Today I Have Mostly Been Reading...

I've been waiting to read this for so long! Phil Rickman is my favourite author (though others occasionally topple him off the top spot for the space of a book) and this is the latest in his Merrily Watkins series.

That basically tells you all you need to know about the book. If you enjoy the Merrily Watkins series, you'll love this. If you haven't a clue what I'm canting on about, you would be better off starting at the beginning with 'Wine of Angels'. I know these characters now. I've practically watched Jane grow up. Of course I'm going to love the book!

One thing which might not stand out to the average reader is the sheer amount of times the Midlands or the Black Country are mentioned. They aren't usually mentioned in books and they stand out to me as a Black Country wench. I know why - Phil has two friends in Dudley (whom I'm acquainted with too), who run his website for him. These are nods to them.

Please take it as read that I'm raving about any Phil Rickman book, though he'll never beat 'December' for knocking my socks off.

This is one of those books which all of my friends own and therefore, I've read the first chapter about ten times, whilst waiting for them to get ready to leave the house. This gave me a very skewed pre-conception of the book. I thought it was going to be about the Bush administration and that it was going to centre on its foreign policy.

No, that's just the first chapter. The rest of the book covers a range of issues, with each chapter standing alone. If there is a recurrent theme, it concerns race and/or social status, but it lampoons the Democrats as viciously as it lampoons the Republicans.

I'm glad that I've finally got round to reading 'Stupid White Men'. I've laughed aloud until tears rolled down my face (I particularly enjoyed Moore's solution to the Irish Troubles), while also agreeing with the majority of points made. Ordinarily, big, brash sarcastic isn't my humour, but I'll make an exception for Michael Moore. I doubt a British man could have got away with writing this book, as it does dumb issues down in part, but you expect this of Moore and so he gets away with it. In fact, quite cleverly, because underneath all of the bluff and palaver, he makes some intensely important points.