Spring Unfurled by Angela Harding. Earlier books with her wonderful artwork are a treat to own. Here, Angela guides us through the seasonal rhythm of the first quarter of the year with her prints and observations. Others to follow as the year unfolds. Just opening the pages makes you breathe calmly with joy.
The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime and a Dangerous Obsession by Michael Finkel. The story of Stephane Breitwieser, along with his long-suffering girlfriend whose pleas to him to stop failed, is spellbinding. He carried out more than 200 heists over ten years. Museums churches and private collections all caught his eye and his insatiable desire to increase his own collection of over 300 objects. An insight to the obsession and addiction of a man who did not believe he would be caught until … Read on!
Lost in the Forest; Notes on not belonging from the English countryside by Colin Heber-Percy. Many will know Colin personally or in his clerical role or as a screen writer and author. A busy life. Plenty of opportunities to observe and question. Walking, in his case often in Savernake Forest, can give the opportunity, in this busy world, to reflect on quite how important the natural world is to our spirit. His previous book, ‘Tales of a Country Parish’, had many of us hoping fom more. This he has given us and it’s deep, personal and utterly brilliant. I won’t say too much because, Colin has said it all so beautifully. This is a book to treasure; it will resound with many.
Captain De Havilland’s Moth: Tales of High Adventure from the Golden Age of Aviation by Alexander Norman. And what an adventure it is! The story of this iconic light aircraft the DH60 Moth and the characters drawn to it. It is 1925 and the craze for flying in a war-weary world was about to take off. De Havilland himself was a designer of military aircraft but wanted to do for flying what Ford did for cars. And the Moth was the most successful aircraft of its time. The Moth owners were a colourful, eccentric, daring and mainly privileged bunch of daredevils. The Prince of Wales and his brother the Duke of Gloucester both had one. Women such as Amy Johnson and Beryl Markham take centre stage – pioneers in their own right and as women aviators. Within these pages the author leads us into this golden age of flying and its characters in such vivid storytelling that you feel you are part of the adventures.
FICTION
Burma Sahib by Paul Theroux. ‘There is a short period in everyone’s life when his character is fixed for ever.’ So said George Orwell. Theroux’s novel, now in paperback, is a brilliant historical imagining of Orwell’s time as a police trainee in 1920’s colonial Burma. Some say this period was when the seeds for later views and thoughts in Orwell’s writing were planted. Theroux’s writing even in his 80’s has lost none of his ability to bring us an authentic recreation of colonial Burma. One of my favourite novels in a long while