What I've been reading lately

I like Bill Bryson. He's easy to read, refreshing, and entertaining. I picked up his memoir, which talks about his boyhood in middle America in the 1950s, and I highly recommmend it.

I am beginning to get fascinated by history. I mentioned this before in another post, and it occurs to me again with this book that history is actually quite interesting. It's all in how you tell it though. Bryson tells it in such a way that you can't put it down. I admire his style.

My Book List has more on my reading. If you're interested.

I also read another book by one of my favorite authors, Alexander McCall Smith. This one, The Right Attitude to Rain, was quite lovely but not amongst my favorite of his work. The ones he writes about Africa, with the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, those are, at least to me, better. But I still enjoyed the one about the Rain. It wasn't really about rain though, it was about a woman in Edinburgh (where apparently rain is relentless). I looked for references of Edinburgh that I remember from other books about that town, mostly Ian Rankin's mysteries. I devoured them at some point in the not too distant past. The characters really grew on me (most notably, John Rebus). Anyway, McCall Smith remains one of my favorite authors and I will read his books again.

History lesson

I never really liked history, truth be told. The way they taught Canadian history in highschool didn't exactly evoke the kind of thirst for more knowledge that is supposed to be happening. Although it is questionable if any public school system these days evokes thirst for knowledge...but that's another day's rant.

Then one day, I saw this book on a library shelf:











This book is fantastic! It is, in a sense, a book about Canadian history, but it focuses on the culinary aspects of the early settlers who came from everywhere, particularly Europe. It talks about the customs that people were used to, the pioneering adjustments that were inevitable due to the completely different nature of the environment, and many other interesting tidbits.

There is a mention of several cookbooks that I would love to get my hands on one day. Perhaps one day I will search for this book and buy it to add to my library.

If anyone is interested in food, and/or in Canadian history, this is a highly recommended reading pleasure.

For other books of interest, visit My Book List blog.