Musk, Byrne, Bullboar Sausage

Thankfully, I finished Untouched a couple of nights ago. I have made a start on Musk & Byrne. And was quite amazed when bullboar sausage popped up! I was listening to an ABC radio programme, Bush Telegraph while driving out to Cooroy for a hospital meeting at the end of last year and was totally drawn into a story about bullboar sausage. It's a food that was introduced into the Victorian goldfields area in the late 1800s by Swiss-Italian migrants, the setting of Musk & Byrne. I'm only a little way into this book but far enough to know that I'm enjoying it - it's a good one. It's got a specific setting in an interesting period and place in Australia's history. The whole "bullboar" connection is such a coincidence. It's really helped to bring the story to life for me because the radio interview was really fascinating and well done.

Author Talks

Anna Campbell, the Queen of Regency Noir, is doing a talk tomorrow night at the Sunshine Coast Regional Libraries. She will be talking about her writing and her life. I won't be rushing along to that one. I am looking forward to finishing her book Untouched. It's set in Yorkshire and apart from the author, there's not much (nothing!) Australian about the book. It's pretty tedious, sadly. It's not badly written - but the "will they, won't they; should they, shouldn't they" so-called moral dilemmas are as far-fetched as the plot and setting. Anna Campbell "does" the sex bits ok but perhaps it's a bit wasted on me - currently suffering from a bladder infection... Oh dear, definitely too much information .... kinda like the book, really!!

Regency Noir?

Last night I finished The Time We Have Taken and found it mainly to be quite tedious read. Too naval gazing, too much self-indulgent introspection. Maybe tedious is too strong a word as I was always interested to keep reading to find out what would happen next with Rita, Mrs Webster, Michael, Madeline and Vic. But in the end, the book was really about people with too much time on their hands - they were all a bit "me, me, me". They analysed themselves to death!

But now, I have taken a huge plunge into Untouched by Anna Campbell, who is described as "an amazing, daring new voice in romance". This book is "a second dark and dangerous romance from the rising star of regency noir"; whatever that is! I think I am about to find out ...

The Time We Have Taken

Well, it didn't take much time at all to finish Wanting. I came to the end of this heart-breaking story about a nasty time in Tasmania's history, in the late 1800s, last night. What happened to the Aboriginal girl and many of her people in this story (and in this period of history) is definitely not for the squeamish. Kind of an interesting read to have finished just before Australia Day.

Anyway, we seem to be on safer neurotic white ground at the moment, with another Steven Caroll book, The Time We Have Taken.

Pressure's On

I finished John Birmingham's Weapons of Choice last night and need to quickly get through Wanting by Richard Flanagan as it's due back at the library on Feb 4. So without further ado, time to get stuck in ...

Talk About a Mixed Bag ...

It seems I have raced through The Garden Book. It was pretty bleak, "about loneliness, addiction, exploitation". It was a bit like this sentence from the book: The chill, the aching heart, the soul raw and red (245).

So I might try an "explosive alternative history techno-thriller" for a bit of light relief.


I thought there had been a mistake when I picked up from the library the book Untouched by Anna Campbell. Yuck, I have to read that??!!

It looks truly awful but who knows ...

Musk & Byrne was the other book I picked up at the library today.

From the Gulf to the Garden

Finished the truly wonderful Carpentaria today. Alexis Wright is an indigenous writer, whose storytelling is described as "operatic and surreal: a blend of myth and scripture, politics and farce". I also like how Nicholas Jose, from the Sydney Morning Herald, describes the book: "The history she deals with is huge and terrible, but it energises her in an almost loving way."

Now to The Garden Book!