Recent Book Activity

I was till 2008 a legal executive specialising in family law. After a brief but eventful stint as a market research interviewer, I now have a lovely little part time job in the local Public Health department, which I am really enjoying.

I am married with three grown up children, awaiting final results from a counselling course as an option for alleviating imminent poverty on a state pension. Now I've reached my 60s I'm starting to think of more ways to achieve more fun and less work. I got GCSE Spanish a couple of years ago and occasionally fantasise about having a little hideaway in Spain one day. I have one son who often works in the Balearics, and a daughter who has lived in Barcelona, so who knows?

I always enjoyed reading, but only found the motivation to pick books up again a few years ago. I became hooked on Bookcrossing, though that is now having to take its place in line alongside the other things I am interested in.

A new, but long awaited, interest is working on some 25 acres of woodland we bought and planted about 20 years ago but never had the time to tend to till recently. Lots of weekends are now spent hacking off side branches of trees, making paths, and planning what courses we want to go on, such as chainsaw, fence building and so on. I also like going to the theatre, particularly musicals, though sadly this has lapsed recently. I have just joined the University of the Third Age, and am having a go at writing poetry - an interest I resurrected thanks to a thread on Bookcrossing! I was lucky enough to win a runners up prize in the July issue of Writers' Forum!

RINGS OR RAYS I HAVE STARTED 2007

SMALL ISLAND by Andrea Levy (completed)
MOTHER TONGUE by Bill Bryson (completed)
FRIED GREEN TOMATOES AT THE WHISTLE STOP CAFE by Fannie Flagg (appears to have collapsed with solnechny)
THE SWEETEST DREAM - Doris Lessing (completed)
THIN - Grace Bowman (completed)
THE READER - Bernhard Schlink (completed)
LIFE AT BLANDINGS - P G Wodehouse (completed)
VANISHED - Mary McGarry Morris (collapsed on last reader)


RINGS AND RAYS COMPLETED 2007

Who Killed Marilyn Monroe, Sophie and the Rising Sun, The Food of Love, A Lifetime Burning, Turning Point, My Antonia, Skinny Dip, Stage by Stage, A Yellow Raft in Blue Water, The Memory Keeper's Daughter, Forgotten Dreams, Tuesdays with Morrie, Seventh Heaven, The Fifth Child, Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination, Peace like a River, The Book of Eve, Ten O'clock Horses, Scuba Dancing, Refuge, Women of the Silk, The Snow Goose, Desert Dawn, Soft Voices Whispering, American Fuji, Hard Work, I am Legend, The Scent of Water

RINGS OR RAYS COMPLETED 2008

Butterfly House, Emotional Geology, Lucky Man, Toppling Miss April, The Magic Toyshop, Lucky, Black Like Me, Miss Julia Speaks her Mind, Swallowing Grandma, Out, Self Made Man, Trans-Sister Radio, SARK - New Creative Companion, The Neverending Story, Stuart, a Life Backwards, Geek Love, I am the Cheese, Between, Georgia, For One More Day, SHAM, Escape, Alone on a Wide Wide Sea, Undead and Unwed, The Little Book of Feng Shite, Star Gazing, No, I Don't Want to Join a Book Club, Blackberry Wine, Mr Golightly's Holiday, Pigs in Heaven, Sister of my Heart, Ben in the World, Cries Unheard, No Toilet Paper on the Road Less Travelled, The Girls, The Clock Winder, Green Angel, Lessons to Learn



RINGS AND RAYS STARTED 2008

A WOMAN'S GUIDE TO SECOND ADULTHOOD - Suzanne Braun Levine -completed
CHOCOLAT - Joanne Harris - completed
IN TIME OF WAR - completed
HOLY FOOLS - Joanne Harris - completed
BITTER SWEETS by Roopa Farooki - completed

BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWNUPS - Anne Tyler

Haugtussa - Norway
Tregossip - UK
Icila - France
Leodog - USA - on its way here
IceAgent - Canada
Marcenda - Portugal
Girandola - Italy



CAN'T WAIT TO GET TO HEAVEN - Fannie Flagg - completed


RINGS AND RAYS STARTED BY ME 2009

THE HIDING PLACE - Corrie ten Boom

Tregossip - UK
martjxox - Italy
bookguide - Netherlands

WE, THE ACCUSED - Ernest Raymond

bearyfriend (Singapore) - posts anywhere
bilbi (France) - posts anywhere
Tregossip (UK) - prefers EU
lucy-lemon (UK) - prefers EU
Bookworm-lady (Spain) - prefers EU
Back to Midlifecrisis


NATURAL FLIGHTS OF THE HUMAN MIND - Clare Morrall

BOKWORMY (Portugal) - posts anywhere
teenie-k (Canada) - posts Canada or US
Bug2004 (US) - posts US
Kobie03 (Canada) - posts anywhere
elviraro (Romania) - posts EU
followdream (Switzerland) - posts anywhere
arturogrande (UK) - posts anywhere
lellie (UK) - posts anywhere
Danielle23 (UK) - to keep or pass on as she wishes


RINGS AND RAYS COMPLETED 2009

The Hiding Place - Corrie ten Boom (9)
The Clock Winder - Anne Tyler (4)
Back when we were Grownups - Anne Tyler (8)
The Adventures of Goodnight and Loving - Leslie Thomas (8)
Five Quarters of the Orange - Joanne Harris (9)