The Year in Review 2009

Yet another good year for reading, with some truly excellent titles, though perhaps not as many as I had hoped. I have also been rather slack with my reviews and will endeavour to write them as I go in the coming year, rather than leave it until I have forgotton the details!

Five particular books stand out as my favourites of the year:
Skellig - David Almond
Looking for Alaska - John Green
What I Was - Meg Rosoff
Eleanor Rigby - Douglas Coupland
The Thirteenth Tale - Diane Setterfield

David Almond, Meg Rosoff and John Green have gone straight into my all time favourite young adult and children's author category!

It also seems that I have begun the last two years on a real high, with my first book of the year ending up as one of my favourites...no pressure for 2010 then!

Books read this year
Looking for Alaska - John Green
The Last of the High Kings - Kate Thompson
The Happy Prince and other stories - Oscar Wilde
Twilight - Stephenie Meyer (reread)
New Moon - Stephenie Meyer (reread)
Eclipse - Stephenie Meyer (reread)
Outcast - Michelle Paver
Oath Breaker - Michelle Paver
Shakespeare Wrote for Money - Nick Hornby
Skellig - David Almond
Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer (reread)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - Simon Armitage translation
The Good Fairies of New York - Martin Millar
The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop - Lewis Buzbee
Inkspell - Cornelia Funke
My Swordhand is Singing - Marcus Sedgewick
How I Live Now - Meg Rosoff
The Perks of Being a Wallflower - Stephen Chbosky
The Master and the Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov
The Accidental - Ali Smith
Enduring Love - Ian McEwan
The Horse Whisperer - Nicholas Evans
The Black Tattoo - Sam Enthoven
Inkdeath - Cornelia Funke
The Puppet Master - Joanne Owen
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie
What I Was - Meg Rosoff
An Abundance of Katherines - John Green
Once Upon a Time in the North - Philip Pullman
Into the Forest - Jean Hegland
Eleanor Rigby - Douglas Coupland
The Book of a Thousand Days - Shannon Hale
The Knife of Never Letting Go - Patrick Ness
Shakespeare - Bill Bryson (reread)
The Thirteenth Tale - Diane Setterfield
Dead Until Dark - Charlaine Harris
The Road - Cormac McCarthy
Graceling - Kristin Cashore
Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger
Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
I am Morgan le Fay - Nancy Springer
Paper Towns - John Green
The Uncommon Reader - Alan Bennett
The Last Unicorn - Peter S Beagle
Ghost Hunter - Michelle Paver
Dewey - Vicky Myron
The Bride's Farewell - Meg Rosoff
Piece by Piece - Tori Amos
Moon Called - Patricia Briggs
The Forest of Hands and Teeth - Carrie Ryan
Nation - Terry Pratchett

Busy busy busy...

So, been away a while! I'm working on a manic environmental impact assessment, which is a little new to me, so I haven't really had the chance to have a break in a few weeks. Plus I've been crazy busy in the evenings, so my reading has really suffered too. But I did get to spend a weekend diving in an old quarry, albeit in 8 degree water with less than 2m visibility! It was gloriously sunny though which made up for it (see photo)! I'm hooked again and will be doing a lot more when I get back, though UK diving is certainly something to get used to!



In fact I've been so busy that I have missed my own one year blogiversary! So I'll be having a delayed little blog celebration in a month, as I'm off to the States on Monday (assuming my flights don't get cancelled due to swine flu!) for three weeks of travels, catching up with old friends and a spring wedding! This weekend will be frantic getting ready for the trip, catching a performance of Pride and Prejudice at a small local theatre, an early viewing of Coraline in 3D (not out here yet!) and seeing the wonderful Kate Rusby in concert. Just thinking about it wears me out!

So apologies to all for not commenting on your blogs recently. I have been trying to read them, (with some success) and will try and catch up on some reviews before I go. I hope you are all well and enjoy the rest of spring! I leave you all with some lovely english bluebells as seen at Blickling Hall last Friday. If that doesn't make you love spring...I don't know what will!

Too busy to blog!

Craziness. I haven’t been this busy in years! There’s me complaining about not having a life when I’m working offshore, and now I finally have an onshore job there’s not enough time to do everything! So I really shouldn’t complain. but unfortunately it’s really cutting into my reading habits, and I had to abandon blogging for a little while, just to save the time to read a bit. Things are calming down a bit now, well rather its more organised chaos so I should be able to keep an eye on my blog more regularly. Phew. This having a life malarkey is really exhausting! So apologies for not having the time to comment on everyone's blogs recently, I am slowly making my way through all your posts!

On the up side, I have just booked my flights to the States for May. I’ll be flying to Minnesota and spending a week there for a good friend’s wedding, then driving (hopefully, if I can afford a rental car) west through several states including Montana, where I hope to do some horse-riding, and Wyoming (Yellowstone!) and then ending up in Washington, where I can explore the forests of the Olympic Peninsular, the bookshops and café’s of Seattle, and have time for a quick visit to Vancouver Island to see some orcas. Ambitious for three weeks? Possibly, but I can’t wait! I have the travel bug, and as I was planning on going to the wedding, it seemed silly to spend all that money and travel so far without making the most of it. I will however, be taking a week off my book buying ban while in Seattle, so I can grab those elusive US publications not available over here! So I’m planning some stops along the way and am very open to recommendations if fellow bloggers know the area!

Blog Advent Tour 2008

Welcome to your next stop on the great Blog Advent Tour 2008 as organised by the ingenious Kailana from The Written World and Marg from Reading Adventures!

I thought I would share a little something about my build-up to the winter holidays this year. I live in Norwich, a mediaeval city on the east coast of the UK. The city is not very large, but famous for its 11th century Cathedral and Castle, old markets, fairs, street theatre, crafts, infamous Colmans mustard and of course for our most famous resident...the great Stephen Fry! I have only been living here for two and a half years, but love the history and culture the city has to offer, and this is the first time that I have been here during the build-up to Christmas.


Every year the city hosts numerous festive events and I have had the pleasure of attending both the Mediaeval Fayres over the past two weekends, one at the Dragon Hall and the other in the cloisters of the Cathedral. Both were transformed by the presence of stallholders in traditional costumes selling mediaeval style wares, such as pottery, woodwork, games and jewellery. Minstrels, jugglers, fire eaters and storytellers graced the halls, passages and cloisters, with the smell of hog roast and mulled wine permeating the brisk winter air. I was particularly taken by the traditional ash longbows, but I did not have enough silver coin and had to be pleased enough with a beautiful old flowerpress, antique wooden jewellery box and mediaeval dice game in a small leather pouch. Here is a little taste of the Historic Christmas Fayre in the Cathedral.

And the final highlights to my mediaeval winter celebrations..a trip to the theatre to see a lovely performance of Charles Way's play Merlin and the Cave of Dreams and a visit to the somewhat drafty Cathedral to see the fabulous group the Mediaeval Baebes play their best performance yet (in my humble opinion), with the audience sipping mulled wine in an effort to stop shivering. I was even graced with my favourite song (which brought more than one tear to my eye) and the lovely ladies signed a copy of their new album for me. Drums, flutes, strings and beautiful lyrics sung in mediaeval latin, english and welsh in a stunning mediaeval setting. I do not know how I am going to top this next year!


A very Merry Yule/Christmas/Hanukah (etc etc delete as appropriate) to you all! Thanks for stopping by, and don't forget to visit the other blogs on today's advent blog tour:

Laclau from Conversaciones de cafe
Kriss from The Swim Mom
Morgan from Insert Clever Name Here

And there are plenty more fabulous sites to visit from tomorrow:

20 December
Jessica from The Bluestockings Society
Naida from The Bookworm
BookClover
BookThingo

21 December
Rhinoa from Rhinoa's Ramblings
Melissa from Remember to Breathe
The Bluestocking Guide
Michelle from Fluttering Butterflies

22 December
Think Pink Dana
My Friend Amy
Nicole from Linus's Blanket
Susan from Reading, Raving and Ranting by a Historical Fiction Writer

23 December
Jane from Janezilfeandtimes
Memory from Stella Matutina
Debbie from Friday Friends Book Blog
Cari from Book Scoops

24 December
Carl from Stainless Steel Droppings
Sheri at Semicolon
Kailana's Written World

6 months today!

Well, a couple of days ago, it was my blog's half birthday, as I first started blogging 6 months ago. I'll be the first to admit I'm not the most prolific reader, nor the most regular blogger, but I have really enjoyed blogging over the past half year, and have enjoyed reading all your blogs even more! So I wanted to say a big thank you to all you bloggers out there, and here's to the next 6 months!!

Orcas, blogging, and a nasty bout of seasickness

Some people have expressed some curiosity about what I do, so I thought I would describe my last week and its ups and downs..

I'm not a blogger who posts everyday..sometimes I forget, sometimes I'm far too busy, sometimes I just don't have anything to say..but I do like to blog at least 2 times a week, and I like to read a lot of other blogs daily, scribbling down those all important book recommendations! But this past week has been a big challenge! As I've mentioned before, I work at sea, 12 hour shifts, 7 days a week (depending on the weather), so on a good day there's not a lot of "me" time. I don't usually get seasick, so even in the bad weather I'm using tippy tapping on my keyboard quite happily, but this job has been something else! I've spent the last week desperately trying to keep meals down. I say meals in the loosest term, as I'm on a very small ship (compared to the usual things I sail on!) with 5 crew plus my colleague and I, and as the crew are Danish/Estonian/Filipino, they don't really cater for vegetarians! So I started on a diet of lettuce and potatoes, which didn't last long in this weather, I've not been at my best! It doesn't help when my colleagues on the main vessel are radio-ing about the fabulous lunch and ten hours uninterrupted sleep they just had! Plus I've still had to do my 12 hour shifts after very little sleep, staring at two laptop screens, trying not to be sick, and pretending to be excited about listening for whales and dolphins. Hence the lack of posts!

It all started so well...our first day sailing from Bergen, watching the QE2 sail past (wow!), glorious sunshine...we approach out survey site, only to encounter 3 pods of orcas playing and breaching near the ship, over 1500 Atlantic white-sided dolphins swimming all around the ship (by which time we had the hydrophone in the water which is a lot of dolphin chatter!) and perhaps most excitingly (for a marine mammal nerd like myself !), Sowerby's beaked whales! What a treat! And that was it...ten days later, and we haven't heard or seen a thing. And the weather has been rubbish. And the tin can we are stuck on (see below!) doesn't have a stability tank, so you have no idea how much she rolls. I really don't know how those guys on Deadliest Catch do it!

Wow, after that woe is me post...yes, I did get to see orcas, white-sideys and Sowerby's, so I can't complain, and probably would have done it again..another species to cross off my list! And the weather is now glorious, we should finish the survey tomorrow and I can either go home, or transfer to the main vessel for the next job...either way, I still get t'internet! Fabulous. (I hear they have ice cream on the other ship!).

Cue gratuitous orca photo ;)