Michael Pye, Antwerp: The Glory Years

 I've just been out and spent a fortune on all the books I have wanted to buy since September, and the first one I read is one that wasn't even on the list. An impulse purchase in Waterstones' half-price hardback sale, and not a history of Antwerp as I had assumed, but a telling of Antwerp's golden age in the 16th Century. I whizzed through it somewhat, but a nice easy read to end the year. Tomorrow if all goes to plan I'm going to cycle round London and do some IRL Zwifting as it should be quiet on The Mall and Whitehall for a change

Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

 'It took me a while to get into it - the orignial intention was to read it in instalments in the same way it was published, but I found it tough to follow and distinguish between pickwickians. The arrival of Sam Weller changed all that, and all of a sudden there was an engaging character to follow through the story, By the end I was very happy to see his good fortune. We're in Twixtmas at the moment, although I am still working so it isn't the normal cheese quality street and sofa period. I didn't feel great over christmas following my booster, so I need to get back in the habit of exercising properly. I also came off the wagon spectacularly with my book buying after the self-imposed moratorium. I'll try and do a similar thing for books and booze between Jan and my birthday and try and buy neither. Will see how I get on - there will, of course, need to be the occasional discreet exception 

David McCullough, John Adams

 Back on home territory, and I feel I know and admire Adams far more than before. The preening, pompous quasi-monarchist I had pictured was a kind, faithful, honest man. The complexity of the founding fathers is an endless study, it's like different aspects, foibles and personalities of ancient gods. Which in a way, they are. Christmas is approaching, the omicron virus variant is spreading at record levels throughout the UK and we don't know what the situation will be at Christmas. Helen has had a booster jab, I have mine tomorrow, but Freddie is not yet eligible for his and Libby and William aren't vaccinated at all. At the same time whoever in the media has been protecting Boris Johnson has cut loose and every day more and more damaging stories are emerging about how he and his administration have flouted the lockdown rules. He looks like a dead man walking, but then it's always been obvious that he is completely unsuitable for public office, why did we have to suffer 2 years of his incompetent premiership to find out what we knew already

Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Blood & Sugar

 'I shouldn't have bothered. The book is a period murder mystery set in 18th Century Deptford and revolving round the iniquities of slavery. It was awful though. The dialogue was clunky, a sample from a random page being ' Forgive me for interrupting your breakfast, but I require a few minutes of your time'. Maybe an attempt to write in the perceived elevated tones of the times, but it just sounded clumsy. Add in to that a dull as ditchwater main character, one dimensional and of course, the white saviour destined to solve the case. When the murderer turned out to be a black slave, well. . . uggh. 'But he was brutalised by his white masters, don't you see? It's actually a very clever commentary on the depravities of slavery and how it debases us all. Except the white saviour of course'.

John Le Carre, The Russia House, Eduardo Galeano, Football in Sun and Shadow

 The Russia House was my read on the best day of the year, the day I drop the car off for a service and MOT in Farncombe and have to kill a few hours in Guildford. I hung found on coffee shops, pubs and tea rooms doing the crossword and reading. Got the christmas shopping finished too. The normal complex, cynical second-guessing cold war paranoia of Le Carre, he was a truly great writer. Galeano was an impulse purchase, the first book I've bought to read myself since September as part of a self-imposed embargo. I'm not sure of the point of the embargo, at least it means there are things I want for christmas. I think I may finally have understood the concept of delayed gratification, as I fully intend to be buying all of them on Boxing Day

Daniel Walker Howe, What God Hath Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848

 An 800 page doorstop, one of many 800 page doorstops that have been sitting in my garage for far too long and causing the shelves to bow. An incredibly detailed overview of a pivotal time in American history, when a few colonies clinging to the eastern seaboard expanded to cover a continent. One thing that will stick with me is the map of James Polk's plan for US expansion, which included most of Mexico and Cuba, a huge southward expansion. The book covers the incorporation of Texas, the war with Mexico which doubled the territory of the US and the expansion into the Oregon territory too. It's undeniable that the USA has done more than any other nation to spread democracy, liberty and prosperity throughout the world, but at the same time this has been done by exploitation, slavery, aggressive militarism, dishonesty and double-dealing. a very complicated dual inheritance which makes american history so fascinating. 

Colin Dexter, The Way Through The Woods

 A later Morse, set in the early '90s but still very dated in parts. There are the remnants of a very conservative outlook on social matters - unmarried couples in hotels being something to remark on, illicit dirty magazines and far too many unnecessary mentions of bosoms and other parts of the anatomy. It's also a world without the internet and mobile phones which seems incredible now. Morse has to phone the local education authority to find out term dates, people can genuinely disappear without trace or use someone else's passport. The Past is another country. Morse remains an irresistible character though. Curmudgeonly, pedantic, preening but with that first-class mind that enables him to see what others cannot. I'm running low on rereads though, just two to go. Maybe Flashman next, or back to the Poirots. Perhaps something new - PD James? Or back to Wallander. . .