PLACES & BOOKS

2019. What a big year. Crikey – so much happened! There was · A level results for youngest daughter and her going off for her first year at Liverpool Univers...

Losing yourself in a book. We’ve all done it. Entering the world, becoming the character, forgetting yourself. It’s a wonderful and sometimes overwhelming ex...

In my last blog I asked What is a Classic? and I considered that possibly the best we could do would be to cumulate all our “100 books you should read” lists...

I saw a fascinating-looking book the other day which I'd have bought if I'd not been on a book buying ban. It was called 'Why read the classics?' and was by ...

Let me take you down to the borders of Wales and England, to a small and beautiful town nestling in the hills on the edge of the Brecon Beacons. This is farm...

30 books, Marie? Really? Well of course we all now know that’s not what she said. Or at least I hope we know that. What she said was ““I now keep my collecti...

Do books you have previously read call to you? Or do you just want to keep discovering new books and new authors? Today I am considering the best good balanc...

How diverse are your bookshelves? I'm constantly asking myself that question, challenging my assumptions - for why read if not to experience as many differen...

2018. There it goes. Whoosh. Bye! While others were obsessed with Brexit, I was busy reading (and doing other stuff). Mostly reading though. The count was 85...

In memory of my favourite bookshop... I still feel a sense of loss whenever I walk past a particular shop-front in my town. All the frivolous consumer outlet...

Do you listen to podcasts? What about audio books? Me, I’m a relative latecomer to these worlds of wonder. Until about a year ago, I pretty much spent all my...

I’m lucky enough to work in the heart of Bloomsbury – Virginia Woolf territory – in London, so spend virtually every weekday there. Within a stone’s throw is...

A little while ago I squeezed a longer article into bookstagram format, so here I am going to unpack it a little. The post was called The History of my Readi...

Why read fiction? Hmmm? Of all the ways to pass your short time on this planet, why stick your head in the midst of a few hundred pages of paper and read som...

Good day lovely people. Today I am bringing you a list of my top hundred favourite books. These aren't necessarily the greatest books ever, but simply the on...