What Else Are You Reading - XVIII

I read Fanfare for Tin Trumpets by Margery Sharp, 1932, which was her second novel and another mildly satirical comedy, also one of her few novels with a male protagonist. This story is about a young man who decides to spend a year trying to be a writer, of vaguely considered novels or short stories or plays or..., after his father dies and he inherits £100. He works out a frugal budget and rents a room with a friend attending teacher training college, but then our hero falls in love with an overbudget actress. Oops. This isn't as laugh aloud funny as some of Sharp's novels but even in the early novels her astute eye for human behaviour is always amusing to me (and it's definitely more Furrowed Middlebrow than some of her later more satirical work). I only have two unread adult novels by Margery Sharp left now.

Quotes

The English Way of Death: "On Mr. French's death he had been surprised to feel practically no sorrow, only an additional warmth of affection towards his friend; and in view of the exceptional circumstances had even managed to mention this feeling in so many words. But that was a couple of days ago, and the incident could now be considered closed."

Make-up: "You want either," said Charlie Coe impartially, "to take some off or put some on. It doesn't matter which, but just now you look like a corpse."

Age and dignity, or not, lol: "The sunken mouth puckered into a grin, the beady eyes sparkled, her whole aged countenance was suddenly alive with that pure bawdy gusto that makes some parts of Shakespeare so unsuitable for the use of schools."

J just read and loved Cluny Brown - I hope to get back to the two other books I have by her soon (the one published recently and another Netgalley book from the Open Road Media reissues a few years ago.

I currently have several books on the go, including a VMC (Barbara Comyns) and J Courtney Sullivan, Friends and Strangers. One of the main characters has been given a copy of Angel by Elizabeth Taylor by her English boyfriend. I'm wondering if this turns out to have a particular meaning....

I'm reading a non-Virago book by a Virago author - The snow ball by Brigid Brophy. I own but haven't read King of a rainy country, but Snow ball is good so far.

I've just read The Sun Egg (absolutely lovely), and now I'm in between two books The Girl And The Witch's Garden (surprisingly good so far, I think), and Old Herbacous, which is perfect for coming summer.

I feel so badly I haven't been chatty. I love this group.

I'm making an effort to read more of the many unread books on my shelves, and spending some time re-cataloguing it all here. :)

I've started reading The peacock, which Ali's review drew to my attention. I'm thoroughly enjoying this comic novel so far.

I am now reading The D Case: or The Truth About the Mystery of Edwin Drood by Carlo Fruterro. It's one of a few mystery books that I have been reading since the pandemic began. I had never read mysteries in the past. I also read some of Conan-Doyle's Sherlock Holmes mysteries and have enjoyed all of them.

I have been absent from LT for quite a while and i am disappointed that there are so few posts. I still feel a loyalty to Virago and have used it as a stepping stone to discover other authors and their works. I still mainly read books by and about women.

I think we all fell into a Covid trough, Kay. I've been part of this group since I joined in 2008 (?) and I still miss Paola (the woman who started the VMC group), Rob, and Mary in Tennessee with the goats. (What was her LT name???) And Belva!!! Where are you Belva? Lyzard is doing a great job of rallying the troops, but the rest of us are just meh at the moment.

I haven't read anything serious this last year except half a dozen Persephones during AV/AA. I email Peggy in North Carolina and Elaine in Chicago and I watch Netflix. That's it.

>7 kayclifton: I don't post much in this thread because most of the books I'm reading that would appeal to readers of the core VMC canon are already well-known but....

At the end of last year I re-read most of Mary Wesley's novels and they all held up well.

I enjoyed Penelope Lively's skilful How it All Began.

I recently re-read Alison Lurie's Pulitzer Prize-winning Foreign Affairs, which with hindsight seems very 1980s but is still an interesting examination of "the woman question".

More lightweight are the many Margery Sharp reprints, and Madeleine St. John's evergreen The Women in Black.

New, but well publicised, is Janice Hadlow's The Other Bennet Sister, which appealed to me much more than most Jane Austen fanfic (although I also enjoyed Soniah Kamal's more metafictional Unmarriageable I wouldn't automatically recommend it to VMC fans).

And from further afield but still dealing with middle-class women's interactions with wider society, I especially enjoyed Aminatta Forna's Ancestor Stones, and also the older but still relevant Changes, by Ama Ata Aidoo.

Here endeth my recent VMC read-a-likes. :-)

Top of my current reading pile:

Ann Patchett, The Dutch House
Interestingly, Ann Patchett says she wrote a novel called Maeve, the name of one of the main characters in the novel, but then rewrote the book totally from the narrative point of view of Maeve's younger brother Danny

Paula McLain, When the Stars Go Dark
Unlike her best known work, historical novels published by Virago and told from the point of view of real life women - 2 of them - Beryl Markham and Martha Gellhorn are even authors republished by Virago - this is a crime novel set in California, though I think the present day of the novel is a few years ago, as there are references to missing teenagers who were born in the 1970s.

I've also just started Emma Donoghue, The Pull of the Stars, set in Dublin at the time of the flu pandemic. I've been mocking my partner for watching pandemic films, but this is my second pandemic read in quite a short space of time. I just finished reading a Louise Welsh novel published in 2013. The Donoghue was published last year but she started writing it in 2018.

I used to alternate my reading between fiction and nonfiction. I have been a long time anti-war and social justice activist and have been affiliated with a number of groups. We still exchange information but at this time I am still not able to read the non-fiction books but I do have many online sources and I still read newspapers and send pertinent information to a long list of recipients.

At this point for entertainment. I am reading mysteries. They had never interested me before but now I enjoy them.

>11 kayclifton: I am not a big fan of mysteries either but I'm currently enjoyed Crossed skis which is one of the classics reissued by the British Library.

I've enjoyed a couple of recent(ish) novels focusing on race in the USA. Such a fun age and The vanishing half were both very good, deceptively easy to read but leaving you with many questions and thoughts.

I've also enjoyed a couple of the British Library Women Writers reissues, O the brave music and Father. Many thanks to stuckinabook for curating this series and getting so many great books back into print!

I'm now reading The Stone of Chastity by Margery Sharp which already has me chuckling. She is one of my favorite writers. I love her quirky characters and plots. I also recently read her book Britannia Mews. I have been able to get both books from public libraries. My favorite work of hers is The Eye of Love.

>13 kayclifton: I adore Margery Sharp's work for adults. I recall The Stone of Chastity being her sharpest satire and probably most overtly feminist novel. Britannia Mews otoh was possibly her most downbeat novel. I don't think I could pick one favourite, but I recall The Gipsy in the Parlour was a five star read for me.

Yesterday, I recalled reading The Innocents by Margery Sharp. I'm not sure if it is a Virago but I thought that it was wonderful. These are fragments from a review on the Goodreads website:

Margery Sharp’s most poignant novel, set during World War II and filled with her trademark wit and warmth, tells the story of the powerful bond forged between a British spinster and the unusual little girl left in her care...An insightful, unsentimental novel about the challenges of raising a mentally challenged child in 1940s England, The Innocents sweeps readers along to its shocking conclusion.

I taught in a public school that had a class for mentally challenged students and learned a lot from their teacher who had been trained for that profession.

>15 kayclifton: I thought The Innocents was very good. I've also often wondered if Martha in the Martha trilogy (The Eye of Love, Martha in Paris, and Martha, Eric and George) is intended to be a portrayal of a woman on the autistic spectrum.

I am reading the latest Ruth Ware - One by One. So far so good.

Reading several books, including:

Louise Erdrich, The Night Watchman (courtesy of Netgalley, for review), set in the early 1950s, at a time when the US government had announced plans to remove land rights and recognition of the Native American population, their tribes etc, euphemistically referred to as "emancipation". Very good so far, and interesting - I've read various books set in the period and even studied an inderdisciplinary option "America in the 1950s" in my first year at the university, but none of this bit of the history was mentioned.

Peter Robinson, Not Dark Yet, #27 and the most recent instalment in his long running Detective Inspector Alan Banks series, though this one is more of a personal story for the characters than a police procedural, and it very much follows on from the 2 books immediately before it in the series, with references to and spoilers for events in previous instalments.

Carol Shields' Collected Stories

Natalie Haynes, The Children of Jocasta - historical novel/Greek myth from a female and feminist perspective

Ellen Wilkinson, The Division Bell Mystery - reprint from the British Library Crime Classics series - interesting but I don't love it as much as the author's other novel, Clash - about the General Strike - republished as a VMC but currently not in print or available at a reasonable price so if you see a secondhand copy that isn't expensive, worth snapping up.

I am continuing my mystery reading. I just finished a compilation of A Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes short stories. After watching many of the videos it's interesting to read the stories. The videos are quite true to the books and the illustrations are wonderful.
I also have another Margery Sharp (my favorite writer's book The Nutmeg Tree and am looking forward to reading it. I borrowed it from a public library. I'm not sure if it's a Virago title. The Night Watchman is on my TBR list.

>19 kayclifton: I think only The Eye of Love has been published in Virago Modern Classics. Other recent editions of some of her novels that I know of are from Sourcebooks a few years ago and Dean Street Press - the wonderfully named Furrowed Middlebrow - most recently. I'm going to start reading it this week, but as I have other books on the go it might take me a while.

> 18 Have finished 3 of the 5 books mentioned in this post, by Peter Robinson, Natalie Haynes and Carol Shields.

Near the top of my pile is Emma Donoghue's novel The Pull of the Stars, about a nurse in Dublin during the flu epidemic of 1918. It was published last summer so I assume it was already with the publisher before it became so grimly topical. I can fully understand that some people might want to avoid this novel right now or more generally for the subject matter, but think it's an excellent book. The Children of Jocasta has also become rather more topical as disease and infection are part of that story too.

I have just begun Paula Byrne's biography of Barbara PYm.

>18 elkiedee: I just bought The night watchman and am looking forward to starting it. I really enjoyed The children of Jocasta when I read it a couple of years ago. I must find my copy of A thousand ships.

I've read a couple of very good books recently. Sarah Moss is popular in this group, I think, and I found Summerwater to be up to her usual standard. She writes very flawed characters who really come to life on the page and this slice of life on a rainy holiday park in Scotland felt very realistic. A crooked tree was fantastic, a novel set in a summer vacation in the early 80s in the townships just outside Philadelphia. It's the story of an Irish-American family and the fallout from an outburst of temper that causes the mother to leave her 12 year old daughter by the roadside while driving home. The relationships between the 5 siblings and their friends and community is really well written.

I'm looking forward to All Virago - All August this year to get my Virago reading back on track!

>21 Sakerfalcon: I'm looking forward to All Virago - All August this year to get my Virago reading back on track!

Time flies! All Virago/All August 2021 is here:

https://www.librarything.com/topic/333824

I am reading A Town called Solace by Mary Lawson and enjoying it.
I have also started Into the Loneliness by Eleanor Hogan which is the story of Ernestine Hill and Daisy Bates, two pioneering Australian women and their work with indigenous Australians in early 20th century.
It provides a fascinating insight to their relationship with each other.

I am presently reading A Town called Solace by Mary Lawson and enjoying it.
I am also reading Into the Loneliness by Eleanor Hogan, the
fascinating story of the relationship between two Australian pioneering women, Daisy Bates and Ernestine Hill, in the early 20th century and their work with indigenous Australians.

I've just begun reading Travels With My Aunt by Graham Greene. I have never read any of his other works but I have a few Dvd's of his books that were made into films and I enjoy watching them.

Greene was bi-polar and it shows in some of his writing. Travels With My Aunt is very light in comparison to some others. The Third Man is brilliant. I can't recommend it highly enough. I also loved The Human Factor and The Comedians. I was less thrilled with his dark Catholic books although Monsignor Quixote is lovely.

I have just finished reading Lady Catherine's Necklace by Joan Aiken and it was a fun read. I also borrowed a book by Gladys Mitchell titled St Peter's Finger. I believe that Mitchell is a Virago author but I don't think that the latter book was on the list.

>27 kayclifton: I love Gladys Mitchell's mysteries! Mrs Bradley is such a great character. The Virago title is The rising of the moon which is very good.

>28 Sakerfalcon: I love them Mitchells too - Mrs. Bradley is so wonderfully batty and I tend to find the stories have me on the edge of my seat!

>29 kaggsy: Me too! I also like that in some of them (Convent on Styx springs to mind) the scene is set and the characters well-established before the crime takes place and it's about half way through the book before Mrs B arrives, so that by then you are really invested in the secondary characters and their stories.

Lots of books on the go as always, and have finished several in the last few days.

I just read Lara Feigel's first novel, The Group, billed as a take on the more famous Mary McCarthy novel which became a VMC in 2010. I loved and liked the two non fiction books I've read by Lara Feigel, but I found this novel a little bit disappointing, lacking in the social history of women's lives and the wit of the Mary McCarthy work.

My current reads include

Hermione Lee's biography of Penelope Fitzgerald - Hermione Lee is a Virago non fiction author (biographies of Willa Cather and Edith Wharton) and both HL and PF have written introductions to Virago Modern Classics and Persephone books.
Esther Freud, I Couldn't Love You More
Marika Cobbold, On Hampstead Heath

I have a really outrageous number of library books out on loan and more shiny new books keep turning up on Islington's reservations shelves for me - I have a few to take back tomorrow so I can borrow more!

>31 elkiedee: I have a copy of that The Group TBR but I'm prepared to be slightly disappointed! What a lovely problem to have at the library! I keep having review books tumble onto the doormat ...

>32 LyzzyBee: Yes, when you put it that way, I'm lucky. I also have lots of Netgalleys and several years of books via the Amazon Vine programme still TBR, plus lots of Kindle and charity shop purchases, and quite a few Persephones - I'm a bit sad that I only learned the shop was moving to Bath too late to make a last trip to Lambs Conduit Street (I found out the day before!). I shouldn't complain really....

>33 elkiedee: Yes, I was gutted I didn't get a last Persephone trip, too.

>elkiedee: I also have been borrowing books from public libraries and it amazes me that they have copies of books like St Peter's Finger written in the 1930s and still available for circulation. I've been alternating my reads and I have never done that before. In addition to the Mitchell book, I am also reading Jane Fairfax by Joan Aiken and Margery Sharp's The Sun in Scorpio. I tailor my choice to fit my mood.
The books are available for three weeks with automatic renewal. The latter has only been happening since the advent of the pandemic.

I am continuing to read The Sun in Scorpio. It contains her usual assortment of quirky characters. For that reason among others, her books are never dull.

The ending of St Peter's Finger was a bit disappointing.

I just read A town called Solace which was just wonderful.

I'm truly sorry I haven't been around. It's my favorite group on LT and I've been neglectful.

I've compiled a list of books to read for fall.
I'm in the middle of The Hazel Wood, pretty good so far.
Then I'll read Magpie Murders, Hallowe'en Party, More Tales To Tremble By, and then Weird Woods: Tales from the Haunted Forests of Britain.

Digging around on public domain to see what else i can add to my spooky fall list.
Thinking about Twenty-Five Ghost Stories

I am now reading Vittoria Cottage by D E Stevenson and I also have a copy of another of her works Listening Valley. Neither of the books are Viragos but Virago has published other works by her.
I borrowed both of them from a public library and the network that the library is affiliated with has a collection of her works distributed throughout its system.
She is one of the authors whose works I find soothing.

>39 kayclifton: Over the last few years I have read, and enjoyed, many books by D. E. Stevenson, books that I would have probably sneered at in my youth but which, like you, I now find very pleasant. I am a big fan of the Dean Street Press Furrowed Middlebrow range and they are republishing many of Stevenson's book as well as many in a similar style. They have very recently published books by Molly Clavering which are set in a similar area, and era. She was a close friend of D. E. Stevenson.

>39 kayclifton: Not sure Virago have published D E Stevenson's work - Persephone have published 3 of her books.

I do love D E Stevenson. I feel they might fall below the "Whipple Line" for Virago. As CDV says, the Molly Claverings are similar and equally soothing.

I agree about the Whipple line. I own the Persephones but also a few others. Very enjoyable comfort reads.

I began reading another Stevenson book Listening Valley the other night and had to stop because it was distressing for me to read about the verbally abusive treatment of the main character, a young girl by her father.Vittoria Cottage ultimately turned out to be a disappointment for me because of Stevenson's treatment of one of her characters. It also was a young female and she was portrayed in a very negative way without any redeeming qualities.

What is the Whipple Line?

I have just begun reading The Convenient Marriage by Georgette Heyer. She is a Virago author but I don't think that The Convenient Marriage is published by Virago. So far, it's a fun read.

I am also reading Partners in Crime by Agatha Christie. i have a number of DVDs of her mysteries but had never read any of her works.

i am now reading the next book in my series of mystery reads. Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham
I liked More Work for the Undertaker but not Cargo of Eagles. The plot was difficult to follow in the latter book.

I gave up on The Convenient Marriage and have begun reading a book by Elizabeth Cadell titled The Corner Shop. I don't recollect seeing her name mentioned in our "what else are you reading" thread. (I just discovered that it was made into a film in 1940 titled The Shop Around the Corner)Has anyone ever seen it?)
I found her books in the catalogue of the libraries that I patronize.
The book has a rather unusual plot and I thought that it might contain violent overtones but as I've continued reading it has taken a different turn.
Has anyone else read any of her books and if so what did you think of them?

I just finished reading The Flowering Thorn by Margery Sharp and really enjoyed it. She is at the top of my list for novelists. It's another of her works in which a child is a main character. Another of her books, Rhododendron Pie is next on my list.

>48 kayclifton: Margery Sharp is high on my list as well and I think that The Flowering Thorn is my favourite of her books. That or The Innocents.

I am sure that you will love Rhododendron Pie too.

I finally got round to reading Cluny Brown earlier this year, bought as a Kindle bargain several years ago, and loved it. I then read The Eye of Love in a VMC paperback edition, also acquired a few years ago. Since then I've bought a few more Kindle editions and am looking out for more.
,

I've just finished Elly Griffiths' most recent novel, set in Brighton in 1965, courtesy of the library - it's from what I've previously called the "Stephens & Mephisto" series but actually the main detective characters in this one are twod women who feature in earlier books. Emma is an ex police officer, now married to police detective Edgar Stephens and the marriage bar means she can't return to her old job, so she has set up as a private detective (using her maiden name, Holmes!) with her journalist friend Sam (as in Samantha). When Emma is hired to investigate a case, her client Verity is keen to deal with women and Emma turns to Meg, a very young detective constable from a working class Irish family in the working class area of Whitehawk. Edgar and his old friend Max Mephisto are very much still in the cast but in supporting roles. I like this series nearly as much as the author's Ruth Galloway books but the women taking centre stage made me like it all the more.

Also reading

Selina Todd, Snakes and Ladders: The Great Social Mobility Myth - very well written and readable social history of social mobility in 20th century Britain. Informed by the author's interests, that include working class social, economic and political history, women's history, the effects of government policies, especially on education and the economy.

Zadie Smith, Grand Union - a collection of short stories, with quite a lot of examining the societies her characters live in, on both sides of the Atlantic.

Jessica Fellowes, Bright Young Dead aka The Mitford Affair - #2 of 5 books which include the Mitfords as characters - the central characters in this are a servant, a police detective and a female police colleague - the oldest two Mitford sisters, Nancy at 21 and Pamela at 17, are major supporting characters. The fictional plot also mixes in other real life people and plot including a female criminal gang. Anna Freeman wrote about the same real life gang from the point of view of some of the criminal family and gang members in a novel Five Days of Fog a few years ago. I am quite enjoying this but I think it's not that well written and is a bit shallow.

My favorite Margery Sharp book is the Eye of Love. Almost all of the books that I read are borrowed from public libraries but I recently purchased the latter and have reread it and enjoyed it as much as the first time. I find her quirky characters memorable and the love affair between the two adults is hilarious. Sharp's portrayal of the unwanted step daughter is both comical and sad.

I am reading the latest (to me) Elly Griffiths book A Roomful of Bones. Her archaeologist heroine Ruth is in Norwich Cathedral and describes a stain glass window of Mother Julian of Norwich. I have a passing acquaintance with Mother Julian having looked at her briefly during my religion degree, but who knew she had a companion in her isolated cell? The original crazy cat lady as Google says.

Thx to whoever turned me on to these books. Peggy?

Hope this link works

https://www.pilgrimgifts.co.uk/products/st-julian-of-norwich-her-cat-norwich-cat...

I am now reading All This and Heaven Too by Rachel Field. I now subscribe to "Literary Ladies" and her works were mentioned. there. She was an American novelist of the 1930s and 40s but I had never heard of her. She also wrote a few books for children. The book is enjoyable so far.

I'm reading and reading and reading Rose Macauley's Pleasure of Ruins. It is a true pleasure!

>53 lippincote: Yep. I am a huge lover of RG, and Julian is one of my heroes. Who else would refer to Jesus as our mother???? I'll read the link when it's not so late and I maybe have a brain.

There was a recent notice in the newspaper about the death of Joan Didion and I remembering reading her book Blue Nights a few years ago. She had an

interesting life.

I agree Kay. I read her in the Sixties right through until about 10 years ago when I read the book about her husband dying. She was not one of my favorites but I respected her work.

Sorry I have been a bit AWOL. Will try to be here a bit more often. I am currently reading The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante for my book group. I should finish tomorrow, and then we'll see what I fancy.

>58 Heaven-Ali: I have The Lying Life of Adults in my library TBR. I'm still hoping to read it soon but I still have too many library books out and have been mostly working according to which books are reserved by other readers and therefore can't be renewed. Although there have been reservations on this, there are also a lot of hardback and digital copies in circulation.

I just finished reading a memoir about Monica Jones, best known as Philip Larkin's girlfriend and a racist alcoholic. She was also an Oxford graduate and a lecturer in English Literature, where she taught John Sutherland, author of this memoir, and later mentored and went to the pub with him and, slightly surprisingly given that she made no secret of her racist and reactionary political views, a young Indian Marxist called Dipak Nandy (father of Lisa Nandy).

I have various reading plans involving books publsihed by Virago and/or Virago authors over the next few months, and still lots of TBR books.

I just finished Claire Keegan, Small Things Like These, a novella set in 1980s Ireland and inspired by the coming to light of the injustices of the Magdalen Laundries, and their treatment of young women who fell pregnant and their children. I've even written a review before clicking the return button as it was a library ebook, so I won't be able to refer back to it.

Current reading includes a revisiting of the Cinderella story, Stepsister by Jennifer Donnelly and Murder Most Unladylike, a series I've been curious about for a while. I know lots of girls and women who have really enjoyed these books, including my niece and my friend's daughter as well as LT posters, and this is fun so far.

>55 LizzieD: I am very pleased to read this, as I have The Pleasure of Ruins in my queue of library books.

I have now begun reading Spring Magic by D E Stevenson. Since the pandemic began I have limited my reading to more upbeat works.

>61 kayclifton: I just finished The Fair Miss Fortune by DES, another lovely one (also recently read Five Windows which I adored).

I'm currently reading a fascinating book about a Japanese woman author I hadn't heard of before. Her name is Chiyo Uno and the book has a biography of her at the front plus three of her works in translation. Fascinating stuff!

>60 BeyondEdenRock: I hope you find pleasure in the Macaulay, Jane! It is a pick-it-up-and-read-a-bit book rather than a page turner especially if you then hasten to Google Images to look at the ruins you just read about. I cheerfully confess to be a ruins geek. I also loved the London post-WWII ruins in The World My Wilderness. That's how I came to get a copy of *Pleasure* in the first place.

I'm currently reading four books simultaneously and it's rather puzzling as I've never done it before. Oh Well! the pandemic is having peculiar effects and as long as it doesn't stop my reading completely, I'll just have to follow my own rhythms.

I'm currently reading a Persephone book The New Magdalen by Wilkie Collins which I read before many moons ago. It's so compelling, a real page turner that's hard to put down.

I have now read all of Margery Sharp's novels for grown-ups.

I started with The Eye of Love back in 2018, after a recommendation from Paola, and finished with her final novel Summer Visits.

It isn't her best work but it left so many thoughts swirling around my head that I wrote my first book review in ages - it's here!

When I started Margery Sharp had only one book in print, I have been delighted to see reissues appear, but I have read either my own copies that I tracked down or copies from my library's fiction reserve.

>67 BeyondEdenRock: Your link takes me to a Wordpress page that says Coming Soon

>68 elkiedee: Sorry about that. It should be working now. Wordpress makes you jump through more hoops when you start a blog these days than it used to.

>69 BeyondEdenRock: No apology needed from you, though I'm sorry if my query came across as a complaint because it wasn't meant that way. A really interesting review, thanks for sharing. It sounds like this would be an interesting read - I quite enjoy books that are of a time before the one when they were actually written or published - though my TBRs of every kind (owned, paperback, kindle, library print and digtal) are huge. I've also recently found my copies of the first few Miss Bianca books, not sure if they are from my childhood collection or acquired more recently (1970s editions could be either).

>70 elkiedee: I didn't take your words as a complaint at all, and really appreciated you highlighting the problem.

Margery Sharp is my favorite Virago author. Rosa, In Pious Memory, Rhododendron Pie and Harlequin House are at the top on my TBR list. All of them are available in my public library system.

I just returned to the library catalogue and discovered that the old Hollywood movie The Notorious Landlady shown in 1962 was based on a Margery Sharp story. I remember seeing the film but don't remember any of the plot details.

OMG! The Notorious Landlady! Kim Novak, Fred Astaire? I saw it recently on TCM.

Currently reading Anna and her Daughters by D E Stevenson, a nice old 1950s hardback with dj I found in a second hand bookshop a few years ago. Really enjoying it.

I'm currently reading The Hollow Land by Jane Gardam. I've really liked most of the books that I've read by her.

Currently reading Jon Kalman Stefansson's Heaven and Hell trilogy which is excellent grim Icelandic stuff (but not crime; historical fiction, i suppose you'd call it).

I have just discovered a (currently) obscure North American novelist by the name of Fannie Hurst. I think that I might have discovered her from Furrowed Middlebrow's website. She was very popular and widely read during her time beginning in the 1920's I'm now reading one of her works Family and am enjoying it.
A number of her books were the basis for Hollywood films.

I'm now reading Eliza's Daughter by Joan Aiken. The "Eliza' in the title refers to the daughter of Col Brandon in Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen.

I am now reading The Four Graces by D E Stevenson. It has whimsical quality which I am enjoying.

Catching up as usual! I just finished a few recently: Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason (longlisted for the Women's Prize); Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller; and Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan. A threesome of really good reads! Currently finishing One by One in Darkness by Deirdre Madden. Another gem!

Loving Lessons in Chemistry! Every character so real, smart and oh so engaging and original! 1960's era vibe. Pitch perfect!

I've got that coming up on my TBR, keep seeing glowing praise for it!

>1 spiralsheep: I've been iffy about trying some of her lesser-known works like Fanfare for Tin Trumpets, but your comment has convinced me that I may want to try for her whole oeuvre too. She quickly became one of my most-read authors when I discovered her a few years ago.

I'm almost done with Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup. Not much to say about it that hasn't already been said. I watched the series with Amanda Seyfried first and now find that portrayal a bit too sympathetic.

After that, I'm planning to start Elizabeth Daly's Evidence of Things Seen. I've never read her before and have heard very little except that she was supposedly Christie's favorite American detective novelist? I have a good feeling, though.

I am now reading The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. In the past, I have so much enjoyed watching DVDs of the mysteries featuring the late Jeremy Brett. I can visualize him and his co-star Edward Hardwicke as I read the various stories.

>84 surtsey: Please don't hesitate to read Margery Sharp's early novels. They are lovely and only obscure because they were originally published before her greatest successes and not reissued until very recently. The only books that need to be approached with caution are her very late works that haven't been republished.

>86 BeyondEdenRock: I must have misremembered which ones I heard I should avoid; thanks for steering me in the right direction!

I have just begun reading another of the works by Miss Read one of my favorite authors. It's titled Mrs Pringle of Fairacre. The character has appeared in other Fairacre settings and she's been quite interesting and a bit quirky so I hope to get to know her better.

I'm reading what I thought was a Virago but is actually a Persephone, Guard Your Daughters by Diana Tutton. A very old library copy used by a child to practice their letters in decades ago. I appreciate the slightly daring (for the time) content and, as a "name nerd" myself, the author's obvious fascination with names: the main characters are sisters Pandora, Thisbe, Cressida, Morgan, and finally plain Teresa. I was amused not just by the author's choices but how the characters talk about names: "...while (Gregory) represented the physical type proper to the name, one could, if one tried hard enough, make the same three syllables conjure up a different, and vastly superior, image."

I was just able to obtain a copy of the new edition of The Fortnight in September by R. C. Sherriff from a public library and I am looking forward to reading it. There are many copies of the book in the library network and a number of requests for it.

I've recently read a great book from a writer who's still working but is far too neglected - A Day to Remember to Forget by Rosalind Brackenbury. I don't quite know why she's better known, but this book, set in the late 60s/early 70s, explores women's lives and options quite brilliantly! I wrote a bit more here in case anyone is interested:

https://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2022/06/20/how-infinitely-hard-to-...

>91 kaggsy: That sounds really interesting - there is also a link to another LT user's blog review of the same novel on the LibraryThing page for the novel.

>92 elkiedee: It's really good, Luci, and I can't imagine why she's not better known. She seems a prime candidate for a reprint by either Virago or Persephone, but I'm glad Mike Walmer picked up her books. I have a second and third lined up. Will check out the review here - thanks for the hint! :D

I just finished reading The Fortnight in September by R C Sherriff and enjoyed it immensely. It's perfect early summer reading. The edition that I read was not published by Persephone but by Scribner in 2021. The cover of the book was beautiful. It brought back memories of similar family vacations.

I'm now reading The Musgraves by D E Stevenson. She is one of my favorite novelists.

I am continuing my Stevenson read with The Two Mrs Abbotts

I liked that one, Kay!

I just finished reading Brat Farrar a superb mystery by Josephine Tey. It was serialized by the BBC in 1986 but I don't think that it's available as a DVD and many times TV and film adaptions of books are disappointing.

Loved Brat Farrar!

I've just finished reading Bleeding Heart Yard by Elly Griffiths, her forthcoming 3rd novel featuring DI Harbinder Kaur, who has moved from Sussex to London to take up a promotion, and is living with flatmates instead of her parents. It's delightful and highly recommended, though if you haven't already enjoyed The Stranger Diaries and The Postscript Murders reading in order is a good idea, as with all this authors' series - while the novels don't spell out the plot of previous stories, the strength of these books is the recurring characters rather than the plots.

I'm now starting to read a debut novel about 3 American women, again a Netgalley and not due to be published until next year - Pineapple Street by Jenny Jackson.

And I'm going to start reading another book by Elly Griffiths. The Locked Room is #14 in her Ruth Galloway series. I've been waiting impatiently to read this book for at least 18 months, since I finished the last one - finally a library reservation was about to come through when it popped up as a 99p Kindle Daily Deal.

I've also started to read Little Reunions by Eileen Chang, a Chinese novelist and short story writer from a privileged but very dysfunctional Chinese family who later moved to the US. I think this posthumously published novel, translated from a manuscript in Chinese, might be somewhat autobiographical. My copy is a library ebook but it's published by NYRB. Some of Eileen Chang's work has also been published by Penguin, and I have a volume of short stories TBR.

>100 elkiedee: "Bleeding Heart Yard" is a locale in Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens. It is the home of the Plornish family a group of zany characters who are typical of Dickens.

>102 kayclifton: There's also a historical crime novel by another of my favourite authors, Andrew Taylor, called Bleeding Heart Square. If I ever find myself in that area again with time on my hands I'm going to go and look for the real street names.

In the area where I live, we are experiencing severe drought conditions so I am soon going to read Heat Wave by Penelope Lively a Virago author and or Instructions for a Heat Wave by Maggie O'Farrell. Both books are available in the public libraries that I patronize.

>100 elkiedee: I'm excited to see there's a third Harbinder Kaur coming! I enjoyed the first two books and was hoping there would be more.

I loved Heat Wave!

I really enjoyed Pineapple Street, a Big House story about the difficulties of relationships whether you're an interloper marrying into money, a wealthy family's daughter who married out of her class or her younger unmarried sister realising there is more to life than the privilege she's born into. If you're drawn to Henlit takes on the concerns of Jane Austen's characters, but transposed to 21st century Brooklyn, this was what one LT friend calls a Thumping Good Read for me. Main drawback, it isn't out for ages yet.

I am continuing to read two books consecutively : a mystery and a conventional novel. I just finished The Case of the Late Pig by Margery Allingham. The plot was a bit complicated but I enjoyed it nonetheless.
I am now rereading A Long Way From Verona by Jane Gardam and for mystery, another Allingham: Dancers in Mourning.

>107 elkiedee: Aha - I went to look for that on NG and found I'm waiting for approval on it!

>109 LyzzyBee: I hope that you get approved, as I suspect you'll probably review it properly before I do, or write and save something that you can post closer to the publication date if that's what they would prefer (not actually checked yet).

Top of my pile:
Cynthia Voigt, Homecoming - 1st of 7 books that are US children's/YA books first published in the 1980s (?) - younger readers will enjoy if they don't "get" everything - teenagers will understand more but there is plenty going on for adults.
I've collected the series on the basis of having loved at least one before, but I am now thinking I have only read one of the others and that it was over 30 years ago. I am enjoying this but I started it unsure whether or not it was a reread and now think it's not - I think the one I read was one of the later books Seventeen Against the Dealer and I borrowed it from the Central Library teen shelves when I somehow managed to read 2 books a day in my early 20s as an unemployed graduate. (Probably not being distracted by the internet!)

Also reading Brit Bennett's first novel, The Mothers - I didn't know quite what to expect here but it's an interesting story, a book which I'd already bought as a 99p deal and it was listed in July for a 75 Group sadly topical reading challenge for books about abortion and related issues (in the light of US legal and funding decisions affecting women's right to choose). Lots of different opinions on the author's own views are on Goodreads but I'm a bit confused by what some readers are inferring from the story. Anyway, good read and thought provoking, about 80% read so far.

>110 elkiedee: I remember reading most of the Homecoming series as a YA and enjoying them a lot. They were quite a bit more serious than a lot of teen fiction, with the characters really having to struggle and not always getting a good outcome for their efforts.

>111 elkiedee: I've got that one TBR!

Elk - I read Homecoming to my son when he was really young. We both loved it.

I just finished A Long Way from Verona and enjoyed it very much.

I'm continuing to read Dancers in Mourning by Margery Allingham. In the chapter that I was reading last night there was a bombing and Allingham described all the complicated details about the bomb itself. She must have done a lot of research.
I don't have my Virago list but I think that at least one of Allingham's books is on the list as that, I believe was how I discovered her.
Has the group ever had a Virago Mystery Writer's read? I know that there are two Celias on the list, Celia Dale and Celia Fremlin. and I have read Dale's work Other People but it wasn't a Virago.

I have several crime novels published by Virago years ago, including some then contemporary US and UK based authors and a few reissues. Also quite a lot published by the Women's Press and Pandora.

Virago mystery/crime writers:

Patricia Highsmith
Relatively recent editions of a large number of novels including the 5 Ripley books and many of her famous ones, and her not crime novel about a lesbian relationship, originally published under a pseudonym

Nancy Spain 1917-1964
4 reprints so far from the middle of a series of about 9 - I've read Death Goes on Skis this year and have Poison for Teacher and Cinderella Goes to the Morgue TBR from the library, together with 2 of her 3 memoirs (secondhand book found in one of my many cardboard boxes, no memory of acquisition, definitely TBR, and library TBR) and a biography borrowed from the library

Sara Paretsky
At least one of her VI Warshawski series, now over 20 books from several UK and US publishers, and I have all the novels on Kindle now

Gillian Slovo
A couple of her 1980s Kate Baier novels, though these also seem to have been published by other companies including some from the Women's Press

Amanda Cross
Many of US academic amateur sleuth series featuring Kate Fansler and literary references

Janet La Pierre
US writer who died a few years ago

I have others, I don't know if there's a list somewhere.

The Women's Press includes many contemporary Marcia Muller books from the 1970s to the 1990s, Val McDermid's first few novels featuring Lindsay Gordon - late 80s and early 90s, Gillian Slovo and others.

Pandora - 1980s, a Pamela Branch novel, several reprints by Christianna Brand and Celia Fremlin (whose most famous period was much earlier but she lived well into this century) - both Women's Press and Pandora Crime titles had their own distinctive cover look, as did many crime imprints over the years (including Penguin and Collins).

Oh, that would be fun - I've read a few Crime Viragos and they've been very interesting!! Fremlin is a huge favourite!

>116 kayclifton: I've read The hours before dawn by Celia Fremlin and it was absolutely gripping.

Other Virago crime that I've read include The rising of the moon, which was a good read although I guessed the murderer immediately, and a couple of the Nancy Spain reissues, which I very much enjoyed. I've read several of Amanda Cross's Kate Fansler books too, which improved as the series progressed.

I am new to mystery reading and don't like any with horror aspects. I like ones with intricate plots and lots of suspects and the least violence possible.
Since there is so much graphic violence in films and on television now, I suspect that it's also carried over into current fiction but I may be mistaken.
I have a collection of Sherlock Holmes (starring Jeremy Brett) DVDs and the intricate plots are wonderful and the characters memorable.The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle is my favorite.

Interesting what you say about The Rising of the Moon Claire because I stopped reading Gladys Mitchell for just that reason. I could guess the murderer very early on, every time. The Fremlin, however, was great!

I just finished reading Dancers in Mourning and am now starting my third novel by the inimitable P G Wodehouse. I have read two of his other works recently and really enjoyed them. His characters and plots are so comical, I sometimes laugh out loud.
I borrow them from public libraries and a number of them are the original editions.

>122 kayclifton: How did you like Dancers in Mourning? I found it to be an easier read than some of her others, maybe more conventional in some way.

Just finished Something in Disguise by Elizabeth Jane Howard, my second of hers. I appreciated its twist on the domestic novel--I wasn't as into The Light Years. Usually I like books where nothing happens, but I wasn't particularly invested in the characters and had no desire to read the rest of the series.

>123 surtsey: I enjoyed it for the most part but there were so many suspects to the crime that it became a bit tedious towards the end which was a let down.

i have been alternating my reading between D E Stevenson and Elizabeth Jane Howard. I also recently realized that books by the latter were made into a TV series: "The Cazalet Chronicles" so I am going to borrow a library DVD of some of its episodes after I finish reading a couple more of her books. I like to compare the differences between books and films or TV programs made about them.

I am now reading Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver and the plot is unusual but fascinating.

Has anyone read any of her works?

>126 kayclifton: I've read most of her books - I have some short stories and non fiction TBR I think. And I think some of her books might be due a reread, I'm just a bit spoiled for choice at the moment. I loved Prodigal Summer but think I read it when it was fairly new (maybe 20? years ago) so that should probably go on a reread list.. I'm reading her new novel published last month, Demon Copperhead

>127 elkiedee: I borrowed Prodigal Summer from the library and had looked at reviews of some of her works before choosing it. I'll put Demon Copperhead on my TBR list as that title and many other books of hers are available from the Library system that I use.
Prodigal Summer was quite long with very interesting material of an ecological nature deftly woven into the story line.

>128 kayclifton: Her other novel with eco themes at the centre (they're always there to an extent) is Flight Behaviour.

>129 elkiedee: Thank You, I'll add it to my list. I don't usually read books by the same author consecutively. I tailor my reading to my moods.

>127 elkiedee: I would be reading Demon Copperhead right now if we hadn't taken it on holiday, Matthew started reading it first, put it down, insisted on reading David Copperfield first, did, but it took all holiday, and he started DC on the plane home and is still working his way through it now!

>131 LyzzyBee: Makes me glad that Mike and I don't usually read the same books. There are some we're both interested in at least in theory, but he rarely actually picks them up and reads them properly, and I sometimes don't encourage him to pick up books I'm interested in because he's not gentle with them. I use bookmarks and generally try to keep them in good condition, or at least the same as how they started, whereas some of Mike's books look half destroyed.

At least though you've still got the book to look forward to.

It has made me interested in reading David Copperfield at some point but the paperback is daunting and the Penguin Modern Classics Kindle edition doesn't have page numbers. I can see why Matthew would have wanted to go back to the Dickens, but it isn't essential to have read or reread it first! I was put off Dickens at school by the extracts used in English comprehensions. Great Expectations was a text on one of my university courses and I read Bleak House for an email based discussion group (back in the days between getting online at home and moving from dialup to broadband!). I think I've seen some of a TV adaptation but I'm not sure which one.

>132 elkiedee: Usually he does the audiobook and I do a physical or Kindle version and we can read at the same time (we're doing that with Dave Grohl's book at the moment) but this was a physical copy that I was sent by a friend. He's pretty careful with books though, thankfully. I don't like Dickens and feel no need to re-read DC - I have read it but in my teens, along with Great Expectations, Oliver Twist and Tale of Two Cities. I read Pickwick Papers in my 20s because I thought it was meant to be amusing ...

>133 LyzzyBee: You don't like Dickens????? 😲😲😲🤣🤣

>133 LyzzyBee: and >134 kaggsy: I'm not really a great Dickens fan either.

Fair enough! I like him a lot, although I *do* need stamina for his books nowadays!

>134 kaggsy: Sorry, really don't. Have read quite a lot and find him too arch and heavy-handed for me. I do like a hefty classic - Hardy, Trollope, Eliot, etc. - so it's not feebleness with big books, just never liked him.

I must join in the Dickens conversation. I read David Copperfield in high school and wasn't too happy with it. However, I slogged through a few more because my mother had a complete collection. I found his use of coincidences too far-fetched, but mostly it was the long-winded writing.

LOL, yes he can be long-winded. But I don't know if DC is his best. Certainly CC, Tale of Two Cities and Bleak House are up there with my fave books!

I have some DVDs of Dickens' works and they are really enjoyable. The portrayals of some of his characters are very amusing. I especially love

The Pickwick Papers and Martin Chuzzlewit.

>140 kayclifton: My all-time favorite Dickens adaptation is David Copperfield starring a very young Daniel Radcliffe as David and the PERFECT Aunt Betsey Trotwood played by Maggie Smith--donkeys!!

I also love Little Dorrit with a young Claire Foy and Matthew Macfadyen; and Bleak House with Gillian Anderson, Anna Maxwell Martin, and the absolutely evil Mr Tulkinghorn played by Charles Dance.

Ooh, can't forget Our Mutual Friend with the brilliant performance by David Morrissey as the obsessively creepy Bradley Headstone.

>141 kac522: I didn't mention it but I also have Little Dorrit, Bleak House, Great Expectations and Our Mutual Friend and I have watched them many times and

never get tired of them. One of the things that I like about Dickens is his use of a number of consecutive story lines in his books and his use of both comic and

serious characters.

>142 kayclifton: So true. They also work so well on audiobook--they just seem to be meant to be read aloud.

I have just finished reading The Town in Bloom by Dodie Smith and enjoyed it very much. I'm not sure whether it's on the Virago list. The book that I read was from a public library and it was published in 1965. It's nice that an obscure book published so long ago is still available for readers.

>144 kayclifton:: I think Virago only publishes I Capture the Castle. About 12 years ago, another Little, Brown/Hachette imprint, Corsair, reissued three much less well known novels by Dodie Smith - I'd had no idea they even existed until they were reprinted. The other two are It Ends with Revelations and The New Moon With the Old and they're available in paperback and Kindle here in the UK.

Among other books, I'm reading

Penelope Mortimer, Saturday Lunch With the Brownings - a collection of short stories, reissued by Daunt Books with a new introduction - I'm reading a library ebook. The author also wrote several novels - I think I have 3 TBR, a tatty old orange Penguin, a VMC and a Persephone

Michelle Magorian, A Spoonful of Jam - a historical novel for children set in the late 1940s, and #2 in a series about various members of the Hollis family, working class kids who become involved in a predominantly middle class theatre industry. Like #1 and several of her other books, it's set just after WWII, and is very much about children, young people and their parents struggling to adjust to the effects of wartime separations and big social changes in England.

Marina Lewycka, We Are All Made of Glue - her third novel, which I've had TBR for a very long time - Georgie has recently split up with her husband and makes a new friend, a much older, eccentric woman. They have very different views and attitudes but can they help each other. Only beginning this but interesting so far.

I have also read The New Moon with the Old. I live in the US and the library system where I borrow my books has an extensive collection and they exchange books between their various branches. There is also a library system in the US by which books are available from libraries across the country including those of colleges and universities. I have gotten a number of books by that method.
I am now reading Not in the Calendar by Margaret Kennedy. It's an interesting book because its focus is on a character who is deaf and can't communicate with words and has been mistreated because of her handicap. The book was written in 1964.

>147 kayclifton: That's a Margaret Kennedy I've never heard of before, and I thought I knew her output pretty well! I'll be interested to see what you think of it. She's one of my favourite Virago authors (along with Pamela Frankau).

>148 Sakerfalcon: I just finished Not in the Calendar. It is on my list of favorites. It not only has the theme of working with the handicapped but it is also a family saga and it has an unusual ending.

Have you read Kennedy's other book The Forgotten Smile? I read it a few years ago and liked it a lot.

>149 kayclifton: The forgotten smile is on my TBR pile! It was reissued by Vintage Classics along with several other of Kennedy's books. I was really pleased to see her work in print again.

>151 Sakerfalcon: I read Kennedy's The Feast last summer and it was fantastic. It was reissued by Faber & Faber.

>152 kac522: That may be my favourite of hers! It's SO good!

A few years ago I read Kennedy's Lucy Carmichael but don't remember the plot.

>154 kayclifton: I was lucky enough to find a copy of that very soon after I read BeyondEdenRock's review of it. I loved it, apart from the ending which felt a bit rushed. Jane's review is very detailed if you want to refresh your memory.

I've been reading books from the The Cazalet Chronicles by Elizabeth Jane Howard and intend to borrow the DVD of the series after I've read a few more of

the books. Has anyone else read any of her works?

>156 kayclifton: I'm reading the third in the series - Confusion. The DVD is lovely (though a little dated) but only covers the first two books. There was never a 2nd season. During lockdown, I started listening to the BBC Radio Dramatization that was also good. I didn't finish listening so I'm not sure how abridged/condensed it is.

Edited to add, Lesley Manville plays Villy in the TV series. I'm on a Lesley Manville kick watching her in Magpie Murders and I simply LOVED her in Mrs Harris Goes to Paris. She's fabulous all around!

>149 kayclifton: Inspired by this thread, I read The forgotten smile this weekend. I really enjoyed it. It started out feeling quite light and humorous, but then acquired real depth with the revelation of Selwyn's backstory. I'm glad you prompted me to read it!

>157 bleuroses: I have two DVDs with Lesley Manville in the cast; both dramatizations of works by Elizabeth Gaskell. The first is North and South and the second is
Cranford. She is the mother of the main female character in North and South and the housekeeper for one of the characters in Cranford.

Come join the new 2023 project to celebrate 50 years of Virago!

Master thread here to see the year's schedule: https://www.librarything.com/topic/348159#
February thread here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/348128#

Kay - When we were stationed in Germany with the USAF (early 90s) my friend in London sent me the Cazalet Chronicles one after the other as she finished reading them. EJH was new to her but I had been reading her since the 60s. Anyhoo - As I ended book 3 I was confused. Nothing seemed to be happening to wrap the story up and sure enough it ended on a cliffhanger. Turns out EJH had not even written the fourth book and by the time I got to read it I had to re-read all the others.

I have just completed reading the final volume of The Cazalet Chronicles . The last volume was quite long.
I now intend to borrow the video of the series from the library.

Back to DICKENS!!!! My D is for Dickens! The Lizzie is for Lizzie Hexam. Everything you say to his detriment is true. I also loathe the way he treated his wife. BUT ---- his narrative prose! Brilliant turn of phrase! Almost effortless, supremely well-crafted writing makes him the master in my book, and it's a very thick one!

As to what I'm reading now, it's Elly Griffith's latest, The Last Remains. I'm torn between wanting to gobble it down and to consume small sips so that it lasts longer. Meanwhile, I'm rereading a Nathan Lowell Ishmael Wang space opera, which I find very comforting. Go figure. And The Silk Roads, which I'll be happy to finish this year.

>163 LizzieD: I've just read The Last Remains, and I understand the dilemma. But she has a book in her Brighton series due in the autumn, which is something.

Yesterday I finished reading a short novel by Elizabeth McCracken, published a few months ago, The Hero of This Book. It's about a middle aged American woman walking round London as a tourist and remembering taking her mother, who has recently died after a long illness there. It's a beautiful account of an interesting woman, of the mother-daughter relationship (from the daughter's point of view). Although the mother in this is very different from mine, I also really liked the portrayal of the complexity of grief and loss.

Currently reading: several books on the go -

I thought The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore would be a historical novel, well written family saga. It's mostly set in the present day although there is some looking back to the past by a woman with three adult daughters.

Rereading Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes, as I first read this soon after publication - I think I read it in 1998. She has recently written a sequel about Rachel 25 years on, so I'm rereading in preparation for that. A young Irish woman was sharing a flat in New York City with her school friend, and thinks she is enjoying a busy social life, but then she finds herself in rehab back in Ireland for cocaine and other drugs.

Also enjoying Australian novelist Thea Astley's Drylands, a novel I've been meaning to get to for some years about women and some men in a remote Australian town.

I haven't been on LT in a while and am glad to see so much recent activity here :)

I've been wanting to read more of (and about) May Sinclair this year and serendipitously came across a copy of the Twayne's English Authors Series book about her. I think I'm the only person on LT with it in my library. Not surprising -- it's pretty dry, but there are some interesting parts: comparisons with Virginia Woolf and Dorothy Richardson; her interest in psychoanalysis and spirituality; her progressive social views. I'm hoping that Suzanne Raitt's book on her is more compelling.

Also just started The Forbidden Notebook by Alba De Céspedes.

I've been reading a number of books by women mystery writers and am now reading a second book written by Ngaio Marsh. It's title is Light Thickens and the setting is a theater during the preparations and production of a staging of MacBeth. Marsh was involved with the theater herself so she knows a great deal about it. She was a New Zealander but the play is being staged in London where she lived for a while.

>166 kayclifton: I considered reading that after I read MacBeth for the first time last year. I liked A Surfeit of Lampreys but have abandoned every other Marsh book I've picked up. Who are your favorite women mystery writers? For me, no one really compares to Josephine Tey.

>167 surtsey: Hmmmm. That's interesting, Sarah. Why do you abandon Ms. Marsh? I enjoy her - especially the theater books. (I think that this group has dealt with her racism before.) I love Tey too, but Sayers is my first choice among the golden and silver age women. In fact, Allingham is the one of that era who leaves me cold.
My list of contemporary women is a long one. At the moment Elly Griffiths is at the top, but then I think of Susan Hill and Deborah Crombie......

>168 LizzieD: I'm not sure, and maybe I should try her again. Which of her theater books would you recommend? Also, who is considered "silver age"? I've never heard that before.

Murder Must Advertise was my favorite mystery I read last year; I guess I prefer Death Bredon to the usual Wimsey. Of course, I loved Gaudy Night.

There's something so original and atmospheric about Allingham, but I do find her challenging to read.

>169 surtsey: You've mentioned my two favorite Sayers although I also love Strong Poison and Busman's Honeymoon.

Silver Age, I think, refers to '50s-early-'60s. I'm too sleepy to think of anybody but Patricia Wentworth, and Miss Silver really wasn't a favorite. I'll try to do better another day.

As to Marsh and theatre (!) Killer Dolphin should let you determine whether you want to keep on with her.

ACK! What happened to my post?????

It's too late, and I'm too sleepy.

>169 surtsey: Add Strong Poison and Busman's Honeymoon, and you've mentioned my favorite Sayers...

I think Silver Age refers to mysteries from the 50s to mid-60s.... Patricia Highsmith springs to mind....

For Marsh theatre (!) mysteries, I'd recommend Killer Dolphin and Light Thickens.

I have trouble with some of the Dorothy L Sayers books because to me some of the plots get very convoluted so when I'm more than halfway through I give up and turn to the last few pages to find out who the villain is. I have liked some of the Albert Campion books as they are sometimes witty. Brat Farrar by Josephine Tey is one of my favorite mysteries.

>172 kayclifton: Good to hear about Brat Farrar, as I just picked it up at a library sale today! I read The Daughter of Time years ago, but don't remember much--do for a re-read.

>173 kac522: I hope that you like it as I always worry if I make a book recommendation.

>174 kayclifton: No worries! I bought it before I read your post anyway.

I am now reading Village Centenary by Miss Read. The edition is not a Virago but I thought that she was a Virago author. However, I just scanned the list and couldn't find her name. It's puzzling because I don't know how I became familiar with her works. I have read quite a few from her Fairacre and Thrush Green series and love visiting with the inhabitants of those villages Her plots usually have happy endings which is unlike so many books that are now written. Her main character in many of the books is a teacher which I was also and so can identify with some of the incidents which happen in the classroom.

>176 kayclifton: I don't think that Miss Read was ever a Virago author. I did read some of her books when I was quite young and have copies of some.

I'm now reading Road Ends by Mary Lawson. I previously read another of her works Crow Lake and really enjoyed it. Her characters are interesting.

Sarah - my favorite Marsh's include A Surfeit of Lampreys but also Death and the Dancing Footman and Singing in the Shrouds. I have not liked all of her books (her detective is a pompous ass) and, despite being a NZer by birth, I prefer her books set in England - perhaps only because I love British mysteries. I read all of Allingham and Sayers as a teen and Tey is a huge favorite.

I am back to reading books in French and doing Duolingo online. It's part of my plan to stave off dementia and build new neuro pathways. (No signs of dementia but it runs in the family.) I am currently re-reading Michael Connelly novels, having worked my way through about half of Agatha Christie's. I've been amazed at how easy I am finding it, given that my French dates back to a really really bad high school in 1960's South Australia. All this French vocab has been lying in a pit of sawdust at the back of my brain for over 50 years!!! Am loving Duolingo (it's free). I honestly think I would've been fluent in French my whole life if someone had started me with a clapping, dancing owl instead of Madame Moussali, who shrieked and screamed through every lesson.

Before beginning Poor Caroline I have been reading the mystery Photo Finish by Ngaio Marsh . It has an interesting plot and setting so I am enjoying it.

I'm reading several books as normal:

Emmeline by Judith Rossner. First published in 1980, reprinted a few years ago by Persephone Books with an afterword by Lucy Ellmann, it's set in 19th century America, with the first part taking place in 1834. A note at the beginning of the novel warns that it is based on a tragic true story. I've not quite finished but find it sad on quite a number of levels.

Bird Summons by Leila Aboulela, set in modern day Scotland, in which 3 women who are involved in a Muslim Women's Group set out on a trip to the Scottish Highlands.

Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton, just at the beginning, about environmental activists in New Zealand

This Mortal Boy by Fiona Kidman, another historical novel based on a true story, about a young man who, soon after moving from Northern Ireland to New Zealand in search of better economic prospects, is caught up in a bar fight and faces the death penalty

Memphis by Tara M Stringfellow - on this year's Women's Prize longlist, about several generations of women from an African-American family.

>181 elkiedee: Oh Bird Summons looks very interesting!

>182 LyzzyBee: I really enjoyed it, and am glad to have finally got to it, as it's been TBR for ages. For some reason I had to give back the library hardback unread a few years ago, then came the pandemic and that copy disappeared from the catalogue, but Islington Libraries bought the paperback.

I think some readers will be annoyed because it goes off into a rather fairytale direction - a kind of Muslim magical realism. It's a bit different from the previous novels I've read by her, Lyrics Alley and The Kindness of Enemies - I still have her earlier novels, her newest one, and two collections of short stories TBR. But the three women in it, who are probably between their late 20s and late 40s/early 50s, are all thinking about their lives, choices made and choices to make.

Leila Aboulela is a Sudanese and Scottish woman who now lives in Scotland (like the characters in this novel). I think some of her earlier work has more about Sudan in it.

>183 elkiedee: I've managed to edit a thesis and multiple articles about/including her without reading any of her novels! I need to address that ...

>181 elkiedee: I've finished all the books listed above and they're all well worth a read, I think - none Viragos but think they have much to offer a lot of Virago readers.

Now at the top of my pile:

A S Byatt, Possession
I read this early in 1991, soon after it came out, and decided it was long due for a reread after 32 years, more than half a lifetime ago for me. I only remember enjoying it, that there was a contemporary and a historical storyline about literature and literary research. I'd forgotten the satirical tone and the err.... poetry. I'm still really enjoying it but possibly reading it very differently from the first time round (though really my memory is a bit hazy!)

Emma Henderson, The Valentine House
I still have the author's first novel (shortlisted for the Orange Prize) tbr but this is another dual timeline historical novel, about an English family and their house in France. Several viewpoints but the lead voice is of one of the locals who is hired as a servant by the family, by a woman who takes on staff she thinks her husband won't fancy because of ugliness and other physical flaws in her eyes.

Alison Light, A Radical Romance: A Memoir of Love, Grief, and Consolation
I wanted to read this as soon as I found out about it and borrowed a copy from the library, then put it off, because it's kind of about a member of my extended family. Which makes it really interesting but also sometimes strange to read. Alison Light has written about Virginia Woolf, about her own family and about 20th century women's writing, middlebrow and popular fiction. This is about her relationship with and marriage to the historian Raphael Samuel for the last 10 years of his life (late 1980s to 1997, I think). Raph was my aunt Anna's partner in the early 70s, and also an important part of her older three children's lives. I was quite a young child when we stayed at what was then Raph and Anna's house. This relationship was started more than a decade after Anna and Raph split up, but there are still bits that are slightly tricky to read. I'm not criticising the author of the memoir - it's very well written and almost painfully honest, but it is a strange read for me for reasons I hope I've explained.

Margery Sharp, The Stone of Chastity
A Furrowed Middlebrow book found in a charity shop last year, so far an engaging social comedy set in a village. I think I was probably put off starting this a little by the title but now I know the reason I'm enjoying it.

Brigitte Reimann, Siblings
Recent Penguin Modern Classics reissue of a very short novel (novella) about an artist in East Germany and her family, set before the Berlin Wall went up, when residents of the GDR (Communist East Germany) could visit the other side, compare lives and perhaps decide to try to move. Interesting so far, and it seems that quite a few people want to borrow it from the library.

I have just obtained Books and Islands in Ojibwe Country by Louise Erdrich. I have read a number of her other books and always find them fascinating.

>186 kayclifton: I liked her last two novels a lot, The Night Watchman and The Sentence, and I have a copy of Books and Islands somewhere. Simon reviewed it on his StuckinaBook blog the other day and made me think oh, I must read that (but I have so many books I must get to soon, sigh).

>187 elkiedee: I added Books and Islands to my wish list having seen that blog post!

>187 elkiedee: I subscribe to Simon's blog but don't remember seeing it there. I was just browsing my library catalogue and found it there.
I just borrowed a couple of mysteries by Ngaio Marsh, A Many Lay Dead and Death and the Dancing Footman. I sometimes like to alternate my fiction reading with mysteries. It's only recently that I've begun reading them. I had never done so in the past and I'm not sure why.

I'm now reading Pigs in Heaven by Barbara KIngsolver. It's the third book of hers that I have read and she is now one of my favorite authors.

New here. Pocket bio: Retired humanities teacher, residing in Tlaxcala, Mexico, with two dogs and six indoor cats. Passionate about literature, history, philosophy, classical music and opera, jazz, cinema, and similar subjects. Nostalgic guy. Politically centrist. BA in American Studies from Yale; MAs in English and Education from Boston University. Born in northern New Jersey. Have lived and worked in San Francisco, Chicago, northern Nevada, northeast Wisconsin, South Korea.

Just finished and highly recommended: Edna Ferber’s book:Come and Get It|149152. Having greatly enjoyed the 1936 movie version, I took up the novel and was interested to discover that it is very different in many respects and covers a much longer time-span than even the two generations of the movie. A rich and wonderful reading experience, completely absorbing. One startling development that is not in the film knocked me right off my chair.

I especially relate to this novel because I have lived on its Northern Wisconsin turf. “Butte des Morts” is Neenah in the northeast, close to where I resided in Little Chute. “Iron Ridge” is Hurley in the northwest, the great northwoods area that I often visited. The timber and paper industries are at the core of the narrative.

Ferber is adept at what critics call “solidity of specification”, description of exterior elements as in Balzac. You always know how the rooms are furnished, how the characters are dressed. (I was surprised to have it pointed out that Trollope, even writing at the length he does, doesn’t much bother with this, and it is true.)

A belated welcome to you! And thank you for sharing your thoughts on the Ferber. Always nice when a book takes in somewhere you've lived and know well!

I've never read Edna Ferber, but The girls is on my TBR pile.

I've been in Paris for a few days and took with me a volume of Colette's essays and autobiographical writings. This was the perfect choice! Her observations really capture the nature of Paris, even given the distance in time. The book I took contained Journey for myself and The evening star.

>193 Sakerfalcon: I read The Girls in June and really enjoyed it. And hope the European heat wave misses you.

I am reading a very obscure novel written in 1927. The title is Islanders and the author is Helen Hull She was an American feminist and suffragist. I'm really enjoying it. The book is the original edition and I borrowed it from a public library. I don't even remember how I discovered her. She was a native of Michigan so there might be some connection with Edna Ferber as she was also born there.

>195 kayclifton: I have Heat Lightning on my TBR published by Persephone. So glad to hear you're enjoying her writing.

I have Islanders and Quest in US Feminist Press reissues as well as the Persephone Heat Lightning . I need to read them though.

I enjoyed Heat lightning and would seek out more of Hull's work. Thanks to you I have some titles to look for!

Y'all may know this already, but I just found out. Kate O'Brien and her son wrote a short series of detective stories together, which is available on Kindle, titled Ghosts: being the Experiences of Flaxman Low. I love KO'B, so I'll have to give them a chance.

>199 LizzieD: I'm sorry if this is disappointing but....

I'm not sure that's the same Kate O'Brien - Wikipedia doesn't mention the writer published by VMC as having any children.

The authors of the book you mention include a Kate Prichard (nee O'Brien) born in India in 1851.

I am now reading Katherine Wentworth by D E Stevenson. I have already read quite a few of her books and liked most of them.

My next read will be The Dark Flood Rises by Margaret Drabble and I believe that it is her most recent novel. It was published in 2016.

Have just finished one of the most recent British Library Women Writers releases Sing Me Who You Are by Elizabeth Berridge which was excellent.

One of their later titles, from 1967, and it brilliantly captures the time, with the characters still emotionally damaged from WW2 and society in a state of flux. Highly recommend it! :D

>202 kaggsy: Glad you enjoyed!

>203 LyzzyBee: I did, though thanks for the warning. I was prepared for the cat issue… 🫤

My next read will be Lummox by Fannie Hurst "an American novelist and short story writer of the post WW1 era. Many of her books including Lummox were
made into Hollywood movies and she was one of the most widely read authors of the 20th century".

>200 elkiedee: Thank you for the correction! I really thought that our KO'B married the Pritchard, but I guess I've been under a misapprehension for some time. I sort of thought the dates were wrong but didn't bother to check. So now I have some early-ish mysteries.

>201 kayclifton: Thank you for the reminder about Margaret Drabble, Kay. She is an old favorite, and I will check out Francesca growing old.
I'll also add that there are times when nobody but D.E. Stephenson will do.

As to what I'm reading now --- Fortress in the Eye of Time by C.J. Cherryh.

I just found out about this old blog post (2018) that sorts Persephone books in publication order. Thought some here might find it interesting and useful:

https://www.stuckinabook.com/persephone-books-in-the-order-they-were-originally-...

As it's Black History month here in the UK I've been reading some suitable books. Betsey Brown is a wonderful coming of age story of the title character in 1950s St Louis. Betsey is lively and smart, part of a loving family who shield her from the worst discrimination. But following the Brown v. Board of Education decision she and her siblings are bussed to white schools, something they are not thrilled about. Betsey's hopes and dreams and sometimes foolish actions are very relatable. I enjoyed this so much.

I've also read Rattlebone, a collection of linked short stories which are rather similar to the content of Betsey Brown. They revolve around Irene Wilson and her family in 1950s Kansas City Kansas, as they too deal with the issues around integration. The tone of this book is slightly less exuberent than that of BB, but Reenie and her friends spring to life from the page. Some stories are seen from the POV of other characters, broadening the picture of this community. It too was an excellent read.

Reading Come Back in September, Darryl Pinckney's memoir whose focal point is his mentor, Elizabeth Hardwick. She was a Virago reader before they published her: "She was interested in the books by women that made her way to her from Carmen Callil's Virago press (with Ursula Owen and Alexandra Pringle), a good thing to come out of London, she said, with its list of new women writers and not always well-known women writers from the past."

An audience member at a talk asked her who her favorite American woman writer was. She answered, "Henry James." The audience didn't get the joke and I'm not sure I do either. I wonder if she means that he wrote with a feminine sensibility...? There's another line from her about his "inanities... She was going to keep a ledger of James's silliness."

Other Virago author mentions: Christina Stead (positive), George Gissing, Katherine Anne Porter (funny anecdotes), Jean Rhys (she thought Goodnight, Midnight was her best work), Zora Neale Hurston (Pinckney has interesting commentary), George Eliot (Hardwick compares her genius with that of Joan Didion's), Colette, Anais Nin.

I've been reading a number of books by D E Stevenson. I enjoy her books because she is fond of her characters unlike many other authors. I find some
novelist's work overly depressing. I think that Elizabeth Taylor is one of those authors.

>210 kayclifton: I have just finished the Mrs Tim series. Delightful characters and a lovely comfort read.

Currently reading A Bookshop of One's Own, all about the much-missed Silver Moon Bookshop in London. Great so far, though interesting to read that there was a potential run-in with Virago who decided to open up their own shop in Covent Garden at the same time!!

I just added a couple of new books to my TBR list. I found them on Furrowed Middlebrow's website. They're books by Norah Loft and I'll probably begin reading the first book in a Trilogy. Is anyone else familiar with her work?

OOPS!!!!!!!!!

The author's correct name is Norah Lofts

>212 kaggsy: I really want to read that one - have put in a library reservation but it could take a while.

I have discovered a memoir by Ursula Owen, another of the key Virago women for many years and have already borrowed it from the library. I've read Lennie Goodings' memoir.

My various current reads include Mamma by Diana Tutton, a reprint in the British Library Women Writers series and Red Comet by Heather Clark, a recent, very long biography of Sylvia Plath. I bought it a while ago but was distracted by library books and daunted by its sheer size (over 1100 pages including the endnotes. I am quite pleased that it came up as a 99p Kindle deal the day after I started to read it. The hardback is just so big even to hold (and I imagine the paperback could be quite a challenge without cracking/damaging the spine). And on this one they have done the Kindle endnotes properly so you just click on the number to read the note.

>213 kayclifton: I haven't read that trilogy by Lofts but I read some of her stand-alone historical novels some years ago, which focused on real people from history. I enjoyed them at the time but have since gone off that sort of fiction. I think I overdosed on it!

>215 elkiedee: I thought Red comet was very good. The author seemed to me to show both Plath and Hughes "warts and all" rather than taking sides and characterising one as "good" and the other as a villain. I saw it came up as a kindle deal - this is the sort of volume that kindles are made for!

>215 elkiedee: Oh, I'd not heard of the Ursula Owen memoir - I'll have to look out for that as I did enjoy the Lennie Goodings book! Thanks for the heads up!

>216 Sakerfalcon: I just borrowed the book by Norah Lofts that was described in Simon's Stuck in a Book's blog. The title is Lady Living Alone which I find rather catchy.

I never was a fan of historical novels and I never liked history courses when I was a student.

Have just finished reading Letters to a Friend by Winifred Holtby - a collection of letters to a wartime friend over a period of around 15 years. Gives a wonderful insight into Holtby's life and work, as well as how life was like at the time!

I have just finished reading A City of Bells by Elizabeth Goudge and it was pleasant reading.

I am now reading This Must be the Place by Maggie O'Farrell and I am enjoying so far.