I've been at work almost two weeks already. I didn't have as good a holiday weather as those who started two weeks later - it actually is too hot and humid for my taste now - but I had plenty to do: shopping, cooking, mother's medication, laundry, lawn mowing, hedge cutting...

 

WP_20140702_003-normal.jpg

Lahti July Market 2014

I had no time to go the the beach, but I did have time for reading, lighter this time than my usual summer holiday fare (in approximate order of reading):

  • Eric Enno Tamm, Suuri seikkailu Mannerheimin jäljillä (orig. The Horse that Leaps through Clouds)
  • Panu Rajala, Naisten mies ja aatteiden: Juhani Ahon elämäntaide ("Man of ladies and of ideals: the art of Juhani Aho's life")
  • Alastair Reynolds, Absolution Gap
  • Ian Rankin, Standing in Another Man's Grave
  • G.I. Gurdjieff, Kohtaamisia merkittävien henkilöiden kanssa (engl. Meetings with Remarkable Men)
  • Terry Pratchett - Stephen Baxter, The Long Earth
  • Sofi Oksanen, Kun kyyhkyset katosivat ("When the Doves Disappeared")
  • Ian Rankin, Saints of the Shadow Bible
  • Hannu Raittila, Terminaali ("Terminal")
  • Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals
  • Ian Rankin, A Question of Blood
  • Alastair Reynolds, House of Suns
  • Elizabeth George, Just One Evil Act
  • Erik Wahlström, Den dansande prästen ("The dancing clergyman")
  • Iain M. Banks. Surface Detail
  • Terry Pratchett - Stephen Baxter, The Long War
  • Ian Rankin, Doors Open

And now some short comments on the books: obviously I like Alastair Reynolds, Terry Pratchett and Ian Rankin, so nothing more on them. I was very pleased to read Rajala's biography of the writer Juhani Aho, and Wahlström's novel about Uno Cygnaeus I found better than acceptable (unlike Fredrik Hertzberg in Svenska Dagbladet). Oksanen's latest was well written, but somehow pointless - she seems to keep harping on about the same theme endlessly. Raittila's novel was disappointing after all the praise it had received. My history with George has had its ups and downs; this one is definitely one of the tops. Meetings with Remarkable Men was puzzling, and discourages me from reading the other books of the All and Everything series. Tamm's book on following in  C.G.E. Mannerheim 's footsteps in China was not uninteresting, but slightly disappointing none the less.

As a whole a satisfactory holiday, in spite of mother's panics and alarms.