zu behändigen im bärigen Stübchen für Mitglieder - it waits in the cupboard for members to be picked up in beautiful Appenzellerland.

Du hast ein Buch gefunden, willkommen bei Bookcrossing! Es wird Dir hoffentlich gefallen. Behalte es solange Du willst, und lass es wieder frei, wenn es gelesen ist. Wir freuen uns auf jeden Eintrag, möchten wissen, wie es dem Buch geht, wo es sich gerade befindet. (Anonyme Eintrage sind ok, oder denk Dir einen lustigen Namen aus und werde Mitglied unserer grossen weltweiten BC-Gemeinschaft.)

*****************
You found this book, I hope you enjoy it. Make a journal entry and let us know where you found it and how you'd liked it - and maybe what you plans are with it (anonymous is ok - or think of a cute name and sign up for free and become part of our great bookcrossing community). Bookcrossing is free and it's great fun!

it lays beside of my bed now :)

This is the saga of three families who live in or around Victorian London: the Wellwoods (who are Fabians and have eight children, some of them extramarital), the Cains (major Cain will be keeper of the future Victoria and Albert museum) and the artist family Fludd. It's a most interesting, but intricate story with dozends of characters, a bit hard to keep track of them all. A cast list would surely have been helpful.
Olivia Wellwood is loosely based on E. Nesbit, the successful children's books author who was one of the founders of the Fabians. I've heard the first time of this society. The Fabians were intellectual socialists, the progenitors of nowadays Labour Party!

The protagonists are not the average citizens; their whole world is enlightened with art, pottery , theatre plays, books and music. The story begins in a museum and never leaves the artsy approach, is indeed a comprehensive cataloque of Belle Epoque and Jugenstil. The children of these blessed families live in a magic fairy tale world become true, in a big garden with puppet theatres and visiting artists, and Olive Wellwood writes a personal fairy book for each of her children. We meet many historical figures, Oscar Wilde for example or J.M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan.
Byatt is dragging us around in her display of cultural history, the World Exhibition 1900 in Paris, the Suffragettes movement in England (including the death of Emily Davison at the horse race), the anarchist cabarets in Munich, the Monte Verità in Ascona, where artists and communist from all over the world danced naked for a better world.
Because the art is ubiquitous, the author spends a lot of words, no, pages for the description of carpets, furniture and fashion, the fine engraving of a brooch, the glaze and shades of fantastic vases, the flowery prints of reform dresses ... can be a bit lengthy at times.

But the end left me baffeled. Why is she leading us onto the gory battlefields of WWI? This must be a mistake. Children who grew up as free-thinking Fabians in an artistic, intellectual milieu, how can they chose VOLUNTARILY to join a war and get themselves killed in soaken trenches? I just can't believe this. Most unlikely twist.

Hello spy, it sounds like a modern fable...a happy country, then invaded by the barbarians, tha Nazis..THE BLITZ...let me have a look and give it back - I will have a look inside.

in the small shelf
------------------------

Dear finder

Thank you for looking up Bookcrossing and entering the number. Please, kindly write a short journal entry, that you own the book now. You can do this anonymously, but it's much more fun if you'll become a member and write under your nick name. It's still anonymous, but you'll get a notification every time somebody writes a new entry. You are able to follow the book's voyage and read the opinions of other readers. Bookcrossing is fun, it's free and free of spam. Try it, it might change your life. Or at least your bookshelf ;)

happy reading
=^,^= spy

Ha, this big volume of a novel is back home again...some stories seem to stick...Hopefully I now find time to read it...spy pointed out to me that it is on several wishlists...I could send it to someone in Europe...

Du hast ein Buch gefunden, willkommen bei Bookcrossing! Es wird Dir hoffentlich gefallen. Behalte es solange Du willst, und lass es wieder frei, wenn es gelesen ist. Wir freuen uns auf jeden Eintrag, möchten wissen, wie es dem Buch geht, wo es sich gerade befindet. (Anonyme Eintrage sind ok, oder denk Dir einen lustigen Namen aus und werde Mitglied unserer grossen weltweiten BC-Gemeinschaft.)

*****************
You found this book, I hope you enjoy it. Make a journal entry and let us know where you found it and how you'd liked it - and maybe what you plans are with it (anonymous is ok - or think of a cute name and sign up for free and become part of our great bookcrossing community). Bookcrossing is free and it's great fun!
Hilfe für Newbies: https://www.bookcrossing.com/forum/14/510414

Du hast ein Buch gefunden, willkommen bei Bookcrossing! Es wird Dir hoffentlich gefallen. Behalte es solange Du willst, und lass es wieder frei, wenn es gelesen ist. Wir freuen uns auf jeden Eintrag, möchten wissen, wie es dem Buch geht, wo es sich gerade befindet. (Anonyme Eintrage sind ok, oder denk Dir einen lustigen Namen aus und werde Mitglied unserer grossen weltweiten BC-Gemeinschaft.)

*****************
You found this book, I hope you enjoy it. Make a journal entry and let us know where you found it and how you'd liked it - and maybe what you plans are with it (anonymous is ok - or think of a cute name and sign up for free and become part of our great bookcrossing community). Bookcrossing is free and it's great fun!
Hilfe für Newbies: https://www.bookcrossing.com/forum/14/510414

Picked up from the book fridge. I think this book is on the 1001 list!

UPDATE: I'm absolutely in love with this book! Like, this is the best book I've ever read! I'm reading it very slowly because I can already predict a lengthy book hangover, once it's over. Luckily, it's 600 pages long.

At the English Book Swap


If you aren't familiar with Bookcrossing, take a few minutes to check out this very cool site. Bookcrossers LOVE books, and more than anything, they love to read books and then set them free for other people to find and enjoy. I would love it if you would leave a journal entry -- you can say where you found the book or how you liked it when you read it.