slavery was a depravity to make one's 'blood boil', in Charles Darwin's words, a sin requiring expiation: 'to think that we Englishmen and our American descendants ... have been and are so gu...

This week's book is one that I have had for quite some time on my shelves, The Book of Secrets  by Tom Harper. The back cover summary tells a story that is exactly my cup of tea. "In a snowbound village in the German mountains, a young woman discovers an extraordinary secret. Before she can reveal it, she disappears. All that survives is a picture of a mysterious medieval playing card that has perplexed scholars for centuries.   Nick Ash does research for the FBI in New York. Six months ago his girlfriend Gilliam walked out and broke his heart. Now he's the only person who can save her - if it's not too late. Within hours of getting her message Nick finds himself on the run, delving deep into the past before it catches up with him.   Hunted across Europe, Nick follows Gillian's trail into the heart of a 500-year-old mystery. But across the centuries, powerful forces are closing around him. There are men who have devoted their lives to keeping the secr...

A long time since I posted something under this banner, but now I am back with a wonderful book. It is Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman. I bought it because many of you put up excellent reviews. They were well deserved. A review will come soon.      Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader "When people ask me what I do - taxi drivers, dental hygienists - I tell them I work in an office. In almost nine years, no one's ever asked what kind of office, or what sort of job I do there." The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice "She came with me from my childhood bedroom, survived the foster placements and children's homes and, like me, she's still here."

This week's book beginnings and page 56 text comes from a book on my shelves. Since it is November and I am participating in Nonfiction November , I choose a non-fiction book; The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England  by Ian Mortimer. Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader "What does the word 'medieval' conjure up in your mind? Knights and castles? Monks and abbeys? Huge tracts of forest in which outlaws live in defiance of the law" Such images may be popular but they say little about what life was like for the majority." The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice "The foregoing makes the woman's lot seem a particularly harsh one. However, there are some great advantages to being a woman. When the king issues writs to his sheriffs summoning an army, it is the men who have to risk their lives and fight, not the women. Despite this, high-status women are still entitled to all the benefits of being connected...

This week's book beginnings and page 56 text is another library book,  Shadowplay by Joseph O'Connor. It is a little bit out of my usual style, but it features Bram Stoker, so could not resist it. I have not yet read it, but review will follow. Love the cover! "1878: The Lyceum Theatre, London. Three extraordinary people begin their life together, a life that will be full of drama, transformation and passionate devotion to art and one another. The Chief ... HENRY IRVING volcanic leading man and impresario The Leading Lady ... ELLEN TERRY most lauded actress of her generation The Theatre Manager ... BRAM STOKER following along behind them in the shadows Fresh from life in Dublin as a clerk, Bram may seem the least colourful of the trio but he is wrestling with dark demons in a new city, in a new marriage, and with his own literary aspirations. As he walks the London streets at night, streets haunted by the Ripper and the gossip which swirls around his friend Oscar...