Have you read the Guernsey Literary Potato Peel Pie Society? A fairly light novel with lots of charm (not to be confused with film of same name which I haven’t seen so can’t comment on) which looks at the occupation through a different slant.
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Many years ago, my late uncle Peter from Guernsey (who lived through the occupation and wrote a manuscript himself) recommended me the Potato Peel Pie book, which has been rather ruined by the recent film which wasn’t shot in Guernsey, making Islanders outraged! When I was coming back from Guernsey last year, an employee from Visit Guernsey was taking surveys of passengers and asking reasons for visiting, the film was one of the reasons they expected people to be visiting, and I spoiled that for them by saying that it wasn’t even filmed in Guernsey. Another reason that Visit Guernsey hoped that people were visiting was the ‘Peaceful Way of Life’ Ha! Even 15 years ago, Peter complained of the traffic jams and crowdedness because of the finance industry, known to some of us as ‘The Other Occupation’. It is so bad now with traffic and overcrowding, it isn’t peaceful, although the West Coast and the smaller islands still have some beauty. Yeah, so I remember the book, and it isn’t bad. Poor old Guernsey.
Was given this for Xmas, just started reading.
Normally it’s sci-fi from kindle unlimited though
I looked it up, looks fascinating, a good autobiography like that is well worth a read.
“Head of State” by Andrew Marr, because Madame found it for £1.49 in Oxfam on her last trip to the UK.
I don’t think it is a great work of fiction, but I suspect it contains hidden messages that will only be understood by the political inner circle.
“Manfred’s Pain” by Robert McLiam Wilson. Very popular in France and recommended by Sister-in-law, who is a retired librarian.
“Heroic Failure” by Fintan O’Toole who says “Brexit makes sense for a nation that feels sorry for itself.”
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I’ve just read The Soldier’s Wife, set in Guernsey. Very, very good for something that looked “lite”
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Sounds good, I will look it up.
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I listen rather than read. In between podcasts I have recently enjoyed
The Deceiver by Frederick Forsyth
I have just started
Anatomy of a Scandal by Sarah Vaughn
I also have in my library ready to listen to
The Night Manager by John Le Carré
Mr Midshipman Hornblower by C S Forester
That all sounds good. I wish I could listen but I have a tendency to lose concentration.
Currently this post. I can’t get into reading, unless it is instructive.
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The world according to Jeremy Clarkson
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Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray 
First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde 
A Gentle Plea for Chaos by Mirabel Osler 
Various gardening books…
And… the Encyclopedia Britannica, online! 
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I bend the knee. No joking. I find poetry very difficult to read. Either it’s impenetrable, as are those of a friend whose ouevre, along with his wife’s, is immortalised in the Oxford Book of 20thC Verse. Or it’s so affecting I come over all ‘death of Chatterton’.
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I’m reading A. Einstein. Not about relativity et al but his 'Essays in Humanism’. Pieces of the ‘bonnes pensées’ of the great scientist. It’s ironic that the first essay is ‘Why Socialism?’ [1949]. In 1935 he had taken citizenship in the most capitalist country in the world, the USA.
Somewhat more than an irony is that, for all Einstien’s great achievements in science and thoughtful reflections on other topics, his personal life had a side to it that, in the reading of his letters to his wife, belief in what we understand was a deeply humanitarian person is confounded.
In July 1914, Albert Einstein wrote to his first wife, Mileva Maric, the mother of his two sons, laying down a series of conditions under which he would agree to continue their marriage:
‘‘A. You will see to it (1) that my clothes and linen are kept in order, (2) that I am served three regular meals a day in my room. B. You will renounce all personal relations with me, except when these are required to keep up social appearances.’’ And: ‘‘You will expect no affection from me . . . You must leave my bedroom or study at once without protesting when I ask you to.’’
I confess I was a stranger to Death of Chatterton 'til you referenced it. I get your point, I think 
! I reckon it’s a matter of the way we’re strung or tuned, Cap’n.
I’ve always been left cold as a leg of mutton by popular music, such as has been extolled on SF, folk salivating over albums. There are a few exceptions, dating back to my very callow youth and childhood. I have a great liking for French café ballads and chansons d’amour. Choral music if all kinds I love, and lieder.
We all march to our different drum, it seems. But some kitsch poetry sets my own teeth on edge.
The last in his fantastic trilogy - Highly recommended
And a little lighter but equally enthralling
Finding the Sky TV adaptation of Stephen Kings ‘The Outsider’ difficult to watch because it is so well written, filmed and acted - The actress portraying Holly Gibney is brilliant.
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@Dan_Wood
I loved the Secret Commonwealth but then I love pretty well everything by Philip Pullman. If you enjoyed that you might enjoy the Mortal Engines books by Philip Reeve.
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Well now Peter, as a man who likes his chansons d’amour but ‘cold as a leg of mutton’ [necessarily cold, this mutton?] by popular music, how about giving two love songs a listen, written by two men inspired by the same woman.
One song ‘Something’ by George Harrison, was rated by Frank Sinatra as the greatest love song ever written and the other ‘Layla’ was inspired by the tale of Layla and Majnun, the ‘Romeo and Juliet’ of Arabic/Persian poetry as expressing the desperation of the forlorn and love-sick fellow. The full version of this song is over 7 minutes, with a piano coda. That’s the one. It’s somewhat anthemic and should be played at considerable volume.
For pudding, you could go for a song written by the love-lorn fellow who did, in the end, tempt his ‘Layla’ away from George Harrison and came up with this sugar-coated confection, ‘Wonderful Tonight’ . A big favourite with the ladies, this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUSzL2leaFM. You have to put up with a ghastly video game ad first …
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Majnun and Layla were v cool as they spoke to each other without seeing one another and the verb used means to telephone, nowadays, so v anachronistically funny in the 8th/9th century…
Layla meaning night could also make you think of Byron: she walks in beauty like the night/of cloudless climes and starry skies/and all that’s best of dark and light/meets in her aspect and her eyes
My BIL downloaded Seamus Heaney reading lots of his poems for me. He has a lovely voice and great phrasing, so he makes the poems ‘penetrable’. Give it a try?
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