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Reading, Watching and Writing: Weekly Round-Up

READING: An extraordinary book is a wondrous thing. But my gosh, it sort of ruins you for whatever book you pick up next. Do you find that? I finished A Little Life last week (read my thoughts here), and have struggled to engage with anything ever since. I’ve downloaded a couple of samples but have realised (thanks again to A…

Reading, Watching and Writing: Weekly Round-Up

READING Every so often a book comes along that makes you want to press pause on the world, just so you can finish it. A Little Life is that book. I’m only half-way through this Man Booker Prize Long-listee, but my goodness – what an experience! I will definitely be writing more about this, once I’ve finished. It’s the type…

Reading, Writing and Watching: Weekly Round-Up

READING I finished The Goldfinch! Yes, only one year late. But still… 784 pages is a big commitment and quite frankly it’s taken me that amount of time to muster up the courage. To be honest, mid-way through, I did start to rush through it a bit. I did skim sections, yes I did. Every time I would lug The…

Books to Buy this Christmas: Kids’ Edition

Buying books for kids is about as much fun as Christmas shopping gets. A book is fun, inexpensive, easy to store and – of course – educational. It ticks every gift-giving box I know. That said, the choice is extraordinary, so here are a few of my top picks.

Books to buy this Christmas: Adults Edition

We are officially only four weeks from the big day, so I think it’s safe to start talking about Christmas shopping. Needless to say, I think everyone’s stocking requires at least one book in it, maybe more. You know the old saying… Something they want, Something they need, Something to wear and Something TO READ! The last one, obviously, being…

Meet Christopher Currie, author of ‘Clancy of the Undertow’

Teenagers are so hard to buy for. Right? Well, I might just have solved at least one of your gift shopping issues for this Christmas. ‘Clancy of the Undertow’ is a brilliant piece of contemporary realist fiction (ie set in the here and now) which would be perfect for any girl (or nuanced boy) aged 15+. You can read more…

How to be a ‘Writerly Reader’

booksIf you end a book & think nothing could be improved-you’re a reader.
If you end a book & think everything could be improved-you’re a writer.

This was a tweet that came through on my feed last week and sparked an interesting conversation between several writers (including me), who largely disagreed.

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