WWW Wednesday is run by Taking on a World of Words.
The Three Ws are:
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
Currently I’m reading The Case of the Gilded Fly by Edmund Crispin, written while Crispin was an undergraduate at Oxford.I wrote about its beginning and an extract from page 56 in my Book Beginnings post here. It’s the first Gervase Fen Mystery, a locked room mystery, first published in 1944.
Edmund Crispin was the pseudonym of (Robert) Bruce Montgomery (1921-1978). His first crime novel and musical composition were both accepted for publication while he was still an undergraduate at Oxford. After a brief spell of teaching, he became a full-time writer and composer (particularly of film music. He wrote the music for six of the Carry On films. But he was also well known for his concert and church music). He also edited science fiction anthologies, and became a regular crime fiction reviewer for The Sunday Times. (from Goodreads)
The last book I read was Nero by Conn Iggulden, an Advanced Reader Copy via NetGalley; the expected publication date is 23 May 2024. It’s the first in a new trilogy, historical fiction set in Ancient Rome, telling of Nero’s birth and early years, so it’s more about his mother Agrippina than about Nero. It doesn’t shy away from the brutality of the age, particularly those of Tiberius, Caligula and Claudius, who was easily as ruthless as his predecessors. I read and watched the TV series I Claudius and Claudius the God years ago and this book is making me want to re-read those books. I find the period absolutely fascinating. I’ll be writing more about nearer to its publication.
I’m never sure what I’ll be reading next but it could be: Enemies and Neighbours: Arabs and Jews in Palestine and Israel, 1917-2017 by Ian Black because I want to understand more about the conflict between Palestine and Israel.
Synopsis from Amazon UK
A century after Britain’s Balfour Declaration promised a Jewish ‘national home’ in Palestine, veteran Guardian journalist Ian Black has produced a major new history of one of the most polarising conflicts of the modern age.
Drawing on a wide range of sources – from declassified documents to oral testimonies and his own decades of reporting – Enemies and Neighbours brings much-needed perspective and balance to the long and unresolved struggle between Arabs and Jews in the Holy Land.
Beginning in the final years of Ottoman rule and the British Mandate period, when Zionist immigration transformed Palestine in the face of mounting Arab opposition, the book re-examines the origins of what was a doomed relationship from the start. It sheds fresh light on critical events such as the Arab rebellion of the 1930s; Israel’s independence and the Palestinian catastrophe (Nakba in Arabic) of 1948; the watershed of the 1967 war; two Intifadas; the Oslo Accords and Israel’s shift to the right. It traces how – after five decades of occupation, ever-expanding Jewish settlements and the construction of the West Bank ‘separation wall’ – hopes for a two-state solution have all but disappeared, and explores what the future might hold.
Yet Black also goes beyond the most newsworthy events – wars, violence and peace initiatives – to capture thereality of everyday life on the ground in Jerusalem and Hebron, Tel Aviv,Ramallah, Haifa and Gaza, for both sides of an unequal struggle. Lucid, timelyand gripping, Enemies and Neighbours illuminates a bitter conflict that shows no sign of ending – which is why it is so essential that we understand it.
Although this is a weekly meme I’m only taking part occasionally.
BooksPlease 