Despite having more spare time I seem to have less reading time. I guess this will change once I come to grips with the fact that Rome wasn’t built in a day and everything doesn’t have to be done at once.
I have finished a couple of books, all very much stop and start efforts:
The Debs Of Bletchley Park by Michael Smith should have been a great book. Recounting the stories of women recruited to break German codes, translate messages, and pass on intelligence during World War 2, some of the 8000 women who lived and worked in poor conditions for the War Effort share their pride in working alongside men and aiding their country at Bletchley Park.
Lots of fascinating information but not an easy read. Ok, yes, maybe the brain needs to shift out of party mode. Blame me and not the author.
A Man Named Ove by Fredrick Backman.
This was my chosen paperback for plane travel, which has also been turned into a movie.
Bleak. That sums it up.
An old man wakes up each morning planning to kill himself following the recent death of his wife. He is no ordinary man either – he is one of those blighters who was curmudgeonly at 25. Hey, we all know one, don’t we? Anyway, it does have a happy ending, kind of, but you suffer for it.
I had to laugh at the back of the book where there was a questionnaire to check if your personality type was the same as Ove’s. I figure that could send some people over the edge…….
Kittyhawks Beyond The Gap by Dennis O’Leary
This one was lent to me by a friend I hadn’t seen since her wedding, nearly forty years ago. Her Dad was a soldier on the Kokoda Track and her late husband was Navy, so she has an interesting collection of reading material. I could have filled a suitcase!
In the words of his dedication in Kittyhawks, former RAAF engine fitter Dennis O’Leary has written this book as a resource for students ‘so that the youth of today may know what the youth of yesterday did for them’. My friend met O’Leary in his 80’s when he used to enjoy working in his garden.
This was an easy yet fascinating read and I particularly enjoyed learning about the Morotai Mutiny, when pilots were disgruntled about their limited participation in events happening around them.
Another one that should be in all High School Libraries…….
I think I’ll now reread Peter Brune’s “A Bastard Of A Place”, about this conflict. You seem to gain more out of a (historical) book when it becomes personal, dont you think?

Brizzy Mays Books and Bruschetta 
I find less time for reading (apart from blogs) since I’ve been blogging….
LikeLiked by 1 person
I was spending two hours a day on the train travelling to and from work which was perfect down time for reading. That time is now going into projects I had been talking about starting for years. Stupidly, I seem to have started five or six projects at once! At Xmas! The house looks like a cyclone has gone through!
🙂
LikeLiked by 2 people
Go girl….🙄
LikeLike
I read “A Man called Ove” and really enjoyed the book. I read it for the book club I had joined. I never had the chance to discuss it with them but I loved the book. Ove reminded me of several personalities around me while I was growing up in the Catskill Mountains.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Cupcake, yes, I was familiar with a couple of Ove type characters also.LOL. I found it cleverly constructed and well written – and very believable – just depressing. Those first chapters were a hard slog, though it got easier as Ove mingled. Not a happy statement about old age, was it? I could not bear to watch the movie.
LikeLiked by 2 people