Recent reading
Oct. 4th, 2023 10:04 pmHester by Margaret Oliphant (1883)
Wow, this was great. I listened to the Librivox recording which was very enjoyable, but it's on Gutenberg, too. I will link to![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
regshoe’s review for a summary of the plot, but it is one of enemies to… something complicated, between a young woman and her great-aunt. Where the complicated eventual relationship is one of mutual respect and recognition of how similar they are after all, and also one of mentor-and-(strongly implied)-heir-to-her-legacy. Very satisfying! I read someone somewhere complaining that Margaret Oliphant was not feminist enough, which I really cannot understand! Granted that perhaps the three books I have now read of her might not be representative, but those three books have all had a focus on women, relationships between women, and women working for a living.
Kornas planet (Planet of Cows) by Gunnar Rundgren and Ann-Helen Meyer von Bremen (2020)
This book is about cows, from all sorts of angles: What it was like when the authors decided to get cows a few years ago, the history of cows and humans together, how cows and humans live together in different places around the world (with interviews), how cows fit into the food system today and in the past, cows and nature conservation, cows and climate, etc etc. I liked the mixture of down-to-earth stories of their own cows, with the wider outlook.
Wow, this was great. I listened to the Librivox recording which was very enjoyable, but it's on Gutenberg, too. I will link to
regshoe’s review for a summary of the plot, but it is one of enemies to… something complicated, between a young woman and her great-aunt. Where the complicated eventual relationship is one of mutual respect and recognition of how similar they are after all, and also one of mentor-and-(strongly implied)-heir-to-her-legacy. Very satisfying! I read someone somewhere complaining that Margaret Oliphant was not feminist enough, which I really cannot understand! Granted that perhaps the three books I have now read of her might not be representative, but those three books have all had a focus on women, relationships between women, and women working for a living.Kornas planet (Planet of Cows) by Gunnar Rundgren and Ann-Helen Meyer von Bremen (2020)
This book is about cows, from all sorts of angles: What it was like when the authors decided to get cows a few years ago, the history of cows and humans together, how cows and humans live together in different places around the world (with interviews), how cows fit into the food system today and in the past, cows and nature conservation, cows and climate, etc etc. I liked the mixture of down-to-earth stories of their own cows, with the wider outlook.
