This week has flown by and it has been busier than I thought it was going to be.  Yesterday DH and I went to visit a long standing customer in North Wales and the weather for the drive was great; very sunny but very cold!  On the way we got to see the seaside and also quite a lot of very tiny lambs!  Spring has really sprung. I did take my book with me and got quite a few hours of uninterrupted reading and it was glorious.

This is my Book for March and have just finished and loved it.  I have read quite a few of Edward Marston’s books now and love the Railway Detective ones.

It is 1866 and Giles Blanchard has just finished dining at his Club in Chichester and gets on the train in First Class to go to Portsmouth so he can get the ferry back to his home on the Isle of White. In the carriage is a young woman who starts to talk to him, just before the train leaves a naval officer climbs in to the same carriage.  Just as things begin to be interesting between Giles Blanchard and the young woman he is attacked from behind and strangled to death by the naval officer.  The woman and he leave the carriage at the next station and move to another train.

When Mr Blanchard’s body is discovered Inspector Colbeck and Sergeant Leeming are dispatched from London to Portsmouth to try and discover who killed him and why.  It is further complicated by a rash of women on the Isle of white, Chichester and Portsmouth being blackmailed by a woman and man who threaten them including one young woman who is companion to Queen Victoria, currently residing at Osborne House on the Isle of White. Can Colbeck & Leeming find the culprits quickly?

I love these mystery books as they are historical but also quite gentle and well written.  They can be found in all formats at the usual suppliers.

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This is the book I have now started, which is the first book of Jayne and my Book Club.  I already have a few of Laurie Gilmore books so I am sure I will love this one too.  I look forward to hearing what Jayne thinks.

Today has been busy; my new washing machine has been delivered so I can now catch up on all the washing I need to do and I need to make a start on my home jobs too.  DH has been out all day with Eldest and tomorrow they are going to look at this car.  Tomorrow evening we are at the local pool for the final round of the League and then Sunday DH is out all day at another swimming event and I will be quilting.

I hope you have all had a lovely week and a great weekend to come. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx

Well I thought it was going to be a quiet week but in fact it has been really busy!  DH is back at Eldest’s today sorting out a few things and I have not got a vehicle at the moment because Eldest’s needs a repair and is waiting on the part, so he is using mine until the part arrives! Not that I am bothered as I have plenty to do at home!

As we have had a book theme week I thought I would carry on today with books.  I mentioned about whether it is considered “reading” when you listen to a book.  I know of a few Bookstagram people who not only read the book but listen to it also, not sure if it is at the same time or as well as!  I have been listening to books whilst I have been with Eldest at his business and quite enjoyed it, although I am not sure about the book I am listening to at the moment.

K. L. Slater is from Nottingham and still lives there, which is DH and my hometown, so this was why I decided to download this book as it is also set in Nottingham.  

Saffy gets a message from her childhood best friend Leona “Can’t speak….don’t text or call…..please just come”.  She sees the message and then it disappears.  When she gets to Leona’s home she is there with her young daughter, Saffy’s Goddaughter and her husband and everything is okay, well Leona tries to persuade Saffy it is.  Saffy leaves to collect her young son from nursery worried about her friend but she has her own worries and needs to sort her own life out without interferring in her friends.  Then she finds the Police on her doorstep as Leona, her husband and young daughter have disappeared and Saffy was the last person to see them.  They begin to question her but not as a witness but more as a suspect!

I liked the first bit of the book until the Police started to question Saffy and it has been written with quite a heavy hand and from the point of view that they believe Saffy to be guilty of the disappearnce.  However that really could not be the case for one women to disappear two grown adults, one of them a man, and a little girl who is her Goddaughter.  It really does not come across very well.  Then for the next several chapters it waffles along bringing in Saffy’s own troubled life with her ex-husband and his attitude towards her and the fact that he has full custody of their young son and is using him as a weapon over Saffy.

It is one of those books in which I will carry on to see what happens in the end but I don’t think I will read/listen to any of her other books.  Of course this is just my opinion and if you look there are quite a lot of people who absolutely loved the book, good job we are all different!

One series I have really enjoyed is the above one with June Whitfield as Miss Marple.  Sadly no longer with us, June Whitfield was an amazing actress, mainly comedy, but so talented on the radio too and in the theatre.  I think I will be looking for more of these to listen to and getting some books on Audio that I have already read and know that I like so that I can listen to them whilst at Eldest’s.

This week the weather has been quite spring like during the day but cold at night with frosts in the early morning but at least we have seen the sun for a while.  This weekend it is even going to be 17°c during the day but then next week back to normal temperatures.  It means that the garden will start to grow so that will need to be added to the list of jobs to get done as well!

Happy Friday you lovely lot and I hope you have a wonderful weekend. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco Bookworm xxxx

We have a book theme going on this week on my Blog.  Today is World Book Day and I am hoping  to be able to do some reading later.  

My Local Library, Aspley, Nottingham.

Books played a big part in my life from when I was little.  Every Saturday afternoon Mom, Dad and I used to walk to our local library and get our books for the week.  We all loved books and in our local library there was a room right next to the check out desk which was for the children’s library.  After a while having read a lot of the books I was anxious to get my “grown up” reading cards so I could choose books from the main part of the library.  I will always remember getting those tickets and as you were in the main library you got six!

These are the old type of tickets you were issued with and the Librarians used to put the slip from the book into them so they knew who had checked the book out.

The library was a great place and of course it was long before computers and Google at home so if you had homework assignments you quite often had to go to the Library to find the information to complete it!  Our local library also had a room which had desks in for you to do work at.  I used the library for a long time even after my parents had passed, but then I was earning and I started to buy books with my paychecks.  So began my collection of books!

If you have followed me for a while you know that with the books we own I do re-read them again and again but DH does not as he has an extremely good memory and can remember the books which says a lot about my brain!!!!  I also love to keep my books as they are like friends, even if I have not read them for a while.

The Boys in The British Library, London in 2005.  They were nine and five.

Our Boys had lots of books when they were little and they too love reading although they do not read as much as they used to, they do read when away on holiday.  They always used to love World Book Day at school as they got to choose a book each to add to their collections.  We have started Little Man off on his book journey with quite a few books already.  For his Birthday we bought him the Ultimate Book of Vehicles and he loved it.

We took the Boys to Hatchards, the Oldest Bookshop in London, in 2005 and here they are choosing books.  Youngest managed to find one of the small seats and was quite happy sitting there going through the books, the pile at his feet are his selections!

I hope you get chance to do some reading on World Book Day.

Yesterday I was with Eldest at his business doing paperwork and the accounts and I got there at 7.00am and left at 8.00pm!  It was a very long day and freezing cold although we did see the sun for a little while.  Today is home job day as well as washing and ironing.  Grocery shopping tomorrow and I am hoping to get the quilts cut out tomorrow so I can begin to sew this weekend.

Have a great Thursday and it is almost the weekend. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco Bookworm xxx

You all know how much I love reading and my books and so does my best friend Jayne, who I lunch with once a month.  Anywho in January I suggested to Jayne that we make our own little Book Club, just the two of us, as she loves reading too and we are very alike in our tastes.  She thought it was a great idea so today, as well as lunch, we had our inaugural meeting of our Book Club.

We didn’t manage to meet up during February as she and I were too busy with things on, so whilst DH was away at the beginning of February for the week I put together some things to mark the start of our Book Club including the first book as I had two copies of the same book for Christmas.  I bought one copy then DH bought me another copy as part of my Christmas presents, so I thought that would be the perfect one to start with. 

I made a book cosy for both of us and a book mark in the same material

I got us a magnetic bookmark each with our names on.

A pen and little pin badge.

A cotton book bag to keep everything in.

A Pride & Prejudice Bag Charm with a tea cup, book and hat on and below some book stickers.

You cannot read without a mug of tea and these teabags came with book quotes on them.

The pin badge.

The above is a book journal to record the books we read and our opinions etc, also with our names on.

This is our first book “The Cinnamon Bun Book Store” by Laurie Gilmore which is quite appropriate.  It is a cosy mystery book.

We have arranged to see each other for lunch on April 15th which is five weeks away so we think that will be ample time for us both to read the book and then discuss it when we see each other.  People have often said you must belong to various Book Clubs but I have always stayed away from them because the ones I do know of locally, the books they choose are, in one word, depressing!  I am sure to them they think they are wonderful but I think of them as being esoteric or thought provoking.  I, however, read to escape and read for enjoyment not to make me depressed!

I thought I would show you my TBR shelves as they stand at the moment :

This shelf holds my fantasy books, my crime books and my Christmas books to read, as well as some of the Clive Cussler books I am reading too.

The middle shelf here holds my Biographies, my Historical books, and crime books.

The middle shelf here holds my Agatha Christie books, books on London and about Bookshops, some of my recipe and garden books and some other factual books.

There are quite a lot but this is one of my Aims this year is to do more reading but to also get my TBR shelves down a little bit.  I did say to Jayne that having our little Book Club would also be a good idea to keep me reading.  So we will not only be Ladies Who Lunch but Ladies Who Read too!  I think, as both our Birthdays are in June, we should call it The Gemini Book Club, what do you think?

Our next get together in April is to a local, well local-ish, bookshop called The High Peak Bookstore near Buxton, Derbyshire.  It is well known, if a good drive away but hopefully the weather will be nice and it is a lovely drive.  The building used to be an old Garage and it was bought and turned into the bookstore and the original owners have retired but their daughter runs it now.  There is also a cafe so we can get some lunch too.  We will be able to pick our next book to read then.

Really looking forward to our new Book Club.

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco Bookworm xxxx

Well February’s Book Club has come round quickly and as we always say where are the weeks going to?

I am keeping up with my Aims of doing more reading this year and have managed to finish two books but I have also listened to three on my Apple iPod whilst I am working or doing home jobs.  Some people say that this is not really “reading” but then others say yes it is as although you are listening to the book you are still getting into the story.  So for February’s Book Club I will show you the Book I listened to

This is about three women in the village of Churchwood who meet.  Alice who is the retired Doctor’s Daughter who have just moved to the village since his retirment. Kate who lives on one of the local farms with her father and brothers who treat her like a slave and dress her like one of them and Naomi who owns the big house in the village and is in charge of all the local charitable good works.

Alice had damaged her hand whilst still in London and is not back to full health and is very concious of it, Kate is very concious of how everyone feels about her family and especially how she looks and acts and Naomi is concious of how everyone sees her as being stuck up and too good for the village.  The three of them come together and form a strong bond of kinship and help the village and the wounded servicemen at the local hospital by starting their own bookshop, they also discover whilst organising the bookshop a traiter in their midst.

To be honest this is only the second book I have listened to on my iPod, the first one being a book that I had already read and new the story, thinking that this would be better for me as I already knew what was going to happen.  I did wonder if I would actually listen to the story if I was busy working, but it is amazing how good our brains are at doing two things at once and I did manage to listen to the story and work!  I have also gone on to download two other books to the iPod to listen to in the future. 

It would never stop me from reading the books, which I do still prefer but being able to listen to the story whilst working works well.  The Wartime Bookshop was a lovely story, not too taxing but it was well written and read and I already have, in printed form, the next book in the series The Wartime Bookshop at Christmas so I will be reading that!  I have just started to read this book, below, and have read quite a few of Mr Marston’s books already and do love them.

The view from the Cafe.

This weekend is entirely free, no swimming, so we have a few jobs to do and we are going to see Little Man tomorrow.  This morning DH was not working so we went out to Chatsworth Farm Shop cafe for breakfast and it was lovely.  The weather was very cold and frosty so we are still in the depths of winter but it is supposed to get a little warmer later in the week, just in time for us to help Youngest & Fiance move in to their new home next weekend!

Have a wonderful weekend you lovely lot. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx

Someboday loves Henry Hoover!

This is my book which I have been reading at the end of December and into January and one of the many that I have had on my TBR shelf!  I love reading the Christmas mystery books before Christmas and at this time of year too.

Roz Parker has just retired from the Police Force after thirty years and is leaving London on the sleeper train to The Highlands of Scotland, her original home, to be with her daughter and partner as they are expecting their first baby, a Granddaughter.  However as with all good mysteries the weather is not co-operating on the run up to the Christmast holidays with heavy snow causing a lot of cancellations.  They are waiting in the First Class lounge and Roz is intrigued by her fellow travellers.

One young couple are semi-famous being reality TV stars, she an influencer and him a arrogant reality TV wannabe.  There are also a family of five in the sleeper bit, a son and his mother and four young students going North to compete in a quiz to see who will be picked for a university course.  A very mixed bag. 

They think their journey is going to end before it begins with the sleeper train being cancelled but it fights its way through the weather to London for the return journey to The Highlands and they all board, however not all of them will be getting off at the end!  Roz will have to take charge and find out who the murderer is before they strike again before she can begin her retirement in earnest!

I am on Page 209 of 326 and will probably finish it this weekend.  I am really enjoying it as it is not too taxing but Alexandra Benedict does move the story along well and you feel engaged with the characters without being annoyed.

Here is a sneak peak of my next book, which I have been carrying around with me just in case I finished the one above!

Molly the Maid is busy with her job at The Regency Grand Hotel getting everything ready for Christmas but her boyfriend, Juan, keeps disappearing and the corridors are wispering things and someone is keeping a secret, will they manage to solve the mystery before Christmas?  It is only 128 pages long but I think it will be a lovely little story.

Been out all day today with DH visiting customers and companies we work with and a few personal jobs.  This weekend we are beginning the 2025 de-cluttering of our home and tomorrow evening is another swimming event.  Have a wonderful January weekend. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx