Menewood is the
sequel to Nicola Griffith’s novel Hild
about the woman who would eventually become St. Hilda of Whitby.
Hardly
anything is known about Hild before her thirties except for her parents and
where she was born, and Griffith has imagined a densely detailed early life for
her. I was fortunate enough to receive a review copy of Menewood and I loved it for the same reasons I loved Hild – Griffith’s absolute genius at
creating a sense of time and place within the culture of seventh-century
England.
That world comes alive, from the birds in the air to the winter floods
to the tangled relations of Hild and her accumulated “family” in the valley of
Menewood. Menewood brings us
complicated, brave, arrogant, valiant, flawed characters I did not want to part
with.
This second novel ends well before Hild actually enters the firm
historical record, and so I am hoping for more of her story. It doesn’t matter
whether the actual St. Hilda lived this imagined early life – Hild is wildly
alive on these pages.
In the much anticipated sequel to Hild, Nicola Griffith’s Menewood transports readers back to seventh-century Britain, a land of rival kings and religions poised for epochal change.
Making a much-anticipated return to the world of Hild, Nicola Griffith’s Menewood transports readers back to seventh-century Britain, a land of rival kings and religions poised for epochal change. Hild is no longer the bright child who made a place in Edwin Overking’s court with her seemingly supernatural insight. She is eighteen, honed and tested, the formidable lady of Elmet, now building her personal stronghold in the valley of Menewood.
I
have always been a huge Terry Pratchett fan and this biography, by his personal
assistant of many years, speaks so strongly with Pratchett’s voice.
A great
deal of it is derived from Pratchett’s notes on the autobiography that he began
when he was tragically diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Wilkins’
text takes us from Pratchett’s early childhood (when the headmaster of his
school decided he wasn’t going to amount to much) through the beginnings of
Discworld, and on to his collaboration with Neil Gaiman on Good Omens, among other adventures.
The chapter titles themselves
are Pratchettian: Chapter 3 is called “Smutty Magazines, Unfinished Custard and
the School Uniform of Satan.” Just go read it.
WINNER OF THE 2023 LOCUS AWARD FOR NON-FICTION WINNER OF THE BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION ASSOCIATION AWARD FOR BEST NON-FICTION
'Always readable, illuminating and honest. It made me miss the real Terry.' - Neil Gaiman
'Sometimes joyfully, sometimes painfully, intimate . . . it is wonderful to have this closeup picture of the writer's working life.' - Frank Cottrell-Boyce, Observer
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At the time of his death in 2015, award-winning and bestselling author Sir Terry Pratchett was working on his finest story yet - his own.
The creator of the phenomenally bestselling Discworld series, Terry Pratchett was known and loved around…
My college reunion is coming round again and I usually find
myself rereading Gaudy Night
beforehand.
Although it was published before I was born, it speaks to the issues that bedevil educated women, maybe
particularly female writers. It’s set at a women’s college in Oxford and is the
only one of Sayers’ mystery novels that doesn’t have a corpse. Instead, it has a
creepy, increasingly dangerous somebody with a grudge against women dons. Or
maybe a woman don herself. That’s the trick, because it’s not that easy to
figure out.
It’s an excellent book for those pondering whether you can have a
life of the heart and a life of the mind. To write well, must one be an
alcoholic/drug-addicted male with serial wives or a depressed female with her head
in the oven? Or is it possible to balance, if only precariously, on that
angelic pinhead and have both work that matters and a love life that matters,
without one being the servant of the other?
The twelfth book in Dorothy L Sayers' classic Lord Peter Wimsey series, introduced by actress Dame Harriet Mary Walter, DBE - a must-read for fans of Agatha Christie's Poirot and Margery Allingham's Campion Mysteries.
'D. L. Sayers is one of the best detective story writers' Daily Telegraph
Harriet Vane has never dared to return to her old Oxford college. Now, despite her scandalous life, she has been summoned back . . .
At first she thinks her worst fears have been fulfilled, as she encounters obscene graffiti, poison pen letters and a disgusting effigy when she arrives at sedate Shrewsbury…
Coyote weather is the feral, hungry season, drought-stricken and ready to catch fire. It’s 1967 and the American culture is violently remaking itself while the country is forcibly sending its young men to fight in a deeply unpopular war. Jerry has stubbornly made no plans for the future because he doesn’t think that, in the shadow of Vietnam, the Cold War and atomic bomb drills, there is going to be one. Ellen is determined to have a plan, because nothing else seems capable of keeping the world from tilting. And the Ghost, who isn’t exactly dead, just wants to go home to a place that won’t let him in, the small California town where they all grew up.
