sarahmatthews

sarahmatthews, 4 days ago to bookstodon

When I couldn’t sleep last night I read one of the stories by Alice Munro Granta have unlocked on their website in her memory, A Queer Streak. As with all her stories you really have to read it twice! It was published in two parts, here are the links:
Part 1- Anonymous Letters https://granta.com/a-queer-streak-part-one-anonymous-letters/
Part 2 - Possession https://granta.com/a-queer-streak-part-two-possession/

#bookstodon #AmReading #AliceMunro @bookstodon

sarahmatthews, 5 days ago to nature

I’ve just finished The Next Big Thing by Anita Brookner which was a great and sometimes difficult read. It’s about Julius who’s in his 70s and is now retired. His parents and brother have died and his wife has left him. He’s living alone in central London, his adopted city after his family fled from Nazi Germany. He’s looking for the next big thing in his life, pondering his past and feeling concern for his failing health. Sounds gloomy, right?! Well, the insightful writing just carries you along and pulls you in before you know it and you’re hooked on this story of loneliness and regret in later life. I found myself, like I often do with Anita Brookner, rereading sections due to the beautiful prose. Here’s an example to give you a flavour:
“He raised his eyes to a rooffline bristling with television aerials , lowered them again to windows still blank before the evening lights were lit. The sky was already darkening; signs of spring were absent, and yet the chilly damp held a promise of greenness, of new life only just in abeyance. it was even possible to appreciate that sky; its opaque blue reminded him of certain pictures, though no picture could compete with this strange sense of immanence. With the crust of the earth ready to break into life, the roots expanding to disclose flowers, the trees graciously putting forth leaves. The impassivity of nature never ceased to amaze him. This awakening process was surely superior to anything captured on canvas, yet art made all phenomena its province.in its unceasing war with the effort of capturing moments of time art won this unequal contest, but only just. The majestic indifference of nature was there to remind one of ones place, and no doubt to serve as a corrective to the artist’s ambition. When the canvas was finished it was already a relic, outside change. And surely change was primordial; all must obey it. To ignore the process was to ignore the evidence of one’s own evolutionary cycle.’
Haunting, introspective and with a hint of dark comedy this was so good, just maybe one to approach with caution if yu’re about to retire! This novel was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2002.
#bookstodon #AmReading #Braille #BookReview #nature @bookstodon

sarahmatthews, 14 days ago to bookstodon

I had a sudden craving for Barbara Pym last week and thoroughly enjoyed rereading A Glass of Blessings, 1958, in which we follow Wilmet’s life in her suburban London parish. Full of quirky characters, it’s a great read! #bookstodon #BookReview #Storygraph @bookstodon
https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/e7b574c0-ecaf-4a84-a30f-d3021490ad35

sarahmatthews, 15 days ago to Pubtips

ElevenLabs are getting in on #audiobooks uh oh via The Publishing Post | “Amidst widespread fears, in the publishing sector and beyond, about the prospect of a future labour market with jobs lost to generative AI, the collaboration has been met with scepticism.”
#bookstodon #publishing @bookstodon https://www.thepublishingpost.com/post/harpercollins-to-use-ai-narration-in-non-english-audiobooks

sarahmatthews, 25 days ago to books

That last boost from @NewDoorBooks led me to this interesting article on Dorothy L Sayers during WW2 #bookstodon #reading #history @bookstodon | “From September 1940 onwards her letters reported bombs near her London flat, the neighbouring property to her solicitor being ‘blown right down’, the destruction of her favourite milk bar near where she used to work and that of St Alban’s, Holborn, and devastation in Bloomsbury. She described Witham as ‘reasonably bomb free”, however. The only moment of interest was “a bit of a rocket, which sailed into the garden on Christmas Eve.’”
https://blogs.bl.uk/english-and-drama/2023/10/wartime-correspondence-of-dorothy-l-sayers.html

sarahmatthews, 29 days ago to bookstodon

The #WomensPrize shortlist for 2024 has just been announced! I’ve not read any of them yet but a couple are tempting - The Wren, The Wren and Restless Dolly Maunder. Shame Western Lane didn’t make it #bookstodon @bookstodon Announcing the 2024 Women's Prize for Fiction shortlist! - Women's Prize : Women's Prize https://womensprize.com/announcing-the-2024-womens-prize-for-fiction-shortlist/