MARCH TBR AND FEBRUARY WRAP UP | MARCH 2018

MARCH TBR AND FEBRUARY WRAP UP | MARCH 2018

I read quite a lot in February, partly due to the fact that I went on holiday, and I read A LOT on holiday. I took four books with me, but only read three. Before I went on holiday I finished The Secret History by Donna Tartt. I've done an entirely separate blogpost on the book, and overall I wasn't that impressed by it. I enjoyed the structure and the characters, but the whole plot wasn't very plausible to me in the slightest. 

Down to the books I read on holiday; firstly I read Sebastian Faulks' A Week In December. I've been wanting to read it since getting it for Christmas, and from a previous blog post I have confessed that Sebastian Faulks is my favourite author. This book follows multiple characters which overlap someway or another. The characters vary from teenager to elderly man, rich capitalist, to poor idealists; which typically involves their view on society, and the way each generation does and thinks about the world. It is set in Metropolitan London, therefore comes with the current issues of the city and the UK in general; drugs, social media, mental health, terrorism, economy, religion, politics and the ins and out of the Internet. The novel incorporates the social ladder of the rich and the poor; which come together in the form of a 'dinner party'. Faulks' in all describes the insecurity and awkward arrogance of that social setting, especially when politics is involved. Especially after last year (2017) being such a dramatic and devastating one for the UK, it's a feeling of togetherness at the end, when the multiculturalism and different values equals what makes modern society; a sense of solidarity (with a few oddballs in terms of the money hungry and power hungry like John Veals). 

The second book I read was Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. Always fitting when in the hot sunshine to be reading about the harsh weather of the Scottish Highlands. It's a fantasy-historical novel where Claire Randall who currently was in 1945 travels back in time to 1743. The book is full of ancient traditions especially witchcraft. In 1945 and in the Second World War she was a War Nurse, and was also newly married; they travelled to Scotland for a honeymoon after the war. But where they are visited is full of 'witches' and the magical realism of a stone circle carries Claire back in time. Now, in 1743 Scotland is in the realm of Jacobite uprisings. Claire desperately wants to find her way back to 1945, but then Claire falls in to the hands of Highlander James Fraser, they inevitably fall in love (she soon becomes reluctant to go home to her husband in 1945. But of course it looks slightly suspicious to have an English woman walking the Highlands with a rugged Highlander, but that's all part of the mystery of her story. 

Charlotte Gray, another by Sebastian Faulks I read whilst on holiday also. This is the second in his 'France Trilogy' I've read, and I was not disappointed. Charlotte Gray is a Scottish woman, who moves to London. She starts as the socially awkward and unhappy young woman, in someways she is quite lost in her way. Then she meets Peter Gregory, falls in love but there is a war on and he is sent to Southern France on a secret mission, but gets caught there and injured. She also gets involved with the G-section, and since she's speaks fluent French she becomes a courier to France. But since receiving news that Peter is missing, she decides to stay in France. But little did she know that she would get involved with the Nazi regime and the genocide of Jewish people. I loved this book because of the historical element, and the paradox of the idyllic French countryside being indulged in a war zone. 

Onto my March TBR; I've started re-reading Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks. I think sometimes you need to reread your favourite books, and books in your collection to really appreciate them. I'm also reading Beginning Theory; An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory by Peter Barry. I'm starting to build my collection of essential reading for when I start University in September (so far I'm enjoying learning about the different strands of theory). 
Other books I plan to read is White Teeth by Zadie Smith. I think it's time for me to delve in to Zadie's writing, because I've heard so much about it. Also hopefully, I will get to The Undergroud Railroad by Colson Whitehead. 

'We never leave a library or a bookstore empty handed, even when our hands are empty' - Kristin Costello 

Happy Reading 
Rose x