Current reading

For no real reason whatsoever, I'm reading a bunch of English Girl's Boarding School stories (Angela Brazil), one American Boy's School and Athletics Story (Lester Chadwick, which is a pseud. for Howard R. Garis and apparently he also wrote the Uncle Wiggley stories, of which I had the board game) and experimenting with Dorothy Dunnett's much less known series, the Johnson Johnson books. I've got Roman Nights and Ibiza Surprise, which were originally Dolly & the Starry Bird and Dolly & the Cookie Bird. They're very odd James-Bondish books with female protagonists and I don't know if I can handle the voice just yet, because it's very distinct and quick-cut and elusive.

Perhaps here is where I disclose again that despite attempts, I have never been able to make it into either of Dunnett's far more heralded books, despite trying a few times. They're on the list of books that people I admire greatly and write books I admire greatly all adore, but I have yet to penetrate them. It's not even like the Aubrey and Maturin books, where for some reason it takes some doing to get me to pick one up, but once I do I'm usually caught for the duration; with Lymond and Niccolo both I just ended up putting the book down within a few pages and never coming back to them.

I also just finished reading Susanna Kearsley's Winter Sea, which was a very quiet and pleasant book, with two rather bland but not too terrible heroines and a sweet little love story. Something good to read if you're a fan of stories along the line of Mary Stewart, although Stewarts are more crackling and lively, on the whole. These are definitely mug of tea on a rainy day kind of books - very soothing.