Tag: robert b parker

Library visit

Today is Sunday.

Grey and cloudy.

No hockey last night.

Today, I’m going to the library.

Most of my recent library books,

 were enjoyable and/or informative.

I loved my Somerset Maugham,

Creatures Of Circumstances.

I learned a few things,

from Genderqueer.

Some of this information,

 will take me a while to digest.

I found the personal accounts particularly poignant.

I’m glad I read it.

An important book with valuable insight.

I recommend it highly.

I haven’t finished,

 just barely,

 started,

 The Country Of Pointed Firs,

I’m going to renew it,

 and try to finish over the holidays.

The Daphne Du Maurier,

 My Cousin Rachel,

couldn’t get into it,

 too Gothic for my taste.

Off to the library,

will let you know what I get 🙂

**************************

I’m Back.

I picked up what I believe to be,

 some good loot.

Last week,

 I read a Robert B. Parker,

 from his Spenser series,

it was a delight,

took me out of both my book and emotional slump.

So I got another,

Pastime,

The front cover boasts:

The secrets of Spenser’s past -revealed at last!

The size was right and I couldn’t resist that line,

so into the book bag it went.

I have heard wonderful thing’s about Penelope Fitzgerald’s,

The Bookshop,

I can never resist bookish books with bookish titles,

again a tiny book.

I also got Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh.

I started reading Brideshead Revisited last night,

and I’m already captivated,

 so,

 the little Waugh with the intriguing title,

another natural for the book bag.

They are all small books,

 easy to carry and hopefully,

 easy to get through,

 over the hectic holiday period.

Well,

I’m going to read now.

Later girls

BB

 

 

 

 

 

Happened upon in a book slump

Wow, it’s really coming down out there.

Cotton Ball snow,

pretty.

The Habs lost last night,

 second in a row.

They lost to Toronto,

 that hurts.

In a effort to get out of my book slump,

I read a Robert B Parker,

 that was lying around the bookstore.

The Professional, a Spencer novel.

I had never read any Parker,

I do however,

 remember the character from a television show,

Spencer For Hire,

shows you how old I am.

Spencer is a private detective in Boston.

I like detective novels.

The one’s I really like are,

 the Sara Paretsky V.I. Warshawski novels,

to a lesser extent the Sue Grafton Kinsey Milhone’s.

The old fashioned hard drinking,

macho stuff is not really my thing.

The Parker wasn’t like that.

It is very masculine,

 in the sense that Spencer is a guy,

a guy who used to box and is a private eye.

He is also a literate, mature, funny man.

His love interest is a mature beautiful woman,

a Dr of Psychology from Harvard.

Susan is also a fun character.

I loved this novel.

I zipped right through it,

not bored for an instant.

I intend to take some out of the library.

Parker wrote many,

sadly there will be no more,

he passed away.

Still, there should be enough to last a while.

Once I finished the Parker,

I was poking around looking for something else.

A few weeks ago,

I had put aside for a customer,

The International by Glenn Patterson.

This customer,

 one of my favourites,

likes short story collections,

and obscure British, Canadian, Irish … novels.

For some reason she passed on The International.

I looked at it again,

 for me.

On the back, Colm Toibin describes Patterson as:

 One of the best contemporary Irish novelists.

Here is the jacket description:

January 1967, An ordinary Saturday in the Blue Bar of the International Hotel In Belfast. While 18-year-old Danny pulls pints, he contemplates his future and the bar’s varied clientele. But, ordinary Saturday’s like this are almost over. On the next day the hotel will host the inaugural meeting of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, and the slide towards the troubles will begin.

Sounded good to me,

 I love fiction about The Troubles.

It seems to me,

 that I have seen mostly movies about The IRA era.

Cal, In The Name Of The Father, Some Mother’s Son, The Crying Game.

All really hard, dark, and piss you off type movies.

Makes you angry at the waste and the injustice.

It does however make for good fiction.

This novel seems to be just what I need right now.

Well, have a lovely Sunday.

Later girls

BB