Being Mrs C

Crafting books

Things are finally getting a bit more organised following our move and it felt great to today get all my craft books in one place on some new (to me) shelves in my study. Over the last few years I've been picking up various books either when I've seen them in sales, or in charity or secondhand book shops. Getting them altogether made me realise what a collection I've been building up covering knitting, crochet, embroidery, dress making and patchwork.

Although new books are always lovely and very inspirational, there's something about finding ones secondhand that give me a real thrill. Knowing that other people have learnt from them over the years and probably cherished them into their old age as well. My recent trip to Barter Books provided me with some such treasure. 

 

I first heard of Mary Thomas when I joined my mum at an Embroiders' Guild event last year. Someone was talking about how it's a shame that books like her's are so difficult to get hold of these days as they were fantastic at teaching people all the embroidery basics. As soon as I saw Mary's name on the shelf in the craft section I therefore jumped on these two volumes. 

Mary Thomas's Embroidery Book covers all the different embroidery types in detail, including some of the history and examples of its use. Some instructions are included, but it often references out to the second book in the pair: Mary Thomas's Dictionary of Embroidery Stitches or as it seems to be commonly known, The Dictionary. This really does as it says on the cover, all stitches, in alphabetical order are included, with instructions and diagrams to have a go yourself. Looking at the Embroidery Book it seems that it was first published in 1936, with the Dictionary preceding it by a couple of years. My copies are 1980s re-issues and looking on Amazon I believe that later versions have been released, although not within the last 10 years or so. 

 

Whilst Mary Thomas concentrated on embroidery in her books, Agnes M. Miall was much broader in her writings. Complete Needlecraft, originally published in 1943, covers a wider remit of all needle based crafts. 

 

It's lovely to see all of these things covered in one book, and although the styles of some of projects in the gift-making section had me laughing out loud. I think some of my friends and family would thing I'd totally lost the plot if I turned up with something made following these instructions - shampoo cape anyone? How times change!

Up and Down in the Dales - Gervase Phinn

 

I have simply loved all of Gervase Phinn's other books and Up and Down in the Dales is no different.

Gervase is back as the school inspector working in God's own county and encountering the "delightful" children that the region's schools are trying to educate. This time round though he is acutely aware of the impact of a child's home-life on how they perform at school. Gervase's wife Christine is expecting their first child and he is determined to make sure that this child has every possible head start when he or she enters the education system.

As ever the book is filled with delightful Yorkshire characters and the tales that some of them come out with are quite simply priceless! I will warn you though that some knowledge of Yorkshire dialect is required to ensure that you get all of the jokes in the book. Maybe it's a sign that I've been down south too long when one of the punchlines went straight over my head...

Make do and mend - updated

I wrote previously about the press coverage of John Lewis' updated version of Make do and mend, and I'm not delighted to say that I managed to pick up a copy when I was in my local store recently. I was delighted to find that they are selling copies for just £3 each. Admittedly it's only a small book, but one packed full of valuable tips and hints and in my opinion would make an excellent stocking filler at Christmas for anyone who is keen to save a few pennies.

The book starts with some traditional "home truths"; those handy little hints about how to solve household problems like cleaning smears off aluminium and other metals and removing the smell of onion from your hands after chopping them. It them moves on to cover how make your clothes last longer and right through to protecting the screen of your MP3 player. To anyone who is already clued up as to how to make things last they will probably be nodding along with most of the things in the book, but may still find something useful themselves. I'm guessing that there may well be plenty of other people to whom it would be a complete revelation and dare I suggest that they may be the ones more in need of it.

The JL version is only available from John Lewis themselves, but there are various versions of the original available from amazon.

Wogan's Twelve - Terry Wogan

 

Terry Wogan's a bit like marmite really: people either love him or hate him. If you're in the latter category then to be honest there's probably no point in reading Wogan's Twelve as you'll probably dislike it as much as the man himself. However, if you're someone who looks forward to turning Radio 2 on at 7.30am on a weekday morning then you're in for a treat!

Written in a diary style this book gives a year long insight into Terry's life. Not only do we hear about the radio shows and his interactions with his beloved TOGs, but also the books signings, Eurovision appearances and family events. Written in Terry's unique style there's a great mix of humour and sensitivity. The entry covering the untimely death of Paul Walters brought tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat. 

Definitely worth a read even if just to satisfy the small bit of TOG inside you!

Clean Break - Val McDermid

 

Years ago I read most of Val McDermid's books (well all the ones that had been published at that time) and completely loved them. I was therefore thrilled when a bag of books my mum passed on to me included Clean Break. It was a while since I'd read any of Val's books and although I think I must have read this before I still loved it!

Kate Brannigan is the main character in Clean Break, as well as a number of Val's other books. Kate is a private detective, working in Manchester and taking on all kinds of jobs that come her way. In this particular book Kate is called in after a Monet is stolen from a stately home where she was responsible for installing the security system. Needless to say she is determined to find the culprit, but things are not as simple as just following a few clues conveniently left behind.

Val's writing style is fantastic and makes the pace of her books incredibly fast moving. The pages literally flew past. A great style, good solid storyline that has the reader puzzling over a few things and characters that you feel completely in tune with. My only remaining question is why haven't I read any of Val's books recently?

King of the Castle - Susan Hill

 

This was the first Susan Hill book that I had read and I have to say that I wasn't initially all that impressed by it. I'm the King of the Castle follows the story of two boys (Edmund Hooper and Charles Kingshaw) who are brought together when Hooper's father employs Kingshaw's widow mother in their large country house.

Hooper takes an instant dislike to Kingshaw and goes out of his way to make it clear to the boy that he is not at all welcome in what Hooper consider to be his home. Hooper quite simply makes his life sheer hell. The book does bring Kingshaw's fear to life and it is hard not to read this and think about just how cruel things can be. 

An interesting episode in the local wood shows that Hooper does have his weaknesses and for a brief moment Kingshaw things that he may have a chance to reverse the roles, but this does not last for long.

The book itself is incredibly raw in places. It is hard not to feel shocked by some of the events that take place, but at the same time I found it a very difficult book to be drawn into. Whilst I could feel sympathy and hatred for the characters they still somehow didn't completely come alive for me. 

A moving book that maybe is in that category of books that should be read, but possibly will not be enjoyed.

Housewife, 49

A day off work sick gave me the opportunity to pamper myself and catch up with a few things off our magic TV box. Quite a few people I know are currently enjoying Nella Last's War and it reminded me that I had the TV adaptation, Housewife 49, which I still hadn't got round to watching. I had thoroughly enjoyed both Nella Last's War and Nella Last's Peace, so I was a tad worried that the film version would not live up to how I had pictured everything in my head.

I shouldn't have worried though as Victoria Wood had done a fantastic job with the script and playing the role of Nella. Admittedly there were some things that weren't quite how I imagined, but nothing that was too far out. Victoria's portrayal of Nella was a tad more outgoing that I had expected, but she also played the more tender moments fantastically well. As much as I love Victoria in her comedy roles, she really can play the straight ones very well too.

If you have enjoyed these books based on Nella's diaries then you might be interested in hearing about what I found on Amazon earlier: Nella Last's Fifties. The projected release date isn't until October 2010, and there are no further details, but I am guessing that this will be based on the diaries she wrote in the 1950s (as the title suggests). Certainly something to look forward to!  

The Divide - Nicholas Evans

 

When I received the latest pile of books from my mother in law, S, I was pretty sure that I recognised the name Nicholas Evans but it took me quite a while to place exactly why I knew it. It's quite a few years since I read his first novel, The Horse Whisperer, but I do clearly recall that it was one of those books that everyone at school was desperate to read. Since then I have to admit that I've not see anything else he's written, until now. 

The back cover and first chapter of The Divide made me think that I was going to be reading a crime fiction style book, but that quickly changed and instead this book actually takes the reader on an emotional roller-coaster of a ride through its pages. 

Ben and Sarah Cooper's daughter Abbie's body is found on a remote mountain side in Montana, embedded in ice. How it came to be there is a mystery, but since Abbie was on the run from the FBI for murder and eco-terrorism her parents have almost finished being surprised. The book looks back on the trip to the Divide that changed the course of the Cooper's lives for ever. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and actually felt quite disappointed when I finished it, but there were two small quibbles. Firstly (or should that be lastly), at the end of the book everything is just tied up a little too neatly. There are no loose ends. Now, I know that I sometimes complain about books that leave too many loose ends, but it almost felt unrealistic at the end in the way that everything seemed to finish neatly.

My only remaining comment is one that I can't possibly place any blame on the author for. For some very strange reason throughout the book I always kept picturing Abbie's brother Josh as the son, Chris, from Family Guy! The only logical explanation I can give is that we've been watching rather a lot of Family Guy on the TV lately, although it did make it very hard to take the character seriously...

The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook

By the time I reached central London on the train yesterday morning I felt so hungry! The culprit being an impulse purchase in the garden centre on Sunday of The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook. One of my work colleague J has being going on about this cookbook for ages, mainly as his two young daughters keep feeding him with various things that they'e been baking from it.

I've not had the opportunity to actually bake anything from it yet, but I did manage to read it cover to cover on the train and the photos make it all look so yummy! The Hummingbird Bakery specialises in American stye home baking rather than the more conservative British style - not a bad thing at all when it comes to yummy things like cup cakes!

One thing that was a tad freaky is the fact that my colleague J arrived at the office this morning with a tupperware box fully of brownies made from a recipe in the book. So, although I've not been able to make anything from the book myself yet, I have at least sampled one of the recipes. Now I just need to go and buy some muffin cases as British bun cases just aren't big enough! I'll let you know how I get on.

If you already have the book then it might be worth noting that the bakery have published some baking tips (and corrections to a couple of printing errors) here on their website.

Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell

When I look back I'm sometimes amazed at how few of the "classics" I actually read whilst I was at school. I'm certainly trying to make up for that now though and make an effort to pick up such books when ever I see them going cheap in charity shops. They're not all the easiest reads, but I do feel a sense of achievement when finishing them and also feel that my reading repertoire is expanding and maturing.

One book that I am somewhat amazed that slipped through the net is George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. When you think about how many things from this book have made it into general usage it's somewhat staggering, although I do wonder just how many teenage Big Brother fans actually know where the term comes from.

I've read and enjoyed a couple of other Orwell books before and found the general style well flowing and a relatively easy read. Nineteen eighty-four was going along in the same way until Winston starts reading Goldstein's book. At that stage I have to say that it almost lost me through sheer boredom. I did persevere to the end, but it became a bit of a slog from there on. Once the book quotes were over things did pick up again, but the shine had gone at that point.

These may be literary classics, but I'm not sure I can like all of them. Is that so bad?