In addition to the actual being on holiday part, my favorite thing about a Christmas break has always been reading. I read. A lot. I read every single day, mostly on my way to and from work. Sometimes I wish I had more time to read. Y’know just to settle down in a comfy chair and really lose myself in a book. That’s what Christmas holidays have been about to me since I was a child. One of my best friends (and oldest friend I have known her since I was 4 years old!) knows my passion for books. Every year she asks me what book I would want for Christmas. I then send her a list (and it is always a long list), she then chooses which one to buy, so it is kind of surprise to me on Christmas eve. (Us Scandinavians open our presents on December 24th.) Here’s a sneak peek at my book list for Christmas 2013. It is not the whole list, but these books are at the top of it. What are you reading this holiday season? Are there any books you could recommend? These are my picks:
ROMANCE
Kathleen Tessaro is one of favorite writers. Her new book THE PERFUME COLLECTOR is about a surprise inheritance and the glamorous world of perfumers and their muses in Paris. I would also like a mysterious and glamorous aunt who used to be the belle of the ball in the 1920s high society in New York and Paris. What could be more glamorous or romantic than that?
Amanda Colgan is a master of the rom com and the chic lit to me. I have spent many a tube journey stifling my giggles and completely lost in her books(s). Always funny, always entertaining, and always so romantic. Her latest offering is CHRISTMAS AT THE CUPCAKE CAFE. Issy finally has her dream cupcake cafe but when the busiest season arrives, so does a job offer for her boyfriend in New York. What should Issy do?
In THE AVIATOR’S WIFE, Melanie Benjamin tells the story of one of history’s legendary couples, aviation pioneer Charles Lindbergh and his wife Anne Morrow. Charles was clearly the star of the family but Anne was also an adventurer and a very ambitious woman. Two strong people, one complicated marriage. Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. And so much more fascinating!
SUSPENCE
I don’t read thrillers often enough, but when I do, Robert Harris is my “go to” guy. Ever since I read the fabulous “Pompeii”, I always look forward to his new releases. His new book “AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN” is a gripping war time thriller about not only officers and spies, but one of the most notorious miscarriages of justice in recent history.
I have probably seen more movies based on John Grisham books than I have actually read his books. He has written a sequel called SYCAMORE ROW to one of his most famous books ever – A Time To Kill. and Jake Brigance is finally back in the courtroom! Patricia Cornwell terrifies me. But she writes so well it is impossible not to read her. Kay Scarpetta is once again on the case of organised crime and corruption. The book gets its name DUST from dust discovered on a body which “under ultra-violet light fluoresces blood-red, emerald-green and sapphire-blue”. Intriguing.
I am currently reading 11/23/63 by Stephen King and I wish my commute to work was longer! I cannot put it down! There is a time traveling portal and the question, what if JFK had lived? And if you had the opportunity to go back in time, like the book’s protagonist Jake Epping does, would you go back and change history? And what you need to know is history does not want to be changed and fights back!
HISTORICAL
I read an excerpt in Vanity Fair from the new Jeeves and Wooster book JEEVES AND THE WEDDING BELLS. Written by Sebastian Faulks, the language is as witty and punchy as in the original P.G. Wodehouse books. Except in this book roles are reversed and Wooster becomes Jeeves and vice versa. Hilarity ensues!
BRING UP THE BODIES is a sequel to the Hilary Mantel Cromwell era saga about well, Cromwell and Henry VIII. I just read the first installment, Wolf Hall, and it was magnificent. I cannot wait to start this one. The first book was all about Henry’s fixation with Anne Boyleyn and this next book, is all about Henry getting rid of Anne. Life in those days was ruthless.
LUMINARIES by Eleanor Catton is the Man Booker Prize winner 2013. Murder, mystery and New Zealand gold mines in 1866.
I buy every single Philippa Gregory book. She is my favorite writer of historical fiction. “The Cousins War” series which started with “The White Queen” book has progressed to the daughter of the White Queen- Elizabeth of York. She is known as the THE WHITE PRINCESS (as the York symbol was a white rose) and she has to balance between her mother’s ambitions and her husband’s tyrannical ways (she was married to King Henry VII). History can be cruel. Especially to women. But when you look at closely, lot of the time it was the women behind the power who were pulling all the strings…
COOKBOOKS
I seem to be one of those people who buys a lot of cookbooks and then admires the recipes but rarely actually cooks them. But this selection of cookbooks may just tempt me into the kitchen. I can recommend Omar Alllibhoy’s tapas recipes wholeheartedly. I eat in his restaurant TAPAS REVOLUTION a lot. Baking judge Paul Hollywood has a new cookbook about PIES & PUDS. Fellow blogger the Pioneer Woman cooks a A YEAR OF HOLIDAYS, all her family favourites for the year’s festivities. I remember seeing a TV show where chef Yotam Ottolenghi traveled to the middle east and thinking how delicious all the food looked like. Now he has released a cookbook JERUSALEM with Sami Tamimi. The region’s cuisine is so much more than just tahini.
More inspiration from The Times bestseller list and The Guardian books blog.
Image source: Illustration- Jordi Labanda for Louis Vuitton. (I added the book, the snow and the Christmas tree. Sorry Jordi!)
Books- Amazon.
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