Howards End Is on The Landing

Having learned of The Book Depository,  I took advantage of their world-wide free shipping again recently and acquired Susan Hill's new book, Howards End Is on the Landing: A Year of Reading from Home. In about 30 chapters Hill talks about the books in her house, re-reading some, reading some that she bought but had never got to, and generally reminiscing about the books in her life.

The plan was to buy no new books for a year, reading instead books she already owned. The result is a delightful ramble through the world of literature and is filled with incidents in her life during which she met and sometimes became friends with a lot of famous writers. It's always a treat to read anecdotes that let you into the lives of writers you admire and Hill has many of them to share.

I naturally thought about doing the same thing: not buying books for a year and instead reading or re-reading the books I have around the house. This is unlikely to succeed, considering my history of new year's resolutions broken, usually by the end of the week, even when New Year's Day is on Friday.

But I can do something similar, with the understanding that I can buy a few books by authors whose works I collect (Michael Chabon, Dennis LeHane, Toni Morrison) and that I can borrow books from the library. I might also give myself the ok to buy books for my Kindle. And there's the problem of all the wonderful books Hill describes with such joy that I'm eager to read them myself.

In any case, this was a delightful book and I zipped through it in no time. And of course it wins second prize for the lovliest book cover of the year, comeing in close behind The Children's Book.

Comments

[Thomas]

While I did enjoy reading this one, I was one of those that fell into the "annoyed with Susan Hill" camp.

You are certainly right about the cover. A bibliophile couldn't ask for a more enticing cover.

[Mary Ronan Drew]

Thomas, I had positive reaction to Susan Hill as she presents herself in this book. Tell me about the "annoyed with Susan Hill" camp.

md

[Thomas]

Some were upset over her discounting whole swaths of literature (like Canadian and Australian) and others, like myself, were annoyed with the fact that the book was not really a journey through her books. It was more a collection of essays that she tried to hang on the idea of the year long journey but then never followed through on the metaphor.

Also her critique of the Internet and blogs is kind of funny given that her book reads just like a blog. Lots of short, episodic "posts" that are pretty random have no overarching theme other than books. If she had followed through on the "journey" conceit she might have been able to avoid the "printed blog between two covers" label.

[Thomas]

P.S. I wrote a review of it a few weeks ago that expands on these ideas.

[Mary Ronan Drew]

You can read Thomas' excellent review at http://myporchblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/book-review-smoke-and-mirrors-are-on.html

Good point on Hill's re-reading vs reading for the first time, Thomas. I hadn't noticed that.

md