Gemma

Photo Log: Things To Do In Santander

28th February 2017 by Gemma 2 Comments

Santander, in case you were not aware, is not part of the Spanish Basque region. It is the capital of Cantabria, a different area altogether, but also lies along the northern coast. The city is roughly two hours by bus from Bilbao. things to do in santander

Santander is not a city that would pop in a tourist’s mind. What are entertaining things to do in Santander, anyway?

However, I have a somewhat personal connection to it: one of my lovely colleagues that I used to work with was born and bred in Santander….

Serial Summaries – Book Edition III: Jan/Feb Mini Reviews + Comment Challenge

26th February 2017 by Gemma 4 Comments

The last time I did this was back in August — how much do I fail on this? *laughs* At least this is my blog, so I am free to do what I please with it, and this time, instead of listing out the books I’ve read and bought for the month, it’ll have mini reviews of some books I’ve read but don’t have much to say about to warrant one whole post. I mean, surely, you do not want to click on a post that contains a whopping five sentences (or even less) about a book!

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Photo Log: Bilbao 2016

21st February 2017 by Gemma 4 Comments

Around the same time last year, we went to Northern Spain, somewhat skirting the coast of the Bay of Biscay for a week. We flew into Bilbao, took a bus to San Sebastián and spent most of our time there, then another bus to Santander, before returning to Bilbao to see the city for two days then flew back to London. This post has photos from Bilbao so I’m obviously going backwards — it was a bit easier to sort out the photos this way!

Bilbao is the biggest city of the Basque Country, or Euskal Herria in Basque. The Basque Region includes three provinces in France (Northern Basque) and three/four in Spain (Southern Basque — someone correct me, please, as to whether Navarre is definitely in Basque?).

When you hear of Bilbao, is the Guggenheim Museum the first thing you of? I wouldn’t blame you because that’s what came to my mind too. It’s the most architecturally imposing building in the centre of the city, and its very modern design rises quite singularly from the other buildings around it. …

Bibliophile Fridays: 5 Favourite Fantasy Books

17th February 2017 by Gemma 3 Comments

Bibliophile Fridays is a weekly meme hosted by Whoo Gives A Hoot and Foxes and Fairy Tale. More information on the Goodreads group. This week was ‘five books from your favourite genre’.

My all-time favourite genre? That would be fantasy. I started off with fairy tales and myths when I was a wee one, and that’s what has been close to my heart ever since. I have now varied my reading choices, but I will always have time for fantasy.

The five fantasy books closest to my heart, in no special order (because that’s too hard!) —
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Book Gig: Headline Blogger Night 2017

13th February 2017 by Gemma 4 Comments

I was very lucky to be invited and be part of Headline‘s Blogger Night last Thursday the 9th, organised by their brilliant marketing team.

I’m going to be honest — I had to pause and think whether this deserves a blog post. I’ve been to a few book marketing events before and have never blogged about them, so why now? And then I remember the time I attended Jessie Burton‘s talk about her sophomore book, The Muse (out now in paperback!), on its publishing day at Waterstones Hampstead, and I so badly wanted to tell someone about what she related to the audience but never thought to blog about it! Doh.

So this is post is going to be the first of a “series”. I put that in quotation marks because I do not plan to blog about everything, but when I do wish to write about a brilliant author event or bookish event, it’ll be under the book gig tag/category!
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