Wednesday, March 6, 2024

COMING UP FOR AIR -George Orwell


 

















Very funny for Orwell, sad in places but a lovely read -"never go back, it will never replace your memories"

OPERATION PEDESTAL -Max Hastings





















Thousands of men thrown into a mincer.  A great read , getting supplies to Malta
 

THE IDIOT - Fyodor Dostoyevsky


 

















Astonishing writing , this was very readable, whereas I found Demons unreadable

ASHENDEN - W. Somerset Maugham


 



















A good set of spy stories, always worth a re-read

A HANDFUL OF DUST - Evelyn Waugh

















The genius that was Waugh
 

INSIDE STALIN'S KREMLIN - Peter S. Deriabin


















Disappointing. Written in the 1st person 30 years after the events was always going to make it suspect.  Deriabin was a genuine defector but this reads like a superannuation supplement.  Mercifully short.



 

TROTSKY -Robert Service


 
















A brilliant complex man but so narcissistic it's surprising Stalin let him  live as long as he did