I got a bit bogged down in other stuff this month (lots of work!) – but I did manage to do a bit of reading…
Two Women in Rome – Elizabeth Buchan
This was this month’s book group read. Tellingly, I started reading the physical book and was rather uninspired, so I got the audiobook so I could listen whilst doing other things (mainly stripping wallpaper)!
This is the story of Lottie, a modern-day archivist in Rome, unearthing the life of Nina, a 1970s British spy. There’s not too much more I can say without spoilers.
It was OK. I became interested enough to want to find out the truth of Nina’s life and romance. But the story was full of convenient coincidences, the twists were clumsily foreshadowed and predictable, and I found the characters erratic and unbelievable.
I did learn a little more about 20th century Italy, and some of the descriptions were very beautiful, especially of the art and the city. And, as a former student of history, I particularly liked this insight:
The past was the greatest of all escapologists and it was almost impossible to experience it viscerally. Taste, smell, the texture of food, stuff under your fingers, fear of God, the warmth of the sun on your back, a caress, the sound of music striking up: the experiences of those five centuries or so back could only be guessed at and never truly felt. Yet there were clues, which, if you were careful and scrupulous, made it possible to take a reading of what was there.
Two Women in Rome – Elizabeth Buchan
Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing – Matthew Perry
I picked this up as an e-reader daily deal. My sister and I were big fans of Friends (a little after the fact, as we were born in the 90s). We watched and rewatched and rewatched and rewatched… She had already read this, and I thought it would be interesting to read it too and discuss it with her.
It was a tough read emotionally. It was a brutally honest account of Matthew Perry’s struggles with addiction, and it was hard to hear how much he was struggling throughout and beyond the ten years of Friends. It was vulnerable, and surprisingly funny given the subject matter, but a little repetitive in places.
I strangely ended up finishing the book on a rail replacement bus journey!
Anatomy: A Love Story – Dana Schwartz
Another e-reader daily deal, which I picked up because the blurb described a 19th century woman wanting to become a surgeon, which sounded a great premise.
I got about halfway through without particularly enjoying it (the writing wasn’t marvellous). Then the “love story” of the title finally started in earnest, with the two main characters heavy-handedly flirting and fantasising about each over over an autopsy, accompanied by the bad smells of the corpse. I decided it wasn’t for me.
Cryptic Meg 