Haul

A couple of weekends ago I went to the Bookbarn in Somerset. I’ve been many times, ever since I stumbled across it by accident while getting lost. It used to be an absolutely enormous barn of books – as the name applies – and you could only really look at a tiny section each time. I’d go just looking at authors A-D, say. It was extraordinary.

Then they put most of it into an internet-only section, leaving a smaller, newer ‘barn’ where all the books were £1 each. Smaller but still big. And with lots of unsorted shelves where you could find gems – and a cafe, which was good for long-suffering relatives who didn’t want to look at books for hours at a time.

And then I went a couple of weeks ago…

My first thought was disappointment. And my second thought, and my third. They’d closed off two-thirds of the smaller barn. The cafe was bigger, but there was no unsorted section. There were shelves and shelves of cheap, rubbishy paperbacks. And the books weren’t £1 each anymore. The rubbishy paperbacks were, but anything from before about 1960 was in a ‘vintage’ section, where everything was £4. And I’m talking anything. Out-of-date algebra textbooks. Cheap editions of Milton’s poetry. The sort of thing you’d pay 20p for at a church fete.

But… things got better. I made the conscious decision not to compare it to previous trips to the Bookbarn. I would look carefully at the paperbacks. I didn’t find anything I wanted worth £4 in the ‘vintage’ section (and I did hear one old lady say to a staff member “They’re not vintage; they’re just old”), but did get a lot of the paperbacks.

And then I remembered that you could search their warehouse inventory, fill out slips, and get them to bring books out for you. Obviously that did mean no serendipitous finds – but did mean a handful of books I was very pleased to get my mitts on! And, oddly, at very reasonable prices – some rather less than the £4 they’d slapped on unsellable tat in the front of the shop.

Anyway – a rather long intro to the books I did buy! The last five are the ones I ferried from the warehouse catalogue, and the others are the cheapy paperbacks.

The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster
One of those books – or, rather, three of those books – that I’ve intended to read for a while. I don’t remember where I’ve heard good things about it, other than… everywhere, I guess?

The 27th Kingdom by Alice Thomas Ellis
I’ve still only read one Alice Thomas Ellis novel, Unexplained Laughter, but happy to add another to the shelves – particularly one as intriguing as this.

Chapman’s Odyssey by Paul Bailey
As above – read one novel, the brilliant At The Jerusalem, but at one quid I can definitely add another Bailey to the pile.

Nice Work by David Lodge
I haven’t read any Lodge novels yet, but this is on the list for my book group next year.

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
It’s on brand for me to read a book years after everyone was talking about it. Rachel mentioned we could do this one for ‘Tea or Books?’ and then stopped replying to messages, as per.

Linger Awhile by Russell Hoban
This one looks quite trashy and odd, but I loved his Turtle Diary (which was odd but not at all trashy) so will give it a go. Someone falls in love with an actress long after she dies? Something like that?

Thornyhold by Mary Stewart
I’ve never read any Stewart but my friend Kirsty, who was one of the people I went with, had recently read and loved this one and pressed it into my hands.

Behold, Here’s Poison by Georgette Heyer
Perhaps more surprisingly, I’ve never read any Heyer. Whenever someone writes a blog post about her, I say that I intend to try her – and have never even bought any before. Now I have one of her detective novels – hopefully a good’un?

The Color of Evening by Robert Nathan
Nathan is one of those authors I really, really enjoy but don’t remember ever seeing mentioned in the blogosphere (though I have seen The Bishop’s Wife mentioned, a lovely film adapted from his novel of that name). His books are harder to find here than in the US, so was pleased to get this one.

The Bridge by Pamela Frankau
Road Through the Woods by Pamela Frankau
One of the authors I looked up on the warehouse catalogue was Frankau, hoping to find one of her rare, early novels. They didn’t have any of those, but I was also pleased to add these late novels to my Frankau shelves.

Sheaves by E.F. Benson
Paul by E.F. Benson
They did have quite a few scarcer E.F. Benson novels – some out of my budget, but these two were priced relatively low. I was particularly pleased to find Paul, which has intrigued me for a while – and might sneak into Project Names. And onto my overcrowded shelves of unread Bensons.

All in all, I came away with a pile that I was very pleased with – having thought for the first twenty minutes or so that I’d come away empty-handed. Goes to show that even bookshops that have got worse can hold gems, and the intrepid book-hunter shouldn’t be dismayed by initial appearances!

Remember early in 2019 when I said I wouldn’t be buying any books this year? Except special occasions? Well, that is increasingly looking stupid. Cos I’ve bought a lot of books this year. I’ve also read a lot, but still…

Anyway, the silver lining to my total lack of self-control is that I get to do a haul blog post! It’s not all from one place, but here are books I’ve bought over the past month or so. Many of them on two trips to a great secondhand bookshop in Wantage.

Here’s some more details, from top to bottom…

This Other Eden by E.V. Knox
I love a collection of essays – to the extent that my essay shelves are bursting. Might need a shelving rethink.

Don’t, Mr Disraeli by Caryl Brahms and S.J. Simon
I’ve not read anything by these two, but I keep seeing A Bullet in the Ballet around. I guess they were good at titles! This mystery novel will tick Project Names anyway, and that’s enough to convince me that it’s a good purchase.

Alexander’s Bridge by Willa Cather
Another that will work for Project Names, and a novel by Cather that I hadn’t even heard of. I think she might now be on my list of “stop buying books by them and actually read one” now.

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie
Sad Cypress by Agatha Christie
I haven’t bought a book by Christie for ages – mostly because I bought dozens when I was around 14, and have still not quite made my way through them. But I am coming towards the end of that pile, so picked up some cheaply in a charity shop.

The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida
I can’t remember how I came across this book, written by a severely autistic boy about his experience, but I do know that I thought it could be a good way for me to try and understand autism better.

Heat Wave by Penelope Lively
I do have a few unread Livelys, but it was a heat wave when I picked this up, and clearly I’m that suggestible.

Wine of Honour by Barbara Beauchamp
Peace, Perfect Peace by Josephine Kamm
Spam Tomorrow by Verily Anderson
Table Two by Marjorie Wilenski
I’m grouping these because they’re all among the latest reprints from the Furrowed Middlebrow series from Dean Street Press. I got three as review copies, and then bought these four on top – it is such a fascinating looking batch this time around. They’re all connected with WW2. Do check them out!

Sixpence House by Paul Collins
One of my favourite books of the year so far is The Book of William by Collins, all about the First Folio. So it was only a matter of time before I got hold of his book about living in Hay on Wye, and I finally crumbled.

Keep The Home Guard Turning by Compton Mackenzie
Rich Relatives by Compton Mackenzie
Mackenzie is DEFINITELY on the list of authors I should stop buying and start reading – but I’ve made an exception here because the first one was recommended by a couple of people, and because the second is a sequel to Poor Relations, which I loved. At least I think/hope it is.

The Question Mark by Muriel Jaeger
I don’t read a lot of science fiction, but Karen made this one sound so interesting that I went right out and bought the British Library reprint.

There’s a Porpoise Close Behind Us by Noel Langley
I read a fun little book by Langley a while ago, and I couldn’t resist (a) this title, and (b) the fact that it features theatre actors. That’s one of those elements of a novel that I cannot resist.

The Sun in Scorpio by Margery Sharp
The Innocents by Margery Sharp
I am increasingly loving Sharp, and so was delighted to find a couple of her novels in the wild. In Wantage, to be more precise.

Maybe I need to return to the ban on book buying, because I’ve been on a bit of a spree recently. But I also made space for a new bookcase (bookcase still to be bought), so maybe it’s all fine? Anywhere, here’s a bunch of books I bought recently…

I was in Portsmouth last week for a training course, and I had time after it finished to pop to a nearby bookshop. It was very crowded and very reasonably priced. Curiously most of their older fiction seemed to be in ‘pocket sized’ editions, albeit for people with enormous pockets. And I bought a small handful of interesting looking books.

Proud Heaven by Ethel Mannin

Anybody who’s read much about middlebrow novels in the interwar period has probably seen Mannin’s name pop up, but I have very little idea about what her novels are actually like. This is the second of hers on my shelves, so I must give her a proper go sometime soon.

Thin Ice by Compton Mackenzie

OK, I won’t buy any more Mackenzie until I read some of the ones I have. He says.

My Favourite Books by Robert Blatchford

I couldn’t resist a book about books, even if this one is published so early in the century that it’s unlikely to coincide with my favourite books.

The Lack of the Fairfaxes by Katharine Tynan

I’m sure I’ve seen Tynan’s name around. I can’t remember where, but this looked fun – and has a name in the title, so I might even read it under Project Names.

Just those four in Portsmouth – but I was meeting a friend in Woodstock for lunch today, and there’s a lovely little independent bookshop there. So I had a browse, and bought a couple of things that have on my wishlist for a long time, because I like to support independent bookshops. I’m altruistic like that. The third of these came from a charity bookshop in Woodstock.

The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr

This has been getting great reviews, and anything that can make me a better writer can’t hurt. Though, having recently finished writing a novel, I’m hoping this won’t make me have massive re-thinks about structure…

Ghosting by Jennie Erdal

Slightly Foxed often send me their lovely Editions as review copies, so I thought I’d offset that by buying one for myself – which is a memoir of ghostwriting. Fascinating, no?

I For One by J.B. Priestley

A few years back, Priestley’s essay collection Delight was republished – and it was a delight. This collection of essays appears to be things that he wants to complain about – which could well end up being equally fun.

I’ve just been away for a wonderful week in Dorset, staying in a beautiful Georgian mansion with 24 other people. It was the best. It also involved little trips to Bridport and Lyme Regis, and those places have secondhand bookshops. I decided that holidays were exempt from my ban on buying books (that was already, let’s face it, a pretty flimsy ban). And so I bought fourteen books…

The American Way of Death by Jessica Mitford
I’ve been keeping my eye out for this book for years. It’s quite easy to get online, but I’d decided to wait to find it in the flesh. Thank you, Bridport charity shop.

The House by the Sea by May Sarton
I’ve got a few unread Sartons on my shelves, but this is a memoir about staying alone in a house by the sea – and that sounds irresistible to me.

Interim by R.C. Hutchinson
R.C.H. is one of those names from the early-to-mid 20th century that I have seen pop up all over the place, but have never read. (Have you?) I liked this little paperback edition, and Interim is hopefully as good a place to start as any.

The Nutmeg Tree by Margery Sharp
Again, I have quite a few Sharps unread, but I’m always happy to add to that number – and was intrigued by this one being a ‘services edition’. I wonder what an exciting life this copy has led?

The Snow Queen by Michael Cunningham
There is a definite theme to this haul – of finding books by authors I like, when I already have books by them waiting. I don’t have that many by Cunningham unread (one or two), so… better? Maybe?

The Winged Horse by Pamela Frankau
You may remember that I wrote a blog post asking if book recommendation sites worked – and LibraryThing’s #1 recommendation was The Winged Horse. Where LibraryThing advises, I listen. Thank you Sanctuary Books in Lyme Regis for aiding and abetting.

Carnival by Compton Mackenzie
Look, yes, I have lots of Mackenzie unread. This is another. I will not be judged!

The Women’s Side by Clemence Dane
I didn’t know anything about this – though Dane is another author I have on my shelves unread, and I read a lot about her when I was researching The Book Society. This is a short book about women’s rights in 1926, from education to the vote to ‘sex and the business women’. Sounds so interesting! Totally up my street.

The Man on the Pier by Julia Strachey
I love Cheerful Weather for the Wedding by Strachey. This is her only other book, so hopefully it’s just as good.

Lions and Shadows by Christopher Isherwood
I have SO many unread Isherwoods, but I couldn’t put this one back on the shelf once I’d started to flick through it. It’s a fictionalised account of Isherwood’s early writing career, and the literary scene of the 1930s. Fun, no?

Novelists in Interview ed. John Haffenden
This collection of author interviews from 1985 includes people like Angela Carter, Ian McEwan, Iris Murdoch etc. It should be an interesting look at the 1980s literary scene! So many literary scenes.

The Glass of Fashion by Cecil Beaton
The lady in Bridport Old Books was laughingly cross that I was buying this – she has a rule that she leaves everything on the shop floor for a week before buying the books she has her eye on, and I swooped in during that week. It’s a history of fashion in the first half of the 20th century through the eyes of Cecil Beaton, so how could I leave it?

Life Among the English by Rose Macaulay
English Country Houses by Vita Sackville-West
Two slim and rather lovely books by authors I love, in a series called ‘Britain in Pictures’. Er, yes please.

So I’m very happy with this haul, even if it breaking all sorts of self-imposed rules! And now I do need to give proper consideration to where all my new books can fit… or come to the realisation that they can’t.

As mentioned in my Weekend Miscellany, I spent some of Saturday at Astley Book Farm – with some friends from university and their three children. It was super fun (and, let me tell you, Astley does not skimp on their cake slices). The turnover of books didn’t seem to be huge in the six months since I’d been there, and the children’s section might have been more restricted than I’d imagined (having not ventured into that section before). It was definitely still a joy to go back, and I bought four books – maybe the last books I’ll buy this year?? (But also probably not, let’s be honest.)

My Friend Says It’s Bullet-Proof by Penelope Mortimer

I’ve been meaning to buy this distinctively titled Mortimer novel for so long, and just waiting until the moment came. And the moment was here! I do have one or two books I’ve yet to read by her on my shelves, but another can’t hurt.

The Best Books of Our Time by Asa Don Dickinson

This is an annotated list of the best books published between 1900 and 1925. I have only dipped in so far, but the list will hopefully bring loads of suggestions into my life. It is based on the votes of many people, and is just the sort of book I couldn’t leave behind. Who was Asa D D? No idea…

The Dress Doctor by Edith Head

Ms Head might be a big name I hadn’t heard about, but this non-fic book about costume design in 1940s/50s Hollywood sounded fascinating. I flicked through and saw Our Hearts Were Young and Gay mentioned, and I had to have it.

Last Boat to Folly Bridge by Eric Hiscock

I used to leave near Folly Bridge (in south Oxford) and walked across it more or less every day for two years – so the title caught my eye. It’s a memoir about publishing, so even better.

I am trying not to buy books this year, but by the time I’d made that resolution I’d already organised to stay near Hay on Wye for a week. Five friends and I stayed in the beautiful Landmark Trust property Shelwick Court, which is about 40 minutes from the town of secondhand bookshops. Every time I go, there are sadly slightly fewer bookshops – two had closed down since I was there last year – but there are still lots of wonderful places to visit and books to buy. And here’s what I got!

Down the Kitchen Sink by Beverley Nichols
The Moonflower by Beverley Nichols

Every trip seems to mean more Beverley! I hadn’t heard of the second of these, but apparently it’s one of his detective novels. I’m excited to see what he’s like in that mode – my assumption is: fab.

The Passionate Elopement by Compton Mackenzie
The Darkening Green by Compton Mackenzie
Reaped and Bound by Compton Mackenzie

I went to Hay with the intention of stocking up on some more Compton. And I did! I even left quite a few behind – I’m starting to think that I might have been lucky before at picking novels from his funny-novel-period, and he might have been a bit more melodramatic before that. But let’s find out! And the third of these is a collection of essays, even though I have no space on my essays shelves…

The Glory and the Dream by Viola Larkins

I’ve realised that, on book buying trips, I often only buy books by authors I know about – either because I’ve read them before, or by reputation. So I decided to mix it up with at least one book, and was drawn to this one. It seems that I picked somebody truly unknown – this book isn’t mentioned anywhere online, that I can discover, and I have had no luck tracking down info about the author. Here’s hoping it’s a lost gem!

A Cure of Souls by May Sinclair

Always happy to find another Sinclair novel to add to my Sinclair shelves! She was so prolific, and so interesting.

It Gives Me Great Pleasure by Emily Kimbrough

I hadn’t realised that Kimbrough had written so many books, and was pleased to find one of them. I don’t love her solo work as much as I love Cornelia Otis Skinner’s, but it’s still good fun.

Woman of Letters by Phyllis Rose

Some might argue that I don’t need another biography of Virginia Woolf, but to those people I say – did you know that Phyllis Rose wrote one?? I love Rose’s writing, and was really pleased to find this.

Parallel Lives by Phyllis Rose

I LIKE PHYLLIS ROSE.

Old Soldiers by Paul Bailey

I’ve only read one Bailey novel, and I see quite a lot of his around in secondhand bookshops. Having looked at quite a few in Hay, this is the one I came home with.

The Ponder Heart by Eudora Welty

This was the first Welty novel I read, many years ago, but it was a borrowed copy. It seemed about time that I had my own, right?

The Great Victorian Collection by Brian Moore

I still haven’t actually read The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, but I’m banking so much on liking it that I bought another. This is about a man who dreams a Victorian market and then can’t tell dream from reality – which seems super up my street.

The Best We Can Do by Sybille Bedford

I didn’t expect to find Bedford in a green crime Penguin – this is an account of the trial of John Bodkin Adams, a serial killer. Not the sort of book I’d pick up if Bedford hadn’t written it, but hopefully I’ll be brave enough to read it at some point.

Julian Probert by Susan Ertz

I have two Ertz novels I haven’t read, so fingers crossed I like them and want to read this third! And, I’ll be honest, part of me bought it because I thought the cover was rather lovely in its simple design. (And wasn’t it nice when covers weren’t plastered with generic quotes from people you don’t care about?)

I was doing quite well at a month-by-month record of the different books I bought, but it rather fell by the wayside. So, instead, here is the record of a couple of different visits to London over the past few weeks, and the books I bought on my journeys. The photo is of books bought there, various other times, review books, gifts… so not all are mentioned in this post, but do give a yell if you’d like to hear more about any of them!

Firstly, I went up to London on a wet and windy day – to see the excellent productions of The Lover and The Collection as part of the season of Pinter plays at the Harold Pinter theatre. Astonishingly expensive, so I’m glad it was good. While there, I went to visit Rachel (my ‘Tea or Books?’ co-host) in her lovely new flat – and the entire time I was there, her piano was being slowly taken up the stairs. So we couldn’t have our planned lunch together – but it did given me time to dart along to ‘Word on the Water’ – a bookshop on a barge near King’s Cross.

It’s very small, and was lovely and warm when I went. It’s also very low, and I couldn’t stand up fully – but I was crouching to look at books anyway. The selection is necessarily limited, in such a small space, but seems to be well curated – and I came away with a copy of David Sedaris’s diaries.

After the theatre, I popped into Any Amount of Books on Charing Cross Road, which was having a sale in its basement. Dangerous. I bought a few books for other people (I’m so noble) – and, yes, a few for myself. More specifically, The Play Room by Olivia Manning, The Christmas Pudding by Nancy Mitford, and a book by Marghanita Laski about Mrs Ewing, Mrs Molesworth, and Mrs Hodgson Burnett – the first two names are ones I know vaguely, but nothing more. Frances H-B has survived rather better, of course.

On this trip, I was also reading Mrs Gaskell & Me by Nell Stevens – as reviewed the other day – and went off on a hunt to buy her Bleaker House. Easier said than done. Where to look for it?? I went to the enormous and wonderful Waterstones on Piccadilly, and looked through biography and generic literature… they didn’t have it, it turned out, and I went down to Hatchard’s to make the same exploration. (Incidentally – having the queues right in front of the door makes going into Hatchard’s rather an overwhelming process – but, once inside, it’s a lovely building.) No luck – but the man on the desk (once I’d assured him it was definitely Bleaker House that I was after) found it for me – in the creative writing section.

I was back in London this past weekend, meeting up with my dear friend Lucy. She had devised a tour of independent bookshops in East London, which is a part I don’t know very well. It’s also a part that seems to have few secondhand bookshops, so we were only looking at independents selling new books. Since I like to support bookshops by buying at least one, I had to ration myself between the shops…

First up, Libreria. No phones allowed, so I couldn’t check the title of the book I was after – but happily stumbled across it nonetheless: This Little Art by Kate Briggs, all about translation. I read quite a lot of it on the train home, and loved it, so watch this space – indeed, it’s not in the picture above because I’m currently reading it. Libreria is very, very hipster, but (/and) a great shop with a thoughtful selection. Better for browsing than going with a title in mind, I think.

Next, we came to Brick Lane Bookshop – not quite the same brilliance in their selection, but I did enjoy the essays shelves. I hadn’t heard of Difficult Women by David Plante, but it sounds wonderful – as well as looking wonderful, being an NYRB Classics edition. It features portraits of Jean Rhys, Sonia Orwell, and Germaine Greer. Yes please!

When we got to our third planned bookshop, Broadway Books, we discovered that it was closing in three minutes… we had a quick rush around and were asked to leave, so they didn’t get the sale I was contemplating of a Stefan Zweig. But somewhere to try again one day!

While I’m writing about books that have come into the house recently – I have to mention the C.S. Lewis books that Karen/Kaggsy very kindly sent to me recently, while she was having a clear out! I’ve read a few of his non-fiction titles on Christianity and Christian life, and really like them, so am chuffed to get these. Even better, the rest went to my aunt and her church – as my aunt lives a few streets away from Karen!

I’m going to cut back on book buying again next year, one way or another, so I’m making the most of these little treats while I can!

I don’t know why it’s taken me so many years to get to Astley Book Farm. I first heard of it years ago, I think perhaps from this blog post that Hayley wrote in 2010. At the time, I didn’t have a car – and without a car, it wouldn’t be very easy to get to this bookshop. While it’s close to Nuneaton, it’s pretty isolated in transport terms – unsurprising, given that it’s a converted farm. I got a car in 2014, but somehow it didn’t happen – until last weekend!

Astley Book Farm is every bit as wonderful as you all told me it would be. Room after room after room, warren-like, with a wide variety of reasonably priced books. And an amazing cafe. And a snug at the end. And a barn of 50p books. It was all wonderfulllll. I can tell I’ll be back there often. But these are the books I bought while I was there…

The Poor Man by Stella Benson
I’ve been doing surprisingly well with Benson books on recent bookshop trips, and was delighted that the streak is continuing.

Encounter by Milan Kundera
Slowness by Milan Kundera
Yes, I have lots of books by Kundera that I haven’t read, but not these. Until now! Encounter is essays and Slowness is a novel. Yay Kundera!

Willa Cather by Hermione Lee
A Woman of Passion by Julia Briggs
Early Stages by John Gielgud
The Gift by H.D.
What is Remembered by Alice B. Toklas
I’m grouping all of these in a lazy way because I bought them all to stock up my biography/autobiography shelf. The Toklas is after reading Two Lives (which turns out to have kicked off quite a chain reaction), while A Woman of Passion is a biography of E. Nesbit. I started in the biography section, which partly explains why there are so many…

Family Matters by Anthony Rolls
Sergeant Cluff Stands Firm by Gil North
There turn out to be so many British Library Crime Classics I don’t know anything about, and I am grabbing all of ’em.

Mrs Carteret Receives by L.P. Hartley
I might not have bought this if I’d realised it was short stories, as for some reason Hartley doesn’t seem like an author I’d enjoy as much in brief bursts. But it’s mine now, so I’ll find out eventually!

A Wild Swan by Michael Cunningham
Whereas I did know this was short stories, and I’m more than ready to try out Cunningham at that!

Old Filth by Jane Gardam
I’ve only read one Gardam novel (God on the Rocks), but this is the one every talks about as being brilliant – so, since it was 50p, I thought it was worth a shot.

I’m pretty pleased with the haul I came away with! There are definitely a lot of modern paperbacks alongside the more unusual finds, but there’s plenty for everyone – and I’m looking forward to my next trip, if only because of the amount of cake options in the cafe that I’ve still got to sample.

I’ve missed these for a few months, which emphatically doesn’t mean that I’ve not been buying books. But I think I’d been a bit restrained over the past couple of months – and, indeed, had been pretty restrained in August until the last week or so of it… and I have a whole heap o’ books. But they’re pretty great. No regrets.

If Only They Didn’t Speak English by Jon Sopel
I saw Sopel speak at the Hay festival earlier in the year – the only thing I went to, in fact – and it was excellent. Saddening, but excellent. So I eventually got a copy of his book – which retreads a lot of the same ground as his interview, but is good reading nonetheless.

Portrait of Stella Benson by R.E. Roberts
My recent wonderings about Stella Benson led me to buy this – I’d seen it described as a personal account of her life, and I love it when the memoirist has a relationship of some sort with the subject.

Letters of C.S. Lewis
I found this in a charity shop, and apparently bought it shortly after it was put out on the shelves. Which led to a curious conversation with the person shelving books, who I thought wanted to take the copy from me. It was all very confusing.

In the Freud Archives by Janet Malcolm
Forty-One False Starts by Janet Malcolm
Psychoanalysis: the Impossible Profession by Janet Malcolm
The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm
Yup, I was serious when I said that my recent read of Two Lives had sent me off on a Janet Malcolm craze.

The Snow Ball by Brigid Brophy
I really enjoyed her novel Hackenfeller’s Ape, and the Backlisted podcast did an episode that convinced me this novel was definitely worth buying – so I was pleased to find it in a charity shop recently.

The Trip to Echo Spring by Olivia Laing
Adding to my pile of Laing books to read, after really liking To The River. This one is all about writers and alcohol – intriguing, no?

The Bachelors by Adalbert Stifter
I’ll be honest, I don’t even remember buying this. But I love these boxy little Pushkin Press editions.

Reaching Down the Rabbit Hall by Allan Ropper and B.D. Burrell
The subtitle ‘extraordinary journeys into the human brain’ sum this one up – hopefully the sort of popular neurosciency type stuff that I find fascinating.

Rockets Galore by Compton Mackenzie
I want more and more Mackenzie. Though I think this might be a sequel. Which would be the second time I’d done that with Mackenzie.

Rosy is My Relative by Gerald Durrell
Sure, I need more Durrell waiting on my shelves.

Any you’ve read, or would recommend, or are interested in? I’ve already started the Sopel and one of the Malcolms…

I’ve just spent a glorious weekend in this AirBnB in Herefordshire, near the Welsh border, with good friends and great weather. And, yes, it just happened to be near Hay-on-Wye, the town of secondhand bookshop. It also happened (though we didn’t realise this when we booked the holiday) to be the Hay Festival.

When I found out it was the festival, I was a bit worried that all the bookshops would be overcrowded, and all the good books would be gone – but I managed to come away with quite a great haul. AND I saw Jon Sopel talking about Donald Trump, which was entertaining and terrifying in equal measures.

It’s been a little while since I went to Hay, and it was lovely to go back – and, staying nearby, we were able to get there early and leave quite late. ALL THE MORE BOOKSHOPPING. And here are the *cough* 21 books I bought – a haul I’m really pleased with. Bonus: the view from my window at the AirBnB.

Do Butlers Burgle Banks? by P.G. Wodehouse
Company for Henry by P.G. Wodehouse
Barmy in Wonderland by P.G. Wodehouse
One of the bookshops I went in is, sadly, closing down – there do seem to be fewer and fewer each time – and it was holding a half price sale. There were SO many P.G. Wodehouse novels available, and I would have loved to picked up armfuls of the novels I didn’t have yet. I restrained myself and picked three that looked interesting.

Concerning Books and Bookmen by Ian Maclaren
This is a short book about how great books are, and what book obsessives are like – and it was published in the 1910s, which just gores to show that not all that much has changed.

Tantivy Towers by A.P. Herbert
I think APH has appeared in a few of my recent ‘hauls’, and this is a comic opera, of all things.

The Little World by Stella Benson
Here’s a top tip for book hunters: never overlook the ‘pocket classics’ section. I’d long assumed that there were filled with small editions of the standard classics – the Dickens, Gaskell, Wordsworth, etc that could be found anywhere. WELL, not so. It’s where I found this book (travel writing by Stella Benson) and the next one…

Lovers and Friends by E.F. Benson
I was hoping to find some more E.F. Benson in Hay – more on that later – and was really excited to stumble across Lovers and Friends, which I don’t remember ever hearing about before.

Murder at the Manor
Thirteen Guests by J Jefferson Farjeon
More books for my growing British Library Crime Classics shelf! My assumption is that I’ll be reading them for years and years.

Buttercups and Daisies by Compton Mackenzie
I’ve started reading this one already – it’s a very funny novel about a well-meaning tyrannical father and husband who disastrously moves his family to the countryside. I’ll feed back soon!

In the Purely Pagan Spirit by John Lehmann
Having just read some Rosamond Lehmann, I thought I’d read one of her brother’s novels – well, I didn’t know he’d written any novels (despite having read his vituperative memoir of the Woolfs) but now I have one!

Ivy Compton-Burnett by Frank Baldanza
I. Compton-Burnett by Charles Burkhart
Some ICB fan had obviously sold a pile of books to one bookshop, and I was happy to sweep them right UP.

English Journey by Beryl Bainbridge
Apparently this is something of a response to J.B. Priestley’s book of the same name (which I haven’t got or read), but who more entertaining to give her own eccentric and unique perspective on England than Beryl Bainbridge?

The Challoners by E.F. Benson
And another Benson! This was in a shop that had quite a few in stock – though this was the only one I could afford. The man running the bookshop confidently suggested that £250 (which one of the rarer books cost) was “only the price of dinner for four or five people”. Which means that I’ve convinced a stranger that I look like the sort of person who spends at least £50 on dinner, so that’s something.

The Fool Hath Said by Beverley Nichols
News of England by Beverley Nichols
For Adults Only by Beverley Nichols
The Powers That Be by Beverley Nichols
A couple of the people on our trip had popped into Hay the day before I went, and I’d been forewarned about lots of Nichols books – and I swooped in and bought all the ones I didn’t already have. This range seems to encompass novel, essays, journalism, and theology. Versatile!

Rose Macaulay by Jane Emery
I did read bits of this biography of Macaulay in the Bodleian once, but it’s good to have it on my shelves.

Have you read any of these? Or any particularly catch your attention? I’d love to hear your thoughts!