This month's BookCrossing meeting was held at The Australian Heritage Hotel in the Rocks. This is one of my favourite Sydney pubs; it has delicious food, great atmosphere and is centrally located. (Although the pub can be hard to find, as the Rocks is a bit of a maze. The trick is to use the Argyle stairs off Argyle Street.)
The Australian Hotel can be added to our list of "pubs with interesting bathrooms". In one toilet cubicle, in the women's facility, there is a statue hidden behind the toilet door. When I first entered this stall, it scared me half to death. I thought there was someone standing behind the door. I wonder if the staff at the Australian put it there on purpose to frighten their customers.

August's book recommendation:

• Rebecca . Daphne DuMaurier
  What a wonderful novel; I really loved this book. The young, shy narrator falls desperately in love with Max De Winter, a much older and wealthy widower. After a whirlwind romance they marry and return to his much lauded estate, Manderley. The new bride has to compete with the memory of Max's ex-wife Rebecca, who had been beautiful and sophisticated, the opposite of the dowdy and timid narrator. She also has to deal with the forbidding housekeeper, Mrs Danvers, who is utterly devoted to the memory of Rebecca. I particularly liked how the narrator remains anonymous to emphasise the contrast between her and the larger-than-life Rebecca. This is a fascinating tale of love and jealously, trust and betrayal. Anyone who enjoyed Jane Eyre will also love this novel. I can't believe it's the first time I've read this classic. One of my favourite reads from this year.

This month's Bookcrossing meeting was once again held at The Arthouse Hotel. However, this month the Arthouse were expecting and prepared for the arrival of 30 bookgeeks. We also managed to secure the Attic Bar, the very stylish cocktail bar at the top of the Arthouse, for our meeting. The evening progressed more smoothly than last month.

July's book recommendation:

• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - Mark Haddon - A very interesting book written from the perspective of a 15 year old autistic boy. Christopher discovers his neighbour's poodle dead, impaled by a pitchfork. Because he enjoys puzzles and murder-mysterys he sets out to solve the mystery of who killed Wellington. Very different and very good.
  "That Haddon was able to write a book from Christopher's point of view with all his quirks and still make him lovable is extraordinary. By necessity, the writing is simple and unadorned, but the language of details elevates it from the mundane. The insertion of mathematical puzzles and drawings add to the reader's understanding of how Christopher's mind works. Haddon's real skill is an understatement that allows the reader to comprehend what is going on even if Christopher cannot. Although Christopher cannot grasp subtlety and nuances, the reader can, and that's where the true force of this exceptional novel lies." -- Amazon

June's Bookcrossing meeting was held at the Arthouse Hotel on Pitt St. We had a record turnout of 26 people! We'd warned the Arthouse we were coming but I don't think they listened. They were completely understaffed and the poor bartender was very frazzled. We now have so many people turning up with armloads of books that you can choose your book in either paperback or trade paperback sizes... "yes I'll have a small 'Tis to go thanks!"

Last night's most interesting conversation was about the weird and wacky toilets we've used over the years. The funky toilets at the Arthouse prompted the conversation. Instead of sinks for washing your hands, the Arthouse has a waterfall which automatically turns on when you put your hands underneath. The weirdest toilet I know of is at Buzz Café in Darwin where the men's urinal is a one-way mirror. Men peeing are treated to a view of the restaurant. Sarah told us about the toilets in Austria where little robot hands came out to wipe down the seat and then another pair of robot hands came out to dry the seat. Finally Clare informed us of the futuristic toilets in the QVB where the doors open and close automatically and the toilet flushes by itself after you've left the cubicle.

June's book recommendation:

• The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger This is a wonderful book! Such an interesting premise! Amazon classifies this as Science Fiction/Fantasy but I think they've got it wrong. It's really a wonderful character study and a beautiful love story.
  "A dazzling novel in the most untraditional fashion, this is the remarkable story of Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. Henry and Clare's passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap, and it is Audrey Niffenegger's cinematic storytelling that makes the novel's unconventional chronology so vibrantly triumphant. An enchanting debut and a spellbinding tale of fate and belief in the bonds of love, The Time Traveler's Wife is destined to captivate readers for years to come." -- Amazon

the "foreigners", Sarah and Anja	Marianne "wheel of fortunes" our impressive collection of books	the armless, neckless woman is stalking us!

Finally I have a photo of the elusive Ms. Rebecca! (pictured in the middle here with Clare, left, and Kalinda, right.) In every past photo from a Bookcrossing meetup, Rebecca is the one holding a book to cover her face or hiding behind another person. At meetup last night, Rebecca agreed to be in a photo. I think she just wants the fame associated with being featured on FuShMuSh. The red carpet invitations, the paparazzi, being interviewed by Parkey...all you FuShMuSh regulars understand *g*.

This month's recommendation:

• Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil - John Berendt - wow, what a fantastic novel! When I picked this novel up I had no idea I was going to enjoy it so much. Although this is essentially a murder mystery, the murder does not happen until half way through the book. Midnight's real appeal is its host of eccentric and colourful characters: Luther Driggers, a bizarre recluse who experiments on animals, Chablis, a brazen black drag queen, Joe Odom, a piano-playing, con artist, Minerva, a voodoo priestess who uses graveyard dirt to work her magic, and Jim Williams, an arrogant, haughty antiques dealer who kills his gay lover in "self defense". And then I was amazed to discover this story and the people in it are based on reality! Ultimately this novel shows that truth is stranger than fiction.

Once again our monthly Bookcrossing meeting was a huge success. This month we had a turnout of 25 people which is amazing considering our humble attendance of 7 at the early meetings. Last night's meeting was at Forresters Bar and Restaurant, home of the $7 steak. Forrestors is a great place for a cheap meal. They have 5 tasty selections to choose from all under $8, although the steak seems to be the popular choice (see picture).

I figured I'd continue the trend of recommending good reads each month:

• Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress - Dai Sijie - A charming, easy read. An interesting story from a fascinating period in Chinese history. After reading the novel, I'm sad I missed out on seeing the film.
  "The Cultural Revolution of Chairman Mao Zedong altered Chinese history in the 1960s and '70s, forcibly sending hundreds of thousands of Chinese intellectuals to peasant villages for "re-education." This moving, often wrenching short novel by a writer who was himself re-educated in the '70s tells how two young men weather years of banishment, emphasizing the power of literature to free the mind." -- Amazon
  
  
• Prodigal Summer - Barbara Kingsolver - Another wonderful Kingsolver novel! I read this while travelling around Tasmania. This was strangely apt as the book explains the history of the Coyote in America which is very similar to that of the Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger).
  "Barbara Kingsolver's fifth novel is a hymn to wildness that celebrates the prodigal spirit of human nature, and of nature itself. It weaves together three stories of human love within a larger tapestry of lives amid the mountains and farms of southern Appalachia. Over the course of one humid summer, this novel's intriguing protagonists face disparate predicaments but find connections to one another and to the flora and fauna with which they necessarily share a place." -- Amazon