The Book Post – July

Since we last spoke I’ve been quiet on the bookish front…I’ve also (mostly) been at home and also back to doing double duty in the day job. My brain is exhausted.

While this is the time when I should be reading – to take me away to someplace else, I haven’t been…to be completely honest I’ve struggled with identifying what I want to read. But, as they say, this time too shall pass.

Anyways, onto the books.

The Summer Skies, by Jenny Colgan

The release of a new Jenny Colgan is always a reason for much celebration – and this one is a standalone story. Set in the Scottish Highlands and the remote islands off the mainland, this romance swept me away. Not much more to say other than this was easily my read of the month.

The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels, by Janice Hallett

I actually have no idea how to describe this. The blurb goes like this:

Everyone knows the story of the Alperton Angels: the cult-like group who were convinced one of their member’s babies was the anti-Christ, and they had a divine mission to kill it – until the baby’s mother, Holly, came to her senses and called the police. The Angels committed suicide rather than go to prison, and Holly – and the baby – disappeared into the care system.

Nearly two decades later, true-crime author Amanda Bailey is writing a book on the Angels. The Alperton baby has turned eighteen and can finally be interviewed – if Amanda can find them, it will be the true-crime scoop of the year, and will save her flagging career. But rival author Oliver Menzies is just as smart, better connected, and is also on the baby’s trail.

As Amanda and Oliver are forced to collaborate, they realise that what everyone thinks they know about the Angels is wrong, and the truth is something much darker and stranger than they’d ever imagined.

This story is far from over – and it won’t have a happy ending.

Told entirely through a series of emails, texts, transcribed interviews and WhatsApp messages between Amanda and her publisher, Amanda and her sources, Amanda and Oliver, Amanda and her transcriber, Ellie, this is really cleverly done and the ending really came as a surprise.

Once I got my brain around the (clever) format, this was a great read.

Amazing Grace Adams, by Fran Littlewood

This was almost a DNF – the chopping and changing of points of view and timeframes confused me at first, but ultimately they worked. I did, however, persevere – and am glad I did, although I’m still unsure how I feel about it. Sad, mostly, I think.

One hot summer day, stuck in traffic on her way to pick up the cake for her daughter’s sixteenth birthday party, Grace Adams snaps.

She doesn’t scream or break something or cry or curl into a ball. She simply abandons her car in traffic and walks away. But not from her life – towards it. Towards the daughter who has banned her from the party. Towards the husband divorcing her. Towards the terrible thing that has blown their family apart . . .

She’ll show her daughter that no matter how far we fall, we can always get back up. Because Grace Adams was amazing. The world and her family might have forgotten. But Grace is about to remind them …

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

I’ve just finished listening to the fabulous Miriam Margolyes read Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. This really is a book that was meant to be read aloud.

I was so excited when this one was chosen as our book club read and can’t believe I’ve never read it before. Nor have I had it read to me and am now wishing I’d read it to my daughter when she was a child.

According to something I read when down in the rabbit hole I frequently found myself while reading this book (see what I did there?) Alice contains some serious themes. There are, apparently, within these pages references to drugs, societal norms, the loss of childhood innocence and wonder, and the idea of death as a constant underlying menace. 

To me though, it’s about what happened when a girl named Alice went down a rabbit hole and had many impossible adventures underground. It brought my imagination to life in absolute technicolour and I loved every minute of it. More importantly, it filled me with a sense of wonder I’d begun to be afraid I’d lost. Attempting to read anything more serious into it would diminish that wonder. The very Alice-ness would be lost.

I think though, the thing that I loved most about this was how it reminded me of the dreamworld I weaved for myself when I was a little girl – always looking for the magic faraway tree in Enid Blyton books and fairies that lived in the mushrooms at the bottom of the garden. A magical world where everything was possible… even the impossible. It made me wonder about what happened to make that wonder go away, to dull the imagination into something that was more, well, real.

It’s why of all the quotes in this novel, the one I like best is this one:

The Hebridean Baker – Recipes and Wee Stories from the Scottish Islands, by Coinneach MacLeod.

I’ve resisted the urge to get onto TikTok (does one get “on” to TikTok?) but have been following this guy on Instagram for some time. It’s not just the wee Scotty dog or the kilt (although I do love some plaid), it’s the whole Scottish island baking package.

MacLeod began baking – as so many people did – during lockdown and soon after began posting short clips of himself making his recipes and chatting about life in the Hebrides and the stories that go with the islands. In the process he attracted a heap of followers and, soon after, a publishing deal.

Kali bought me this book for Mother’s Day (she’s such a clever spaniel) and I’ve been so entranced with the stories in it that up until this week I hadn’t actually cooked anything from it. I have, however, now rectified that situation with custard creams.

Your turn…

Deb, Donna, Sue, and I would love you to share what you’ve been reading…the linky is below.

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