All work and no play makes...

River a very dull girl. Very dull indeed.

What is really annoying is that although I am working flat out and have been for the last three or so months, I am really impecunious. Its the peril of self-employment as I can never quite tell when the money is going to come, although from the silence following my last set of cost updates (which are usually greeted with a resounding chorus of 'send us your invoice'), it won't be soon.

My only solace is reading and its when that stops I am really in trouble. I've had days recently when I thought my head might explode, so I've been limiting myself to reading old favourites and undemanding prose. Stuff meditation, yoga etc., 30 minutes with a good, fun undemanding read is all that I need to prevent my brain overheating.


One book I would really to recommend everyone interested in detective fiction (as I am) is The Suspicions of Mr Whicher or The Murder at Road Hill House
by Kate Summerscale. This is an examination of the Road Hill House Murder in 1860 and how this murder and its investigator, Jonathan Whicher, captured the popular imagination and inspired Dickens (Inspector Bucket in Bleak House) and Wilkie Collins (Sergeant Cuff in The Moonstone). The Afterword is particularly salutory and stunning.

Reading

I love to read. If you know me you will already know this as I always have a book with me, if you have visited my home you will know that every room is stuffed to the gills with books, so stuffed that even I am beginning to feel that I am teetering on the edge of having too many books, if that is a possibility. I am a reader and I love talking about the books I have read and hearing about books my friends have loved reading. I will read almost anything, or at least give it a try and can count the number of books I have abandoned reading halfway through on the fingers of one hand. I am a reader and have been known to happily sit down and read the yellow pages or a dictionary if there was nothing else around to read. Reading is my solace, my escape, my education, my entertainment. Whatever I read has to fit my mood, sometimes I am in the mood for a piece of light and fluffy fiction, or a gruesome murder mystery, or a piece of non-fiction, it doesn't matter as long as the writing captures my attention. I am a reader. But I am not a book lover. Don't get me wrong I love books and I can't ever see myself reading through choice from a computer screen as nothing beats the sensory experience of picking up a book and feeling its weight in my hand, experiencing the colours and design of the cover and its particular aroma. I am a reader. I may appreciate the cover and binding of a book in the same way that I might admire the beautiful cup that holds my coffee or the glass that holds my wine, but you can only look for so long before taking a sip. I am a reader.