Book review: The Sense of an Ending

Title: The Sense of an Ending
Author: Julian Barnes
Genre: Fiction
Year published: 2011
Pages: ~192
A place to buy it: If you are in Sweden you can buy the book from Bokus, and if that's not the case you can buy it of Amazon.
Other: Winner of the Man Book Prize for Fiction in 2011
Previous book review: The List of My Desires

Beautiful and elegant

I absolutely loved this book. The story is told by Tony, and he is telling the reader a story that begun in his youth but ended much later. I don't want to reveal too much of the story, but his friend's suicide and ex girlfriend are involved, along with his dead friend's diary. It's an interesting story, but there was parts in the book when I almost felt like the story came in the way of the things I actually wanted to read about - philosophical thoughts and reflections revolving around issues like history, memory, life and death. I could have read a book twice as long with just old Tony reflecting and contemplating his life or just life in general. And that is something that very easily can become boring, but it was really beautifully written.

The story itself is quite subtle in the beginning, I didn't really grasp the plot - because the plot is not introduced right away - but it wasn't a problem, the way Julian Barnes write is good enough. It was towards the end that I understood everything much clearer, and when I was done reading the book I realized how elegantly the story was put out.

Calm, interesting and recommended

Part of the charm with this book is the beautiful language and the carefully played out plot in a good combination, but I also enjoy the fact that everything appears very calm. I never felt the writer hurrying something just to get to the end, it was like floating on a still river the whole time. In my opinion it's not many books that manages to be so calm and still be that interesting and not at all boring.

I highly recommend this book, it's a good read and you feel like the story is told directly to you. Young Tony and older Tony also show great character development, and the story is good. So whether you appreciate the words and language - like me - or if you think the plot makes the book, read it!

Photos from the lake

Hi everybody! In my last post I wrote a little about how I fell into the water of a lake when trying to row an inflatable boat with my friend. Last post was about the photos I took on our way home again, but I also have some photos that I took while we were there. None of them are of me falling into the water though, I will have to disappoint you if you were hoping for that. But I'm actually really happy with these photos.

It's nice to get out and take some landscape photos sometimes, especially this day since the weather was perfect. It was a little bit cloudy, but as I've said previously that really don't matter when you are taking photos, it's actually to prefer since direct sunlight gets a bit to sharp. Or at least that is my opinion about photo-weather.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy today's photos!

Countryside

Hello readers! Yes, I know it was over a week ago since I wrote anything but I really didn't have anything to post and everything just felt a bit too much. I had three of the more important tests this past week and I've just been tired and the weather has been grey. But today I and a friend went and took our little inflatable boat to a nearby lake. Things didn't end great, I fell in the water thrice and it was cold and horrible. But I did take some photos during the way home.

I can't say these are the best photos ever taken, because it's really hard to get the focus right when you are inside a car. And at the same time you can't just stop every five seconds either, so I just took these ones when the car was moving. Still, I don't think they don't look too bad.

Crows, cat, tree

Hi everyone! I had saved these three photos in my photo folder, waiting to get something better to pair them up with. Now, that didn't seem to be happening, so I decided to just post them together. All three of them have something with the outside to do, so that's one similarity. I wanted some photos of our cats too, but it really didn't work out that great. The cats are just sleeping tight now, since it's so warm outside (and inside too) so they are not much fun, and my last post was about Maja and Sessan after all.

To update you on the phone and instagram situation: I realized the other day that if I turn my phone off and then on again I can open instagram and upload one photo. So it's kind of working, or at least working good enough for me right now, I might start to get annoyed later but right now I'm just glad it's working.

Maja and Sessan

Hello readers! I saw that a lot of you have seen my book review, and I hope you liked it. From now on, I'm probably going to be able to get a review out every other week. I've also been trying to update my instagram lately, but I don't know what my phone is doing right now. So nothing new is coming up on instagram, apparently... But I can still blog and that is probably the most important thing.

Today I have taken these photos of Maja and Sessan. All the cats are very sleepy because it has been very hot here lately, around twenty five degrees. The heat came very suddenly but it's fairly nice. It feels like summer, even though it's not that far into May yet.

Book review: The List of My Desires

Title: The List of My Desires
Author: Grégoire Delacourt
Genre: Drama
Year published: 2012
Pages: ~185
A place to buy it: If you are in Sweden you can buy the book from Bokus. Or if that's not the case you can buy it of Amazon.
Previous book review: The Poison Tree

Jocelyne and Jocelyn

The main character, Jocelyne Guerbette have almost exactly the same name as her husband Jocelyn, both are nicknamed Jo, but to keep them apart I'm going to refer to the main character - Jocelyne - as Jo and her husband as his name. The story is not very complicated. It starts with Jo telling the reader about her life with her husband. Jo is a dressmaker and hoping to become a fashion designer in Paris. She and Jocelyn lives a modest life in the little city of Arras in northern France. Jo's friends then encourage her to buy a lottery ticket and then it happens, Jo win 18 574 301 euro and 28 cent.

When Jo wins the lottery the story begins, she start to write lists of things she want - hence the title. But she don't want to change her life, she loves her current house and the life she has with Jocelyn, something the money threatens to change. On top of that - and it's already a good story - come a twist a the end that I really didn't expect at all.

Easy to read and well written

I did like this book quite a lot. The story is not very fast and constantly changing, you get the overall idea and in the end it doesn't come down to small detail. It's basically not a thriller/action kind of drama. I found the book well written and quite easy to read. At first I thought that Jo would just come to the conclusion that money isn't everything and live happily ever after with Jocelyn, but that is not what happened. Nevertheless the ending was very nice.

Trying to not spoil anything but still trying to give you an idea of the ending I will say that Jo realize that you don't have to feel obligated to love someone back just because they love you, and you don't need a significant other to be able to be happy. The ending - and only the ending! - actually reminds me a little bit about Ladies Coupe.

If you want to read an interesting, short little book without a thousand things happening around every corner and something that is also easy to read I would defiantly recommend this book.

Spring sunset

Hi readers! I blogged more than usually this week, and I'm happy you enjoyed my extra post, the feedback was good. This week I've also got some people asking for another book review, and I'm sorry it's taking so long but it is going to happen. I'm just not done with the book quite yet. It's because it's getting close to the end of school - so now is the time for tests, test and tests - but also because I simply cannot read that fast because I'm not at all used to reading French books like this. So yes, it is coming, but I can't say exactly when right now.

That is pretty much everything I have to say today. The photo just happens to be a photo of today's sunset. It almost felt like summer today, and the thing I like the best with summer is probably the beautiful sunsets.

Cherry blossoms

Hello readers! Today I have these photos of beautiful cherry blossoms to share with you. I like cherry blossoms a lot, they are probably the thing about spring that I love the most. Last year I made another post about cherry blossoms but I think these photos are much better than last year. I had taken a lot of photos of the flowers but I really couldn't pick out a few favorites, so I picked out a total of seven photos instead.

As I mentioned in my post last year I had an obsession with cherry blossoms when I was younger and I thought that it was the most perfect and beautiful flower of all. I don't think that have changed really, I still want to stop at every tree I walk past and take loads of photos... it's just so beautiful. Right now I even have a few flowers in a vase on my desk - it was those flowers I when taking these photos.

Sponge cake with raspberries & blueberries

Hi readers! I promised to post today, so I'm going to share this recipe of a delicious sponge cake with raspberries and blueberries, with vanilla sauce if you like. It's perfectly fine without the sauce too, but it just slightly better with vanilla sauce in my opinion.

Oven: 175°C 

Serves: 10

Ingredients:
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1½ cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla sugar
½ cup milk
50g melted butter (not too hot!)
150g raspberries and/or blueberries (or other berries)

Optional toppings:
Vanilla sauce
Ice cream
Berries

How to do it:
1. Put non-stick baking paper in square baking tray or coat it with butter.
2. Beat the egg and sugar until it's white and fluffy.
3. In a separate bowl, mix the flour, baking soda and vanilla sugar.
4. Pour the milk and butter into the eggs and beat it. Then gradually add in the dry ingredients into the same bowl. Lastly fold in the berries. After that, put your mixture into your baking tray.
5. Bake in oven for 28-30min.

The sponge cake topped with vanilla sauce

Nature and a donut

Hello readers! Today I was with my friend and we took a short walk around his neighborhood and I took some photos of things we walked past. We also went to the yearly spring market where I brought a donut and a bag. And it just so happens that I took a photo of this donut before I ate it, so I'm just going to put it in the post too, haha. But I mean, it was a great donut so why not?

Last but not least, I know yesterday was supposed to have been the day I posted, so to make up for this I'm going to make another post tomorrow just because I missed yesterday. It would be a bit unnecessary to make two posts in one day, so I just thought posting two days in a row would be the best alternative.

Lilac flowers in different lighting

Hi everyone! This was originally, by that I mean before I took the photos, to only be called "lilac flowers" but the strange weather made me add the "in different lighting"-part. I was not outside for long, but still, the lighting kept changing all the time. Some photos turned out really overexposed because I didn't think about the weather and suddenly it went from raining to sunshine. Also, when I edited these photos I noticed they looked so different in lighting they could've been from different days, but I took them all in under thirty minutes.

Video - Hailing

Hello readers! I've made a short video with some clips from when it was hailing yesterday. Just wanted to let you know! You can watch the video right here or on my YouTube channel Issapixlat. I tried something a little different, so please tell me if you liked this or not. Of course, I'm still more interested in taking photos but I really loved the sound the hailing made, so I decided to film a little bit this time.

Rain and Maja

Hi readers! The weather this weekend has been very shifting. Today it has rained, snowed wet snow and right now the sun is shining. Maja was outside with me when I tried taking some photos of the rain. It stopped raining and I only took one photo of it, so I tried taking some photos of Maja and some flowers from the garden. Most of the photos I tried taking of Maja turned out blurry because she wanted me to pet her so she kept going after me when I tried to take the photos.

Window photo

Hello readers! For today's post I had originally taken some photos of Tigra but for some reason I saw that all of the photos had a strange, blue shadow across the middle. I have no idea where it came from. Thinking it might be something with my lens I took some photos from my window and just randomly in my room but it didn't happen again. I think that it might have had to do with my shirt, it's dark blue and it might have come in the way of the photos or something, I don't know for sure but that is possible.

Because of that, I don't want to post the photos with the blue shadow. So I'm just going to post this photo that I took from my window. It's not what i originally planned but I think it's an okay photo.

Chocolate squares topped with coconut

Hi everybody! It's been some time since I made a post about something I've baked. These chocolate squares are very delicious, they are topped with a chocolate frosting and coconut flakes. I found these photos, forgotten in an unnamed folder on my computer. The idea when I took the photos must have been to post them right away, but that didn't happened. So why not post these photos now instead?

Green and yellow

Hi everybody! I feel like this weekend passed so quickly, I don't know where all the time went. Luckily I haven't forgot about blogging, but it was very close! In the last minute I remembered and sat down by my computer again. The photos i chose today are a bit random but I think they go together pretty nicely.

The photos are a bit like the ones in my last post. I believe it is because the weather and therefore the lighting is the same. Both these days were cloudy with a bit of rain at times. I don't like the weather but I really like the lighting.

After a rain

Hello everyone! Today it was not great weather, it was rainy and cold. But it did clear up at times and I took the opportunity to go outside and take some photos during one of those occasions. When I was outside it started drizzling but I think I got some nice photos while the sun wasn't hidden behind dark clouds. I really like the effect a bit of raindrops on leafs gives, it makes really nice photos in my opinion. So today I tried taking some different photos and I think some of them came out looking pretty decent.

I hope you enjoy today's photos and that you have a nice weekend!

Nighttime

Hello readers! I hope you enjoyed my book review, I really recommend the book, it was really a great read. Yesterday I was supposed to have posted but I realized today that I forgot, so I'm just going to post this one photo. I took it when I was in Gothenburg during the horse show but I didn't post it because I couldn't find any other photos to upload along with it. But i suppose I can post it today, even though it might be a bit boring with only one photo. Because of that I'm going to try and post something tomorrow,  when it's Friday and everything.

Book review: The Poison Tree

Title: The Poison Tree
Author: Erin Kelly
Genre: Thriller, drama
Year published: 2012
Pages: ~382
A place to buy it: If you are in Sweden you can buy the book from Bokus(in Swedish) or if that's not the case you can buy it of Amazon.
Previous book review: The Sorrows of an American

Young Karen and older Karen

This story is set in two time periods. One when Karen is older and the other during a memorable summer in her youth. Most of the story is focused around the summer, that is when she meets the siblings Biba and Rex who live together in a big, messy house and have completely different personalities. Karen meet and instantly love the colorful, aspiring actress Biba with a love for smoking pot, drinking wine and throwing parties.

Karen and the siblings Biba and Rex

Biba invites Karen to one of her parties and that is when Karen meet Rex for the first time. He is a quiet, silently loving man with a passion in house renovation. Karen is not falling head over heels for Rex during their first meeting, but the reader learn very early in the book that Karen in the other time period - when they are both older - is together with Rex and that they have a daughter together. But the reader also learn that Rex - when they are older - just have come out of jail and that Karen feels guilty for something around that.

Karen love Biba incredibly much during that summer, and even though the sometimes reckless acts Biba do, Karen is always faithful to her new best friend. Karen moves into the house during the unforgettable summer and a series of unexpected events take place. (And if I tell you what happen I will spoil the book, but it is also what happens that makes the plot amazing!)

Tying everything together nicely in the end

The author never cease to surprise me during this book. In to the very last moment I don't quite stop getting surprised, even though I kind of saw the last turn coming. I'm very happy with the book, it really felt like a roller-coaster of believable characters and plot twists. And I have to say that the turns this story takes is what makes the book great, I can't tell you what happens so you just have to read it for yourself. It's a great read, I recommend to everyone!

Daffodils after a rain

Hello readers! I forgot about the flower photos I was supposed to edit for yesterday. I just realized that I forgot now, and I almost forgot about today's post because I thought I made a post yesterday. Why I forgot, I've no idea, but here are the photos. As I said in my last post, these flowers have a bit of water on them because it had been raining.

I really like the look of these flowers, and the rain made it even better. In the future, I'm probably going to make another post with them. Hopefully that is going to be soon because I don't want the daffodils to bloom out. I'm also going to post the book review tomorrow or on Monday, it's depending a little on my homework and when I get it done.