#WWWWednesday – 18th September 2024

WWWWednesdays

Hosted by Taking on a World of Words, this meme is all about the three Ws:

  • What are you currently reading?
  • What did you recently finish reading?
  • What do you think you’ll read next?

Why not join in too?  Leave a comment with your link at Taking on a World of Words and then go blog hopping!


Currently reading

PiranesiPiranesi by Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury) 

Piranesi’s house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.

There is one other person in the house —a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.

The GlassmakerThe Glassmaker by Tracy Chevalier (Harper Collins via NetGalley)

It is 1486 and Venice is a wealthy, opulent center for trade. Orsola Rosso is the eldest daughter in a family of glassblowers in Murano, the island revered for the craft. As a woman, she is not meant to work with glass — but she has the hands for it, the heart, and a vision. When her father dies, she teaches herself to make beads in secret, and her work supports the Rosso family fortunes.

Skipping like a stone through the centuries, in a Venice where time moves as slowly as molten glass, we follow Orsola and her family as they live through creative triumph and heartbreaking loss, from a plague devastating Venice to Continental soldiers stripping its palazzos bare, from the domination of Murano and its maestros to the transformation of the city of trade into a city of tourists. In every era, the Rosso women ensure that their work, and their bonds, endure.


Recently finished

Terra Incognita by Simon Turney (Head of Zeus)


What Cathy Will Read Next

Shy CreaturesShy Creatures by Clare Chambers (Wiedenfeld & Nicolson) 

In all failed relationships there is a point that passes unnoticed at the time, which can later be identified as the beginning of the decline. For Helen it was the weekend that the Hidden Man came to Westbury Park.

Croydon, 1964. Helen Hansford is in her thirties and an art therapist in a psychiatric hospital where she has been having a long love affair with a charismatic, married doctor.

One spring afternoon they receive a call about a disturbance from a derelict house not far from Helen’s home. A mute, thirty-seven-year-old man called William Tapping, with a beard down to his waist, has been discovered along with his elderly aunt. It is clear he has been shut up in the house for decades, but when it emerges that William is a talented artist, Helen is determined to discover his story.

#TopTenTuesday Books That Take You In All Directions #TuesdayBookBlog

Top Ten TuesdayTop Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish and now hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl.

The rules are simple:

  • Each Tuesday, Jana assigns a new topic. Create your own Top Ten list that fits that topic – putting your unique spin on it if you want.
  • Everyone is welcome to join but please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own Top Ten Tuesday post.
  • Add your name to the Linky widget on that day’s post so that everyone can check out other bloggers’ lists.
  • Or if you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment.

weathercock with four winds in countrysideThis week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic is Ten Characters Authors Surprisingly Redeemed. Apologies to Deanna at A Novel Glimpse who suggested it but I could not for the life of me come up with any ideas for this one. Instead I’ve taken a different direction, you might say. Links from each title will take you to my review.

  1. North Woods by Daniel Mason
  2. The Northern Reach by W. S. Winslow
  3. The Cold North Sea by Jeff Dawson
  4. Secrets of Southern Girls by Haley Harrigan
  5. South Riding by Winifred Holtby
  6. West Heart Kill by Dann McDorman
  7. Run to the Western Shore by Tim Pears
  8. Ghosts of the West by Alec Marsh
  9. The Western Wind by Samantha Harvey
  10. The Moral Compass by K. A. Servian