Reviews

‘One of those rare gems that comes to the reviewer out of the blue . . . enough twists to shame a cobra . . . the story fairly rips along, defying the reader to put the book down . . . Christine Poulson should be heralded as the fine entrant to the world of crime fiction she most certainly is.’ [Stage Fright]

- WWW.CHRISHIGH.COM

Sentimental Journey

Posted on Dec 13, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

A couple of weeks ago I was at a study week-end in Birmingham and drove over to Moseley, a suburb where I used to live between the ages of 22 and 30, an important time in anyone’s life. First I was a postgraduate student and then I worked at the Museum and Art Gallery as […]

The power of art to console

Posted on Dec 2, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

Last Monday I was in London doing research for an academic article and was travelling from the British Library to the London Library on the underground. I was feeling low, a November day, and not very happy. I was coming up the first of the escalators at Piccadilly Circus when I heard someone singing. As […]

Warning: Reading Can Damage Your Health

Posted on Nov 28, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

‘A whole family, brought to destitution, has lately had all its misfortunes clearly traced . . . to an ungovernable passion for novel -reading entertained by the wife and mother. The husband was sober and industrious, but his wife was indolent, addicted to reading everything procurable in the shape of a romance. This led her […]

The pig and the sausage

Posted on Nov 20, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

It’s a strange experience reading a novel by someone you know well, especially when it definitely has autobiographical elements. Sue Hepworth’s lovely comic novel, PLOTTING FOR BEGINNERS, came out earlier this year and features a woman of a certain age living in the Peak District, married to a somewhat eccentric husband, with three children. She […]

namedropping

Posted on Nov 15, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

Who would have expected a book about the Bayeux tapestry would read like a thriller? It was almost looted by the Nazis. Himmler regarded it as an Aryan masterpiece and was desperate to get it out of France. The Allies reached Paris only just in time. THE BAYEUX TAPESTRY: THE LIFE STORY OF A MASTERPIECE […]

. . . ‘I prefer reading’

Posted on Nov 10, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

‘People say that life’s the thing, but I prefer reading.’ I’ve always liked that quotation from Logan Pearsall Smith, and there have been times when that was true for me. My decision to make this a blog about books and reading has made me think about the part reading has played in my life. What […]

A Failed Southern lady

Posted on Nov 2, 2006 in Uncategorized | No Comments

A book that made me laugh out loud recently was Florence King’s CONFESSIONS OF A FAILED SOUTHERN LADY. I missed it when it came out in the 1980s and only caught up with it now because it was chosen by my reading group. It’s supposed to be autobiographical (I imagine some of the tales have […]

What Christine’s been reading

Posted on Oct 8, 2006 in Uncategorized | One Comment

It’s been a good month or two for reading with a holiday in Denmark and two long ferry crossings allowing more time than usual. I don’t tend to read much crime when I’m writing a novel myself, so holidays are a good time to catch up. I enjoyed THE COFFIN TRAIL, the atmospheric first novel […]