Christmas Reading

I love the idea of getting gifts for myself for Christmas. That's really bad, isn't it ? The thing is, I love reading and I simply never, ever receive books for Christmas. You would think that the fact that I give practically everyone books for Christmas would be somewhat of a clue wouldn't you ? I mean, wouldn't you ? But, alas, no. So I buy my own.

My selected texts were somewhat of a surprise, even though I had chosen them myself. Which is quite funny in itself, no ? In a twisted, kooky kind of way.

Here's the first one that I chose: 'The Psycopath Test'. I thought it was going to be some sort of humorous, wry look at testing yourself to see if you're a little bit crazy. Oh, no Sireee.. It's a serious look at the traits that psychopaths possess, like a lack of real empathy, or a total non-response to disturbing images, etc. Apparently, only a very small percentage of the general populous are actually psychopathic, or possess psychopathic traits, but interestingly when they 'tested' senior managers of 'big' businesses, the percentage possessing psycopathic traits rose to an alarmingly high 6-odd per cent. Not that that surprises me in the slightest. The book then goes on to discuss what the impact of this is. Evidently, this isn't exactly jolly, light festive reading is it ?? But I stuck with it.


Next, I chose Caitlin Moran's 'How To Be A Woman'. Not that I wanted to know 'how to be a woman', as such. OK, maybe a few, little pointers..ha, ha. It was more about the fact that I enjoy reading Caitlin Moran's feature in the Saturday Times magazine (the one in today's magazine about Rape reminded me why she wins awards for her writing). Also she's practically, a Brummie. Born and raised in Wolverhampton, and added to that it had won the Galaxy Book Awards Book of the Year, amongst other awards. What's not to love ? It sounded like a win-win-win read to me.

So, I bought it, looking forward to a light-hearted look at her upbringing and background etc; etc. Guess what ? It was not to be. It's quite a substantial rant about feminism and what Moran thinks it is like to be a woman now, in today's society. And what is wrong with the way women are treated right now. There are some more light-hearted bits, there are some funny parts, but certainly there's more on Moran's take on more serious issues - like the behaviour of young women and her views and experiences of abortion.  And certainly not a Christmas read.

So you can imagine the I was very pleased to receive this gift:

Now, that is my kind of book, well, for a Christmas read...