Books, books, books...

Here I am not only gifted with a marvellous nature, but also have a heap of books at my disposal - and since I sorted them when I was here last time, I even know what is there!

There are two shelves going around the staircase. This picture doesn't really show the amount; the lower rows are stacked from both sides and there is another bookshelf in the other corner of the room.
I have just looked in my book collector programme at what I read here, and decided the New Year is a good time for a review of last year's books. I have hardly read anything at home, but a lot on my animal-sits.

• Paul Theroux: The Pillars of Hercules ***A journalist travels around the Mediterranean
• Chris Stewart: Driving Over Lemons - An optimist in Andalucía **** Ex-Genesis drummer buys a farm in the Alpujarras  - a patch of mountain studded with olive, almond and lemon groves, sited on the wrong side of a river, with no access road, water supply or electricity. 
• Karel Capek: War with the Newts *****!!! Satirical science-fiction written in 1936, how a race of intelligent newts dominate the world
• Alan Bennett: The Uncommon Reader **** The Queen discovers the joys of reading
• Michael Allin: Zarafa: A Giraffe's True Story ***** In 1826 the viceroy of Egypt presents a giraffe as present to the French king Charles X. It is shipped down the Nile, across the mediterranean and then lead walking from Marseille to Paris
• Matthew Flinders: A biographical tribute to the memory of Trim **** The story of a brave, seafaring cat who, in the company of Matthew Flinders, circumnavigated the globe in the years 1799-1804
• Daniel Glattauer: Gut gegen Nordwind ***** intelligente Liebesgeschichte in schönen Worten
• David Safier: Mieses Karma ** leichte, dämliche Unterhaltung
• Daniel Glattauer: Alle Sieben Wellen ***** Ach, wie schade: sie werden sich nicht mehr schreiben, weil sie jetzt reden können...
• Mary H. Kingsley: Travels in West Africa ***** The adventures of a Victorian lady, who travelled in West Africa in 1893 and describes it in wry English humor
• Carlos Ruiz Zafón: Der Schatten des Windes ***** read again
• Jonas Jonasson: Der Hundertjährige, der aus dem Fenster stieg und verschwand *****  irrwitzige Lebensgeschichte eines eigensinnigen Mannes, der sich zwar nicht für Politik interessiert, aber trotzdem irgendwie immer in die großen historischen Ereignisse des 20. Jahrhunderts verwickelt war
• Tony Hawks: Round Ireland With a Fridge *** Nice to read, but since he was covered by a radio series, that reported his travels daily, it wasn't really hitchiking any more.
• Daniel Brühl: Ein Tag in Barcelona **** Man erfährt über Daniel Brühl mindestens genauso viel wie über Barcelona. Beide sympathisch. Gut geschrieben von einem Spanien-Korrespondent der SZ
• Boris Meyn: Totenwall ***** Seine historischen Hamburg-Krimis sind immer faszinierend, diesmal Immobilienspekulation um 1910
• Eric Newby: The Last Grain Race ***** Sailed around the world in 1938 on 4-mast barque Moshulu, via Cape of Good Hope to Australia, via Cape Hoorn back.
• Edmund De Waal: The Hare With Amber Eyes ***** he traces a heritage of 264 netsuke through his family.