Happy Sunday bookish peeps!
This week’s Bookish Wrap Up is linked with the Sunday Salon and the Sunday Post.
The Sunday Salon is a meme hosted by Readerbuzz and is a place to link up and share what you have been doing during the week. It’s also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. While the Sunday Post is a meme hosted byCaffeinated Reviewer and is a chance to share news. It’s a post to recap the past week on your blog and share news about what is coming up on your blog for the week ahead.
Non-bookish things:
Recently, I have archived a whole stack of blogposts that for whatever reason I don’t love any more. I’ve cut down on the posts I plan on participating in, in an attempt to make blogging fit better around university life, and I’ve given the blog a little makeover. I’ve found that I really want to simplify my ‘hobby’, so that I can read more, create more and live more.
Being neurodivergent, I am a bit of an all or nothing kinda girl, Some days I am hyper-focused, other days I completely forget I even have a blog. I am hoping small changes and little bit of routine may help. I do love routine…right up until I don’t. So we’ll see how I go….no promises as this is not the first time I have tried to simplify and schedule this blog. Honestly, it’s not the first time I’ve tried to simplify and schedule my life.
As always I have a lot happening, like so many of us do, between full-time work, online study, organising and setting up our newish house, family and furbabies. But then I also want ‘me time’ to do the things I love – reading, blogging, crocheting, meditating, pilates, yoga, going for walks…. so there’s a little bit of push and pull as I try to work out the best way to fit it all in and not burnout. Wish me luck!
Bookish things:
This week’s reading was a mixed bag with two 5 star reads, a four star read and one DNF.
Here’s what I read:
The Vanishing Act of Margaret Small by Neil Alexander – ★★★★★
Meet Margaret Small: 75, plain spoken and a Cilla Black super fan. Shortly after the death of her idol, Margaret begins receiving sums of money in the post, signed simply ‘C’.
She is convinced it must be Cilla, but how can it be? To solve the mystery of her benefactor Margaret must go back in her memories almost 70 years, to the time when she was ‘vanished’ to a long-stay institution for children with learning disabilities.
An absorbing and page-turning mystery with a dual timeline, The Vanishing of Margaret Small takes readers into a fascinating past, and introduces an unforgettable literary heroine.
My thoughts: Worth every single star. It’s been a while since I’ve read historical fiction but I devoured this in a sitting. It was unputdownable. I loved Margaret right from the start, she had such a beautiful heart and I couldn’t help but champion her.
This novel was a very real depiction of disability and mental health during this period of history. Margaret’s experience being institutionalised was fraught with abuse, danger and trauma but somehow she managed to survive, finally creating a life for herself outside of the institution.
I enjoyed the dual timeline and the letters from ‘C’ kept me guessing (and hoping) right to the very satisfying ending. Hard to believe that this is the author’s debut.
The Surrogate by Freida McFadden -★★★★★
Abby wants a baby more than anything.
But after years of failed infertility treatments and adoptions that have fallen through, it seems like motherhood is not in her future. That is, until her personal assistant Monica makes a generous offer that will make all of Abby’s dreams come true.
Or all of her nightmares.
Because it turns out Monica isn’t who she says she is. The woman now carrying Abby’s child has dark, twisted secrets. And she will stop at nothing to get what she wants.
My thoughts: Another 5 star read from Freida McFadden. One of her earlier books, I read The Surrogate in a night with my hand to mouth and dread in my stomach. I couldn’t turn away from my kindle for a second. My husband was barred from interrupting me…it was just so good.
I’m becoming a big fan of McFadden and would like to work my way through her backlist.
The Eights by Joanna Miller -★★★★
They knew they were changing history.
They didn’t know they would change each other.
Oxford, 1920. For the first time in its 1000-year history, the world’s most famous university has admitted female students. Giddy with dreams of equality, education and emancipation, four young women move into neighbouring rooms on Corridor Eight. They have come here from all walks of life, and they are thrown into an unlikely, life-affirming friendship.
Dora was never meant to go to university, but, after losing both her brother and her fiancé on the battlefield, has arrived in their place. Beatrice, politically-minded daughter of a famous suffragette, sees Oxford as a chance to make her own way – and her own friends – for the first time. Socialite Otto fills her room with extravagant luxuries but fears they won’t be enough to distract her from her memories of the war years. And quiet, clever, Marianne, the daughter of a village vicar, arrives bearing a secret she must hide from everyone – even The Eights – if she is to succeed.
But Oxford’s dreaming spires cast a dark in 1920, misogyny is still rife, influenza is still a threat, and the ghosts of the Great War are still very real indeed. And as the group navigate this tumultuous moment in time, their friendship will become more important than ever.
The Eights is a captivating debut novel about sisterhood, self-determination, courage, and what it means to come of age in a world that is forever changed.
My thoughts: A perfect read for International Women’s Day. A captivating historical fiction set in an era of change for women’s rights. I loved reading about these four women, their bonds of friendship tied to their fight for education in a ‘man’s world’. Each of the girls had heartbreakingly realistic backstories and showed incredible strength, determination and courage as they supported one another to follow their dreams.
As for the DNF:
This year I am trying not to waste time on books that I just know are not for me, DNFing early instead of pushing through. However, I won’t be highlighting these books or explaining why I couldn’t read it so as to not sway anyone’s opinion one way or another. I feel that even though I didn’t enjoy it, doesn’t mean someone else might not love it…or at least find it readable.
And that’s my bookish week. How was yours?
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