PGMCC explores the Biblioverse in 2024: Second instalment

Books completed in 2024

Title; Author; Status; Start/end date; Number of pages

Hogfather by Terry Pratchett Reading 19/12/2023 - 15/01/2024 445 Pages
If on a Winter's Night a Traveller by Italo Calvino 05/01/2024 - 27/01/2024 272 Pages
Relight my Fire by C. K. McDonnell 27/1/2024 - 01/02/2024 518 Pages
Berlin Game by Len Deighton 01/02/2024 - 07/02/2024 296 Pages
The Chalk Circle Man by Fred Vargas 08/02/2024 - 12/02/2024 247 Pages
The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth 12/02/2024 - 27/02/2024 369 Pages
Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson 27/02/2024 - 05/03/2024 350 Pages
The Accordionist by Fred Vargas 05/03/2024 - 249 Pages

Now that I have finished Relight My Fire I must find my next read. What a lovely task to have.

>2 pgmcc: The best of tasks! Happy New Thread!

>2 pgmcc: I second that - it's a lovely task.

Happy New Thread!

>2 pgmcc: Happy New Thread! What are the candidates?

Happy new thread, Peter!

Thank you, everyone, for the new thread good wishes.

I have started reading Berlin Game by Len Deighton. This was the result of a discussion, both on Facebook and LibraryThing, about Slow Horses. Some people were saying they liked it and I expressed my experience that it was trying too hard to imitate John Le Carré's George Smiley novels, and that as such I could not finish the first book. In response someone else suggested that the comparisons in the media between "Slow Horses" and Le Carré's books is an example of comparing apples with oranges. They suggested a comparison with Len Deighton's work might be more appropriate. Someone else mentioned the "Harry Palmer" novels and Deighton's "Game, Set and Match" series might be a good comparison. My recollection of my reading of "Slow Horses" and the "Harry Palmer" novels indicates that the comparison would be unfair to Deighton. However, I have and have been intending to read the "Game, Set and Match trilogy", so I have started with The Berlin Game.

The above string of events happened prior to my identifying the books I would choose my next read from, so, in answer to >5 Karlstar:'s question, no list of candidates was consciously compiled. That step was bypassed in a fit of eagerness to start Berlin Game. So far I am enjoying it. The setting in 1980s Cold War. I think I will enjoy this book.



By the way, I love Gary Oldman's acting and he is the leading actor in the TV adaptation of "Slow Horses". I may be tempted to watch the series because Oldman is in it.

Happy new thread! I hope it brings you many excellent reads.

Today my tenth book from the Du Bray Reader's Year programme* arrived.

This month's book is Final Appeal by Remigiusz Mróz and translated from Polish by Witold Zbirohowski-Koscia and "Joanna Saunders".



* Retirement gift from a friend. A book a month selected by Du Bray Bookshop staff for a year. Two more to go.

I'm behind in congratulating you on the shiny new thread. (So congrats!)

And now I have a question for you. How many books do you read that are translations of original works? (Yes, Calvino touches on translation so that's part of what's in my head, but not perhaps in quite the way I mean it here.)

As an individual reader, do you find yourself reading a significant percentage of works in translation? Your msg above (#9) notes a book translated from Polish, but what about from French or Italian? You've noted Umberto Eco and Italo Calvino on your threads previously, but are there lots of others? As I read William Weaver's translation into English of If on a Winter's Night A Traveler, I keep thinking how much work it must have been to properly convey the style of Calvino. When I read the Zipes' translation of The Original Bambi and the Coward translation of The Phantom of the Opera, the same thing came to me. The translators don't always get author credit in the records we encounter here on LT.

How much attention do you pay to that kind of thing? (I sometimes suspect that European readers must notice it a whole lot more frequently than do American readers, but I realize that may be a totally bogus assumption.). Have you ever purchased a book because you in fact noted the name of the translator and decided to give it a go (based on the translator's name)? Would that be any kind of a decisive factor?

>10 jillmwo:
I have not calculated the percentage or number of books in translation that I read. I suspect it is reasonably high compared to some people here on LT. I find that reading books that were not originally written in English can provide interesting viewpoints on stories. Also, exploring translated literature gives me access to books that can be quite different from the books commonly available that were written in English. According to the LibraryThing original language analysis of my catalogue the language breakdown is as follows:

English 2,170
French 54
Italian 19
Japanese 18
Russian 17
German 15
Spanish 14
Polish 7
Czech 2
Irish 2
Chinese 2
Catalan 2
Portuguese 1
Dutch 1
Egyptian 1
Hungarian 1
Norwegian 1
Turkish 1
Multiple languages 1
Romanian 1

I can tell you that some of these figures are in correct. My catalogue has at least four books by José Saramago, a Portuguese author, and yet the statistics show only on book as being Portuguese.

The number of books in any language will be due to authors or individual books that caught my attention. I remember the day I found a book by Arturo Perez Reverte, a Spanish author. The book was The Dumas Club. I enjoyed it so much I sought out other books by Reverte and have several of his books as a result. Also, there are many excellent people who wrote in Spanish and I have picked up books by them. These include Gabriel Garcia Marguéz, Isabel Allende, Jorge Luis Borges, Roberto Balaño, and many others. Looking at my shelves I can confirm that the figure of 14 books with Spanish as their original language is a significant underestimate.

French includes great authors such as Guy De Maupassant, Albert Camus, Daniel Pennac, Georges Simenon, Gustave Flaubert, Alexander Dumas, and Jules Verne. I have a number of non-fiction books originally written in French, including several economic books by Thomas Piketty and a particularly interesting book called The Society of Equals by Pierre Rosanvallon. One French author you may find worth following up is Fred Vargas. She writes murder mysteries and I love how her books are very French. By that I mean they are infused with French culture and the way things are done in France. One of her books clearly portrayed the significance of the elected mayor in small towns/villages in France, and how the structure and operation of the police and judicial system is very different from other countries.

I have discovered these authors one way or another and track down and read their books when I can. I find the provide me with interesting ideas and I enjoy how they are different from books originating in English speaking countries.

Umberto Eco will account for many of the Italian books, but there are other authors of note. Italo Calvino, obviously, as well as the writing group Wu Ming whose novels I loved.

I suspect the number of Japanese books is also an underestimate. You will be familiar with my love of the books of Haruki Murakami. Other books originally written in Japanese include works by Seishi Yokomizo, and Akimitsu Takagi. Murakami's works account for the majority of my Japanese novels and short stories.

There are a few Russian authors that I have eagerly read. These include Yevgeny Zamyatin*, Vladimir Voinovich**, and Alexander Pushkin.

*Yevgeny Zamyatin's famous novel, We, is very interesting from the point of view that while it was written about 1922 and quickly appeared in English, its publication in the original Russian did not happen until the 1980s. I will not discuss the political reasons why this happened.

**Vladimir Voinovich was a fascinating character. I first became aware of him when I picked up and read The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin. This was a satire of the Soviet system. This is a book I highly recommend. It is very funny and did not endear Voinovich to the Soviet system. He was exiled and lived in Germany until after Glasnost and Perestroika led to the breakup of the Soviet Union. He was then invited back as a hero and presented with a medal by President Putin. There is a picture of Voinovich receiving the medal with Pushkin standing in the background. The thought I had when I first saw the picture was that Putin could easily have been the person who expelled Voinovich in the first place.

After the award Voinovich returned to Germany where he lived out his life in peace.

I found The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin after reading the Czech book, The Good Soldier Svejk and His Fortunes in the World War, a parody of the life of a soldier in the First World War. It is an Eastern European classic and a Serbian friend of mine was amazed that I had even heard of it, let alone read it. It is another book well worth reading. It was written by Jaroslav Hasek, and I have two of his books in my catalogue.

Again, books in German are the result of my discovering a book by an author and then reading more of their books. The main one in this case would be Stefan Zweig. Herta Muller and Gustav Meyrink are in the mix.

I know that many of the languages with "1" book against them are not correctly counted. This is probably due to the LibraryThing database not having been updated with the original language of the books.

TRANSLATORS

Regarding you questions about translators. I believe translators are not give a fair representation. A translator can be an unsung hero or a villain who gets away with murder. I do notice if something has been well translated or not, and I try to remember the translator when I am writing my views on a book. My first reading of The Three Musketeers was fortunate as I happened to pick up an edition that was a brilliant translation. It was as poetic in its English as the original is in French. Of course I cannot remember the translator's name at this stage, but he was Lord someone-or-other and was a renowned translator.

I cannot say I have ever picked up a book based simply on who translated it. I have not carried out my due diligence of translations to that degree of detail.

In Chapters Bookshop there are two sections that I always visit when there. One is books in translation and the other is cult books. Many of the cult books are also books in translation. Browsing through these sections has helped me find new authors that I have loved.

Books Upstairs is another independent bookshop that has provided me with new authors who write in a language other than English that I have found rewarding. Both Arturo Perez Reverte and Daniel Pennac are authors I discover in Books Upstairs.

Your question has triggered a deluge of words from me. I could go on, but thank you for prompting this impromptu analysis of my reading in translation. I would love to hear your views on my comments above.

ETA:
A quick scan of my 2023, 2022 and 2021 reading reveals that the number of books I read in translation in each of these years was:

2023: 7
2022: 4
2021: 9

>11 pgmcc: On the edit page for your books, there is a section to enter the original language. I'm not sure how all this works, but I wonder if you checked that if it would update your stats? It is one of those things I keep meaning to do in mine, but never quite get around to. Although for the books I enter now I use it if I know my book is a translation.

>12 MrsLee:
I have seen that and updated it a few times. It is a bit disappointing that when data on a book is captured from another source it does not capture the original language. I suspect some of the original sources do not have that information.

It is my believe, which needs to be verified by data, that updating that field will affect the number of books in the language categories. it is also possible that that update may take a bit of time to filter through to the reported statistics if there is some periodic update to the figures.

>12 MrsLee:
I just updated the original language of my latest addition to Polish and the Polish count was updated by one immediately. It works. Yay!

I do not, however, see my updating all my translated books with their original language.

>14 pgmcc: Good to know it works. Yes, there are too many books to read, no time to tweak all the entries. :)

>10 jillmwo:
A little more analysis: Translations in relation to works completed in each year.



As pointed out in >11 pgmcc:, the count of books per language is inaccurate consistently on the low side so the percentage of my library made up of translations, noted on LT as 6.91%, is an underestimate. The percentage of books I read in translation may exceed the percentage of translations in my library, or it may not.

I hope some of >11 pgmcc: and this post go part way to answering your question. Your question stirred my inner statistician an that statistician may end up looking at earlier years.

ETA: As I was saying:

I am sorry to learn of the death of Christopher Priest.

>17 pgmcc: Oh no.. I never read anything of his, but the movie version of The Prestige was a huge favorite of both my daughter and my son.

>11 pgmcc: and >16 pgmcc: You've more than answered my question. Some of what you've noted doesn't surprise me in the least (for example, that when visiting a favorite bookstore, you ALWAYS hit up the section they have of Books in Translation).

I had asked the question because in reading Italo Calvino, I noted the name of William Weaver. When I googled him, it turned out that he had his own Wikipedia article, an item that I found rather striking. We don't give translators all their due precisely because their names tend to fall second to the primary author. There are some exception. Emily Wilson's translations of Homer have her name fairly clearly shown on the cover. Her name isn't quite as big in size as that of Homer. but her name is quite clearly displayed. By contrast, Weaver's name as translator isn't shown at all on the cover design of If on a Winter's Night, a Traveler; his name appears only on the title page and in a carefully receding position and font. And yet, if you are going to popularize an author outside of his native country and language, the publisher has to be very careful in selecting the right individual.

No real takeaways at this point. Just checking my own assumptions, biases, and habits against those of another reader whose selections may be broader than my own.

>18 clamairy:
The book is well worth reading. There are subtle differences between the book and the film. When at the 2005 Worldcon he talked about being invited along to the filming and being happy with the amendments being made for the film.

>19 jillmwo:
I suspect a translator of something like Homer's work is going to be a somewhat different beast from a translator of more recent tomes (that is not a typo). for example, in the case of translations of Dante's Inferno the translator tends to be a key factor. People who have translated the ancient classics tend, as far as I know, to be academics. Any translators I know personally are hard working translators plying their trade in an attempt to earn a crust. They do not make all their money with novel translation but can also be involved with translating technical documents and government documents that must be translated into other official languages. Ireland has two official languages, Irish being the primary language and English the second. By law, all public documents and communications prepared by public sector bodies have to be available in both Irish and English. If you go onto any of the Irish government or civil service websites you will see an option to read the website in Irish or English.

As a member of the EU any documents for communication to other EU members have to be translated into all the official languages of the EU.

I am not sure if I asked you before, but have you read Umberto Eco's Mouse or Rat: Translation as negotiation? I found it to be a wonderful discussion on translations of many sorts including language translation of books and poems, and media translations such as book to screen.

Part of the trouble for translators of modern novels is that people often want to read the books because of the original author's name. If the translator has done their job well then the reader may never think of the translator. It is when a translator is not good, then people find problems with the book and may wonder is it the fault of the author or the translator.

I think the approach to translation described in If on a Winter's Night a Traveller is hilarious. Basically write a different book and submit it as a translation of a book that few if any other people will have read in the original language. Picking a less popular, even a dead, language and producing apocryphal translations is probably the best way to avoid getting caught.

There is a recent scandal about the Icelandic translation of Dracula. Icelandic was the first non-English version of the book published. For years it has stood as an example of how quickly the Icelandic publisher was to get the book translated. Only recently someone started translating the Icelandic version back into English and found that the story is not like the original at all.

Are you likely to develop a Scholarly Kitchen article on the topic of translation? I think that would be fascinating. That is, I would like it. I am not sure if the main audience for the Scholarly Kitchen would find it of interest. As you suggested in an early post, translation is not at the forefront of every mind in the US.

>17 pgmcc: Oof! I had not heard but am also sorry to hear the sad news.

>18 clamairy: I love both the movie and the book. I list them in that order because that is how I experienced them. That being said, I liked Priest's written ending better than how it was done in the movie. Like Peter said, the book is well worth reading.

>18 clamairy: I am with the others to encourage you to read the book The Prestige. I liked them both and appreciated the differences.

>21 pgmcc:, >23 MrsLee: & >23 MrsLee: I'm caught in a serious crossfire of BBs here. LOL On to Mount Toobey it goes!

>24 clamairy: You will not regret it. :-)

>23 MrsLee: >22 ScoLgo:
Well done, team. We did it.

>17 pgmcc: Oh no! I hadn't seen this. Very sad news. I've been impressed by all the books I've read of his. The Islanders and others set in the Archipelago are probably my favourites.

>10 jillmwo:, >11 pgmcc: etc. Some publishers are now giving equal weighting to translators on book covers and in other credits. Small presses like Tilted Axis, Fitzcarraldo and others are especially good. The International Booker Prize is awarded equally to the author and the translator, with the cash prize divided between them. So gradually the art and importance of translation seems to be being recognised and rewarded.

Today is a bank holiday in Ireland, the first Monday of February. It is a new bank holiday that was introduced last year as a token of appreciation to people for what they endured and did during COVID. It is being called the St. Brigid Bank Holiday. St. Brigid's day is actually the 1st of February, but bank holidays here are usually held on a Monday to make a three-day weekend for most of the people who work. People who work on bank holidays will be either paid double or receive a day-in-lieu. As a retiree a bank holiday is basically just another day in my 366-day weekend this year.

By the way, St. Brigid is one of the three patron saints of Ireland.

So, what did I do on the St. Brigid's Day bank holiday?

Today I visited Hodges Figgis and picked up a book I had on order. I also picked up another book by Fred Vargas.



The Parasites by Daphne Du Maurier is a BB fired by Sakerfalcon. The injury was inflicted a week or two ago but I had to wait the bookshop to get it in before getting my grubby little hands on a copy.



A Climate of Fear is a book from Fred Vargas' Commissaire Adamsberg series. As you might have deduced, I have become very interesting in Fred Vargas murder mysteries. This one was translated by Siân Reynolds, a historian, translator and former professor at the University of Stirling. The details of the translator are presented on the first page in the book, just under a brief paragraph about the author. The brief paragraph is short enough for me to add to this post.

FRED VARGAS
Fred Vargas was born in Paris in 1957. A historian and archaeologist by profession, she is now a bestselling Novelist. Her books have sold over 10 million copies worldwide and have been translated into 45 languages.

What a great way to celebrate Saint Brigid! I'm sure she would approve. This article appeared in the Guardian today: Move over Saint Patrick

I hope you enjoy The parasites. I need to get back into the Adamsberg series, but I am missing the next book. I must remedy that.

>27 pgmcc: That is a good holiday.

>27 pgmcc: How wonderful! (Both the human and the book acquisitions!)

>28 Sakerfalcon: Great article. I was very relieved to see that the Celtic goddess was included in the article, and not just the other Bridget. :o)

>28 Sakerfalcon:
I spotted that article and intended to read it. Your post prompted me to read. Very interesting.

I suspect the next few years will see the St. Brigid's Day bank holiday exploited commercially the way St. Patrick's Day has been converted into a week long festival. Dublin city centre was very calm when we were there yesterday. On St. Patrick's Day it is packed.

Apparently after we went home two protest marches kicked off: one anti-immigration and the other anti-racism. We appear to be suffering from right-wing influences stirring up feelings against immigration. Thanks to the Guards there were no serious disturbances.

>29 Karlstar:
We enjoyed the day. It was a good opportunity to introduce my wife to the chowder in The Duke on Duke Street. If I am in town to meet friends I often drop in for some chowder while waiting to meet my friends. I tend to go into town early on such occasions so I can pop into one or two bookshops. Between the time the bookshops close and I meet my friends I am in need of some sustenance and a place to read, hence The Duke and the chowder. :-)

>30 clamairy:
It was a nice day. Mild and dry. Today the rain is lashing out of the heavens.

Last year when the new bank holiday was introduced there was a lot of talk about commercialising it. Thankfully the commercial bodies have not managed to arrange that just yet.

>27 pgmcc: Always happy to see someone picking up a Vargas book. Are you reading them in order or just as you get to them? I think the Adamsberg series benefits from an ordered sequence as, although each is a self-contained story, the team develops significantly as they progress especially in the later books of the series.

>34 AHS-Wolfy:
I first came across Vargas in our book club. We read The Three Evangelists. I have since read Dog Will Have His Day and have The Accordionist awaiting attention.

I have the first two Commissaire Adamsberg books awaiting my starting this series. The book I picked up yesterday was the only Vargas in the shop. I intend reading them in order.

I really enjoy the French environment that I found in the books I have read so far.

>35 pgmcc: Hope you continue to enjoy them. Personally, I preferred the Adamsberg books to the Three Evangelists though The Accordionist is the only book I've not yet read of hers (that's been translated anyway).

I am reading and enjoying Len Dieghton's Berlin Game. On page 248 there is a line that I believe haydninvienna will appreciate. It is spoken my a music teacher while a quartet practices a piece of music in the next room.
"Haydn speaks an everlasting truth."

>37 pgmcc: Yes indeed! Thanks Peter.

Berlin Game by Len Deighton (First published 1983) Penguin Moder Classics pp296

Would I read another book by this author?
Most definitely.

Would I recommend this book to others?
Yes.

To whom would I recommend it?
Anyone interested in well written espionage novels, especially if they have a liking for the espionage of the Cold War era.



Did this book inspire me to do anything?
It has ensured I will be keen to read more of Len Deighton’s novels, in particular I will be reading the next two books the Game, Set & Match trilogy, namely Mexico Set and London Match.

I really enjoyed this novel. It is an espionage story with good characterisation, and interesting plot, and a level of tension that keeps the reader slightly unnerved with anticipation of what is going to happen.

I am a great fan of the books of John Le Carré. Comparing Deighton’s work with Le Carré’s strikes me as a bit like comparing apples with oranges. Le Carré has the edge on Deighton in terms of his phraseology and plotting, and his observations are more insightful and profound than Deighton’s. However, one approaches Le Carré’s works expecting more analysis, strategy and socio-political exposés than one would be looking for in a more action packed espionage story. That being said, Deighton provides a different product from what Le Carré gives his readers.

In his afterword to Berlin Game, Deighton talks about his approach to writing and how he does a lot of planning when preparing to write a book. I particularly like how he described modern advice about writing promotes simplification of plot, less characterisation and no sub-plots, and how he came to writing before these instructions were fully formalised, hence he would probably break one or all of them. I think he did a good job by not adhering to the modern advice.

Deighton's description of how this trilogy came about was a result of his planning process and also the fermentation of some ideas over along time. I found his Afterword very interesting in relation to his thoughts on writing and on how a novel can be put together.

>39 pgmcc: Sounds like a good one. I am learning about interesting books this year much faster than I can read them!

I've only read the Spy Hook, Spy Line and Spy Sinker series, but I think they are all based around Bernard Samson in different timelines.

>41 Bookmarque:
Apparently Samson was in nine books all told. Game, Set and Match were the books he first appeared in.

Just by chance I came across a 2015 interview with Ken MacLeod about Iain Banks. You can find it HERE if you are interested.

>43 pgmcc: Great stuff, thanks!

>42 pgmcc: Yeah, that's pretty clear with the Hook, Line & Sinker series. He's not quite retired, but not a field agent anymore either and most of the plot revolves around his wife who is also a spy.

I have started reading The Chalk Circle Man by Fred Vargas, translated from the French by Siân Reynolds. This is the first in the Commissaire Adamsberg crime series.

The novels I have nominated for this year's Hugo Awards:
Titanium Noir by Nick Harkaway
Hopeland by Ian McDonald
Beyond the Reach of Earth by Ken MacLeod
The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty
The Green Man's Quarry by Juliet E. McKenna
Good luck to all.

>47 pgmcc: More books to add to my list! You have progressed past BB's and have moved up to a shotgun.

>47 pgmcc: You've nominated five, but out of what number of SFF titles that you slurped down last year?

>49 jillmwo:
Well, I read all the ones I nominated. The nomination process only permits the nomination of five titles per category.

what number of SFF titles that you slurped down last year?


12

On principle I do not nominate or vote for anything I have not read.

I am such a good husband.

My wife has been struggling with a problem for the past few days. She told me this morning that she can not think of what to get me for my birthday. I told her not to worry, that I would sort out the problem. With one act of selfless chivalry I removed that worry from my wife by ordering a copy of Tartarus Press's limited edition M. R. James Ghost Stories.

Gee! What a guy!

>51 pgmcc: Very selfless! A great solution. :)

>51 pgmcc: I'm sure she appreciates that very much, especially if she likes to read them also.

>51 pgmcc: That is truly an act of selfless devotion, to be highly commended.

>51 pgmcc: I believe you showed some impressive restraint by only ordering one book.

>52 Karlstar: >53 MrsLee: >54 Sakerfalcon: >55 clamairy:
Your appreciation of my chivalry is heartwarming. It will encourage me to further practice such selflessness.

Today I have been organising my library. This process is at its early stages. Last week I ensured I had catalogued all my Swan River Press hardback collection. Today I have been working on my John Buchan collection. It appears some of my John Buchan novels need to be hunted out, and also, there may be a couple of titles I do not have. How incomplete of me.

A report on my John Buchan books will follow organisation and cataloguing.

This morning I completed my read of The Chalk Circle Man by Fred Vargas and translated by Siân Reynolds. It is the first novel in the Commissaire Adamsberg series. It appears there are thirteen books in this series and I am looking forward to reading them all.

Would I read another novel by this author?
Yes.

Would I recommend it to anyone?
Yes.

To whom would I recommend it?
Anyone who enjoys a cozy crime murder mystery with no gore or violence.

Did this book inspire me to do anything?
Yes. For the first time in my life I actually sought out a map of the Paris arrondissements. When arrondissements have been mentioned before I had vaguely committed myself to looking them up. While reading this book I actually did look at a map and see were the different arrondissements are.

I have given this story a 3.5 star rating. While I really enjoyed it there were a few little things that I just rolled my eyes about and moved on. They did not affect overall enjoyment of the story, but I felt they prevented it getting the full four stars.

While establishing the crime and following the investigation that is the core part of the story, Vargas introduces Commissaire Adamsberg, shows him arriving at his newly appointed police station, and introduces the reader to his new work colleagues. We also get a bit of characterisation and a glimpse at the commissaire's peculiar, at least that is what his subordinate thinks, approach to investigation and processing of the evidence gathered. A bit of Adamsberg's background is thrown in and I suspect this will play a part in future stories.

Those of you familiar with Maigret will recognise a similar set up in terms of the commissaire and his relationship with his inspectors.

All in all an enjoyable read and I look forward to reading the next book in the series, Seeking Whom He May Devour.

>56 pgmcc: While you are being so diligent and methodical, don't forget to note original language in your catalog.

>57 pgmcc: You have hit me enough for me to put this on my wishlist. When I start purchasing books again, I suspect this will come to me.

>58 MrsLee:
don't forget to note original language in your catalog.
As it happens I have been adding the original language. As John Buchan wrote in English it is proving quite a simple task.

I hope you enjoy any Vargas that you read.

I have started reading The Radetzky March written by Joseph Roth and translated by Michael Hofmann. This was one of the books selected for my by the staff of Dubray Books as part of the retirement gift I received from a friend.

jillmwo, this is the sixth book I have read this year and is the third of those books originally written in a language other than English. Books in translation percentage for 2024 is therefore running at 50% at this stage.

ETA: I just checked. The Radetzky March record on LT already has German set as the book's original language.

ETA Part 2: If on a Winter's Night a Traveller did not have its original language set at all, and The Chalk Circle Man had its original language set as English. Merde!

Do your professional espionage activities always involve you in such careful literary analysis? I never think to check those things.

>61 jillmwo:
I sincerely hope you do not expect me to break protocol and my cover to answer such a question.

Apart from the breach in security, I have only started checking them since you raised the question about how many books in translation that I read. That is my cover story and I am sticking to it.

Some of you may have noticed that I like stories that play with the reader's grasp of reality and that try to distort how one sees the world. Well, today I found that the LibraryThing birth and death dates at the bottom of the home page is trying to do just that.

Máirtín Ó Cadhain (1906-1970) is reported on today's LT Home Page as having been born on 13th February, 1906. For some reason I looked at the Wikipedia entry for Máirtín Ó Cadhain. It reported that the famous Irish writer, IRA commander, Head of Irish Language at Trinity College Dublin, author of Cré na Cille (The Graveyard Clay) and polyglot, was born on 20th January, 1906. Further investigation (= Googling) produced The Dictionary of Irish Biography's version of the truth being the 4th January for his date of birth birth. An Irish Times article published on 12th Oct 2020 stated January 1906 as the author's month of birth but did not risk a more specific date.

Most of you know I am loath to rely heavily on Wikipedia as a definitive data source. The LT date of birth for Máirtín Ó Cadhain is subject to update by users without control, and so far LT is the only source suggesting February as his month of birth. Of the four sources found so far I am inclined to put most credibility on The Dictionary of Irish Biography. I will report further if I find any more information. If I get the opportunity I will consult the Register of Deaths and Births to see if there is any more official information. As John Gall stated in his excellent book, Systemantics, "Things are as they are reported". So far I have three reported dates for Máirtín Ó Cadhain's date of birth.

>63 pgmcc: Good luck in your investigation.

>63 pgmcc: Oh my. So I guess it's hard for you to consider changing the LibraryThing entry when you don't have an exact date. Best of luck clearing that up.

>63 pgmcc: I could see that particular author not minding the obfuscation of his date of birth. At least the one book I read by him seemed as if he had the storyteller gene, which makes facts just another bit of the tale.

>63 pgmcc: Isn't the real question one having to do with available, reliable sources for this type of information? What was the practice in Ireland with regard to birth certificates or church baptismal records in 1906?

>67 jillmwo:
That I need to investigate. I know that births and deaths have to be registered but I do not know the situation in 1906, especially in the poor rural part of the country where Máirtín Ó Cadhain was born. In addition, during The Civil War a major repository for such records was burned and many records lost.

Local churches kept their own baptismal records. I am not aware of any centralisation of baptismal records. As you can imagine various accidents can happen to local records from accidental fires, roof leaks flooding sacristies to the dining habits of local mice.

ETA: I have found detail on where he is buried. His grave is in the same graveyard I visited with my friend a couple of weeks ago.

I am sitting in The Duke having a cup of tea with my wife. We came into town to have lunch in our favourite restaurant, Chez Max. We then strolled over to Hodges Figgis where I picked up Italo Calvino’s Into the War, a collection of stories recommended to me a few weeks ago by one of my Tuesday night drinking buddies.

By the way, if you are ever in Dublin and like chowder you have to visit The Duke and try their chowder.



Translated by Martin McLaughlin.

>63 pgmcc: and >68 pgmcc:

I signed up to MyHeritage.com to see if I could get more reliable information on the specific date of birth for Máirtín Ó Chadhain. I found the data for him. The record indicated the year 1906 but made no mention of month or day. Then, "Hey presto!", I discovered another record for him that stated 1905. By the way, the first record identified the source of the information as Wikipedia. :-(

I thought the likes of MyHeritage would use birth registrations as the source for this type of information. This would, however, be a problem vis-a-vis privacy laws for living human beings. The privacy laws under GDPR in the EU do not apply to deceased individuals.

>70 pgmcc: I can at least tell you that an online search at irishgenealogy.ie produces nothing. I went to the General Register Office site, which handed me off to irishgeneaology.ie, and searches on both the civil record and the church record returned no results. Wikipedia doesn't give an authority for its date, of course.

>71 haydninvienna:
Thank you for trying. I suspect his original record was lost in The Four Courts fire. He probably would have approved.

>66 MrsLee: I suspect you are correct about his views regarding the obfuscation of his date of birth.

>65 clamairy: I have a friend whose wife is a genealogist. I should be seeing him this month and will ask if his wife can suggest a reliable source. She may confirm the loss of the records in the big fire.

>64 Karlstar: Thank you! It will be interesting trying to track down the information, if it even exists.

I collect books by George A. Birmingham, but that's not important right now.

What is important is that in my pursuit of material by said George A. Birmingham I became aware of a political article written by him and published in the December 1911 issue of "The Irish Review: A monthly magazine of Irish Literature, Art and Science". By the way, his article was entitled, "Politics in the Nude". What is also important is that I bought this copy of The Irish Review many years ago and up until this evening the only thing I have done with it is read George A. Birmingham's article. This evening I have been reviewing my Birmingham collection with the intention of ensuring it is properly catalogued and shelved in a suitable fashion to support my research on Birmingham and his literature. In so doing I took down my copy of The Irish Review and for the first time had a look at the other names featuring in the contents of this issue. I was quite surprised and delighted to see, besides George A. Birmingham, the names:
W. B. Yeats
Lord Dunsany
James Stephens
Maud Gonne

W. B. Yeats requires no introduction.

Lord Dunsany will be familiar to many of you as one of the earliest writers of fantasy novels. His work is highly regarded and still being read.

James Stephens is the author of such titles as The Crock of Gold, The Demi-Gods and In the Land of Youth. He is also famous for writing one of the few documented eye-witness accounts of the 1916 Easter Rising, The Insurrection in Dublin. This account is the main source for much of what is known about activities around St. Stephen's Green in Dublin. He worked in the nearby National Gallery and during his breaks he would walk down the road to observe the activities of the rebels and the British army around St. Stephen's Green.

Maud Gonne was an activist and her sister's name is more famous. He sister was Countess Markovich, one of the leading rebels during the Rising.

>72 pgmcc: I tried Familysearch.org on the off chance (they have produced some records of my mother's and Better Half's families I've not found elsewhere). Found his grave, with date of birth "1906", which isn't helpful, and 310 irrelevant records. Sorry pardon.

>77 hfglen:
Thank you for looking. Now that I have a photograph of his grave and a grave reference number I will seek out his resting place.

We were in the café of the local garden centre having some tea. All of a sudden Marc Bolan and T-Rex came over the sound system playing "Get It On". I was transported back to my 1970s disco days. It was an amazing moment and I am still earwormed, but in a nice way.

>76 pgmcc: That's quite the collection of authors! I see that page is marked up a little, but might that copy be somewhat valuable?

>80 Karlstar:
The contents are on the front cover. It is quite a thin volume with only about thirty pages.

I am not aware of its being valuable. For me its value is in the historic, literary and political history held within its pages. It also brings to life the authors and other contributors as it shows part of their lives that one may not suspect from reading the works that they are famous for. There are several libraries in Dublin that will have copies of The Irish Reviews. These would include, The National Library of Ireland, The Royal Academy of Ireland Library, and The Royal Dublin Society Library. I suspect the library in Dublin University, Trinity College will have copies too. These would be invaluable from a research point of view, but I suspect the people doing the research will not necessarily have the means to spend money acquiring high cost copies, hence there is not likely to be much demand that would drive up the value of the copies.

One of the things I like about reading the likes of George A. Birmingham's novels is how he included a lot of social context in his stories. He did this by showing the lives of various people in the story and this can be paired very closely with the socio-political events of the time. He wrote his novels very quickly and consequently the worlds he presents are not dulled by the need to look back on memories. He wrote his books as the history was happening. Given the turbulent history of Ireland, the fact that Birmingham was writing through the first half of the twentieth century when much of the turbulence was in full swing, means that his books have lot of significance. Another endearing feature is that while Birmingham, whose real name was Reverend James Owen Hannay, Church of Ireland minister, he was a very fair and objective observer of events in Ireland. It is obvious from his writings, and also his politics, that he was had a good understanding and empathy for all parts of the Irish & Anglo-Irish population, and that his interest was in a fair and equitable society for all.

Another author whose books were written and published very quickly and contemporaneously with the political events of the day, is Eric Ambler. Like Birmingham's books, Ambler's books give an insight into the lives of local people in the countries were the stories take place, and also give an idea of the prevailing politics of the time. Ambler's stories take place across Europe and span from the period between the world wars to the 1990s.

As well as a cup of tea at the garden centre to celebrate Valentine’s Day we watched True Lies tonight. There is nothing like a training video to draw a couple together.

>82 pgmcc: Bwahaha!

A few years ago I converted our smallest bedroom into a "Reading Room". You might recall my installation of four IKEA Billy bookcases, and ultimately a black leather recliner, which guaranteed that most of the hours spent in that room would be spent snoozing rather than reading. You may also recall that when I posted photographs of the books I had put on the shelves that some of you were quite upset that my organisation was rather loose. I think some of you may even have experienced high blood pressure on my behalf at the thought of a motley crew of randomly assembled books occupying my newly installed shelving. There were several posts expressing concern on the subject.

The randomness of the book storage does not annoy me and, as I mentioned at the time, it adds a bit of pleasure when I discover books I had forgotten I had as I explore my shelves.

All that being said, this weekend I have started assembling books by author with the intention of shelving them in this fashion, albeit not alphabetically. Many of my favourite authors already have their books grouped together with perhaps on or two truant volumes hiding amongst the rabble. My process has involved listing the books I have catalogued on LibraryThing for a given author, making a list of any volumes I do not already have grouped under the author's name, and then hunting the missing copies down. Once I have the books together I select a place on the shelves and place them there as best I can.

What started this activity, you might ask. Well, I had a few shelves given over to work related books. Having retired a year ago I have not felt inclined to dive into these books. Some of them are a bit dated. Others still interest me from a general interest point of view, but most of them relate to the type of work I used to do and that I have no intention of going back to. That being the case I started removing these books from the shelves which left me with some space to start rearranging my non-work related books. So far I have worked on the following authors:

- Umberto Eco
- Ursula K. Le Guin
- Kim Newman
- Ken MacLeod
- Hans Fallada
- Vladimir Voinovich
- Jaroslav Hašek
- Martin Cruz Smith
- Wu Ming
- Robert Harris
- H.P. Lovecraft

While the author groupings will not be in alphabetic order they will generally be grouped by genre. Alphabetizing by author name, even within each genre, would be a pretty hefty task requiring the shelves being emptied and the books organised before being returned to the shelves. I generally have a good idea where most of my books are (something I will keep saying even on the occasion when I am hunting for a particular book that is hiding from me), so it will be easy enough to know where a given author's books are located. I only have about twenty Billy bookcases, so it will not be that difficult. :-)

Some of you will understand when I say, "This is fun!"

Others might just think, "Get a life, Peter".

Still others might think, " ".

Whatever you think, I continue to say, "This is fun!" :-)

There may be updates on progress as the process continues. Possibly even pictures of recently grouped author collections.

Oh, I forgot to mention, that before I even looked at the work related books and removed them from the shelves, I had already started to review and collate my John Buchan and George A. Birmingham collections.

Ah! “work related books” Are we disposing of these clues properly? Burial? Fire? Resale?

>85 2wonderY:
There will be an effort to inflict them on former colleagues who may still be under the delusion that they might read them some time.

>84 pgmcc: I say, "Go go, Peter!" It sounds like a wonderful activity to me.

In another couple of weeks I will join you in spirit because I will have to reload my bookshelves in the apartment after the floors are reinstalled. A good time for examination of intent as owner (am I doing this book justice, or would someone else better meet its needs?), and delusional thinking that I can organize them (its all very well until one book in a group is 1/4" too tall).

>87 MrsLee:
Good luck with your new floor selection and installation. I hope the arranging of the books will be a pleasant activity after the trauma of dealing with the flooring problem. At least this time it was not me who caused the flooding in your house.

My Du Maurier and Du Maurier related books. This was easy as I have always kept them together.

>89 pgmcc: I am pleased to see a copy of the thrilling adventures of lovelace and babbage there at the top in the picture, although it has nothing to do with the works of Daphne du Maurier. But unless I am missing it, i don't see du Maurier's Frenchman's Creek on that shelf; I am aware you didn't particularly enjoy it, but does that mean you re-homed the copy you had?

>90 jillmwo:
Two books to the left of The Daphne Du Maurier Companion.

>84 pgmcc: I am definitely in "this is fun" camp. Good luck :)

I organize and reorganize our bookshelves from time to time. For reasons I fail to understand (entropy?), after a while they revert to a state of chaos. It's an ongoing struggle.

>91 pgmcc: Much reassured. Thank you for directing me to the correct placement.

>90 jillmwo:
I have not gotten around to reading Lovelace and Babbage but am looking forward to it.

>92 Alexandra_book_life:
Handling books and arranging them always leaves me in a good mood. If I am upset or in a bad mood I find that twenty minutes with the books has me smiling and relaxing. What's not to enjoy about that?

The truant books are The Birthday Girl and, ironically, The Elephant Vanishes. First Person Singular is on my Kindle. :-( This is a problem with kindles; they prevent one showing off one's complete collection.

>88 pgmcc: Wait. What? Did you do that last time? And not even say "Hello" while you were at it?

>89 pgmcc: & >96 pgmcc: Lovely groups of books. I think they look well pleased to be grouped together.

>96 pgmcc: Don't see What I Talk About When I Talk About Running nor the one about Aum Shinrikyo. But otherwise, very handsome. Well done!

>97 MrsLee:
A few years ago I had a dream that I stayed at your place and had a bath in the upstairs bathroom which resulted in an overflow that flooded downstairs. At the time you were kind enough to point out that you live in a single storey house, so my dream could not be true.

>98 haydninvienna:
I do not have the book about running, but I believe Underground, third book from the left, is the one about Aum Shinrikyu.

>100 pgmcc: So it is. Evidently I can't read sideways.

>84 pgmcc: I think it sounds like a wonderful way to spend time. And I would love to have a reading room rather than a reading nook, which is what I have right now. The nook doesn’t hold near enough books.

>84 pgmcc: Whatever organization method works for you! I agree that the organizing is the enjoyable activity, not so much the organization. I try to keep mine alphabetized by genre, because if I use the 'I don't know where this book goes so let me put it here where I'll remember' method results in immediately forgetting where that book should be found after about 2 days.

>84 pgmcc: I am definitely in the "this is fun" camp. There are few things more pleasurable than sorting and arranging one's books.

>100 pgmcc: What I talk about... isn't just about running. I read it and enjoyed it a lot. Underground may be my favourite of his books, although "favourite" is perhaps not the right word for such a devastating book. But I found it deeply moving and engaging.

I am enjoying The Radetzky March. This morning I read the following and I just have to share it:

And little Sternberg, through whose brain the thoughts passed singly, like stray birds in an empty cloudscape, with no fellows and leaving no trace,..."

>105 pgmcc: Wonderful quote!

>105 pgmcc: That's hilarious.

>99 pgmcc: Ah yes, I remember now. This old brain still works, you just have to jiggle the handle now and then.

I am in town to meet a few friends. By pure chance I walked half a mile out of my way and ended up in Hodges Figgis bookshop. How on Earth did that happen?

Well, never one to waste an opportunity I had a quick browse and bought two books. They are both translations from Japanese and they are:

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa and translated by Eric Ozawa,

and

Strangers by Taichi Yamada and translated by Wayne P. Lammers.

Yes, jillmwo, more translations.

The Tartarus Press Limited Edition volume of the ghost stories of M. R. James arrived today. You might recall this is the book I ordered in that show of stunning chivalry when I solved my wife's problem of what to get me for my birthday. Well, it arrived today which is a good day for it to arrive because it is my birthday. I am twenty-one again.



You can see more detail about the book on the Tartarus Press website, HERE.

We celebrated my birthday by my wife, younger son and myself meeting up with our older son and his fiancée at a local pub/restaurant and had a lovely meal.

Would you believe that one of the gift bags I received had a range of animals on it. Yes, there was an elephant. Also, my sister-in-law and brother-in-law presented me with a key holder with an Indian elephant on it, as well as six coasters with the same image on them. I will not claim these sightings as part of the fortuitous, random appearance of elephants as these items were picked deliberately to ease my obsession. This does not, however, nullify the truism, "There is always an elephant!"

>110 pgmcc: Happy birthday, Peter! But you might like to look at the third paragraph of your post ...

>110 pgmcc: Happy birthday! You know, most of us just get books for our birthday, not entire herds of elephants! (A set of six coasters and a key ring with elephants would constitute a full herd in my estimation...)

>110 pgmcc: Sounds wonderful. Happy Birthday, Peter!

Thank you all for the good wishes.

>111 haydninvienna:
LOL. We had a real mean time. :-)

>112 jillmwo:
I need to be aware of the stampede risk.

>113 clamairy:
I love the marching elephant. It has reminded me of the magnificent scene in the original Jungle Book cartoon with the elephants on patrol.

>114 pgmcc: I was absent for your birthday, but I will send you best wishes for the year ahead, and for your day of recovery after your birthday. The celebration sounded lovely. I heard it from here. :p

>115 MrsLee:
Many thanks for your good wishes for the year to come. Apologies for the noise. We tried to keep it down but you know what we Irish are like.

Belatedly, a Hippo Birdie Two Ewe!

(Thinks: two elephants maybe?)

>117 hfglen:
Thank you for the birthday greetings.

>112 jillmwo: (A set of six coasters and a key ring with elephants would constitute a full herd in my estimation...)

I thought I must have introduced a slight misunderstanding. When I said a "key holder" I was referring to a small, wall mounted board with hooks on it for hanging keys from. I wasn't going to mention it, but today at lunch something happened that made me realise that you were not suffering under a misunderstanding, but were rather demonstrating your mystical mastery of prescience. We met a friend for lunch and she gave me a key ring with an elephant dangling from it. Jill, you are spooky.

I have a real life mystery to solve. Today a book arrived at my house. It is a secondhand book entitled The Clockwork Rocket and it was posted in the USA by Thrift Books Global LLC PHL in Dallas. I have no recollection of ordering it and there is no record of it having been ordered on any of my book ordering sites (ABEBooks; Amazon (.co.uk; .com; .fr; .de); Book Depository; et al...). Whatsmore, there is no order acknowledgement in any of my e-mail accounts indicating where or when it was ordered. Also, there is no trace of a payment transaction in any of my financial records.



I am resigned to suspecting that a kind beneficiary has found this book and thought I might like it, and then arranged the shipment. With bated breath I await a clue as to the origin of this volume.

If you are out there, you know who you are. Thank you!

The Truth is Out There

>119 pgmcc: You have achieved mastery of the universe. Now books are sending themselves to you!

>120 MrsLee:
I am afraid I am slipping into another reality; a parallel universe; an Otherwhere.

E.T.A.: Very Murakami!

>118 pgmcc: I knew instinctively that such a thing was on its way to you. (Which is not to say that I am NOT spooky but the word has some odd connotations trailing it at times...)

>119 pgmcc: Others know instinctively the book you need to read next. Cherish those friends on the astral plane...

>122 jillmwo:
Cherish those friends on the astral plane...

I repeat, "Spooky".

Happy belated birthday, Peter!

>124 Karlstar:
Thank you, Jim.

Happy belated birthday from me too! I'm glad you had a great day of celebration!

>126 Sakerfalcon:
Thank you, Claire.

jillmwo hit me with a BB for Everyone on This Train is a Suspect. I have ordered this from Chapters bookshop and will be picking it up tomorrow morning. My looking online for this book led me to Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone. I picked up the Kindle version. jillmwo can count that as a BB hit as well. I believe she is retaining the lead position regarding scoring hits on me.

>128 pgmcc: I have no sympathy for you. You have no one to blame for this bullet barrage but yourself. You go into her threads with pen & paper handy, or just cut and paste everything she's raving about into your online shopping list. The rest of us cover one eye, or at least look slightly askance.

>129 clamairy: Guilty as charged. And yes, it is usually cut-and-paste. Sometimes it is a little note taken on my phone for reference while in the bookshop. I keep taking my medication, but she still manages to hit me very regularly.

>130 pgmcc: Well, if you're finding books you like there's no reason to attempt to avoid the bullets. I feel the same way about several other people on this website, especially sakerfalcon. I don't think she's ever steered me in the wrong direction.

>129 clamairy: and >131 clamairy: Wait a minute!! You're looking at me "askance" but you don't look at sakerfalcon the same way? I sense -- well, something.

And anyway, w/ pgmcc, it's just tit-for-tat. He hits me and then I feel obliged to hit him. All those BBs are little rubber balls bouncing off walls.

>132 jillmwo: No offense intended. For starters she only posts about once a week. LOL You often have six books going at once, and spray your bullets in every direction. I've also taken multiple hits from you over the years.

>133 clamairy: I wasn't offended, you dear silly human clam. (Text won't always properly convey tone and you'd think I'd have learned that after umpty-umpt years living online.) After all, it's not like I haven't followed multiple directed arrows shot from your reading thread. We like so many of the same things.

>134 jillmwo: Yes, if they were actual bullets neither of us would be here. Come to think of it, I'm not sure who would be left in here. There are one or two posters who never seem to look in anyone else's threads. They might still be here. LOL

I am enjoying The Radetzky March. It is describing the career, thoughts and experiences of a grandfather, his son grandson in the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the run-up to WWI. When the grandfather was a lowly artillery sergeant saves the life of the young emperor at The Battle of Solferino. The emperor's gratitude, favour and sponsorship ensures the artillery sergeant is raised in station from his origin as a village peasant to a member of the elite, and his son and grandson benefit from the on-going sponsorship and favour.

>136 pgmcc: Dang Austrian bullets.

>137 Karlstar:
:-)

I did pick up my book order at Chapters Bookshop today.


This was a BB fired by jillmwo, that marksperson extraordinaire. I look forward to reading Everyone on this Train is a Suspect.

While there I purloined another couple of books.



I picked up Declarations of War as I have become fond of Len Deighton's stories. Apparently this is a set of short pieces about, clue in the title, declarations of war.

Episodes is apparently another set of shorts. I have neglected Christopher Priest's work for some years and his recent death has prompted me to look to his works again. This is a book I did not have until I picked it up today. It is almost in his honour that I bought it.

By the way, we had another little meet-up with some of my wife's cousins today. That went well. The venue we use is Blas Café. Blas is a café run by the husband of one of my wife's cousins. When I suggested we start up this series of get-togethers I proposed Blas as the venue as it is a nice place, there is plenty of room and people are not rushed out. It also keeps things within the family. The fact that Blas is just around the corner from Chapters Bookshop had no part in the decision making process. Honest!

By the way, "Blas" is the Irish for "taste", and the food is very tasty.

>139 pgmcc: May I suggest that the proximity of Blas (which sounds enticing!) to Chapters was, at least, not a minus-point?

>140 hfglen:
You might be correct.

My U.S. based daughter is due to attend a work retreat this week. She arranged her flights so that she could stop off here for a visit today before flying to the work meeting tomorrow. Kind daughter that she is, she contacted one of her brothers and they organised a family dinner for this afternoon to celebrate my birthday and the birthday of my other daughter's husband which coincides with mine. The only people missing were the husband and children of the daughter doing the organising. :-(



Here we are enjoying a lovely meal. Right to left: wife, son, grandson, son-in-law, granddaughter, granddaughter, daughter, daughter*, son, son's fiancée.

*Daughter whose idea the dinner was.

I received a gift. It is in the photograph below, along with the coasters, key holder and key ring I mentioned previously.

>142 pgmcc: Oh, that sounds like a fabulous outing! I'm so glad your daughter was able to attend. Nice gifts!

>142 pgmcc: So lovely that most of you could be together.

>142 pgmcc: What a lovely family gathering! I'm happy for you. The elephant gifts are great.

>142 pgmcc: Bless you all, Peter. It's a very Irish-looking celebration, or so I think.

>143 clamairy:, >144 MrsLee:, >145 Alexandra_book_life:, >146 haydninvienna:

It was a fabulous occasion, thank you.

>146 haydninvienna: I suppose it was the potín bottles on the table that gave it away.

>147 pgmcc: Ha! Except they use those bottles to serve water these days.

>148 clamairy:
Come on, Clare. Just ask yourself “Who would serve water at an Irish do?

>131 clamairy:, >132 jillmwo: No comment!

>136 pgmcc: This is already on Mount TBR otherwise it would be a BB.

>142 pgmcc: What a great celebration! Lovely that you could all be together.

>142 pgmcc: What a great family gathering! I'm glad they could pull it together for you.

>150 Sakerfalcon: & >151 Karlstar:
We had a great time on Sunday. It all worked out very well.

Later in the day my wife's siblings came to our house for a couple of hours to catch up with our daughter.

At the moment our daughter is in Tenerife for work. Apparently the three afternoons of Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are more relaxing the working mornings.

The conference is quite an interesting phenomenon. Virtually (if you will excuse the pun) everyone is working remotely, so this is the first opportunity for many of these people to meet one another having been working on-line with them for years.

On a similar note, I visited the head office of my old company today. Two friends invited me along for lunch and to see the new office building. I ended up spending about four hours in the building. It is all open-plan and lots of people spotted me and wanted to have a catch-up as it is a year since I retired. It was great to see so many of my former colleagues. I also met two people whom I worked with on-line for about two years and today was the first time I had a chance to talk to them face to face and shake their hands. That was a weird feeling. They are people I felt I knew really well and yet today was our first time not talking through a screen.

On a book note, I finished The Radetzky March yesterday and started Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson.



This was a BB from jillmwo, that world renowned sharp-shooter. She tempted me with Everyone on this Train is a Suspect by the same author and then informed me there was an earlier book. She hit me with two shots for the price of one.

I am obviously enjoying it as I am 22% through its 350 pages already.

In terms of The Radetzky March, I found it a very interesting book.

Would I read another book by this same author?
Yes, but I would not hunt one of his books down.

Would I recommend this book?
Yes.

Who would I recommend it to?
People interested in historical fiction that is focused on the life of military families in the period running up to the First World War.

Did this book inspire me to do anything?
I have not done anything yet, but it has urged me to do more reading on the history of Europe in the run-up to WWI.

The book traces the life of three generations of a family, specifically the lives of an artillery sergeant who saves the life of the Emperor, the sergeant's son and grandson. Their lives are used to present the prevailing social structure of the time, and the rules and protocol of both society and the army. Their lives show the nature of the old world order of monarchy, military honour, and upholding the existence of the Empire. Through their lives and careers the reader sees the decline and fall of that world order in the face of various pressures and challenges both within and from beyond the borders of the Empire. This was the time of nationalist ideas becoming stronger, and people starting be feel unhappy with their lot. WWI lasted from 1914 to 1918. This covers a period when revolution was in the air and many monarchies experienced disquiet amongst their people.

I received The Silence Project as the eleventh of twelve monthly picks from my Dubray Reader's Year retirement gift. The blurb, the first page, and various reviews did not kindle any interest in me to read the book. Thanks to the very flexible exchange mechanism in the scheme I was able to exchange it for The Silver Bone by Andrey Kurkov.



An earlier book I received as part of this scheme was Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv which I enjoyed very much, so I am delighted to have another of Kurkov's books to read.

>154 pgmcc: Seems like a good swap.

>154 pgmcc: Nice! I've read Kurkov's Grey Bees and liked it very much.

>155 Karlstar: I agree.

>156 Alexandra_book_life: Kurkov was new to me with the Jimi Hendrix book, but he has won me over to being a fan. I was looking for an opportunity to get another book of his.

This was a very interesting and entertaining murder mystery. A bonus was that the detective was also the one writing up the story. Several opportunities were taken to break the fourth wall by describing to the reader the process and rules for writing a Golden Age murder mystery. The author also took time to tell the reader and demonstrate how he was keeping to the rules. This led to an interesting process of trying to work out who the culprit was. Stevenson was very skilled at leaving clues in a very fair way and yet making the reader work to tie the clues together. This was very enjoyable.

Would I read another book by this author?
Most definitely. I already have my second one bought and ready to go, courtesy of a book bullet from that skilled marksperson, jillmwo.

Would I recommend this book?
Yes.

To whom would I recommend it?
Anyone interested in murder mysteries, especially Golden Age murder mysteries.

Did the book inspire me to do anything??
Yes. Enjoy my reading.

>158 pgmcc: This book sounds tempting ;)

>159 Alexandra_book_life:
Go on. You know you want to.

>160 pgmcc: Yes, I know what a well-aimed BB looks like... ;)