July reads

I spent much of July with The Boy, either travelling or at home, and I tend not to read a great deal when we're together.  Hence the relative paucity of books this month: just four (and one of them is still unfinished).

1. I picked up The Snowman from the book swap shelf at work as I love a good crime novel but hadn't read anything by Jo Nesbo before.  I really liked the dark and sinister atmosphere of the book, about a serial killer stalking women as winter falls in Oslo.

2. Walking Home tells the story of poet Simon Armitage's journey along the Pennine Way a couple of years ago.  As both a walker and a Yorkshirewoman, it was a great read.

3. The Boy very bravely bought me some books for my birthday (generally, no-one dares try to find something I don't already own) and 23 Shades Of Black is the first one I've read.  Nothing to do with that book, by the way; it's a hardboiled detective thriller with political overtones, set in New York in the 1980s.

4. I am late to the party on this one, I know, but oh my god A Game Of Thrones is so fucking good!  I got a sample on my Kindle after being recommended the books for the zillionth time by a colleague, and within a couple of pages I'd already downloaded the whole novel.  I haven't quite finished it yet - I find myself reading it in quite a tentative way, because the one thing I know from media coverage is that George R.R. Martin likes to kill people off - but am head over heels in love with the characters, the intrigue, and the brilliant descriptions.