This has been an okay month for reading, a bad month for review-writing. But in my defence we’ve been on holiday and that’s definitely a time for reading without thinking too hard about analysis. I do have some thoughts running around my brain that I will at some point turn into reviews when time allows. I also bought quite a lot of books while we were away, which I’ll share pics of soon.

For now I have about a thousand holiday photos to scan through for highlights and half a dozen loads of laundry to wash. Ah, that coming home from holiday feeling! I have a few posts planned about our recent holiday but for now I’ll tease with this photo. There will be many more to come.

How was your July?

Books read

Alif the Unseen by G Willow Wilson
Romance and fantasy meet the Arab Spring. A romp of an adventure centred around a hacker who gets out of his depth.

Angela Carter’s Book of Fairy Tales
Folk tales from all over the world collected and curated by Angela Carter, with a heavy emphasis on capable and/or cunning women. They’re not actually written by Carter and the quality varies a lot but it’s certainly an interesting curio.

A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K Le Guin
The first part of the Earthsea saga, this classic children’s fantasy centres around a young wizard’s coming of age, from his education to his first major adversary. The storyline is fascinating but I felt the characters were only really sketches. Perhaps I prefer her adult books. Or her science fiction.

The Summer Book by Tove Jansson
A Finnish classic, this is the (lightly fictionalised) story of young Sophia (Jansson’s niece) and her grandmother (Jansson’s mother) over the course of a few summers spent at their family home on a tiny island in the gulf of Finland. Grandmother is as open about her impending death as the family is silent about the recent death of Sophia’s mother. A beautiful, sad but still uplifting book. I’ll write a review soon as I have thoughts!

The King’s General by Daphne du Maurier
When in Fowey… Before leaving for holiday I picked up a random Cornwall-set Du Maurier, little realising how well I’d chosen. This is a fictionalised account of the occupants of Du Maurier’s Cornwall home Menabilly during the Civil War. It’s a romantic historical adventure – not a new favourite Du Maurier for me, but it was pretty amazing to read about the Rashleigh family while seeing their name everywhere we went this past week.

I can hardly believe it’s August tomorrow. Time flies faster every year. I look forward to plenty more lazy warm summer evenings. Happy summer!