MissWatson hatches a cunning plan (B) ...

... which is to have no plan. This is my first year in retirement, and I have no idea where it will be taking me. So I'll just list my reading on a monthly basis, following the CATs and KITs as my fancy takes me.

To brighten things up, I am using the birthstone for each month to illustrate the thread. It will feature a book from my library which relates in some way to the jewel.

Oh, and I almost forgot to introduce myself: I'm Birgit and I live on the shore of the Baltic sea.


The gentleman in this picture is named Corrado, one of my faithful travelling companions.

January+February: 6,857 pages
March: 3,464 pages
April: 3,663 pages

January: Garnet


The name of the heroine is Garnet, and like me she was born in January, hence her name. One of my first historical fiction reads.

Unter Katzenfreunden by Axel Scheffler and Frantz Wittkamp
Carlo und Cleopatra : erste Begegnung by Victoria and Zaeri Mehrdad
Alles ganz wunderbar weihnachtlich by Kirsten Boie AlphaKIT
Shakespeare Katzen by Susan Herbert
Eisvögel by Karel Nový RandomKIT
Den Titel hab ich leider vergessen ... aber es ist blau by Monika Reitprecht
Die weiße Iris by Fabcaro and Didier Conrad
Yukon Ho! by Bill Watterson AlphaKIT
Little Novels by Wilkie Collins CalendarCAT, Bingo: personal name in the title
Flash for Freedom! by George MacDonald Fraser CalendarCAT, Bingo: three-word title
Atemschaukel by Herta Müller PrizeCAT, AlphaKIT, Lists
Sommerfreuden by Herman Bang CalendarCAT
After dark by Wilkie Collins CalendarCAT, AlphaKIT, Bingo: paper-based item
Flashman and the Redskins by George M. Fraser HistoryCAT, Historical Fiction, Bingo: read a CAT
Miss Marple – The Complete Short Stories by Agatha Christie AlphaKIT, MysteryKIT, Bingo: short story collection
Eldest by Christopher Paolini SFF KIT, Bingo: mercenaries or warriors
Der große Ausverkauf by Vicki Baum CalendarCAT, AlphaKIT, Bingo: fewer than 100 copies on LT, lists
Stalking the angel by Robert Crais AlphaKIT, Bingo: set in a city

February: Amethyst



The ancients apparently believed that the stone could protect against drunkenness, hence its name. While this particular myth is not referred to in this book, this was my introduction to the ancient Greeks when I was a kid: Die schönsten Sagen des klassischen Altertums. I loved the complicated names!

The woman in white by Wilkie Collins HistoryCAT, RandomKIT
Nina Balatka by Anthony Trollope CalendarCAT
Geschichte Tschechiens by Joachim Bahlcke
Das Feuerschiff by Siegfried Lenz RandomKIT, AlphaKIT, Bingo: features water
Die Purpurlinie by Wolfram Fleischhauer AlphaKIT, MysteryKIT
Katzenberge by Sabrina Janesch PrizeCAT, RandomKIT
Emil und die drei Zwillinge by Erich Kästner CalendarCat, AlphaKIT, Bingo: about friendship
Der kleine Mann by Erich Kästner CalendarCAT, AlphaKit, Bingo: the word little in the title
Meisternovellen by Stefan Zweig CalendarCAT, AlphaKIT
La femme de trente ans by Honoré de Balzac AlphaKIT

March: Aquamarine



Aquamarine is Latin for seawater, and seafaring tales are among my favourites. Nevertheless, I've chosen something else because it has a lovely picture of the Mediterranean on the cover.

Die rätselhaften Honjin-Morde by Seishi Yokomizo AlphaKIT, Bingo: current bestseller
After the ice by Steven Mithen HistoryCAT
Goethes Leichen by Paul Kohl DNF
Die Reise unserer Gene by Johannes Krause and Thomas Trappe HistoryCAT, AlphaKIT
Schönbrunner Finale by Gerhard Loibelsberger MysteryKIT, historical fiction
Watership Down by Richard Adams CalendarCAT, PrizeCAT, RandomKIT, AlphaKIT
Am Weg by Herman Bang AlphaKIT
Guy Mannering by Walter Scott February HistoryCAT
Die Henkerstochter by Oliver Pötzsch

April: Diamond



The title translates as "Diamond girl" and it's still on my TBR.

My Lady's Money by Wilkie Collins
Le rêve by Émile Zola CalendarCAT
La disparue du Père-Lachaise by Claude Izner MysteryKIT
L. A. Requiem by Robert Crais MysteryKIT
Watery Grave by Bruce Alexander CalendarCAT, HistoryCAT, MysteryKIT, Historical FictionKIT
Der letzte Satz by Robert Seethaler Bingo: similar library
Post Captain by Patrick O'Brian AlphaKIT, Historical FictionKIT, Bingo: re-read a favourite
L'ombre du Vétéran by Jean Failler AlphaKIT, Historical FictionKIT
Rapscallion by James McGee MysteryKIT, HistoryCAT, Historical Fiction: favourite period
Les adieux à la Reine by Chantal Thomas HistoryCAT, PrizeCAT, Historical Fiction: real event
Undine und andere Erzählungen by Friedrich de La Motte-Fouqué AlphaKIT
Der grüne Fürst by Heinz Ohff AlphaKIT, RandomKIT
The two destinies by Wilkie Collins DNF

May: Emerald



The heroine in Hugo's classic Notre Dame de Paris is named Esmeralda, which is Spanish for emerald.

Merlin's Keep by Madeleine Brent Historical Fiction: has a speculative element, Bingo: set in multiple countries
La place des bonnes by Anne Martin-Fugier CalendarCAT, AlphaKIT
Mörder mögen keine Matjes by Krischan Koch CalendarCAT, Bingo: food or cooking
Louis by Tom Lichtenheld
Johanna im Zug by Kathrin Schärer RandomKIT
Das Duell der Großmütter by Hannes Wirlinger
Die Erlebnisse des Polizeiagenten Schipow bei der Verfolgung des Schriftstellers Tolstoj by Bulat Okudschawa CalendarCAT, Bingo: epistolary
Mord in der Josefstadt by Milos Urban DNF
Les empires normands d'Orient by Pierre Aubé HistoryCAT, AlphaKIT
Murder Underground by Mavis Doriel Hay MysteryKIT
The curios incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon PrizeCAT, AlphaKIT, lists
Wolfszeit by Harald Jähner CalendarCAT
A practical guide to conquering the world by KJ Parker AlphaKIT

June: Pearl



The name Margaret/Marguerite is said to mean "pearl", so this month features the most famous book of Marguerite Yourcenar.

July: Ruby



"Karfunkel" is an ancient name for red jewels, from the time when people couldn't distinguish clearly between rubies, garnets and spinells. Die Frau mit den Karfunkelsteinen is a nicely trashy 19th century romance.

August: Peridot/Olivin



Olivin is the name under which I first saw this stone in a shop on Tenerife, and yes, I bought a matching pendant and earring set. I also bought quite a few books in Spanish on the island over the years, and La Galatea is one of the oldest.

September: Sapphire



The dragon's name is Saphira.

October: Tourmaline



Tourmalines are among my favorite jewels, and they are usually bichromatic, showing dark green and pink. So for this I have chosen a bilingual book, which has a few Russian fairy tales in both Russian and German.

November: Citrine



Citrines come in wonderful shades of yellow, gold and brown, and I own a ring with a citrine made by a small Italian jewelry outfit whose design was inspired by the Duomo in Florence.

December: Turquoise



Okay, this is a bit far-fetched, but turquoise proved difficult. However, Samarcande is famous for its many mosques wth bright, turquoise tiles on their walls and roofs. So there.

BingoDOG



1: Mörder mögen keine Matjes by Krischan Koch
7: Die Erlebnisse des Polizeiagenten Schipow bei der Verfolgung des Schriftstellers Tolstoj by Bulat Okudschawa
8: Der kleine Mann by Erich Kästner
9: Der letzte Satz by Robert Seethaler
10: Emil und die drei Zwillinge by Erich Kästner
11: Flash for Freedom! by George MacDonald Fraser
12: After dark by Wilkie Collins
13: Flashman and the Redskins by George M. Fraser
14: Miss Marple – The Complete Short Story Collection by Agatha Christie
15: Little Novels by Wilkie Collins
16: Stalking the Angel by Robert Crais
17: Der große Ausverkauf by Vicki Baum
20: Das Feuerschiff by Siegfried Lenz
21: Eldest by Christopher Paolini
22: Post Captain by Patrick O'Brian
24: Merlin's Keep by Madeleine Brent
25: Die rätselhaften Honjin-Morde by Seishi Yokomizo

Birgit's lists

I looked at the Popsugar Challenge for 2024 and found it geared too much to younger readers and social media, which I don't follow, so I've decided to read from the various lists that I maintain on my spreadsheet. These are the notorious 1001 BYMRBYD list, another of 100 German novels compiled by Deutsche Welle, ZEIT newspaper presented a new list just in time for Christmas (they had a similar project in the 1980s), and a long time ago Rowohlt publishers also offered a list of 100 novels from the century. I'm not sure how far I'll get with this, but it's worth a try.

Deutsche Welle 100 books
Atemschaukel by Herta Müller

German authors in exile published by Querido
Der große Ausverkauf by Vicki Baum

1001 BYMRBYD
Der Amokläufer by Stefan Zweig
Schachnovelle by Stefan Zweig
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon

Guardian 1000
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon

Just in case

If anything else pops up ... which is the bicentenary of the birth of Wilkie Collins. I think I'll do a major re-read of his works, as he is one of my favourite authors.

1. Little Novels
2. After dark
3. My Lady's Money
4. The two destinies DNF

Welcome! Step in, have a coffee or a cup of tea and let's talk books.

Happy new thread.

Your June heading reminds me that I have Memoirs of Hadrian this on the shelf to read, having found an old penguin copy second hand too hard to resist.

Happy new thread! I love the connections between your books and the jewels for each month.

Happy New Thread, Birgit!

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread, Brigit, I am looking forward to seeing where your reading will lead you. :)

Happy new thread.

Happy new thread, and welcome back from Paris!

Great new thread! I hope you had fun in Paris!

>19 charl08: Thanks! I liked that book very much.
>20 christina_reads: Hi Christina! I was surprised to find so many on my own shelves.
>21 MissBrangwen: Thanks, Mirjam!
>22 LisaMorr: Thanks, Lisa!
>23 thornton37814: Thanks, Lori!
>24 DeltaQueen50: Thanks, Judy. Right now I am drawn to Paris.
>25 lowelibrary: Thanks, April!
>26 Jackie_K: Thanks, Jackie. I could easily have stayed another week!
>27 Tess_W: Thanks, Tess. We had a great time. And I bought books!

Today we had warm weather and no rain, so I got on the bus and took a trip to our 1972 Olympic village, where the sailing competitions were held way back. They have been hit very hard by a storm last October and the damage is still not fully cleared up. But it was lovely to see children playing on the beach.
And tomorrow our first open air fleamarket takes place. I wonder if there will be books...

The weather gods have been kind and there was sun most of the time, so I spent some lovely hours browsing. Way too many second-hand clothes, though.

CalendarCAT

Le rêve is not set in Paris, but it was next on my Zola to-read list. This one is odd, as we have none of the usual depravity for which the Rougon-Macquart are notorious. And only the reader gets to know the connection the heroine has to that family, she is an illegitimate daughter of Sidonie Rougon whom we met just before in La curée, and as far as I recall there was no mention of a child. The atmosphere of growing up in this small house in the shadow of a cathedral is claustrophobic, and the ancient trade of embroidery adds to a sensation of having fallen out of time. Angélique leads a strangely isolated life, away from contemporary friends, with a single book of legends of the saints for reading matter (nothing else holds her attention), so her thinking is rather warped. And yet it is convincing as a portrait of a girl in puberty, all fervour and longing and certainty that things will turn out as she dreamt them.

April MysteryKIT: series

La disparue du Père-Lachaise is the second in a series about Victor Legris, owner of a bookshop in Paris in late 19th century Paris. I'm still not overly fond of our hero, but I enjoyed walking around Paris and encountering the names of familiar streets which were still present to my mind.
I was also surprised to learn that the Musée d'Orsay, formerly a train station, was built on the grounds of a palais that housed the Cours des comptes until it was torched during the 1871 uprising. The place was in ruins until they decided to build the train station there. My guidebook never mentioned this.

April MysteryKIT: series

If I ever do a challenge based on quotes from my favourite wizard, the top slot will go to "I have no memory of this place...", a category for books where I have completely forgotten the plot. This happens more and more frequently, and usually these are mysteries. Have I read too many of those that they start to blur or vanish entirely from my mind?
It's particularly odd in the case of L. A. Requiem, because this is the one where we learn the backstory of Joe Pike, who was the only reason I kept buying the books. I marked it as "To read" when I entered it, and on re-reading it I found much of the plot was unfamiliar, but as the final showdown in Palm Springs played out I knew I had read this before. I find this a little worrying.
The book differs from others in the series in that it is not a straightforward first-person narrative from Cole, as usual, Pike's past is spread around the text in inserts and there are also scenes tolod from the killer's POV, which was distracting. And I really can't be bothered with Cole's girlfriend troubles, tbh. This time it will go to a new home.

>32 MissWatson: - I looked to see where I was in the series and found I read this 3 years ago and I have no memory of it either. I don't usually read mysteries to remember them, but still - I would have thought I would remember Pike's back story. so you're not the only one.

Happy new thread. Glad you were able to get out and have a browse at the flea market. Weather's been dreadful all year, it seems.

>33 dudes22: I must have got ~ 50 pages into a book before it seemed in the least bit familiar. LT has helped in that regard, by providing a hint as to what I thought of it last time.

>33 dudes22: That's a relief. I usually remember previously read books much sooner than this.
>34 Helenliz: Yes, adding a tag in my LT catalagoue helps a lot with this. I've also started taking short reading notes, and that helps, too. The downside of fleamarkets is that it usually involveds the buying of books. Ah, at least they are cheap.

CalendarCAT / HistoryCAT / MysteryKIT / Historical Fiction

Watery Grave is the third book in a series of a historical mystery series about a real person, Sir John Fielding of the Bow Street Court. I found this the weakest of the three books I have read so far, the nautical bits didn't feel very credible to me (and I have made my way through the entire Hornblower, Delancey and Jack Aubrey series, among others). I also found some of the attitudes towards young Jeremy reflected 20th century thinking too much. But I'll definitely pick up the next book if they cross my path.

Bingo: from a similar LT library

Der letzte Satz was an impulse buy from the remainders box, because I thought it would fit the recent bestseller prompt. But that has already been filled, so it's a good thing that it also shows up in several of my similar libraries.
This is very short and deceptively easy to read. Composer Gustav Mahler sits on the deck of a steamer crossing the Atlantic and reflects on his life and his approaching death. Beautifully written, yes, but it is strangely lightweight and insubstantial for such an amazing life. And at 139 pages printed in a very large font, it leaves you wanting much, much more.

AlphaKIT / Historical Fiction KIT / Bingo: re-read a favourite

My niggling doubts about Watery Grave turned me to Post Captain, and I think I was right to be skeptical. It's also nice to re-visit the adventures of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, and this one is a rollercoaster ride in many respects. I love how the depth of their friendship is described as being able to keep house together, given Stephen's slovenly habits and Jack's obsession with cleaning and swabbing everything. There is so much truth in that.

>36 MissWatson: I've got book one on my TBR, but so far......

>39 Tess_W: It's not a "you must read this!" series for me.

AlphaKIT / Historical Fiction: based on a real event

L'ombre du Vétéran tells an episode from the history of Concarneau, a small fishing port in Brittany. A French navy threedecker runs from a Royal Navy squadron into the safety of this port and remains trapped there for years. One of the local boys tells the story years later, and it reads like one of those Boys' Own Adventure yarns aimed at the under-twelves, but the surprising thing here is that this is based on fact. I immediately looked up if Bonaparte's brother Jérôme really commanded the ship, and yes, he did. Of course, he was ordered off to Paris immediately on disembarkation and another man took over. We get a plot where the Chouans want to blow up the ship, foiled by our spunky hero, and some local colour about the sardine fishery disrupted by the English blockade. It's not great literature, but interesting enough, especially if you know the ville close.

MysteryKIT: series / HistoryCAT: mayhem / Historical fiction: favourite period

The narrator in L'ombre du Vétéran tells us that he joined the French navy and was captured and imprisoned on a prison hulk in England from where he escaped. This put me instantly in mind of Rapscallion where Bow Street Runner Hawkwood is sent to such a prison hulk undercover to find out how such escapes are organised (and what happened to the Navy lieutenants gone missing on the same mission). There's a near rebellion on board before Hawkwood makes good his exit, in the company of a French privateer, and with the help of English smugglers who hate to see their business disrupted by government. One of them plans to attack the admiralty office in Deal where the gold for Wellington's army is to be shipped, and also the gold that goes across the Channel on the infamous guinea boats.
This was a rip-roaring adventure yarn with loads of mayhem, not to mention the conflicting loyalties and double or even triple crossings. The lecture on the economics of the guinea boats was a trifle long, but enlightening. That's something to read up on, especially as the trade was controlled by the Rothschilds, which was surprising (there's that episode in the Sharpe series where Nathan Rothschild smuggled the pay for Wellington's army into Spain himself...). The author's historical note makes suggestions for further reading.
Looks like I'm going to stay with this period for some time yet...

HistoryCAT: revolutions / PrizeCAT: women's writing / Historical Fiction: real event

I was looking for a prizewinning book that wouldn't take me too far away from my current reading focus, and I was happy to see that Les adieux à la Reine has won the Prix Femina in 2002. It looks at the first days of the French Revolution from the perspective of the Queen's reader (a rather lowly occupation at a status-conscious court) and it succeeds well in giving you an idea of how far removed from the real world of Paris this court life was.

AlphaKIT: U

The first "U"book that caught my eye on the shelf was Undines Tod, but the blurb suggests that you need to have read ETA Hoffmann's Kreisleriana to enjoy it fully, so I'm saving it for later. Instead I read the original, contained in Undine und andere Erzählungen. This was published in 1812, so there's a connection to my previous books, but the turbulent times aren't mentioned here. These are tales full of romance, magic and idealised Middle Ages, a product of the German Romantic period. And again, Fouqué's writing style hasn't aged well. But it was interesting to learn that Scott borrowed the theme of Undine for The Monastery, and that Robert Louis Stevenson's The Bottle Imp copies Das Galgenmännlein. Which makes for an ever-growing list...

AlphaKIT: O / RandomKIT: Enchanting garden visitors

Der grüne Fürst is a biography of Prince Hermann Pückler-Muskau, and all I knew going in was that an ice-cream is named after him and that he created two English landscape gardens at his castles Muskau and Branitz. It turned out to be the life of a truly fascinating character who lived a long life in turbulent times. When he was born in 1785, Germany was a patchwork of tiny statelets, and he headed one of them, exercising feudal rights that he himself considered obsolete. He died shortly after Wilhelm was proclaimed Emperor in Versailles. And in between he lived life to the full, having affairs without count with famous and infamous women, travelled widely, gambled himself into debt, spent several fortunes on his garden projects and wrote books that were bestsellers in his time. And he knew or met everybody, it seems.
I'll be keeping this for further reference, as he provides a detailed list of his sources which may turn into another reading project.

ETA: This was first published in 1991, so the bulk of it was probably written while German reunification was happening. It would be interesting to know what has become of the gardens in Muskau and Branitz, left derelict after the war, and Branitz is now cut in two by the German-Polish border. At the time of writing they were still in ruins.

So, it's the last day of April and I don't know how that happened. My time is my own, and there still aren't enough hours in the day for all the books I want to read. Well, I hope I can finish The two destinies today.

>46 MissWatson: I think many of us have discovered that strange phenomena!

>47 Tess_W: That's good to know!

Just in case / DNF

I have decided to bail on The two destinies. I am on page 112, and for the third time there are several lines missing from a paragraph. Important information is lost, and it ruins the story. I think at a later point I will go looking for a digitised copy online, but right now I'm also not in the mood to tolerate the idea of two people being "meant" for each other. Frankly, George is a pain in the neck. I am also afraid that my other Collins novels from this publisher will suffer from the same defect, so there may be more DNFs in my future.

April has been a good reading month, and I notice that I read more than in previous years, even when I'm travelling. Yay to that! And now we're in May. Again, I'm not planning ahead much, but I have put La place des bonnes on my desk. More Paris, and more 19th century, that's the plan.

Historical fiction: a speculative element / Bingo: set in multiple countries

The first book of May is a re-read from my youth, a historical romance set in the days when the map of the world showed pink: Merlin's Keep. The sinister Vernon Quayle uses his dark arts to ensnare a young woman, which provides the speculative element.
ETA: strictly speaking, we visit only two countries, but Jani has to cross India on her way from and to Mustang, so I'll stretch it a bit.

Birgit, you have read so much! I have also started things only to realise I've read them before - most recently with a Robert Harris novel which I only read in 2017! Maybe if we read less we would remember more, but that doesn't sound like a good solution. Like Helen, I find my LT library very useful for double-checking. I only list books I've read.

>51 susanj67: Hi Susan, nice to "see" you! Being retired means I have definitely more time for reading, but I'm still buying them faster than I can read. Every time I see an interesting review I take a note. And I entered them all in LT to reduce buying duplicate copies. Which has worked quite well, so far.

>52 MissWatson: I agree, although I am reading a lot more, I am also buying the books faster than I can get through them. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be abating, and I have had the "book addiction" since I was a kid. When there was still a large bookstore near me, I once ran into a colleague there whose expertise was addictions counseling. I had a bunch of books in my hand and he quipped,"Feeding your addiction?" He must have been doing the same as he had books in his hand too.

I'm still buying them faster than I can read
I hear you.
I've taken the decision that seeing I've not read even half of the books I bought for last year's thingaversary/birthday I'm not going to buy any this year.
Let's see how long that lasts... I have a list that I fancy getting, which will just get longer, I suspect.

>53 LadyoftheLodge: Yes, sometimes it feels like an addiction. At least it doesn't harm anyone.
>54 Helenliz: Ha. I tried that, in vain. My only concession now is that I try to buy them only secondhand, cheaply.

May CalendarCAT / May AlphaKIT: P

La place des bonnes was a surprisingly quick read for a non-fiction history of female servants in Paris, and in particular the poor maids of all work. Statistical facts are hard to come by, but she gives what she found, and also supplies information about hiring, firing, wages, and conditions of work. Much of her analysis about the relationship between masters and servants is drawn from literature, there's much citing from Balzac, Maupassant, Flaubert, Zola and Proust, and one of two authors new to me. I think I'll be reading those classics with a different eye from now on.

May CalendarCAT / Bingo: food or cooking

I was rather amused to learn on local TV that last Saturday was "Weltfischbrötchentag" (World Fish-in-a-bun Day). I instantly thought of Mörder mögen keine Matjes. This is the seventh book in a series of cosy mysteries set in a small village on the North Frisian coast which has only one police officer. His regular gang of friends meet at the local diner where Fischbrötchen are a must-eat item on the menu. This time they go to Hamburg to visit one of their gang in hospital, and the diner's owner also wants to do a little market research. They also get embroiled in a mystery whose plot is shamelessly lifted from The Big Sleep, adapted to snobbish Hamburg shipowner's. Fun, but forgettable.

Wilkie Collins is one of my favorite authors, too, and so far you've managed to read books that I haven't got around to reading yet!

>58 cbl_tn: Thanks to the internet and digitisation, many of the more obscure titles are now easier to find. I would love to see more of his novels turned into films, instead of umpteen versions of Austen.

I'll be away for a few days and visit my sister. We've got concert tickets, and there's the annual garden show at Castle Wilhelmsthal. If only the weather will hold!
See you on Monday. Happy reading!

RandomKIT

It's been a lovely weekend, and because of the carnival some of the shops in my sister's small town opened on Sunday. She found three children's books for the library which we all finished on the same day, and one of them is unusual enough to fit for the May RandomKIT of art and architecture: Johanna im Zug. It's a picture book, and on every page you see the artist at work, drawing her own hands drawing the story, as well as the implements, like erasers, pencils and crayons. The others are Louis, a picture book about a teddy bear, and Das Duell der Großmütter, which had rather more text than is usual for first or second grade readers.

May CalendarCAT / May AlphaKIT / Bingo: epistolary

I noticed that Bulat Okudschawa had his 100th birthday on 9 May, so I picked up Die Erlebnisse des Polizeiagenten Schipow bei der Verfolgung des Schriftstellers Tolstoj which I have owned for decades. Since uni days, I think. The author was a popular singer-songwriter in the Soviet Union back in the 1970s, and he wrapped his social satire in historical novels such as this. I'm afraid the satire was lost on me, but the letters going back and forth between the various departments involved in the police surveillance of suspected revolutionaries, all trying to cover their asses in case of failure, are timeless.

DNF

I also borrowed a book from my sister's library which looked interesting: Mord in der Josefstadt, a historical mystery set in Prague in the late 19th century when the city was being remodelled on a grand scale. The former Jewish ghetto is being torn down, and the inhabitants pushed out to the suburbs. However, I strongly dislike the narrator who is a narcissist impoverished nobleman, and there's far too much about him coughing into his handkerchief and messing around with prostitutes, and not enough about the city. Or a mystery, come to think of it. We're 80 pages in and still no case. I'm bailing.

>45 MissWatson: I owned this book twenty years ago (when my mom worked in a bookshop and brought home lots of defective copies), but I did not read it and gave it away when I moved. But I have read a few other books by Heinz Ohff and enjoyed them. I like his style.

>64 MissBrangwen: Yes, I'm looking forward to read more from him. I found another gardening book at the charity bookshop the other day.

>61 MissWatson: What a wonderful find! I have never grown out of enjoying a good children's picture book.

>66 cbl_tn: Whenever I visit my sister (she's a librarian) I happily browse the picture book section. There are so many gorgeous illustrators to discover.

HistoryCAT: Middle Ages / AlphaKIT: N and P

Les empires normands d'Orient is a non-fiction book about the Norman kingdom of Sicily. And a severe disappointment it was.
There's the misleading title: at the beginning there is mention of Viking raids against Constantinople and their hiring as imperial guards, but the bulk of the book is concerned with their conquest and rule of Sicily and Southern Italy, and that's not the Orient to me. (But that word is dangerous territory I won't enter now).
Next, he quotes frequently from other historians' works without giving proper citations, no endnotes. That's a serious fault in my mind. And then his writing style is incoherent, larded with colourful phrases that he probably lifted straight from the medieval chronicles, and it seems to me that he takes them at face value too often. How many times can a city be raised to the ground and suffer the same fate again twenty years later? Does he really expect us to believe they rebuilt it in that time? And who exactly does the building if the entire population is massacred?
The fact that nearly all of these men are named Roger, Richard or Guillaume doesn't help, either. I did learn one new thing: the kings relied on an elite cavalry force recruited from the muslims, an Arab legion.

May MysteryKIT: Golden Age

Welcome relief from my tedious non-fiction book, or so I thought. But Murder Underground has one of the most annoying male characters I have ever run across in a mystery. I could have gladly shoved Basil Pongleton down the Underground stairs on which his aunt was murdered just to get rid of him. Not even Georgette Heyer's Freddie Standen was such a ninny, and that's saying something.
Whereas the structure of the novel is quite unusual, the investigation is watched entirely from the POV of the victim's relatives and co-lodgers at the boarding-house. The police don't show up until the final chapters. There are also some nice digs at the tropes of the mystery novels written at the time.

>69 MissWatson: Aw, I LOVE Freddy Standen! But I can understand that he's not for everyone. :) I remember mildly liking Murder Underground, but I remember very little else about it at this point.

>70 christina_reads: So do I, because he grows up in a very believable manner. Which Basil doesn't do, in my opinion.

PrizeCAT: Doubling up / AlphaKIT: N / lists

The curious incident of the dog in the night-time features on the Guardian's 1000 Books list, and on the other one, and for once I think it deserves this place. It won the Guardian's Children's Fiction Prize, but this is a book which adults can enjoy just as well, and it may also give them an insight into what it means to think differently from everyone else around you. I'm glad I finally got round to this.

>72 MissWatson: I was fortunate to see this one enacted on stage. The actor portraying the main character Christopher was very authentic because he had the same ways of thinking as the main character, with the same condition of autism. There was also an interview with the actor included in the program book. I read the book first before seeing the play and both were exceptional.

>73 LadyoftheLodge: That must have been a notable experience!

>72 MissWatson: Putting it on the wish list for the November PrizeCAT. Children’s book awards.

>72 MissWatson: Have that one on my TBR. Am mentally moving it up!

>75 pamelad: >76 Tess_W: It's worth spending time with Christopher.

CalendarCAT

The brief years between the capitualtion in May 1945 and the currency reform in 1948 didn't receive much attention in my school history, so I thought the 75th anniversary of the Basic Law coming into effect was a good reason to read Wolfszeit which offers a German social history of those years. It's well written, and there are lots of endnotes and a bibliography, to delve deeper into topics that were only briefly touched on here.

May AlphaKIT: P

A practical guide to conquering the world offered a welcome escape from the rather grim content of my previous book, and I stayed up till way after midnight to see how it ends. We get another odd fish out of water, and I loved the fact that he is a translator, and how that was worked into the story. And all that time in the library was obviously well-spent!

So, we are entering the last days of May. What do I want to read next, now that all the categories are more or less checked off? I watched a documentary about the Louis XV style on Arte TV the other day and it wasn't until the end that I realised that he died 250 years ago this 10 May. I think I'll go back to France and his time with L'énigme des Blancs-Manteaux.

>69 MissWatson: I have Murder Underground on my wishlist but your opinion makes me want to remove it.

>78 MissWatson: Jahner's book sounds interesting. I have placed a hold on the English version at the library. The topic and time frame didn't receive much attention in my history either.

>80 VivienneR: I think it much depends on your mental form while reading it. On another day I might have had more patience with Basil.
Jähner's book is interesting, the most interesting part for me was the information about the newspapers the allies set up. The author is a journalist, so knowledgeable about the business. But there also very depressing bits, especially the fact that the Germans didn't face up to their guilt. In light of current events, it's also very scary.