Precious Bane

I was awake till the early hours of this morning as I wanted to finish one of the best books I have ever read - Precious Bane by Mary Webb. If you haven't read it please do as I just couldn't put it down. It is similar to Thomas Hardy's style and Mary Webb's descriptions of the Shropshire countryside and her characterization are superb. When I had finished it I was disappointed there wasn't more - I can't praise it enough. It is one of Shropshire Girl's favourite books too and she has written a post about Mary Webb. I belong to a Reading Group and Precious Bane was on our reading list. Next with it being the centenary of Daphne du Maurier's birth we will be reading My Cousin Rachel. On Wednesday we all went to a member's house to lunch and to watch the DVD of David Copperfield as we have recently read this book. Next month we visit Jane Austen's house at Chawton as this isn't far from where we live so I'm looking forward to blogging about that.

Don't be put off by the vernacular, it really isn't too hard to understand and is so relevant to the represenatation of rural English country life. What a shame that so many words and expresssions are now out of common usage. Are there any that you still use? I always refer to making a packed lunch as 'bagging out' which is Cornish and another expression I love from the same county is 'The evening have crowned the day'.

I hope you all have a lovely Bank Holiday weekend.

Portugal

I haven't posted anything for ages. We've been away on holiday and since we returned I have been trying to catch up on leaving messages on other people's blogs with no time to write my own. We spent a week on the Algarve staying in two pousadas both of which were wonderful for different reasons. The first was a converted 14th century convent in Tavira

which had a beautiful quadrangle.

These are the stairs to our room.

The second pousada was on the coast at Sagres and this is the view from our balcony window

This is me looking rather windblown in the most south western point in Europe, Cabo Sao Vicente.

I have never been to Portugal before but would love to return. Most of my holiday photos seem to be of doors and deserted buildings!

I won't bore you with anymore!