The Pleasures of Men by Kate Williams book cover
Blimey, it's that time of the month again! What happened there? Damn you February, why can't you have a sensible number of days like every other month! Better yet, why don't we revert back to the old Egyptian calendar with 12 months of 30 days length each, and then a spare 5 at the end (which I think we might put to good use for 'partying down' and what not). Isn't that just a much better system all round? It'd make me less confused for starters. On the downside, they did have ten day weeks back then, so the weekends would always be a fair stretch away (although I'm not sure the old slaves got weekends while they were whacking up those pyramids). Anyway, a minor digression. But important I think; someone ought to be keeping an eye on these things. Never mind all this getting in sync with the moon, what about my poor muddle brains?

Ok, shall we talk about book now? That's what we're hear for really, isn't it? Sharp-eyed as you all undoubtedly are, you'll have noticed that I didn't actually review To the Lighthouse or Northanger Abbey last month, as promised. I did manage to read both, but had far too many things to say and far too little time (see previous paragraph, damn you February) to condense my thoughts into a review-sized post. So we'll call them rolling concerns, if you don't mind awfully.

This month I think we'll go with The Pleasure of Men as the book of the month. I heard Kate Williams give a reading a couple of weeks ago, followed by some minor Twitter stalking (on my part, that is), so I feel the least I can do is give the book a whirl. I've heard good things, and if anyone ought to be qualified to write a historical novel it's probably a historian like Kate Williams. So into nineteenth century London I shall dive, where a spate of murders captures the imagination of a young lady in the city. Interesting.

Going on from that, I'll go for a couple of light reads: It's Not Rocket Science by Ben Miller and It's Only a Movie by Mark Kermode. The former an idiot's guide to big science as provided by tellybox comedian and PhD drop out, Ben Miller. The latter, wittertainment in written form (if that means nothing to you, then you probably don't listen to the good doctor's movie reviews with long suffering colleague, Simon Mayo, on radio Five Live). Both, I assume, will provide light reads for my aching brain bits.

Talking of light reads, the final book I'm attacking this month is my newly acquired copy of Arguably, a 700-page plus collection of Christopher Hitchens's essays and articles. I never pre-judge a book, but I think it's safe to say I'll find something to enjoy in this tome.

Notable Posts from February