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<\/a><\/p>\nI’d watched the SBS documentary on the Cambridge spies only a few days earlier, so A Spy Among Friends<\/em> leapt out at me. I have had (past tense, hopefully) some long and intense bouts of insomnia, and the topic interests me. English writer Diana Athill (1917-2019) had a long and distinguished career in publishing – she worked with Margaret Atwood, Philip Roth, Jean Rhys and VS Naipaul among others – before she became an award-winning writer herself, with a series of memoirs. This is the last, so perhaps not the best place to start, but I never mind\u00a0 knowing the end of a story. It will be a good introduction. And I remember meaning to read The Life of I<\/em> when it first came out, and never did.<\/p>\n Oh, and so are the 35 copies of a beautifully produced English magazine called Hortus<\/em>, which should keep me in armchair gardening all winter. Aren’t the covers lovely? Worth the 20c per copy they cost me. A rhetorical question. No, of course not. I have plenty, including quite a few I haven’t started yet. But I went to the legendary (in Castlemaine they are!) Friends of Castlemaine Library book sale. Not only went to it – … Continue reading <\/a>
\nI’ve already skimmed through the book on novel writing. It is, as Lynne Truss says on the cover, extremely funny. Laugh-out-loud and tears-running-down-my-face funny. The authors parody bad prose with excruciating accuracy. I’ve read most of Penelope Lively’s novels for adults and children; I admire her writing and look forward to this memoir. Storr’s Solitude<\/em> is something I re-read every few years, yet I’ve never read anything else by him. And now I can. And Out of the Woods<\/em> is nature, walking and thinking. Right up my alley.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n
\nThis catalogue of utter gorgeousness was $4! How could I resist?<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nThis is why I have book culls. Because I really do need more books.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"