More books

Recently read:

• Death of a Nag and Death of a Bore by M C Beaton - both Hamish Macbeth and good light reads with darker undertones if you choose to look for them


• Life from Scratch by Melissa Ford - this was a free e-book download and very good it was too. Rachel splits up from her husband and takes a year off from her job as a graphic designer. She starts a blog about learning to cook and makes a new life for herself. Fact or fiction? Who knows? Good reading though - set in New York.


• Lizzie Harrison Loses Control by Pippa Wright - Lizzie is in PR dealing with celebrities. She is really organised but life - in the shape of out of control celebrity Randy Jones - is about to knock her sideways. Feel good read with enough serious insights to keep you reading


• Gently Does It by Alan Hunter - the first in the Inspector George Gently police series. This one is set in a loosely disguised Norwich. I can remember my mother being a huge fan of Gently and I can see why. They are well crafted crime novels without too much violence with an interesting main character the peppermint cream eating Inspector Gently from Scotland Yard.


• The Way to a Woman's Heart by Christina Jones. Love it! Feel good women's fiction with a touch of magic set in the Berkshire countryside. It came out last year but I have been waiting for the e-book version to come down to the paper back price.

Books currently in progress

• Gently by the Shore by Alan Hunter - second in the Gently series


• Housework Blues by Danielle Raine - about why we don't like housework and how to think differently about it. This is a good example of how e-books could develop with active links to books and websites mentioned in the text.

Books read

'24 for 3' by Jennie Walker - a pseudonym of Charles Boyle the poet. This is a novella rather than a novel and unique as books go. It covers the time span of a test match between England and India. The female narrator - never named - has no knowledge of cricket and her husband - Alan - and lover - the loss adjuster - attempt to explain the rules to her. Stepson Selwyn goes missing for a few days though a phone call is received to say he is all right. The narrator toys with the idea of leaving her husband and family. There are little gems of poetic description and the symbolism provided by the match is linked to everyday life. It is a beautiful book and the Hockneyesque cover really sums it up.

'Got You Back' by Jane Fallon demonstrated in quite literary fashion that you cannot team up with someone else to exact revenge on a third party because you always have different ideas about when enough is enough. Seldom have I read about a believable character with such large feet of clay. James, the husband, is someone we've all met who seems to think his view of life is the right one and everyone sees what he sees. It does not have the conventional happy ending.

I've also read 'Now Then, Lad . . . .Tales of a Country Bobby' by Mike Pannett. This has a very chatty conversational style and contains both funny and tragic events. His knowledge of human nature and the criminal world are wide and he demonstrates how policing in the country is different from policing in London. He transfers back to his home county of Yorkshire because he misses the countryside. His love of the area really shines through. The only thing I found irritating was the Yorkshire dialect - he could have simply commented on the way they spoke and written the dialogue in plain English.

I have also started - Anne Brooke's 'Maloney's Law' - 70 pages - good so far Anne. I like Paul but am definitely less sure about Dominic!

For total contrast I'm also reading Christina Jones' 'Happy Birthday'.

Heaven sent

I'm half way through Christina Jones' 'Heaven Sent'. I've read all her books and they're really good light reading. There has to be a bit of suspension of disbelief here as regards the 'magic' involved in all her books, but if you can deal with this you should find them amusing. This one is about making fireworks. Characters who have appeared in previous books appear in this one - Jemima and Charlie, Lola, the Berkeley brothers and the Pinks, as well as Mitzi Blessing and Amber from recent books. From this book there is the unforgettable Guy Devlin and YaYa Bordello - the best drag queen in the business. How could I have missed out the unforgettable Suggs the ferret. A brilliant read, and you can learn a lot about making fireworks as well. Thank you Christina for keeping me amused before my medical appointment later today.