imhilien

The Friday Five


1) What is the best book you've read?

'Beauty' by Robin McKinley. A lovely re-telling of 'Beauty and the Beast and the way the author wrote was great.


2) What is the worst book you've read?

I forget the title, but it was a historical novel about a working class woman who wanted a Nice Thing and was punished for it, because she didn't Know Her Place or something horrible like that. Ugh.


3) What is a favourite book from childhood?

'The Ordinary Princess' by M.M. Kaye. A re-telling of 'Sleeping Beauty' but she is cursed with being ordinary instead and loses the beauty she was born with. This turns out to be a good thing in the long run.


4) What is a favourite book from adulthood?

'Intervention' by Julian May. Rogi is the black sheep of his powerful, Kennedy-esque French-Canadian family because he prefers to own a sci-fi / fantasy bookshop (with cat, of course). Sometimes the unlikely person is the hero. Set in an alternate America where telepaths start being born in the general population after WW2.


5) What is a book you've read a number of times?

'Sleeper's Castle' by Barbara Erskine. It's the perfect winter read. In Middle Ages Wales, a female musician keeps house for her surly father. She starts seeing a strange woman... is she a ghost? In the modern era, a woman is house-sitting for a friend in Wales when she sees a strange woman... is she a ghost? Then the two eras start merging in the ancient house, which has secrets of its own...