Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by JK Rowling Harry Potter Hogwarts House Editions The sixth Harry Potter novel introduces some new characters and some new - and very dark - magical concepts. It also immerses us in the teen world of romantic attachments, jealousies and rebellion. The Ministry of Magic now knows that Lord …
Category: Books
Jane, the Younger
I keep going back to Jane Austen! A couple of weeks ago, I bought a series of lectures from The Teaching Company's Great Courses. By Professor Devoney Looser of the Arizona State University, they explore Jane Austen's life and works, and examine the customs and morality of the late eighteenth/early nineteenth century in which she …
Hogwarts #5#
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix By JK Rowling Harry Potter Special Hogwarts Editions Following the encounter with Voldermort in which Cedric Diggory lost his life, Harry Potter is back in Muggleland with his aunt and uncle. Now, forced to use magic to save himself and his cousin Dudley from the Dementors, he …
Hogwarts #4#
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire By JK Rowling Harry Potter Special Hogwarts Editions Readers who have progressed thus far in the series know that Harry Potter is a wizard. When he isn't attending Hogwarts School of witchcraft and wizardry, he lives with his unpleasant aunt and uncle, the Dursleys, and their bullying spoiled …
New Troy
The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller Over the past few days, I have been revisiting the classic poems of ancient Greece, and watching a series of lectures on Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. These epic poems always bear retelling. Whether in the original format or recast in one of the many variations that have appeared …
Little Bones
by N.V. Peacock Cherrie Forrester seems a normal young woman. She lives in Northamptonshire with her partner Leo and eight-year-old son Robin. She works in a supermarket, has some good friends and enjoys watching back episodes of Greys Anatomy. But Cherrie has a past, one she doesn't want Leo or her friends to know about. …
Saintly Con in Santa Cruz
Revisiting the favourite literature of our childhood and youth can often bring disappointment. There may be several reasons why this is so. For one thing, reading tastes change as we grow older. The world changes too; ideas about what is acceptable, amusing, moral, and so on, do not remain fixed. That is not to say …
It isn’t all tinsel and lights
Cold Christmas A short story collection by Reggie Walton I suspect that most of us view Christmas as a happy season, with lots of food, drink, fir trees, decorations and good company. Even when we are not moved by its religious significance, Christmas is a time for reflecting on the past year, and for looking …
A Good Hanging
A Short Story Collection by Ian Rankin 'To be honest, if you were going to see Christ anywhere in Edinburgh, the Hermitage was perfect.' [from 'Seeing Things'] It's been a while since I read one of Ian Rankin's detective stories - Westwind isn't a detective story! - so I enjoyed dipping into these tales from …
Summer Shorts
Over the past couple of weeks, I have been dabbling in short stories, something I don't often do. The first collection which grabbed my attention was Short Stories from the Strand, published in 1992 by The Folio Society. The Strand Magazine came into being in 1891, a collaboration between the publisher George Newnes, literary editor …
