Oszkar Jaszi, The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy, John le Carré, Our Kind of Traitor

Most of both of these read on an epic train journey from Woking to Cardiff for Paul Shah's out-of-season 40th Birthday celebrations. The Severn Tunnel was shut, so 3 rail replacement services, hour-long waits at Bristol Parkway and Shrewsbury and lots of time for reading. I'm far too old for the carnage of Cardiff After Dark though, I serendipitously met up with Clay in the station car park and whined about my longing for a comfy chair and wine rather than shots and loud music and vomiting in chip alley.

David Peace, Red or Dead

A fictionalised account of the life of Bill Shankly. Took a while to get into the repetitive rhythm used to convey shankly's single-minded obsessions. Sometimes descended into lists of fixtures and scorers and there's a danger of being taken in by the emperor's new clothes, but I loved it and it kept me gripped, even more so than The Damned United. Given that Peace's football novels are meant to be his weak link, his other work must be pretty special. It's on the wish list. . .

Libby's had chicken pox recently and got used to me sleeping on the floor in her room to comfort her, which is now standard procedure! If I try and move she shouts 'Daddy Sawyer! Daddy Sawyer!' until I'm back in my place. She won't let me call her anything other than Libby or Elizabeth at the moment. A few days ago I called her 'Boo', and she indignantly declared. 'No! not boo! Libbymarysawyer!'

Fred has competed in his first running race too, he did a 1K at Alice Holt as I was there for a 10K. He seemed to really enjoy it, and I want to encourage it without pushing. I'm so proud of him for how he manages to cycle back through a busy town every day with only the occasional wobble. He's getting fast though - and tall. He really does look like an amalgam of Gareth, me, Steve and Kev. I still get confused and call Kev 'Fred' whenever the two of them are in the same area.

Barry Cunliffe, Europe Between the Oceans: 9000 BC-AD 1000

Fernand Braudel was namechecked quite often, and his spirit was ever-present in this sweeping history of a continent over 10,000 years. The Roman Empire just a blip, much more emphasis on 'pre-history' and the thriving cultures and communications links that pre-date classical civilisation and were based on the three 'oceans'; the Med, the Atlantic and the North Sea/Baltic.  We've just got back from a week on the Isle of Wight, staying just outside Newport on the Medina. Obviously I'm now a sailing expert having spent nearly 48 hours on a boat last April, so was confidently striding round the harbour giving my valued opinion to all. We spent an awful lot of time at a lavender farm, which was a beautiful spot, like Cold Comfort Farm at the end of the novel.

Fred and I built a Lego X Wing Fighter as our holiday project; obviously it’s been smashed up and fallen apart and we've lost Jek Porkins' blaster already. For the last couple of nights I've been using  the Star Wars Lego to act out Ep IV as Fred's bedtime story. Pretty sure Helen wouldn’t be happy If I bought/assembled a couple of AT-ATs and Bespin Cloud City out of Lego to enact The Empire Strikes Back. My story would really have benefited from a Lego Death Star though. . . .

Michael Chabon, Telegraph Avenue

'An Oakland Middlemarch'. Took me a while to get into, but was hooked by the end. The opposite of 'Kavalier & Clay', which I was immersed in from the start and then came to an underwhelming and rushed conclusion. Gran's funeral was on Wednesday, so it's a bit of a strange time, but we've been able to formally say 'Goodbye' now.  The kids were too young to be involved, so it would be nice to do something like plant a tree or dedicate a bench that they can attend and have something to remember Gran. 

Marc Morris, Castle: A History Of The Buildings That Shaped Medieval Britain

Gran passed away last week a few days after she left hospital to go into a Nursing Home. Have seen lots of Mum and Dad since just so we're all together, and Dad seems to be coping ok. Gran left a notebook full of the story of her life, which is heartbreaking. It begins 'If only I'd been born a boy'. Her Father wouldn't look at her when she was born apparently, as he only wanted a boy. How very sad. I've said I'll transcribe it after the funeral. M&D asked for us to put together some memories for the funeral, these are mine:

As children, it was wonderful to have grandparents so close by and to have them as such an integral part of our lives. We were so very lucky to have Gran there when we were growing up. We loved having Gran babysit us, and playing Monopoly or Knockout Whist, or endless rounds of Newmarket with her. Once a week we would go to 13 Hatch Lane after school and it was always a treat. We'd have biscuits from the green biscuit tin, play in the coalshed, the greenhouse and the garden and then a wonderful roast dinner with the best roast potatoes  followed by perfect custard for pudding. Gran would start each meal by declaring 'What do we want?', to which the enthusiastic response was 'Clean Plates!' We still use this at family mealtimes today!

 We'd spend Saturday mornings with Gran and Ben too playing in the park, or on Ben's allotment behind the village hall, or collecting conkers from the vicarage garden. When we went into school on Monday we would have to draw our  favourite thing from the weekend and those Saturday mornings always featured.

Gran and I appeared in the local paper in 1977 having planted a tree on Moor Lane, which in later years was pointed out whenever we passed it. It's wonderful to think that a sapling we planted 35 years ago is still there and thriving amongst all the change in the village. In recent years we've always consulted Gran when we need gardening advice and her love of flowers and nurturing plants has been passed down to her great grandchildren who love to be out in the garden, getting dirty digging and weeding.

Jerry White, London In The Eighteenth Century: A Great and Monstrous Thing, Henry Treece, Swords From The North, Tom Fort, The Grass Is Greener: Our Love Affair With The Lawn, Jake Arnott, The House of Rumour, Peter Ackroyd, London Under, Derek Miller Norwegian By Night, Adam Hopkins, Holland, Rachel Joyce, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry was very moving, and a few times even caused what Freddie calls 'Goosepingles' to appear. The story of a retired Middle Englander who receives news from someone who affected his life profoundly twenty years previously that she is dying. He cannot think of what to write to her that expresses his feelings, and so rather than post the terse 'sorry' letter he has written, walks straight past the postbox, then past the post office, and then keeps on walking to the other end of the country to see and save Queenie Hennessey. Along the way he has time to think about his life, his regrets and his relationship with his family. At the same time, so does his wife at home. I'm not doing this justice at all, but it was a wonderful book. Swords From The North is one of the few books concerned with Harald Hardrada. He must be due a biography, but looks like there are very few resources to draw on, so fiction is the way to go. How strange it seems that someone whose name is so well known is so unknown. Tom Fort's The Grass is Greener was a reread, based on my current lawn obsession. Since reading the book, there's been a heatwave that has meant the grass hasn't grown, it has instead been bleached into straw by the sun and is dying on its erse. The rubber paddling pool even managed to burn its kidney-shaped outline into part of the lawn somehow.

We went camping in the New Forest  for the second time this weekend, and this time it was dry and hot rather than wet and freezing. The kids loved it, although it was stuffy in the tent. Next time we'll take more mozzy repellent and also some decent tent pegs - the ground was concrete. Any excuse for a trip to the camping shop. It's so hot I've been thinking about emptying out the summerhouse, inflating the airbeds and letting Freddie sleep out there. Now the holidays are about to start maybe we'll give it a go!

Henning Mankell, the Troubled Man, Tom Holland, In the Shadow of the Sword, Naomi Alderman, Liars' Gospel, Marc Morris, The Norman Conquest, Keith Ridgway, Hawthorn & Child

Have left it far too long, there's definitely books missing from the above list. My 'to read' bookshelf is now overflowing with goodies, but I just can't stop buying books. I was online yesterday debating whether the £20 it would cost to get a copy of The British General Election of 1983 from New Zealand was worth it, or whether it would be better spent on the biography of Philip Snowden that is unaccountably in Arkansas. It was very sad to read the final Wallander book, and Mankell's uncompromising last pages when Wallander's descent into loneliness and Alzheimers are starkly set out will stay with me for a long time; Helen felt the same.

Marc Morris' book had enough in it to make me buy his 'Castle' book, obviously the sandcastle influence. In the meantime, we've been to Brittany and Normandy on holiday which feels like it will go down in our memories as a golden holiday; Fred learnt to ride and to swim without armbands! So proud of the little fella; on the first day he was saying he couldn't ride at all, and by the end of the holiday he was tearing around the campsite and along the corniche. He's riding to school every day now too.

Dad bought us a lawnmower as a moving-in present following on from the lawn care service, and mowing the lawn has become mildly addictive. I've bought Tom Fort's 'The Grass is Greener' to reread. My gardening is still limited to the destructive elements; mowing, weeding and the like, but I'm trying to expand my repertoire. The garden just looks and smells so lovely. It really is different every day. The Sextons obviously knew what they were doing, although they'd be horrified if they saw our levels of incompetence! Next up is trimming the hedge. . .

Libby is still somewhere between a viking berserker and a Tasmanian Devil, albeit one with pretty dresses and beautiful flowing hair. At the weekend I heard Helen shout 'No Freddie! Don't give Libby anything she could use as a weapon!' Fred had naively given her a spoon, an instrument that Libby could kill a Rhino with. Yesterday she ran headlong into a trolley at Morrison's, and the trolley definitely came off worst. Libby just stood there for a moment, and like Sean Fitzpatrick against Ireland in 1992, took her metaphorical gumshield out, spat out the blood and gore from her gob and then just scrummed down again.