What I've been reading

Fever Pitch (Double A-side)
by Nick Hornby

"For many people watching football is mere entertainment, to some it's more like a ritual; but to others, its highs and lows provide a narrative to life itself. For Nick Hornby, his devotion to the game has provided one of few constants in a life where the meaningful things - like growing up, leaving home, and forming relationships, both parental and romantic - have rarely been as simple or as uncomplicated as his love for Arsenal."

Given that I have no interest whatever in football, he's a good enough writer to make this an interesting book. And that's all I can think of to say about it.

Before the Coffee Gets Cold
by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

translated by Geoffrey Trousselot

"In a small back alley in Tokyo, there is a café which has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. But this coffee shop offers its customers a unique experience: the chance to travel back in time."

Lent to me by Lola II, I thought the premise was a good one but it wasn't a comfortable reading experience, probably because of the translation. There were complicated relationships (a list of characters at the start was a warning sign) not helped by the translator choosing to have women who were not related call each other 'Sis'. So I didn't really enjoy the book.

The House of Mirth
by Edith Wharton

narrated by Eleanor Bron

"Lily Bart is a well-born but impoverished woman belonging to New York City’s high society around the turn of the last century. Though raised and educated to marry well both socially and economically, she is reaching her 29th year, an age when her youthful blush is drawing to a close and her marital prospects are becoming ever more limited."

So well written and well narrated that a story more than a century old felt almost contemporary. But not quite - those in society without their own money were forced to seek a favourable marriage, and the heroine of this story simply failed to do so, nor did she adapt to her unfunded situation - she was brought up with particular values and wasn't willing or able to accept anything less. A tragic but beautiful book.