Read in 2026 - 23: Elsewhere

Elsewhere

Gabrielle Zevin

My sister lent me this paperback during our recent holiday in Ripon, and I finished it on our last night there.

It is a Young Adult novel in the genre “Magic Realism” (according to wikipedia), but although my own Young Adult time was decades ago, I enjoyed the book very much.

 

The idea behind the story is that people who die are neither here nor there, but elsewhere.

And “Elsewhere” is indeed the place where 15-year-old Liz lands after she dies in a hit and run accident while cycling to the mall, where she was supposed to meet her best friend to help choose her prom dress.

 

Although Liz makes a friend during the passage on the ship to Elsewhere, and upon arrival meets her grandmother (who died before she was born), and Elsewhere doesn’t seem a bad place at all, she longs for her life back on Earth. 

As a teenager, she still had so much ahead and so much to look forward to, and she can not accept that she’ll never be 16, never will have a driving license, graduate from High School, go to college, move out from home and generally do all the things on does as one is growing up.

 

Will she come to terms with her new “life”?

 

There was a lot in this book to like. Most of the characters are like real people, their thoughts and actions plausible. I guess my favourites were Betty, Liz’s grandmother, and the dog she adopts (yes, pets go Elsewhere, too, when they die).

I wasn’t quite in agreement with the ending, but that’s just my personal taste, I suppose.

It was my first read by this author. My sister has more, and I might borrow them from her, too. Clicking on word "wikipedia" above takes you to the entry about the book, which of course links to an entry about the author, which I knew nothing about until reading up on her.

Read in 2026 - 22: Queen Esther

Queen Esther

John Irving

It’s been a while since I last read an Irving, and I remember that I have not liked each of his books to the same extent. My favourites so far were “Widow for a Year” and “Owen Meany”.

For my birthday this year, my sister gave me “Queen Esther”, and although I have finished it weeks ago, I only now got round to writing my review.

 

In short, it’s a great read. Irving’s handling of language, his descriptions of characters, places and situations as well as dialogue are at their best in this book.

The decisions people take and how they deal with each other may not always be plausible or relateable, but that’s life, isn’t it – we don’t always “get” other people and why they do (or don’t) what they do (or not).

 

The book spans eight decades, following Esther’s life and that of her son from 1905 to 1981.

There are occasional dips further back in time to when Esther’s Au Pair employers (and something like adoptive parents for her) were young.

 

I’d say that the life of Esther’s son takes up more room than hers, but she is always hovering in the background even when she is elusive.

 

Born in Vienna and orphaned at the age of 4 after her father dies on the ship to Portland and her mother is murdered by anti-Semites in Portland, Esther is unwavering in her determination to live as her mother taught her, as a Jew, She is exceptionally clever and loved by everyone at the orphanage. When she is 14, the Winslows, a philanthropic New England family, take her in as their latest Au Pair. They aren’t Jewish themselves but despise anti-Semitism.

Again, she is loved by the entire family and fully returns that love.

 

The youngest daughter, Honor, wants a child but without all the physical things involved from conception through pregnancy, giving birth and breastfeeding. Esther, on the other hand, has an insatiable appetite for knowledge and life and wants to at least try everything she can - including pregnancy and birth.

Together, the two young women work out a solution that satisfies them both – Jimmy is the result, with Esther as his biological mother but Honor the mother he grows up with.

 

In the 1960s, he studies in Vienna and makes friends for life there. His approach to fatherhood is as unusual as that of Esther and Honor to motherhood, but it all works out in the end, making for happy families and lasting friendships.

 

I could go on and on about the various elements of the story; the characters and their quirks, the recurring references to being tall or short, to Jewishness and what it means, to wrestling and working for the Mossad.

But I’d rather have you read the book for yourselves, if you found my brief outline interesting enough. I believe you won’t regret it.

 

There is no need to link to further introduce John Irving, I guess – he is well known and popular enough, and of course he has his own website as well as an article on wikipedia if you want to look him up.

One Weekend, Two Hikes

When I spend the weekend at my husband's, we are often too busy to go hiking; there is usually stuff to do around his mother's house and garden, or we are invited to some event or other, or there is something to do with the village band etc.

But last weekend, amazingly we had NO appointments at all, and because temperatures were forecast to be very high during the day, garden work wasn't advisable unless one would start very early in the morning.

Instead, we got up at 7:00 on both days and were out of the house by 9:00, when it was still wonderfully fresh.

Our hike on Saturday (8 August) was a repeat of one we'd done twice before; funnily enough, once on Saturday, 8 August 2020, and then again on Sunday, 11 August 2024. Clicking of the dates will take you to my posts from back then.

The Gertelbach waterfalls weren't exactly down to a trickle, but there was a lot less water coming down the steep rocky slope than in previous years. It still was very nice to be there, though; even just the sound of the water is refreshing, and since most of the hike is in the woods under the shade of trees, we were fine.

A six-legged cow?

As before, we stopped at the Herta-Hütte to eat our sandwiches, and later for a shandy at the beer garden. 

View from Herta-Hütte (Herta's Hut)

Instead of driving straight home afterwards, O.K. suggested we have a look at the Schwarzenbach Talsperre and drove us further up into the Black Forest to that special place. A water reservoir was created there exactly 100 years ago when a dam was built and the farmers and other people living at the bottom of the valley were resettled to other places. Now the wall is in need of repair, and to achieve that, several months ago the reservoir was let run empty, and the work is now in full swing.

It makes for a strange and fascinating place, seeing the bottom of the lake and the entire wall, normally underwater on one side. We weren't the only people to have a look! Boards with information about the work 100 years ago and what is now being done line the path, and we found it all very interesting.

Water-side of the dam

All this is usually under water!

The other side of the dam, after we'd walked across. This side is never under water.

We still didn't go straight home after this but stopped in town for ice creams. Back at the cottage, we were ready for an afternoon nap, and later went across the road to my mother-in-law for a drink and a chat on her terrace before we retreated to our own terrace for a sundowner. It was, by the way, our 3 months wedding anniversary :-)

Sunday (9 August) was forecast to be hotter, and we opted for a much shorter hike. This one, too, was a repeat; in October 2023 we did this tour from Reichenbach to the Martinstein ("Martin's stone") (with slight variations) before.

Parts of the tour were in the sun but there was still plenty of shade in the woods, and we had started early enough to be back home before it became too hot.

Martinstein

This time, we didn't have a meal at the Martinstein Hiesli, only a very welcome, well-chilled shandy. 

Back home, we had coffee after a rest. While we were napping, a few drops of rain fell, but evaporated almost as soon as they hit the ground.

In the evening, we enjoyed a nice meal of merguez with fried zucchini (courgette) and yellow pepper plus couscous, out on the balcony.

First Week Back

Easing back into work after my two-week break was smooth; because it's still the school holidays here in my part of Germany, many of my colleagues and clients are away right now, meaning there were a lot less emails to sift through and meetings to attend than at other times. It was still hot, though, and very dry apart from one glorious, brief spot of rain.

Monday (3rd of August) was too hot and humid to go for an after-work walk. I had a total of 140 emails in all my work-related inboxes; compare this with 288 emails after my summer holiday in 2024.

Another walk-less day followed on Tuesday (4th of August), equally hot and just as humid. I left the house only to pick up my prescription of eye drops at the pharmacy, ten minutes on foot from this keyboard. Work was very productive, but I developed a throbbing headache early afternoon and eventually took a paracetamol. Finally, some rain fell - it didn't last long and much of it evaporated on the sealed surfaces here in town, but it was a tiny bit of relief.

View from my kitchen at 6:04 that morning

Wednesday (5th of August) was a tad cooler at a max of 30C/86F, and it was pleasant in my north-facing office in Weilimdorf (no A/C in my part of the building). It was nice to see some of my colleagues again, while many others are on holiday right now.

After work, I walked to Benningen - it was warm and I sweated profusely once I arrived at the station there to take the train back to Ludwigsburg, but it IS high summer after all and perfectly OK to sweat as the natural physical reaction to heat. This very familiar walk is part of my "homecoming" routine, and I enjoyed it.

Not sure how well you can see it, but the birch trees to the left look very much like early autumn. Trees around here are really stressed because of the ongoing lack of rain.

Approaching Benningen

I was again at the office on Thursday (6th of August) and afterwards went to see my Mum; my sister was there, too, and we enjoyed one of Mum's delicious salads together.

Friday (7th of August) was the coolest day of that week at a high of 27C/80F! Over night, the temperature dropped to a chilly 15C/59F, making for a lovely fresh morning with all windows wide open and allowing for a much easier cleaning round.

My usual trains to Offenburg aren't running right now because of the holidays, but I still managed to arrive there at 8:00 pm, where my husband picked me up as usual and we enjoyed our start into the weekend together.

While waiting for my connecting train in Karlsruhe, I had a rather unusual encounter: An elderly lady walked up to me on the platform, asking whether the soon-to-be-arriving train was going to stop in Baden-Baden, which I confirmed. She thanked me and I thought, that was that. Nothing unusual about it.

But then she looked me intently in the face and said: "Now I want to do something good for you. What is your zodiac sign?" I was a little taken aback by this question and truthfully replied that I don't believe in zodiac signs, smiling politely. She said: "I am VERY clairvoyant, even if you don't believe in it!" Her manner wasn't unfriendly (neither was mine), but to my relief she moved on to the young woman standing next to me, also waiting for the train, and asked her for her star sign.

As they were both standing so close to me, I couldn't help overhear their conversation. After the young woman had told the clairvoyant her star sign, the elderly woman proceeded to say that she "should be very cautious tonight, as we have a full moon" - which was rubbish; on that night the moon was a waning crescent - the previous full moon was on the 29th of July, and the next is on the 28th of August.

I don't know how much the young woman participated in the conversation out of politeness or whether she actually believed any of it; the train arrived, and in the mad rush of a very crowded platform with passengers getting off and on the train I lost sight (and sound) of the two. For a split second I had been tempted to ask the elderly woman how come she didn't know where the train was going to stop if she was so "very clairvoyant", as she put it - but of course I did no such thing, since any discussion would have been useless.

When the train stopped in Baden-Baden (several stops before mine in Offenburg), I spotted the two getting off the train. Still on the platform, the clairvoyant was talking animatedly to the young woman, and I suspect the conversation had gone on non-stop for the last half hour or so. Just before the train moved on, the young woman hurried off the platform, and I lost sight of the clairvoyant.

We knew that Saturday and Sunday (8th and 9th of August) were going to reach 31 and 36C / 88 and 97F again, but the mornings were forecast to be much cooler than that, and so we decided to get up early and go hiking.

I'll show you these hikes in my next post.

First Weekend Back

The weekend after my return from Yorkshire (Saturday/Sunday, 1st and 2nd of August) my husband and I spent at my place in Ludwigsburg - understandably, I didn't feel like yet another train trip the day after I'd just arrived, and of course I wanted to do my washing and generally get ready for back to work on the Monday.

It was (and is) still very hot and way too dry in my part of the world; such a contrast after the pleasant summer weather we'd had in England.

On the Saturday, O.K. arrived in time for a late-ish lunch of Tabouleh after which we walked into town for an espresso first and icecream later. We also visited a couple of shops for an errand or two and then walked on to the palace grounds for a stroll in the shade there.

After a rest at home and considering various options for dinner we ended up at "my" Irish pub at a table outdoors on the market square and had fish & chips, very nicely done to our "extra crisp, please" specification and helped along with refreshing well-chilled cider.

For the Sunday we had arranged to meet with my sister at my Mum's at 11:00 for a welcome-back breakfast. On the way there we stopped at a bakery and bought croissants for all of us. Afterwards, O.K. and I walked the short distance to the cemetery and then home, where we unsuccessfully attempted to rest a while during the hottest part of the afternoon. It was just too noisy in and around the house.

Eventually, I prepared a light meal for us, finished off with delicious icecream (which was anything but light) and when my husband left for the long drive home, I went on a walk for another hour to catch the sunset and enjoy the slightly cooler evening air.

I now felt ready to pick up work again the next morning.

Friday on Trains; Bits & Bobs

Friday (31 July) was spent mostly on trains. My sister-in-law picked us up at the cottage at around 7:30 in the morning and took us to the train station in Harrogate, where our train to London left on time at 8:33.

We arrived in London around 11:30 and had plenty of time to cross the road from King's Cross to St. Pancras and start the process of checking in and going through border control for the Eurostar, departing at 13:31. Everything went well, but we were disappointed to find once more that our seats didn't have a window; we could only look through a narrow gap between the backs of the seats in front of us instead of enjoying the view of first the English and then the French countryside on the 3 hours or so to Paris.

There, we had another 45 minutes or so to wait at Gare de l'Est for our train to Stuttgart, which was also on time. Border control between Strasbourg and Kehl (across the Rhine) made for a delay of ten or 15 minutes, but once in Stuttgart, we had several options and simply took the first local train going to Ludwigsburg.

Already on the way to Stuttgart it had started to rain, and we made that last part of the voyage home on foot from Ludwigsburg station in the rain, accompanied by thunder and lightning. I shut the door to my flat from the inside at almost precisely 10:00 pm.

Phew!

It was wonderful to have that rain, but because of the thunderstorm and gusts of wind, I could not keep all windows open to let fresh air in. Still, while I was unpacking and getting ready for bed, some exchange of air was possible.

Returning from a holiday always feels a mixture of strange and familiar, I find. But I slept reasonably well back in my own bed.

- - -

Here are some bits and bobs that for one reason or other weren't included in my other posts, in no particular order:

Look at this bust of an unknown man. Doesn't he look extraordinarily lifelike and modern? This work of art was created in the 2nd century of our time. It is one among many in the Great Hall at Castle Howard.

Another one from Castle Howard: This large vase with fresh meadow flowers was...

...in the Ladies' toilets there! Attention to detail at its best, I'd say.

The view from my bedroom at Matchbox Cottage in Ripon, towards the town. That yellow expansion is actually the lawn in front of our row of cottages. I have never seen it as dry as this in all the years we've been coming here.

Looking in the other direction, behind that hedge is our private garden. We can hang our washing there and sit with friends, as we did this holiday a couple of times.

Click to enlarge and read the over-enthusiastic and emotional marketing babble on the back of the muesli box we got from Tesco's. I found it rather weird to describe a muesli in such language:

My bedroom upstairs at Matchbox Cottage, as it looks now with new curtains and fresh paint:

The front of our cottage. On this bench we had our afternoon coffee/tea almost every day. The window behind the bench is the front room, the upstairs one is my bedroom.

A view of the row of cottages; Matchbox Cottage is our end, then follows Boxtree Cottages with our landlord and -lady living in the middle part and one of the previous owners of the B&B living at the other end.

Kirkgate, Ripon, coming towards the Cathedral. Always a beautiful sight!

A sunflower my husband sent me from an evening walk around the village:

The view I had from my place at our dining table, where we had breakfast every morning and where I sat for blogging:

One last picture from Castle Howard. This bust of Dionysos is at the bottom of the staircase visitors reach first when entering the house. Look at his eyes! He must be thinking, "Not another load of tourists..." or something like that:

Thursday in Littlethorpe

Littlethorpe is a small village just outside Ripon, across the bypass. A., my sister-in-law, lives there with her husband, an elderly cat and occasionally her daughter's dog. I have blogged about Littlethorpe before (for instance, last year), but this year it was the first (and only) time we actually went there.

Thursday (30 July) was our last day in Ripon before leaving on Friday morning. Knowing we were going to spend the following day entirely either sitting on trains or waiting at some station or other, we wanted to give our legs a good opportunity to stretch and decided on a walk to Littlethorpe.

J., our landlady, joined us, which was very nice. Her broken wrist stops her from driving and doing some jobs she normally does around the house, but not from walking. The weather was fine as before, at a very pleasant 22C and a breeze.

It isn't all that far from the cottage on Coltsgate Hill to Littlethorpe. The shortest way is across Ripon's centre and down to the canal; along there, one can reach Littlethorpe via a bridge over the canal.

To our surprise, we found the small church open - a first! There were a few ladies on church business, but they were just finishing, and we were welcome to have a look around. That was done quickly, as the church really is small. Because the ladies were still there, I didn't take pictures of the inside. You can find out more about the church (and the village) on the official website.

Our friend Neill had told us about the potteries at one end of Littlethorpe; at one time in the past, there were several of them, each specialising on a different type of product: One would make roof tiles, another one drain pipes, the next crockery, and so on. The clay was taken conveniently from a local clay pit, originally allowing for the pottery industry to start in this small village. Nowadays, there is only one left.

My sister and J. had never been this way, but I knew it from years back when I still came to Ripon on my own, staying with my mother-in-law first and later at my sister-in-law's in Littlethorpe.

The aptly named Pottery Lane took us past some very nice houses (you could almost call some of them mansions) set in beautiful gardens. There were few people about and only the occasional car.

Before leaving Littlethorpe completely behind, we turned back. At the church, we took a different road than the way we had come up from the canal, and I was pleased to find the former School House still as charming as ever (it has also featured a few times on my blog - I'd love to live in a house like this!).

Across the bypass, we reached Ripon's centre in time for lunch, around three hours after we'd set off in the morning. All three of us love Indian food, and so Realitea was the obvious choice. The food was once again delicious.

A rest at home was in order after that, followed (as usual) by coffee and tea on the bench in front of the house. This time, we also had cake - freshly baked at Realitea's, and fantastic!

After that, we both felt the need for yet another walk; this time a shorter one along the river Skell within the boundaries of Ripon. 

It was my turn to make our evening meal, and I used up what still was in the fridge; we couldn't take dairy products or other perishable food with us on the trip tomorrow. I made a batch of mash out of the remaining Jersey spuds, a leafy salad with avocado and cubes of cheese, and heated a pack of small pasties we'd bought for convenience a few days earlier but hadn't gotten round to eating.

This was our good-bye meal, eaten while watching an old episode of Vera. The only thing left to do that evening was to pack; my packing was done in about half an hour, including figuring out how to fit the five paperbacks I bought into my suitcase as well as the Emma Bridgwater mugs I had been given as a wedding present.