More frightening than a hen party?

Hen and Stag party capital, Newcastle upon Tyne didn’t know what had hit it when Red Deer Readers came to town in May.

Forgot I’d taken this.

Of Angleworms and Others

Welcome back to the near death experience that is the Red Deer Readers’ Reviews blog.  Here’s a last walk round the island, poking the moss back into place with my stick, leaving hanging the question as to whether this is my last time in this splendid isolation.

So, The Summer Book by Tove Jansson of Moomin fame…

I loved the tensile framework of this book despite a (very) few unsatisfactory chapters and a positively rancid foreword.  And hearing what you lovely Red Deer Readers had to say about it served to deepen my appreciation, as ever.  I am again awed by those that can write so well that they can leave so much unsaid, who have the generosity and faith to let their readers inhabit their work and world.  It’s clear from this novel, that draws from her own and her family’s experiences, that Tove Jansson was such a writer.

The highlights for me included: the geriatric breaking and entering; the Enormous Plastic Sausage and the sherry-bearing Visitor.  The first and last chapters, though, are sublime.

I wouldn’t class this as a perfect book but a very rewarding read which I have placed on my '”to keep” shelves.

PS  I know we were all too polite to say last night but I’ll now admit to being rather disturbed by Pat’s mistakenly reviewing this book for the one actually on the list…