Weekly Reading Round-Up
Happy Friday, all!
Over the course of the week, we hopped from winter straight into summer in NYC, with no spring in between. During the colder part of the week, I read two atmospheric new books, both of which were wins: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries and The Secrets of Hartwood Hall.
I adored Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries, which reminded me a great deal of Margaret Rogerson’s Enchantment of Ravens, crossed with late Victorian/ Edwardian academia in an alternate Cambridge where the study of Faerie is an academic pursuit. It was just utterly pitch-perfect and I can’t wait for the sequel.
After that, I stayed in the Victorian vein with The Secrets of Hartwood Hall, which hit all the beloved Gothic tropes: a vicar’s widow forced by penury to take a job as a governess at a dilapidated manor house where the inhabitants are feared by the villagers– but why? And what secrets does the heroine bring with her?
Right now, I’m not at all sure what to read next, so I’ve been dipping into my collection of vintage 80s Elsie Lee novels with one of my old favorites, Satan’s Coast, which also involves a crumbling manor house (in this case in Portugal). I do love crumbling manor house novels….
(It’s probably not a coincidence that Lost Summers of Newport was just included on a BookBub list of books about crumbling manor houses– they are rather an obsession of mine.)
What have you been reading this week?
I’m doing some re-reads of Dick Francis and Mary Stewart and having a fabulous time. It’s been long enough for most of them that I’ve almost forgotten the endings. I found Nine Coaches Waiting and Madam Will You Talk most satisfying. And I really enjoyed re-reading the Sid Halley books; such a great character!
Happy Place by Emily Henry- so good!
Infamous by Minerva Spencer- also good!
The Henna Artist & The Secret Keeper of Jaipur- couldn’t stop reading!
I devoured the first Rivers of London book, and can’t wait to start ‘Moon Over Soho’ BUT I have to read my book club book for the month first, Kate Atkinson’s ‘Shrines of Gaiety.’ London between the wars, looks like it will focus more on a woman running a nightclub and her family and the police’s interest in her than the Bright Young Things. Just started but interesting so far. Alice Diamond has already made an appearance.
Started the new Kate Morton. So good.