I don’t need anything to read that is too demanding. I gauge how tired I am by the number of pages I am able to read before lights out.
I am reading Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, I am reading it on Ipad.
I have found out the snag of reading on Ipad, the battery ran out just when I had got to an interesting part.
Wilkie Collins
Just wanted to say that I finished Year in the Merde by Stephen Clarke and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It made me giggle and I can thoroughly recommend it for reading in bed.
I found this book in the Oxfam shop where I often browse round for reads - well worth £1.99.
I’m reading another John Grisham now - The Summons - Its a bit dull in comparison, but I’ll take it to Wales with me tomorrow and hope it improves a bit.
I recently had a book lent to me by a friend who knows of my deep interest in the subject matter. It is an English translation of a book by the German historian Jorg Friedrich.
The book is called ‘The Fire’ or to give it its proper title ‘Der Brand’ and is a quite remarkable account of the allied bombing of the German cities during WW2.
I found it difficult to read some of the harrowing accounts of the suffering endured and the unspeakable death and destruction wrought on the civillian population, but by the same token I felt compelled to finish it.
I think my friend has it about right when he says of the book, “if any example of the sheer futility of war was needed, look no further”.
Like him prior to reading this work I, and I suspect many others of a certain generation, has heard of and seen pictures of the devastation of Dresden.
The bigger cities like Cologne and Essen sustained 250 raids each, they were hit so long and hard that they only succeeded in making ruins out an already existing ruin. However, I was not aware that so many other smaller cities like Kassel, Paderborn, Swinemunde, and many more were all but wiped from the face of the earth with countless loss of life.
I realise that many will say, so what, they reaped what they sowed and we should only remember our own blitz and suffering. I can only speak from a personal viewpoint and as someone who survived that very blitz I am glad to have read the book and looked at the other side of the coin.
Interesting to know but I feel nothing, not even sadness.
My sorrow goes to the six million European Jews massacred, shot and gassed in extermination camps …children and disabled first in line for the gas chambers…others worked to death in concentration camps, diseased or starved.
My own mother’s house was flattened in the blitz, she miraculously escaped with my brother and she was once machined gunned by a german pilot.
They, the Germans, were perpetrators not victims.
And we are told, when speaking to Germans - ‘don’t mention ze vor’ 
and get your towel on the deckchair first.
My post was just a personal review of a book I read, it was mainly about innocent civillians especially mothers and children. I cannot see for the life of me how they were the agressors but I still felt no need to make judgements on the rights or wrongs of the war.
One aspect of moving on and preventing other such conflicts is to accept that there are atrocities perpetrated by all sides. Only by reading such books can anyone make a rational judgement.
Thanks for the input though, interesting.
Shunt
The story of James Hunt a driver that I really admired,
Black Wind by Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler.
It was a Christmas present. I’m on chapter 17 and finding it hard going. The plot jumps around here there and everywhere, and then goes off at a tangent when the author gives you a mini history lesson on something unimportant to the story. I won’t ever buy Clive Cussler book myself now.
Hi SuzyQ, I see you like to read something silly. How about I send you a copy of my book Free of Charge and you can post your comments. It would have to be the e-book version for Kindle or I-Pad or any computer.
No strings…no spam… I need publicity…Stay Cheeky…Gordon
I’ve been trawling through some books I have had for years and have started to read Henry Williamson’s Tarka. I am really appreciating again the wonderful descriptive nature of this book.
I was given a copy of “The Shawshank Redemption” And even though I have seen the film more than once, the book is just, if not more interesting than the film.
Just finished Peter James “Twilight” and Stuart McBride “Flesh House” which I enjoyed.
Now starting Elizabeth Haynes “Into The Darkest Corner” which has been awarded Amazon’s Best Book of the Year 2011.
Reading the first part of the Clifton Trilogy by Jeffrey Archer on my kindle. Its really easy to read 
My daughter lent me the Jean M. Auel book, The Land of the Painted Caves. I had been waiting to buy it (or have it bought for me;-)) as it was the last in the Earth’s Children series.
So far I’m disappointed. This has not gripped me like the other five - obviously well researched but so far quite repetitive. I’m about a third of the way in 
I reserved the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett and I am looking forward to reading it. The book of the Month in our library is The Woman in Black by Susan Hill so that came home with me too. It is supposed to be ‘Heartstoppingly Chilling’ and it has been made into A Major Motion Picture so we will see.
The 100 year old man, who climbed out of the window and disappeared.
How’s that for a title? 
by Jonas Jonasson.
Not as funny as I expected, so far. But I’m enjoying it. It’s quite an absurd story…Allan on his 100th birthday in his care home and waiting for a birthday party he didn’t want, Allan takes a fit in his head and escapes out of his window in his carpet slippers…he’s met two unsavoury characters so far, one of whom is quietly murdered (in a freezer:confused:) and there are more to follow. (apparently ;-))
I enjoyed that one! Have just started A time to die by Wilbur Smith and also Buddhism without beliefs by Stephen Batchelor.
Afternoon Everyone. Just joined here last week. I do read a lot. Reading ‘Royal Flush’ by Lynda La Plante. I’m enjoying it so far.
Annie I am a great fan of Wilbur Smith. Have even read some of his books twice. Hope you enjoy reading his book.
Yes, and I’m glad folks here on the forum suggested his books. I picked one of the slimmer volumes on the library shelf as my first read, but am already glad there are several more to read once I finish this one. 
I’m about halfway through Christopher Fowler’s “Off The Rails” - his latest volume in his “Bryant and May” series.
Bryant and May are two detectives in their late 70’s still working for the appropriately named “Peculiar Crimes Unit” of the Home Office. They are great characters and Fowler uses their “old fashioned” way of working to both satirise and affectionately romanticise our capital city. Weaving together the strands of London History and modern changes, Fowler creates a gentle and very clever who-dunnit in familiar surroundings which succeeds in being both light-hearted and very dark at the same time. This is the seventh book in the series and they are all well worth a read.
Mick