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Category Archives: 20th Century
Recommendation: The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers
English Bell Ringing, Stolen Emeralds and Murder My memories from my first reading of The Nine Tailors was that it was a bit slow and there was way too much detail about English change-ringing of church bells. I think that … Continue reading
Posted in 20th Century, British, Crime fiction, Fiction, General adult audience, Mystery, Novel
Tagged bell ringing, church life, clergymen, Dorothy L Sayers, Engish fen country, intricate, Lord Peter Wimsey, Lord Peter Wimsey novel, Murder, mystery, Plot-driven, rich setting, slow starter
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Recommendation: The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club by Dorothy L. Sayers
PTSD and generational tensions regarding war service didn’t start with the Vietnam War. Both are explored in Sayer’s Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club by Dorothy L. Sayers is another delightful Lord Peter Wimsey novel. … Continue reading
Posted in 20th Century, British, Crime fiction, Fiction, General adult audience, Novel, Uncategorized
Tagged about more than just murder, convoluted plot, death, effects of war, good out loud, good place to start, intricate, Lord Peter Wimsey, Lord Peter Wimsey novel, men and women, mental illness, moral injury, Murder, mystery, observant, plot driven, police, rich setting, well written, wills and inheritance, WWI
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Quintessential Diana Wynne Jones: Archer’s Goon is about a boy, a family, a town and a threatening goon who takes up residence in the kitchen
Archer’s Goon is classic Diana Wynne Jones with various mysteries and characters gradually converging. The arrival of the Goon in Howard and Awful’s kitchen, demanding mysterious payment in the form of written words from their author-father, leads them to the … Continue reading
Posted in 10 years and up, 11 years and up, 13 years and up, 20th Century Children's, Adventure, British, Children's Classic, Comedy, Fantasy, Fiction, Novel, Speculative Fiction, YA Classic, Young Adult
Tagged a little dated, adversity, Diana Wynne Jones, engaging characters, humour, siblings, the town is a character, well paced, well written
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Small Steps by Louis Sachar: An engaging, amusing and compassionate sequel to Holes
The sequel to Sachar’s Holes is as hilarious, enjoyable carefully-woven and heart-warming as the original. Continue reading
The most enjoyable ‘collected letters’ I’ve ever read: 84, Charing Cross Road (and the Duchess of Bloomsbury street)
From 1950 to 1970, an American scriptwriter, Helene Hanff, embarked on self-education by book with the aid of some British secondhand booksellers. 84, Charing Cross Road is a collection of the letters which passed primarily between Hanff and the shop’s … Continue reading
Posted in 20th Century, American, British, Diary, General adult audience, Letters
Tagged American, books, British, criticism, epistolary, friendship, literary criticism, literature, rationing, trans-Atlantic, travel
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A children’s series that ages with its audience: Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill captures 10 year old life well
Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill is the third in Maud Hart Lovelace’s Betsy-Tacy series. The girls are now 10 years old and the largely standalone chapters of the first two books smoothly transition into larger story arcs … Continue reading
Posted in 10 years and up, 20th Century Children's, 7 years and up, American, Children's, Children's Classic, Children's Classics, Coming of Age/Rites of Passage, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Novel, Uncategorized
Tagged Betsy-Tacy books, childhood, children's classic, early 20th century, fiction, friendship, good out loud, growing up in America, historical, humour, illustrated, imagination, Maud Hart Lovelace, mid-western United States, play, school, semi-autobiographical, siblings, society, starting school
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Deadly lizards, delinquent boys, a sinister warden and a whole lot of HOLES feature in Louis Sachar’s acclaimed YA novel
When Stanley Yelnats gets caught holding a celebrity’s stolen sneakers which have just fallen on him out of the sky, he knows that it’s because of the family curse acquired by his no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather. Stanley is sent to Camp Green Lake, … Continue reading
Posted in 10 years and up, 20th Century, 20th Century YA, Adventure, American, Coming of Age/Rites of Passage, Family Drama, Fiction, Light Fiction, Novel, YA Classic, Young Adult
Tagged boys, camping, friendship, good out loud, growing up, hardship, history, Louis Sachar, overcoming adversity, resourcefulness, summer camp, survival, Texas, well written
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A powerful book about growing up and making sense of the world that I first read while I was growing up: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
I first read Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird in year 10 and it was the first really decent book I got to read for high school english (the junior syllabus really wasn’t inspiring – in year 8 we had … Continue reading
Posted in 20th Century, 20th Century Literature, American, Classic, Coming of Age/Rites of Passage, Fiction, General adult audience, Novel, Uncategorized, YA Classic, Young Adult
Tagged American South, childhood, fear, growing up, growing up in America, injustice, power, race, racism
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Bucketlists and marriages of convenience: The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery uses a bunch of tropes before they were popular
The Blue Castle was L.M. Montgomery’s only book written for adults and my favourite of her non-Anne books. Really the only difference between it and her young adult novels is that the heroine is 29 and unmarried teen pregnancy is … Continue reading
Posted in 20th Century, 20th Century Light Fiction, Canadian, Fiction, General adult audience, Light Fiction, Novel, Romance, Young Adult
Tagged Canada, cats, classic tropes, death, drunkness, family, fiction, individualism, L.M. Montgomery, lighthearted read, marriage of convenience, romance, spinsterhood, teen pregnancy
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