Well developed, larger-than-life characters interacting in somewhat ludicrous situations. The style – many very short chapters – makes it a racing read.
Rather different from most of McCall Smith’s well-known books.
The Huguenot Chronicles by Paul C.R. Monk Dramatic events following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes France, 1685. Louis XIV has brazenly revoked his grandfather Henry IV’s treaty, which had granted Protestants substantial residential and religious rights. Now the King is determined to unite the nation in one Church – by force, if necessary. A…
Another brilliantly researched and well-told story of desperately strained relationships. Two overlapping plots lead us on, as we explore the ethics of mercy killing as well as the torment a respected public figure goes through when he falls in love with another woman and his wife disposes of all his possessions.
Robert Harris paints a vivid picture of life around the bay of Naples just before Vesuvius erupts. The engineer Attilius battles powerful, arrogant, carefree, unscrupulous men in his successful attempt to repair the aqueduct which is the lifeline for all the towns around the bay. Then, anticipating the eruption of Vesuvius, he does what he…
#ClimateStrike #Zürich Was that a nod from heaven that it rained … and rained in Zürich yesterday? It didn’t discourage 12,000 people – mainly school kids and young people, joining hundreds of thousands worldwide – to take to the streets. They protested against the thoughtless pollution which is disrupting the world’s climate and provoking extreme…
It’s the beginning of the 19th century in rural England. Anne Elliot, ‘with an elegance of mind and sweetness of character, was nobody with either father or sister; her word had no weight, her convenience was always to give way – she was only Anne.’ But, amid illustrious Lords and Ladies, Baronets, Admirals and naval Captains, we see the world through her eyes.
How is it that a story, in which hardly anything happens except for Harold nursing his blisters, can be so captivating, so thought-provoking, so moving? Rachel Joyce has an unusual knack for interweaving past incidents and memories into the current narrative, while cunningly maintaining our suspense by concealing what really happened twenty years earlier until…