Reading Reviews for Online Living by Peter Leyland

                                                Reading Reviews for Online Living                                               

Since the pandemic I have noticed something interesting that has emerged online connected with books. Several dedicated readers have been reviewing books sent to them by publishers and posting the reviews for their followers to beg, borrow, or buy in order to read. These reviewers have a variety of handles: There is Findingtimetowrite, by Marina Sofia. This deals mainly with books in translation which she publishes; Adventures in reading, running and working from home by Liz Dexter who likes non-fiction and who has commented on my own and others’ Authors Electric posts; Kaggsy’s Bookish Ramblings which is mainly fiction although her review of a recent memoir, Leningrad Diary, by Vera Inber caught my attention; never imitate (Robyn Reviews), which combines book reviewing with detailed accounts of park runs and the adventures of a teddy bear called Edward; and most recently I have discovered At Boundary’s Edge by Alex Hormann which specialises in Science Fiction titles. 

I have myself bought or been given some of the books I have seen reviewed online. For example, for Christmas 2023, I received as a present, Held, by Anne Michaels which I had seen reviewed by Jackie Law on her never imitate site. One or two of these dedicated readers have sent me copies of the books that they have reviewed: Marina Sofia sent me a translation of Nostalgia by Mircea Cartarescu. (Marina also runs an online blog called Friday Fun and as she is about to move to Berlin, she has recently delighted her followers with pictures of bookshelf designs that might inspire people's book collections in their new apartments.) Liz Dexter from Adventures in reading...has sent me two books that she has reviewed: My Journey to Lhasa by Alexandra David-Neel, pictured, and the excellent A House Through Time by David Olusoga which was written together with Melanie Backe-Hansen and based on the television series produced under the same name.

Liz Dexter, is my main contact for the type of reviewing I am describing. She is a prolific blogger and recently reached her 20 Year Blogging Anniversary - so when I asked her for some help with this piece, she was very enthusiastic. She requests and receives hundreds of books from publishers and she always thanks them for sending her a copy in return for 'an honest review'. The first book she sent me, pictured, was the story of a woman, Alexandra David-Neel, who at the age of 55 became the first European woman to enter Lhasa, the forbidden city of Tibet. The book is a detailed account of her journey to Lhasa, together with a young companion who was a Sikkimese lama. The author had to disguise herself heavily in order outwit those who would prevent her entry to Lhasa and eventually, after enduring days and nights without food or shelter and using thumo reskiang, the mental discipline practised by Tibetans, she succeeded in getting there. 

I found the book inspiring both because of my own journey to Ladakh, discussed in my blog of September 2021, and because of my interest in Kim, mentioned in a more recent piece about my mother and father. This is Rudyard Kipling’s story of the boy, Kim’s journey with the lama in the remote mountain regions of Northern India, and it includes a reference to Ladakh. I find the connections between books and life experiences fascinating, particularly when one’s reading triggers something else in one’s mind, perhaps a vivid memory or a close link with another book. Liz Dexter has an expression she uses relating to this: If the same thing crops up in two books that you read near to one another, she says, it creates a "Bookish Beck Serendipity Moment". Finding that ‘Ladakh’ is referred to in both Kim and in My Journey to Lhasa, must qualify as one of those moments.

 

A fictional book that she introduced me to in her online reviews wasTomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, which she says was the book that received the most views ever on her blog. The title is a favourite Shakespearean quotation of mine from Macbeth, and one which I am fond of quoting to myself and others with its follow up, ‘creeps in this petty pace from day to day, / To the last syllable of recorded time’. Anyway, after reading the review I was determined to find Gabrielle Zevin’s book and sure enough in the next few days I came across it in my local Oxfam bookshop.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow is the fascinating story of two people, Sadie and Sam, who meet as children and become gaming companions. It traces the development of a complex friendship over three decades and deals with themes of friendship, love, ambition, betrayal and the passage of time, and it connects well with Liz Dexter’s ideas about book blogging. In an email discussion she told me that being a member of the book blogging world has brought her community, fellowship, interaction and a feeling of connecting with the wider world. This became particularly important to her during the lockdowns. Because she was working for herself from home, she couldn’t see many people. 

 

During this time, Liz says, she enjoyed seeing what her online friends were reading. One of them was Kaggsy, mentioned above, with whom she was eventually able to meet up. I have followed Kaggsy’s book blogs for some time and those that I have read recently are her reviews of many of Jack Kerouac’s novels. In my time as an adult education tutor, I had used Kerouac’s The Subterraneans in a course on The Novella and in the teaching I had discovered many interesting facts about the writer’s work and life. As I read through Kaggsy’s blogs on Jack Kerouac’s books, of which she had a great many, I learned a whole lot more about him. Her review of Vanity of Duluoz, about his early years particularly got my attention, and I determined to look out for it in my trawls through second-hand bookshops.

 

These places, Oxfam's in particular, are a good source of reading material for me as I am always looking for my next read in connection with the book community that I have been describing. These communities play an important role in the lives of many people, especially since the lockdowns. It was therefore a huge disappointment recently to learn that Between the Covers, pictured below, an excellent programme chaired by Sara Cox where celebrities discuss their reading, is not going to be commissioned for another series. I mentioned this programme in my Authors Electric blog of December 2022, when the panel were discussing Howards End, and I have really enjoyed the conversations around accessible books that the series creates. I have now read many online comments criticising the BBC's decision to close the show from people asking why sport and cookery programmes get so much more attention than those about reading books? It is The National Year of Reading in 2026 and I for one think that it is surely time for the BBC to realise that there are a lot of people out there who love reading and talking about books, as I think I have illustrated in this piece. 

                                                                 Between the Covers, Series 8, Episode 6

I hope the blog shows the important role of book reviewing to bring in new readers. All the reviewers I've mentioned write a response to comments made by those viewing their blogs which is a great way to communicate. What do you think? Is this a good way of learning about books both old and new? Finally, should programmes like Between the Covers be taken over by another channel as has been suggested in order to keep us all reading? I would love to hear your views.

References

Nostalgia (2005) by Mircea Cartarescu, translated by Julian Semilian

My Journey to Lhasa (1927) by Alexandra David-Neel

Howards End (1910) by E.M. Forster

The Subterraneans (1960) by Jack Kerouac

Vanity of Duluoz (1968) by Jack Kerouac

Kim (1901) by Rudyard Kipling

Held (2023) by Anne Michaels

A House Through Time (2020) by David Olusoga and Melanie Backe-Hansen

Macbeth (1623 - First Folio) by Wm Shakespeare

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (2022) by Gabrielle Zevin

Thanks are due to Liz Dexter for her help with this piece and to Cactus TV for the Between the Covers photograph