A Christmas present book that I read while waiting for the library van day last week. I've read a couple of his other books and 'Deep Country' about his 5 years in a remote Welsh cottage is a favourite. I've reserved it to re-read.
Neil has been gradually losing his hearing for many years and this book is about his attempt to listen to all the birds in this country that he's never heard, before his hearing goes completely. It's fascinating how he has to plan to be in the right place at the right time and his travels to many remote places.
This is a podcast where Neil talks about the book.
It was sad to hear that he had Lyme Disease which triggered Rheumatoid Arthritus and was unwell when this recording was made.
Completely different was this little book by Rumer Godden published in 1969.
Grizel Dane, a servicewoman in the US army arrives during the war to stay with her elderly Great Uncle, Sir Rollo Dane, but that doesn't happen until the last part of the book. Through Rollo's memories and voices of the others who lived there we hear the history of the Dane family and Lark Ingoldsby. Lark was adopted after being orphaned in a train crash and finds herself in the middle of sibling rivalry, loved by Rollo and his older brother Pelham but hated by sister Selina.
It only a small book and was read in an evening, once I'd got used to the way it is written in different voices and times, often overlapping and going backwards and forwards.
Maybe the earliest written book I've read for a while is this - originally published in 1898. Another very small book quickly read.
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Thanks for the info about Neil Ansell, I will look for 'Deep Country'. Lyme disease can be so nasty, a friend of mine wasn't correctly diagnosed for ages and became very poorly.
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Elizabeth and her German Garden is a beautiful read and as you say it is not at all dated, I thoroughly enjoyed it, it was passed to various family and friends who also loved it. Jan
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