Francesca's Thoughts

The length of time it’s taken me to write this blog is almost equal to the length of time it took me to a) read the book and b) recover from my book hangover. I think book two of 2025 might be in my top three books of 2025 and it is only February. That said I am currently knee-deep in the Bone Season series and that might become my favourite new series of the year, so I guess my goal of reading more than I scroll is coming to fruition.

Read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell (Susanna Clarke, 2004) if you like:

• History! I did not know going into it that this type of novel is called ‘alternative history,’ and because I am naff at dates I did not know when the Napoleonic Wars were, or that this book is set then. I had a fabulous time regardless; if you’re a history nerd you’ll enjoy all the details, and if you’re vaguely interested in history you’ll have fun meeting King George and Lord Byron.
• Slow storytelling. I read this on my Kindle because a physical version was on loan at the library and I’m quite glad about it, because it is eight hundred-odd pages long and my arms since I developed fatigue are like over-cooked noodles. Some novels of comparable length feel like they’re having you on for a laugh as paragraph after paragraph trudges by with little discernible plot or character development – naming no names but that series with dragons and no ending – but Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell felt perfectly paced. It’s precisely as long as it needs to be, like getting into a bath that’s just the right temperature.

• Footnotes. Pratchett uses footnotes. This uses footnotes. I think I might have to start using footnotes.
• Fairies. Because I picked this up after a good ten years authors I like recommending it or citing it as an influence, it hadn’t occurred to me to read the blurb, so the fantastical element surprised me as much as the historical element did. Herein lies the fair folk, and they are great fun. (I do not know why I continue to forget to read blurbs. I think since I read The Raven Cycle I’ve assumed that all blurbs are inaccurate.)
• Academics and academia. Well, you don’t have to like academia. If you’ve had a cup of tea in the vicinity of academia, you’ll recognise Norrell and Strange as emblematic of different approaches to learning.

As ever, if you want to buy any of the books I recommend, I have a Bookshop link – you’re supporting local bookshops and me if you use it. If you’ve been hearing rumblings that Amazon is about to stop you from saving ebooks to your computer then I’d like it set on record that I think if you’ve bought one of my books as an ebook, you own it just as properly as if you own a physical copy and the file is, as long as it’s not being redistributed or sold on, yours to read on whichever device you like. Do with this information what you wish.

I have to go write more things before I can get my Kindle back out to devour more of The Bone Season (one day I will own a proper bookshelf and get hard covers of most of the books I’ve talked about here, but today I have a damp problem in my rental property and will probably move eight more times before I can finally commit to more than a second hand eBay unit with crap shelf space, so libraries and ebooks it is!). Have you read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell? Have you read Piranesi, Clarke’s other book? It’s as short as Jonathan Strange is long, and just as bizarrely excellent.

Look after yourselves,

Francesca

Thanks for reading. If you’d like to read my short stories and see behind-the-scenes work, you can sample? the No. 1 Reader’s Club on Patreon for a month with this link. No pressure to stick around! Think of it as trying a miniature dessert with no requirement to eat the whole menu. You can also find me on Ko-fi. Thank you for your support – you’re helping to fund this space and pay for other costs of running a creative business, like paying editors.

Here are the books I’ve published so far and where you can find them. If you enjoy my book recommendations, browse my Bookshop.org page here.

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