State of the TBR – April 2024

The piles have diminished! I have managed to get the first pile sitting normally on the shelf again with only a slightly smaller gap at the very bottom compared to last month. I took ten print books off the shelf and read them (three of them were Three Investigators Mysteries!), and I have started two more (one TBR project, one newer). I took the two oldest books off the TBR and read six more of my TBR Project books (23 read, 20 reviewed, 118 to go; will be reporting quarterly which means I should be reporting now and will do later!). The Liz and Emma Read Together books are in a separate pile (top shelf, to the left) because they don’t form part of the TBR project, and the books on the top left top are review books.

I completed 17 books in March (three with reviews to be published), reading 7 during a week’s holiday in Spain where we did little but sleep, eat, read and run / birdwatch. None of them were print review books and one was a book that I acquired in March. I am part-way through four more (including my current Reading With Emma Read and a read that will take all year). I read my remaining February NetGalley books and all of my March ones during March (I set one aside, “A Dirty Filthy Book” which was about Annie Besant – it was so long and detailed I had to skim it, and my NetGalley review percentage is at 91% due to all the books that came in (oops). I read one book for Reading Ireland Month and two for Reading Wales Month, one of which I bought during the month, undermining my own policy.

Incomings

I had a lot of lovely print incomings. Oh, this duvet cover has come around again rather than still being on, as I notice I photographed my books on it last month! Anyway, three from the Bookshop (two from an author event), two from a Bad Place, three from friends and two review copies for Shiny New Books

My best friend Emma read Sally Page’s “The Book of Beginnings” and enjoyed the story set in North London so sent me a copy. I was buying a Spanish phrasebook in a hurry to replace the one that has mysteriously disappeared and mistakenly thought I needed to buy more things to get faster delivery, so chose Darren Chetty et al. (eds) “Welsh (Plural)” (already read and reviewed) and Kenny Imafidion’s “That Peckham Boy”, never able to resist a story from the bit of South London I lived in for a bit in the 90s. Back to being Good at The Heath Bookshop, I went to a lovely event with Huma Qureshi and took the opportunity to pick up her memoir “How We Met” as well as her new novel, “Playing Games” (two sisters in London: one Emma might like, too). While I was there, I spotted Richard Askwith’s “The Race Against Time: Adventures in Late-Life Running” which I had to get really.

I was at Ali’s and she’d confusingly been sent this non-fiction book about Essex, “The Invention of Essex” by Tim Burrows – I had a hand in it so she happily passed it to me. While I was away, Steve Doswell popped a copy of his “Running: Me Running EU” running book through the letterbox – I edited this excellent memoir about his attempt to run in every EU country before Brexit was completed and we’re doing an event together at the Bookshop in June so I was thrilled to have a proper copy in my hand! Robert Ashton’s “Where are the Fellows Who Cut the Hay” is an Unbound book I subscribed to, looking at how old customs might be of use now.

Finally, two wonderful review copies for Shiny – Corinne Fowler’s “Our Island Stories” details country walks through colonial Britain (it will have a lovely cover which is why I’ve included the letter with it) and Zeinab Badawi’s “An African History of Africa” does what it says on the tin. Thank you to the publishers for those.

I have been incredibly unrestrained on NetGalley and all my ships came in at once. However their publishing dates are spread across a lot of months, fortunately.

I was offered Emily Kerr’s “The Typo” (published in May) by the publisher as I’d previously enjoyed three of her other books. Two strangers are brought together by a typo in an email address so I don’t even have to put my editor hat on while reading it! “Our Daughter Who Art In America” published by Mukana Press (April) is the publisher’s second anthology of African writing and I hope to find some new authors to read here. Thao Votang’s “Linh Ly is Doing Just Fine” (July) has such an enticing cover; it follows a Vietnamese American woman living in Texas as she gets perhaps too involved in her mother’s dating life.

Niigaan Sinclair is one of the country’s most influential thinkers on issues impacting Indigenous communities in Winnipeg and “Winipek: Visions of Canada from an Indigenous Centre” (May) is a collection of his writings. I was offered Nikki May’s “This Motherless Land” (July) because I’d loved her “Wahala” – this one follows cousins who want different things from life between Lagos and England. I couldn’t resist the two sentences on Iqbal Hussain’s “Northern Boy” (June): “A Big Bollywood Dream. A Small-Town Chance.” It’s set in Blackburn, Pakistan and Australia. And I couldn’t resist the title of Damilare Kuku’s “Only Big Bumbum Matters Tomorrow” (October) and the story of family secrets as its heroine comes of age and only wants a bottom enlargement is enticing, too. Ayaan Mohamud’s YA fiction “The Thread that Connects Us” has two young girls of Somali heritage hating each other at first sight when one moves to England as the other’s new stepsister, but will they need to work together?

I was offered “The World After Alice” by Lauren Aliza Green (August) and was tempted by the comparisons to Anne Tyler (the email said it was because I’d read Charmaine Wilkerson, too) in this book about a split family brought together for a wedding. I was also offered Christie Barlow’s “The Vintage Flower Van on Love Heart Lane” (May), 14th in the sweet series about a small Scottish town and of course a yes. And finally I won Nailah Blades Wylie’s “Joyful By Nature” which is about (American) women of colour embracing activities in nature, something I’m interested in supporting and promoting even if it’s US not UK-based. That’s out in May but I had a bit of trouble downloading it so I’m going to read it this month if I can!

So that was 17 read and 22 coming in in March, however I have read one of the print ones already and one I just need to reskim.

Currently reading

I’ve picked the next oldest book off the TBR, Remi Adekoya’s “Biracial Britain”, which was another Oxfam Books find published only a year or so ago – fascinating so far. And I decided to give myself an Easter Monday treat and start “Birmingham’s Public Art” (also, because it’s quite a wide book it was taking up two spaces on the bottom shelf of the TBR as it had to go through to the back!). I’m also still reading Hunter Davies on London parks with Emma and my literary quotes for the year with Ali.

Coming up

Ever since Christian Cooper’s “Better Living Through Birding” arrived from Cari (thank you!) I’ve wanted to pair it with British Patrick Hutchinson’s “Everyone Versus Racism”: two Black men who have used their moments of (unwanted) fame as a platform to promote understanding and unity. So I plan to read these two this month.

And I have eight NetGalley books published this month. “The Husbands” is a fantasy about a woman’s loft creating multiple husbands for her: which kind will she choose? “Sweetness in the Skin” has a young woman trying to leave Jamaica for France to join her aunt: will she succeed? “100 Words for Rain” and “Just Add Nature” are two National Trust publications with nice illustrations and fun text – I’ll probably review both alongside the Shells one from last month, and I’ve almost finished “Just Add Nature” already. “Our Daughter Who Art in America” will give me a good anthology of African writing. Libby Page’s “the Lifeline” is the sequel to “The Lido” which I read back in 2018! and Emily Henry’s “Funny Story” has an ex-partner-swap story which looks fun. Rachel Kong’s “Real Americans” is a Chinese American family epic (although I note it has YET another Rich White American Boy as the love interest).

I also have “The Milliner’s Hat Mystery” by Basil Thomson to read for Kaggsy and Simon’s 1937 Week which runs 15-21 April. With the ones I’m currently reading, that’s three books to finish (Emma and I have two weeks to go on the current read), two review books to read and review and eleven others to read at a minimum, which might happen!

---

How was your March reading? What are you reading this month? Are you doing any book challenges for the year or the month?

Book review – Marian Keyes – “Again, Rachel”

I suspect I’ve read all of Marian Keyes’ novels over the years and of course I particularly love the Walsh Family series, each about a different sister. Rachel turned up first in “Rachel’s Holiday” and a good while ago now I saw there was a new book about her, but, well, I’m mean and I knew I probably wouldn’t keep or re-read it. It was in the back of my mind and then there it was in the front of my mind as I spotted an only superficially tatty hardback copy for ONE POUND FIFTY in The Works at the start of the year (oddly enough I haven’t read or reviewed any of the other books bought in January, although I’m in the middle of “London Parks” with Emma). Up comes Reading Ireland Month over at 746 Books and hooray, I had one to contribute to it (even if it’s not counting towards my TBR project by three days). Trigger warning: there’s an incredibly well done baby loss theme, I’m not going to apologise for putting that there as a spoiler as the book’s been out for ages, as it could be very triggering.

Marian Keyes – “Again, Rachel”

(03 January 2024, The Works)

In “Rachel’s Holiday”, Rachel was living in New York and patching up her relationship with her husband, Luke. Now she’s living back in Ireland and with Quin, who is a man who looks like a bit of a Middle Aged Man in Lycra and turns out to be; I loved the story of how they met and some other set pieces. She’s working at the very addiction centre that saved her all those years ago and has a little dog to whom nothing bad happens, and she lives with her niece. When Luke’s mum dies and one of his friends gets in touch with her, she has to decide whether she wants to get that closure she never got at the end of their marriage. But should she stick with what she knows or go around uncovering things? All the other sisters pop up pleasingly and Mammy Walsh is deep into managing her own “surprise” 80th birthday party and although there’s some very sad content it’s really well done, as are the stories of the addiction centre and their crossover with Rachel’s own life.

I read this one for Reading Ireland Month over at 746 Books readingirelandmonth24

State of the TBR – March 2024

And so it grows. Yup, I’ve had to go into piles. Compared to last month it’s even bigger! I did a fair bit of book token spending in the month. I only took six print books off the shelf and read them (but four of them were Three Investigators Mysteries!), and I have one more I’m in the middle of. I didn’t take any of the oldest books off the TBR but I did read five more of my TBR Project books (twelve read, ten reviewed, 129 to go; will be reporting quarterly). The Liz and Emma Read Together books are in a separate pile (top shelf, to the right) because they don’t form part of the TBR project.

I completed 17 books in January (two with reviews to be published, one review to come on Shiny). Two of those were review books and two were books that I acquired in February. I am part-way through four more (including my current Reading With Emma Read and a read that will take all year). I read my remaining January NetGalley books and all but two of my February ones in February and my NetGalley review percentage is back up to 92%. I read four books for ReadIndies month, which was a bit disappointing, and am more than half-way through a fifth.

I didn’t review “Fourteen Days” edited by Margaret Atwood as I found it uninspiring, got annoyed by how they arranged the author list at the back so you couldn’t easily check who wrote what, and accidentally spotted a major plot point which unnerved me!

Incomings

I had a lot of lovely print incomings, thanks to book tokens I could spend now Christmas and Birthday Season were out of the way, lovely gifts, a publisher, a book event and subscribing to a book via Unbound:

“Forest Silver” by E.M. Ward came from the lovely folk at the British Library and I’ve read and reviewed it here. Michael Paramo’s “Ending the Pursuit” is a book about asexuality, aromanticism and agender identity I subscribed to from Unbound a few years ago.

The next six books are from The Heath Bookshop, mostly book token spends: “We Come with this Place” by Debra Dank is a powerful book of memoir and history of the original people of Gudanji Country in Australia, which a good few of my Australian blogger friends have read and recommended; Louise Erdrich’s “Books and Islands in Ojibwe Country” does the same in Canada; and “Birmingham’s Public Art” details current and former art in my home city, a great reminder that the Bookshop can order in books that cover the world and one’s particular interests. Andrew McMillan’s “Pity” I bought at his book event and couldn’t resist (review here); it’s likely to be one of my books of the year. Adèle Oliver’s “Deeping It” is from a small press and I thought I might use it for ReadIndies: it tells of colonialism and the criminalisation of UK Drill music; and Oliver Smith’s “Atlas of Abandoned Places” has pictures, maps and descriptions of amazing places around the world. I’d seen both of these on the shelves of the shop and finally snapped them up, hooray!

I was very restrained when Bookish Beck sent round a list of ARCs she was passing along and only asked for Rebecca Smith’s “Rural” about rural lives in the UK now, and Bianca Bosker’s “Get the Picture” which is a deep dive into the art world. Finally, my lovely friend Cari in New York had tried to send me Christian Cooper’s “Better Living Through Birding” (he’s the Black birdwatcher a White woman called the police on in Central Park: social justice and birdwatching in one book!) and it had come back to her, so she added Alicia Garza’s “The Purpose of Power: How to Build Movements for the 21st Century” and sent them a different way for a lovely extended birthday present!

I have been incredibly restrained on NetGalley and only three books have come in!

I was offered Clare Pooley’s “How to Age Disgracefully” (published in June) because I’d enthusiastically reviewed “The Authenticity Project” and “The People on Platform Five“; it features a Senior Citizens’ Social Club that strikes back against ageing (and the local council). Layal Liverpool’s “Systemic: How Racism is Making us Ill” (June) looks worldwide at how racism and bias are affecting health outcomes systematically and looks to offer solutions. Lauren Farnsworth’s “The Lonely Hearts Quiz League” (July) is another community novel set around pub quizzes.

So that was 17 read and 12 coming in in February, and I’ve read two of the print ones already.

Currently reading

I’m currently reading Barclay Price’s “The Chinese in Britain” which I wanted to get read for ReadIndies month but didn’t finish; it’s a good survey of Chinese visitors and residents with some reservations. I’ve started Beverley Kendall’s “Token” from NetGalley and am enjoying reading about a non-Disaster Millennial Woman Black central character in this New York novel. Emma and I are getting along very well with “London Parks”. Not pictured: I’m continuing to read “Bedside Companion for Book Lovers” along with Ali.

Coming up and my 2024 reading challenge

I mainly wanted to take books from the TBR Challenge off the shelf, but I’ve changed tactic slightly. The point of the TBR challenge was to allow me to read books I acquire more quickly, but was potentially blocking me from reading new books till they were all done, so I am now going to read one new one for every two of the oldest ones I read. This extends the up-to-the-end-of-2023 reading deadline to the end of June 2025 (I think!).

I have almost no other challenges in March as amazingly I have no books by Welsh writers on the TBR (unless you have a squint at the photo at the top and spot any) and just Marian Keyes’s “Again, Rachel” for an Irish one, so it’s a free for all on the print TBR, and you can imagine I’m going to take two from the top and one from the bottom.

I have two remaining reads from February (“If You See Them” and “A Dirty Filthy Book”) and “Token” has moved to publication in March so this my March e-book TBR:

There’s “Token” by Beverley Kendall (New York business/romance); Lisa Ko’s “Memory Piece” (three American women with Chinese heritage from their teens into the future); “Dominoes” by Phoebe McIntosh (Black woman, White man, same surname, oh-oh); Sara Cox’s second novel, “Way Back” (North London middle-aged woman rediscovers herself); Olivia Ford’s “Mrs Quinn’s Rise to Fame” (bake-off style show reveals secrets); and Helen Scales’ “The Shell Spotter’s Guide” (well, what it says). These don’t seem too demanding so I’m hoping I’ll catch myself up.

I’m already reading “Token” so with the ones I’m currently reading, that’s two books to finish and at least eight to read, which might just happen!

---

How was your February reading? What are you reading this month? Are you doing any book challenges for the year? Have you read or picked up any of my selection and can you spot any Welsh or Irish authors I’ve missed?

Book review – Kate O’Brien – “The Land of Spices”

My second read for Reading Ireland Month, and like “How Green was my Valley”, I took it on holiday, though it was my plane home read and I finished it at home. 

I bought this one in Stratford last October when I met Scott and Andy from America. The books I bought then I shared in this blog post and I haven’t read and reviewed any others of them yet.

Kate O’Brien – “The Land of Spices”

(18 October 2022, Oxfam Books, Stratford-upon-Avon)

From the beginning, chilled more than she knew by the shock which drove her to the purest form of life that could be found, and hardened in all her defences against herself by the sympathetic bleakness of Sainte Fontaine, she grew into that kind of nun who will never have to trouble about the vow of poverty, because poverty is attractive to her fastidiousness; who has looked chastity in the eyes with exaggerated searching, and finding it in the perverse seduction she needed at a moment of flight from life, accepted it one and for all with proud relief; but who sill have to wrestle with obedience. Not that she does not understand its place in the ideal, or that specific acts of submission trouble her. But because it is a persistently intellectual sacrifice, it is always an idea. (p. 19)

Like “Small Things Like These”, this book centres around a convent in Ireland, however this is a positive story with no laundries, just a school and a community of nuns, their mother convent based in Belgium and Mother Mary Helen, an English woman raised on the Continent who is mistrusted and somewhat feared by the mostly Irish nuns and school girls and the priests who are associated with the school.

The book follows both a linear narrative and a non-linear one, as we follow Anna Murphy’s progress through the school (starting very young, the youngest girl in the school) and dot back and forth through Mary Helen’s life so we only discover mid-way through the book what compelled her to rush into a vocation aged 18. Both women experience tragic losses and both experience spiritual development in this very subtle book, which has no sentimentality or melodrama, but a close and careful look at the petty jealousies and bad behaviour of nuns, school girls and old girls and the ways in which they can console themselves.

There are lovely, touching moments of friendship and fierce defences of what is right: I don’t know much about Kate O’Brien but Clare Boylan in her introduction names her an unsentimental feminist, and there is a strong thread supporting women’s education and right to have their own freedom running through the book. Different kinds of moralities are presented, with Anna’s brother giving his opinion on the nature of their father’s alcoholism and Mary Helen’s father presenting an atheistic view of the world, which makes for interesting contrasts but no lectures or over-philosophising. Another thread is the loss of innocence, again shadowed by the two main characters.

It’s a gently paced book with some remarkable scenes and I very much enjoyed it: I might not have picked it off the charity shop shelves without this challenge to read it for, and I’m glad I did.

I read this book for Reading Ireland Month, hosted by Cathy746Books and it was the second of the two I had hoped to read for the challenge, and completes my Reading Wales / Reading Ireland double challenge with two books for each. It also fills in a year of my Reading the Century project, which hardly ever happens these days!

In another Bookish Beck Serendipity moment, this and “How Green Was My Valley” were published within 3 years of each other (1942 and 1939 respectively) and were set around the turn of the 19th/20th centuries, not a gap I encounter frequently – I also note I chose to share a quote from p. 19 of each book!

Book review – Claire Keegan – “Small Things Like These”

It’s Reading Ireland Month and this was a quick win read in one or two great gulps, as I’m reading two books to review for Shiny New Books but wanted something to talk about here, too.

My lovely friend Meg kindly gave me her copy of this wonderful book in November 2022 (of the seven print books incoming in that month I have read and reviewed two, but that’s not that long ago, is it … ). I feel like everyone in the world has read this jewel of a novella, and it’s hard to say anything new about it, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and am glad I have read it at last.

Claire Keegan – “Small Things Like These”

(November 2022, from Meg)

Always it was the same, Furlong thought; always they carried mechanically on without pause, to the next job at hand. What would life he like, he wondered, if they were given time to think and reflect over things? Might their lives be different or much the same – or would they just lose the run of themselves? (p. 19)

As they carried on along and met more people Furlong did and did not know, he found himself asking was there any point in being alive without helping one another? Was it possible to carry on along through all the years, the decades, through an entire life, without once being brave enough to go against what was there and yet call yourself a Christian, and face yourself in the mirror? (p. 108)

Deceptively simply written, as so many great books are, and with an air of almost a fairy tale, this beautiful and perfect novella takes an ordinary man, runs us through his life, thoughts and emotions, gives him time, indeed, to think and reflect over things, shows us his community and his upbringing, subtle hints woven throughout (a kind man; a man who was himself the child of a single mother; a man who will give the change in his pockets to the child in poverty with an alcohol-abusing father; a man who worries if his daughters will be resilient enough for the modern world) and then has him do first one strange, out of character thing and then one absolutely extraordinary thing.

We’ve all read about a man finding someone in a coal shed when doing deliveries, but there is much more to it than that: a man who was adopted by a Protestant widow in a big house but whose mum died when he was a child still himself, and a Catholic convent on the hill with whisperings about its “training school” and who exactly does the laundry work. What’s shocking is that this story about the Magdalen laundries is set in 1985 and that the afterword explains the last one was closed in 1996, thousands of young women incarcerated and often worked to death, their babies taken from them to be adopted or to die.

So there’s a pretty modern world of shops and phone calls and offices and then a terrible place on the hill where the nuns clearly close rank and punish anyone who steps out of line. Who shut Sarah in the coal shed and what eventually happens to her we will never know; but she is named, she is seen, and Bill Furlong makes sure of it. The women characters are superbly done, especially Bill’s wife, Eileen, and the whole is enthralling, enchanting and heartbreaking. A Christmas tale that can be read any time of the year, a lovely Irish turn to the language and a very special book.

I read this book for Reading Ireland Month, hosted by Cathy746Books and it was the first of two I hope to read for the challenge.

State of the TBR – March 2023

Well, in good news, the bulk of books on my TBR has stayed essentially the same as last month, the bad news being that I still have almost an extra shelf of it!

I completed 20 books in February (one left to review) and am part-way through four more (one my new Reading With Emma Read). Sadly I didn’t read quite what I intended to, as I was struck down by an unpleasant virus that seems to be doing the rounds and only able to read a series of (nine!) very light and enjoyable novels on my kindle for about a week in the middle of it. I read three of the #ReadIndies books I’d laid out for myself, with one still on the go and therefore should still Count, and added two that came in through the month handily from indie publishers. So six ReadIndies challenge books in total, plus two of the ones I laid out for myself I really didn’t like at all and put to one side, at least thus removing five from the print TBR. I finished one of my other print review books (review to be done for Shiny) and am part-way through another (see below). And I DID read all five of my NetGalley books published in March, hooray, plus three more NetGalley books by Christie Barlow that were waiting for me to read the first six (I did). So eight books off the NetGalley TBR and my percentage is 88%!

Incomings

Not quite so many incomings this month (mainly because I couldn’t see very well or leave the house much this month, I suspect). The kindness of friends and publishers kept me supplied, though!

Ada Leverson’s “Bird of Paradise” was a kind gift from the publisher, Michael Walmer, and I have read and reviewed it already (here). Bookish Beck sent me Jeremiah Moss’ “Feral City” which is about New York and the pandemic (I’m aware I need to send this on to Laura Tisdall so will try to promote it up the TBR!). I spotted Bob Mortimer’s autobiography, “And Away” in The Works when milling around on the High Street and couldn’t resist it. Charlie Hill dropped a copy of his historical novel “The Pirate Queen” round (read and reviewed here) and my lovely friend Jenny dropped Deesha Philyaw’s “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies” (racy stories!) and Cyndia Lauper’s memoir round on the same day. I bought Hunter Davies’ “The Heath” for Emma as she lives near Hampstead Heath and we decided to make it one of our Read Together Books – even though we have one on the go and another two in hand, I decided I had to have this one, too, so ordered it from the (Heath!) Bookshop. Michael Hann’s “Denim and Leather” is the story of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal: I did a very small amount of transcribing for it (and he added me to the acknowledgements!) and decided to pre-order the paperback LAST Feb so thank you, Past Me. And Vertebrate Publishing sent an enticing email about review copies and I chose “The Outdoors Fix” by Liv Bolton which has essays by a lovely diverse group of people and how the British countryside has helped them in various ways (look out for that review soon as it’s out on 9 March).

I won four NetGalley books this month and didn’t buy any other ebooks:

Ryan Love’s “Arthur and Teddy Are Coming Out” (published April) is a feel-good novel where a grandfather and his grandson both want to come out as gay but one finds it easier than the other. Paul Morgan-Bentley’s “The Equal Parent” (March) looks at research from around the world about why parenting gets gendered and how to combat it – so much so that as a man married to a man, he gets called MummyDaddy by their local chemist. Christie Barlow has another one out but this time I’m caught up so can read it at the right time – “A Summer Surprise at the Little Blue Boathouse” (April) returns us to Heartcross and more warmth and community. Finally Catherine Joy White’s “A Thread of Gold” (June) brings Black women out of history to celebrate them as they should be.

So that was 20 read and 13 coming in in February, two of which I’ve already read – a win!

Currently reading

As well as Adam Nicolson’s “The Sea is Not Made of Water: Life Between the Tides” with Emma, I’m reading Lauren Fleshman’s “Good for a Girl”, about her own life in athletics and women’s experience in general, for Shiny New Books, and Liv Bolton’s “The Outdoor Fix” as described above.

Coming up

This month, I’ll also be reading for both Bookjotter’s Reading Wales (Richard Llewellyn’s “How Green was my Valley” and Charlotte Williams’ “Sugar and Slate” (which was the main read for it last year but I was balking at buying the ebook until I just had to) and Cathy at 746 Books’ Reading Ireland (Kate O’Brien‘s nun-based novel “The Land of Spices” and the novella “Small Things Like These” by Claire Keegan which I know everyone has read except me) for once (I usually manage one or the other).

My NetGalley TBR for March has eight books on it and an equal mix of fiction and non-fiction:

Jacqueline Crooks’ “Fire Rush” is set in reggae clubs in London and Bristol and takes our heroine through gangs and to Jamaica. Monica Macias tells of her life as a West African growing up in North Korea in “Black Girl from Pyongyang”. Nikesh Shukla’s YA novel “Stand Up” has teenager Madhu caught between helping her family and wanting to be a stand-up comedian. We’ve seen “The Equal Parent” above, and Katherine May’s “Enchantment” looks at how to help your mental health through finding wonder in life. Julie Shackwell returns to Scotland with “A Scottish Country Escape” – another reliably good light novelist. “Rootless” by Krystle Zara Appiah is a poignant novel about a British-Ghanaian marriage in crisis. Finally, Elizabeth Day explores her own friendships and broader discussions of friendship in “Friendaholic”.

With the ones I’m currently reading (not including my readalong with Emma as we won’t finish it this month), that’s three books to finish and twelve to read, which feels OK, though I would like to continue progress on reading hardbacks I bought recently before they come out in paperback …

---

How was your February reading? What are you reading this month? Have you read or picked up any of my selection?