The Portuguese Bear

Ideal as a gift for children and grown ups alike, this top quality bear produced by Keel Toys, is a great souvenir to remember the good times spent in Portugal.

Size: 12cm (approx)

Available to buy here

Marley & Me

I never wanted to read the book because I figured that a book about someone's life with a dog had probably to end, well...with the dog's final moments. Having a Labrador myself and being a hyper-sensitive dog lover I chose not to read the book. I did give a copy to my mum as a gift when it came out in Portuguese and she absolutely loved it.

Now, if I didn't read the book why would I go and see the movie? Well, one part of me cannot resist dogs, full stop. The other part told herself it'd be fine if I stopped watching when he gets old and all that. I did...I focused on this blue light on the cinema's floor, closed my eyes, sang a song in my head, swore when I heard snippets of what was being said, etc. My mum on the other hand said how silly of me not to want to watch the end, it was only a movie, death was part of life and all that. So I was a little surprised when I heard this sobbing by my side. Everyone in the cinema is getting up and she's sitting there sobbing blocking everyone's way for a few embarrassing moments.

I do want to read the book now because I want to read things that John Grogan said or thought that could not be shown in the film. I look forward to that.

"A dog has no use for fancy cars or big homes or designer clothes. Status symbol means nothing to him. A waterlogged stick will do just fine. A dog judges others not by their color or creed or class but by who they are inside. A dog doesn't care if you are rich or poor, educated or illiterate, clever or dull. Give him your heart and he will give you his."

The Portuguese Water Dog

This is Bica, the Portuguese Water Dog, one of our bestseller books at the shop. This story, which young children will enjoy reading or having read to them, is about a Portuguese Water Dog who lives by the sea on the south coast of Portugal...

Available to buy here

Summer Times in the Algarve

The Algarve is the source of inspiration for this exciting new collection of short stories, memoirs and poetry. Seventeen contemporary writers both recollect and recreate the lives of people along the Algarve coast from Tavira to Sagres and up into the mountains. They takes us on a journey back in time to the Moors, through the Revolution of April 1974, and into the twenty-first century. Some mourn the vanishing years of the simple pastoral life, impoverished though it was, some celebrate it. Others on short visits have been enchanted or amused by an event with one of its inhabitants, and somehow, when they left a bit of their heart has stayed behind. All of them are united by their fondness of Portugal and its serene and laid-back southern province.

Available to buy here

Handcrafted Valentine's Cards

Just like last year we have a beautiful range of handcrafted cards for Valentine's Day. These are unique cards (no two cards are exactly the same) and they're a great way to show your loved one how much they mean to you.

The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama

Paperback edition of the book which sets out presidential Barack Obama's political vision for the future of America. With intimacy and self-deprecating humour, Obama describes his experiences as a politician, about balancing his family life and his public vocation. His search for consensus and his respect for the democratic process inform every sentence, as he discusses the importance of empathy in politics, and how the ideals of democracy can be renewed. Click here to buy

A Year in Monchique by Paul McKay

A Year in Monchique tells the story of a couple of London escapees getting to grips with life in rural Portugal. The challenging move from city living in politically correct Newham to the agricultural nightmares of bean eating bees, escaping goats and an amorous, sexed-up sow is made more difficult by their woeful endeavours at becoming fluent in the language.

On their journey, they meet a diverse group of people: new age eco-warriors, seed munching fruitarians, crystal swinging diviners and an octogenarian widow farming an acre of land unaided.

As well as immersing us in the comic side of daily life, the diary revelas a rapidly changing community who share a love and respect for the Portuguese countryside.

Price: 10€ (click here to buy)

Happy New Year

Closed for the holidays

We'll be closed between 25th December and 2nd January.

Merry Christmas

Lynn

Thank you so much for card and words! What a great surprise!

I don't have your address so thanking you here hoping you'll get this message.

Merry Christmas

White Christmas

Last Day For Christmas Orders

Please place your orders no later than December 15th by 6pm. We cannot guarantee deliveries in time for Christmas after this date.

Thank you.

The Gift by Cecelia Ahern

A magical and enchanting story which ends on Christmas Day, from the bestselling author of PS I Love You and A Place Called Here. PS I Love You has sold over a million copies in English worldwide, and the film, starring Hilary Swank and Gerald Butler, was a box-office hit. Ahern also co-created ABC's comedy series Samantha Who?, which has been voted new comedy of the season.

Beautifully packaged, with box, red ribbon and gift tag this book is the ideal gift present this Christmas.Price: 19,50€ (Hardcover)

Entirely Up To You Darling

Prompted by his adventures in the movie business this is the long-awaited autobiography by Sir Richard Attenborough, one of the world's best-loved actors and directors. Written together with his long-time friend, colleague and business partner, it covers the extraordinary breadth of his life and experiences as well as the film business. Attenborough also movingly reflects on the other passions and relationships in his life, football, politics, his avuncular friendship with Princess Diana, and finally the tragedy of the tsunami which robbed him of his daughter and granddaughter.

The Road Home by Rose Tremain

Reviewed by Dr. Janice Russell

This book is a magnificent read, in every way, and it’s easy to see why Rose Tremain is described as gifted – she is able to paint a picture with depth, sensitivity and brutal honesty, entrancing her reader from the outset. She also does her homework, researching her subject matter extremely well, resulting in a credible, moving and gripping work.

The Road Home is the odyssey of Lev, an ‘ordinary’ man, who moves to England from Eastern Europe in order to find work and fund the future of his family. Lev finds an England that he didn’t quite expect. Tremain’s writing of this England brilliantly interweaves details and commentary on some of the less prestigious aspects of English culture – celebrities as the new aristocracy, the elderly abandoned into care homes –with a series of rich and vivid characters who embody more attractive values.

The characters throughout the book are boldly drawn. Most courageous is Lev himself – a man with much to carry in his heart and on his shoulders, we feel for him, his plight, and his sense of family duty. We also see his weaknesses: an inward struggle with his own violence, and his mixed ‘whore and virgin’ attitude to and treatment of women. His friend Christy, an Irish immigrant, is drawn with similar complexity, Rudi, the friend left at home, Sophie, the English woman with whom he has an affair, and Lydia, the woman on the bus with whom he travelled from hi s home town, add dimension and interest. They all work well, and provide vehicles for different aspects of Lev’s character to be drawn. These characters also provide the opportunity for humour, which is never far away in a well crafted sense, through use of language, through being media for Lev to remember stories and anecdotes which make us smile frequently throughout. This lightness of touch makes the book extremely easy to read, most engaging.

The plot and pace move along, and while there is a certain predictability, for example in what kind of work Lev does, there are surprises throughout in the form of ‘bit parts’. Tremain’s depth of writing earns her the right to a certain inevitability in the ending, which is foreseeable though far from pure ‘happy’. She has been likened to Steinbeck in her treatment o f the subject matter, evoking the senses of both determination and alienation common to the immigrant, and yet which are more common to many people than is ever truly acknowledged, even when on home turf . Maybe this is why Tremain works so well – not only does she write a good story, but we can identify with the emotions of her characters, whether or not we’ve ever been in their situation. She writes lyrically yet honestly , and her work is moving without being sentimental. This book is an experience: I recommend it highly.

Janice Russell is a life and business coach, and a writer and tutor. She has written Keeping Abreast, a factional, entertaining and provocative story of surviving breast cancer, currently being reprinted. Her latest novel, Rough Diamonds, is being publi shed by Legend Press, and both will be ready to order by Christmas, Janice teaches creative writing online, and offers workshops and critiques in the Algarve.

Visit: www.insightlifeandbusinesssolutions.com
www.algarvecreativewriting.blogspot.com

Books For Christmas

Lots and lots of books to choose from for all your family and friends. The catalogue is now available. Request yours from info@magnacartabookshop.com

"Do give books - religious or otherwise - for Christmas. They're never fattening, seldom sinful, and permanently personal." Lenore Hershey

Elise Designs - Personalised Handcrafted Christmas Cards

Click on photo to enlarge

This Christmas, just like last year, we have a wide range of Christmas cards. But we'd like to remind you that if you wish to send something unique to the special people in your life, why not order a personalised card from the Elise Designs range? For 4,25€ choose a design and have the name of who you're sending the card to, printed on the front of the card.

The Private Lives of Pippa Lee by Rebecca Miller

Reviewed by Dr. Janice Russell

This is a book of three parts.

Pippa Lee, middle class sophisticate wife, has moved into a retirement village with her 80 year old husband, Herb, a successful American publishing executive. As the youngest person there, Pippa inevitably begins to question whether retirement world is where she wants to be, and begins to find herself experiencing strange sense of disquiets and disturbing symptoms of unrest, such as sleepwalking. Not in a usual sense, but in an extreme sense. Thus begins a journey which leads the reader through the chronicles of Pippa’s past life, revealing depths and experiences that are not immediately apparent within the character.

The second section of the book makes the reader privy as to why this may be, basically summarising Pippa’s life journey, and is written with sensitivity and depth, traversing worlds of bohemia and excess, exploration of sexualities, and addiction to drugs. Themes of mother daughter relationship and guilt are explored with insight and expertise, and the text is eloquent, the themes compelling.

Part Three of the book integrates past and present with an unsurprising dénouement which embraces the themes you might expect – conflict resolution within the family, repeated patterns within the marriage, and Pippa’s exorcism of her ghosts which enable her to move forwards a free woman. In a sense, this is an odyssey, the chronicle of challenges and triumphs

I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would from the first chapter, and in a way, this is symptomatic of the structure. Three distinct parts, all written from the point of view of an omniscient narrator, trying to take us inside the heads of Pippa, her mother, her daughter, and Chris, the somewhat erratic son of Pippa’s neighbour up the road. If anything, this structure slightly distracts from what is otherwise a very convincing read – it is compartmentalised rather than threaded, a structure I would have preferred. While we are privy to Pippa’s past life in the second part of the book,, there is no indication that she is remembering the same things, discovering the same insights. Maybe this is deliberate, and just indicates that these evets are conspiring on an unconscious level.

That said, this book is intelligent and bold, courageous enough to suggest the darker aspects of parent child relationships, the complexities of responsibility, the shadow side of the protagonist. It is also frank in its observations of the ageing process, which is a refreshing change from the line that seventy is the new forty, and other such clichés, which, while empowering, can fail to look honestly at the effects of time on our bodies and minds and the real impact that this has for relationships. It is also far from the usual depiction of the all American family, for which I am grateful. Overall, an excellent read and I would recommend persevering beyond the first chapter into the body of the book.

Janice Russell is a life and business coach, and a writer and tutor. She has written Keeping Abreast, a factional, entertaining and provocative story of surviving breast cancer, currently being reprinted. Her latest novel, Rough Diamonds, is being published by Legend Press, and both will be ready to order by Christmas, Janice teaches creative writing online, and offers workshops and critiques in the Algarve.

Visit: www.insightlifeandbusinesssolutions.com
www.algarvecreativewriting.blogspot.com