Did you enjoy The Crown on Netflix or Victoria on PBS Masterpiece Theater? Then check out my latest library blog listing related reading for fans of the series.
Of the fifty odd books I read this year I’ve picked a handful of favorites, all but one published this year. My two fiction choices are both beautifully written stories of wartime, one set on the Eastern front in World War I and one in London during and after World War II. I was stunned that neither of them made the New York Times or Washington Post’s Best Books of the Year list. My nonfiction choices are both histories, not surprisingly as I read a lot of history. What these have in common is that I knew absolutely nothing about the subjects beforehand and they were both revelatory. Next my favorite guilty pleasure of the year and my favorite older book discovery. Continue reading
The Execution of Guy Fawkes by Nicholas Visscher
One of the oddest questions I’ve been asked since moving to the U.S. is “Do you celebrate Thanksgiving in England?” Yes, this was a real question. I resisted the temptation to answer “Yes, we celebrate that the Puritans left and took their repressive ban on dancing and merriment with them!” More tactfully I said “No, but we have our own November holiday, Guy Fawkes Day.” That met with blank stares. So I explained that Guy Fawkes was a guy who plotted to blow up King James and the Houses of Parliament in 1605. He was part of a Catholic plot to restore the true faith in Protestant England. “You mean you have a day to celebrate a domestic terrorist?” “No, no” I hastily corrected. “We burn him Continue reading
The bride wore white. The bride wore red. It was an American wedding. The marriage of my cousin Christopher’s daughter Emily and Kunal, the son of Indian-Americans.
Family members of the bride and groom traveled to the little town of Roslyn on Long Island. We came from near and far, from New York City and Long Island, from Kansas and Virginia, from San Francisco and Washington State, from Maryland and England. We came to celebrate the union of two people, two families, and two cultures. The couple are both the children of immigrants, the bride’s father from England, of Irish heritage, and Continue reading
The View
The excited cries and yells of the teenagers echoed down the narrow, winding stone staircase and into our tiny hotel room where we were trying, unsuccessfully, to unpack without bumping into one another. We had just arrived at the Porta Rossa Hotel in Florence, a 13th century building that looked as though it hadn’t been renovated in all the centuries since. It was a kind of Italian Fawlty Towers, only with a real tower. We hurried up the stairs to find the source of the excitement. A rat in their room wouldn’t have been out of place in this medieval pile. Continue reading
German troops on the Champs Elysees in Paris 1940
My latest blog for my former professional home, Montgomery County Public Libraries, is a companion piece to my post on Churchill’s V sign. I introduce a selection of books on World War II resistance in Europe and reveal my favorite fiction and nonfiction books of the year so far, which just happen to be on the same theme. Also, the next book up on my nightstand, by one of my favorite authors: Resistance in World War II
Trump’s 12 Days of Christmas
On the first day of Christmas Trump found beneath his tree
A Democratic House majority
On the second day of Christmas Trump found beneath his tree
Two ex-Chiefs of Staff and
A Democratic House majority
On the third day of Christmas Trump found beneath his tree
Three resigning generals Continue reading →