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Sometime earlier this year, I added Kent Haruf to my list of ‘books/authors to read’. I’d not heard of him before but caught some reviews of his final work, Our Souls at Night. In a second-hand bookstore in New York City (favourite destinations, both), I found a hardback copy which then sat on my shelf of ‘unread’ …
Introduced to Patrick O’Brian by a friend, I was suspicious. Volume after volume of a boy’s own adventure—ships and sailors, battles on the high seas. Yes, there is that and it is extraordinary in his deft hands but O’Brian’s genius is in taking the Napoleonic Wars as an exoskeleton, holding within it the soft flesh of human …
Travel, exploration, philosophy, religion and science in one luminous work—Peter Matthiesen’s 1978 classic The Snow Leopard is unlike anything I’ve read before. Matthiesen’s narrative follows his expedition to the Himalayas with a zoologist friend to study the bharal, a sheep/goat which has proven elusive to classification—somewhat like this book. The language both soothes and stimulates. …
This is the first of a series I’m writing to recommend some literary gems and authors I've loved. If I can help other readers find some new ‘old’ books, I’ll be repaying some of my debt to writers. Find them! * ‘When all is said and done, killing my mother came easily.’ So begins Alice Sebold’s …
It was astonishing to hear a spokesperson from the Donald Trump camp question whether a 'fact’ even existed anymore. Her argument that ‘truth’ is in the eye of the beholder is a disturbing sign of the pervasiveness of spin, and complete rubbish. In the world that the rest of us inhabit, facts matter. While the …
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing some of the ways you can get results with clever use of words. I’ll teach you how to attract someone’s attention, hold it, and get a result. Writing for outcomes is a blend of basic elements which can be ticked off in a checklist, and poetry …
This is the beginning of a series I’m writing to recommend some literary gems. In the vast crush of information today, what is the longevity of a novel? There are so many that deserve to be remembered. If I can help other readers find some new ‘old’ books, I’ll be repaying some of my debt to writers. Find them! And enjoy.
I went to a party on Saturday night and got talking with friends about bookclubs. I'm a fan of anything that gets people reading, books circulating and authors rewarded. While reading is essentially a private activity for me, I love sharing suggestions and my lovely friends in book clubs asked me for my top ten. …
Continue reading "For my friends in book clubs, looking for ideas…"
Where is home? What is it? Does it convey a house, a city, a country? The Oxford defines it as ‘the place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household’; the Macquarie says it is your ‘fixed residence’. When we’re kids, I think it means ‘where our parents live’. I grew …
Three books crossed my path recently that share a message, albeit in different ways. They are about the power of resilience and the value of looking inwards for answers. In 1995, grieving her mother, not knowing what she was doing in life, dabbling in heroin, loving the wrong men, losing the right ones, Cheryl Strayed made …
Continue reading "3 resources for mental strength – and all from women!"
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