This blog’s books of the year

I have reviewed 31 books on this blog this year – three more than last year. Some of these are sent to me by publishers or authors, some I simply go out and buy. Which books you like is as personal a choice as what music you like. But for what it’s worth, here are…

Book review – The Nature of Sex by Carin Bondar

This book is a review about how animals beget other animals. It must be quite difficult to write about sex in a way that is neither coy nor coarse and which will keep the attention of the reader with whatever moral and personal baggage they might bring to the subject. The author  tells us of…

Sunday book review – Walking with Birds by Colin Whittle

  This is a very pleasant book of observations of birds around the author’s home in the Lake District. There is a lot about the flight of Buzzards and the song of Blackbirds. I really liked the author’s watercolours of the views and some birds of the Lake District and nearby areas although I’m not…

Sunday book review – A Sky Full of Birds by Matt Merritt

This is a book about bird gatherings from seabird colonies to winter roosts. Having spent a frustrating evening recently looking for a Pied Wagtail roost that wasn’t there I enjoyed hearing of Matt Merritt’s successes. A huge flock of birds is a sight to be seen – and sometimes a sound to be heard and…

Sunday book review – Winter by Melissa Harrison (ed)

This book is on the same model as the preceding three volumes: an anthology of seasonal nature writing with a mixture of work from well-known and older writers and some very modern pieces too. I liked Spring, Summer and Autumn and I like Winter too. It felt as though there were more poetry in this…