Sandra

Six Degrees of Separation: from Phosphorescence to …

It’s been a while. Six months, I see. I’m a bit rusty. Attempts to fill the space in between have amounted to naught so – having ended on a six degrees in September, with autumn beckoning and the dark difficult winter ahead – I’ll pick up as if I’ve never been away with another six degrees. I note in my September preamble that I gave warning of a darker chain than usual. A portent perhaps? But if so, I give notice now that this next chain is light and bright and filled with good things. Spring is calling, and on its back flies hope of easier times for everyone.

Six Degrees of Separation: from Rodham to …

Six Degrees has come around very quickly as always, with very little to see on A Corner of Cornwall between this chain and the previous one. Hopefully I’ll get some non-book related posts up this month! Meanwhile, Six Degrees of Separation is organised by Kate and the background can be found here. After a hesitant start I found my stride. The finished chain is darker than usual for me. A reflection of the changing seasons perhaps? Maybe I’m preparing for those dark autumnal reads…

A Month in the Country by J L Carr

Can this Booker-shortlisted novella really live up to expectations? When Fiction Fan and I decided to publish our thoughts about this little book on the same day, no one seemed to have a bad word to say about it and what’s more, everyone seemed to respond to it with real affection. Winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1980, presented as the genuine much-loved English classic, the risk of disappointment seemed alarmingly high. I need not have worried. Reading A Month in the Country was a joy.

Six Degrees of Separation: from How to do Nothing to …

There are warning signs: I have too much else going on which suggests I may disappear for a while. But my six degrees chain was put together a while back so perhaps I’ll let it leapfrog to the front of the queue. Six Degrees of Separation is organised by Kate and the background can be found here.

Birds on the Balcony: the hawk comes a-calling

It was over in an instant. It felt like a lifetime.

A sparrowhawk is sitting on the balcony railings. A large bird, a female. Facing us as we watch through the window, I can see she is brownish-grey and without the beautiful rufous colourings of the male. Her eyes, bright yellow and steely, are alert and watching.

Reading Rambles: Rabbits, Bears and other talking animals

… it still has its gold lettering on the spine, just about visible

I was so careful. I gave myself a list of 8 titles without committing to any. But my fate was sealed in a single sentence:

“Even I ought to be able to write one Jazz Age post in June…”

Sadly, Jazz Age June has come and gone and we’re past the midpoint of the next month. But Jazz Age July has a certain ring to it and if Laurie and Fanda will permit it, I have a post or more to contribute on the basis that late is better than never.

WWW Wednesday: 15/7/20

It’s July and we must be roughly mid-way through the time allotted to the 20/15/10 Books of Summer. Those weeks seemed endless at the beginning, where have they gone already? Not that I haven’t been reading; I’m enjoying an unexpectedly rich period of reading at the moment. There will be no problem in reading my 10 books. As usual, the challenge lies in writing about them, particularly as most of them seem to demand a post to themselves. But picking up this weekly meme again is a way of ticking off a couple of books at least, and keeping tabs on my reading in general.

WWW Wednesday is currently hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words. Each week there are three questions:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Six Degrees of Separation: from What I Loved to …

Six Degrees has come around already. It only seems a week or so ago that I was making the chain for June but that’s because I was late in June. Remarkably, I am on time for July!

Six Degrees of Separation is organised by Kate and the background can be found here.

The View from Here: walking in the writer’s footsteps (part 3)

“I did not escape an office to be pinpricked by bumpkins”

See part one and part two

At the bottom of the hill sits our nearest neighbour: a run of whitewashed cottages which at first sight appears to be three small farm workers’ homes but is now one large and one smaller dwelling, the latter a more recent addition. These days they form the frontage of a discreet holiday business. Six pleasant wooden chalets lie beyond, out of sight of us or passers-by. The owners are warm and friendly but keep to themselves; the guests are quiet. We couldn’t ask for better neighbours.

From the neighbours we learned that the original building was once a public house and that it was also briefly the home of the writer, Mary Wesley. I read a fair few of her books in the eighties and nineties, which I then passed along to a charity shop. I rather wish I’d kept them now. She is probably best known for her second novel: The Camomile Lawn (1984) which became, as I remember it, a slightly racy tv series.

The View from Here: love is the true price of love (George Herbert)

It’s now – looking back – that I can see how worthwhile it was.

This post has existed in draft for almost a year. It seems fitting to publish it now – in its original guise – with an update at the end.

July 2019 It was easy when I began blogging. I wrote for myself. Slowly a community has built which I value highly, but as it has grown I find myself questioning the content I choose. I begin to ask myself what others may wish to read; I begin comparing what I post against what others post. And that’s not what it’s about. Family stuff has quietly slipped off the table although it was a key part of why I started the blog in the first place. But this is a post that I want here for many reasons. I remind myself that it’s easy enough for people to slide on past if the subject matter is not to their taste. Continue reading “The View from Here: love is the true price of love (George Herbert)”