The Mistletoe Bride was good. A selection of short ghost stories and one play, the stories were interesting and well-written. It almost matched Stone Matress.

I finished it the day before yesterday. Yesterday we went to Portovenere – but, like posts about some restaurants, I shall tell you about that when I’m in front of a proper keyboard – so no reading yesterday.

This morning I’ve started The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro.

But it seems the books I enjoyed most this summer were the books of short stories, which I wouldn’t have expected.

A “Sunday Times bestseller” is highlighted at the bottom. “A wildly funny novel” is prominent elsewhere.

But did they apply this to the wrong book? For this was neither wildly nor funny in any sense. It will be the very top of my list to give away to a Jumble sale.

A story of the old wealth and upper classes divisions in the UK, it seemed to try to sway me that all was ok with the typical English social games. Neither that nor the lack of sympathy for any of the characters went to make this a “must read” book. Indeed, I would further add that I won’t read anything by the author again.

That was Snobs and now onto the second Kate Mosse book for this summer – The Mistletoe Bride – a selection of short stories by her.

Well it seems that is the theme this year.

When I was a kid I had and read all the “Mystery” books by Enid Blyton. I loved them. Then, as I got older, Agatha Christie and, I guess, I was pretty sated with detective books by then.

And that hasn’t really changed. But, by pure chance, this year’s summer books seems to be mostly “detective”.

Alchemy was a couple of stories rolled into one. It was ok but the connection between the stories seemed quite weak to me. Not the “special” book for the summer.

Then, over the last 36 hours there’s been The Risk Of Darkness by Susan Hill. She is very “readable” but it’s not a “wow” book.

And now to Snobs by Julian Fellowes. A book I’ve had for ages and ages (second hand, I’m sure) and it doesn’t really appeal but I’m determined to get it out of the way.

Wish me luck!

Well, as I suspected, I had read Fatal Voyage before. It was ok but, if I’m honest, really not worth the second read. But it is annoying in that I could have been reading something new!

So, onto new. The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith. Now I understand he’s popular as he’s certainly been at Hay but I’m not really sure why. Ok, so it was a readable book but I kept thinking it was a cheap version of an Agatha Christie novel. With AC you get clues (even if they’re not usable clues) but with this story you didn’t much. Plus the “detective” seemed, in the main, bloody useless and only solved the case by accident. Still, light enough and easy to read.

And then on to Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear. Another bloody detective! However this was thoroughly enjoyable. I’ve looked it up and there are more Maisie Dobbs novels and I just might be persuaded to read another.

Just one thing – for a book set in England between the wars, the spelling of the American “theater” instead of the English “theatre” really angered me. Especially as she had gone to all the trouble of spelling Cockney English correctly!

And now to Alchemy by Maureen Duffy. At least I’m getting through them at a decent rate now and I have a stack of them (finished) to take back home in a week’s time!

After finishing Holy Sh*t yesterday I treated myself to the Margaret Atwood book I got last year.

Holy Sh*t was really interesting. Detailing swearing from Roman times to the present day (English – US and UK) but this wasn’t a ¡novel, of course, being more of a history book. Great fun though and I learnt a lot.

But on to Margaret Atwood. There’s something about her writing. I feel that I could just read only her work, forever, if only she would write more – much, much more.

This was a collection of 9 short “tales”, each one different in almost every sense except one – they were about old people, more or less.

I’ve always liked “old people” things. Drawings, paintings, films, etc. The older the people, the better. And so, this was a wonderful book with wonderful tales.

This year I didn’t bring The Blind Assassin, my favourite book of all time – and now I wish I had.

Instead, I’ve started Fatal Voyage by Kathy Reichs – another book I think I’ve read before. Another one I probably didn’t put in the “books I’ve read” cupboard. *sigh*

Well, I finished it but not at my normal rate. Sure, it was a thicker book than most but also because a) Best Mate is here and b) the book didn’t race along until about halfway through and, then again, towards the end.

Anyway, it was quite good but I doubt if it will be the number 1 book of the summer for me.

Now I’m on to The Various Haunts Of Men by Susan Hill who, I’ve discovered, comes from my neck of the woods. Except, I think, I read this last summer!