I seem to have run out of words to describe The Ladies Number 1 Detective Agency novels. Suffice it to say that In the Company of Cheerful Ladies continues the proud tradition of being absolutely delightful.
Forfatter: Mirthful
Do Not Pass Go
In which we play Monopoly.
Do Not Pass Go was a delightful discovery. I cannot honestly claim to have ever been really bitten by the Monopoly bug, but of course I’ve played it, and the basic premise of the book was therefore perfectly familiar to me. And any book that sets out to investigate London (or, indeed, any part of Britain) in such an eccentric fashion has notched up several points in its favour before I?ve even turned the cover. Neither does Moore disappoint. He is charming in a quietly humourous way and funny in a quietly charming way and all that a good travel writer should be. Hurrah. And I’ve got another of his books in my tbr pile, a fact which I only realised half way through Do Not Pass Go. Hurrah, hurrah.
Strong Poison
A bout of rereading again. In a few short weeks I got through Strong Poison, Have His Carcase, Gaudy Night, Busman’s Honeymoon and Thrones, Denominations. As delightful as ever and still touching me deeply, though in a somewhat different way than before (and yes, Martin is to blame for that).
Under en hårdere himmel
Chilling reading in these warmongering times, though the main point Bjørneboe attempts to make deals with the aftermath of war (WW2), rather than war itself. Still, it’s hard not to hear echoes of current argumentation when he states that facts, and even opinions, lost all significance, the only argument anyone was interested in was which party you belonged to. «You say two and two makes four? Where do you pledge your allegiance? I knew it! Keep away from me with your propaganda!»
And both (all) parties are equally guilty.
I am, as usual, reminded that there are piles of books in Norwegian I have neglected in my anglophilia. And as usual I promise to make amends. Let’s see if I stick to it for once…
The Dark Room
I once had an Indian pen-pal who sent me two of R. K. Narayan’s novels, The Guide and Waiting for the Mahatma, both of which rather impressed me. I picked up The Dark Room second-hand somewhere, and finally got around to it when picking a book to read this weekend. It was a bit of a disappointment, frankly, nowehere as good as I remember the two others to be (which makes me think I probably ought to reread those). I think it will probably not survive the next move.
The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs
I was planning to wait and read The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs only after I’d got my hands on Portugese Irregular Verbs and so read them in the proper order, but it was lying so handily nearby when I was looking for a new book to start that I decided to be improper, just this once.
This, incidentally, is a book of the Laugh Out Loud variety. There is the unfortunate incident of the sausage dogs and the lecture and then there is the even more unfortunate incident of the sausage dog and the veterinary institute and towards the end there is the rather catastrophical incident with the sausage dog and… Oh, but that would be telling, so I’d better not.
The Sword in the Stone
I tried reading The Sword in the Stone once, ages ago, and never got anywhere with it. I only had to read a few pages in this time before I A. realised why I found it uninteresting back in the late eighties and B. burst out laughing. This may be common knowledge to the rest of you, but The Sword in the Stone is a seriously funny book. I always though it was a rather solemn tale of King Arthur’s childhood and ascension to the throne. However, I quite see that I would not have found it anywhere near as funny when I was twelve or so – a lot of it would simply have made a whooshing noise while passing over my head. But I know better now, and I intend to let the world know, starting with YOU. Go. Read. Now.
Eleanor Rigby
Coupland has done it again, though I would be hard put to tell you exactly what «it» is. I only know I find Coupland’s novels strangely compelling, Eleanor Rigby being no exception.
The Risk Pool
Another re-read, another of Richard Russo’s masterpieces. Oddly enough, The Risk Pool seems not to have been reissued in the new paperback editions of Russo’s works, you can still get hold of it second-hand, though.
The Sunday Philosophy Club
I was apprehensive to see what I’d make of McCall Smith outside of Botswana, but The Sunday Philosophy Club, luckily, did not disappoint. It doesn’t hurt, of course, that the setting is Edinburgh, a place I – unlike Botswana – already know and love. And then you’ve got to love a man who can write paragraphs like this one:
‘Perhaps,’ Cat had said, but she had been looking away then, at a jar of pickled onions – this conversation had taken place in the delicatessen – and her attention had clearly wandered. Pickled onions had nothing to do with moral imagination, but were important in their own quiet, vinegary way, Isabel supposed.
Isabel Dalhousie is a charming main character, on the whole, and to make it even better she might eventually make me understand cryptic crosswords. I am certainly looking forward to the next installation, if there is one, which I hope…