
Had a fabulous few house wandering the rooms and gardens at Blickling- loved the library the best ( of course!)
Had a fabulous few house wandering the rooms and gardens at Blickling- loved the library the best ( of course!)
Popped into Blickling Hall today (once home to Anne Boleyn) - the library houses 90,000 books! A team of volunteers opens a different cabinet each week and leaf through every page of every book checking of damage - wish we lived local, I imagine that‘s a great way to spend an afternoon.
We‘ve been wild camping for four days - so popped into a nearby National Trust estate for tea, cake and to use the facilities! Added bonus they had a second hand bookshop! Happy holidays!
Had a bit of a slump in April but May got me back on track! I‘ve realised when I‘m in a slump it‘s chunksters that get me out of it - something meaty to really get lost in. What gets you back on track?
Can‘t believe we‘re 6 months in ! Junes #goldenagecrimeclub pick is more of a WHY dunnit rather than a WHO dunnit.
We‘ll be chatting about the book on the last Sunday of June. Happy reading!
There were also lots of funny bits in this novel - some chuckles, some great older characters and some novel bizarre parental choices! Overall thoughts, fractions, things we‘ve missed?
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The fortune teller was a fab character - one of the only men in the book and we see him briefly. Whilst lots of the mystery tropes are in this book - his character seems quite unusual! It felt very different from a Christy or Sayers novel……
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The war felt like it had a strong presence in this book - it was lingering in the background in terms of the older women‘s histories and the current (1941) situation of WW2. I wonder how it was writing fiction during war time. ……..
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I loved the first sentence “ At the age of 61 Emma Betony in a kindly light looked ten years younger” ….. I‘m always on the look out for kindly light! What did you think of our sleuth?
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What did you think of the setting? A school / nursing home with sooo many staff and very few residents!
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Welcome everyone to our fifth buddy read! Posting a few days early as I‘m heading off wild camping tomorrow for a few days!
So let‘s kick off with initial impressions and relationship with the book …..
Thank you to everyone who is joining in each month for the #goldenagecrimeclub. Each month we‘re reading once book and chatting about it on the last Sunday of the month. Everyone is welcome to join us!
May‘s book takes us into the world of boarding schools!
Discussion 6
As always - over to you! Anything I‘ve missed, hasn‘t been said, particularly struck you about the book?
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Discussion 5
This book is an early example of a psychological drama popular in books now. The villain, although we hardly meet them is terrifying in terms of the impact of the crime and the amount of people it effects. How well do you think Tey builds the image of this person and their impact?
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Discussion 4
This book was based on the real case of Elizabeth Canning who was a media sensation of her time! So much of her case and the report g of it focused on class boundaries and overstepping those. Tey doesn‘t really challenge this does she??
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Discussion 3
There seemed to be lots of fear amongst the community of unmarried women of a certain age- people who don‘t quite fit. I found these women my favourite characters! Who appealed to you ?
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Discussion 2-
Without a murder - did you find the plot and the detection ‘ satisfying‘? How well did Tey do at keeping up the tension?
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Welcome to this months chat - let‘s start with your general impressions of the book (an unusual crime novel for the 1940s as it is no murder) and your experience of reading Tey………
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It‘s that time of the month again….. we‘re getting set for Sundays chat about this months book - The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey.
Everyone welcome
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To say I choose this book for it‘s beautiful cover wouldn‘t be a million miles from the truth! 🤣
Thankfully - actually enjoying reading it too!
An exciting premise - a lesbian, former punk rocker, tattooed, chain smoking novice nun turned amateur investigator in New Orleans! But she‘s a poor investigator and a even poorer judge of character! Her back story gives her interest and intrigue - but the ‘mystery‘ element is a let down. I believe in her - and maybe book two she‘ll find her stride for that reason I made it a ‘pick‘!
All the squash seeds are soaking! I love Sarah Raven fruit and veg - her relaxed and wild style suits me! Fingers crossed these work out!
So often history is learnt in isolation. I love that this book takes the orbits of two influential women working in very separate spheres and charts the impact of their intersections, influences, shared supporters and detractors as well as their respective legacies. I learnt lots. Got cross at the world lots and have told everyone who will listen snippets of interesting facts! Overall a successful read!
Our April #goldenagecrimeclub read was written in 1948 - inspired by an eighteenth century true crime! In 1990, it was voted the 11th greatest mystery novel of all time by the Crime Writers Association. Grab a copy, have a read and come back and share your thoughts with us here on April 30th.
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Final thoughts - ideas / themes were not yet touched on………
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Brand characters all seem ‘wounded‘ in some way. Did that make them likeable / relatable / enjoyable to spend time with??? I did really like the relationship between the 2 detectives - how did you find the characters ?
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Brand sets this book up as a type of ‘locked room mystery‘ and then shows us lots of different ways it could have been committed throwing in also lots of false confessions! Did you like this format? Was there a ‘solution‘ you favoured or thought she‘d missed out!
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The prologue sets up the motive for murder on the first few pages - a revenge killing linked to a tragedy that happened in Burma. Did you like this structure???
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Yeah - it‘s that time of the month again! Looking forward to chatting about this ‘new to me author” with you all. As always let‘s kick off the discussion with initial impressions, likes / dislikes, experience of the author etc…..
#goldenagecrimeclub #buddyread
I‘m in a dilemma - my new read is a dual biography of Etta Lemon - who founded the Royal Society of Protection of Birds and Emmeline Pankhurst‘s campaign for the vote. So what bookmark do I go with??? The struggle is real! 🤣🤣
It‘s wild garlic season - and the woods behind our house are brimming with the stuff! Had a go at making wild garlic salt - just waiting for it to cool down, then jar it and have it on hand to season scrambled eggs, pasta, steak… anything you want a strong garlic shot of!
After lots of training Woodford is now super comfortable falling sleep in cafes! That means I get to #readonlocation again! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
OMG - this thumb drive is too cute!
https://topatoco.com/products/uns-ccusb?variant=39583213455
Reason 101 why I love my local bookshop - the owners reviews always include a sniff test! 🤣
There‘s so much here I didn‘t know-the role of the brave, courageous, inventive, passionate French Alliance members in ending WWII. Ordinary people doing taking extra ordinary risk to feed information to the British in order to defeat the German invasion sweeping across Europe. Their leader - a woman. An intelligent, resourceful, quick thinking young woman who lead with such courage and compassion. An inspiring woman and her story is told so well
Valentine‘s knowledge gained as a pathology technician, her involvement in medicolegal history & her love of Christie shine through. It helped me set some Christie novels in time- in terms of medical advancement & true crime. Valentine has an encyclopaedic knowledge of crimes and evidence collection methods used by Christie and does a fab job of underpinning this with science. What comes through strongly is what a genius Christie really was!
I loved this - it starts slowly, and the layers of the story build and build so skilfully that before you know it you have such a deep and nuanced view of each character. It‘s sad, involves lots things that might be triggers ( the main character looks after a cemetery) but its joyful too! There‘s hope and reminders about how we live our lives, how we love and care for those closest to us and how we want to leave this life. I love this author!
Turning out to be a perfect bookmark / book pairing! 👍🏼
Ginger cake ….. yum! The kitchen is smelling sooo good! This is what procrastination looks like when you‘re ‘working‘ from home! 🤣🤣
I‘m loving this book - everything comes out soooo good! Tried the Anzac cookies today and they were yum. Chewy, just how I like them! Although Woodford would request more dog friendly bakes be included in the book!!
First few chapters in …. I like this writers style - you go in thinking it‘s a story about one thing and then it‘s about something co pkwy welsh different. Enjoying being gently tugged into the story‘s orbit.
On the last Sunday of every month the #goldenagecrimeclub meet to talk about a book. Please do come and join us if you‘d like. This month we‘re discussing a seemingly impossible crime written by Christianna Brand, first published in 1949 and described as a fiendishly constructed puzzle with dumbfounding acts of misdirection!
Anne Sykes added material swatches to a ledger given to her by her husband on their wedding day, annotating them with dates & names. Strasdin uses the book to bring Anne to life, tracing her though archives, newspapers, ship manifests & parish records - enlarging material scraps into dresses inhabited by bodies living in a real world. Peppered also with histories of cloth, dye, industrialisation & dress etiquette, fascinated reading.
I‘m loving this book so far - the author is piecing together this Victorian woman‘s life from her ledger of fabric scraps she kept her entire adult life.
https://www.penguin.co.uk/articles/2022/11/victorian-textiles-from-the-dress-dia...