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Original poster

So I have got nine books

34 replies

janeite · 04/08/2009 18:00

Nine books for a two week holiday - do you think I am likely to cope, or will I be chewing my own arm in frustration after day six?

I have got:
The Moonstone
The Woman In White
Let The Right One In (Swedish vampire thing)
Netherland
Something about a rat that I found in a charity shop - can't remember what it is
Tom Bedlam
Something about WW1 - forgotten what it is
A Georgette Heyer
Animal Farm (re-read)

OP posts:
mumblechum · 04/08/2009 18:03

Oooh I love Wilkie Collins. Hope you go somewhere foggy and gloomy to read those ones (kidding).

BecauseImWorthIt · 04/08/2009 18:03

How are you travelling out/home? For me, that's the killer. If you're flying that's a book per flight, which would leave you only 7. And Animal Farm is only a slim book, so that will be devoured all too quickly.

Personally I would look to add a couple more.

Or is your DH/DP taking any books that you could snaffle?

I made this mistake one year, and was therefore delighted to discover a stash of books in the villa, left by previous visitors. However, delight soon turned to dismay when I realise they were all books about poor, down trodden women from Liverpool in WW2. It was still better than having nothing to read though!

YouLukaAmazing · 04/08/2009 18:05

Message withdrawn

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:06

Flying.

That's the situation I was in last year and ended up reading some real tripe (hands up Kate Mosse).

Dd1 is taking a Sophie Kinsella and Bridget Jones, so I may be reduced to those as well.

Oh I've remembered another one too - a history of food and cooking, which is pretty hefty.

OP posts:
mumblechum · 04/08/2009 18:09

Yes, Kate Mosse is truly tripe. Because I'd heard her on Radio 4 I'd assumed she was q. highbrow.

Having just plodded through Labyrinth, well. Oh dear.

SobriquetDuJour · 04/08/2009 18:11

BIWI, what is this 'book per flight' you speak of?

Can't remember the last flight that wasn't punctuated with Muummy..Muuuuuuuum..I need a wee...Mum he hit me.....blah blah, you get the picture

I'm guessing you have older dcs Janeite? Am at your pile to read

BecauseImWorthIt · 04/08/2009 18:11

At least Kate Mosse can write long, grammatically complex sentences - not like the bloody books I was reduced to reading! Honestly it made me wonder how those writers ever got contracts.

Flying awkward because although you may need more books it adds to your weight. But I would definitely add a couple more if you can.

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:12

Yes they are older and have their own books to read so I can happily ignore them on the flight!

OP posts:
Terpsichore · 04/08/2009 18:17

Ooh, 'The Woman in White' is fab. I once took it on a family holiday when I was about 13, and had finished it by the time we got to our destination....er, about 3 hours' drive away (my parents were doing the driving, obviously!). I felt like my eyes were going to fall out of my head with all that 'extreme reading', but I just HAD to find out what happened.

These days we never go away without about 20 books for a 2-week holiday. Luckily I managed to marry another insane dedicated reader.

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:20

Am looking forward to THWIW now!

Lucky you, being able to read in the car - it makes me sick just looking at the cover.

OP posts:
Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:21

Sorry - stray H there! The Woman in White.

OP posts:
whosturnisit · 04/08/2009 18:29

I remember the holidays before children. I would reckon on a book a day. This would allow for one or two failures. Then when the DCs were small it was 1 book per week. Now they are 11 and 13 and I have a pile of 7 books for 2 weeks. It's a short flight and they are all favourite authors.

DS2 is also a big reader so I need to find enough books to keep him happy for 2 weeks.

I've seldom been anywhere where there wasn't a bookshelf of "donated " books but I'd hate to rely on it.

Terpsichore · 04/08/2009 18:29

janeite, unfortunately I have to read - it's a long-standing compulsion . Never go anywhere without a book and get very anxious if for some reason I can't lay hands on one!

But yes, TWIW is marvellous. As is 'The Moonstone'.

OP, another book I've been thinking about re-reading is Rose Tremain's 'The Way I Found Her'. I loved it - it's narrated by a 13-year-old boy who lives with his mother in Paris and embarks on an 'adventure' trying to find one of their friends who's disappeared. I think it tends to divide opinion (the hero is an unusually mature-sounding 13-year old), but I would recommend it highly...

Terpsichore · 04/08/2009 18:29

Ooops, sorry janeite, you are the OP!

BecauseImWorthIt · 04/08/2009 18:31

I have to confess that I quite enjoyed Labyrinthe, and on the strength of that I bought Sepulchre, which was a total, total, pile of shite. I got quite cross!

Terpsichore · 04/08/2009 18:40

janeite, have you seen the film of 'Let the Right One In'? Very creepy and beautifully done. I won't give anything away but I'd be interested to hear what the book's like.

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:45

I haven't seen the film, no. I don't 'do' horror films and generally only read Stephen King in the horror genre but dp really wanted this, so I thought I'd give it a go too.

Have read most of Rose Tremain's but don't remember that one - will look out for it.

OP posts:
Terpsichore · 04/08/2009 18:49

The film's incredibly low-key and non-bloody, apart from a couple of memorable scenes, which makes it very effective. But I suspect the Scandinavians do this sort of thing much more tastefully!

Quattrocento · 04/08/2009 18:52

Why not take a massive must-read-before-I-die kind of book so that it's impossible to run out of books. Like War and Peace or Anna Karenina.

Too much mist and gloom in your selection - you've got a blazing fireside reading list. Your WW1 book will be full of mud and death, animal farm isn't cheery, Wilkie Collins is marvellous but shouldn't be read in daylight ....

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 18:56

Tried and failed with both of those before.

Might take Sense And Sensibility to lighten things up a bit!

I think the rat thing is supposed to be quite funny and the Heyer will be lovely and light.

OP posts:
EachPeachPearMum · 04/08/2009 20:08

"Something about a rat that I found in a charity shop"... now did you find the book or the rat in the shop? (made me laugh anyway!)

BIWI- I like you're thinking! Pre-dc I would have taken 11 or 12 for a week... now though... I managed 1 and a quarter last holiday (was for 2 weeks too ) Good to know once they're older I'll get to read again.

Janeite- did you read the scrabble book yet? I read that n holiday...

Original poster
janeite · 04/08/2009 20:15

Not yet - but am just about to go and play against dp. Beat him last night and hope to do so again!

OP posts:
TwoIfBySea · 04/08/2009 20:37

I haven't seen the film but I read Let The Right One In recently and you'll be up all night wanting to finish it, really gripping and there is one part that is truly nightmare scary which I believe is not in the film. Really good book.

cathcat · 04/08/2009 20:45

I am very impressed that you can read The Woman in White so quickly...I read it last winter and it took me about 6 weeks. 500 pages of dense type! I did enjoy it though.

I agree that Labyrinth was a pile of rubbish.
Have you read David Mitchell? Cloud Atlas is quite long.

jkklpu · 04/08/2009 20:50

I can't wait for 10 years hence when I will be able to read books on holiday again. Cathcat - sorry I HATED Cloud Atlas: full of repeated grammatical mistakes and then Sloosha's bloody crossing. Like the sound of Janeite's list, though.

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