Bookshelf Traveling - December 27, 2020

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West. This may be the last one – I haven’t run out of bookcases but I think Katrina and I may have run out of steam. Today I am looking at a bookcase in my home office which includes some old and new titles. During the pandemic, however, I have mostly worked in the dining room where the Christmas tree is.

Bookshelf Traveling - December 20, 2020

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West. Today I am looking at a bookcase in my bedroom which includes some really random titles along with some mystery authors I like.

Bookshelf Traveling with the Aiken Sisters - December 12

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.  Last time I displayed a shelf that holds my juvenile hardcover Joan Aikens, so today we are going downstairs to a shelf that is shared by Joan and her sister Jane Aiken Hodge, another favorite. 

Bookshelf Traveling - November 29

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West. This is a shelf in my guest room where most of the children’s books live and contains three favorite British authors: Ruth M. Arthur, Elfrida Vipont, and Joan Aiken.

Bookshelf Traveling - November 21

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West. 

This is another bookshelf from my living room.  On the left are several books by Jodi Picoult. For those who have not read her, she writes contemporary fiction with themes that seem torn from current headlines: suicide pacts, school shootings, manipulative talk show hosts.  Most readers either love them or hate them; I am more in the middle as I used to enjoy them a lot but now find some are very readable and some are just tedious. 

Back before she was a bestselling author, I picked up one of her books my then company had published – I think it was Picture Perfect, which is about domestic abuse.  I found it extremely readable but very disturbing.  Books on this topic are not uncommon now but I think this one was the first I had read (I seem to recall And the Ladies of the Club includes this theme too but I don’t recall exactly when I read that).  Publishers sometimes give up on an author they can’t break even on, and it took Picoult several publishers and quite a few books before she became a bestseller with My Sister’s Keeper.  Two of these are autographed so I can’t discard them, can I? But I might need space on this shelf!  

Bookshelf Traveling - Friday the 13th of November

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   This is another shelf in my living room and it reveals a mixture of mysteries and lighthearted English fiction.  It is one of five tall bookcases and I need a stool to reach the top shelf.  Maybe that is why some of these are unread!

Mary Elgin (1917-1965) was a British writer of just three books that are known but is considered the closest thing to Mary Stewart. Her books are contemporary gothics with humor and charm, set in the Scottish Highlands.  In Highland Masquerade (1965), teenaged Aillie Rannoch put a curse on the man who drove her father to suicide, and then fled her Highland home - swearing never to return.  Ten years later, driven by disturbing memories of the past, Aillie returns to Glenshael disguised as a dowdy secretary, seeking revenge.  If you come across an Elgin paperback at a used bookstore, grab it!

Bookshelf Traveling - October 31, 2020

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.

This bookshelf is directly below last week’s and you can see it begins with two hardcover Brenda Jaggers (I had to reread A Winter Child last weekend – still a 5, with a quirky ending) there was no room for above.  Next are my Daphne du Mauriers, although I think I loaned Rebecca to my niece and The House on the Strand is in a box I mailed in May to my sister in New York.  The post office periodically sends unconvincing updates to say they are still looking for it.  That USPS sent my box of books to North Carolina instead of New York does not give me a lot of confidence many of those mail-in ballots will be delivered in time to be counted next week.  Thank you for nothing, Louis de Joy. 

Bookshelf Traveling - October 24

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.

This shelf contains primarily historical fiction/upscale historical romance by British authors Brenda Jagger and Stella Riley and Canadian author Susanna Kearsley.  Jagger (1936-86) wrote just nine novels, several of which were set in 19th century Yorkshire.  She is best known for The Barforth Trilogy, which consists of The Clouded Hills, Flint and Roses, and The Sleeping Sword (these were retitled in the US which is always annoying when you think you've found a new one).  It is a wonderful series set in the late 19th century in which independent women struggle with identity, marriage, class, and the expectations of those around them.  I am trying to remember which are my favorites so took A Winter’s Child down from the shelf beneath the one pictured and began rereading.  Set in Yorkshire just after World War I, it is about a young widow who spent the war nursing soldiers in France and returns home to rebuild her life near her husband's family.  I gave it 5 stars the last time I read it.

Bookshelf Traveling - October 17, 2020 - mostly mysteries

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.

This shelf holds many of my paperback mysteries, although, surprisingly, starts on the left with the history of Jordan Marsh, the former New England department store chain.  My first real job was in its executive training program and I was interviewed for the book by local historian Anthony Sammarco.  Anyone interested in Boston history should follow him on Facebook's Lost Boston.

Bookshelf Traveling - September 26

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.

This is an American History shelf that features some admired authors.  On the left are several books by David McCullough.   My parents heard him speak at Roxbury Latin and asked him to autograph John Adams (2001) for me.  I remember my friend Duncan read Truman (1992) aloud to his newborn when it first came out and that baby just got engaged!  I listened to the audio of Mornings on Horseback (1981)(about Theodore Roosevelt) as I drove to Quebec a year ago.   I also really liked The Wright Brothers (2015) but do not own that one.   Next is Down with the Old Canoe, A Cultural History of the Titanic Disaster (1996) by Steven Biel.  I have a separate section for books about the Titanic so this book is in the wrong place!  I think I got it mixed up with Tippecanoe and Tyler too, the 1840 campaign song my father told me about long ago. 

Bookshelf Traveling - September 19

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books. 

This is a very random shelf with six suspense novels by Helen MacInnes, eight novels of varying genre by Catherine Gaskin, seven historical novels by Valerie Anand and, finally, two by W.E.B. Griffin, hidden behind the Fred Lynn bobblehead.  Old W.E.B. (and his son, now writing the books) has other shelves and deserves his own post another time.

Bookshelf Traveling - September 12

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books. 

Bookshelf Traveling - August 29

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and is currently hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.  

My guest room has seven bookcases of children’s books, including this shelf which holds the Ellen Confords, three by L.M. Boston, Understood Betsy (which I couldn’t find when I needed it last month for the family read!), the Carol Ryrie Brinks, and my E. Nesbits.

Bookshelf Traveling with Patricia Wentworth - August 22

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which was created by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness and now hosted by Katrina at Pining for the West, on opposite sides of the Atlantic.  The idea is to share one (or three) of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps another pile of books.  

Three shelves of Patricia Wentworth!

This is a quick post (or was meant to be) because it is the first weekend of the semester, which means homework in my two classes, Collection Development and Library Management.  And although I was planning to take next week off, I have an overdue grant that must be finished before I can take any vacation from work.  But I swear by Tuesday I will have turned off my alarm and will be sleeping late or reading in the hammock instead of trying to motivate my department from dawn to dusk.   Six months of working from home has been challenging for everyone, and those with children are especially worried about today’s news that Boston schools will both delay the start and conduct classes remotely.

Patricia Wentworth

Bookshelf Traveling - August 15

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.    

Bookshelf Traveling - August 7

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a pile of books on the floor that you keep meaning to read or at least make space for in a bookcase.

Bookshelf Traveling - July 25, 2020

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.   

After traveling with Eva Ibbotson last week, I reread her Magic Flutes and then decided I had never read The Star of Kazan so began that one.  Do you know sometimes you are so familiar with an author or genre so well that you recognize what is going to happen and then you think, wait, have I already read this?   It happens to me with Elizabeth Cadell and D.E. Stevenson’s books, most but not all of which I read years ago, and is definitely happening with The Star of Kazan.   We’ll see if I am right.  As it is an audiobook, I now realize I should have been pronouncing Eva as “Ava.”

Bookshelf Traveling - July 17

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books. 

This shelf holds most of my Eva Ibbotson collection, a Viennese-born author (1925-2010) who spent most of her life in England.  I don’t recall if my mother or I first found Ibbotson but we became fans in the 80s after her first two books were published, A Countess Below Stairs and Magic Flutes.  Her seven adult novels are charming, light historical novels with romantic elements about resolute heroines with an oversized sense of responsibility for others, no matter how dire their own straits.  Ibbotson’s books display a sensitivity toward refugees and displaced people that likely resulted from her own experience.  They are real comfort books!

Bookshelf Traveling to India - July 11

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books. 

Judith mentioned M.M. Kaye’s mysteries recently and that sent me to my India bookshelf. In the early days of HBO, coverage included Wimbledon and my family subscribed because we were big tennis fans.  HBO also aired its first miniseries, The Far Pavilions, based on Kaye’s 1978 novel and starring Ben Cross, Amy Irving, and Omar Sharif (when I checked the cast, I saw there is talk of a remake). The cinematography would have made it worth watching even if the story and acting hadn’t been very compelling!  The next day I went to the library to get a copy of the book, set in the 19th century Raj about a young Englishman born in India but raised in England; when he returns to India as an officer he falls in love with an Indian princess and struggles with cultural divides.  Kaye also wrote a well-reviewed three-book memoir, beginning with The Sun in the Morning (1990) about her childhood in India.  One critic wrote, "No romance in the novels of M.M. Kaye... could equal her love for India."   Shadow of the Moon, one of her other historicals, is just as good or better than The Far Pavilions, however.

Bookshelf Traveling - July 3, 2020

Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness.   The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.   And hooray for a vacation day because that means lots of time for reading!

Someone in my Betsy-Tacy discussion group mentioned Elizabeth Janet Gray the other day, which sent me straight to this shelf.  Gray is one of many authors I came to through my mother.  Gray was a distinguished writer of children's and adult books and is best known for Adam of the Road, which won the Newbery Medal in 1943 and was illustrated by Robert Lawson (the only person to have ever won both a Newbery Award and a Caldecott Medal).  Set in the 13th century, it is the story of Adam’s life with his minstrel father and how Adam copes when they are separated, learning how to survive on the road alone through a series of adventures.   Perhaps I can inspire my youngest nephew to read it this summer.