Facebook

Since I returned to the UK I have not used Facebook that much.  It was great while I was away to stay in touch with people, but now I am home I have found less and less use for it.  Until now.  It has proved a great way to spend a few minutes, checking in with other folks, seeing how they are doing and generally having a banter.  (I have stopped checking the community pages as that got quite depressing, :-(  ).

One of the recent challenges on FB was to post a picture of one book cover each day for seven days. You did not have to offer any explanation, just post the picture and nominate someone else.  It is actually quite hard to do this and it was also quite hard to nominate folks, which was interesting.

Anyway, I thought I'd put the books on here with a bit more of an explanation as they all brought back lots of different memories.

I read this book at school and absolutely loved it.  It is about a time travelling girl and it is probably the book that sparked my interest in history.  I am also still quite partial to a time travelling novel, :-).

Two other books I remember reading as a child didn't make the cut:

I loved the Moomin books, but they don't seem so popular today.  Probably more early evidence of my preference for sci fi books, which I never really noticed until a few years ago when a friend pointed it out to me.  I also loved Enid Blyton.  I appreciate she is not a politically correct choice these days, but she wrote good stories and got children reading back in the day.  A product of her time, I guess, but times change.

On Day Two, I posted this one:

I read a lot of Jean Plaidy novels when I was a teenager. While probably not the best literature, JP manages to pack in a lot of historical details in a very readable format.  The Sixth Wife was the first one I read when I was about twelve.

Day Three was this one:

I love Daffers and this book is one of my favourites of hers.  Back to the time travelling theme or is he just hallucinating?  That's the thing with Daff, you are never quite sure. Love it.

Day Four was dedicated to the goddess and literary genius, Margaret Atwood:

I love L'Atwood books and enjoy listening to her when she is being interviewed.  I was lucky enough to see her in Oxford and was blown away by her intelligence and depth of knowledge.  

Continuing with the theme of literary goddesses, Day Five belonged to Hilary Mantel:

Although I am a big fan of her Thomas Cromwell series, I actually much prefer her other work, in particular this one.  Like Ms Atwood I enjoy listening to her being interviewed and am always hugely impressed with her intellectual prowess.

Day Six was a chance to included a book by a male author, Choderlos Laclos.  I was surprised how much I enjoyed reading this. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that I saw the incomparable Alan Rickman with the magnificent Lindsay Duncan perform it on stage in London.

The final day's choice was Pat Barker.  Again, this was associated with some good memories of studying with the Open University.  Although I found it incredibly hard work, studying with the OU was one of the best things I have ever done.  I learned a lot and made some good friends.

Inevitably, seven books was never going to be enough, but it was a fun exercise and made me think, :-).