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Our first folder - this is where we will park the weekly "What are you reading this week" post.

Very difficult to concentrate. Am reading and loving “Shuggie Bain�� in between doom scrolling.

Test works.

I thought about starting a thread about a specific book I just finished, to discuss, but realised how messy that would make things if we all did the same. So I realise your test thread is important.
Good work! 😃

Tally wrote: "Test works.

I thought about starting a thread about a specific book I just finished, to discuss, but realised how messy that would make things if we all did the same. So I realise your test thread..."

Exactly :-). Thanks a lot to LL to have thought this out carefully!

Appreciate everyone's patience... A bit like tinkering with the automobile's motor while we're hurtling down the autobahn! We'll sort it out - I hope!

Gladarvor wrote: "Tally wrote: "Test works.

I thought about starting a thread about a specific book I just finished, to discuss, but realised how messy that would make things if we all did the same. So I realise yo..."

In the spirit of the 'old' TLS - a first digression... yesterday, I received a new Carte Bleue... frustrating, as we haven't been able to travel to France at all in 2020, and don't know if it'll be possible in 2021. It drove me to have a look at 'ble noir' and other goods on the FrenchClick pages. Meanwhile, our friends are stuck in Sarzeau, but will have to return to their London flat soon - for tax reasons, I think. They can't stay more than 6 consecutive months in France, apparently.

Lljones wrote: "Our first folder - this is where we will park the weekly "What are you reading this week" post."

Good - this should work.

I am currently reading Henning Mankell's "After the Fire", and enjoying it very much... it has more regretful humour than is usual in his books. More on that next week, when I have finished it.

Re-read A Clockwork Orange earlier in the week. There's a consensus among Burgessian aficionados that it's not his best book, and by his own avowal one he didn't care much for notwithstanding the hubbub created by Kubrick's adaptation. But I still find the nadsat lingo and all the quirky syntax as practiced by Alex and his droogs quite fascinating; and there's food for thought too. Real horrorshow!

I know the reference but never read it myself. I suppose not to everyone's tastes but anything edited by Burgess is bound to be good. Remember reading some reviews saying that he managed to reduce the novel to one third its length, which seems helpful. No longer in print though.

I’m re-reading Good Omens. Just got to the witch and the bicycle bit which seems pretty appropriate for Halloween.
I know this isn’t quite TLS but I think it’s a fantastic next best thing and the main thing is that everyone is here. I don’t often post but very much enjoy reading the comments and it’s a great comfort to me to see all your familiar “faces��.
I think starting a weekly section to best replicate TLS is perfect. We’ll get used to the lack of threads. I sometimes found them quite hard to scroll back to on my phone to follow a conversation anyway. Reading everything in order might work just fine and perhaps people can just flag in some way who they are replying to when posting to help with the flow of things.
Thank you so much for setting this up 👍

That should say - for setting this up! Distracted by the ability to add an emoji 🙄

My current read is World Without End by Ken Follett, and find myself in the midst of the black death. Debates on the efficacy of masks and hand washing from the 14th century.

I am also reading Eagle of the 9th by ebook, which I dip into now and again.

LoveTheBees wrote: "Reading everything in order might work just fine and perhaps people can just flag in some way who they are replying to when posting to help with the flow of things."

Yes, it is definitely more faff here since it's not shown automatically as is on the Guardian's interface. So I feel it'd be super helpful if, for a response, people always kept part of the automatic quoting at the beginning of the post. Here that's: 'LoveTheBees wrote: ...', and people know I'm replying to you in this thread (and ideally to which exact post if I leave enough of the relevant quote in there).

As for Good Omens, a brilliant read, all the more at Halloween!

In Taking Chances , by Molly Keane, Maeve and Roguey are sister and brother. Maeve is newly wed to Rowley; she loves him very much. Roguey is newly wed to Mary; he loves her very much. But the fiercest love of all is that between Mary and Rowley, who of course are not married to each other. The plot of this 1929 novel about Anglo-Irish aristocratic society follows the tangled threads of sexual passion into the great houses and across the hunting fields; horses, dogs, guns are the only other obsessions.

At the centre of the web we find Jer, Maeve and Roguey’s younger brother. Asthmatic, stammering, shunning equestrian activities, he is both a part of and separate from his siblings�� world, appears more mature than either of them, and is certainly far more observant. He harbours an intense but ambiguous love for both Maeve and Mary, accompanied by an exceptional understanding and sympathy with their separate plights; he foresees, long before anyone else, the impossibility of the situation that pits the two women he most cares for against each other.

Taking Chances is a simple tale told with a sophisticated and non-judgemental intelligence, embellished by the interiors, landscapes and frocks of late-1920s upper-class Ireland. Molly Keane takes obvious pleasure in detailed descriptions of horses and rituals of the hunt comprehensible only to the initiated, but never loses sight of her human characters - and thus managed never to lose this reader.

Justine wrote: "In Taking Chances, by Molly Keane, Maeve and Roguey are sister and brother. Maeve is newly wed to Rowley; she loves him very much. Roguey is newly wed to Mary; he loves her very much. But..."

Nice inter (unable to uptick here, I liked it there). I can't remember if I had linked this for you before (I had intended to) from the Irish Times on 12 female Irish writers. Just checked and Keane features.

Gladarvor wrote: "Justine wrote: "In Taking Chances, by Molly Keane
Thanks, Glad! The list was interesting - I'll have to investigate Jennifer Johnston (whom others have praised here) and Kae O'Brien.

For US members who don't have enough books, the is running through Nov 16, with a number of NYRB titles. No pressure, but they do sell out of some titles.

I was slightly more restrained this time, but still bought 12 books; I indulged in some authors that were touted on TL&S who I might not have tried otherwise: Schweblin, Murnane, and Zweig. I also ordered The Complete Claudine because Alex Ross tells me that a lot of the final volume is set at the Bayreuth Festival.

Bill wrote: "Schweblin ..."

Fever Dream?

Lljones wrote: Fever Dream?"

Yes, Chess Story and Stream System: The Collected Short Fiction of Gerald Murnane for the other two mentioned.