Hello September! How happy I am that the -ber months have arrived!😁🎉🎉🎉New month, more books, and it's time to post about the books I read in the second half of August. My thoughts on the books I read in the first half of the month are here.
In this book, the author, who formerly worked for the BBC, is focused on three children who were born in Nazi Germany or whose birth circumstances because of the Third Reich. Their situations were wildly different and each illustrates different impacts of tis terrible time in history. Renate was born in one of Himmler's 'lebensborn' homes, set up to encourage women to have children for the fatherland. In order to keep the births coming, SS officers in particular were encouraged to 'mate' with many women. When Renate's mother met a handsome SS officer, who was quite high up in the system and was later executed for war crimes, she fell head over heels in love with the guy and they started an affair. He was already married so that was never an option. Renate never met her father, but her situation was unusual in that after the war her mother came to claim her from the woman who had been caring for her. Joe's parents lived in a Warsaw ghetto and were eventually shipped to a concentration camp. It's not a spoiler to say that, miraculously, they survived. If they hadn't, Joe wouldn't have existed. He was born in a displaced persons camp after the war. Dan's Jewish parents left Germany in 1933, seeing what was coming they felt it best to get out while they could. They went to what was then Palestine and that's where he was born. Each of these kids had a different relationship to the Third Reich and their family histories impacted them in different ways. Catrine Clay writes about each person's history, how they coped with the family dynamics and dysfunctions as a result of that history, and where they are now. I was particularly interested in this book because my father was the child of an SS officer who experienced the war as a child and continued to carry that trauma with him. Because of the silence about this, his trauma--at least when I knew him--was unexamined and passed on and had a big impact on my own life. This is something I continue to try to understand in ever deeper ways. For me the best thing to do was to remove myself from the relationship with both parents (my mother had her own unhealed trauma to pass on), so I don't know whether he finally came to a place of peace before he died. I hope so. This book doesn't really address the specific sort of situation I am most interested in, but it's an excellent and informative book nonetheless. It's an important topic in many ways and sadly more relevant than ever.
This is another fascinating book, which tells the story of the Nuremberg trails from the perspectives of 8 women who were involved in various ways. Some were journalists from various places--the UK, US, and Germany. One woman was a survivor of concentration camps. One managed a sort of boarding house where various witnesses and others stayed during the trial. One was an artist, another a Russian interpreter. Some of the women are well known (Rebecca West) and some are not. Each of these women was involved in different ways and interpreted things from their own unique perspectives. It's a fascinating book, which offers insight into both the trial and the lives of women from very different backgrounds. The book comprises two sections. The first one introduces readers to each woman and describes their histories, how they ended up at Nuremberg, and what they experienced there. The second section tells readers what they did after the trial and how it impacted them. Each woman has her own chapter in each section, which makes it highly readable. I was quite interested in the women's stories even beyond their experiences at the trial. Great book! Bill is reading it now and he's liking it too.
I'm not seeing an editor's name anywhere on this book, which is a collection of essays about various aspects of food. It's an interesting book which, to be honest, I wasn't sure I'd continue reading after the first essay. There was nothing wrong with the first essay, it was simply not my thing. It's a unique structure which is supposed to be memoir-ish, I guess, organized around the author's memories of and history with cookers (ovens). The essay didn't work for me because when she stuck the memoir-ish bits in, they seemed superficial and things jumped forward but without context other than what she thought of the cooker. Once I'd read that I seriously considered putting the book aside but decided to read another essay. They got better as the book went on and I think I liked the final one in the collection most of all. The essays range across various topics and other than that first one, I enjoyed them.
I read a few books that will be published soon. Thanks to NetGalley, the publishers, and the authors for digital review copies of these titles.
Our Noble Selves by Kate Atkinson
to be published on September 10, 2026 by Random House UK
ISBN 9781529937824
It's 1949 and in London, Harry Flynn is sitting on a park bench. A journalist before the war, he's been drifting since he returned. Today we'd say he was suffering from PTSD due to his experience not as a soldier but as a journalist who was taken as a POW in Asia. He tried at first to settle into life again, thinking that marriage and possibly children would help him heal. That didn't work out and he has just sort of meandered through his life ever since. As he sits on the park bench, the guy who encouraged him to go to Asia to cover the war appears and is surprised to see him--since Flynn was considered missing, presumed dead, this is understandable. This guy offers him a job as a poetry judge for the Festival of Britain, to be held in 1951. Flynn takes the job. The story then jumps to 1951 and the ever more frantic preparations for the festival. Harry's jobs have multiplied well beyond being a poetry judge and as more and more ideas are tossed out there, his responsibilities grow. New people appear in the office. He is still puzzled by some things and misses nonverbal cues when communicating with people, but he's a little less aloof now and has even developed some tentative friendships. Soon though, weird things start happening and he finds himself in the middle of a mystery. Plot ensues.
I love Kate Atkinson, so I was thrilled to read this book. It did not disappoint. It's a page turner both for the development of the mystery and for character development. It's actually a funny book--I laughed at various times throughout. In an author's note at the end, Atkinson described how, when doing research for the book, she realized that it was meant to be a humorous book and so she decided not to include a lot of gruesome details of what a POW's experience in Asia was like. It's there, but just enough to help readers understand what makes Flynn who he is. The Festival of Britain is a historical event, but details are fictionalized here. It's a Kate Atkinson book, so of course the writing is excellent, the characters are well developed, and the historical setting is interesting. I wholeheartedly recommend this book.
The Agatha Christie Cure: What Reading the Queen of Crime Taught Me About Life by Cathy Rentzenbrink
to be published on September 10, 2026 by Canongate Books
ISBN 9781837262885
The book opens on the night before Christmas Eve, with the author sitting on her couch feeling deeply depressed and anxious--familiar feelings exacerbated by the season, which is not her favorite, and her life circumstances. Her marriage is crumbling but she's not sure if she should try to hold it together or let it go. She's struggling with maternal ambivalence--how does she meet her son's special needs while still meeting her own? How much of herself is she 'supposed' to give up? How has she gotten here? As she sits with these kinds of thoughts running through her mind, her eyes wander across her bookcase and she thinks about her Agatha Christie collection of books, mugs, tote bags, puzzles, etc. This sparks an idea. She'll read all of Christie's novels in publication order. It's just the sort of project she needs. And so, she begins, finding insight and inspiration in Christie's work and her life.
This is a memoir as well as an exploration of Christie's life and work. While there is necessarily some speculation about Christie's thoughts, in an author's note at the end, Rentzenbrink assures readers that when it comes to her own life, what she's written is the truth as she sees it. She also points out that there are stories that are not hers to tell and that truth can sometimes be subjective. There were several aspects of this book that I loved. First of all was simply the ways in which the author engaged with the novels and described her epiphanies about what Christie might have been trying to do in them--and how she sometimes went back to a novel as new thoughts occurred to her. I also enjoyed the conversations Rentzenbrink had with her son about the books and Agatha Christie and how sometimes his observations led to her gaining new insights. This all made me want to go re-read some of the novels, including the Mary Westmacott titles. Another aspect of the book that had me turning pages was the evolution of the author's relationships with others and with herself. She grows and changes throughout the book, learning things about herself in the process. Her increased confidence and self-awareness was good to read about and created a hopeful feeling.
Rentzenbrink is an excellent writer so I was happy to go along for the ride. I do think one should be at least somewhat familiar with Christie's work, even if in a general way, before reading this book. There are spoilers sprinkled throughout and while major spoilers, such as the solutions to the mysteries, are flagged ahead of time, others are not. As I said above, I love reading books about books and reading and one thing I liked about this book was the fact that the books were by one author. The deep interaction between the current author and the previous author was fascinating to read about. I also found the ways in which Rentzenbrink connected the novels to her own life and to the circumstances happening in Christie's life at the time she was writing them quite compelling. There was just so much to love about this book. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
to be published on October 1, 2026 by Pan Macmillan
ISBN 9781037412172
It's Christmastime in the west of Ireland. The snow is falling--so much so that there's a status red weather warning. People are staying home. But in a hotel, there are two guests. One is an elderly widow named Janice, there from England, who is luxuriating in long baths with good books. The other guest is Jerry, who is returning to his homeplace to see his mother, who doesn't have long to live. As the snow falls outside, the two have dinner together. No one else is there except Ryan, the server, and Donal, the cook. Early in the evening, the conversation takes a strange turn when one asks the other, 'What's the worst thing you've ever done?' Janice goes first. Things go on from there.
I loved this novella. I'm a big fan of Sarah Moss and this book did not disappoint. The writing is, as always, excellent. Moss is so good at creating atmosphere--there's a scene where Janice is telling her story and eating oysters and other shellfish that is so well done I actually stopped to admire it as I was reading. The pace is just right. It's a short book, but there's a lot in it and now that I've finished it, I think it's a book that's definitely worth a reread. Certain kinds of mysteries set at Christmas are always favorites for me and this one is now among them. Highly recommend.
There you have it--the books I read in the second half of August. I hope you had a great reading month and will have an excellent bookish September!
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