#joan elizabeth mortimer

[a-modernmajorgeneral]

Most stirring of all, though, are the pictures she did during the second world war under the auspices of the WAAC. Yes, they are technical exercises. Yes, they are propaganda. But somehow none of this matters when you stand before them, your lip beginning sentimentally to tremble. My favourite is Corporal Elspeth Henderson and Sergeant Helen Turner (1941), which stars two young women who were awarded the Military Medal for bravery, both of them having continued to work on their switchboard even as their RAF base was bombed by the enemy. Oh, the expressions on the faces! They look so marvellously unimpressed. And while Knight has given all due attention to their uniforms, their equipment, and even to a map on the wall behind them, it is the distinctive orange-red of their lipstick that catches the attention, all their pluck somehow captured in the careful application of a little Max Factor.

Corporal Elspeth Henderson and Sergeant Helen Turner Laura Knight, 1941

[a-modernmajorgeneral]

Cpl Elspeth Henderson was among three female comrades to be awarded the Military Medal for bravery in the face of the enemy for their efforts during the Battle of Britain. Why was this honour questioned in some quarters, including by the airwoman herself?

As bombs pounded down on to the flimsy huts of Biggin Hill airfield on 30 August 1940, three women working there knew they had to act.

Cpl Elspeth Henderson, Sgt Helen Turner and Sgt Joan Elizabeth Mortimer were based at the south-east London fighter station at the height of the Battle of Britain.

That day they were on shift as teleprinter operators in the operations room. As the Luftwaffe began its attack, everyone was ordered to get out and take shelter.

Yet the three stayed at their posts, keen to protect their colleagues both on the ground and up in the sky.

As bombs smashed through the building, Cpl Henderson stayed put, using the plotting table for protection as she waited for the broken telephone lines to be repaired.

Sgt Turner also kept working, while Sgt Mortimer relayed messages at the telephone switchboard before rushing outside with a set of red flags to mark where unexploded devices had fallen on the airfield.

The raid killed 39 that day. Each of the three women would be awarded the Military Medal for bravery in the face of the enemy, a move that was questioned in some quarters.

"It was controversial because Military Medals were viewed as men's medals," explains Heather Redfearn, Cpl Henderson's daughter.

The award also did not sit entirely comfortably with its recipient.

"She was embarrassed about it; she never talked about it very much," Mrs Redfearn says.

"The thing was," explains Mrs Redfearn's husband John, "while she was under the plotting table waiting in case the phones came back, outside you had the phone engineers repairing the phone line, so they're all outside during the air raid - and they're not getting Military Medals - and she's under the table waiting in case the phone lines came on.

"And she did.

"She was a little bit embarrassed about that, but there was no reason to be."

Cpl Henderson spent six months working at the base as part of the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF). She had arrived in March 1940 having signed up the December before, following a realisation she had while at a family event.

"She attended her cousin's wedding and she felt that it was morally wrong that she, a single woman, should be continuing to enjoy civilian live while he, just married, taking on responsibility for a wife, was joining up - so she enlisted the following day," says Mrs Redfearn.

[...]

At its peak, the WAAF had 182,000 members. They would carry out a huge range of activities to aid the war effort across the UK and beyond, from providing weather reports and deploying barrage balloons, to repairing aircraft and intercepting codes and ciphers.

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 9.22

Beer Birthdays

Lord Chesterfield; English statesman (1694)

Alfred Vinzenz Werthmueller (1835)

George Kennth Hotson Younger (1931)

Carlos Sanchez (1958)

Dave McLean (1969)

Five Favorite Birthdays

Bilbo Baggins; Hobbit character

Frodo Baggins; Lord of the Rings character

Michael Faraday; English scientist (1791)

Joan Jett; rock singer, guitarist (1958)

Tatiana Maslany; Canadian actor (1985)

Famous Birthdays

King Sunny Ade; Nigerian reggae singer (1946)

Scott Baio; actor (1960)

Eric Baker; English activist, co-founded Amnesty Int’l (1920)

Toni Basil; pop singer (1943)

Elizabeth Bear; author and poet (1971)

Shari Belafonte; actor (1954)

Maurice Blanchot; French philosopher (1907)

Andrea Bocelli; Italian singer-songwriter (1958)

Debby Boone; pop singer (1956)

Barthold Heinrich Brockes; German poet (1680)

Harold Carmichael; Philadelphia Eagles WR (1949)

Nick Cave; rock musician (1957)

Neil Cavuto; journalist and author (1958)

Ellen Church; 1st airline stewardess (1904)

Dave Coverdale; rock singer (1951)

Quintin Craufurd; Scottish author (1743)

Babette Deutsch; poet (1895)

Ashley Eckstein; actress (1981)

Will Elder; illustrator (1921)

György Faludy; Hungarian poet & author (1910)

Tom Felton; English actor (1987)

Grigory Frid; Russian pianist & composer (1915)

Philipp Nicodemus Frischlin; German mathematician, astronomer & poet (1547)

Theodore Hook; English composer (1788)

John Houseman; actor (1902)

Bonnie Hunt; actor (1964)

Ruth Jones; Welsh actress (1966)

Anna Karina; actor (1940)

Brian Keene; novelist (1967)

Charles Keeping; English author & illustrator (1924)

Allan "Rocky" Lane; voice of "Mr. Ed" (1909)

Tommy Lasorda; Los Angeles Dodgers coach (1927)

Paul Le Mat; actor (1945)

Katie Lowes; actress (1982)

Matthäus Merian; Swiss-German engraver & cartographer (1593)

Ian Mortimer; English historian & novelist (1967)

Paul Muni; actor (1895)

Catherine Oxenburg; actor (1961)

Peter Simon Pallas; German zoologist & botanist (1741)

Rupert Penry-Jones; English actor (1970)

Sue Perkins; English comedian, actress (1969)

Saul Perlmutter; astrophysicist, astronomer (1959)

Rosamunde Pilcher; English author (1924)

Billie Piper; English singer, actor (1982)

Arthur Pryor; trombonist, composer (1870)

Paolo Ruffini; Italian mathematician & philosopher (1765)

Martha Scott; actor (1914)

Elizabeth Simcoe; English-Canadian painter & author (1762)

Bill Smith; clarinet player & composer (1926)

Theodore Clement Steele; artist (1847)

Michael Torke; composer (1961)

Ken Vandermark; saxophonist & composer (1964)

Charles Waterhouse; painter (1924)

Fay Weldon; English writer (1931)

Billy West; actor (1892)

Ray Wetzel; trumpet player & composer (1924)

[charmtion]

could you rec other books you loved reading? besides Lanny and starve acre?

⎯benediction by kent haruf ⎯the mirror & the light by hilary mantel ⎯maps of our spectacular bodies by maddie mortimer ⎯human traces by sebastian faulks ⎯the road by cormac mccarthy ⎯the field by robert seethaler ⎯achilles by elizabeth cook ⎯circe by madeline miller ⎯the year of magical thinking by joan didion ⎯the spinning heart by donal ryan ⎯a girl is a half-formed thing by eimear mcbride ⎯on earth we’re briefly gorgeous by ocean vuong

[alexlacquemanne]

Décembre MMXXII

Films

Détective privé (Harper) (1966) de Jack Smight avec Paul Newman, Lauren Bacall, Janet Leigh, Robert Wagner, Julie Harris, Shelley Winters et Pamela Tiffin

Le Grand Sommeil (The Big Sleep) (1946) de Howard Hawks avec Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, John Ridgely, Martha Vickers, Dorothy Malone et Peggy Knudsen

Rebecca (1940) d'Alfred Hitchcock avec Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Judith Anderson, Nigel Bruce et Reginald Denny

Le Baron de l'écluse (1960) de Jean Delannoy avec Jean Gabin, Micheline Presle, Jacques Castelot, Aimée Mortimer, Jean Constantin, Blanchette Brunoy et Jean Desailly

La Femme d'à côté (1981) de François Truffaut avec Gérard Depardieu, Fanny Ardant, Henri Garcin, Michèle Baumgartner : Arlette Coudray et Véronique Silver

De la part des copains (Cold Sweat) (1970) de Terence Young avec Charles Bronson, Liv Ullmann, James Mason, Jill Ireland, Jean Topart et Michel Constantin

Un Américain à Paris (An American in Paris) (1951) de Vincente Minnelli avec Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Oscar Levant, Georges Guétary et Nina Foch

L'Odyssée de l'African Queen (The African Queen) (1951) de John Huston avec Humphrey Bogart, Katharine Hepburn, Robert Morley, Peter Bull et Theodore Bikel

L'Arnaqueur (The Hustler) (1961) de Robert Rossen avec Paul Newman, Piper Laurie, Jackie Gleason et George C. Scott et Myron McCormick

L'Express du colonel Von Ryan (Von Ryan's Express) (1965) de Mark Robson avec Frank Sinatra, Trevor Howard, Raffaella Carrà, Brad Dexter, Sergio Fantoni et Edward Mulhare

L'Adorable Voisine (Bell, Book and Candle) (1958) de Richard Quine avec James Stewart, Kim Novak, Jack Lemmon, Ernie Kovacs, Hermione Gingold et Elsa Lanchester

Hannibal (Annibale) (1959) de Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia et Edgar G. Ulmer avec Victor Mature, Rita Gam, Mario Girotti et Carlo Pedersoli, Gabriele Ferzetti et Milly Vitale

Cléopâtre (Cleopatra) (1963) de Joseph L. Mankiewicz avec Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison, Roddy McDowall, Pamela Brown, George Cole et Martin Landau

Astérix et Cléopâtre (1968) de René Goscinny et Albert Uderzo avec Roger Carel, Jacques Morel, Micheline Dax, Lucien Raimbourg, Pierre Tornade et Bernard Lavalette

Les Trois Mousquetaires (The Three Musketeers) (1973) de Richard Lester avec Oliver Reed, Raquel Welch, Richard Chamberlain, Michael York, Frank Finlay, Christopher Lee, Geraldine Chaplin, Jean-Pierre Cassel, Faye Dunaway et Charlton Heston

On l'appelait Milady (The Four Musketeers: Milady's Revenge) (1974) de Richard Lester avec Oliver Reed, Frank Finlay, Richard Chamberlain, Michael York, Raquel Welch, Christopher Lee et Faye Dunaway

Salomon et la Reine de Saba (Solomon and Sheba) (1959) de King Vidor avec Yul Brynner, Gina Lollobrigida, George Sanders, Marisa Pavan, Finlay Currie et David Farrar

Avatar : La Voie de l'eau (Avatar: The Way of Water) (2022) de James Cameron avec Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Britain Dalton, Chloe Coleman et Stephen Lang

Fantômas (1964) d'André Hunebelle avec Jean Marais, Raymond Pellegrin, Louis de Funès, Mylène Demongeot, Jacques Dynam, Robert Dalban et Marie-Hélène Arnaud

Fantômas se déchaîne (1965) d'André Hunebelle avec Louis de Funès, Jean Marais, Mylène Demongeot, Jacques Dynam et Robert Dalban

Derrick contre Superman (Eine grosse Fünf) (1992) de Michel Hazanavicius et Dominique Mézerette avec Patrick Burgel et Évelyne Grandjean

La Classe américaine : Le Grand Détournement (1993) de Michel Hazanavicius et Dominique Mézerette avec Christine Delaroche, Evelyne Grandjean, Marc Cassot, Patrick Guillemin, Raymond Loyer et Jean-Claude Montalban

Séries

Inspecteur Barnaby Saison 7, 21, 22, 20, 10

Les Femmes de paille - Le monstre du lac - Epouvantables épouvantails - Les Lions de Causton - La Randonnée de la mort - La monnaie de leur pièce - Le couperet de la justice - Les Sorcières d'Angel's Rise

Friends Saison 1, 2, 3

Celui qui déménage - Celui qui est perdu - Celui qui a un rôle - Celui avec George - Celui qui lave plus blanc - Celui qui est verni - Celui qui a du jus - Celui qui hallucine - Celui qui parle au ventre de sa femme - Celui qui singeait - Celui qui était comme les autres - Celui qui aimait les lasagnes - Celui qui fait des descentes dans les douches - Celui qui avait un cœur d'artichaut - Celui qui pète les plombs - Celui qui devient papa : 1re partie - Celui qui devient papa : 2e partie - Celui qui gagnait au poker - Celui qui a perdu son singe - Celui qui a un dentiste carié - Celui qui avait un singe - Celui qui rêve par procuration - Celui qui a failli rater l'accouchement - Celui qui fait craquer Rachel - Celui qui a une nouvelle fiancée - Celui qui détestait le lait maternel - Celui qui est mort dans l'appart du dessous - Celui qui avait viré de bord - Celui qui se faisait passer pour Bob - Celui qui a oublié un bébé dans le bus - Celui qui tombe des nues - Celui qui a été très maladroit - Celui qui cassait les radiateurs - Celui qui se dédouble - Celui qui n'apprécie pas certains mariages - Celui qui retrouve son singe : 1re partie - Celui qui retrouve son singe : 2e partie - Celui qui a failli aller au bal de promo - Celui qui a fait on ne sait quoi avec Rachel - Celui qui vit sa vie - Celui qui remplace celui qui part - Celui qui disparaît de la série - Celui qui ne voulait pas partir - Celui qui se met à parler - Celui qui affronte les voyous - Celui qui faisait le lien - Celui qui attrape la varicelle - Celui qui embrassait mal - Celui qui rêvait de la princesse Leia - Celui qui a du mal à se préparer - Celui qui avait la technique du câlin - Celui qui ne supportait pas les poupées - Celui qui bricolait - Celui qui se souvient - Celui qui était prof et élève - Celui qui avait pris un coup sur la tête - Celui pour qui le foot c'est pas le pied - Celui qui fait démissionner Rachel - Celui qui ne s'y retrouvait plus - Celui qui était très jaloux - Celui qui persiste et signe - Celui que les prothèses ne gênaient pas - Celui qui vivait mal la rupture - Celui qui a survécu au lendemain

Alexandra Ehle Saison 3

Sans visage

Coffre à Catch

#92 : Kane tombe dans un traquenard ! - #93 : The Brothers of Destruction à la ECW ! - #94 : Edge, Kofi, Shelton : Catch Attack représent !" - #95 : Tac Tac c'est l'anniversaire d'Ichtou ! (feat. David Jouan)

The Rookie Saison 4

Dénouement - Toc toc toc - Les trois quêtes - Tir à vue - Témoins à abattre - Un meurtre pour de vrai - Négociation - Traîtres - Simone - Enervo

The Crown Saison 5

Comme un déjà vu - Le système - Mou Mou - Annus horribilis - Des précautions salutaires - La Maison Ipatiev - No woman's land - Une vraie poudrière - Couple numéro 31 - Déclassement

Columbo Saison 4, 3

Inculpé de meurtre - Play Back - Candidat au crime

Affaires Sensibles

Leonarda, l'adolescente qui a défié le président

Meurtres au paradis

Le fantôme de Noël

Spectacles

Bénabar : tournée des indociles (2022) au Cirque d'Amiens

Alain Souchon au Dôme de Paris (2022)

The Glenn Miller Orchestra Live at the Avalon Theatre (2021)

L'orchestre fait son cinéma au Zénith de Pau (2013)

Livres

La vengeance du Chat de Phillipe Geluck

Nota Bene, Tome 5 : La Mythologie Grecque de Benjamin Brillaud, Mathieu Mariolle, Phil Castaza et Joël Odone

Détective Conan, Tome 3 de Gôshô Aoyama

Mémoires d'un gros mytho de François Rollin et Stéphane Trapier

OSS 117 : Gâchis à Karachi de Jean Bruce

Tatiana K. Tome 3 : Le stygmate de Longinus de François Corteggiani et Emanuele Barison

Le tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours de Jules Verne

Kaamelott Tome 9 : Les renforts maléfiques de Alexandre Astier et Steven Dupré

The Clash en BD de Jean-Philippe Gonot et Gaëts

Le Voyage du Père Noël des Editions Korrigan

Astérix Tome24 : Astérix chez les Belges de René Goscinny et Albert Uderzo

Lucky Luke Tome 56 : Le ranch maudit de Morris, Claude Guylouis et Michel Janvier

[heartofstanding]

And whatever they’ve been thinking, there was no need to worry about it because everything is fine (or excluded from the narrative).

Yeah, I think she went for “Bad Boy ‘Cause He’s Wearing a Leather Jacket” John Holland (his first murder is excluded from the narrative, the second is part of it but is just kinda “he shouldn’t be punished for it! Because I love him, Daddy!” (it was her Elizabeth of Lancaster book, her Joan book finishes with Richard’s coronation iirc).

That’s very true. The Glyn Dwr kids are hardly ever talked about - perhaps because we don’t really know what happened to them, perhaps because we don’t really want to know or care what happened to them (I use “we” in a general sense). The Mortimer boys are really glossed over -- there’s an argument that Edmund Mortimer was deliberately presented as incompetent and stupid, to make him seem less of a viable alternative to the Lancastrians, and people just tend to accept it at face value.

Yeah, though I feel if you wanted to write a grand historical romance about Edward III and Philippa of Hainault, you’d focus it on their first meeting and marriage and not on her confinement so much. There’s still plenty of historical drama happening then, too, it’s not like you’ve got to choose between the Interesting History or the Romance with them. I do get so bored of novels that are spend like 10 words on the birth of a child and their upbringing until the Big Bad is like “I shall threaten this child” and the narrative then demands that the heroine is totally driven by the kid they hardly noticed before.

I’m also not a big fan of the idea that France, a massive colonial and imperial power of its own, is often presented as the colonised subject in these production? Not all of them do that (iirc, the ESC productions present them both as imperialist) but it just seems bizarre to present France as such. It makes more sense to present Henry V as a play within a play, as you say, where it can sit next to imperialist Britain. I’d forgot about the London Blitz production but I’ve imagined a production that could sit beside the Franklin Expedition or the Black War between the Tasmanian Aboriginals and British colonialists or in the trenches of World War I, and offer a critique of empire through that but they just go for the “war bad :( Henry V worse :(” reading.

The thing that bugs me about the readings on Henry V and propaganda is that a lot of it draws from England’s Empty Throne by Paul Strohm and, specifically, the way Strohm talks about the Oldcastle revolt and the Southampton plot were depicted in after the fact renderings of the event as though they were cooked up by Henry himself. Strohm himself doesn’t actually say that the plots were entirely invented by Henry, only that they appear so in the accounts - but a lot of people take that to mean that maybe they were totally faked so Henry could wipe out his enemies, show himself to be a strong ruler and leave England secure. It’s so, so, so stupid. Like, if Henry had cooked up the Southampton Plot, he wouldn’t have done it on the eve of when he was meant to leave for France on his very expensive first military campaign where failure would likely result in a crisis in his reign?

There is a bizarre thing too where we tend to read our view of war back onto the medieval population and there’s no consideration of the way how our view of war were formed by the traumas of two World Wars, the anti-war demonstrations the Vietnam War inspired and the hollowness of the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. I’m not sure I can unpack this thought entirely - it’s not that there weren’t anti-war sentiments in 15th century England but that their idea of warfare was less... sharply divided as ours?

The Queen’s Choice by Anne O’Brien

The Queen’s Choice is a pretty average novel, with some good tidbits and some things that got under my skin. But it’s main problems aren’t bad history (though there is some of that), but bad writing. It has the same problem that a lot of historical fiction in the vein of Philippa Gregory has, where the heroine of the novel is not necessarily present at a lot of historically significant moments. The way to counteract this problem is by making her the focus of her own plot, so we aren’t left with nothing but a conspicuous absence. The Queen’s Choice goes in the opposite direction– almost every important plot element happens off screen. Even the choice the novel is named for happens only in exposition. Joanna’s imprisonment happens after a six year time skip, so it truly comes out of nowhere. The battle of Shrewsbury, the execution of Archbishop Scrope, most of Henry and Joanna’s marriage takes place in letters or single sentences that get cast aside. It conveys, perhaps more than Anne O’Brien intended, that Joanna was a Queen with nothing to do and no importance. Which makes it increasingly laughable every time Joanna is praised for her political knowledge and ability to give good counsel, when we never see her express either attribute and she gets shot down whenever she tries. This Joanna is ironically far less active than any of the information about her indicates, and her characterisation is too flat to give her any other impact.

To put it frankly, it reads like fanfiction– not just because it’s an easy read, but because it feels like a companion piece, the kind of fic you write about a side character you like but who isn’t very involved in the main plot. If you don’t already know this time period in depth, you won’t have any idea what is going on. 

Little Details I liked

Keep reading

[richardii]

Medieval English Royals + ClickHole, The Onion, and Reductress headlines. Richard II.

[malglories]

do you have any medieval book recs? 👀 whether fiction or non-fiction? thank you!

of course my love! my apologies for how long it took me to answer this! in no particular order:

a vision of light, judith merkle riley*

the once and future king, t.h. white

in a dark wood wandering, hella s. hasse*

katherine, anya seton*

the half-drowned king, linnea hartsuyker*

the maid and the queen, nancy goldstone (nonfic)

the time traveller’s guide to medieval england, ian mortimer (nonfic)*

here be dragons, sharon kay penman*

the summer queen, elizabeth chadwick~

joan of arc, helen castor (nonfic; good as a political history, not good as an examination of joan)

daughter of the forest, juliet marillier (more fantasy, but still has a medieval flavor)*

shadow on the crown, patricia bracewell~

the wreath, sigrid undset~

hild, nicola griffith

the last hours, minette walters~

doomsday book, connie willis~

faves have asteriks, and ones i’ve partially or haven’t yet read have squigglies! enjoy!

[nanshe-of-nina]

Favorite History Books || For Her Good Estate: The Life of Elizabeth de Burgh by Frances A. Underhill ★★★★☆

The individuals we remember from fourteenth-century England are kings, war leaders, a few churchmen, the more notorious royal favorites, and mystics. Few women crowd to the forefront of our recollections: perhaps Queen Isabella, the “she-wolf of France,” for her public humiliation by Edward II and her adultery with Roger Mortimer, or Queen Philippa, for her cheerful disposition and persistent fecundity. More fourteenth-century women should be remembered, however, among them especially Elizabeth de Burgh, lady of Clare. Today Elizabeth’s castles stand ruined, the foundations she endowed for friars and for perpetual prayers swept away by sixteenth-century changes in English ecclesiastical policy. She has, however, a living memorial at Cambridge University; there she founded Clare College, and more than six centuries after her foundation, students remember her in annual ceremonies.  Elizabeth de Burgh carried out a noblewoman’s traditional domestic roles, and moved as well into more commanding roles in a last, long widowhood. In all her initiatives, she skillfully utilized the advantages of royal kinship, wealth, and connections, all needed in an environment uncongenial to female power and influence. Medieval women rarely functioned independently unless unfettered by ties to a male, for while noblewomen often served as pawns in the shifting alliances of the early fourteenth century, they were largely peripheral to the politics and warfare that dominated the period.1 Law and custom coalesced to preserve total male dominance of the central features of English institutional life. Historians discussing the fourteenth century typically concentrate on the growth of parliament and England’s wars with France and Scotland, genuinely masculine enterprises. Neither estates nor lineage qualified women for parliamentary summons, so they were excluded from the development of that important institution. Women paid war taxes on their properties, but were spared the hazards of war as well as its profits. They were desirable spectators in the chivalric spectacles that glorified military skills, but they played passive roles, offering up approving choruses that required little talent or ability. England produced no Joan of Arc, rallying her compatriots to deeds of martial valor.

It was rather as wives, mothers, sisters, grandmothers, and guardians that women of the magnate class functioned. Families planning marriages for their sons naturally looked to women whose natal ties promised important political and social links and who would bring wealth to their marriages; families loved daughters but had no qualms about consigning them to marriages that promoted family interests, not personal preferences. As most noblewomen had some disposable income, merchants valued their custom and clerics appreciated them as potential benefactors. As wives, they conventionally managed households, entertained visitors, provided comfortable retreats for their spouses, and assumed broader duties in their husbands’ absences. Prized for their biological role in childbearing and for their nurture and care of the young, mothers usually directed the early education of sons and daughters, relinquishing the boys, around the age of seven, to male tutors, but continuing to school daughters for later duties as wives and mothers.

When a woman married, her husband assumed control of her property. The king controlled the subsequent marriages of his tenant-in-chiefs’ widows; even the homage due the king by a female tenant-in-chief was performed by her spouse. Men thus considered heiresses valuable marriage partners, but even great heiresses were required to operate by indirection when married, relying on husbands’ affection and appreciation of their judgment and contributions rather than power based on economic independence: if women brought wealth from one family to another, they had no role in its administration. While women could receive testamentary bequests of personal property, male beneficiaries were preferred. Rules of primogeniture favored the inheritance of intact family estates by the eldest son; in the absence of male children, surviving sisters divided the inheritance into basically equal shares. But contemporary opinion deplored the latter possibility, opening the way for more frequent use of entails to exclude female inheritance.

If marriage was the normal state for adult noblewomen, a few did gain legal and economic freedom through strategies that kept them unmarried yet firmly in secular society. Free of male tutelage, women could control vast economic assets, manage estates, employ staff, and build networks of clients. They could not offer their retinues the joys or spoils of war but could provide good lordship, enhancing personal power through fostering promising contacts and attending to the needs of local gentry and lesser nobility. Without husbands but with independent wealth, women could transcend restrictions imposed on their sex by law and custom and could contribute successfully to cultural, social, and charitable objectives. Elizabeth de Burgh was one such exceptional female, though before attaining independence as a widow she experienced a typical round of marriages. In early life, she was thus controlled by her brother, her uncle King Edward II, and her husbands, and so was peripheral to major events. After a vow of chastity in widowhood protected her from further marital adventures, she emerged as a shrewd administrator, a focus for family relationships, and a patroness courted by ecclesiastical fund-raisers.

[the-romantic-lady]

Happy Mothering Sunday to everyone in the UK. To celebrate I wanted to make a post about some of my favorite historical mothers. Not all of them are great mothers according to modern standards but they are women who created lived for their children and formed their character. And I love them all!

Empress Matilda. Singlehandedly assured the throne for her son. Founded a dynasty and a strong character who fought for herself and her son.

Eleanor of Aquaitine. One of my favorite women she was also an amazing mother. She stood with her children rightly or wrongly against her husband. She supported them through their reigns and left them with strong characters.

Eleanor of Castile. A woman I am learning more about but one that had so much good influence on all her family.

Isabella of France. Neglected and overlooked, she deposed her husband with her possibly lover Roger Mortimer. She made her son king and although he later dismantled her influence he carried on her strength in his future endeavors.

Joan of Kent. Mother to Richard II, she was not dealing with an easy child. But both had a great bond. He relented to execute his half brother at his mother's bequest. She stood by him in his tumultuous younger years and even as he grew older. A woman with an amazing story.

Margaret of Anjou. All I can say is that she literally led a country into civil war for her son. Not even my mother has done that for me.

Cecily, Duchess of York. One of my personal favorites. She witnessed almost all her children in tragic circumstances. But she lived on for her other children and supported them. A strong woman if there ever was any. (Shameless plug of my own artwork here)

Elizabeth Woodville. Like or hate her, she was a formidable mother. In a dangerous political environment she ensured the future of her children.

Princess Diana. An awesome woman but also an amazing mother. Certainly one that has led to a future king with one of the best characters in BRF history.

Last, the Duchess of Cambridge. I like to think George, Charlotte and Louis have one of the best upbringing in all of history. With a mother like Catherine, they are in good hands.

Happy Mothering Sunday! Mothers are gems without whom none of us would even exist. But they go to lengths to protect us and give us security!

[scotianostra]

March 17th 1328 saw Treaty of Edinburgh between King Robert I and Edward III which recognised Scotland's independence, ending the First Wars of Independence.

The Scots call this the treaty of Edinburgh, the English, The Treaty of Northampton, We  do have another Treaty of Edinburgh in 1560 which was between the Lords of the Congregation, Elizabeth of England and France, I will come to that in July when it pops up again.

  Dates for this treaty vary, depending on the source, and when they perceive the treaty to have come into effect, the reason being it was concluded in one month, endorsed in a later month and then backdated to an even earlier date, just to add confusion. To add one final confusing ingredient, it was made between the English and Scottish Kings, neither of whom were actively present at its ratification.

In 1328 King Robert the Bruce was an old man and he was slowly dying. He had been at war with England for more than twenty years. The Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton would finally seal the peace.

Edward II had refused to give up his claim to overlordship of Scotland but he was no longer in control. The English king had been deposed by his wife Isabella of France and her lover, Roger Mortimer. I touched on his death yesterday, some say he had an altercation with a red hot poker!

  With Longshanks son out of the way Bruce saw his chance and sent James Douglas to attack the north of England. The English feared that the Scots would take Northumbria and folded straight away, they sought terms. with Scotland. The terms of the Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton were agreed. The English finally recognised King Robert I as King of Scots and acknowledged the independence of Scotland. Edward II’s daughter Joan of the Tower would marry the Bruce’s son, David.

In July 1328, the six-year-old Joan was married to the four-year-old David II. Less than a year later, Robert the Bruce died. Peace and freedom had been hard fought for but it would be short lived and would cause the young King David II to be sent to France for his own safety.

  A note of interest, the pic shows the copy of the treaty held by the National Archives of Scotland in Edinburgh, as many an important document is. Remember this was the first time that the English acknowledged Scotland was an Independent country, setting down our borders, so a very important step forward.

  As was usual there were two copies, the original document consisted of one page, on which the terms were written twice in French. Officials then tore it in two, with a wavy edge to ensure that the originals would marry up if either part was subsequently challenged. The other half, held by the English was unearthed a few years ago in York, where it had been relegated to be reused as padding in the binding of another manuscript.

  Another part of the treaty was the promise to return the Stone of Destiny from Westminster Abbey to Scotland — a pledge not fulfilled until 1996.

The document is held by The National Records of Scotland, here is a partial translation

Be it known to all those who shall see these letters that on the seventeenth day of March [1327/8]… the following matters were discussed and agreed... between the most excellent Prince, Robert, by the Grace of God, king of Scotland and... the most excellent prince, Edward, by the grace of God king of England...

Firstly that there be a true, final and perpetual peace between the kings, their heirs and successors and their realms and lands and their subjects and peoples... and for the security and permanence of that peace it is settled and agreed that a marriage take place... between David the son and heir of the king of Scotland and Joan, the sister of the king of England, who as yet are of so tender an age that they cannot make contract of matrimony…

Item it is treated and accorded that the said kings, their heirs and successors, shall be good friends and loyal allies, and that the one shall aid the other in suitable manner as good allies: saving on the part of the king of Scotland the alliance made between him and the king of France. But if it happen that the said king of Scotland… by reason of the said alliance or for any cause whatever make war upon the said king of England… that the said king of England may make war on the foresaid king of Scotland…

Item… that the said king of England shall assist in good faith that the processes, if any are made in the court of Rome and elsewhere by the authority of our Holy Father the Pope against the said king of Scotland, his realm and his subjects, cleric or lay, be dismissed; and this to do and accomplish he shall send his special letters of prayer to the pope and the cardinals.

[dykerachelsummers]

earth-82 flashfamily

Jason “Jay” Theodore Garrick (The Flash) - January 3, 1940

Alan Ladd Wellington Scott (Sentinel) - June 3, 1940

Maxwell “Max” Jack Cranwell (Quicksilver) - November 16, 1940

Jonathan “Johnny” Mortimer Chambers (Johnny Quick) - September 3, 1941

Joan Katherine Garrick - January 9, 1942

Elizabeth “Libby” Charlotte Lawrence (Liberty Belle) - December 26, 1942

Iris Anne West - May 13, 1985

Barrence “Barry” Henry Allen (The Flash II) - September 30, 1985

Meena Dhawan (Fast Track) - July 27, 1985

August Heart (Godspeed) - June 22, 1986

Linda Park - July 9, 1995

Wallace “Wally” Rudolph West (Kid Flash -> The Flash III) - November 11, 1995

Jennifer-Lynn Hayden (Jade) - September 7, 1996

Todd James Rice (Obsidian) - September 7, 1996

Jessica “Jesse” Elizabeth Chambers (Jesse Quick -> The Flash IV) - August 2, 1997

Avery Ho (The Flash of China) - July 27, 2003

Wallace “Ace” Daniel West (Kid Flash III) - July 29, 2004

Donovan “Donnie” Henry West-Allen - October 2, 2008

Nora Dawn West-Allen - October 2, 2008

Jeven Thomas Ognats - August 30, 3894

Meloni Vanessa Thawne - January 8, 3897

Iris “Irey” Francine West (Impulse II -> The Flash V) - August 31, 2015

Jason “Jai” Joseph West (Inertia II) - August 31, 2015

Bartholomew “Bart” Joseph Allen (Impulse -> Kid Flash II -> Mercury) - June 12, 3922

Jennifer “Jenni” Katherine Ognats (XS) - August 30, 3922

[minervacasterly]

Elizabethan Medicine and Tudor Hygiene:

“There is no concept of “health and safety” in Elizabethan England, so you will inevitably feel vulnerable when you arrive. Nauseating smells and sights will assail your senses; contemporary standards of cleanliness will worry you. People die every day from unknown ailments, the young as often as the old. Infectious diseases periodically kill thousands within a few weeks. Even when plague is not in town, it lurks as an anxiety in the back of people’s minds and, when it does strike, their worry turns to terror. On top of the illnesses, the chances of being attacked and hurt are much higher than in the modern world, and workplace injuries are far more common … The principle ideas underpinning most Elizabethan medical thinking come from Galen, who lived in the second century A.D. Physicians will cite him as an unquestionable authority when they explain to you that your health depends on a balance of the four humors: yellow bile or choler, black bile, phlegm, and blood …”

In her documentary “A Tudor Christmas”, Ruth Goodman also mentions this, adding that physicians could determine the source of your ailment based on any of these four humors, and just how did they know which humor(s) you had? Easy, they looked at your skin complexion, your hair, your eye color and any other thing that they were taught from academic manuals at the time that indicated any of these belonged to one or more humors.

As far as birth is concerned. In her three-part documentary series, acclaimed historian, Helen Castor says that the birth of a child was a private feminine affair. Men weren’t allowed unless it was absolutely necessary or if the woman or her child were dying and needed a priest to perform the last rites. If the latter wasn’t available, it would fall unto the midwife or midwives to carry out his duties. The Catholic Church didn’t frown upon this custom. They believed that if the mother and (especially) her child wasn’t given the last rites or (in case of the latter) was baptized, then their souls wouldn’t enter the gates of heaven and would be stuck on limbo for eternity. With the Protestant Reformation, people started to look down on the profession of midwifery. Before, there the usual accusations of witchcraft against these women, but they weren’t as frequent as people think. With the advent of new belief-systems taking most of Western Europe (and some of its colonies) by storm, this changed. Midwives were looked down upon, seen as agents of the devil. Many physicians scoffed at them and thought that they instead of doing of providing good service, they did a great disservice to the people they served by using holy trinkets and relying on old superstitions to make them feel good. Male physicians began to study women’s bodies -while still frowning on female anatomy- and while some of them looked at medicine with a more scientific approach, many of them were still susceptible to their religious bias (ironically, the same thing they accused the midwives of).

Yet, amidst all this chaos, some women continued to practice midwifery and some tried to bring it into the medical field by ridding it of all its superstition. What these women did that was different from their male counterparts is that they honored those that came before them, while still remaining critical of them.

Then there is sanitation. There was no health agency around this time to distribute leaflets on the dangers of poor hygiene. In her book “How to be a Tudor”, Ruth Goodman says that making fun of people with lice or bad health might have been a way to open people’s eyes. This is not an impossibility. In our world, we often use humor to open people’s eyes about various social ills so it is not weird that the same thing was being done by our ancestors in Tudor times. However, good hygiene wasn’t something that was being widely practiced in the Elizabethan period. Like her father, Queen Elizabeth I studied about various potions and kept a book about diseases and how to prevent them; but the same can’t be said for her subjects. After the smell of human waste on urban areas like London became unbearable, Elizabeth I ordered that public letrines be built on almost every corner.

Before the Tudor period there were many bath houses but due to its malevolent association with prostitution (thanks to literature -which was the modern equivalent of The Enquirer or other gossip magazines), they became less used and people began to see bathing often as something bad in contrast to the preceding view from medieval England.

As for clothing. It was important to have your undergarments cleaned often. Ruth Goodman and Lucy Worsley go into this subject in their respective books “How to be a Tudor” and “If Walls could Talk”. Even if you weren’t a fan of having a bath, people still believed it was vital to wash your clothes often. The Queen, as previously stated, took a great interest in her hygiene and bathed more than most of her courtiers and had most of her under-garments cleaned and handled with care so she wouldn’t have to suffer from lice and fleas. Looking good also translated to smelling good, so in case you had a B.O. (body odor) you couldn’t rid yourself of, people would carry special bags packed with spices, roses and other herbs that acted as perfume.

Source quoted: Time Traveler’s Guide to Elizabethan England by Ian Mortimer

Additional sources:

1. How to be a Tudor by Ruth Goodman

2. The Private Lives of the Tudors by Tracy Borman

3. If these Walls Could Talk by Lucy Worsley

Documentary links: ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inoVg5a1kps&index=9&list=PLubXsfF29GmNIOGORlQDYVIOGK2U4VsSq )

Unfortunately YouTube no longer has the Helen Castor documentary. You have to buy it on Amazon. Although it sounds like a nuisance, it is worth it. I learned a lot from it and I also recommend her books (She-Wolves, the women who ruled women before Elizabeth I & Joan of Arc).

[rattlinbog]

at one point, i had gotten myself down to about 10 books on my reading list and then this happened over the past couple of months

Fiction

Peter Darling by Austin Chant  

Remarkable Creatures by Tracey Chevalier

Life Mask by Emma Donoghue

The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits: Stories by Emma Donoghue

Adam Bede by George Eliot

North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell

Far from the Maddening Crowd by Thomas Hardy

Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy

Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

Thistle and Thyme by Sorche Nic Leodhas

Utopia by Thomas More

Bodies of Light by Sarah Moss (1)

Cold Earth by Sarah Moss

Ghost Wall by Sarah Moss

Night Waking by Sarah Moss (3)

Signs for Lost Children by Sarah Moss (2)

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

The Overstory by Richard Powers

Bone China by Laura Purcell

The Farm by Joanne Ramos

Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice

Blackberry & Wild Rose by Sonia Velton

Light from Other Stars by Erica Swyler

Jonny Appleseed by Joshua Whitehead

Lighthousekeeping by Jeanette Winterson  

Non-Fiction

J.M. Barrie and the Lost Boys by Andrew Birkin

The Evening Crowd at Kirmser’s by Ricardo J. Brown

Joan of Arc: A History by Helen Castor

Our History is the Future by Nick Estes

Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin

Marie Antoinette by Antonia Fraser

A Bookshop in Berlin by Françoise Frenkel

Haben: The Deafblind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law by Haben Girma

A Jane Austen Christmas by Maria Grace

Waking the Witch by Pam Grossman

Marmee & Louisa by Eve LaPlant

The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson

The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane

The Wild Places by Robert Macfarlane

1493 by Charles Mann

The Time Traveller’s Guide to Elizabethan England by Ian Mortimer

The Time Traveller’s Guide to Restoration England by Ian Mortimer  

The Frozen Ship: The Histories and Tales of Polar Exploration by Sarah Moss

Names for the Sea: Strangers in Iceland by Sarah Moss

Scott’s Last Biscuit: The Literature of Polar Exploration by Sarah Moss

Louisa May Alcott by Harriet Reisen

The Five by Hallie Rubenhold

Reproduction on the Reservation by Brianna Theobald

All the Single Ladies by Rebecca Traister

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn

Black from the Future: A Collection of Black Speculative Writing

for the past nine years, i had always been trying to get my reading list down to less than 15 books. because having a shorter list made going to bookstores more about wandering about and just browsing without being on a set mission. but i’ve resigned myself to the fact that when i enter a bookstore, my first action is always TO FIND and THEN to browse. that’s just who i am in a bookstore 

[cinema-tv-etc]

Franco Zeffirelli, revered Italian director, dies aged 96

Sat 15 Jun 2019

Italian equally celebrated as director of films, theatre and opera over 60-year career

Franco Zeffirelli, one of Italy’s most revered artistic figures, has died at the age of 96.

In a career spanning more than 60 years, Zeffirelli was staggeringly prolific and equally celebrated as a director of films, theatre and opera. Several of his stage productions became successes on screen – most notably a vibrant version of Romeo and Juliet which starred a young Judi Dench at the Old Vic in London and led to an Oscar-winning box-office smash in the late 1960s.

Shakespeare inspired other hit movies for Zeffirelli: The Taming of the Shrew with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, Hamlet with Mel Gibson and Glenn Close, and a film of Verdi’s Otello with Plácido Domingo. His lavish opera productions brought sensational performances by Joan Sutherland and Maria Callas; 25 years after the latter’s death he directed a biopic, Callas Forever, starring Fanny Ardant. His filmed operas reached large TV audiences and he was celebrated as a great populariser.

Zeffirelli believed he had inherited his passion for music from his grandfather, a conductor. He was born on 12 February 1923 and raised in Florence, the illegitimate son of a fashion designer, Alaide Garosi Cipriani, and wool merchant Ottorino Corsi, both of whom were married to other people. He was named by his mother after a line about zeffiretti (breezes) in a Mozart aria. Cipriani, whose career was damaged by the scandal, died when her son was six and he was taken in by his aunt.

His passion for theatre was sparked as a child during holidays spent in Tuscany where he saw performances by travelling players. “I’ve never believed anything at the theatre as much as the fantasies those storytellers brought us,” he wrote in his autobiography.

He attended a Roman Catholic school in Florence where he said he was sexually assaulted by a priest. When the second world war broke out, he joined the partisan effort, twice escaped death by firing squad and became an interpreter for the Scots Guards. In the postwar years he switched from plans to be an architect and began a career as an actor in radio productions, including a role alongside Anna Magnani in L’Onorevole Angelina. Many years later, he would direct Magnani’s return to the stage in the long-running show La Lupa.

Zeffirelli credited Luchino Visconti with changing his life. Visconti directed him in a small role in a stage adaptation of Crime and Punishment in Rome, then made him assistant director on his 1948 neo-realist classic La Terra Trema, filmed in Sicily using non-professional actors. Zeffirelli then assisted Salvador Dalí on his designs for As You Like It, directed by Visconti. His first task, he recalled, was persuading Dalí to use stuffed goats rather than real ones in the stage production.

In the mid-1950s, Zeffirelli directed Callas for the first time, at her request, in Rossini’s Il Turco in Italia. He went on to direct her in a series of spectacular operas including La Traviata in Dallas in 1958, which broke with tradition by opening with her character dying and then unfolding in flashback. He also directed Bellini’s Norma in Paris in 1964, featuring his own set designs, and Callas’s final operatic role, Tosca at Covent Garden in 1965.

The other soprano Zeffirelli enjoyed a lengthy collaboration with was Sutherland whose career exploded into stardom after he directed her in a blood-soaked version of Lucia di Lammermoor, conducted by Tullio Serafin, at the Royal Opera House in London in 1959.

Later that year, also at the ROH, Zeffirelli staged the short operas Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci, giving them both an authentically realised Sicilian setting. These led to the Old Vic asking him to stage Romeo and Juliet with a similarly realistic Italian setting. Although anxious about directing Shakespeare in English and in England, Zeffirelli launched a youthful production of the tragedy, starring Dench and John Stride. It was dismissed by many critics but championed by the Observer’s Kenneth Tynan, who wrote that Zeffirelli: “approached Shakespeare with fresh eyes, quick wits and no stylistic preconceptions; and what he worked was a miracle … The director has taken the simple and startling course of treating [the characters] as if they were real people in a real situation.”

Zeffirelli’s film version of Romeo and Juliet was also a breath of fresh air. Starring teenagers Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, it was partly shot outdoors, had an unstagy feel and reached a young audience. The film helped make Zeffirelli rich. For many years, he claimed, he had been getting by on freelance director fees and had supplemented his income by selling off a series of Matisse drawings given to him as a gift by Coco Chanel.

In between the theatre and film versions of Romeo, he staged a Sicilian-style Much Ado About Nothing at the Old Vic with Maggie Smith, Robert Stephens and Albert Finney, and shot The Taming of the Shrew with the combustible star power of Taylor and Burton. The couple partly funded the film, which was shot at Dino De Laurentiis’s studios in Rome.                   

Zeffirelli grew accustomed to stepping from one grandly ambitious project to the next, juggling theatre, TV and opera productions. In 1976, he directed Otello at La Scala with Domingo; the following year his epic TV film Jesus of Nazareth, with Robert Powell as Christ, Ian McShane as Judas Iscariot and Anne Bancroft as Mary Magdalene, was broadcast to a large audience. By 1978 he was preparing a remake of the sentimental drama The Champ, which would star Jon Voight and Faye Dunaway and become a box-office hit.

Further film projects included the 1981 romance Endless Love, starring Brooke Shields and released in an edit that upset Zeffirelli, a 1988 biopic of the conductor Arturo Toscanini and a 1996 adaptation of Jane Eyre with the title role shared by Anna Paquin and Charlotte Gainsbourg. The semi-autobiographical Tea With Mussolini (1999), starring Smith, Dench and Joan Plowright, was co-written by Zeffirelli and John Mortimer. The film followed Luca, a dressmaker’s son in Florence, who, like Zeffirelli, grows up playing with a toy theatre and has encounters with the partisans and Scots Guards during the second world war.

In 1994 Zeffirelli became a member of the Italian senate, representing Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party for seven years. He was made a Knight of the British Empire in 2004.

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2019/jun/15/franco-zeffirelli-revered-italian-director-dies-aged-96

[rathertoofondofbooks]

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga’s Reviews and Reading Reality, which is all about sharing the books that you’ve acquired in the past week!

  Books and eBooks

Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi

I’ve had this book on my wish list for ages now so when I spotted it in a deal this week I snapped it up. I think this will be a hard and in-depth read so I’m not sure when I’ll get to it but hopefully it won’t be on my TBR stack for too long.

Unbelievable by T. Christopher Miller

I recently watched the Netflix drama which is based on this book and I was gripped by it so I wanted to read the book. I downloaded the sample onto my kindle but that was as far as I got then yesterday I saw the ebook in the Kindle sale so I grabbed it. I know I’ve already posted my Non-Fiction November TBR but I might swap one of those books for this one!

My Sh*t Therapist and Other Mental Health Stories by Michelle Thomas

The title of this book caught my eye in last month’s kindle sale and after getting engrossed in the sample I downloaded I had to buy it. It feels like an easy read but one that will also be helpful and interesting.

Catching a Serial Killer: My Hunt for Murderer Christopher Halliwell by Stephen Fulcher

I’ve just started watching the ITV drama A Confession and as often happens I wanted to know more about this case so when I saw this book I had to get it. I might try and squeeze this one in during Non-Fiction November if I can as I’m keen to read it soon.

The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls

This is one of those books that has been on my radar for such a long time and yet somehow I’ve never picked up a copy of it. I’ve not put that right and I hope I can finally get to read this book before too much longer.

Tuesday Mooney Wore Black by Kate Racculia

This is a book that I keep seeing and every time I see it I wonder if it’s for me or not. I’m still not sure why I’m not sure but I think it’s one my husband might enjoy so I decided to buy a copy anyway and we can both try reading it.

A Gift in December by Jenny Gladwell

This was an impulse buy because it sounds super festive and I do love a good Christmas read in December!

The Memory Collector by Fiona Harper

I love the sound of this book so this was another impulse buy!

The Visitor by Zoe Miller

This is another book set at Christmas but it’s more of a crime/thriller and I do like a book like this during the festive season so I’m glad to have a copy of this one.

  Audio Books

The Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century by Ian Mortimer

This book has been on my radar for years now but I’ve always held back from buying the paperback so when I saw it was in Audible’s recent sale I decided that this was the format I wanted to read it in so I snapped it up! I do love an interesting read where I can learn something as well as it being a really fun read.

Justice: What’s the Right Thing To Do? by Michael J. Sandel

I’m not sure where I first heard of this book but it’s been on my wish list for ages now so I bought it immediately when I saw it in the Audible sale.

The Disappearance of Adele Bedeau bu Graeme Macrae Burnet

I’ve not read anything by this author before but I do have his more famous book on my TBR and I do love the sound of this writing so decided to take a punt on this one when it appeared in the Audible sale.

The Stolen Marriage by Diane Chamberlain

I’ve just finished listening to The Dream Daughter by this author and very much enjoyed it. It reminded me just how much I used to love reading Diane Chamberlain’s novels so I couldn’t resist buying this book in the Audible sale.

The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie

I’m currently reading The Murder of Roger Ackroyd and loving it so when this book popped up as an Audible daily deal one day this week I decided it was time to re-visit Miss Marple and bought it! Joan Hickson narrates this audio book so I think it will be wonderfully nostalgic to listen to it as I always think of her portrayal of Miss Marple whenever I read the books.

  ARCs

Home Truths by Tina Seskis

I was delighted to get a copy of this from NetGalley as I’ve really enjoyed the author’s previous novels. I’m hoping to read this one this month in amongst my Non-Fiction November books.

I Carried a Watermelon by Katy Brand

I requested this one from NetGalley on a whim as I have a complex relationship with the film Dirty Dancing but have recently being able to love it again. This book sounds like it will be a real nostalgia fest and I’m definitely going to add it to my Non-Fiction November TBR!

My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

I’ve heard so much about this book and have been so keen to read it. I have pre-ordered it but I also requested it on NetGalley recently so I was thrilled when I got approved. I don’t think I’m going to be able to resist reading this one for very long so I may have to fit this in amongst all my non-fiction books too!

    Have you bought any new books over the last week? Please tell me below. 🙂 If you join in with Stacking the Shelves please feel free to leave your link and I’ll make sure to read and comment on your post.

Stacking the Shelves with my new Book Haul (2 Nov 2019)! Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga’s Reviews and Reading Reality, which is all about sharing the books that you’ve acquired in the past week!