Hi Everyone, you may
remember a while back I suggested we choose our next book for the Purple Coo Book
Club Spring Read from the list of 20 most Mood-boosting titles. After deleting the handful we've already read and rejecting those that are
poetry based, the first five on the list are:
I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
Written during WW2, when Dodie Smith was living in California
and desperately homesick, she writes of a happier time loosely based in 1930s.
An eccentric family, the Mortmain’s do their best to survive in genteel poverty
while the castle they live in crumbles around their ears. It’s a wonderful
coming of age story told via teenage Cassandra Mortmain’s diary.
Miss Garnet’s Angel by Sally Vickers
A retired schoolteacher of the old fashioned type travels
to Venice prompted by the death of her friend. She finds the Guardi panels
which tell the story of Tobias and the Angel. The book intertwines the story of
Tobias and the Angel alongside Miss Garnet’s own choices in life. It’s
essentially two tales coming together to show that human nature doesn’t
fundamentally change – there are demons and angels regardless of race, place or
time – and it's up to the individual to choose their own path between them.
A Month in the Country by J L Carr
This book is so good I read it twice, yes honestly and I
can’t wait to read it again. WW1 veteran, Tom Birkin, coping with the trauma of
his experiences in the war along with a broken marriage, arrives in the
Yorkshire village of Oxgodby, where he is to restore a medieval mural in a
local church. Living in the bell tower, surrounded by countryside and
uncovering a doom painting of the apocalypse, he finds himself restored to a
new and hopeful attachment to life. A truly wonderful book.
A Sea Change by Veronica Henry
Jenna doesn’t mind being known as The Ice Cream Girl. There
are far worse jobs than selling ice-cream on Everdene beach. Surfing mad Craig is a policeman who spends as much time as
he can in the beach hut he rents with a few of his mates. One weekend he’s down
there on his own when he notices a girl on the beach. He’s young, free and
single and she catches his eye. But from then on both Jenna and Craig’s lives change, but not
necessarily in the way you might expect.
Soul Music by Terry Pratchett
The sixteenth Discworld novel by the late and much missed Sir
TP. If you've come across the Discworld novels you’ll know the magical, vaguely medieval,
bonkers early modern world he’s created. In this case you’ve rock and roll music, stardom with near disastrous consequences, along with an introduction to death’s granddaughter. Yes,
it’s as wonderful and as crazy as it sounds.
