Six Degrees of Separation: From The Lottery to The Resident

September has flown by and suddenly it’s the first Saturday of October. Which means it’s time for Six Degrees of Separation, hosted as ever by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best.

October ends on Hallowe’en, making it the spookiest month, and our starting point for this month’s chain is a Shirley Jackson short story, The Lottery (available online here).

A heads up – I’m thinking a lot about Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa this week, two women brutally murdered by opportunistic men while simply going about life in a way we should all be free to, regardless of gender, but that women are conditioned to feel at risk doing. So there’s a flavour to my choices this month.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Second Place to Unreliable Memoirs

September already and time for another Six Degrees of Separation, hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best.

This year’s Booker Prize shortlist is announced in a couple of weeks. Kate’s choice of starting book, Second Place by Rachel Cusk, is on the longlist. I wonder if it will go the distance.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Postcards from the Edge to Brooklyn

Summer is on its way out, because here comes August, and I’m a day late for this month’s Six Degrees of Separation, hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best.

August is holiday month for many, so no surprise that Kate’s book choice to start this month’s chain conjures holidays with its title.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Eats, Shoots and Leaves to six other books for which life is too short

Is it July so soon?

I knew instantly what direction my Six Degrees chain would take this month when I saw that Eats, Shoots & Leaves was the starting book chosen by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best.

Six Degrees of Separation: From The Bass Rock to The Lowland

Hello June, here so soon. I’m a day late for this month’s Six Degrees of Separation because summer arrived in Manchester this week and yesterday was too glorious to pass up the chance to read in the garden. Kate, who hosts the meme at Books Are My Favourite and Best, has chosen the Stella Prize winning book The Bass Rock for the first book in the chain.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Beezus and Ramona to Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

It’s May Day! Beltane, if you will. I wish I’d been clever enough to do a folk horror Six Degrees of Separation this month. Kate, who hosts the meme at Books Are My Favourite and Best, has chosen a children’s classic, Beezus and Ramona, for the first book in the chain. Read on to see how I end up in a submarine with Captain Nemo.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Shuggie Bain to The Way We Live Now

April’s starting book for Six Degrees of Separation is Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart. Kate, who hosts the meme at Books Are My Favourite and Best, chose this recent Booker winner to set us off with a chain of six more books that are somehow linked together.

Six Degrees of Separation: from Phosphorescence to The Dark Lady of DNA

Yesterday was the first Saturday of March and I really couldn’t think of how to get my Six Degrees of Separation chain started. This month, meme host Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best has chosen Phosphorescence by Julia Baird as our starting book.

Six Degrees of Separation: from Redhead by the Side of the Road to Snow Crash

February is six days old, and here’s the first Saturday of the month and Six Degrees of Separation. Check out the meme hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best if you want to join in. This month, in a return to normal things, we’re starting with a book I haven’t read, Anne Tyler’s Redhead by the Side of the Road.

Six Degrees of Separation: from Hamnet to How to be Both

The first Saturday of January came too soon for me. 2021 started slowly and I’m only gradually emerging from the brain hibernation I’ve been experiencing for the past couple of weeks. But here I am for Six Degrees of Separation. Can I sustain a chain a month for the meme hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best for another year? This month, we’re starting with a book I read last year, Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet.