This Will Be Fun - E. B. Asher

One of the perks of my job is the number of review copies that come my way, and on Friday's there's the extra bonus of Publishers Weekly where we get sent an impressively long list of books to request from. It's not guaranteed that you'll actually get what you ask for, and it can be a long wait for something to appear (I got a Christmas related book I'd asked for in November 2023 in July 2024). It's entirely likely that by the time something comes through I've completely forgotten why I was attracted to it in the first place.

This is kind of what happened with 'This Will Be Fun' which sat around for a good few weeks before I picked it up a couple of days ago, finally in the mood for something light and fantasy-based again. E. B. Asher is in fact 3 people writing together, and what they've produced is fun cosy fantasy. If you like Travis Baldree and The Princess Bride this is worth a second look. 

Ten years ago The Four - best friends, Beatrice, Elowen, Clare, and Galwell saved the realm of Mythria from a terrible threat, and they haven't spoken since. The Queen of Mythria is about to marry though, their presence at her wedding is demanded, and then when her fiance is abducted they have little choice but to put their differences behind them and set off to the rescue again. However reluctantly it may be. 

In terms of world-building and plot it's not the best book you'll read but for quipping, silly jokes, a celebration of found family, a celebration of the value of therapy, and for asking the question of what happens at the end of the quest it does it all. I don't think the world building matters very much - we're all familiar with the tropes and this book is all about relationships and personal growth. I'm equally indifferent to the plot, evil is vanquished, good wins out, and true love prevails. 

A couple of years ago I would not have thought of myself as a cosy fantasy fan, but when it's done well it turns out I am, it's exactly what I want to wind down from the stress of the busiest time of year. The doing it well bit is the trick. I've come across a few attempts that feel cynical - to paint by numbers and lacking in the humour that makes the best of them work. You need to go light on the smut too - which this does. 

Murder before Evensong - Richard Coles

2025 will, if nothing else, be the year I caught up with Richard Coles and appreciated what the fuss is about. I remain skeptical about efforts to televise this book, for me the charm lies in the observations, turns of phrase, and mild obsession with stationary. I do not believe these will translate well to screen, but with luck something else good will emerge, sufficiently different to the books to be enjoyed in it's own right.

I'm not at al; comfortable with the description cosy crime for these books either - they might take second place to a frank delight in parish life, and the details are mercifully brief, but it does not change their brutality (a carotid artery severed with a pair of secateurs is not a cosy image at all). I've now read the first 2 Canon Clement mysteries, and the Christmas Novella. Book number 3 is out in paperback mid February. I am a committed fan. 

Anyone who followed Coles on social media over the last while (I can't remember when I started - before lockdown?) will recognise elements of the life he shared there, as well as his gift for sharp observation. It's a smart tactic, as is the 1980s setting. The 80s are safely pre DNA fingerprinting, mobile phones, and social media. Even if you don't really remember the era the films and music keep it close. It's an interesting time socially too - which Coles explores with delicacy.

My feeling after reading Murder Under the Mistletoe was that it had a lot in common with The Diary of a Provincial Lady, Murder Before Evensong confirms that, and earns comparisons to Barbara Pym, Murial Sharp, nods towards G K Chesterton, and maybe Molly Keane too, although Coles is kinder than either Keane, or Sharp, towards his characters. His observations might be forensic but they're not unkind - Audrey, Canon Daniel Clements's mother, is a creation of genius. It's a shame that Maggie Smith will never portray her. 

Meanwhile there's much about the workings of the church, village politics, faith, acceptance of human foibles, and dachshunds. It's delightful, and a very strong start to my reading year. 

My Top 10 Books for 2024

It is probably 12th night - I see arguments for different counts on this - and definitely the end of Christmas. My tree will come down this afternoon and it's time for a round up list of last years reading.

Looking back I see I've read more than I thought I had, though maybe not as much as I thought I should, and there have been some really great books in that mix. These don't come in any particular order beyond going back through the years post and thinking that, and that, and that - but they are books I've put effort into selling at work as well so I suppose I've really staked whatever bookselling reputation I have on them too. 

Sarah Clegg's Dead of Winter is first up. An interesting and entertaining survey of the darker Christmas traditions and the comeback they're making, albeit in a sanitised and social media friendly form. I went to see Twelth Night at the RSC yesterday which was a stark reminder of how unruly and cruel a tradition that could be. It's a charming and funny production that still cannot hide the viciousness of the low comedy in it. Sarah Clegg knows her stuff, and she's excellent company in this little book - a mix of fun new trivia and deeper thinking that isn't just for Christmas.

Next is Murder Under the Mistletoe. I hadn't paid as much attention to The Reverand Richard Coles books as I might, but this one was the magic combination of short and fun. It's an enjoyable story with an ingenious murder plot - it also inspired me to buy the earlier books. I loved Murder Before Evensong and am sailing through A Death in the Parish. I see that the Murder Before Evensong is being televised. I have mixed feelings about this, so much of the charm of the books for me is in the quality of the descriptions/sharpness of observation and I'm doubtful about how well that will translate to screen - if you like lengthy descriptions of how church works stick with the books. 

This is the book I've bought and given most copies of - Alice Lascelles Martini. She is one of the best writers on spirits around - I cannot recommend her books on cocktails highly enough for clear and sensible instructions that will give excellent and achievable results every time. People spend a lot of time and money on trying to overcomplicate drinks - the Martini takes us back to basics and builds on them in all sorts of ways. She's not particularly hard line about what can be called a Martini, and more than willing to include iterations some purists would have drawn the line at. More power to her on that front. It's a splendid book. 

There isn't an order to these books, but if there was this one would be at the top of the list. Jen Hadfield's Storm Pegs is an extraordinary book however I look at it. A beautiful meditation on place and language and time that blurs the lines between poetry and biography. This is Hadfield's account of the home she found and made told through language and landscape. It's magical. 

I was frankly disappointed with the adaptation of Man Size in Marble shown on Christmas Eve. It over complicated a story that works because of its simplicity. E. Nesbit's Ghost stories are fabulous, and The House of Silence - get this from the soon to be much missed Handheld Press whilst you can - is the best collection around. Weird tales are for all year round, but very much belong in midwinter. 

Greekish is easily my cookbook of the year. I've used it a lot, enjoyed everything I've made, given it to a few people as presents - mostly after cooking from it for them and consider it Georgina Hayden's best book yet. The recipes are perfect for pottering around in the kitchen - not overly complicated but distinctive enough to feel special. It's full of the things she cooks for her family and consequently has a broad appeal. As good for brightening up winter days as it summer food.

Columba's Bones is the one that's divided people most here I think. It's one of polygon's Darklands series, and in my opinion one of the best - but it is violent and graphic with it so avoid if that's not to your taste. I found David Greig's use of language clever and his tale touching as well as occasionally shocking. Overall I think he caught the fear of a Viking attack and the brutality of the moment well. It's a novella that punches well above its weight. 

Someone From The Past by Margot Bennett was my favourite Crime Classic read this year against some stiff competition. This one stood out for the chaotic nature of the heroine, and its overview of bohemian post-war London. There must have been plenty of books set against the same background, but they don't come my way so very often. Bennett's sympathetic portrayal of 2 girls making their way up in the world, the men they encounter on the way, and the murderous consequences for one of them really is a lost classic. 

Nights Out At Home by Jay Rayner sits somewhere between memoir and cookbook - an increasingly popular and sometimes tedious device that works very well here because Rayner is primarily a restaurant critic rather than a cook. Memories of meals he's loved and efforts to recreate them, or in the case of the Gregg's Steak Bake to take them to the next level give us 60 or so recipes, most of which I probably will never try, but all of which make me think about great meals I've had, the company I had them in, and how I approach cooking day to day. If you like Rayner's columns this is worth having.

I should have spent more time with this book since buying it, but there's no huge rush and projects are bubbling away at the back of my mind as I write this. Shetland Fine Lace Knitting by Carol Christiansen is an important as well as useful book. It's come out of a lengthy piece of work she's been involved in at the Shetland Museum and Archive and is a real contribution to the history of Shetland lace. It's also stuffed full of patterns to incorporate into your own work. It's one to treasure for the knitters out there. 

Welcome 2025

I did not mean to leave it quite so long between posts, but the end of the old year has frankly been a bit of a bitch and now we're here in 2025. This is my 4th bookshop Christmas but I'm no nearer adapting to the rhythm of it - it doesn't stop as you go into January, but there's a lot more paperwork (endless returns and no shortage of people trying to return things that weren't bought from us, possibly bought from us but not in the last 2 years, bought from us and trashed far past the point of resale, stolen from us in the hope they could then con us out of a refund - get in the bin - and wilfully refusing to accept how gift receipts work. No you cannot have cash in exchange for the gift someone gave you, and no matter how rude you are I will not give it to you.)

There are also a lot more bored children and parents who seem unwilling or unable to entertain them. Letting them blow into mouth organs that they have no intention of buying is nor the way to fix anything though. At best you are annoying everyone around you, at worst you might as well just let your kids lick the floor and hope whatever germs they pick up don't keep them bored at home for even longer. 

Why yes, it has been exhausting. 

The trend in retail has been for bank holidays to be treated as normal working days, so we're closed on Christmas day but it's just a normal day off - and honestly it's not enough. I needed more than 2 days together, definitely didn't need to then work the 5 days to New Year's eve, ended up ill by New Year's eve, was asleep hours before the bells and stayed that way for almost 12 hours. We're all like that at work at the moment; burnt out, overstretched, and low. I doubt the internet has missed my cheery presence. 

In genuinely sad news a good family friend passed away on boxing day. Richard Gibson was a remarkable man who made all sorts of difference in the world. You can read a little about his work in Shetland Here. He will be very much missed by all who knew him.

But now it's time to look forward and see what the New Year brings, so here's to health and happiness in the next 12 months, and new beginnings. 

Dramatic Murder - Elizabeth Anthony

My Second nomination for reprint of the year, appropriately bought to you on the Winter solstice is Dramatic Murder - an aptly named mystery which I thoroughly enjoyed. I've read some mixed reviews for this but I'm very much a fan from the Scottish island setting the book opens with (however unlikely a name Posset island is) to the well-signposted ending back in London.

Dimpson McCabe, Dimpsie to his many friends has put together a Christmas house party in his Scottish castle, the last arrivals on Christmas Eve find him dead in the middle of his Christmas tree, apparently electrocuted whilst doing something with wires. How grateful we can all be for LED lights. It's a gruesome scene - and splendidly dramatic. 

The sheriff's court reluctantly turns in a verdict of accidental death, but both the police and some of the guests have their suspicions. Back in London meanwhile another member of the house party is found dead, and then another and another. It isn't the best plot (still more convincing than the last series of Shetland though) although the motive is sound and it's more or less believable - but then I don't think we're meant to take it too seriously. There's an almost pantomime element to proceedings that fits with the season and brings the Drama the title promises. 

With that in mind this book really isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea, but if like me you don't want murders you have to take seriously its a lot of fun. The other thing that might be a dividing point is how unpleasant many of the characters are. Dimpsie may be a beloved friend, but he's also drawn as difficult, selfish, bitchy, and manipulative. If he wasn't a successful playwright, useful to know, well-connected, and very wealthy how many friends would he have had? 

Henry Walters, his secretary is insecure, greedy, and determined to make what profit he can from his deceased employer, it's only his sexuality (hard not to read Walters as gay) which is treated with something close to sympathy, and certainly without much comment for 1948. The women in the case are not much better - Holly the ingenue young actress with very short skating skirts making a dead set at a married producer gets to be delightfully spiteful and unpleasant in her private thoughts, Frederica, beautiful wife of the same producer is casually having affairs as they suit her and being thoroughly unpleasant to her Henry Brown, who wasn't always Henry Brown and isn't overly keen for his Jewish ancestry to be known about - and why would he want it to be in in the late 1930s.

I really enjoy a character that's allowed to be unpleasant and Elizabeth Anthony really delivers on this front, allowing her characters to be both awful and sympathetic at the same time. It's what really makes Dramatic Murder stand out - that and the Christmas tree electrocution - and what makes me want you to read it, and vote for it. 

Fear Stalks The Village - Ethel Lina White

I read this book back in May when I picked it up off the top of the nearest pile to be read (there are always piles to be read) and absolutely loved it. It's a slightly tongue-in-cheek examination of what is on the surface a picture-perfect village full of entirely admirable and apparently happily married gentry.

The architecture is a pleasing mix of Tudor, Queen Anne, and Georgian, there's no train line to bring day trippers, all of the old families have adequate private incomes. And yet can anything really be so perfect? No, it cannot; a poison pen letter is proof that something is rotten underneath that wholesome surface. There are rumours which cause a social distancing, more letters bring more fear as neighbours start to distrust each other, and it becomes clear everyone has secrets of their own to guard.

There are clear hints about the overall culprit early on in the book along with some splendid red herrings, but the point is to examine how a hint of blackmail and the pursuit of social power corrupts good people, and how the appearance of goodness matters more than the real thing for many. It's clever, amusing, and not very murdery and I highly recommend it for a lazy afternoon. 

It was my first and most obvious choice for reprint of the year too, not so much because I found the plot or the handling of it especially original, I’d say both are competent rather than brilliant, but because Ethel Lina White is masterly at setting up an atmosphere and getting her characters right, and more than anything she really understands fear and how it operates in this middle class domestic setting.

I wonder if this book also resonates with me so much is also because whilst men are caught up and become victims in this scenario, it’s really a book about the social power and standing of women in a world where they don’t have much other influence. The men, we feel, might forgive each other’s transgressions, the women will not even as they delight in the downfall of their peers. And more than that – even the social power these women have is mostly by permission of their menfolk as we see when the squire takes a dislike to a married woman because he flirted with her. The effects of his disapproval are economic as well as social.

If you have not read Ethal Lina White yet, get her in for the Christmas holiday, you will not regret it. Despite the summer setting this is an excellent winter read – that atmosphere of suspicion behind drawn curtains is just the thing for a dark winters night. 

Ottolenghi Advocaat

Efforts to get in the Christmas spirit have taken a literal turn today. My tree is up, shopping well do the way to completion, and I've made my own Advocaat using a recipe from Ottolenghi's Instagram - which I think is properly attributed to Verena Lochmuller who co-authored the latest cookbook (Comfort) and seems fabulous. 

I've never really been an advocate woman - Snowballs were the Christmas cocktail you'd be offered in my teens but I wanted to seem sophisticated so avoided sweet creamy drinks in favour of hard spirits and dry sherry - which I liked a lot and still do, but sophistication continues to elude me. 

Verena's Advocaat is very similar to Whipkül which in turn has a lot to do with egg nog. There's nothing more luxurious in the depths of winter than something rich with cream and egg yolks, warm with spirits, and sweet with sugar. She promises that it will be stable in the fridge for about 2 months, I think to be safe I'd like to drink it faster.

The recipe and method is simple. Take 12 egg yolks (better plan on making a lot of White Ladies or a huge meringue with the leftover whites) and lightly beat them with 500g of icing sugar - do not let the sugar sit in the yolks for long as it makes them hard. Add the scraped innards of a Vanilla pod, pour in and mix 300ml of double cream, and finally 500ml of alcohol Don't over whip either as the air will work it's way out and leave gaps at the top of your bottles. 

Alcohol wise you could use vodka, white rum, golden rum, or brandy. My preference was for a golden rum for the flavour, white rum or vodka would have been cheaper, but if price was my main concern I'd have just bought a bottle of Warninks. Pour into a large jug through a fine mesh sieve to catch any bits and then decant into sterile bottles or jar. Keep in the fridge and use within 2 months. Have a look at the original insta post from Verena or Ottolenghi for a couple of serving suggestions. 

These quantities made about 1.3 litres of alcoholic custard - it would be easy, and sensible to half them. My plan is to give half away instead 

A Book For Christmas - Selma Lagerlöf

I haven't really been feeling particularly Christmasy so far - and yes I know it's still early, but this preparatory part of the season is the bit I normally enjoy. December has so far been a blur, work has been hard (hit by IT issues) and I've been too tired to really do much more than sleep when I get home. Tonight though my mother battled through awful traffic and worse weather to help me get a tree - it took us almost an hour to get barely a mile and back. Mum is worried that I'll be disappointed with the admittedly lopsided tree we found at the first shop we went to, but it was not an evening to traipse around garden centres, supermarkets, or DIY shops in the hopes of finding something better. 

The lopsided bit is facing the corner of the room and doesn't much matter, the rest of the tree is a nice shape, it was a very acceptable price, and I think it has character. I've started candying oranges, think I'll make biscuits at the weekend, started work on a Christmas stocking, have my first card up, and finished A Book For Christmas last night - so I'm slowly getting there.

I bought this mostly because Penguin sent some really lovely promotional material into the shop with it, it was enough to make me look and that was enough to make me buy. Promotional material works. I wasn't familiar with Lagerlöf but the mood isn't far from Hans Christian Anderson - veering dark and with a strong Christian moral. I'd say it's a collection of 2 halves - the first 4 stories I really liked, the last 4 not so much. A Book For Christmas opens the collection and is charming, The Legend of St. Lucia's Day is lengthy and old fashioned but satisfying. The Princess of Babylon and the Rat Trap both hold the balance between entertainment and moral in a way that works for a modern reader.

Redbreast did not work so well for me - too much of a Sunday school feel to it, and perhaps the same for In Nazareth, although the end to that has a kick to it that lifts it a little. The Skull is an interesting mix of Gothic horror and Christian homily that sit uneasily together in my mind, and the same with the Animals' New Year Night. 

What I do like about all of these stories is the old-fashioned sense of real danger from the weather, from poverty, from starvation, and from violence. On a day I saw an advert for a children's book called Krampus' Bad Fur Day I'm feeling a need for some dark to flavour the cosiness of the season. 

Murder by Candlelight - selected by Cecily Gayford

Why yes, I did actually buckle down and finally finishing a pile of half read books this weekend, and I'm continuing the good work into the week - it's a nice feeling to see the pile by my bed diminish to slightly more manageable proportions. 

I bought Murder by Candlelight, this year's Christmas crime collection from Profile in the Carlisle Waterstones when I had an hour to spare between my bus south from the Birders and the train further south. I don't know Carlisle at all well, but it's a good sort of place to have a bit of time between trains - the town centre is an easy walk, even with luggage, in pursuit of a hot coffee, decent sandwich, and emergency reading. This book turned out to be inspired choice for the journey.

There are three train stories in it and they all take place on the line that runs from Carlisle to Birmingham. I started reading with the Dorothy L. Sayers story as I left Carlisle to find that the characters were also on a train leaving Carlisle (they got off at Rugby, I only went as far as Birmingham). It's a better story than a lot of Sayers shorts I've read. By chance as I changed trains at New Street I picked Cyril Hare's It Takes Two - the denouement takes place in New Street. Further investigation revealed Freeman Wills Crofts The Mystery of the Sleeping-Car Express where bad things happen near Preston. The worst thing that has ever happened to me at Preston was a rail replacement bus service pre-lockdown. 

Fortunately, this last set of train journeys was entirely trouble free, everything ran on time, there was no problem getting seats and I had lots of reading time to enjoy a few murders in. Murder by Candlelight is the strongest collection I've read from Profile. there isn't a dud in it, and Cyril Hare's It Takes Two was a particular gem. Simon Brett's 'How's Your Mother' is another one - it runs close to humour until just before the end when it veers into something altogether more unsettling. I think it's from 1985s 'A Box of Tricks', and owes a good bit to Physcho. 

A really satisfactory collection of mysteries and an excellent stocking filler of a book. 

The Dead of Winter - Sarah Clegg

I have an advance review copy of this book with a cover I actually like more than the finished hardback which is saving me from buying the finished hardback - something I'm rarely tempted to do, but I loved this book so much that I'd make an exception for it. 

The Dead of Winter is a survey of the Demons, Witches, and Ghosts of Christmas and it is an absolute delight - another easy entry into my top ten books of the year list when the time comes to put that together. Sarah Clegg is a knowledgable, academically sound, and overall amusing guide to the darker side of Christmas and where it comes from. 

The answers may be surprising depending on what you already know, or think you know, about Christmas traditions. The short version is that some things - like carnival have roots going back to antiquity, and some traditions are only a few hundred years old. We had mostly moved away from the darker side of the festive season, but the growing popularity of wassailing, Krampus runs, mummers plays and the Mari Llwyd snapping horse heads suggest we need something to balance the jollines of Santa and the saccharine effects of the John Lewis Christmas advert. Or maybe that as Christmas has increasingly become about children, we're looking for some more adult traditions to embrace.

Whatever theories you favour there's plenty to think about here. Clegg never mocks the eccentricities she meets - which might have been tempting for the winter solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, she does invite us to laugh with her at how she manages to scare herself on a pre-dawn Year Walk in an attempt to discover who in the parish will die in the next year. She doesn't believe in the possibility, but on a cold Christmas eve morning well before sunrise having observed the whole ritual - well then it's hard not to believe just a little in anything at all. 

This isn't a particularly dark book and certainly not a how to guide for dark rituals, but very much a survey of recorded folklore and how it's evolved. Exactly the thing to settle down with on a dark night and make you wonder if it's worth leaving out an offering of food and an open window on the 13th of December in the hope of being taken up by Saint Lucy's wild hunt and riding across the winter sky with her.