Recent Reading, Knitting and Christmassy Stuff

Recent Reading


I really do enjoy the Maisie Dobbs series - and thankfully there are still quite a few to go before I finally get up to date. Maisie herself is such a likeable character.

I used to read Rosamond Richardson's column in Birdwatching Magazine and loved her beautifully descriptive style of nature writing and so I just had to buy this book which lived up to its promise. The descriptive writing is sublime describing the sense of wonder you can attain from watching birds. It also includes wonderful quotes from various poets and philosophers. It is a book to read slowly and savour every sentence.

I have read all of Rachel Hore's books and they are good, easy to read and the type of book that is ideal holiday reading.

I so enjoy this Fen series - always I find the book difficult to put down. So glad there are more left to read in the series!

I bought this book because my love of medieval churches left me wanting to know a lot more than I did on life in Medieval England. This is an interesting book if you like history. The book uses an interesting new technique describing what life would actually be like if you travelled back in time to that era. I will be looking out for his book on Elizabethan England.

"Medieval Masons" is another book I bought because of my interest in medieval churches. I wanted a general back-ground read on the subject before starting a book on "The Herefordshire School of Romanesque Sculptures". Easy to understand but probably not for everyone unless you too have an interest in stone carving during the Medieval Ages.

The book below is the second in a series of Wesley Peterson books which I discovered thanks to Rosie from "Corners of My Mind Blog who has inspired me to try many new authors. I enjoyed this very much and yippee again there are quite a few left for me to read in the series.

I've started collecting this lovely little series on features in churches. Lots of fascinating facts and photos.

I follow the author of this book on Twitter where I became aware of this book set near Alderley Edge. This book is gripping and full of suspense and I read it in two days as I just could not put in down. As it is a Christmas haunting story it seemed the right time of year to read it! Evil is lurking beneath the ground waiting to be released from a tomb being excavated by a team of archaeologists. It is part of a Trilogy so I will read the other two books. It is a trifle scary far more so, in my view, than say Barbara Erskine or the Merrily Watkins books. In fact scare factor wise I would put it more on a par with Phil Rickman's non Merrily books such as the Cold Calling which I did find frightening! There again to be fair I should point out I do not read many horror stories so other people may well disagree with me on the scare factor.

I really enjoyed Patrick Barkham's books on his search for butterflies and on badgers and I really liked this book. As he walks the coastal paths Patrick Barkham tells the story of our coast including snippets on rocks, plants, birds, history and people who live or have lived by the coast along with man's attempts to protect our shoreline from tidal erosion and sea-rise due to climate change. A great read.

Getting ready for Christmas

I finally got round to making the mincemeat earlier this month.

We have finally put up the Christmas Tree - better late than never!

I've been knitting again this time an Elf on the Shelf - not happy with his face to be honest but it was the best I could do. I can knit but I am not good at sewing and the faces are the one thing I struggle with when making toys!

Every year I seem to be too busy on Christmas Eve to watch all of "Carols from Kings's" so my son had the lovely thought of buying me tickets for my birthday to see King's College Choir singing Christmas Carols at Birmingham Symphony Hall. It was a magical experience and one I thoroughly enjoyed so thank you D.

Grasmere Gingerbread arrived today - it won't last until Christmas!

I made the cake last month and fed it countless times before B managed to marzipan and ice it. We keep the decorating simple!