Thursday 3 March 2011

One from the Comfort Library...

I love books. My passion for reading began with Miffy Goes Flying and has consumed me ever since (although the type has got smaller and there are less pictures). So I'm really enjoying the current series of TV programmes showing as part of the BBC's Year of Books. I mentioned in a previous post about the excellent Faulks on Fiction, and now I am equally hooked on the nightly showings of My Life In Books (well-known personalities discuss the books they most love and why). Tuesday night's programme with the brilliant Jeanette Winterson was particularly good and still available on i-player if you want to see it.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00z7sgp/My_Life_in_Books_Jeanette_Winterson_and_Alastair_Campbell/
So, in the spirit of bloggy sharing, I thought I'd recommend a book that I have read and re-read because I think it's uplifting, funny and very beautiful. It's called Stargazing – Memoirs of a Young Lighthouse Keeper by Peter Hill. It's an account of Hill's experiences, working on various remote Scottish lighthouses for six-months in 1973. It's really evocative (even more so if you read it on holiday on the Isle of Islay, like I did) and full of great characters and landscapes. The Daily Telegraph described it as "A generous book... as full of lost dreams as a starry sky on a foggy night". You may have read it – if so, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. If not, here's the link to Amazon where you can pick up a used copy for a ridiculously cheap 1p. Enjoy!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stargazing-Peter-Hill/dp/1841954993/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1299153836&sr=1-1

2 comments:

  1. I loved the Faulks on fiction too although it made me realise how ill read I am. I have missed the "My life in books" so far but will defo catch up on iplayer. So many good books to read and so little time. Sx

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  2. Excellent set of programmes, i loved Jeannette Winterson, particularly her recalling her mother's rewritten ending to Jane Eyre!!
    They gave away 1000's of free books that week, Fingersmith in Stamford and A Fine Balance in Ferry Meadows.

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