Betty's blog

  I was leant 'Man's Search for Meaning'- it's a short book, written by a doctor who survived the concentration camps of Nazi Germany. The point of the book is that we can all find meaning and purpose in life, even in the most terrible of circumstances, and this meaning will sustain us, even in Nazi death camps. The 'meaning' can vary from person to person, and can be anything from the desire to write an academic book to the desire to care for your children. Although this book should be uplifting, I didn't find it particularly so- what stuck with me the most was the author's descriptions of his memories of life in the camps. Inspired by Dar's post (Dar's posts seem to be my inspiration for all things book related- I also had a clear out of books which I was no longer inspired to read) today I decided that, as I was feeling a bit under the weather, I would sit and read a book, rather than vegging out in front of the TV. As...

I've come to the conclusion that, as The Lady in the Tower: the Fall of Anne Boleyn by Alison Weir has been sitting half read on my bookshelf for months, I am probably never going to finish it! It's a very dense, well researched book, focussing on a very short time period, and unless I read it in a fairly short space if time (a week, say) I'd never be able to keep a track of who all of the people discussed in it are. Also, The Three Edwards by Michael Prestwich has been hanging about for a while- not as long as Anne Boleyn, but long enough! These books were relevant/interesting/useful to me at one point, but now there are other things that I would rather be reading, so it's rehoming time for them...

  This is a book that I will be keeping, as I am sure that I have not absorbed all of the information in one reading! As this is my home town, I found that I often stopped reading to look on a map to find the places which the book was referring to. I'm not sure that this book would be highly interesting to anyone with no connection to Bury; and I did notice that the author was amusingly defensive of the town (which was described as 'dull' in the nineteenth century) and also mildly disapproving of some modern development. The writing style was fairly engaging- although I might not be the best person to judge this, as my idea of 'readable' has probably been heavily skewed by some incredibly unreadable books during my history degree! One of my favourite books so far, as I will be able to wander around Bury feeling much more well informed about its history, and perhaps actually understand the origins of some of the place and road names.

After all of the Christmas feasting (the fridge is still full of cheese, and sprouts that didn't get cooked), and despite the first cold of the winter, I am feeling the urge to get cracking with some projects, and finish up all of those little lingering jobs that I've been putting off. One of those is to work out what I am aiming to achieve this year...and this is what I have come up with: - complete first module of C&G knitting course and start second. Save enough money to pay the course fees for the whole course. - donate 2% (minimum) of earnings to charity. I am planning to donate at the end of each month, and to donate to a variety of causes, local, international, animals, people, conservation- hopefully a wide variety. - read down the house- I'd like to read 12 books this year, which would leave quite a few books unread. But it'd be nice to establish the habit of reading again. - reduce stash of knitting yarn from just under 40,000 metres to under 30,000 m...

Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. I whizzed through this book, which was actually quite entertaining, as well as thought-provoking. Essentially, he explains the 'bad science' behind alternative remedies/medicine, the dubious credentials of some famous providers of health and nutritional advice, and discusses the media storm around healthcare stories, such as the MMR vaccine's link (or not, as it turned out) to autism. I felt like I was already vaguely familiar with a lot of the information on how scientific research is conducted (although the last time I did anything even close a scientific experiment was about 10 years ago, at A-Level) but there was a lot that I have forgotten, or was not familiar with in such depth. This was a very accessible book, which didn't treat the reader as stupid. It has given me a healthy suspicion of health/science stories as reported in the media...I suppose I always thought there were a lot of dubious/exaggerated stories which may have mis...

Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother- The Official Biography- William Shawcross   Generally, I found this an interesting book. The first fifty years of the Queen Mother's life were interesting as I didn't know that much about her life during that time, and indeed my knowledge of that period of history is a little vague. The last ten or so years were interesting, as I remembered some of the events quite clearly, and it was interesting to contrast the world as it was then with the world she was born in to. I did find the long lists of charities she supported and official engagements a bit dull and repetitive. I also felt that, as it was an official biography, it was a bit...sanitised. (This could also be because Princess Margaret burned a lot of her mother's letters- if they had been in the royal archives, perhaps there would have been some more revealing insights. Also the QM seems to have been quite discreet, so it is probably impossible for anyone outside of her...

Following Dar's post over at An Exacting Life, I thought that it was high time to revisit my (unread!) book collection, which I listed, err, some time ago here . I have actually managed to reduce the book collection quite significantly...but sadly not by actually reading them! I went through them recently and decided that I was very unlikely to actually read or use many of them again- especially books of seventeenth century documents! (Only really useful if you are doing a degree in history). Many of the books are now waiting in a cupboard for someone to buy them from Amazon... I'm going to make a concerted effort to finish at least one physical book per month- and those that are worth selling will be listed on Amazon and join their friends in the cupboard! There may be some that I decide are not worth ploughing through- straight to the cupboard with them... So, here is the updated list: Physical books (all non-fiction) 1. The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne...