a whole new world

Update (29 Jan): Hilary Mantel announced as overall winner! (see comment below) 

For the first time ever, a female winner features in every category of the 2012 Costa Book Awards. The category winners were announced today, Thursday, 3rd January.

The winners in the different categories are as follows:-

Hilary Mantel wins the Novel Award with 'Bring up the Bodies', the book that won her the Man Booker prize back in October. She therefore becomes the first author to win both the Costa Novel Award and the Booker Prize in the same year. 'Bring up the Bodies' is the sequel to 'Wolf Hall' and part of a trilogy, and in it Mantel explores one of the most mystifying and frightening episodes in English history: the destruction of Anne Boleyn. Read more »

While some people like to escape to the sun for Christmas, many prefer the embrace of a traditional white christmas. Whichever group you fit into, maybe one or other of these books might allow you to escape, in a fashion, to the sun or, if it is your preference, to more northern climes. The following are just some of the books I have read in recent months and I hope you get to enjoy them. So travel with me to Australia, South Africa, Iceland, Norway and Sweden!

Going to sunnier regions...

To Australia first. 'The Bat'  is the first in the Harry Hole series by Norwegian Jo Nesbo, but the last to be translated, reason being I understand is that the publisher thought the others in the series more marketable as they were based in Norway, while this novel is based in Australia. In this, Harry is sent to Sydney to assist the investigation into the murder of a young Norwegian woman, it being a race against time to catch the serial killer before he strikes again. Harry is here teamed with an Aboriginal police officer, the Aboriginal aspect being strong in this book. You also learn something of Harry the person, while his problem with alcohol raises its ugly head also. A gritty ending as you come to expect from Nesbo. Read more »

For my "interview a genre author in Ireland" series I got Michael Carroll to answer my questions.

I've read a fair few of Michael's books over the years, most recently the Pelicos Trilogy, starting with the Last Starship and I've been enjoying it, however my husband has been loving it.  Michael has two websites, one concentrating on his Quantum Prophecy series and the other a more general website.  He's also written some Adult fiction as Jaye Carroll (I've read at least one, The Sweetest Feeling). Read more »

Contemporary with the time-period covered by Anne Plumptre’s ‘Narrative of a Residence in Ireland’ (1814-15), available in a three volume set in the Special Collections of the Dublin and Local Studies Collection, was the Congress of Vienna, a Pan-European meeting of nations to try to undo some of the political damage caused by the Napoleonic Era. Ms. Read more »

I love the long, warm, bright summer evenings - but the long, chilly, dark winter evenings have their charms too, as long as I have something good to read. The girls in my house have stored up some special reads for those lazy days between Christmas and New Year. We've had to banish the chosen books from sight so we're not tempted to start reading immediately - there lies grave danger of no present buying, pudding making, tree trimming or other essential ingredients of Christmas. Read more »

The Banned Book list in Ireland has disappeared to a large extent – haven’t seen one in libraries in years – though it does still exist.

However, in the United States, individuals can challenge the inclusion of books in public and school libraries. As I was writing about Ray Bradbury back in November, the irony of ‘Fareinheit 451’ being banned at one point and the book itself being about censorship was glaringly obvious. The list of the most challenged and banned books reads more like a list of the 20th century’s best works, including not only ‘Fareinheit 451’, but ‘The Catcher in the Rye’, ‘Of Mice and Men’, ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’, ‘Ulysses’, ‘The Colour Purple’ and many more. Read more »