Contender for my book of the year

At Hawthorn Time by Melissa Harrison was an excellent novel. It's a book that is stronger of characterisation than plot and there are some tremendous characters ranging from young to old, male to female, which is quite a feat. Pervading it all is a sadness at the loss of traditional ways and our disconnection with Nature. If you like Hardy's The Woodlanders then you'd like this.

900 page epic

Stalingrad by Vasily Grossman is by far the longest book yet on the library challenge weighing in at 900 pages, and this is only the prequel, lol. I didn't enjoy it that much, I have to admit. It had a massive cast list, I didn't know who I was reading about half the time, although there was a list of characters at the back but a lot of them had very similar Russian names and it was quite strangely ordered. Sections of it were good, if you like War and Peace you'll probably like this. I prefer books with a small cast list. 6/10

A guest post from GoodReads

The Wild Silence by Raynor Winn
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The first book was excellent, this concludes the story. It's essentially in three parts: finding a new home, the initial writing and success of The Salt Path, and then a second walk and more on a new walk and Moth's illness.

Hard to imagine what will come next, other than a long hiatus before the next update, or embarking on a new writing project altogether.

An amazing rags to (relative) riches story anyway!

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