I had considered finding a book on salads to try and encourage me to eat more veges and less fruit (and sugar generally), but it not being salad weather I ended up getting Four seasons: A year of Italian food, by Manuela Darling-Gansser. It does have a lot of vege recipes, although being Italian reduces their chance of getting the Heart Society's healthy tick. Like a baked onion recipe for 6 calling for 175g of butter, and the (fried) eggplant slices wrapped around mozzarella cheese. Yum yum. Lots of recipes call for anchovies, which I'm prepared to try but may start with using my chili rule - halve the amount suggested. I'll challenge myself to cook at least 10 things from it before it goes back.
The wedding wallah is a novel set in modern India, and looks fun in a Jane Austen/Alexander McCall Smith kind of way. Romance and humour in an international setting.
Two London books - The Victorian city: everyday life in Dickens' London, by Judith Flanders was a bit of a no-brainer for me really. Social history - tick. Dickens/19th century - tick. The only question was actually did I want to read another book about London? What about Manchester, or Edinburgh, or New York? The author has written another book with a very intriguing title: The invention of murder.
Speaking of murder, Moon over Soho is a police procedural where the gimmick is that the murders are supernatural and the protagonist is an apprentice wizard. I bought another book in the series for David's birthday - Whispers underground. It was enjoyable although the style won out rather over the plot I thought. Anyway, Diana Gabaldon's describes the series as: 'What would happen if Harry Potter grew up and joined the Fuzz.'
Interestingly, Moon over Soho was shelved in Horror, which is not really where I would have put it, but I guess it fits with all the paranormal romance/hip dark horror of the Charlaine Harris and Kelly Armstrong school. In acknowledgement of Halloween at the end of the month, the Dark is a collection of contemporary ghost stories. I like ghost stories and they're a bit out of fashion these days, so fingers crossed. Searching for a good link, I see reviews are mixed. Hmm.
Lastly, Animal madness: How anxious dogs, compulsive parrots and elephants in recovery help us understand ourselves, by Laurel Braitman. Animal behaviour and welfare is another thing that interests me, so it came home too. Again checking reviews while link hunting, it's based on a very sad experience adopting an adult, quite disturbed, dog.
