This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days, I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially in recent circumstances. If you want to look back at previous entries, they are all tagged under bookblog nostalgia.
In the outside world, the big news was the French Presidential election, in which François Hollande destroyed the incumbent with the killer line, "Ce n'est jamais de votre faute!" If only his presidency had been as good as his debate performance.
One of my aunts had a big birthday party; as usual for this era, my best photo is not of her but of various cousins, another aunt, an uncle and an ex-aunt on the front doorstep. Sadly this was to be the last picture I would take of Denise, my youngest aunt, at the front of the group.

I also had a nice trip to Paris with the Georgians, including a meeting with mid-level diplomats at the Quai d'Orsay literally at the moment that the newly appointed foreign minister arrived in the building for the first time. And I was touched by greatness (at 0:37) as Javier Bardem put the case of the Saharawis to the European Parliament.
In the SF world, I picked my first but not my last pointless fight with Brad Torgersen.
And the Russian Eurovision entry was half in English and half in Udmurt.
I read only 17 books that month.
Non-fiction 6 (YTD 22)
The Word in the Desert, by Douglas Burton-Christie
The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching, by Thich Nhat Hanh
How to Sharpen Pencils, by David Rees
The Great O'Neill, by Sean O'Faolain
Tickling the English, by Dara O'Briain
History & Hope: the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland (then unpublished), by Brian Eggins
sf (non-Who) 7 (YTD 32)
Leviathan Wakes, by "James S.A. Corey"
Deadline, by "Mira Grant"
The Moon and the Sun, by Vonda McIntyre
Countdown, by "Mira Grant"
Silently and Very Fast, by Catherine M. Valente
Surface Detail, by Iain M. Banks
Hiding Under the Light (unpublished) by Ruth Coleman-Taylor
Doctor Who 5 (YTD 33)
The Taking of Chelsea 426, by David Llewellyn
Bay of the Dead, by Marc Morris
Invasion of the Cat-People, by Gary Russell
St Anthony's Fire, by Mark Gatiss
Shadows of Avalon, by Paul Cornell
Running totals:
~5,700 pages (YTD 30,800)
5/17 (YTD 25/101) by women ("Grant"x2, McIntyre, Valente, Coleman-Taylor)
1/17 (YTD 2/101) by PoC (Thich Nhat Hanh)
My top new book of the month was Tickling the Englishyou can get it here. Unusually I'm going to call out three that appealed to me less: The Taking of Chelsea 426, which you can get here, Invasion of the Cat-People, which you can get here, and Countdown, which you can get here.
I didn’t have a job 3 years ago, but today:
“I make sure that all the facts a school holds about the people who went there are right. If any of the facts are wrong or if they change, I change them on the computer.” 🙂