First, thanks to Gil for suggestions in Friday's comments (my own comment facility isn't working). I'll see if we've got those in the library. Thanks also to Jayne for a bag of skinny books - much appreciated.
Over the weekend I read:
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett - not boring like I had feared but existential angst in plenty.
Esprit du Corps by Lawrence Durrell - having seen Gerald Durrell's viewpoint of his brother Lawrence I wanted to see what his writing was like. This is an amusing account of the post-war diplomatic service. I must try one of his novels though.
Happy Christmas by Daphne du Maurier - a clever but rather depressing reworking of the Christmas story.
More Friends of the Doctor by Isabel Cameron - well written but very dated pre-war fictional anecdotes set in the Highlands.
High and Low by John Betjeman and John Betjeman: poems, selected by Hugo Williams - two volumes of Betjeman's verse. He is the master of evocation, using familiar objects to bring out homely settings. Clever and amusing word-play. The end of the poems often have their own existential angst, though, all the more powerful for having had such a cosy setting.
Touch Not the Cat by Mary Stewart - I like this author so was pleased to find one I hadn't read before. Slightly dated but not too bad and a well-written mystery. I must try reading My Brother Michael again, by the same author, but set in Greece.
Day 354; book 345
2 hours ago
