Canterbury Tales Guesthouse

[Daveo]

Shadows of the Workhouse; by Jennifer Worth.

 

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In this follow up to Call The Midwife, Jennifer Worth, a midwife working in the docklands area of East London in the 1950's tells more stories about the people she encountered.

There's Jane, who cleaned and generally helped out at Nonnatus House, she was taken to the workhouse as a baby and was allegedly the illegitimate daughter of an aristocrat. Peggy and Frank's parents both died within six months of one another and the children were left destitute.

 

At the time, there was no other option for them but the workhouse.

The Reverend Thornton-Appleby-Thorton, a missionary in Africa, visits the Nonnatus nuns and Sister Julienne acts as matchmaker.

And Sister Monica Joan, the eccentric ninety-year-old nun, is accused of shoplifting some small items from the local market.

 

She is let off with a warning, but then Jennifer finds stolen jewels from Hatton Garden in the nun's room.

These stories give a fascinating insight into the resilience and spirit that enabled ordinary people to overcome their difficulties.

[Daveo]

The Wood Beyond by Reginald Hill.

 

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Hill’s wit is the constant, ironic foil to his vision, and to call this a mere crime novel is to say Everest is a nice little hill’ Frances Hegarty.

 

When animal rights activists uncover a long dead uniformed body in the grounds of Wanwood House, a research facility, Dalziel is presented with a seemingly insoluble mystery.

And he is further perplexed when he’s attracted to one of the campaigners, now implicated in a murderous assault.

 

Meanwhile, the death of his grandmother has led Peter Pascoe to the battlefields of World War 1 and the enigma of who his grandfather was and why he had to die.

[Daveo]

Mightier than the Sword by Jeffrey Archer.

 

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Mightier than the Sword opens with an IRA bomb exploding during the MV Buckingham's maiden voyage across the Atlantic, but how many passengers lose their lives?

 

When Harry Clifton visits his publisher in New York, he learns that he has been elected as the new president of English PEN, and immediately launches a campaign for the release of a fellow author, Anatoly Babakov, who's imprisoned in Siberia. Babakov's crime?

Writing a book called Uncle Joe, a devastating insight into what it was like to work for Stalin.

So determined is Harry to see Babakov released and the book published, that he puts his own life in danger.

 

His wife Emma, chairman of Barrington Shipping, is facing the repercussions of the IRA attack on the Buckingham.

Some board members feel she should resign, and Lady Virginia Fenwick will stop at nothing to cause Emma's downfall.

 

Sir Giles Barrington is now a minister of the Crown, and looks set for even higher office, until an official trip to Berlin does not end as a diplomatic success.

Once again, Giles's political career is thrown off balance by none other than his old adversary, Major Alex Fisher, who once again stands against him at the election.

But who wins this time?

 

In London, Harry and Emma's son, Sebastian, is quickly making a name for himself at Farthing's Bank in London, and has proposed to the beautiful young American, Samantha.

But the despicable Adrian Sloane, a man interested only in his own advancement and the ruin of Sebastian, will stop at nothing to remove his rival.

 

Jeffrey Archer's compelling Clifton Chronicles continue in this, his most accomplished novel to date.

With all the trademark twists and turns that have made him one of the world's most popular authors, the spellbinding story of the Clifton and the Barrington families continues.

[Daveo]

 

Highlander's Last Song by George MacDonald.

 

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George MacDonald was a nineteenth century Scottish preacher, whose works had a profound influence on C.S. Lewis. MacDonald wrote fictional books, and Michael Phillips has graciously put a number of them into modern English.

 

MacDonald’s theological views are usually quite overt in his fictional works.

MacDonald rejected penal substitution, the idea the Christ paid the penalty for people’s sins on the cross.

MacDonald also leaned towards Christian universalism, the idea that sinners in hell will be purged of their sins and will eventually experience salvation.

MacDonald’s works focus on sinners becoming changed and purged of their sins, trusting in Christ, and following Christ’s teachings, especially the command to love one’s enemies and service to others.

Overall, I would characterize MacDonald’s God as loving, yet tough.

 

The Highlander’s Last Song is set in MacDonald’s country, Scotland.

A prominent character is Alister, who is the head of the Macruadh clan.

His brother, Ian, has returned from serving the Czar in Russia, and my impression is that Ian exemplifies George MacDonald’s concept of spiritual maturity, for Ian is full of wisdom and expresses MacDonald’s sentiments about religion and the spiritual life.

The mother of Alistair and Ian is more of a traditional type of Christian, one who wants for people to accept Christ’s sacrifice on their behalf in order to go to heaven, and she and Ian debate about religion, yet they are still close and love each other.

There is Peregrine Palmer, a boorish Englishman, who has bought property in Scotland and has moved there with his family. Peregrine’s two daughters, Mercy and Christina, are rather shallow at first, but their relationship with Ian and Alistair and life threatening experiences manage to deepen them and open them up to the divine.

There are other characters as well: a cranky (yet lovable) old lady who is part of the Macruadh clan, the deaf mute Hector of the Stags, and Hector’s son, the childlike Rob of the Angels, who entrances people with his stories.

 

The great clash occurs later in the book, when Peregrine Palmer tries to get the clan families off of his newly bought land so that he can create a place to hunt deer.

 

The Highlander’s Last Song has a magical quality to it, as do many of MacDonald’s works, and MacDonald’s spiritual commentary only adds to the story.

My favorite part of the book is when the cranky old lady prays for Alister.

MacDonald states on page 35: “And if there was a good deal of superstition mingled with her prayer, the main ingredient was genuine the love prompting it.

If God heard only perfect prayers, how could he be the prayer-hearing God?”

 

One impression that I have, however, is that MacDonald depicts the spiritually mature characters as virtually perfect. This seems to be the case with Ian, who was imperfect in the book’s flashbacks, but who strikes me as perfect in the narrative’s present. Alister is spiritually mature, too, but MacDonald states that Alastair is looking to money for security and needs to be purged of that. Moreover, while MacDonald appears to disagree with Ian and Alistair on whether people should drink alcohol (MacDonald is open to it, whereas Ian and Alistair are opposed), Ian still fits MacDonald’s spiritual standards in that he has inner peace and loves others, including his enemies, and Alister moves in that direction.

 

That makes me wonder: Do righteous, spiritually mature people suffer, according to MacDonald, or are they so in touch with God that they greet every situation and person with inner-peace and love? MacDonald in The Highlander’s Last Song does not stress Christ’s sufferings.

Could that be relevant to my question? MacDonald is still clear that people can tell God what is hurting them, and his spiritually mature characters assure the victimized that they can trust that God will justly judge their oppressors.

Yet, there is an almost zen-like quality to his spiritually mature characters.

 

One scene that comes to my mind is when the cranky old lady is being thrown out of her house, and Alister exhorts her to trust in God and to love her enemies.

She proceeds to inflict biblical woes at those who are tossing her stuff out, as she quotes biblical passages about God’s Wrath and God’s fierce opposition to injustice?

Is MacDonald’s point here that God is both loving and just?

[Daveo]

The Great Pursuit; by Tom Sharpe.

 

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The gullible author of a totally filthy novel, sure to make a shameful pile of money in America, is dispatched across the Atlantic for a chaotic publicity tour.

[Daveo]

Foundation (Foundation #1) by Isaac Asimov.

 

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For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme.

Now it is dying.

But only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future, to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years.

To preserve knowledge and save mankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire, both scientists and scholars and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the Galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for a future generations.

He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.

 

But soon the fledgling Foundation finds itself at the mercy of corrupt warlords rising in the wake of the receding Empire. Mankind's last best hope is faced with an agonizing choice: submit to the barbarians and be overrun, or fight them and be destroyed.

[Daveo]

Heartstone by C. J. Sansom.

 

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Heartstone is C.J. Sansom's fifth spellbinding mystery in the Shardlake series.

 

Summer, 1545. England is at war.

Henry VIII's invasion of France has gone badly wrong, and a massive French fleet is preparing to sail across the Channel.

 

Meanwhile, Matthew Shardlake is given an intriguing legal case by an old servant of Queen Catherine Parr.

Asked to investigate claims of 'monstrous wrongs' committed against his young ward, Hugh Curteys, by Sir Nicholas Hobbey, Shardlake and his assistant Barak journey to Portsmouth.

There, Shardlake also intends to investigate the mysterious past of Ellen Fettiplace, a young woman incarcerated in the Bedlam.

 

Once in Portsmouth, Shardlake and Barak find themselves in a city preparing for war.

The mysteries surrounding the Hobbey family and the events that destroyed Ellen's family nineteen years before, involve Shardlake in reunions both with an old friend and an old enemy close to the throne.

Soon events will converge on board one of the king's great warships gathered in Portsmouth harbour, waiting to sail out and confront the approaching French fleet.

 

The previous books in the bestselling Shardlake series are Dissolution, Dark Fire, Sovereign and Revelation.

[Daveo]

Fusiliers: How the British Army Lost America but Learned to Fight by Mark Urban.

 

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From 1775 to 1781, the Royal Welch Fusiliers fought furiously to uphold British rule in America.

With a wealth of previously unused primary accounts, Urban tells the gripping story of one of the most pivotal campaigns in history.

[Daveo]

I'll Tell You What...by Robbie Savage.

 

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Robbie Savage is one of Britain's most recognisable football pundits.

Incisive, forthright and bold, Savage never holds back where the beautiful game is concerned.

No Premier League footballer has ever divided opinion quite like Robbie Savage.

Mr Marmite, as he was often known (among other things), rampaged his way through almost 350 games in the Premier League and along the way picked up more yellow cards than Gary Lineker has crisps and more enemies than Joey Barton and Neil Warnock put together.

In his explosive new book, I'll Tell You What..., Savage lifts the lid on all aspects of the modern game.

Managers, players, the Premiership, the European game, the FA Cup, kids' football, and pushy football parents are just a few of the topics that Savage takes on in his inimitable provocative style.

Robbie tells us why:

Ø Alex Ferguson is not Britain's best ever manager.

Ø The Messi v Ronaldo debate will go on forever, but I know who's best.

Ø The Class of '92 could do a job for England.

Ø On paper I was probably one of the world's most versatile footballers.

Ø You simply can't knock on Mark Hughes's door and invite him for a game of golf - even if he invites you.

Ø Drinking wine does not win you football matches.

Ø I could never become a manager. Or could I?

Ø Referees are human after all.

Ø Zico is not as good as Ronaldo - despite what Brazilian waiters say.

Ø Good manners should come before diamond earrings.

Ø Roberto Mancini has a great singing voice.

Robbie Savage's straight-talking common sense is only the start of it.

I'll Tell You What is a modern day guide to life, and should be read by anyone who has an interest in anything at all, especially football.

Few may actually agree with him, but everyone listens.

[Daveo]

One Fourteenth Of An Elephant by Ian Denys Peek.

 

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In February 1942, Singapore fell to the Japanese and Denys Peek was among the tens of thousands of British and Commonwealth soldiers and citizens taken prisoner.

Eight months later, he and countless other PoWs were packed into steel goods wagons and transported by rail to Siam, their destination the massive construction project that would become infamous as the Burma Thailand Railway.

He would spend the next three years in over 15 different work and 'hospital' camps on the railway, stubbornly refusing to give up in a place where over 20,000 prisoners of war (an innumerable slave labourers) met their deaths.

Written with clarity, passion and a remarkable eye for detail, Denys Peek's memoir recalls not just the hardships and horrors of the railway, the daily struggle for survival, but also the comradeship, spirit and humour of the men who worked on it.

It stands as a haunting, evocative and deeply moving testimony to the suffering of those who lived and died there, a salutary reminder of man's potential for inhumanity to his fellow man.

[Daveo]

Red Mist by Patricia Cornwell.

 

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The new Kay Scarpetta novel from the bestselling crime writer.

Determined to find out what happened to her former deputy chief, Jack Fielding, murdered six months earlier, Kay Scarpetta travels to the Georgia Prison for Women, where an inmate has information not only on Fielding, but also on a string of grisly killings.

The murder of an Atlanta family years ago, a young woman on death row, and the inexplicable deaths of homeless people as far away as California seem unrelated.

But Scarpetta discovers connections that compel her to conclude that what she thought ended with Fielding's death and an attempt on her own life is only the beginning of something far more destructive: a terrifying terrain of conspiracy and potential terrorism on an international scale. And she is the only one who can stop it.

[Daveo]

Unnatural Acts by Stuart Woods.

 

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When a hedge fund billionaire hires Stone Barrington to talk some sense into his wayward son, it seems like an easy enough job; no one knows the hidden sins and temptations of the ultra wealthy better than Stone.

But as Stone and his erstwhile protégé, Herbie Fisher, probe deeper into the case and an old one comes back to haunt him, he realizes that even he may have underestimated just how far some people will go to cover up their crimes and plan new ones.

 

From Manhattan’s mahogany paneled law offices to its modern penthouse lofts and dimly lit nightclubs, the trail of entrapment and murder leads to a shocking act that no one could ever have anticipated.

[Daveo]

Asimov's New Guide to Science by Isaac Asimov.

 

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Asimov tells the stories behind the science: the men and women who made the important discoveries and how they did it. Ranging from Galileo, Archimedes, Newton and Einstein, he takes the most complex concepts and explains it in such a way that a first time reader on the subject feels confident on his/her understanding.

[Daveo]

The Girl in the Spider's Web by David Lagercrantz & Stieg Larsson.

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She is the girl with the dragon tattoo, a genius hacker and uncompromising misfit. 
He is a crusading journalist whose championing of the truth often brings him to the brink of prosecution.

Late one night, Blomkvist receives a phone call from a source claiming to have information vital to the United States. 
The source has been in contact with a young female super hacker, a hacker resembling someone Blomkvist knows all too well. 
The implications are staggering. 
Blomkvist, in desperate need of a scoop for Millennium, turns to Salander for help. 
She, as usual, has her own agenda, the secret they are both chasing is at the center of a tangled web of spies, cybercriminals, and governments around the world, and someone is prepared to kill to protect it.

The duo who captivated millions of readers in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest join forces again in this adrenaline charged, uniquely of the moment thriller.

[Daveo]

Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China; by Jung Chang.

 

 

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The story of three generations in twentieth-century China that blends the intimacy of memoir and the panoramic sweep of eyewitness history, a bestselling classic in thirty languages with more than ten million copies sold around the world, now with a new introduction from the author.

 

An engrossing record of Mao’s impact on China, an unusual window on the female experience in the modern world, and an inspiring tale of courage and love, Jung Chang describes the extraordinary lives and experiences of her family members: her grandmother, a warlord’s concubine; her mother’s struggles as a young idealistic Communist; and her parents’ experience as members of the Communist elite and their ordeal during the Cultural Revolution. Chang was a Red Guard briefly at the age of fourteen, then worked as a peasant, a “barefoot doctor,” a steelworker, and an electrician.

As the story of each generation unfolds, Chang captures in gripping, moving—and ultimately uplifting, detail the cycles of violent drama visited on her own family and millions of others caught in the whirlwind of history

[Daveo]

Mockingjay (The Hunger Games) by Suzanne Collins.

 

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The third book in Suzanne Collins's phenomenal and worldwide bestselling Hunger Games trilogy is now available in paperback.

 

"My name is Katniss Everdeen.

Why am I not dead?

I should be dead."

 

Katniss Everdeen, girl on fire, has survived, even though her home has been destroyed.

There are rebels.

There are new leaders.

A revolution is unfolding.

 

District 13 has come out of the shadows and is plotting to overthrow the Capitol.

Though she's long been a part of the revolution, Katniss hasn't known it.

Now it seems that everyone has had a hand in the carefully laid plans but her.

 

The success of the rebellion hinges on Katniss's willingness to be a pawn, to accept responsibility for countless lives, and to change the course of the future of Panem.

To do this, she must put aside her feelings of anger and distrust.

She must become the rebels' Mockingjay, no matter what the cost.

[Daveo]

The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco.

 

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The year is 1327.

Franciscans in a wealthy Italian abbey are suspected of heresy, and Brother William of Baskerville arrives to investigate.

When his delicate mission is suddenly overshadowed by seven bizarre deaths, Brother William turns detective.

His tools are the logic of Aristotle, the theology of Aquinas, the empirical insights of Roger Bacon, all sharpened to a glistening edge by wry humor and a ferocious curiosity.

He collects evidence, deciphers secret symbols and coded manuscripts, and digs into the eerie labyrinth of the abbey, where "the most interesting things happen at night."

[Daveo]

The Club Dumas by Arturo Pérez-Reverte.

 

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A provocative literary thriller that playfully pays tribute to classic tales of mystery and adventure

 

Lucas Corso is a book detective, a middle aged mercenary hired to hunt down rare editions for wealthy and unscrupulous clients.

When a well known bibliophile is found dead, leaving behind part of the original manuscript of Alexandre Dumas's The Three Musketeers, Corso is brought in to authenticate the fragment.

He is soon drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and swashbuckling derring do among a cast of characters bearing a suspicious resemblance to those of Dumas's masterpiece.

Aided by a mysterious beauty named for a Conan Doyle heroine, Corso travels from Madrid to Toledo to Paris on the killer's trail in this twisty intellectual romp through the book world.

[Daveo]

While England Sleeps, by David Leavitt.

 

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Leavitt has earned high praise for his empathetic portrayal of human sexuality and the complexities of intimate relationships.

In While England Sleeps, available for the first time in two years, he moves beyond precisely controlled domestic drama to create a historical novel, set against the rise of fascism in 1930's Europe, that tells a story of love and the violent chaos of war.

[Daveo]

1938: Hitler's Gamble by Giles MacDonogh.

 

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The Third Reich came of age in 1938.

Hitler began the year as the leader of a right wing coalition and ended it as the sole master of a belligerent nation.

Until 1938 Hitler could be dismissed as a ruthless but efficient dictator, a problem for Germany alone; after 1938 he was a threat to the whole of Europe and had set the world on a path toward cataclysmic war.

Using previously unseen archival material, acclaimed historian Giles MacDonogh breathtakingly chronicles Adolf Hitler's rise to international infamy over the course of this single year.

[Daveo]

Rome: The Emperor's Spy. M.C. Scott by Manda Scott.

 

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Rome is burning. Only one man can save it.

The Emperor: Nero, Emperor of Rome and all her provinces, feared by his subjects for his temper and cruelty, is in possession of an ancient document predicting that Rome will burn.

The Spy, Sebastos Pantera, assassin and spy for the Roman Legions, is ordered to stop the impending cataclysm.

He knows that if he does not, his life and those of thousands of others are in terrible danger.

The Chariot Boy, Math, a young charioteer, is a pawn drawn into the deadly game between the Emperor and the Spy, where death stalks the drivers, on the track and off it.

[Daveo]

Empire of the Moghul: Raiders From the North

by Alex Rutherford.

 

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The first book in the Empire of the Moghul series: chronicling the rise and fall of the Moghul rulers of India, beginning with Babur who swept in from Central Asia to found one of the most powerful dynasties in history.

 

1494, and the new ruler of Ferghana, twelve-year-old Babur, faces a seemingly impossible challenge.

Babur is determined to equal his great ancestor, Tamburlaine, whose conquests stretched from Delhi to the Mediterranean, from wealthy Persia to the wild Volga.

But he is dangerously young to inherit a crown and treasonous plots, tribal rivalries, rampaging armies and ruthlessly ambitious enemies will threaten his destiny, his kingdom, even his survival.

[Daveo]

Nineteen Seventy Four (Red Riding Quartet #1)

by David Peace.

 

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It's winter, 1974, Yorkshire, and Ed Dunford's got the job he wanted.

Crime correspondent for the Evening Post, he didn't know it was going to be a season in hell.

A dead little girl with a swan's wings stitched to her back, a gypsy camp in a ring of fire, corruption everywhere you look.

 

In Nineteen Seventy Four, David Peace brings passion and stylistic bravado to this terrifyingly intense journey into a secret history of sexual obsession, greed and sadism.

[Daveo]

Punished by Vanessa Steel.

 

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‘Punished’ is the inspiring true story of an unusual little girl, Vanessa, whose childhood was devastated by torture and abuse at the hands of her sadistic mother.

Vanessa was nearly destroyed until she discovered a secret that ultimately saved her life.From the age of 3, Vanessa lived in daily terror of her mother's unpredictable rage.

If she was 'naughty', her mother would lash out at her, with beatings, torture, starvation and making Vanessa sleep in their garden's pigsty, tied up like an animal.

Her mother said her punishments were God's revenge on her for being the devil's child.

Her father lived in denial of her suffering.When she was 6 years old, Vanessa's grandfather began to sexually abuse her to her despair, aided and abetted by both her mother and grandmother.

At eight years old, she then discovered that the 'mother' who hated her so much had adopted her as a baby and would never love her as her own.

At the most horrific times of Vanessa's abuse, she nearly lost all hope that she would escape her prison, until mysterious things started to happen to her that allowed her to fight back.

This is the story of how Vanessa survived a childhood that nearly destroyed her and how her secret led her out of the horrors of her past.

Vanessa Steel was born and brought up on the outskirts of Birmingham in the 1950's.

She survived her childhood ordeals and developed a psychic gift (as a young child she foresaw the assassination of Kennedy in 1963 oblivious to who he was), and started working professionally as a medium.

She is now one of the most sought after psychic mediums in Britain with a long list of private clients including many celebrities, both in the UK and abroad.

[soapie'schoice]

Wild Swans is an incredible read. Probably around 500-600 pages; not something for light reading. It's a love story, it's history, it's horror... A rare view of the effects of a well loved demon had on a billion people. Starvation, crazy schemes to curtail food production to produce incredibly  shity steel, to singing fountains.. It took me several days to finish, as I had to put it down and clear my head. Some incredibly( there's that word again) dark places interspersed with a decades long family love story. I highly recommend it.