Account books, reading books and Goldenford books

A trip to the Goldenford office this morning, where I off-loaded all the accounts stuff for the accountant, was followed this evening by something completely different – a reading circle meeting.

We discussed Miss Pettigrew lives for the day, a novel written in the thirties and very much of its time. It was great fun – a confection of a story, not to be taken too seriously. Miss Pettigrew, a middle aged respectable lady, down on her luck, looking for another governess’s job, meets up with an amoral, flighty mixture of upper class toffs and theatrical women and proceeds to cast off all her original conventional ideas. It was a very fast read, and contrasted with last time’s book, which needed to be read slowly and carefully.

House of the Seven Gables was endearing, yet irritating. It could have done with some drastic editing, for at times, the writer rambled somewhat, and also probably included too much description. He overused certain words - rusty and dusty seemed to come up an awful lot, and he also told us the same things several times, e.g. that Hepzibah, one of the main characters was not at all good looking. It was also a book of its time, but Victorian times, as opposed to a 20^th century book. The characters were very likeable though, so from that point of view, it was a book I was prepared to work at.

Because Miss Pettigrew was a short, fast book, with a great deal of dialogue, I also managed to read this month, Dear Fatty, the autobiography of Dawn French, a great deal of which I enjoyed. At times I got rather confused and thought her BF – best friend – was Jennifer Saunders, but she wasn’t. In general, I liked her telling her life story straight, so although I realise she is a comedienne, I was irritated by her odd ‘letters’ to Madonna and one or two other similar jokey chapters. However, I was moved by her telling of the death of her father, and of other traumas in her life.

The next book is a really thick one, and as I have a number of things to do this month, I’ll have difficulty in getting through it, though it comes with a recommendation.

Our talk at Staines went well and apart from sharing our publishing experiences with an interested audience, we were entertained to scones and jam with tea, followed by cake, too. (So much for the diet.) I am starting to prepare items for the Senses Workshop which we, the Goldenford Girls are giving on Saturday to ten people. I am guiding the group through two senses – sight and smell. It should be interesting.