Written by Alexi Sayle. This was the choice of my Reading Group.

It is a book of short stories, I liked the first one "The Dog Catcher", it was a story about stray dogs in a mountain village in Spain. It was interesting and entertaining. I felt pleasantly surprised by Alexi Sayle.

It did seem to go "downhill" after the first story. I didn't understand the second story about a Tour de France cyclist.

The other stories degenerated in to bad language and explict sex/masterbation. I did not finish the book.

I think it is probably a "Blokes type book", possible holiday read.

written by Ian McEwen.

This is the story of three men and one woman. One man is the husband and Foreign Secretary, the other two are ex-lovers. We never meet the lady, because the book starts with her funeral, which the three men attend. The book is about the down fall of the three men

On the back cover, it says "it is his most enjoyable book". I didn't find it so, I kept having to going back over because "I hadn't got it". I needed to really concentrate on it.

When I have read a book, I google the Author and read about them and the book, having read the reviews, I understood the book better. May have to re-read it in the future!

I though I had better read this before venturing to Berlin, now I understsnd that this is the second of Len Deighton's spy novels that revolve around an unamed spy (he was given the name Harry Palmer in the films with Michael Caine).

Our hero is given an assignment that on the face of it is to bring a Soviet defector over to the west. Set in cold war era London, Berlin, Prague and the Franco-Spanish borders, what should have been a straight forward exctraction turns into a triple cross involving the MI6, the KGB, MOSSAD, the West German secret service, Nazis and Swiss Banks.

The highly complex plot gives nothing away and keeps you guessing to the last.

Le Bal (The Ball), and Snow in Autumn.

I have now read a few of her books, I think they are possibly in the top ten of favourite books for me. I buy them from Amazon, I think it is great, I can choose, order, and a couple of days later, they come through the letterbox!

The Ball: It is a short story length, about the conflict of mother and teenage daughter, and daughters revenge. Irene writes so weel, with good descriptive passages, and understanding of the feelings of her charaters. This story is based in Paris. I liked this one.

Snow in Summer, starts off in Russia, and them the White Russian Characters move to France.
It is the story of the families Nanny, who has been with them for years, looking after generations of the family. The story is about her difficulties of understanding the French language, country and customs. You did feel a lot of sympathy for her.

by Margaret Atwood, a Canadian writer.

Elaine Risely, a painter, returns to Torento to find herself overwhelmed by her past. Childhood memories, unbearable betrayals and cruelties, surface relentlessly, forcing her to confront the spectre of Cordelia, once her best friend and tormentor, who has haunted her for forty years.

That is what it says on the back of the book, and that is what it does. It is an unusual book, different writing style. i enjoyed it, she describes what it is like to be eight years old, and upwards.

Written by Alexander McCAull Smith. I enjoyed his No.1 Ladies Decective Agency, and thought I would read some more of his books.

This series, set in Edinburgh about a lady called Isobel, who becomes a lady detective, is very slow, it waa easy to put down and walk away from. I think it was well written, but not in a style I liked very much.

It was written by John Boyne, I got this out of the Library a few months ago, read it and took it back. At my Readers Group it came us as selection of the month, I thought I would see if I could read it a second time, I could and I did - every word, i didn't skip bits!

It did hold up to a second reading, so that says something for the book. It is the story of a nine year old who is finding the grown ups around him difficult to comprehend, and trying to understand his fathers work.

Written as a teens book, it is never the less, very readable by adults, who can relate to a nine year old boys life.

Written by Irene Nemirovsky in 1941. What a clever lady this was, what an interesting life she lived.

Her books, I think , quite simply are some of the best I have read. Not something I would have chosen for myself, but someone mentioned her at my Reading Group, I looked at them on Google and Amazon, then ordered some, I have just ordered some more.

If you have not read these books, I urge you to give them a try. They are French but translated beautifully into English. They are based around the time of the second world war.

Heck of a book.

I kept having to remind myself this was real life, these experiences were really experienced, that there wouldn't be a solution or a conclusion, that there wouldn't be a happy ending. (This was based before he joined politics.)

It isn't an easy book to read, but one that I think makes you think. We forget, as white people, how easy we really have things. For someone who is neither and both (Obama has a black father and a white mother) it seems so much harder. There is both no heritage and yet too much heritage - but the too much cannot seem to be grasped.

Obama has to travel half a lifetime and half a world to try and find who he really is, and I think that ultimately, he seems to have found himself.

I have The Audacity of Hope sitting on my shelf, unread as yet, and I am very much looking forward to it.

By Anitia Diament. It's a womens' book, she wrote "The Red Tent" as her first book, this one is her second. Similar theme, but this is a modern day story of women, the other, based on old testament times.

The story of two women meeting at a Synagogue, one living in a small American seaside town, the other a summer resident, they become friends although there is an age difference, they discuss their lives, loves, faith, interests and the older womans breast cancer. They are both facing different crisis within their respective marriages. A story of friendship and a realisation their lives will improve and go on.

An interesting book, not exactly a "can't put it down", but interesting. She writes well this author.

Written by Julie Myerson. This lady writes dark and deep books. This is the fourth one of hers that I have read. They all seem to invole families and pregnancy!

This one is how a family find and injured tramp and befriend him. He is a born again, speech making, tract waving Christian. He has a huge effect on their lives. The book has a quite unexpected ending, so I won't say any more.