Reading in Reykjavík

Jungle, desert, mountain, sea? Someone asked this question not long ago in a random poll on a chat forum I frequent, and my answer was emphatically “the sea”. I grew up in sight of it, I start to feel antsy if I can’t hear, see or smell it for more than a couple of weeks, and I really think I would lose something important from my life if I were to settle somewhere far away from it. A lake is just not the same - fresh water smells different, and so do saltwater lakes. So here is some List Love, featuring the sea in a pivotal role: Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Novel. While the eponymous white whale is the star of the show, the book actually is about much more than just Captain Ahab’s obsession. The descriptions of life at sea on a whaling ship were what I most enjoyed about it. In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick. The true story that inspired Moby Dick . An enraged bull sperm whale sinks a whaleship in the Pacific and ...

From The Letters of the Earl of Chesterfield to his Son , ed. Charles Strachey and Annette Calthorp (1901), i. 192. I knew a gentleman who was so good a manager of his time that he would not even lose that small portion of it which the calls of nature obliged him to pass in the necessary-house; but gradually went through all the Latin poets in those moments. He bought, for example, a common edition of Horace, of which he tore off gradually a couple of pages, carried them with him to that necessary place, read them first, and then sent them down as a sacrifice to Cloacina: this was so much time fairly gained, and I recommend you to follow his example.... Books of science and of a grave sort must be read with continuity; but there are very many, and even very useful ones, which may be read with advantage by snatches and unconnectedly: such are all the good Latin poets, except Virgil in his Æneid, and such are most of the modern poets, in which you will find many pieces worth reading t...

I think it's about time I posted this, as I have been working on it for a couple of months. I feel there isn’t enough fiction written about the elderly, or at least about the elderly as protagonists. The elderly in fiction tend to be supporting characters, often wise elders (such as  Dumbledore in the Harry Potter books) or cranky old neighbour types (e.g. the faculty of Unseen University in the Discworld series) or helpless oldsters (any number of books, especially children’s books) for the protagonist to either help or abuse (depending on whether they’re a hero or not). Terry Pratchett has written several of my favourite elderly protagonists and they always kick ass in one way or another, so you will see several of his books on this list, either as listed items or ‘also’ mentions. Without further ado: Here is a list of books with elderly protagonists or significant, important elderly characters. I leave it up to you to decide if you’re interested or not, but I certai...

I don’t feel like writing a full review of my latest read, but would like to recommend this book to anyone who would like to read about a refreshingly normal person travelling without any attempt at finding herself or using travel to heal old wounds or discover deep truths. It’s just travel, with lovely descriptions of nature and places, of nice people, strange people and not so nice people, very short historical snippets when she feels they are needed and the occasional observation on the differences between the USA and Britain. I also recommend it to people who like to read about cycling adventures, since it’s about her bicycling journey around the Hawaiian islands and across the continent from California to Nova Scotia. It’s funny and well-written and told in short episodes so it’s a good book to keep in one’s purse or pannier for a few minutes reading on the bus or while catching a breather. 3+ stars.

Judy Haley of the Coffee Jitters blog contacted me recently, asking for recommendations for books to lighten her mood while she is dealing with breast cancer. I took some days to think it over, and then came up with the following: Dear Judy, Your request sent me to my re-read and feel-good shelves. I imagined what it would be like to be in your situation and which books I would read for comfort, and I chose a number of my favourites. You have probably read some of these books, but you might have to be reminded of them just the same. You wrote that you enjoy chick-lit and mysteries, but also that you were looking for feel-good books, so I included books in other genres as well. I have put them in in no particular order, just as I spotted them on the shelf. Specific titles: Jerome K. Jerome: Three Men in a Boat (to say nothing of the dog) – classic humorous novel Connie Willis: To Say Nothing of the Dog – speculative fiction, time-travel, romantic, funny (it helps to have read Three M...

This is part of my Wednesday reading experiences , one where I challenged my readers to read a book by Joseph Conrad , and did the same myself. Year published: 1907 Genre: Novel Setting & time: London, England; 1886. The story deals with Mr. Verloc, an anarchist who is also a secret agent for a foreign embassy. When the embassy requires him to prove his usefulness by committing an act of terrorism, he conceives an idea which will not put him at risk and that will, if successful, prove his usefulness to the embassy and prevent them from exposing him to the police. But the act of terrorism goes tragically wrong and Mr. Verloc has to pay for his failure in a way he never imagined. This book was first published over 100 years ago, but it is very relevant in today’s society because of its themes of anarchism, terrorism and the examination of the driving forces behind them. The story is excellently written and tightly plotted and a good solid read. Not that I would read it again, like...

I came across an interesting article at BraveNewTraveler: 8 Incredible Survival Stories . While I have only read one of the books ( Endurance ) and seen a documentary and the movie based on Alive , I am familiar with some of the other stories and think they are pretty amazing examples of survival. I already have Yossi Ghinsberg's book on my wishlist, and the movie based on Touching the Void is on my "To Watch" list. Now I want to check out the rest. Be sure to also check out 8 of the Greatest Non-Fiction Adventure Stories Ever Told and 8 of the Greatest Fictional Adventure Stories Ever Told for some more great recommendations.

I discovered Gerald Durrell when his classic memoir, My family and other Animals , was translated into Icelandic. My brother and I loved to be read to, even after we could read perfectly well ourselves, and our mother loved to read to us. The two books she read to us most often were My Family… and Tolkien’s fantasy story The Hobbit . Both books were pure magic to us, Tolkien’s because of the fairy tale element and Durrell’s because of the humour and his talent for description, of places, nature, people and animals. Later, when the family was able to afford holidays abroad, we bought Durrell’s other books whenever we found them, and now my mother and I have most of his memoirs and two of his novels in our book collections. My Family… is still just as magical as it was when I was a child, and is one of my perennial reads. Other favourites include The Bafut Beagles , The Whispering Land and The Drunken Forest . Durrell’s prose is beautiful and flowing and he writes with humour about hi...

I haven’t been reading much lately (only six books this month so far), and have been suffering from selective writer’s block as well – I have something like six half-written reviews on the go and can’t bring myself to finish them, but find it perfectly easy to write short essays. To keep the blog going, here is a list of book recommendations I wrote ages ago but never published until now: First I have to say that my explorations into fantasy literature have not taken me far into the world of series fantasy. The reason is that I have too often discovered that the book I was reading was part of a series where the story was so interwoven with previous books that it was impossible to enjoy it without having read those first, or that the story actually started X books ago, and/or would not end for another X books. I have nothing against series, but each book must be readable as an independent story with a solid beginning and end to interest me. This goes for any genre. The only exception is...

Here is a genre that has been included under the heading of “travel”, although it should properly be labelled “memoirs of places”, or, to borrow from Peter Mayle: “being there” books. These are the accounts of people, for some reason often British, who have chosen the expatriate life and moved abroad and then felt the urge to write about it. The genre has existed as long as there have been expatriates, but it was Peter Mayle who made it popular with modern readers with his bestseller A Year in Provence . Since the publication of this book more and more people have jumped on the bandwagon and written about their experiences. The result has been that the places the most popular books describe have seen an increase in tourism, and people long to buy houses there and live the dream presented in the books. Some have gone further and made that dream come true. I like to divide these writers into two groups: the simple-lifers and the good-lifers. Broadly speaking, the former try to outdo e...

I recently re-read this brilliant story for the umpteenth time, and I have to say that I still love it however often I read it. Synopsis: In pre-revolutionary 18th century France, Grenouille, pathetic and decidedly unpleasant, is born with a handicap: his body has no smell of it’s own; and a genius: he has a perfect sense of smell. These two remarkable characteristics combine to make him an outcast from human society. Consequently, he grows up a sociopath with no respect for human life. His genius opens him up to exploitation by those who recognise the possibilities of such a brilliant sense of smell, and he becomes a perfumer’s “assistant”, making the perfumes while his master takes the credit for them. Finally, when he has learned all he can about the perfumer’s art and experimented with the different methods of extracting smell from all kinds of things, living and dead, he sets out to produce the most perfect and delectable smell of all: the scent that produces love, and which he wi...

Honourable mentions: I reviewed several of these book on the original 52 Books blog. Unfortunately tBlog seems to have disabled the static links, so I can not link directly to the reviews. I’m working on a solution to this problem. Polly Evans: It's Not About the Tapas . Around Spain on a bicycle. Previously reviewed . Christopher Sale Wren: The cat who covered the world: the adventures of Henrietta and her foreign correspondent . The biography of Henrietta, who lived with her owners in such diverse places as Russia, Egypt and South-Africa. An unusual and beautifully told story which qualifies as “travel” because of all the different countries they lived in. Talia Zapatos: A Journey of one’s own . Part travel story collection, mostly travel guide and therefore not eligible for the main list. Bill Bryson: Down Under . Bryson in Australia. I didn’t much care for the other Bryson books I’ve read, but I liked this one. Chris England: Balham to Bollywood . Memo...

I love to read about travel, foreign cultures and geography, and always have. My favourite non-fiction books when I was growing up were accounts of travel to such far away places as South America, India and China. Here are some of my favourite travel books that are available in English. I’m leaving out the expatriate memoirs, i.e. Peter Mayle and co., and may post on those later. The honourable mentions and TBR will come later. Antony Bourdain: A Cook’s Tour . Irreverent and funny warts’n’all account of Bourdain’s journey of discovery around the world in search of good food and extreme eating, with camera crew in tow. Karen Connelly: Touch the Dragon: a Thai journal . Connelly spent a year in Thailand as an exchange student and the book is about her experiences of seeing Thai culture from the inside. Edith Durham: High Albania . Durham travelled for her health, and made a special study of the Balkans at the beginning of the 20th century. Part travel memoir, part anthropology, t...