CR. Nothing is engaging me. I’ll try a little escapism.

Forgot to post a pic of my CR!

CR. A mystery series set in London’s Chinese community in the 1920s. Advertised as “swashbuckling,” so I’m looking forward to some action on top of the standard sleuthing.

CR. The title does not do justice to how bonkers and slyly humorous this book is.

CR. Engaging biography of White, a NAACP investigator and proponent of African-American civil rights in the first decades of the 20th century.

CR. Reading for a book club.

CR. My first professional job out of graduate school was organizing the records of the Knopf publishing house, including Judith Jones’ editorial files. This will be a nice trip down memory lane.

Foyle’s War screenwriter Anthony Horowitz has written an amusing mystery series featuring a screenwriter named Anthony Horowitz. Now the Doyle estate has authorized him to write a new Sherlock Holmes. Good, so far.

CR. My favorite type of history read. I know absolutely nothing about Ethiopia, and this story is giving me context and background on the life of an orphaned prince brought to England after the defeat of his father to the British Army at the height of colonialism.

CR. This is the second in a series about a woman police inspector in Bombay post independence. This one has a library setting to boot, so I’m enjoying it.
It feels a little like fiddling while Rome burns to post about books, honestly.

CR. I’m finding the history of absinthe prohibitions more interesting than the referenced “forgery,” which seems an odd word for people representing new absinthe as old in a very select market.

CR. I’m enthralled by this. The author, a British potter, explores the roots of a family collection of Japanese netsukes that have been in his once-obscenely wealthy family’s hands since the late 19th century. It’s absolutely remarkable. One of my favorites so far this year.

CR. Police procedurals from the UK are my comfort reads. This is the first in a series set in Glasgow. I was legitimately surprised by the reveal which is unusual for me. And I like the protagonist enough to continue to the next in the series.

CR. Netflix’s docuseries on the Cold War prompted me to read more about this.

CR. I forgot I owned this. Just started and it’s already brutal. Not sure I’m in the right headspace for brutal RN, but I’m going for it anyway. Man, Colson Whitehead can write.

CR. A loving reminiscence of the author’s grandfather, an autodidact and book collector in London.

CR. Readable and engaging. Prescient.

Currently reading (CR): my grandmother & Miss Welty were contemporaries in the same city, and, if not close friends, ran in the same circles. My mother and I went to tea at her house once and she was charming and gracious, and probably bored to tears with me. Is she remembered outside the South now?