Anyway, on with this very brief (because I'm very tired) wrap-up!
by Jenny Colgan
My Rating:
Rosie Hopkins is looking forward to Christmas in the little Derbyshire village of Lipton, buried under a thick blanket of snow. Her sweetshop is festooned with striped candy canes, large tempting piles of Turkish Delight, crinkling selection boxes and happy, sticky children. She's going to be spending it with her boyfriend, Stephen, and her family, flying in from Australia. She can't wait.
But when a tragedy strikes at the heart of their little community, all of Rosie's plans for the future seem to be blown apart. Can she build a life in Lipton? And is what's best for the sweetshop also what's best for Rosie?
But when a tragedy strikes at the heart of their little community, all of Rosie's plans for the future seem to be blown apart. Can she build a life in Lipton? And is what's best for the sweetshop also what's best for Rosie?
Reviewed here!
by Jonathan Edwards
My Rating:
Leaping from the pages, jostling for position alongside the Valleys mams, dads, and bamps, and described with great warmth, the superheroes in question are a motley crew: Evel Knievel, Sophia Loren, Ian Rush, Marty McFly, a bicycling nun, and a recalcitrant hippo. Other poems focus on the crammed terraces and abandoned high streets where a working-class and Welsh nationalist politics is hammered out. This is a postindustrial valleys upbringing re-imagined through the prism of pop culture and surrealism.
A really fun poetry collection!
by Jenny Colgan
My Rating:
Rosie Hopkins, newly engaged, is looking forward to an exciting year - especially as the little sweetshop in Lipton she owns and runs continues to thrive. She's also enjoying helping out her best friend, Tina, as she prepares for her big wedding to local lad Jake. But fate is about to strike Rosie and her own fiance, Stephen, a terrible blow, threatening all they hold dear. And it is going to take all their strength, as well as the loving support of their families and their friends, to hold everything together.
Reviewed here!
ed. by Stephanie Perkins
My Rating:
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me ...This beautiful collection features twelve gorgeously romantic stories set during the festive period, by some of the most talented and exciting YA authors writing today. The stories are filled with the magic of first love and the magic of the holidays.
Reviewed here!
by Damian Walford Davies
My Rating:
With the narrative pull of a novel and the vibrancy of a play, this collection offers a thrilling portrait of a Suffolk village in the throes of the witchcraft hunts of the mid-17th century. The poems in this collection are dark spells, compact, and moving, delivered by those most closely involved in the “making” of a witch. The speakers—from priest Thomas Love and the villagers, who slowly succumb to suspicion and counter-accusation, to the witch hunter Francis Hurst and the “witch” herself—authentically conjure a war-torn society in which religious paranoia amplifies local grievances to fever pitch.
A very atmospheric collection, and one that I think I'll be going back to and rereading more than once this year!
What did you read in December?
You read some cute Christmas reads! I read My True Love Gave to Me and I really enjoyed it!
ReplyDeleteMissie @ A Flurry of Ponderings
I'm really pleased I managed to read some festive reads last month - I'm usually so bad at it! Thanks for stopping by. =D
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