The premise of this book made me pick it up, plus people seem to say good things about her books, so I thought I’d try one.
It’s rare I read a 400 page book in a week – it either means it’s addictive or easy to read. I’d say this was more on the easy to read side of things, but it was enjoyable!
Leon needs some extra income to pay for his brother’s solicitor; and as he works nights in a care home, decides to advertise for a flatmate who would have the flat evenings and weekends, and he’d have it in the day, so they’d share a bed, but never meet!
Tiffy, who works in publishing hobby books, answers the ad as she looks to get away from from her ex, who she’s starting to realise has been pretty controlling. The only other place she could afford is full of mould and mushrooms, and so she takes the risk to live in this unconventional way with a stranger.
So each has their own stuff going on, but what sort of a book would this be if they didn’t meet? It’s chick-lit after all…
I see that some *checks notes* foolish short-termists, hellbent on party political mantra, are actively dismantling our BBC. Rather than genuinely & usefully enabling it to find new routes to empower UK & intl citizens. So, from 1994: my quick edit of what still makes our BBC ace pic.twitter.com/tw1BLAjuQg
"When a Prime Minister is spending his time trying to convince the great British public that he is stupid rather than dishonest, isn't it time that he should go?" #PMQs
It's strange that Freddos are cheaper per gram than Dairy Milk bars. It suggests that chocolate is naturally frog-shaped and making it rectangular is an expensive industrial process.
I see the book snobs are at it again. I absolutely refuse to use the phrase “guilty pleasure” about books, music, art, food, tv etc. I don’t feel guilty about things that give me pleasure. The phrase “guilty pleasure” is dripping in snobbery. Free yourself from it.
— Dawn Finch (aka Dawn McLachlan) (@dawnafinch) January 22, 2022
A few years ago I read The Constant Princess, and have finally gotten around to reading the next book in the series! This book runs from 1499-1541, covering quite an expanse of time, but following the story of Margaret Pole. She was a Plantagenet, niece of both Edward IV and Richard III, and cousin of Elizabeth of York who was wife of Henry VII, and so while from a family that had been defeated by the Tudors, was highly involved in the family.
Near the start of this book she takes guardianship of Prince Arthur and his wife Katherine of Aragon, and as time goes on, Arthur passes away and Katherine becomes Henry VIII’s first wife, she becomes one of Katherine’s closest ladies in waiting.
Throughout the book are scattered updated pictures of her family tree so you can keep track of what’s going on as time passes – I always appreciate a book with diagrams!
Life is not easy for Margaret Pole; when life is good it’s very good, but when Henry throws her out of court things become much more frightening.
Henry as a child seems to be fairly delightful, but as he gains power, and time passes without him successfully producing an heir, he becomes much more unbearable. The book covers his first four marriages, and as things go on he seems to become more and more delusional, refusing to acknowledge anything bad that happens, it felt a little pertinent to our current leaders, but with a lot more hangings and beheadings, this situation was clearly much worse!
The other part of the book that felt oh so familiar was when The Sweat spread round the country, and people had to shut themselves away to stop the spread….
It was strange to read about things that were seen as awful at the time they happened, but for us are now perfectly normal: Henry declaring himself head of the church, requiring himself to be referred to as Your Majesty instead of Your Grace, and requiring churches to have the Bible in English instead of Latin.
I didn’t read this for ages because I didn’t know who Margaret Pole was, and so didn’t care much to read it, but I found it so interesting! Yes you take it all with a pinch of salt as it’s fiction at the end of the day, but these are supposedly well researched, there’s a long bibliography in the back, and so there’s definitely some things to learn from it! Looking forward to the next one now!
You may notice that this is somewhat shorter than these have been in the past. WordPress has been struggling with the number of embedded links, which means a lot of times the links are just showing as text. So I’m trying to go for something a bit shorter to see if that helps – and it should mean I’ve filtered some of the rubbish out too, win-win!
From predicting the Queen’s Speech using Markov Chains, to how to wrap presents using the least wrapping paper, it covers all elements of the festive season! It’s nice and accessible too, with lots of notes for further reading for those who want to fully geek out (the number of articles that seem to have been written on cooking a turkey seems to be insane!)
It’s not a heavy book, lots of chatter and humour makes it easy to read, and lots of diagrams too, so you really fly through the 150 pages!
From 1920 ’til 1943, Tolkien wrote letters to his four children (over an age range of 12 years), as from Father Christmas; with shaky writing from the cold, suitable North Pole stamps and postmarks, and hand-drawn illustrations to accompany them.
In the 1976, three years after he died, his daughter-in-law compiled these into a book for people to enjoy, and last year, to mark the centenary of the first letter, this edition was published.
He shares stories of things going on in the North Pole, with his companion the Polar Bear, problems every few years from goblin attacks, and these are also covered in the illustrations. He uses these some years to explain why they might not get what they expect, but always acknowledges the letters they’ve written too.
It’s a lovely warm hug to read over the Christmas period, I saw that someone said they read one letter to their kids every night over advent as a build up to Christmas Day, which I thought was quite sweet!
ineke.co.uk 