Tag: Kim Fielding

Review – The Little Library

Posted November 5, 2020 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of The Little Library by Kim FieldingThe Little Library, Kim Fielding

Elliott is recovering from an awful betrayal, holed up in a small house not far from where his brother lives, and buying books in place of therapy. After a good deal of prodding and some awful interviews as he tries to get back into academia, Elliott decides to share some of his books by building a Little Free Library. And hey, it’s a cliché, but books can bring people together, and so it proves for Elliott — not all the connections he forms are deep and lasting, but it gives him a connection to the community which he was lacking, and starts to wake him up a bit.

Simon is a police officer, or was, before he was shot in the knee. He meets Elliott while walking for physiotherapy, and has something of an awakening as he gets to know Elliott, and browses the books in his library, which include books on queer history. Although he’s in the closet to his family, and Elliott’s planning on moving to wherever he can get a job, the two of them decide to try to make something of it.

The Little Library is, overall, really sweet. Neither Elliott nor Simon are totally perfect, but they are doing their best, and though they have miscommunications and mismatched needs at times, they work through it like adults. We see both of them in their family relationships as well, and there’s no clear-cut awfulness or greatness — just people being people, not always good to each other, but in the end being a family and making things work. The drama isn’t big huge world-ending stuff, and they don’t treat it that way; these are very definitely adult men, figuring things out, making their way through things.

I enjoyed it a lot, and thought Simon was terribly sweet. They make for a good pair, each offering something to the relationship and to each other, and it was fun to watch it happen.

Rating: 4/5

Tags: , , , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted October 22, 2020 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Hey folks! I’m having a tired and overloaded week, so I’ll try to make this quick!

What are you currently reading?

A bunch of things, as ever! I’ll keep it to the three most “on deck” at the moment: I’m reading Blackout, the third in Mira Grant’s Newsflesh trilogy. I keep restarting the trilogy and having to reread the first book, because a lot of the themes are a bit anxiety-making for me, but this time I am determined to get all the way to the end. There’s so much goodness here, even with the anxiety-making.

Cover of The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary SutcliffI’m also rereading The Eagle of the Ninth, by Rosemary Sutcliff. I love the way she put some historical facts together to make this story, and I love Marcus and Esca, and I love the fact that I’ve finally managed to track down another copy of the edition I read to pieces, with the illustrations that are so familiar and the right cover and everything (not the one pictured here). It’s odd how much shorter some bits of the book seem now than I remember them to be. I had this with Narnia, too — I feel like as a child I roamed a lot freer in imagining the bits between chapters and scenes, and made it longer as an experience.

I’ve just started The Little Free Library by Kim Fielding, today, and I’m halfway through. The impulse-buying of books thing is — ouch! I feel called out. I’m finding the rapport between the love interests believable, though, and I’m enjoying watching them get where they’re going.

Cover of Deadline by Mira GrantWhat have you recently finished reading?

Oof. I’ve been bad at actually finishing books, lately, so it might have been Mira Grant’s Deadline. Bit middle booky, now I look back at it, though with some good stuff.

What will you be reading next?

I really couldn’t tell you. I just got Joyce Chng’s Dragon Physician, and I’m intrigued. It’s also short, which suits my current attention span.

Tags: , , , , ,

Divider