📘 ‘Tis the Season…..

‘Tis the season to read whatever you want…..

Spring here in Australia starts on the first of September……Summer begins on the first of December. And yes, difficult as it to imagine we’re almost one third through the season I look forward to, in amongst all the other books I’ve been reading over the past few months I tried to fit some in with Spring in the title……Spring being relevant to the season – just gone!

A mixture from the library and online – after years of not liking them at all I’m gradually becoming accustomed to reading ebooks. I still prefer traditional paper books, ones I can hold but often the really old ones aren’t available that way.
Some of these were mentioned by other bloggers ….most were very short or didn’t take long to read at all……and just by chance fitted in with my year of unread authors

• Spring rain – Marc Hamer 2023.
  This is a story about the rain, a boy, an angry dog and a gardener, and how some of them find peace and freedom.
  
• A Spring of Love – Celia Dale 1960.
  Esther Williams is thirty and single. She has been nowhere, done nothing, loved no one except her recently deceased grandfather. Her life is one of routine and order, following the same pattern week after week. That is, until she meets Raymond Banks.
  
• The Peacock Spring – Rumer Godden 1975.
  Una and her younger sister Hal have been abruptly summoned to live in New Delhi by their diplomat father Sir Edward Gwithiam. Hal settles in well, accepting their new way of life and the governess, Una not so…..until she meets Ravi the under gardener.
  
• Escape in Spring – Martha Ostenso 1939
  A tale that will tug at your heartstrings—of fate’s strange gift of love to two lonely lives

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And as we all know there’s also another season at this time of the year.

🎄✝️The Christmas season^[2] or the festive season;^[3] also known as the holiday season or the holidays, is an annual period generally spanning from late November or December to early January. Incorporating Christmas Day and New Year’s Day, source

It’s definitely not difficult to find books centred around this season. Here’s a few really short ones (novella length even) I’ve enjoyed this month – don’t you love the fun and intriguing titles.
I must have seen mention of them on a blog somewhere because as well as being new to me they are all part of different series. All available on Hoopla – a platform I’m only just beginning to use but it’s yielding books not found elsewhere. It’s one of the benefits of being a registered user at more than one library. My local Victorian card doesn’t have access whereas the Queensland one does.

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding – Agatha Christie 1960
An English country house at Christmas time should be the perfect place to get away from it all….

Put together Hercule Poirot, a missing ruby gemstone plus a cast of upstairs family, downstairs staff along with mischievous children (and scheming adults) all gathered for a traditional Christmas and you have the makings of this very very short story. Jolly good fun.
Hercule Poirot #37.

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Christmas Cake Murder – Joanne Fluke 2018.
It’s Christmas many years ago, and topping young Hannah Swensen’s wish list is becoming the go-to baker in Lake Eden, Minnesota. But as Hannah finds out, revisiting holiday memories can be murder . . .

Family and friends who cook together stay together – recreating a Christmas Ball and Christmas Cake parade, finding and reading an old manuscript that turns out to be true to life, reuniting a mother and daughter……all these (and more) are ingredients in the Christmas Cake Murder.
Hannah Swensen #23

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Tinsel and Trickery – Rose Pascoe 2023.
Penrose & Pyke have until Christmas Eve to save the orphans’ home, by unravelling a tangle of tinsel and trickery

Set in C19 New Zealand Dr Penrose is associated with an orphanage providing free health care, his daughter (Grace) and her fiancé (Charlie) set out to stop the sale of orphanage building due to happen on Christmas Eve and end up uncovering a real estate scheme that benefited one by harming others.
Penrose & Pyke Mysteries #5.5

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Mistletoe and Murder – Sarah Hakamer 2019.
Alec Stratman comes home to Twin Oaks, Virginia, after his Army retirement to contemplate his reentry into civilian life. Instead he’s greeted with the murder of his beloved Great-Aunt Heloise.

Oh my goodness, this was the tiniest of stories about a family gathering after a suspicious death, another actual murder, a will reading that exposes who is and who isn’t family plus a love story that all takes place over a few days right at Christmastime. The shortest ‘fun’ read I’ve had for a while.
Twin Oaks Christmas

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And this year because I’d never read it (and also because it’s fairly short) I decided to read a classic seasonal favourite……….

A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens 1843 .
If I had my way, every idiot who goes around with Merry Christmas on his lips, would be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. Merry Christmas? Bah humbug!

Reading Dickens is almost like learning to read again- it’s a whole new language. The gist of the story is there but not in words we’re familiar with. Anyway I finished it, a rather strange ‘out of this world’ imagined story which leaves the reader with much to think about……as well as being interesting enough to ask Mr G about certain words and phrases…..I was pleased to learn what glee and catch meant in regards to singing – it was mentioned when Scrooge was watching his nephew’s Christmas gathering

“After tea. they had some music. For they were a musical family, and knew what they were about, when they sung a Glee or Catch, I can assure you: especially Topper, who could growl away in the bass like a good one, and never swell the large veins in his forehead, or get red in the face over it “
Stave three: The second of the three spirits

A catch is a round for three or more voices, written only in a single voice part, so that each succeeding singer had to “catch” his part at the proper time. source

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Even though not born and bred here….our first Australian Christmas was 1972 – 52yrs ago !…..still regarded by some as a new chum 😊
I’m partial to a bit of old time Australian (Bush) Poetry.

Like this from C.J.Dennis.

A BUSH CHRISTMAS

The sun burns hotly thro' the gums
As down the road old Rogan comes --
   The hatter from the lonely hut
   Beside the track to Woollybutt.
      He likes to spend his Christmas with us here.
He says a man gets sort of strange
Living alone without a change,
   Gets sort of settled in his way;
   And so he comes each Christmas day
To share a bite of tucker and a beer.

Dad and the boys have nought to do,
Except a stray odd job or two.
   Along the fence or in the yard,
   "It ain't a day for workin' hard."
Says Dad.  "One day a year don't matter much."
And then dishevelled, hot and red,
Mum, thro' the doorway puts her head
   And says, "This Christmas cooking, My!
   The sun's near fit for cooking by."
Upon her word she never did see such.

"Your fault," says Dad, "you know it is.
Plum puddin'!  on a day like this,
   And roasted turkeys!  Spare me days,
   I can't get over women's ways.
      In climates such as this the thing's all wrong.
A bit of cold corned beef an' bread
Would do us very well instead."
   Then Rogan said, "You're right; it's hot.
   It makes a feller drink a lot."
      And Dad gets up and says, "Well, come along."

The dinner's served -- full bite and sup.
"Come on," says Mum, "Now all sit up."
   The meal takes on a festive air;
   And even father eats his share
      And passes up his plate to have some more.
He laughs and says it's Christmas time,
"That's cookin', Mum. The stuffin's prime."
   But Rogan pauses once to praise,
   Then eats as tho' he'd starved for days.
      And pitches turkey bones outside the door.

The sun burns hotly thro' the gums,
The chirping of the locusts comes
   Across the paddocks, parched and grey.
   "Whew!" wheezes Father. "What a day!"
      And sheds his vest.  For coats no man had need.
Then Rogan shoves his plate aside
And sighs, as sated men have sighed,
   At many boards in many climes
   On many other Christmas times.
      "By gum!" he says, "That was a slap-up feed!"

Then, with his black pipe well alight,
Old Rogan brings the kids delight
   By telling o'er again his yarns
   Of Christmas tide 'mid English barns
      When he was, long ago, a farmer's boy.
His old eyes glisten as he sees
Half glimpses of old memories,
   Of whitened fields and winter snows,
   And yuletide logs and mistletoes,
   And all that half-forgotten, hallowed joy.

The children listen, mouths agape,
And see a land with no escape
   For biting cold and snow and frost --
   A land to all earth's brightness lost,
      A strange and freakish Christmas land to them.
But Rogan, with his dim old eyes
Grown far away and strangely wise
   Talks on; and pauses but to ask
   "Ain't there a drop more in that cask?"
   And father nods; but Mother says "Ahem!"

The sun slants redly thro' the gums
As quietly the evening comes,
   And Rogan gets his old grey mare,
   That matches well his own grey hair,
      And rides away into the setting sun.
"Ah, well," says Dad.  "I got to say
I never spent a lazier day.
   We ought to get that top fence wired."
   "My!" sighs poor Mum.  "But I am tired!
      An' all that washing up still to be done."

“C.J. Dennis”
Herald, 24 December 1931, p4

More of his works can be found HERE

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Now because of everything going on behind the scenes there was nothing too deep and meaningful this month although as I read the Spring books they did have me thinking about life and all its mysteries. And even though there were murders in some of the Christmas ones, they were fun to read.
How did your ‘literary’ month go? Lighthearted or Weighty

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Sharing with the final What’s on your Book Shelf Challenge linkup for 2024

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