The Content Reader

  I have not been in the mood to write reviews lately, even if I have read some really good books. As you might have noticed, not in the mood for any posts. Well, I thought I will make an effort and at least write a short summary of some of the books I have read in the last couple of months.  Mornings in Jenin by Susan Abulhawa "Forcibly removed from the ancient village of Ein Hod by the newly formed state of Israel in  1948, the Abulhejas are moved into the Jenin refugee camp. There, exiled from his beloved olive groves, the family patriarch languishes of a broken heart, his eldest son fathers a family and falls victim to an Israeli bullet, and his grandchildren struggle against tragedy toward freedom, peace, and home. This is the Palestinian story, told as never before, through four generations of a single family." Through Amal's eyes, we see the fragile existence of her family and friends. Her story is very touching and dramatic and highlights the ups and downs of thei...

I should not really buy any new books, but sometimes I cannot help myself. At least I manage rather well with new books since I can borrow them at the library. When I visit second-hand shops it is quite a different game. Here you often find older and non-fiction books that are not so easy to find today, although the library has them of course. No excuse there! I was just trying. I tend to go toward non-fiction history books. In the neighbourhood you also find books about local history. Lately, especially during the pandemic when there was not so much more to do than go out into the woods, I have looked more into what was happening close by. Skåne, or Scania, is an interesting place. Settlements have been found from very early on, the area was Danish for centuries and since the mid 17th century is Swedish. That means there is a lot of history around.  Books I bought recently.  Blom, K Arne & Moen, Jan - Försvunna städer i Skåneland - about lost cities in Skåne (Scania) Fost...

Last Classic Club Spin#24 ended on number 18. Under that number, I have Dante's The Divine Comedy of which the book is divided into three parts. Earlier I finished Hell  and for this month I read Purgatory. I have started Heaven which I should finish at the end of the week. It is not an easy book to read, but, I did find it more interesting than I thought.  I am trying to read more of the most famous classical literature, and this is one of them.  Even if I am not able to appreciate it like a professor in literature, it nevertheless gave me pleasure.  Cannot say I really will be able to analyse it, but there are others who can. On Wikipedia, you can find this summary of Dante's meaning with  The Divine Comedy. "The narrative takes as its literal subject the state of souls after death and presents an image of divine justice meted out as due punishment or reward, and describes Dante's travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise or Heaven, while allegorically th...

  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...

 Long time since I posted a bookmark here. Probably due to Corona, since travelling has been scarce. However, now I have made a short trip to Austria and Delft. You will find, in the coming days, two posts about these trips on The Content Reader Goes Outdoors . The meme is hosted by Guiltless Reading   although I think Aloi is mostly posting this meme on her twitter/instragram accounts with the same name.  In Delft, we visited churches and museums and I managed to find a bookmark of Girl With a Pearl Earring, one of the most popular paintings of Delft's famous son Johannes Vermeer. For my magnet collection on the fridge I bought another four motives by him; View of Delft, Little Street, Art of Painting, and Girl With a Pearl Earring.  In the Vermeer centre, I found two books which I am looking forward to reading. They are Vermeer's Little Street by Franz Gruzenhout. Not much is known about the exact location of the painting, so it reads like a mystery. The other...

In 2014 I read  The Chosen Man  by J.G. Harlond. I really loved the book and was looking forward to a continuation. Time passes and it was just when I read Deborah Swift's blogpost  about a new book by Harlond, that I checked if there was a follow up to The Chosen Man.  To my delight, I found that the one book had developed into a   trilogy, with A Turning Wind and By Force of Circumstance.  The 17th century is a very interesting century in many ways. The powers of Europe fighting for religion, new worlds, money, silks, spices, and more. Seafaring is big business, luxury commodities from the east are imported to Europe to please the upper classes. Not to talk about diamonds, rubies, emeralds, and other precious stones. In the center of activity stands Italian businessman and adventurer Ludovico da Portovenere, " one-time corsair, sometime merchant, secret agent of monarchs, servant of none ".   With Portovenere, J.G. Harlond has created an ex...

All things come to an end, and Paris in July 2020 has finished. Host Tamara at Thyme for Tea ,  lets us linger a little bit more though. Time to wrap up. I have enjoyed all the various posts about Paris and France. Learnt a lot, been inspired, got hungry, extended my to-read list, and even managed to put up a few posts myself. As usual, my plans went 'out the window' (as we say in Swedish), meaning that very few of my intended posts were written. Other inspiration came in their place. I read books by my two favourite thriller writers; The Poison Will Remain by Fred Vargas and  Time is a Killer by Michel Bussi. A few favourite French movies went into the pot, as well as some unfinished posts from last year(!) about magical rooms; Gertrude Stein and Natalie Clifford Barney and  Adrienne Monnier and Sylvia Beach . At the very end of July, I received a book from author and blogger Paulita Kincher for a review, Falling for Provence . That was a wonderful novel for wrapping ...