The London Bookshop Crawl 2016

I love book shopping. I know, what a shocker! But nice as it is going book shopping on my own, it's so much better going with friends, to make an event of it, where we all enable each other to buy ALL the books and spend too much money on additions to our towering to-read piles. Last year I went on three book shopping trips with online friends and also went to Hay on Wye for a couple of days with a friend from the Isle of Wight. Yesterday was The Big One, the London Bookshop Crawl Bex has spent months organising for friends, family and anyone else who wanted to come along.

It was an early start for me. Ordinarily for an event like this I would stay overnight at my sister's flat in South-West London and travel from there, but she was very inconsiderately away for the weekend, so I decided to make a day trip of it. The weather forecast was not promising, predicting gale-force winds and non-stop heavy rain for Saturday, so I found myself awake until the early hours worrying and making contingency plans just in case the passenger ferry from Cowes were to be cancelled. When it came to it, although it was a little drizzly and a little blustery, I had a very calm and uneventful crossing, and I got up to London at around ten.

We met in the cafe at Foyle's, where two tables had been reserved for the party, and several people were sitting around chatting, with coffee, cakes and pastries. Other members of the group had gone off around the shop. I was particularly excited to meet Ellie (from Bournemouth) and Ellie (from London), who I've known online and whose blogs I've been reading for years, but had never met, and Erica turned up not long afterwards. Erica reviews bookshops, rather than books, and her blog is a rather handy directory of recommendations which I check out every time I go to a new town or plan a London trip.

Once we'd got everyone together in one place, we set off down the road to Orbital Comics, a friendly and not at all Big Bang Theory-esque comic book shop. We had a mixture of comic book newbies and devotees in the group - I'm more of a newbie, and prefer short series or stand-alone titles to those which have been running for decades. Several members of the group had copies of Lumberjanes, which was a series I've been vaguely aware of through following the author Noelle Stevenson on social media, so that was my first purchase.

After Orbital we headed back to Charing Cross Road and Cecil Court, the bookshop centre of London. The shops were somewhat smaller in that area, so we broke up into smaller groups. My first stop was Any Amount of Books, which, although I didn't recognise it by name, is one of my old favourite Charing Cross Road haunts from my student days. I found several "maybe" books in there, but didn't want to load up too soon, so I left  The Incredible Adventures of Cinnamon Girl, Fannie Flagg's Standing in the Rainbow and a children's adventure book set at the Isle of Wight's very own Blackgang for another time. (I kind of regret not buying the Blackgang book though; I've never seen it before.) If anyone's read these books, do let me know what you think! I bought What She Left by T. R. Richmond, a book I've vaguely had my eye on at work, and went back to the till a second time after Nnedi Okorafor's Lagoon caught my eye and shouted "Buy me! Buy me!" How can you refuse such a call?

Cecil Court is full of bookshops of all sorts, though many specialised in collectors' editions. Marchpane is the children's bookshop (and wasn't it once in the Goldsboro premises?) It had Enid Blyton hardbacks, Chalet School books, including one of the few I've never been able to get hold of (for good reason, looking at the price!) I ran into Bournemouth Ellie and some other people - I'm sorry I can't remember exactly who as I hadn't learned everyone's names yet, but I think Louise was one, and possible Katherine too (and apologies if I've spelled your name wrong or assigned you the wrong Twitter identity) - in Goldsboro Books where we sighed over a £7500 set of first editions of Lord of the Rings. Goldsboro prides itself on being "The Home of Signed First Editions.) Not everything was out of our price range though; all the expensive books were of course locked in glass cabinets, but signed first editions of brand-new books sold at their retail price. I treated myself to Ali Smith's new book Public Library, it being National Library day and all.

 

Out in the street I found a poor lost and lonely Laura and, after a bit of window-shopping, took her on a little detour to Forbidden Planet, feeling slightly treacherous as I did so, as she and Bex had been arguing for ages about whether that ought to be part of the Crawl or not. I hold my hands up Bex, it really was my suggestion. We stopped off for lunch at Laura's favourite little noodle place in Leicester Square, before rejoining the group and trekking up to Persephone Books, where a very lovely member of staff was expecting us. I think, however, she was not expecting quite so many of us as we filed in... and filed in... and filed in until we were packed into the little shop like sardines in a can. The bookseller, whose name I think was Lydia, gave as a tour of the "backstage" area; office and storeroom and packing area, because Persephone is mostly a mail-order company and everything happens on site. She also talked us through what Persephone publishes (out-of-print books mostly from women writers of the early 20th century) and recommended some titles for different tastes and genres. She was an excellent hostess, really knew her stock, and it looked like we came away with multiple copies of all her recommendations between us. I bought The Home-Maker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher, which is my friend Sharon's favourite Persephone publication, as well as Harriet by Elizabeth Jenkins, one of the bookseller's suggestions. Persephone had a 3 for £30 deal (normally their books cost £12 each) so many of the group teamed up with other people buying one or two books to make the most of that offer. You also get a free bookmark with each purpose, matching the books' colourful vintage endpapers, which are prints from fabrics made in the year of first publication.

Next we traipsed down to the London Review Bookshop. This shop selects its stock on its merits over than bestseller quality, meaning that the books on display aren't necessarily what you would find in every branch of Waterstone's and WH Smith. By this point my shoulders were starting to ache from my rucksack and all my shopping bags, so Ailsa, who I'd got chatting with, and I squeezed into a corner of the busy cake shop for a mid-shopping snack. While we were in there, the group agreed to miss out Daunt Books, which was due to be the next stop, as we were running over time, and most of them headed off to our final bookshop, the massive Piccadilly branch of Waterstone's. Ailsa and I stayed at the LRB a while longer, and I was sorely tempted to stock up on many of the fiction hardbacks on the recommendations table (and that's before we even get onto the paperback shelves) but limited myself to one: Yuki Chan in Bronte Country by Mick Jackson. We stopped off at the craft shop next door (and now I know where I can stock up on sealing wax when I run out of the stuff that came with my Harry Potter stationery box) and met up with the group at Waterstone's. I then proceeded to hand out copies of The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet to everyone who'd expressed an interest in sci-fi. Tina and I had kept on running into each other deliberating over whether or not to buy Loney, winner of the Costa First Novel prize. I did, she didn't. My last purchases of the day were Gracekeepers author Kirsty Logan's short story collection The Rental Heart... and another copy of Anne of Green Gables. Yes, that makes four. Not including the colouring book, the journal, all the Anne stationery, and other books in the series. It's the luscious little Collectors' library edition, pocket-sized with gold-edged pages and illustrations, and all for the price of a trade paperback.

Many members of the group began heading off homewards around that point, and Laura, Bex and I ("the founding members") found some comfy chairs up on the fourth floor and sat down to rest our feet and chat about how the day had gone. It went AMAZINGLY. I don't think I've ever been with so many like-minded bookish people, even when I was at university studying books. Everyone was a kindred spirit, easy to join a conversation with, even though we didn't all know each other to begin with. I'm just sorry I didn't get to talk to everyone. Those of us who were left at 6ish had a table booked at Pizza Express, a really lovely end to a fantastic day. It was a long journey home, with a slight delay on the Southampton line, so I took a slightly earlier and faster train than the one I'd initially intended. I got a taxi from the station and arrived at the Red Jet terminal with plenty of time to spare. The journey across the Solent was a little choppy, but hardly the chaos and disruption I'd been led to believe (though that may still be to come.) I finished my day when I got home with a "special" hot chocolate (with a splash of Bailey's) and was in bed by midnight, where I stayed for the next eleven hours. A long day (and an expensive one) but such a happy one.

Sunday Summary: What is the use of a holiday without a bookshop or twenty?

I know, I've been terrible - both at updating the blog, and because of all the books I've bought and otherwise acquired this past month. But up to the end of September, I did pretty well, keeping to my "Read 3: buy 2" rule and getting my to-read shelf down, briefly, to under twenty books. And then I realised I didn't like having such a small selection of things to read (not counting rereads) and they were almost entirely sci-fi or fantasy. But not to fear: my birthday was in October, and I have lots of friends and relations who know me well, as is evident if you've read my birthday post a couple of weeks ago. Then, at the end of the month I had two weeks off from work, which included a trip with my friend Sharon to Hay-on-Wye, the town on the Welsh border that is famous for its quality and quantity of second-hand bookshops. The following weekend I met up with Bex and Laura, for my last book-splurge of 2015. Anything I see that I want, from now on, can go onto my Christmas wishlist.

So, with no further ado, let me present to you a gratuitous "Look at all the booooooooks!" (and bookshops) post.

The White Horse Bookshop, Marlborough

It was really nice to travel with a friend who drives; no stress about changing trains, worrying about who sits next to you, or carrying your luggage to the station. We took the car ferry from Yarmouth to Lymington, and driving through the New Forest the scenery was absolutely gorgeous. The trees were in bright shades of autumn colours - much more impressive than we have on the island. When the signs warned us to look out for animals on the road, I did not appreciate just how many times we would have to slow down to let ponies, donkeys, sheep and cows wander into our way without a care in the world. We stopped off for lunch at Marlborough, a decision that may or may not have been cemented by me noticing an independent bookshop called the White Horse, which stocked new titles across three storeys (although I think the basement was for art materials.) After a lunch at the Polly Tearooms, which was recommended by a passer-by overhearing us discussing where to eat, we spent a little time in the White Horse, which had a good range of fiction, a friendly bookseller, and two rooms upstairs for non-fiction: one for travel, and the other had a wide, cosy window seat if you want to spend lots of time browsing. I treated myself to The Bookshop that Floated Away.

Hay-on-Wye

We took a roundabout way to get into the town centre from our bed and breakfast, and it wasn't until I checked on the map app on my phone that I realised how close we were to the first bookshop - it was quite literally about two minutes' walk away. Our first stop was the Hay-on-Wye Booksellers, a proper, traditional second-hand bookshop with lots of rooms and corners, where you can get lost in L-Space and potentially find yourself in another city. The shop had only just opened, and one of the booksellers was still hoovering, but made us very welcome as she darted around the shop. The children's section was wonderful, full of the sorts of paperbacks that would have been for sale in the '80s and '90s. I spotted Adele Geras' The Tower Room - the first in a trilogy of fairy-tale retellings I remembered from middle school, before modern fairy-tales were the big thing they are now. I did not buy that one, but immediately broke my "one book per shop" rule and picked up a very jolly old school story called The Girls of the Rose Dormitory, and another called Jane's Adventures In and Out of the Book, about a little girl who finds a book in her family's castle which is a portal to many weird and wonderful worlds. Then, upstairs, where Sharon went in search of a book about fashion through the ages, and I buried myself in the little science fiction and fantasy nook (naturally!) I added Young Rissa to my pile, because second-hand bookshops are wonderful for cheesy old sci-fi.

Next up, we stopped at a gorgeous stationery shop, Bartrum's, where I told Sharon to keep me far away from notebooks - I have a bad habit. We sighed over fountain pens and every colour and brand of ink imaginable - except for the one I actually decided I wanted to buy. There were some really dinky little ink bottles for about two or three pounds, and I did end up with one of them in a gorgeous bright green (to make a change from my usual purple.) I also bought a red leather pen-case which fits two fountain pens and a crochet hook quite nicely, and is more convenient than a full-sized pencil case to keep in a handbag.

The handsomest bookshop...

But genre fiction is exiled to
the basement.
(I kind of loved that.)

Richard Booth's Bookshop was up next, which Sharon described as "the handsomest bookshop." It was a mixture of new and used, with fancy painted wooden signs above each section, and covered three floors. Upstairs was a Folio Society reading room, and on the ground floor was a cafe (although it was closed at the time, so alas no cake break. Naturally I went to the children's section to see how many editions of Anne of Green Gables there were - enough to be counted as a respectable bookstore. But I had a particular fondness for the basement. Yes, it was austere, somewhat gloomy, with very poor lighting in the clearance section, but there were rows upon rows just dedicated to the science fiction: pulpy paperbacks from decades past, TV-tie-in novels for Star Wars and Trek and sci-fi shows long since forgotten. Crime and romance were also down here. So, again, I found another cheap and cheerful, battered old book which could be really bad and could be a hidden gem. There were also some publishers' remainders going cheaply, and I was drawn to a book called Speak about an artificial inteligence being whose personality and memories were made up from different people over the years, unable to do anything but tell their story.

We could not find all the shops on the map, and suspect that some may have closed down or relocated. We went into two branches of Addyman's bookshop - three, if you count Murder and Mayhem, which appears to be a separate building for their true crime and crime fiction. We didn't spend very long in there. Sharon worked for the police from the age of sixteen up until a couple of years ago, and as such has little taste for reading about the worst of human nature in the name of entertainment. I like a good thriller, but have trouble knowing where to start when faced with an entire section, or shop, in the genre. The main Addyman's shop was a treat, sprawling and interestingly decorated - I think the walls came from the interior of a church somewhere, in blue and gold. The entrance of the science fiction room is guarded by a life-sized cardboard standee of Captain Kirk (opposite the Star Trek tie-in books, and a couple of cast autobiographies, but no Leonard Nimoy, I checked.)  Captain Picard stood at the centre of the room itself, giving an odd sensation of being watched if I caught sight of him out of the corner of my eye. There were mostly second-hand books, but again, some well-discounted new; I saw stacks of Neil Gaiman's Fragile Things collection, which I've already got, and I also saw a big hardback of The Art of Neil Gaiman, which I do not own, but I was getting towards the end of my day's budget. I did buy a copy of The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury, who I've long been meaning to read more from.

We must have gone into about ten bookshops during our day in Hay, returning to the B&B in the early afternoon to drop off our first batch of purchases, before heading out for more. Other notable mentions were Rose's Books, which specialises in collector's editions of classic children's books. There were a few Chalet School books in there, but well out of my price range. There is a huge cinema converted into a bookshop, and you could probably spend all day in that shop alone - and there were big cases outside, which a very eclectic selection, all going for a pound. I found myself dithering over one book, The Last of her Kind by Sigrid Nunez, before deciding that, if I keep on going back to a book, I'm clearly meant to have it. (I just hope it's good, after that.)

We also stopped off at Hereford on the way home. At the HMV

I bought another copy of Neverwhere - a lending copy, and How

The Marquis Got His Coat Back from the Waterstone's, which got

an approving look from the bookseller.

Bloggers' bookshop mini-crawl

You'd think a weekend in Hay-on-Wye would satisfy my book-buying urges, but if you think that, you obviously don't know me very well. The following Saturday, I met up with Bex and Laura in London, and had a practice run for Bex's planned bookshop crawl early next year. I met Bex first, at St Pancras, and, once she'd passed her children over to her mother's care, we wandered over to the British Library, where she'd seen some advertising for an Alice in Wonderland exhibition, but it turned out that wasn't due to open until later in November. We had a good look in the bookshop, however, where she bought a book and I added to my bookish tote bag collection. Well, I couldn't very well not!

Bex's "Not-Google" map app led us then to Housman's, a political bookshop (political as in passionate about issues, not as in biographies of shiny Etonians.) I kept on being drawn back to the graphic novels and graphic memoirs, and both Bex and I found ourselves making shortlists. I decided on Alison Bechdel's Fun Home, as I haven't been able to find it on the Isle of Wight and keep on nearly-buying it whenever I'm in London. A lack of communication meant that we were heading back to Waterloo station to meet Laura while she was coming to find us elsewhere - and when one tried to phone the other, they'd be on the Underground and without signal, of course. But we found each other eventually, and made for an all-you-can-eat buffet in Chinatown to catch up on all the news.

Our next stop was the big Waterstone's at Piccadilly, where Laura tried to put all her favourite books in our hands, but I was being very well-restrained, only buying books I really wanted and was too impatient to wait until Christmas. I came away with George by Alex Gino and Welcome to Night Vale, the novel tied in with the popular and surreal podcast (which I really need to catch up on. I think I'm only up to about episode 30.) Then, as book-shopping is exhausting work, we had our first cake break.

 

Then it was Hatchards' turn, with its many rooms and staircases, an awesome kids' books section, where, on learning that Laura was unfamiliar with I Want My Hat Back, I proceeded to read aloud to her. (It is a really great book.) Here, I also found a Folio Society edition of Anne of Green Gables which I kind of whimpered at, but did not buy, because any more than my three reading copies (which is a good number of reading copies, for every purpose) and I will have to go all out and start a proper collection, and I really don't have the space for that at the moment. But oh, it's so pretty. And illustrated. And pretty.

I did, however, buy Carry On by Rainbow Rowell, which is tied in to her novel Fangirl. It is sort of the Harry Potter-inspired fanfiction Cath writes in her book, but sort of evolved out of that into a stand-alone Simon Snow novel. Then it was time for another coffee-break, and then up to Forbidden Planet, to look longingly at all the movie and TV merchandise (Pop Vinyl figures of Firefly characters! I have only one Pop figure, of Spock, and would rather keep him as one special figurine, rather than being part of a collection. But on the other hand... Firefly figures! Kaylee! Wash! Jayne!) Downstairs, in the books section, I got very sad at the "In Memory Of" posters in the Discworld and Star Trek sections - I'm still not over it and will not be for a while. Laura and Bex bought various comics and graphic novels, and then it was time to go to our various homes or homes-of-relations.

I spend the next day with Hannah, one of my friends from university, and her husband Paul. I don't get to see much of them any more, and I wondered if their birthday present to me was meant as a subtle hint about writing more - a Harry Potter stationery set, with a journal, paperweight, letter paper and envelopes, and a proper seal and sealing wax. How awesome is that?! (Yes, Hannah, I will try to write more. Promise!) The Sunday was a quiet day at their home, and Monday Hannah was working from midday, but we drove out to Richmond Park for a short walk, although it was so foggy we couldn't see very much at all. But we had a wander around the Isabella Plantation, which I'd last seen back in February, so it was interesting to contrast it at the beginning of spring with the latter half of autumn.

NaNoWriMo

Once I came home, I spent the rest of last week making a start on my NaNoWriMo project, before starting back at work this afternoon. My plan is to get into a habit of writing 2500 words on days when I'm not working, so that on the days when I am at work, I only need to write 1000, and that'll leave a bit of "wiggle-room" for emergencies. Yesterday I was struggling. I hit my personal word count, and beyond, and yet I had that familiar feeling of "this is rubbish, this story is going nowhere." So I decided to break out of the linear story-telling, and jump ahead a bit to where the plot really gets going, as well as introducing some different characters' perspectives with backstory and subplots. It seems to be successful; I'm feeling excited about the story again, and becoming unstuck in the places where I felt myself getting bogged down. So that's what I'll be doing for the rest of November. I hope to have some time still to read - and that I'll beat last year's grand total of four books in November, of which, if I remember correctly, two were children's stories. But I expect it'll remain pretty quiet on the blog for the next month.

Mini-Review: Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore - Robin Sloane

Clay Jannon takes a job as a night clerk at San Francisco's strangest bookshop. Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore sounds like a bibliophile's dream, quirky and tall, with shelves you need very tall ladders to reach. I imagined it rather like Belle's library in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, and the descriptions of the store certainly come under the heading of bookshop porn! But there is another side to Mr Penumbra's: shelves of ancient, uncatalogued books written in code, borrowed but never bought by excitable patrons whose details must be logged for posterity in the bookstore's ledger. Clay's curiosity leads him on a quest of epic proportions and, together with his friends, employs a combination of lost medieval artefacts, Google's headquarters, and Clay's own favourite series of fantasy books to crack a centuries-old code. Mr Penumbra is a light-hearted but unusual page-turner, a celebration of ancient books and new media, friendship and curiosity.

Key Quotes:

The whole economy suddenly felt like a game of musical chairs, and I was convinced I needed to grab a seat, any seat, as fast as I could.

Neel takes a sharp breath and I know exactly what it means. It means: I have waited my whole life to walk through a secret passage built into a bookshelf.

The books I love most are like open cities, with all sorts of ways to wander in. 

I'm really starting to think the whole world is just a patchwork quilt of crazy little cults, all with their own secret spaces, their own records, their own rules.

Read it if you liked: The Night Circus by Erin Morgansten, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

When God Was A Rabbit, Sarah Winman

Thursday was the big launch of the latest chapter in the Richard and Judy Book Club: 2011’s Summer Reads. The first book to be selected, When God Was a Rabbit is the first novel of new author Sarah Winman, and is already sparking a lot of interest. With its strange title and attractive cover, When God Was A Rabbit is a charming, engaging family story told in two parts: “Not really a Before and After, more as if they are bookends.” Part one is set in the 1960s and 1970s, and is more character-based than a linear plot.

The story is viewed through the eyes of Elly as a young girl, with a slightly skewed viewpoint, and Winman highlights the ways that children view the world differently to adults. Although a “real world” book, there are one or two surreal scenes that leave you wondering whether they can be explained by an overactive imagination or if there is some magic in the air. It would spoil the poetry of the novel to think too hard about the question.

Winman excels in creating believable, loveable characters and it is them who kept me turning the pages: Elly’s adored elder brother Joe, Aunt Nancy who is in love with her sister-in-law, elderly eccentric Arthur (who reminded me a little of Edward Bloom in the film Big Fish) and Elly’s best schoolfriend Jenny Penny.

Jenny Penny is a charismatic, imaginative but rather highly-strung child, and I was curious because there is a character of the same name who features in L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of Ingleside. Both Jenny Pennys are appealing little girls with a huge influence on their schoolfellows and with a home life that doesn’t live up to its appearance. I wondered if Jenny Penny is some sort of fairy sprite who pops up in fiction throughout space and time – an unlikely theory perhaps! Winman’s Jenny Penny is a much more rounded, sympathetic character and friend than her namesake.

Part one is an anecdotal story that doesn’t seem to join together, rather like real life. Elly’s is a family with their quirks, ups and downs and guilty secrets, but who love each other above all. The story is fresh, magical and rather innocent, despite some of the themes and events. Powerful characterisation and poetic writing helps to make the ordinary extraordinary.

Part Two deliberately skips forward fifteen years, showing how people change when you’re not watching. In a more conventional novel, time may pass in smaller gaps with gradual characterisation, but here we see how different an old friend can be when you haven’t seen them for so long. Elly – and the reader – gains a new knowledge and understanding of what might have been going on in the lives of others, that as a child you saw very differently or didn’t see at all.

There is more of a linear plotline in the second half. Little insignificant or disconnected parts of childhood memories come to have more meaning and connection to each other. In childhood, one’s priorities can be mixed up, and factors that didn’t even merit a mention in part one, because they seemed to be just part of everyday life, are revealed to be far more significant and sinister.

And then, Elly receives a chilling message from Jenny Penny – a tarot card – that meant little to her but any reader would immediately interpret. I checked the date of Jenny’s letter. Yes.  At this point, the book becomes something else again. The strength of the characterisation and the reader’s own memories bring back to life the moment when everything changed. Recent history becomes real once more, and it is devastating.

When God Was a Rabbit has everything needed for a great read: beautiful writing, quirky but real characters who make you love them. I laughed and cried, and even when the plot didn’t seem to be going anywhere, Winham drew me into her world and I didn’t want to leave.

If you liked this, you may enjoy:

The Earth Hums in B Flat – Mari Strachan
Diamond Star Halo – Tiffany Murray
Eve Green – Susan Fletcher

Richard and Judy Summer Reads 2011

As with the last R&J book clubs, I’ll aim to read and review at least three more of the selected titles, which are listed below:

26th May: The Confession of Katherine Howard, Suzannah Dunn
9th June: The Death Instinct, Jed Rubenfeld
23rd June: The Novel in the Viola, Natasha Solomons
7th July: The Poison Tree, Erin Kelly
21st July: The Return of Captain John Emmett, Elizabeth Speller
4th August: Every Last One, Anna Quindler
18th August: The Summer of the Bear, Bella Pollen

The Girl From Away trilogy, Claire Mowat

There are some people who are, as Anne Shirley would put it, true "kindred spirits." These are the people you can travel with, go for coffee or even lunch with, and completely ignore each other while you are both engrossed in books. Most people would probably think this weird and unsociable, but my closest friends understand completely. I've known my best friend, Judith, for as long as I can remember, and like me she is a complete bookworm. We've been on holiday and on day trips up and down the country, but our favourite finds when shopping are the bookshops, from big chain stores to teeny-tiny second-hand shops. So when she recently went on holiday to Canada, it is only natural that the souvenirs she brought back for me included books. The Girl From Away trilogy was a tatty old ex-library book with stamps, old-fashioned ticket pocket and the opening times of the local swimming pool still visible in light pencil. I love a book that's picked up some history along the way, and especially one that has crossed the Atlantic.

The Girl From Away

The Girl From Away introduces Andrea, a teenage Toronto girl who pays an unwilling visit to Anderson's Arm, a small fishing community in Newfoundland, while having to come to terms with her mother's remarriage. Andrea spends the Christmas holidays with her aunt Pearl and cousins - her uncle Cyril is away working on an oil tanker, and though they remain cheerful, Pearl and her children are clearly anxious about him. The Girl From Away is a lovely portrait of a small community, where everybody knows everyone else and pulls together in a crisis. The setting came vividly to life, and felt identifiably Canadian. The three-in-one edition of the book was published in 2002, but I recognised the stories as being originally written earlier, in the 1990s. There were details that felt old-fashioned, but yet not so much so that they were strange to me. Most noticable was the personal cassette player that was Andrea's birthday present, and the story itself was reminiscent of the books I read when I was a child.

The French Isles

Book two of the trilogy sees Andrea back with her cousins, aunt and uncle - now safely home. A trip to collect Uncle Cyril's fishing boat finds Cyril, Andrea and the Cousins at St Pierre and Miquelon, islands which are located near Newfoundland but are actually French. Not French Canadian; owned by France. Andrea takes a job working at a bed-and-breakfast hotel, and befriends the owner's son, Philippe. After the drama which led Andrea and her family to St Pierre, the story is fairly gentle and uneventful, with a little hint of a youthful romance. It does help if you have a working knowledge of the French language, as there is a lot of dialogue which is left untranslated.

Last Summer in Louisbourg

Andrea is now fifteen and is vacationing in Cape Breton for the summer job to die for! She is childminding at the Fortress of Louisbourg, a job which involves dressing up in period costume and doing a fair bit of historical re-enactment. While working, she is offered a bit part in a film which is shot on location.  Again, Mowat sets the scene beautifully, and I envied Andrea her summer job. It was amusing to see how quickly the novelty of working on a movie set wore off, however, and Andrea came across as rather a sulky teenager, anxious that her costume makes her look silly, and objecting when extra filming spoiled her day's plans. I was a bit disappointed not to see the Newfoundland family this time around, or to hear anything else of Philippe, but there were some great new characters introduced: landlady Jackie and Andrea's verbose roommate Justine, as well as the cast and crew of the film, and Andrea discovers a family secret.

The Girl From Away trilogy is a lovely, easy holiday read ideal for girls aged about 9-12 years old.