David Hughes
@davhug.bsky.social
Books of 2025. Music, movies, nature, secondhand bookshop lover. Lanarkshire, Scotland.
Toad: once read, has never left me; what a wee beauty of a poem, itself a tiny wondrous radiance.
Norman MacCaig (1910–1996) was born #OTD, 14 November. A self-described “Zen Calvinist”, when asked how long it took him to write a poem he would reply “one cigarette – or two for a long one”
A 🎂🧵
“Toad”
THE POEMS OF NORMAN MacCAIG (Birlinn, 2009)
#poem #poetry
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birlinn.co.uk/product/the-...
A 🎂🧵
“Toad”
THE POEMS OF NORMAN MacCAIG (Birlinn, 2009)
#poem #poetry
1/12
birlinn.co.uk/product/the-...
November 14, 2025 at 3:14 PM
Toad: once read, has never left me; what a wee beauty of a poem, itself a tiny wondrous radiance.
I love Dexys. Aged 16 on Soul Rebels release, 18 at Too-Rye-Ay, 21 at Don't Stand Me Down; My Beauty 35, Soar 48. What gifts🙏. Bless Me Father could be fairer, more generous, to Kevin; could have said more about astonishing music & performance. But it's unique, searing, compelling riveting, moving.
November 1, 2025 at 2:52 PM
I love Dexys. Aged 16 on Soul Rebels release, 18 at Too-Rye-Ay, 21 at Don't Stand Me Down; My Beauty 35, Soar 48. What gifts🙏. Bless Me Father could be fairer, more generous, to Kevin; could have said more about astonishing music & performance. But it's unique, searing, compelling riveting, moving.
Reposted by David Hughes
Niki Bowers, contemporary UK printmaker based in Norfolk #WomensArt
November 1, 2025 at 6:28 AM
Niki Bowers, contemporary UK printmaker based in Norfolk #WomensArt
Miss Agnes Russell funded and gifted The Russell Institute to Paisley Burgh in 1927, for the health, care and welfare of mothers and children of the town. What a treat to be given a tour of this amazing building #ArtDeco #Paisley #DoorsOpenDay
October 30, 2025 at 10:23 AM
Miss Agnes Russell funded and gifted The Russell Institute to Paisley Burgh in 1927, for the health, care and welfare of mothers and children of the town. What a treat to be given a tour of this amazing building #ArtDeco #Paisley #DoorsOpenDay
Reposted by David Hughes
Elizabeth Blackwell (1707-1758), Scottish botanical illustrator known for the book "A Curious Herbal" 1737. Blackwell published her hand drawn, engraved and coloured work in order to raise funds to free her husband from debtors prison. #ReframingWomenPrintmakers
October 26, 2025 at 11:04 AM
Elizabeth Blackwell (1707-1758), Scottish botanical illustrator known for the book "A Curious Herbal" 1737. Blackwell published her hand drawn, engraved and coloured work in order to raise funds to free her husband from debtors prison. #ReframingWomenPrintmakers
Perfect late October: Robert Aickman, A Cold Hand In Mine, a roaring fire, and a few glasses of #Lochlea single malt Ploughing Edition. Stories...The Swords, The Hospice, The Same House: wow and shivers. Thanks to @backlisted.bsky.social #HalloweenSpecial for the original steer 🎃🥃🔥🌚
October 24, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Perfect late October: Robert Aickman, A Cold Hand In Mine, a roaring fire, and a few glasses of #Lochlea single malt Ploughing Edition. Stories...The Swords, The Hospice, The Same House: wow and shivers. Thanks to @backlisted.bsky.social #HalloweenSpecial for the original steer 🎃🥃🔥🌚
Autumn reading pleasures.
October 12, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Autumn reading pleasures.
Reposted by David Hughes
Dorothy Dunnett (1923–2001) was born #OTD, 25 Aug, in Dunfermline. She is best known as a writer of #HistoricalFiction – in particular the six-part LYMOND CHRONICLES that begin with those fateful words:
“Lymond is back.”
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booksfromscotland.com/2019/06/redi...
“Lymond is back.”
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booksfromscotland.com/2019/06/redi...
Rediscovering: Dorothy Dunnett - Books from Scotland
'Her brilliance lies in her combining of literary skill with the integrity and passion that underlay her depictions of human lives, histories and societies.'
booksfromscotland.com
August 25, 2025 at 12:49 PM
Dorothy Dunnett (1923–2001) was born #OTD, 25 Aug, in Dunfermline. She is best known as a writer of #HistoricalFiction – in particular the six-part LYMOND CHRONICLES that begin with those fateful words:
“Lymond is back.”
A 🎂 🧵
💙📚
1/6
booksfromscotland.com/2019/06/redi...
“Lymond is back.”
A 🎂 🧵
💙📚
1/6
booksfromscotland.com/2019/06/redi...
Reposted by David Hughes
Scotland 1477. Dorothy Dunnett's Gemini closes the 8-book Niccolo series. Truly atonishing, I've deeply loved it. In the end, a love story about identity & connection, and the search for harmony and meaning. A melancholy book full of death and loss...and emergence. Out of turmoil, a testimony...
September 23, 2025 at 1:04 PM
Scotland 1477. Dorothy Dunnett's Gemini closes the 8-book Niccolo series. Truly atonishing, I've deeply loved it. In the end, a love story about identity & connection, and the search for harmony and meaning. A melancholy book full of death and loss...and emergence. Out of turmoil, a testimony...
Reposted by David Hughes
A recommendation @pear-jelly.bsky.social. Perfectly controlled pacing: onward and inward journey, past infusing present, emergence of heroine's agency, quiet and subtle and powerful. #spinsterseptember
September 23, 2025 at 12:44 PM
A recommendation @pear-jelly.bsky.social. Perfectly controlled pacing: onward and inward journey, past infusing present, emergence of heroine's agency, quiet and subtle and powerful. #spinsterseptember
Reposted by David Hughes
Anthony Price: hard-to-find, always rewarding. Butler's pov, and first meeting with future spymaster Audley, as young men caught in ww2 crosscurrents. Singular narrative drive, gripping action, physical & emotional dislocation, and an intense sense of the blasted mud, wood & waters of rural France.
September 23, 2025 at 12:38 PM
Anthony Price: hard-to-find, always rewarding. Butler's pov, and first meeting with future spymaster Audley, as young men caught in ww2 crosscurrents. Singular narrative drive, gripping action, physical & emotional dislocation, and an intense sense of the blasted mud, wood & waters of rural France.
Reposted by David Hughes
My favourite reads of August 2025, in order: Gemini (Dorothy Dunnett), Rhine Journey (Ann Schlee), The 44 Vintage (Anthony Price) and Pieces of Modesty (Peter O'Donnell). Journeys outward and inward, emotions subtle and intense, high adventure and great enjoyment.
September 23, 2025 at 12:24 PM
My favourite reads of August 2025, in order: Gemini (Dorothy Dunnett), Rhine Journey (Ann Schlee), The 44 Vintage (Anthony Price) and Pieces of Modesty (Peter O'Donnell). Journeys outward and inward, emotions subtle and intense, high adventure and great enjoyment.
Reposted by David Hughes
MFK Fisher, Gastronomical Me (clumsy cover/title😬). A beautiful profound personal collection (1912-41) on how eating & drinking are interwoven in time and life with joy, loss, identity, memory & meaning. Wonderful and moving. Thanks @backlisted.bsky.social for author discovery!🙏 #warmroundpeachpie
August 5, 2025 at 9:05 PM
MFK Fisher, Gastronomical Me (clumsy cover/title😬). A beautiful profound personal collection (1912-41) on how eating & drinking are interwoven in time and life with joy, loss, identity, memory & meaning. Wonderful and moving. Thanks @backlisted.bsky.social for author discovery!🙏 #warmroundpeachpie
Reposted by David Hughes
Georgette Heyer, Faro's Daughter. Hugely enjoyable Georgian romance. I love the tough, funny, expressive, decisive Deborah Grantham. Role-play, comedy, gaming, fights, kidnapping, banter & wit. (4th fave of the 11 I've read!)
August 5, 2025 at 8:13 PM
Georgette Heyer, Faro's Daughter. Hugely enjoyable Georgian romance. I love the tough, funny, expressive, decisive Deborah Grantham. Role-play, comedy, gaming, fights, kidnapping, banter & wit. (4th fave of the 11 I've read!)
Reposted by David Hughes
Purity of Blood, Arturo Perez-Reverte. Language & description immerse you in the dank, sensual, dangerous backlanes of 17th century Madrid; religion and government are rotten with corruption, cant, hypocrisy & inhumanity, leaving our sword-for-fire Captain Alatriste as Europe's last decent man.
August 5, 2025 at 7:46 PM
Purity of Blood, Arturo Perez-Reverte. Language & description immerse you in the dank, sensual, dangerous backlanes of 17th century Madrid; religion and government are rotten with corruption, cant, hypocrisy & inhumanity, leaving our sword-for-fire Captain Alatriste as Europe's last decent man.
Reposted by David Hughes
Crime fiction. Dolly and the Starry Bird, Dorothy Dunnet. Read in Bay of Naples! A fun break while I delay finishing the magisterial Niccolo series. Dated vocab, hard to follow? Riding the tone, I heartily enjoyed this twisting madcap caper with its food/drink/clothes/travel & the wind-in-its-hair!🚤
July 14, 2025 at 3:26 PM
Crime fiction. Dolly and the Starry Bird, Dorothy Dunnet. Read in Bay of Naples! A fun break while I delay finishing the magisterial Niccolo series. Dated vocab, hard to follow? Riding the tone, I heartily enjoyed this twisting madcap caper with its food/drink/clothes/travel & the wind-in-its-hair!🚤
Reposted by David Hughes
June 25, crime fiction. The Snack Thief, Andrea Camilleri. Read in Sicily. Best of 3 I've read. Pleasingly convoluted, with delightful tangents, as the flawed detective grapples with issues of corruption & justice, fathers & sons, inclusion & alienation, in a reach for gestures of meaning & value.
July 14, 2025 at 3:17 PM
June 25, crime fiction. The Snack Thief, Andrea Camilleri. Read in Sicily. Best of 3 I've read. Pleasingly convoluted, with delightful tangents, as the flawed detective grapples with issues of corruption & justice, fathers & sons, inclusion & alienation, in a reach for gestures of meaning & value.
Reposted by David Hughes
June 2025. Crime. City of the Dead, Sara Gran. Smart, quirky, funny, vivid & compassionate. Ace detective Claire DeWitt trawls the urban edges of post-flood New Orleans, in dialogue with dreams & death, history & mystery, in search of truth. Dale Cooper would enjoy. Can't wait to read the other two!
July 14, 2025 at 3:10 PM
June 2025. Crime. City of the Dead, Sara Gran. Smart, quirky, funny, vivid & compassionate. Ace detective Claire DeWitt trawls the urban edges of post-flood New Orleans, in dialogue with dreams & death, history & mystery, in search of truth. Dale Cooper would enjoy. Can't wait to read the other two!
Reposted by David Hughes
Tove Jansson, The Summer Book. The beauty, clarity & fragility of a cherished dream. Attentive to pebble, light, insect, moss, seedlings; small things, sounds, tastes. Unsentimental, immersive. Summer: across memory, childhood, age & identity. Floating, sinking, diving, drifting, sailing.
July 14, 2025 at 3:01 PM
Tove Jansson, The Summer Book. The beauty, clarity & fragility of a cherished dream. Attentive to pebble, light, insect, moss, seedlings; small things, sounds, tastes. Unsentimental, immersive. Summer: across memory, childhood, age & identity. Floating, sinking, diving, drifting, sailing.
Reposted by David Hughes
Penelope Mortimer, About Time Too. This maligned memoir (so poorly reviewed, a planned follow-up was dropped) is sparse, skipping, poetic, witty, questioning, engaged. Full of pain, and chocabloc with damaged, entitled, blustering men, it still finds a kind of peace through its great writing.
July 14, 2025 at 2:52 PM
Penelope Mortimer, About Time Too. This maligned memoir (so poorly reviewed, a planned follow-up was dropped) is sparse, skipping, poetic, witty, questioning, engaged. Full of pain, and chocabloc with damaged, entitled, blustering men, it still finds a kind of peace through its great writing.
Reposted by David Hughes
Recording, for myself, my top reads of 2025. Much travelling in June, has led to having mistly lighter books in tow!
July 14, 2025 at 2:44 PM
Recording, for myself, my top reads of 2025. Much travelling in June, has led to having mistly lighter books in tow!
Reposted by David Hughes
Pictures that explain things.
"Roots of a tree spread as far below ground as the branches do above"
(The Tree and its World, 1975)
Artist: David Palmer
"Roots of a tree spread as far below ground as the branches do above"
(The Tree and its World, 1975)
Artist: David Palmer
June 20, 2025 at 7:40 AM
Pictures that explain things.
"Roots of a tree spread as far below ground as the branches do above"
(The Tree and its World, 1975)
Artist: David Palmer
"Roots of a tree spread as far below ground as the branches do above"
(The Tree and its World, 1975)
Artist: David Palmer
Reposted by David Hughes
Dorothy Dunnett, Caprice And Rondo, 15thC, 7 of 8. Truly loving this reading adventure: moving, confounding, heartbreaking, wondrous; want them to never end and I go into the final book emotionally fragile, intensely engaged, and with a deep, lunatic pang of pure love. 'Whoever cast love aside...'
June 6, 2025 at 7:43 PM
Dorothy Dunnett, Caprice And Rondo, 15thC, 7 of 8. Truly loving this reading adventure: moving, confounding, heartbreaking, wondrous; want them to never end and I go into the final book emotionally fragile, intensely engaged, and with a deep, lunatic pang of pure love. 'Whoever cast love aside...'
Reposted by David Hughes
Elizabeth Taylor, 1st short story collection. My standouts: Hester Lily, Spry Old Character, Gravement. Tales of the unspoken, miscommunicated, saddened, illusory; surfaces, depths, defeats, laughs, and radiant moments.
June 6, 2025 at 7:26 PM
Elizabeth Taylor, 1st short story collection. My standouts: Hester Lily, Spry Old Character, Gravement. Tales of the unspoken, miscommunicated, saddened, illusory; surfaces, depths, defeats, laughs, and radiant moments.
Reposted by David Hughes
What a debut. Already in place: the conversational, intimate, even-handed, analytical voice; honed classical prose; great dialogue; witheld info "I meant to keep myself out of this story..." Cool on food/decor/clothes. Open-ended/canny-quite-find-an- ending? Fab springboard for the brilliance ahead.
June 6, 2025 at 7:16 PM
What a debut. Already in place: the conversational, intimate, even-handed, analytical voice; honed classical prose; great dialogue; witheld info "I meant to keep myself out of this story..." Cool on food/decor/clothes. Open-ended/canny-quite-find-an- ending? Fab springboard for the brilliance ahead.