The Great Glamping

Nothing to do with books or Brussels, possibly more to do with body hair and sandals (hopefully only in small doses), we've just booked a week's "glamping" in a couple of yurts above the Ardeche Gorges in France and I can't wait. I think it looks like a wonderful combination of the great outdoors and home comforts, in particular a king-size bed. Anyway take a look at their website and see what you think...

http://www.canvaschic.com/

My favourite book of 2010

I'm afraid my favourite book wasn't fiction, it was 'How to be Free' by Tom Hodgkinson. This is not exactly a self-help book, though apparently many miserable wage slaves pack their jobs in when they've finished it! It's really food for thought about our mixed up priorities that make us feel that it's better to spend 10 hours a day doing jobs we don't enjoy, so that we can spend the weekends in shopping centres buying a load of stuff. Not to mention the absurdity of the giant debts we all saddle ourselves with. If any of this rings true, read the book! And if you're ridden with angst about not having a job, read the book! I promise you'll feel all smug and pleased with yourself at the end!

Sofi Oksanen

Still thinking about my favorite 2010 read, but meanwhile, here's a tidbit: Sofi Oksanen will be at the Brussels Book Fair in a couple of weeks ( www.foiredulivredebruxelles.be ). Oksanen's website is rather dreary but I found this piece about her work, on a Finnish cultural website, quite illuminating: http://finland.fi/public/default.aspx?contentid=160146&homepagelink

Looking forward to next Thursday!

Picking a book from the shelf

Something wonderful happened today. I was looking for a book in our book case, and I picked up a little hardback book which was given to my husband and I by my aunt and uncle as a Christmas present at least 6 or maybe even 7 years ago. I never did read it as I found the title a little weird - A Third Helping Of Chicken Soup For The Soul. For some obscure reason I opened it and started reading. The book consists of a collection of very short stories, real stories, of real people, which warm the heart and truly feed the soul. One in particular made me cry. It was just one page long but so moving and beautiful.

In this utterly frenetic and frantic world of today I think it is imperative to remember was is truly important in life. Sometimes we all lose sight of it, so I highly recommend this book (you might already know it), perhaps not to be read all at once but just to be opened and read at random...  one story a day.