Sunday Salon: Reading

I had a slightly odd experience this week. I started reading Kate Grenville's The Secret River, and I was really loving it. But when I got about halfway through, I put it aside so I could finish a book I had idly picked up over breakfast, Hilary Mantel's Giving up the Ghost, which completely bowled me over -- I blogged about it a couple of days ago. Then I picked up Kate Grenville again but found I just could not bring myself to start reading it again. Why was this? I have no idea, but it may have had something to do with the fact that, on the cover, it is described as a very sad book. As far as I had read, it was not sad, just fascinating and enthralling -- set in the late 18th century, it is the story of a Will Thornhill, a man from the poorest streets of London who is deported to Australia with his much loved wife and their little children. After making the best of life in the embryonic town which would become Sydney, they set off to claim a piece of land and become landowners -- but are faced almost at once with the fact that the native peoples are antagonistic and threatening. This raises fascinating and important issues, and as I write this I realise I will have to get back to it soon, especially as I have a great liking for books about the early days in Australia (Oscar and Lucinda, Voss). Maybe the problem was just that I was not in the mood for a tragedy, which I suspect this will become. So what did I start instead? Georgette Heyer's Friday's Child. Oddly enough set about the same period, but as different a book as you could hope to find. I read Heyer as a child but this is the first time I've come back to her  in a very nice edition newly published by Sourcebooks. Enormous fun. I haven't got very far but am having a lovely if rather silly time with it all.

Comments

[dovegreyreader]

Harriet, this happens to me all the time if that's any consolation. I put down a book I'm loving just to have a break, pick up something else and suddenly the first one has lost its magic. I did love Secret River though so hope you get back to it.

[Ann Darnton]

Do finish "The Secret River'. It was of my outstanding reads last year and I can't wait for her next novel.

[Sycorax Pine]

I too haven't read Georgette Heyer since my teenaged years. In fact, I think I still have a couple of unfinished ones of hers sitting on a shelf somewhere. Maybe I should return to them!

[Harriet]

Yes I certainly will get back to Grenville -- I do really want to know what happens!

[litlove]

I have that Grenville on my shelves and haven't picked it up yet because I am not always in the mood for sad stories. And I always feel my heart sink as I cross the watershed between the fascinating build-up and the tragic consequences. Glad you found something silly and fun to pass the time.

[Mog]

Started reading Georgette Heyer a couple of years ago, I find they are a nice, light relief from my usual genre of murder/mysteries.

[Danielle]

I have the Grenville book as well and really want to read it, but am hesitant for the same reason--I know it will be sad. I'm actually reading a Heyer, too--Lady of Quality and enjoying it immensely. I'm so glad that Sourcebooks is publishing her work again here in the US.