Kaggsy's musings

It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of Virginia Woolf, and I’ve written before (more than once, no doubt!) about how “Mrs Dalloway” was a pivotal book in my life, as well as sharing my thoughts on a re-read. As is known, the story takes place over one day in June, and there has been a dedicated “Dalloway Day” for some time now; I’m not sure this always on the same date, but this year it’s today,…

I mentioned in my post on Denis Johnson‘s “Train Dreams” that I had also read his collection, “Jesus’ Son” for Shiny New Books and that review is up today. This was the book which really catapulted Johnson into the public eye, and it’s a dark, captivating collection of stories from the underbelly of life. It made for compelling reading, and my review is here.

Although I revisited one of Allen Ginsberg‘s seminal poetry collections earlier in the year, for our 1961 Club reading week, I had somehow missed that 2026 is the centenary of his birth. However, a good number of social media posts alerted me recently to the fact that his 100-year celebration was on 3rd June and so I decided I must mark the day by reading some of his work! Fortunately, I…

Books CONTINUE to lead to other books!! My reading of Peter Ackroyd’s “London Under” was inspired by Nicholas Royle’s “Finders, Keepers“; and there’s a bit of a story attached to today’s book! In Ackroyd’s chapters about the London Underground system, he discussed a number of murder mysteries set there and one of these was a story by Baroness Orczy – “The Mysterious Death on the Underground…

Over the years; I’ve read a lot of Muriel Spark‘s novels; mostly pre-blog although some have appeared here on the Ramblings. However, I’m aware that there are still a good number of her titles I’ve not read and recently an Instagram reel on the subject of Scottish Gothic books sent me off in the direction of a novella of hers first published in 1971 – “Not To Disturb”. What the reel said about it…

“London Under” by Peter Ackroyd was one of the titles mentioned in Nicholas Royle’s wonderful book, “Finders, Keepers“, and I made a note at the time to explore it a bit further. I’m a fan of Ackroyd’s writing and my enjoyment of his Ezra Pound biography made me realise it was time to read more of his non-fiction. As “London Under” was apparently all about what lies below our great capital, it…

Books lead on to other books… When I was offered the chance to review Denis Johnson‘s “Jesus’ Son” for Shiny New Books (I’ll link when this is live), I was reminded that I had also intended to read his “Train Dreams” for some years. As I mentioned previously, Johnson’s “Already Dead” was a book I read and loved when it first came out in the late 1990s (and it’s still on the shelves) but for some…

May has been another interesting month of reading, although it has been dominated by some bigger volumes which will be covered on the Ramblings next month and which tie in particularly with June! Here, however, is the pile of books I read, and I have had a blast with all of these! As always, in case the titles aren’t clear, the books are: The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes – Various Not To Disturb –…

May sees a very special event taking place, and that’s the release of the 150th title in the British Library Crime Classics series. These have been a massive success, bringing back into print some wonderful, lost Golden Age crime mysteries, and I, for one, am a huge fan (as you’ll no doubt realise from the amount of titles I’ve covered!) The celebratory book is a good one, too – it’s by the…

I am nothing if not a very easily influenced reader; mention an interesting sounding book, and I’m off to see if I have it in the stacks or if I can pick up a reasonably priced copy somewhere. And recently, Chris over at Calmgrove Books happened to write about a couple of the stories in the “Black Venus” collection by Angela Carter – “Overture and Incidental Music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream”…

The second of the two recent released from Old Street Publishing, in their ‘Great Events’ series, is the intriguingly titled “Art-Quake 1910” by David Boyd Hancock. Subtitled “The Manet and the Post-Impressionists Exhibition’, it takes a look at another controversial exhibition of artworks; one which took place in Britain and had a different intention to the Nazi one. Boyd Haycock specialises in…

Old Street Publishing is an indie press which I only came across relatively recently, but I’ve loved both of the books I’ve read from them, each by Sheila Fitzpatrick: “The Death of Stalin” and “The Shortest History of the Soviet Union“. That first title came from a series they’d launched called ‘Great Events’ which they describe as ‘short, lively books of narrative history, written by experts…

The books of indie publisher Michael Walmer have featured here on the Ramblings a number of times; he releases a wide range of interesting fiction, poetry and non-fiction, and since his relocation to the Shetland Islands (he was previously based in Australia), his focus has turned to writings from that area. Specifically, he launched an imprint called Northus Shetland Classics, and I’ve covered a…

Back in 2024, I read the classic book “The Woman in the Dunes” by Kōbō Abe for Japanese Literature Month and was very taken with it, if a little unnerved by the claustrophobic atmosphere of the story. At the time, I thought I’d like to explore his writing but I’ve somehow never got to any of his other books. However, a comment on a recent post by Tony about Abe’s work mentioned “The Ruined City”…

I have a new review up at Shiny New Books today and it’s of a fascinating and absorbing book – “The Village on the Edge of the World: Writing and Surviving Ceaușescu’s Romania” by Nobel prize-winner Herta Muller. In “Village…” Muller explores her past, from her time as a child living in a remote village, with all the harshness that lifestyle brings, to her attempts to work and write within a…

There’s been a run of books recently which have arrived at the Ramblings and not even skimmed Mount TBR; and for once, I can remember where I heard about this recent arrival! The book is “Kafkaesque” by Maïa Hruska, translated by Sam Taylor, and it was featured in one of the regular newsletters I get from bookshops; it sounded right up my street so I had to send off for it straight away, and it…

Memo to self: you really should start making a note about where you’ve heard about a particular book as it’s rare that the information remains in your head!! The book I want to share my thoughts about today is one I picked as long ago as 2015 and I have no idea where it or its author first appeared in my sight-line. The title is “Around the World in Seventy-Two Days and Other Writings” by Nellie…