Dissolution
Shardlake is summoned by Lord Cromwell to investigate the murder of a commissioner sent to persuade the abbot of a monastery to turn over its wealth to the crown
A Very Bookish Holiday
I alluded to bookish doings abroad in my last post ... the London trip was amazing, at least from this bibliophile's point of view
Break, Blow, Burn Review
I've spent some time with Camille Paglia's Break, Blow, Burn in which she "reads" forty-three of the "world's best poems."
Paint it Black
Janet Fitch's Paint It Black is aptly named. Josie's is one of the hardest drinking and drugging women I've met in fiction in a while.
The Prime of Miss Jean Brody
The Prime of Miss Jane Brody is a story about five girls and their unconventional teacher, Miss Jean Brodie, who is just entering her prime
Beatrix Potter, Complete Tales Review
The Beatrix Potter Complete Tales with all 23 of the famous tales, beginning with Peter Rabbit and arranged in the order they were originally published
A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City
You'd never call A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City light summer reading
Strong Poison
Seems like a long time since I've chatted up a British mystery ... doesn't it? Well, Strong Poison, by Dorothy L. Sayers, is just the thing to put an end to the dry spell
A Series of Unfortunate Events
In a coup of numerological (and bibliographic) symmetry, Lemony Snicket delivered the final instalment in the A Series of Unfortunate Events
A Far Cry From Kensington
A Far Cry from Kensington offers a wry send-up of the London publishing scene with its debtors, eccentrics, high-maintenance authors and bottomless well of hangers-on.
The Fairy Tales
The Fairy Tales are also appropriate, despite their darker elements, for children who have perhaps overindulged on the sugar-coated Disney versions
The Adventures of Frog and Toad
Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad Are Friends, published in 1970, is the first in a series of four books about these two famous friends
The Moonstone
The Moonstone is a very long tale about a precious gem stolen from the brow of a Hindu deity that wreaks havoc on an English family
Blaming
Blaming by Elizabeth Taylor is the story of an unlikely friendship that forms between Amy, an Englishwoman, and Martha, an American