Current reading matter

[sejintenej]

Challenge that - my business partner is an accountant (tax if that makes a difference!), and she is stark, staring, raving, bonkers with a heavy duty Rioja habit!!

Introduce her to Malapere red - she will have a heavy duty habit but no longer be quite so bonkers; how can anyone with such good taste be anything but sensibile and sensitive!

Of course it is necessary to be stark, staring, raving, bonkers to admit to being an accountant. As for reading matter - there's plenty from Gordon and Alasdair for her delectation

[Laura M]

Correct the answer was 'The league of extraordinary gentlemen' (such a shame as the graphic novels are so completely fantastic)!!

[Tim_MaA_MidB]

My brother gave me "Matter" by Iain M. Banks for my birthday. Hmmmm... not sure if I like it yet.

[Ajarn Philip]

I've just finished a book called "Diplomatic Baggage, (The Adventures of a Trailing Spouse)" by Brigid Keenan. It's basically humorous. In the blurb on the back William Dalrymple says that he laughed out loud 3-4 times per page. I think I may have managed a chuckle or two during the whole book. My main problem was that I couldn't manage to like the author, in fact I found her quite irritating. She seems to have spent half her life sobbing, terrified or simply feeling insecure and inadequate. I don't wish to appear unsympathetic, but my reaction was to say "yes, yes, now tell me something interesting..."

Also, she comes from a privileged background and has had a privileged life, but she doesn't quite seem to have grasped that fact.

Having said that, it may well be a 'gender' issue to a certain extent. Anyone who has been an expat anywhere, and certainly anyone who has done the diplomatic community thing overseas (Kerren?), will appreciate some of the anecdotes.

[Jo]

Having just been through a spate of CH books (Blue Skirts into Blue Stockings, Half to Remember, Away from the Bombs and the Boys, and lastly Anna Swan's excellent Statues without Shadows), I've just finished Iain Banks' The Steep Approach to Garbadale, which I would recommend, and am now finally reading Chocolat. I've had the book for a couple of years but never got round to reading it, although I have seen the film.

I'm also into The Number One Ladies' Detective Agency novels, which are gentle and charming, and great for relaxation. I have a couple lined up as my next reads.

[Katharine]

I've just finished a book called "Diplomatic Baggage, (The Adventures of a Trailing Spouse)" by Brigid Keenan. .....
Having said that, it may well be a 'gender' issue to a certain extent. Anyone who has been an expat anywhere, and certainly anyone who has done the diplomatic community thing overseas (Kerren?), will appreciate some of the anecdotes.

I think you are thinking of me, Philip not Kerren. I have the T-shirts for being Mrs British Council and not a person in my own right.

If I see this I will give it a go and then let you know. I am surprised that this was written by Brigid Keenan, I thought she was a BBC foreign correspondent rather than a trailing spouse.

I tend to avoid these books as I may end up throwing them out of the window, snarling and spitting! (similarly for ones of anecdotes on growing up in a vicarage) If you cram all the incidents of any life into a few short chapters, and with some judicious embroidery it will appear superficially interesting.

Now remind me, have I told you about the diplomatic party when most of our guests were in prison?.......

[Ajarn Philip]

I think you are thinking of me, Philip not Kerren. I have the T-shirts for being Mrs British Council and not a person in my own right.

Sorry, Katharine, of course I was. Yet another senior moment. And you're thinking of Bridget Kendall!

[englishangel]

and Brian Keenan?

[Katharine]

Sorry, Katharine, of course I was. Yet another senior moment. And you're thinking of Bridget Kendall!

Too true!!!

[Laura M]

Jo,
What did you think of 'Away from the Bombs and the Boys' I rather enjoyed it, I knew the author Mrs Gregory (nee Griggs) quite well as when I worked/ran the museum we did a special display for it, I was very sad when I discovered she passed away around 2005, she had been so kind to me even sending me aid packages at Uni!! I guess I was even more sad to see she didn't get an obit/notice of passing in the old Blue.

[englishangel]

I have just read "Away from the bombs and the boys" followed by "Half to Remember" (both bought at the reunion at Hertford museum) and it was really interesting to read of the era from both sides. Audrey was there at the beginning of DRs 'reign' and I was there at the end and it was amazing how little had changed. And from what I have heard very little changed in the last 13 years at Hertford either.

I was also amazed at how badly written "Half to Remember" was. I know English wasn't DRs 'subject' and she probably didn't have the benefit of an editor (as presumably Audrey did) but in places it was almost unreadable. There were sentences dropped in which had no connection with the paragraph around and such like. Such a shame as she had a good tale to tell.

[Katharine]

Having just been through a spate of CH books (Blue Skirts into Blue Stockings, Half to Remember, Away from the Bombs and the Boys, and lastly Anna Swan's excellent Statues without Shadows), I've just finished Iain Banks' The Steep Approach to Garbadale, which I would recommend, and am now finally reading Chocolat. I've had the book for a couple of years but never got round to reading it, although I have seen the film.

I'm also into The Number One Ladies' Detective Agency novels, which are gentle and charming, and great for relaxation. I have a couple lined up as my next reads.

Is Anna Swan's book also CH Hertford? I don't recognise the title.

I enjoyed the Ladies Detective Agency, very gentle books, but I read too many together and suffered overkill, I would recommend leaving a while between them!

[gma]

Anna Swan, was 3s in my intake year, her book is about her parents and their early deaths. I had no idea of any of her story until I read an extract and the review in the Mail on Sunday when the book was published. The only thing I remember about Anna, apart from her being the tiniest girl I'd ever seen, were whispers that no one was allowed to upset and her Housemistress was fiercely protective of her; very clear now why that was so. Book is an extraordinary tale and the only thing that grated was the editor who must have changed 'wearing short beige socks' to 'short white socks' when describing our summer uniform. As this forum has shown, and continues to do so, a multitude of secrets came and went with each year's entering and exiting pupils.

[kerrensimmonds]

Yes I thought there was the odd inconsistency in Anna's book (e.g. socks...) but when I queried them with a friend who is a direct contemporary and friend of Anna's, she confirmed that the book was accurate.
And I agree with you Mary... I always thought that reading 'Half to Remember' was like drinking the gin without the tonic....
But that's how she was.

[Jo]

I really enjoyed all the books. Away from the Bombs and the Boys was closer to my era than Blue Skirts into Blue Stockings, and much of what Audrey described was still in place in 1967 when I went to CH (scary!!) I also enjoyed the contrast between her description and DR's description of the same things, eg DR's descriptions of innovations that she made soon after her arrival.

Although I found the war descriptions interesting in Audrey's book, in a curious way I also felt they were a distraction from the narrative about CH. It's almost like they belonged in two separate books, although I can see that's nonsensical. Maybe it's because I felt like an insider reading about CH, but like an outsider reading about the war.

I'm guessing that DR's book was really intended to be edited into something more elegant but she ran out of time or energy and thought it was better to publish it a bit rough than not at all.

Anna's book was beautifully written, though pretty harrowing. It's amazing that she seems to have emerged a pretty balanced person at the end of it all. She was about four years below me and in another house, so I don't really remember her from school, although the name vaguely rang a bell. But I did meet her briefly in Hertford at the reunion in Hertford this month and she seemed to remember me. I think you do remember people older than yourself rather than younger - I know I certainly do.

I'm sure you are right about the No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency books, Katharine - that's why I've taken a break before reading the next two. I thought the TV dramatisation recently was excellent - Anthony Minguella really captured the spirit of the books.