Category: weekend reading

An oxfam trip

~ winstonsdad ~ 2 Comments

I love to visit our Oxfam. I may go twice a week, but unfortunately, we don’t have a bookshop, just a regular store, but it can turn up some real gems. So when Amanda and I headed to town, I wasn’t sure what would turn up as I had only been a few days earlier, so when I found four great books today, it was a real turn-up for the books as I had only been in a few days earlier. But the book gods had looked down and said you need these gems on your shelves, I found two and Amanda saw two for me.

Now, the two I found would be ones on my long, long list of books to get. The first is Jessica Au’s Cold Enough for Snow, a tale of a mother and daughter who wander around Tokyo looking at art and talking weather horoscopes and clothes as one would in Tokyo, a city on my list of places I want to go most in the world who knows one day Amanda. I may get there/ Then Another book on my trip around the works of Cesar Aira. The proof was one of the books from him I hadn’t got. There is a number I need to get, and when I see them over time, I will be getting them as I want to read all his books over the coming year. I feel that the more you read from him, the clearer the picture of the bigger view of the world he has as a writer. I had hoped for a few more gems as they were on the first part of the shelf, but I had no such luck. There is nothing else in the fiction. Now Amanda loves a little bit of true life and was looking through the biography section, she will look at books she thinks I may like as she says usually an unusual name will be the ones she may show me the book and today she found two gems. For me

Amanda showed me the Pamuk, which has been on my list of books to find at some point, and his memoir of Istanbul and his books around the city he lives in are always an ode to the chaos and world that is Istanbul, I had this down significantly as the collection of his illustrated journals has just come out. I first saw these on a BBC tv show he did a few years ago, and you saw him painting and writing in his journal. And I remember thinking at the time, I wondered if we would ever get to see these in English, and we have, so I will be getting a copy of them at some point. I can’t wait to read this. Next to that was Tove Jansson’s collected letters. I have read most of her adult works and thought her letters would be insightful and excellent books to dip in and out of over the years. A great selection of books from three writers I have read before and one I really wanted to read,

 

 

Sunday Chat oops I had nine days off and didn’t read much or blog

~ winstonsdad ~ 5 Comments

I have been off the last nine days the plan was originally to blog but it is the first time off together Amanda and I have had off at the same time I was off sick for two half months but I did very little going here and there so I was ready for this time we decided rather than go away we would visit family and have a day in York. We visit both Amanda’s parents then I went to visit were my Mother ashes we spread then We had a day in your mid week. We had a great short break a few years ago in York. It was nice to be able to drive up and back in the day asx I grow more confidence in my driving We went and just wander we visit a lot of the tourist must does in outr last visit and a wander coffee and cakes and trying to find some books there was a Amnesty bookshop on my last visit but it had gone but I visited the waterstones , both the Oxfam’s and Ministergate  books by which time with the other times we had brought Chocolates, some prints for when we move house.

The books are , How the Wheel Becomes It! Anthony Powell

Is the book Anthony Powell wrote after his huge Dance to music of time cycle of novels, I saw this and thought as it very small it be a good taster before reading the twelve books of the cycle.

MESOPOTAMIA and The Orphanage bySERHIY ZHADAN

I am a fan of Yales Margellos world republic of letters series and had seen both of these being read by the Ukrainian writer Serhiy Zhadan so when I saw them both I decide I get them both.

 

The Plain in Flames by  Juan Rulfo

I reviewed his book Pedro Páramo 8 years ago and remember that he had written much else but there is this over collection of his shorter fiction. Which after I post this pic on twitter I discovered is one of two translations of this collection

CHARCOAL SKETCHES by Henyrk Sienkiewicz

He won the Nobel I knew this and took a chance as I would love to work through the Nobel winners over the years at some point.

A modest selection but all I could carry. after the trip to York the old car need a clean as it was raining on the way up to York so next day we gave the car a wash and we then head to My dads and we had a day around the cotswolds which was nice  as my dad hadn’t been there much the last few years and enjoyed show Amanda and I where we could go next time we down we visited Stow on the wold , Broadway and its Tower and then chipping clapham (which is very near Burnt Norton which T S  Eliot wrote about in Four quartets). So all in all time and a bought of toothache which meant a visit to the dentist and a tooth out this last week meant I read very little and also blogged very little.But I am in the middle of four books

They are Ninth building a tale of growing top in cultural revolution first as a boy in Being then in the countryside . Then thirsty sea a woman past and present unfold over the course of one day. Toung beast art play is an Italian crime novel the first in what may be a series that follows three detectives as a body is discovered in a World War Two mass grave that has a modern parts on the bones so who put the body there and who is the body !. Then Thomas Mann I plan to read all the books of his I have which is most of them over the next couple of year I have read some years ago but not got any books by him on the blog io also have Colm Tobin’s book The magical which is about Mann. I was so excited when one of my tweets was mentioned on The mookse podcast for there short book episode they mention stones in the landslide if you don’t listen to them go listen to them.Talking `podcasts I like Simon Thomas podcast although he has a very different taste in books to me he is currently reading a novella a day this month on his blog. I looked through my shelves and would enjoy trying this some time.I will return this week I have had a great week with Amanda it has been great spending quality time together. What have you been up to recently ?

 

A Nobel weekend reading

~ winstonsdad ~ 8 Comments

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Here again with my choices for a weekend off reading wise .First up just about to start this classic of African fiction A grain of wheat by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o .The Kenyan is a name that has been in the list of the top ten writers in the nobel betting the last few years .This is his most well-known work ,  he is also a writer I should had on here before now and also carrying on the tradition on this blog of picking a couple of hopefuls that I haven’t read in the months just before the prize is announced .

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Also on this weekends pile is this , as I say I like to plan and last year hadn’t planned my german lit month reading so well .But this year as my books read list shows I have a few books already read from the IFFP list that just didn’t get to review .Then I’m starting with this throwing a couple of books in the next few weeks of my reading plans .The Prodigy by Herman Hesse is a short novella about how a boy is broken by the teachers and system of teaching the success driven school system brings . He was very keen on Eastern ideas and systems at the time he wrote this book and a number of his later books .

What are you reading ? How far in front do yo plan ?

 

weekend reads Labyrinth to New York

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alain robbe Grillet

I am finishing this Novel this evening as my weekend begins , well I am working but this Classic Noveau Roman novel by Alain Robbe-Grillet is a strange journey into a darker seedier new york and the actions of one underground group  in a near future New york of the time , I’m being remind of both Burroughs and Burgess  in some ways .I must admit I love the cover of this copy from the library an old Calder and Boyars with a great piece of typewriter art .

the physics of sorrow

The other book on my radar for reading this weekend is The last of the three novels I was sent from Open letter and the one I have saved as I have really enjoyed the other books from Bulgaria I have read and this story that is described as a modern take on the minotaur story with its narrator following a labyrinth of stories The Physics of sorrow by Georgi Gospodinov .Is one of the books  I am most looking forward to this year so far .

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There is one last thing and that is this The last NME as it is before it becomes a free magazine .This was the music paper I read in my youth some of those covers on the cover I remember the Stone roses one which to my shock is from 1989 my god that makes me feel old . But its sad to see the fact so few people buy it now it was viable to sell it but do it as a free music paper (I imagine with a lot more adverts in than now ) .

What is on your weekend tbr ?

Weekend reads Kassel revisited

~ winstonsdad ~ 5 Comments

Well this is a feature I have been doing a few weeks featuring the books I hold the spotlight on two books I plan to read over a weekend , not that I do but on  whole it is what I read that weekend .But today is a perfect example of what happens , best laid plans and that I had originally had another book in mind , but after work I was checking my emails and saw the library had email to say this had arrived .

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The latest book by Enrique Vila – Matas called The Illogic of Kassel ,I so pleased this came today so I can get to it straight away .This again is a piece of Metafiction with Enrique Vila-Matas going to the Germany city of Kassel to the Documenta (this is a collection of modern art piece around the city every five year ) ,I used live in Germany and my Partner of the time father lived in Kassel , which we visited during one of the Documenta’s the city has a number of pieces around it by Joseph Beuys which strangely came from the city I actually lived in Germany at the time  Kleve .So you can imagine a book describing this city and visiting it plus modern art is just amazing .A bonus being one of my favourite writers as well

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My good blogger friend Lisa is to blame for the second book this weekend she is running her Indigenous week on her Anzlitlovers blog again .I picked this classic of African fiction Lemona’s tale by Ken Saro-Wiwa a member of the Ogoni people of Nigeria , he was a spokesman for them during his life this follows last day in Lemona life as she sits in a prison .The writers own life was mirrored somewhat as he was arrested and killed in the 90’s by the military Government of the time .

 

Weekend reads Galicia to Glasgow

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Well I’m working tonight so will be taking Vicous with me a modern drama with echoes of Shakespeare a man goes kn the run after killing some one and I alway look to mirror a weekend read James Kelman book translated accounts is an unnamed narrators story of living under a military regime .
What are your weekend reads ?

Wildlife and Weekend reads

~ winstonsdad ~ 4 Comments

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A busy day at work saw me going round a local wildlife park with people I support so for this world lit blogger I saw animals from many of the places I have blogged about over the years here you could stroke the  wallabies .It was nice for people I look after to see animals so close up .There was many chance to get so close to all the animals at Yorkshire wildlife park it was lovely to see the people I look after so happy to see them .So now Im home and thankful for a Weekend off here are my weekend reading choices .

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Two books from writers I have read before I have the first two books of what is a loose trilogy by Andrej Nikolaidis under review on the blog and of course the first book bt Mathias Enard The zone we brought into this year’s shadow iffp so the next book street of thieves is one I’m looking forward too .So what are your plans for the weekend ?