I gave myself a pat on the back as I walked out of the library yesterday, because for once I’d borrowed fewer books than I’d taken back. As usual though I can’t wait to start reading them and have already started the genealogy book – well I’ve dipped into it. My loot this week is:

• The Anti-social Behaviour of Horace Rumpole by John Mortimer. This has such a beautiful cover. I think it may be the last novel published by Sir John Mortimer who died in January this year. The Times is quoted on the back cover: ” Very funny about the old dinosaur’s attempt to fit into the depressingly clean modern world”. It promises to be good – about petty criminials, kids playing football in the streets and it even looks as though Rumpole himself will be getting an ASBO (Anti-Social Behaviour Order).
• Not the End of the World by Kate Atkinson. I’ve become a fan of Kate Atkinson so I have to read this one. It’s a collection of short stories, beautifully illustrated with woodcuts, described on the cover as:

Vibrantly contemporary, plausibly implausible, refreshingly original … a timely meditation on mythology and transformation …

•  The Beginner’s Guide to Tracing Your Roots by Diane Marelli. I’m researching my family history whenever I get the time. Actually once I get started it’s hard to stop, but then my brain gets addled and I get everyone mixed up. So I was interested in this book which decribes how Diane Marelli went about her research and I thought it looked rather different from other “how-to” books. It’s written with enthusiasm and is very funny in parts – it’s not a text book but is still packed with information.
• The Birthday Present by Barbara Vine. Cath’s post on her blog Read Warbler about Barbara Vine made me realise that I hadn’t read any of Vine’s books, although I’m familiar with her  work through the TV adaptations. Anyway books are better than filmed versions so I thought I’d see what the library had. Again from the book cover, The Birthday Present is described:

Set against an age of IRA bombings, the first Gulf War and sleazy politics, The Birthday Present is the gripping story of a fall from grace, and of a man who carries within him all the hypocrisy, greed and self-obsession of a troubled era.

I hope it won’t be too long before I get time to read these books!

And to finish off here is another photo of my local branch library, showing a display of books on Mediterranean Cookery with some of the fiction shelves in the background. Note the stand of reading glasses!