It’s a Bank Holiday today here in the UK – if you have the day off, I hope you’re spending it a fun way. We’re on a day trip to Windsor Castle with friends who got free tickets through her work. Otherwise, there’s no way we would ever have gone: it’s very expensive, plus down with the monarchy and all that.

Thanks so much to Eleanor (here, here and here), Laura (the two images below) and Marcie for posting about their recent library reading!

Marina Sofia has posted a couple of relevant blogs, one a review of an Alberto Manguel book about his home library and the other a series of tempting photos of world libraries.

In the media: I loved this anti-censorship George Bernard Shaw quote posted by Book Riot on Instagram…

…and my heart was warmed by the story of Minnesota governor and current vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz installing a Little Free Library in the state capitol earlier this year. He gets my vote!

One volunteering day, a staff member told the strange-but-true story of an e-mail just received to the general libraries account. A solicitor presiding over an estate clearance let us know about a West Berkshire Libraries book found among their client’s effects, borrowed in early 1969 and never returned. Did we want it back? The consensus was that, as we’ve been doing fine without this book since BEFORE THE MOON LANDING, we will drop the issue.

Not exactly library related, but in other fun book news, I took a couple of online quizzes and got intriguing results:

My suggestion (for Angie Kim’s Happiness Falls) featured in the recent Faber Members’ summer reading recommendation round-up. And here’s that blog post I wrote for Foreword Reviews about the Bookshop Band’s new album and tour.

I’m hosting book club a week on Wednesday. Although it’s felt for a while like it might be doomed, the group has had a stay of execution at least until January. We took a break for the summer and at our July social everyone made enthusiastic noises about joining in with the four autumn and winter reads we voted on – plus we have two prospective new members who we hope will join us for the September meeting. So we’ll see how it goes.

My library use over the last month:

READ

• Private Rites by Julia Armfield
• Parade by Rachel Cusk

 SKIMMED

• Nature’s Ghosts: A History – and Future – of the Natural World by Sophie Yeo

CURRENTLY READING

• One Garden against the World: In Search of Hope in a Changing Climate by Kate Bradbury
• Clear by Carys Davies (for September book club)
• Moominpappa at Sea by Tove Jansson
• The Garden against Time: In Search of a Common Paradise by Olivia Laing
• The Burial Plot by Elizabeth Macneal
• Late Light: Finding Home in the West Country by Michael Malay
• The Song of the Whole Wide World: On Motherhood, Grief, and Poetry by Tamarin Norwood
• The Echoes by Evie Wyld

CHECKED OUT, TO BE READ

• Wasteland: The Dirty Truth about What We Throw Away, Where It Goes, and Why It Matters by Oliver Franklin-Wallis
• This Is My Sea by Miriam Mulcahy

IN THE RESERVATION QUEUE

• The Glassmaker by Tracy Chevalier
• James by Percival Everett
• Small Rain by Garth Greenwell
• Bothy: In Search of Simple Shelter by Kat Hill
• The Painter’s Daughters by Emily Howes
• Dispersals: On Plants, Borders and Belonging by Jessica J. Lee
• Held by Anne Michaels
• Playground by Richard Powers
• Intermezzo by Sally Rooney

ON HOLD, TO BE PICKED UP

• The Accidental Garden: The Plot Thickens by Richard Mabey

RETURNED UNFINISHED

• The Cove: A Cornish Haunting by Beth Lynch – I enjoyed her previous memoir, and her writing is evocative, but this memoir about her return to the beloved site of childhood holidays lacks narrative drive. If you’re more familiar with the specific places, or can read it on location, you might be tempted to read the whole thing. I read 30 pages.

What have you been reading or reviewing from the library recently?

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