I was born in Czechoslovakia under the communist rule where books were treasured doors into the outside world. World behind the closed borders, world of the degenerate imperialist capitalists that were drinking Coca Cola and listening to the Rolling Stones.

My parents had a well-stocked library consisting of Czechoslovak authors, as well as, Czech and Slovak translations of a wide variety of international works. I quickly lost the ability to differentiate whether I was reading in Czech or Slovak and only focused on how thick the tome was. The thicker the better… And so I read a selection of Scandinavian 19^th century family sagas, rather inappropriate John Updike’s Marry Me (I remember my Mum gasp when she saw me read it aged 12 or 13) and fell under a long-lasting spell of Dostoevsky (now dispersed). 

I still remember the thrill of purchasing my very first novel in English – Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, and my quickly abandoned attempt at writing down every word I had to look up in the dictionary. I still have that copy, with an autograph from Irvine Welsh, who was not amused. 

I loved the beautiful Czech editions of the J. R. R. Tolkien’s books that my Dad bought me one by one as they were published. These, I later learnt, were translated as samizdat by my university librarian. 

I suspect it came as no surprise that I went to study English literature at university and so my love of books took shape, found a voice and crystallised into an opinion. 

Here, I am not offering reviews as such, as I do not consider myself qualified for that, but rather personal thoughts and musings.