May reading roundup #1

The Importance of Being Seven, Alexander McCall Smith
The sixth Scotland Street novel finds Matthew and Elspeth expecting triplets (!), Angus and Domenica traveling to Italy on holiday, and Bertie struggling, as ever, with his overbearing mother, Irene (and longing to turn seven). Fun and philosophical and gently satirical, like all the other books in this amusing series.

The End of Night, Paul Bogard
Our night skies are disappearing, due to the increasing brightness and volume of man-made light. Bogard visits a wide range of bright and dark places – from the dazzling Las Vegas Strip to Acadia National Park in Maine – to explore the effects of light pollution on our health, our public spaces and our society. His deep love for the night is infectious, and his interviews with folks ranging from astronomers to night-shift workers are fascinating. To review for Shelf Awareness (out July 9).

Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake, Anna Quindlen
I loved this warm, witty book of essays, in which Quindlen touches on everything from the importance of girlfriends to the profound changes wrought by the women’s movement during her lifetime. She writes wisely and often humorously about marriage, motherhood, family and aging – it felt like I was sitting across the table, listening as she shared her wisdom. Wonderful.

Someday, Someday, Maybe, Lauren Graham
Aspiring actress Franny Banks came to NYC after college, determined to make it big in three years – and she’s got six months left. Graham (whom I loved on Gilmore Girls) has created a fun first novel, full of New York moments, sly humor and wonderful mid-90s details (answering services, high-top sneakers, pay phones). Franny is funny, smart and full of spunk, and I rooted for her the whole way. The ending was a bit abrupt, but this was a wonderful ride.

The Romeo and Juliet Code, Phoebe Stone
After leaving England, 11-year-old Felicity is dropped off at her grandmother’s house in Maine while her stylish, mysterious parents return to Europe to pursue their secret work. When Felicity’s uncle starts receiving top-secret letters from her father, Felicity and her new friend Derek investigate. I found Felicity naive and bratty at first, but I did enjoy the story, and I eventually warmed to her. Fun weekend reading.

Calling Me Home, Julie Kibler
African-American hairdresser Dorrie is surprised when her favorite (white) client, Miss Isabelle, asks a big favor: she wants Dorrie to drive her from Texas to Cincinnati for a funeral. As the women travel north, Isabelle shares her story of falling in love with a black boy as a teenager in 1930s Kentucky. Meanwhile, single mom Dorrie is dealing with her own problems, and wondering whether she can trust the new man in her life. I found 1930s Isabelle a bit naive and selfish, but I liked both Dorrie and present-day Isabelle, and several plot twists kept me turning the pages.

Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris, Paul Gallico
I loved this spunky, sweet tale of a British charwoman who saves her money for years so she can jaunt over to Paris and buy herself a Dior gown. The gown is exquisite, of course, but the people Mrs. Harris meets, and the connections they forge, are the best part of the story. (Also: the flowers.) Recommended by Jaclyn. Similar to Miss Pettigrew, shorter and simpler but just as charming.

The September Society, Charles Finch
Victorian gentleman detective Charles Lenox returns for a second case, investigating the death of a young man at Oxford (his alma mater). I loved the visits to 1860s Oxford, different from and yet so similar to the Oxford I know and adore. And I like Lenox, a thoughtful and principled detective, and his circle of friends. Great fun.

Ready for a Brand New Beat, Mark Kurlansky
Released at the beginning of the “Freedom Summer” of 1964, “Dancing in the Street” became the anthem of an unsettled generation. Kurlansky delves into the history of music in mid-century America, the origins of Motown, the civil rights movement and the continuing life of the song, which endures today. Fascinating and well-researched, with plenty of outsize personalities. To review for Shelf Awareness (out July 11).

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May Day memories

It’s finally glorious spring here in Cambridge, and everything – from the azaleas to the tulip magnolias to the shrubs lining the sidewalks near my office – is blooming. The tiny sunken garden next to my building is filled with tulips and flowering trees; the planters outside the nearby Episcopal church are bursting with daffodils. And the other day, the Internet was blooming with people calling “Happy May Day!” to one another.

I didn’t celebrate, or know anyone who celebrated, May Day when I was growing up – I’d read about Maypoles, but they seemed mostly an historical concept. I don’t really celebrate it now. But like so many other things, May Day took on a new significance during the year I lived in Oxford.

Since time immemorial (or since 1509), a group of boy choristers from Magdalen College School have rung in the month of May at dawn, from the top of Magdalen College tower (which sits at one end of the bridge spanning the River Cherwell), with a few a cappella madrigal songs. This coincides with the end-of-term balls at many Oxford colleges, so much of the audience consists of bleary-eyed students wearing crumpled ball gowns and slightly askew tuxedos, the girls’ elaborate coiffures slipping out of their perfect arrangements. Crowds gather on either side of Magdalen Bridge in the chilly blue dawn; jackets are necessary (unless, I suppose, you’ve been out drinking all night).

May Day is also my friend (and Oxford housemate) Lizzie’s birthday, and that year, it was the day of the student end-of-term ball at my beloved church. Both Lizzie and I had planned to go (and bought new dresses for the occasion). Although we knew we were going to be up half the night, we dragged ourselves out of bed in the dark, threw on jeans, jackets and scarves, and walked with our other two housemates, Grace and Jo, down the length of the Cowley Road and over Magdalen Bridge.

As the sun crept upward over the horizon, we huddled among students, tourists, families with sleepy young children and more than a few bobbing balloons. We knew this day was a beginning – the first day of May, the dawn of summer – but we also knew it was the beginning of an ending. We’d spent eight months living together in our wee chocolate-box house in East Oxford, but in May, we would all finish our courses and at least two of us (Grace and I) would leave Oxford for good. But that day, we still had four weeks to revel in each other’s company.

We waited, wrapped in pashminas, morning mist in our hair, to hear the first line ring out from the tower: “Now is the month of Maying.” The crowd was hardly silent, and it was difficult to make out all the words. But we stood and listened, then joined the masses streaming down the High Street in search of breakfast. We treated Lizzie, for her birthday, at a cafe down on George Street, and then we walked back home through the brightening morning, under blossoming tree branches. That night, Lizzie and I slipped on our new dresses and high heels, and danced under the vaulted ceiling at St Aldates, with dozens of our friends.

That last month in Oxford was bittersweet in a thousand ways. I was headed home to the West Texas college town I loved and missed, to be near my family and friends and marry the man I loved. But I was also loath to leave this quiet city of books and gardens, and the friends I’d made during my year there. I longed to freeze time during those last weeks, even as the days slipped away one by one, even as I filled them with long walks and afternoons in cafes and college garden tours and “last things.”

Since I couldn’t hold on to those days, I made every effort to savor them. Even if it meant waking up before dawn and taking a long, chilly walk to hear some old songs performed.

Every year, when the trees burst suddenly into bloom and the light turns golden after months of bare branches and grey skies, I remember that morning in Oxford, listening to that ancient, joyous song with those three girls so dear to me.

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Exploring Cambridge

Thanks to the bike I venture a bit farther afield each day, so that I am beginning to feel I own this place, with its narrow twisty streets and forests of chimney pots. I seem to find a fascinating little shop round every new corner. I gaze at knitting wools, and jumpers, and cookware, but I spend my pocket money in the secondhand bookshops. I love the dry, musty smell of the volumes, the tissue-thin feel of the paper. Even the typefaces speak of vanished elegance. Already the books are accumulating in my room, and nothing, I think, makes a place more like home. In the evenings I curl up in my window seat and look out over the rooftops as the light fades. Sometimes I read, sometimes I just hold a book, and I feel the strongest sense of contented elation.

—Deborah Crombie, Dreaming of the Bones

Although the narrator of this passage is speaking about Cambridge, England, this passage captures perfectly how I feel about Oxford (pictured above). As I adjust to working in Harvard Square (in Cambridge, Massachusetts), the first few lines also express my fascination with my new neighborhood.

I don’t have a bike, as I did in Oxford. Instead I ride the subway to Harvard Square and walk the short distance to my new workplace. On my lunch breaks, as I did downtown, I am exploring these narrow twisty streets on foot, gazing at shop windows or curling up in cafes for cups of tea and squares of dark chocolate. (Dado Tea, a block from my office, is already a favorite.)

I am listening, observing, absorbing the beat and rhythm of life on the Square. And I, too, feel a strong sense of contented elation.

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January reading roundup #2

The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love, Kristin Kimball
Kristin Kimball was a total New York City girl, until she fell in love with a handsome, charming, exasperating farmer. This is the story of their first year running a farm in upstate New York, when everything could (and did) go wrong. Despite the trials (and the dirt), Kimball fell deeply in love with her new life and work. She writes beautifully about that year’s triumphs and griefs, about finding new reserves of strength in herself, about struggling forward each day. Lovely and wise.

Alice I Have Been, Melanie Benjamin
I loved Benjamin’s latest, The Aviator’s Wife, so I picked up this novel narrated by Alice Liddell, the original Alice in Wonderland. Benjamin explores Alice’s childhood and her (rather fraught) relationship with Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll). I am not an Alice in Wonderland fan; I find the story confusing and creepy. But I enjoyed the descriptions of Oxford in the 1860s/1870s, and I found Alice herself a complex, intriguing character. Benjamin also details Alice’s later life, about which I knew virtually nothing, and which I found fascinating and heartbreaking. A gripping (if at times uncomfortable) story of an unusual woman.

The Inklings: C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and Their Friends, Humphrey Carpenter
I’m fascinated by the Inklings and enjoyed this “group biography,” meticulously researched and detailed. Because I recently read a new C.S. Lewis biography, the first part (about him) was repetitive for me, but I learned a great deal about Charles Williams, and about the group’s evolution over the years. (It saddens me that it eventually dropped off.) Carpenter’s fictional re-creation of an Inklings meeting, drawn from diaries and letters, is particularly spirited and fun.

The Plain Old Man, Charlotte MacLeod
I needed something light after Alice I Have Been, so picked up this sixth Sarah Kelling mystery. Sarah gets roped into painting both scenery and faces for her Aunt Emma’s community theatre production. All is well until an heirloom painting disappears and a cast member turns up dead. This story started slowly, but the pace picked up later and the eventual solution was clever. Part mystery, part comedy of errors, part wacky family story (as always). Good fun.

The God of the Hive, Laurie R. King
Sherlock Holmes and Mary Russell’s tenth adventure finds them separated and on the run, from enemies known and unknown. Russell lands in a forest at a hermit’s cabin, while Holmes makes for Holland with his injured son. After resting and regrouping (and some great use of the Times agony column), they head for London and a confrontation with their foe. Fast-paced, with (thank heaven) more moments of levity than The Language of Bees. I was pleased at the return of Holmes’ bolt-holes around London and his well-known deductive reasoning. Lots of fun.

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What are you reading lately?

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Lark Rise to Candleford

I love small towns. And the English countryside. And quiet, witty, heartwarming dramas filled with characters whose lives twine about each other in amusing and interesting ways. So when my friend Allison recommended a BBC miniseries that fit all these criteria, I paid attention.

Sarah had gushed over this series last winter, but for some reason I didn’t pick it up then; perhaps it wasn’t the right time. But she alluded to it again recently, just before Allison rhapsodized about it. So I took myself to the library and picked up the first season. And oh, I am in love.

Image from the Guardian

Based on a trilogy of semi-autobiographical novels, the story follows Laura Timmins as she moves from the Oxfordshire hamlet of Lark Rise to the nearby town of Candleford, to work in the post office under the guidance of Dorcas Lane, her mother’s cousin. What Laura (and viewers) quickly discover is that the post office is the hub of Candleford. In addition to letters and parcels, the secrets, worries, hopes and problems of the town all seem to pass through Miss Lane’s domain and, eventually, through her capable hands.

Miss Lane is a wonderful leading lady – spunky, sweet and slyly mischievous, as well as witty, sharp-eyed and fiercely independent. She understands, and relishes, the uniqueness of her position as a single woman who owns a business vital to Candleford’s day-to-day life. Though she holds herself and her employees to high standards, she does occasionally use the power of her office to do a bit of well-intentioned meddling in her neighbors’ lives. The results are occasionally disastrous, but always entertaining. And Laura – prim and shy at times, but headstrong and feisty at others – proves a willing and capable apprentice. It is so gratifying to watch her grow into herself.

Image from Life on the Cutoff

This series features the sort of ensemble cast I adore, with characters ranging from plain, simple country folk (Laura’s family and neighbors in Lark Rise) to up-and-coming townspeople (such as the nosy but lovable Pratt sisters, who run a clothing and alterations shop). The inner circle of the post office, including Thomas Brown the devout postman and Minnie the hapless scullery maid, forms a tight little family of its own. They love and scold and take care of one another, no matter what small squabbles or larger troubles they face. Back in Lark Rise, Laura’s parents have a wonderfully realistic marriage. They love one another and their children fiercely, but they do argue from time to time. And their sweet, elderly neighbors, industrious Queenie and her lazy husband Twister, are such fun.

I’m deep into the second of the show’s four seasons (and have developed a crush on Fisher Bloom, the dark-eyed, plain-speaking traveling clockmaker). Some things have changed: there’s a new maid in the post office, a new hotel owner in town with eyes for Miss Lane, new challenges for the residents of both places. But the warm, witty dialogue, the bucolic charm and the spunky, winning characters (all of whom I’d like to meet) remain.

Have you watched Lark Rise to Candleford? If so, what do you think? (No spoilers, please!)

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Do you have any peppermint?

When I moved back to Oxford to spend a year earning my master’s degree, I shared a wee house in East Oxford with three English girls.

One of my new housemates, Lizzie, worked at Starbucks. In fact, the first time I met her, to introduce myself and pick up my house key, was at Starbucks on the High Street in central Oxford. I sipped nervously at a raspberry smoothie, studying the blue-eyed girl across from me, hoping she wouldn’t regret opening her home to an unknown American she’d met via Facebook.

Before long, Lizzie transferred to a new Starbucks shop in Headington, up the hill from our house. Despite my preference for independent cafes, I dropped by occasionally when she was on shift. I am not a coffee drinker, and I don’t particularly care for Starbucks teas (my usual drink of choice there is a chai latte). But in early December, I was hankering for a peppermint hot chocolate, so I stopped in and ordered one.

The girl at the counter, one of Lizzie’s co-workers, stared at me in confusion. “We don’t have any peppermint,” she said.

I frowned. Surely she was mistaken? Even across the Atlantic, the red cups and red aprons had come out in November, and the board behind her touted various holiday drinks. And I knew from my own time as a barista that many cafes keep peppermint syrup on hand year-round. No peppermint? At all?

I shrugged. Perhaps they were out. “I’d like a regular hot chocolate, then.”

A few minutes later, Lizzie came over to the table where I sat, sipping my non-minty drink, and I told her they’d better order some peppermint, since the holidays were approaching quickly.

She stared at me with the same look her co-worker had worn.

“No peppermint? She’s mad! We must have a whole case of it in the back room!”

After another second or two, we both burst out laughing.

The next week, when I dropped by and ordered a minty hot chocolate, Lizzie stared at me with a straight face, her blue eyes dancing. “We don’t have any peppermint,” she said.

As her co-worker (a different one this time) stared at her as though she’d gone mad, we both cracked up again.

It’s been five years, but every time I order a peppermint hot chocolate, I think of Lizzie, and smile.

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Mulling cider (and thoughts)

While it’s no secret that I am a tea fanatic (especially as the nights grow colder), I’m drinking a fair amount of mulled apple cider these days. The orchard where we go to pick apples sells it by the gallon, and it’s also in stock at my grocery store.

This isn’t the saccharine, powdered cider mix of my childhood, stirred into mugs of hot water: it is pure, distilled apples, fresh and tart and bold. A cold glass of it tastes like apple juice, only stronger and less sweet. But I like it best after it’s simmered on the stove for a while, with a few cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, allspice berries and a sprinkle of nutmeg.

My friend Abigail often brings cider to church potlucks or friends’ houses in the fall and winter. She likes it best when it’s “really mulled” – the longer the better. It amazes me that while the cider is delicious in its fresh form, the application of heat, spices and time transforms it into something richer, layered and ultimately different.

This time of year, I start to miss Oxford pubs, most of which keep a fat-bellied pot of mulled wine simmering on the front counter through November and December, spiced and steaming, with thin orange slices floating in it. I’m not much of a drinker, but I have fond memories of sipping that wine in a few cozy pubs on wet, dark English winter nights. (The photo above is from Paris, where the mulled wine is equally lovely.) I have nothing against red wine by itself, but I like it best with the added notes of cinnamon, cloves and citrus.

So it is with mulling over thoughts. Most of my (good) ideas don’t arrive fully formed: they require some simmering before they reach their final state. Sometimes I have to throw some “spices” into the mix: different angles, fresh questions, a conversation with a friend. Sometimes, as with the cider, I add the extra ingredients and walk away, letting time and my subconscious do their work. Although the ideas often have value in their raw state, they are improved by a little mulling.

As far as I know (and I even consulted the OED), the mulling of cider or wine and the mulling over of thoughts aren’t etymologically related. But the processes, it turns out, are quite similar. And they both produce something sweet at the end.

What are you mulling – cider, wine, ideas – lately?

PS: We did see high winds and rain as a result of Hurricane Sandy, but we never lost power and are safe and dry. I hope all of you who were in the storm’s path are safe, too. And Happy Halloween!

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Apples, cinnamon and hospitality

Every fall, when the apples appear by the bag at the grocery store (or when we go and pick our own), I reach for the same recipe: Ina Garten’s Apple and Pear Crisp. It has all the best attributes of a crisp recipe: fresh, tart fruit; a crumbly topping of butter, oats and brown sugar; dashes of cinnamon and nutmeg; zest and juice from both an orange and a lemon. (It tastes fine with one or the other, but including all four hits of citrus definitely makes a difference.)

My friend Kara, who pointed me to this recipe, recently posted a photo of it in progress. As I looked at her blue mixing bowl, full of chopped fruit speckled with cinnamon, my mouth watered. And my mind went back to a cozy kitchen outside Fort Worth, Texas, on a frigid February night.

Earlier that day, I had hopped a plane from Abilene, sporting new fleece-lined boots and toting a smart red suitcase, headed to New York for a writing retreat. It was my first trip to New York, my first time flying solo in quite a while, and I was jazzed. But my excitement quickly turned to frustration and then deep disappointment when the “snowpocalypse” on the East Coast grounded all eastbound flights out of DFW. I wasn’t going anywhere that day.

I called Kara, with whom I had shared several college classes and a glorious semester abroad in Oxford, knowing she was living temporarily at her parents’ house after finishing graduate school. Kind soul that she is, she drove to the airport, loaded me and my suitcase into her car, then drove me back to her family’s house. After hugging me, her mom teasingly reminded me of the first night I spent there, when a late-night flat tire after a concert left several of us college girls stranded. Apparently I show up at their house when I am in trouble. But they always welcome me as though I were an expected, even an honored, guest.

It was Kara’s turn to cook dinner, so I went with her to the grocery store and then we donned aprons and got to work. We had shared a kitchen in Oxford, with nearly a dozen other girls, heating oatmeal and pasta and chopping vegetables for stir-fries, baking scones and cookies, drinking countless cups of tea. We also volunteered at our church once a week, cooking meals for a theology course they offered on Tuesday nights, spinning salad and singing hymns and teasing the church’s chef, Jules. It had been several years since all that chopping and cooking, but we fell easily into the rhythm of the kitchen again.

I don’t remember anything else we ate that night, but I remember this: chopping apples and pears on a wooden cutting board, lemon juice soaking into the creases and cuticles of my hands, stinging a little. I remember cinnamon and nutmeg coating the fruit as it glistened in the bottom of a deep baking dish. I remember zesting a lemon and an orange, mixing oats and brown sugar and butter together with my fingers, crumbling it on top of the fruit mixture, sliding the whole thing in the oven.

Later we sat at the long wooden kitchen table with Kara’s parents and her brothers, one of them newly arrived from Africa. I was nearly limp with exhaustion, but I remember smiles and laughter, and conversations about Kara’s new boyfriend in Costa Rica (whom she would later marry) and the newspaper her father runs, and my newlywed life in Abilene. I remember the warm smell of apples, pears and cinnamon, as we dug into our dessert. I felt beloved, embraced, like one of the family.

I haven’t seen Kara in a couple of years, though in a nice bit of irony, she moved back to Abilene right around the time I left for Boston. But every time I peel and chop apples, douse them with lemon juice and cover them crumble topping, I remember that dark, cold night warmed by love and cinnamon and the simple grace of hospitality.

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I never tire of Oxford.

Oxford is a walled city still, and within her black and golden, crumbling, scabrous, aged, dignified, and eternal walls lie pockets of rarefied air, places where, turning a corner or entering a conversation, the breath catches and for an instant one is taken up into . . . if not the higher levels of heaven, at least into a place divine. And then, in the next moment, there comes an eddy of grit, and the ghostly echo of mediaeval oxcarts is heard rumbling down past Christopher Wren’s bell tower on their way from Robert D’Oilley’s castle to his grand bridge over the river.

The High Street, seen from St Mary’s tower

Up the High towards the tantalising curve, but before entering it, at the very foot of St Mary’s wise divinity, I made an abrupt turn north, and there, oddly satisfying in its scorn for a deliberate and formal perfection, was the quadrangle with the round earthiness of the Radcliffe Camera in its centre, bounded on its four sides by the tracery of All Souls on my right, the height of St Mary’s at my back, Brasenose College on the left giving nothing away, and before me, where there should rightly have been trumpets and gilt, the unadorned backside of the Bodleian and the Divinity School. I was home.

—Laurie R. King, A Letter of Mary

The Radcliffe Camera

I am loving every bit of Laurie R. King’s series following the adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Mary Russell, including the convoluted plots, the witty banter, the delightful cast of minor characters and the historical details. But Mary’s love for Oxford, which matches my own, positively thrills me to my toes.

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May reads, part 3

I’m getting through a lot of books lately, and the stacks are (as always) growing. Here, what I’ve been reading:

A little reading with my tea

These Ruins are Inhabited, Muriel Beadle
I found this one at the Montague Bookmill (shelved in the fiction section!). It’s a delightful memoir by a journalist whose husband was a visiting professor at Oxford in the 1960s. Like me, they spent a year in Oxford as wide-eyed Americans who soaked up all the joys (and some of the frustrations) of English life. Some of the details are quaintly outdated, but much of Oxford’s character endures (as always). Beadle’s stories of rambling round the city and meeting all kinds of English folks (and fellow expats) are charmingly familiar. So much fun.

Emily Davis, Miss Read
This is the life story of Miss Clare’s dear friend Emily Davis, longtime village schoolteacher. Best enjoyed if you’re already familiar with Fairacre and its mores and citizens. The more time I spend there, the more I admire these quiet, hardworking, kind country people. (Link is to a 2-in-1 edition including this book and Miss Clare Remembers.)

Bloomability, Sharon Creech
Domenica “Dinnie” Doone, who has spent her childhood moving around the U.S., spends a year in Switzerland attending the boarding school where her uncle works. She misses her family, but meets fellow students from all over the world, learns to ski and starts to believe that anything is “bloomable” (her Japanese friend’s word for “possible”). Sweet and fun. (Recommended by friend and reader Allison.)

What I Wore, Jessica Quirk
Quirk runs a popular fashion blog (which I found via Anne at Modern Mrs. Darcy). Her book is a practical, colorfully illustrated collection of tips on building a wardrobe of mixable basics, layering and accessorizing for each season, and putting your own spin on classic styles. Lots of her advice is basic, even obvious, but it helped me take a fresh look at my closet (always a good idea during the change of seasons, especially after recently reading Overdressed).

Boy Meets Girl, Meg Cabot
I so enjoyed The Boy Next Door that I checked out its sort-of sequel (same setting, mostly different characters). Told in emails, scribbled notes, to-do lists and instant messages, this is a lighthearted story of love, office politics and navigating the single-girl life in New York. Predictable, but fun – perfect for a holiday weekend.

Glory Be, Augusta Scattergood
An unusual take on the “Freedom Summer” of 1964, from the perspective of 11-year-old Glory Hemphill, who lives in Hanging Moss, Mississippi. She writes a letter to the editor when the (segregated) town pool closes, befriends a new girl from the North, and (I love this) stands up to her best friend when he expresses some bigoted opinions. Scattergood evokes the Deep South perfectly; I could almost feel the humidity and see the lightning bugs. The ending is hopeful, but I appreciated that it wasn’t all neat and tidy. (For more, see Beth Fish Reads’ review.)

Oxford, Jan Morris
This is a classic account of the city I adore: a great introduction for Oxford newbies, but with plenty of interesting tidbits for those of us who already know and love it. Morris loves Oxford as much as I do, and she examines many aspects of the city: its religious heritage, its often chaotic college system, the rise of industry and the Cowley motor works, its vegetation, its architecture, and on and on. Her narrative rambles at times, but is mostly fascinating and always thorough. Recommended if you really love Oxford.

The Wicked and the Just, J. Anderson Coats
A fascinating glimpse into medieval Caernarvon, Wales, told alternately from the perspective of Cecily (an English transplant) and Gwenhwyfar (a Welsh girl forced to become Cecily’s servant). Both characters are prickly and not immediately likable, but I kept turning the pages because I wanted to know what happened. (Also intriguing: Gwen never refers to herself as “I” until at least two-thirds of the way into the book.) The plot is based on a historical revolt by the Welsh in 1294, against the English burgesses who were taxing them unfairly. More info at the book’s site.

And Then There Were None, Agatha Christie
A perfectly plotted, truly creepy tale from the Queen of Mystery. I couldn’t go to sleep without finishing it (and then I had to dip into a Miss Read book to calm me down). A cast of distinctly unlikable characters find themselves marooned on an island off the Devon coast, and an unknown murderer starts picking them off one by one. An ingenious (if unsettling) piece of work.

Tyler’s Row, Miss Read
Well-meaning village folk (including all the usual suspects), ambitious renovation projects, cantankerous neighbors, lively schoolchildren, Miss Read’s matchmaking friend Amy, and wry musings by my favorite English schoolteacher. Another winner in the Fairacre series.

Three Bags Full, Leonie Swann
A smart, funny, highly unusual detective story – the detectives are a flock of Irish sheep trying to find out who killed their shepherd! They are unusually intelligent sheep, of course – though they don’t always understand humans. (Neither do I, for that matter.) Such fun and really inventive – a great mystery spiced with philosophical discussions.

What are you reading these days?

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