Bex Blogs

Today is my turn on the blog tour for Renard Press's latest title, The Zebra and Lord Jones by Anna Vaught. Set in the midst of the Second World War, this is the story of the titular Lord Jones, disappointing only son of fascist sympathiser parents, and his encounter with a zebra, escaped from London Zoo during an air raid.  An interesting exploration of class, nationality and expectations of the 1940s, the beginning of the novel jumps around between Lord Jones and his parents, the keeper of the zebras at London Zoo, a boy called Ernest from Deptford who is evacuated to Wales, and Anwen Llewellyn, a defiant and independent servant at Lord Jones' Carmarthenshire house. As the story begins to come together, it becomes clear that what all of the characters have in common is loneliness and a feeling of not belonging where they are. With words and without them, they gradually come to understand each other, and themselves, better.  Although Lord Jones is the title character and the

This is a re-post from the old Ninja Book Box blog, but a subject I still feel very, very strongly about and so I thought it was worth sharing again! Everyone who wants one should feel 'allowed' to have an Indie Book Advent Calendar, for goodness sake.  Recently, I made a quick video about my thoughts on hearing a woman tell her grown up child that she was 'too old for an advent calendar now', and as I'm trying to post more regularly on this blog it seemed like a brilliant chance to expand my thoughts. Here is why you are never too old for an advent calendar... The whole festive season often gets harder as we get older, for a multitude of reasons. Personally, this year brings a whole new set of adjustments from our usual 'one year in Kent, one year in London with the grandparents' rules, as our extended family grows and includes an international contingent as well as many more grandchildren for my parents to divide their time between. A good thing of course,

Well hello 2012! This is a throwback to the very old days of book blogging and to be quite honest, I absolutely love it. I just want to talk about books on the internet, you guys.  This week I've been taking part in the Bout of Books readathon and sharing reading updates and some of my best book recs with people over on Instagram, but I thought it would be nice to do a little wrap up here, old school style.  Books finished: 2 ( The Picts and the Martyrs by Arthur Ransome and Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins) Books started: Friendaholic by Elizabeth Day, Storyland by Amy Jeffs, 52 Ways to Walk by Annabel Abbs, Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins Books continued (started before the start of the readathon and not finished by the end): The Greengage Summer by Rumer Godden, The Board Game Family by Ellie Dix, One Year's Time by Angela Milne Last week was a big, emotional week for me, with closing a business and doing all of the logistics involved in that, an

Many years ago when I first started book blogging, I joined The Classics Club in order to try to read more classics. Lately I've been thinking about rejoining, but I actually don't have many classics left that I'm really keen to read, so I decided that a better use of my time would be to try to read all of the books published by Persephone! If you're not familiar, Persephone Books are an independent publisher based in Bath who publish mostly forgotten women writers mostly from the inter war period, with some exceptions. They publish books of all genres, and I've never read a Persephone I didn't love. I'll share the list of their books here, with updates on which I've read and which I own, and I'd love anyone who wants to to join in as well. * = books I own, bold is books that I've read. List of Persephone Books 1: William – an Englishman by Cicely Hamilton * 2: Mariana by Monica Dickens 3: Someone at a Distance by Dorothy Whipple 4: Fidelity by