Recently my niece Emma (who is my favourite niece of that name)\u00a0 challenged me to list my top ten books via Facebook.\u00a0 I could no more do this than fly in the air,\u00a0 but I note below nine** books or groups of books, which had an impact on me that I still recall.<\/p>\n
Warning: Spoilers.<\/p>\n
The Starry Floor<\/i> by Eleanor Farjeon.\u00a0 Poems inspired by the constellations, Elspeth sent this to me when she moved away to Glasgow, I must have been about 7 years old.\u00a0 My very first poetry book, I adored it and can still quote from it.\u00a0 Still have it.<\/p>\n
British Birds<\/i> by F B Kirkman and F C R Jourdain.\u00a0 Bought by my parents around 1967, for me to pore over.\u00a0 It fueled a life time love affair with the avians. \u00a0\u00a0Still have it.\u00a0 Also Granda Stephen’s bird book, British Birds in their Haunt<\/em>s, Rev. C.A. Johns.\u00a0 I was allowed to read this in Brightons while the grown ups talked.\u00a0 I have this too, dated 1922.<\/p>\n A Day in Fairyland<\/i>, by Sigrid Rahmas, illustrated by Ana Mai Seagren.\u00a0 Our childhood fairy story book, the curatrix of which is currently Ali. \u00a0Glorious pictures in a book the size of a house, a wonderful tale of the denizens of Fairyland preparing for a party.<\/p>\n All the works of Iain Banks*. \u00a0The Crow Road<\/i>: \u201cIt was the day my grandmother exploded.\u201d \u201cWhy do bad things happen?\u201d The Bridge, Espedair Street, Whit<\/i> etc. Summed up the late 20th Century condition, seen from West Fife. \u00a0Phenomenal talent, much missed.<\/p>\n Perfume<\/i> by Patrick S\u00fcskind.\u00a0 I liked it as much for the historic detail as for the portrayal of a psychopath.<\/p>\n Jane Eyre<\/i> by Charlotte Bront\u00eb.\u00a0 Redemption for Mr Rochester, vindication for love lorn Jane, and the wild Yorkshire moors. \u00a0Although hopefully today\u2019s standards would mean a more empathetic outcome for Bertha.\u00a0 Go into the British Library next to St Pancras station and see the original, sitting open at \u201cReader, I married him\u201d. \u00a0\u00a0Also see The Wide Sargasso Sea<\/i> by Jean Rhys for a more balanced Bertha view.<\/p>\n Melvin the Moose Child<\/i> by Louis Slobodkin.\u00a0 Gift from Granny Miller and Aunty Net.\u00a0 Terrifying pictures and words, just a stroll in the forest, eh? \u00a0Scarier than Heart Of Darkness<\/i> but it all ends well as Melvin makes new friends. I still have this.\u00a0 I still get sweaty palms when I hold it.<\/p>\n Poems of New York<\/i> ed. Elizabeth Schmidt, Everyman edition. \u00a0Brought this back from our 2013 visit, some terrific selections, some of which have already been quoted here. \u00a0\u00a0Totally evocative of the city and invokes a nostalgia for times I didn\u2019t even experience, \u00a0testament to the power of the words.<\/p>\n My Family and Other Animals etc<\/i> by Gerald Durrell.\u00a0 He was a grumpy character and many of his autobiographical reminiscences were made up. \u00a0\u00a0But I must have read this book 20+ times when I was in my teens.\u00a0 The tales of Corfu, bathed in the rosy glow of what was always going to be a happier time (pre World War 2 so draw your own conclusions) mixed with the happy if anarchic family and the countless animals, who seemed to have more sense than the humans at times, were my comfort reading.\u00a0 The tale of the disembowelled turtle makes me laugh out loud.<\/p>\n *I have not read any Iain M. Banks.\u00a0 I recognise and applaud SF as a genre, I just don’t read it, yet.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n **still reading ….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Recently my niece Emma (who is my favourite niece of that name)\u00a0 challenged me to list my top ten books via Facebook.\u00a0 I could no more do this than fly in the air,\u00a0 but I note below nine** books or groups of books, which had an impact on me that I still recall. Warning: Spoilers. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2544\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}