Tag: white owl books

Book Review – ‘The Architecture Lover’s Guide to London’ by Sian Lye

~ Helene Harrison ~ Leave a comment

Thanks to Pen and Sword for the chance to read and review this book.

I’m really enjoying these books, having first read ‘The Book Lover’s Guide to London’. They are really handy and engaging little guides to London, and I plan to take both on my next trip down there!

This one focuses on the buildings and architecture of London and how it’s developed over time, starting with Roman Londinium, through Medieval, Tudor and Stuart London, into the Georgian and Victorian periods, and finishing in the present day. This includes locations like the Tower of London, Westminster Palace, 10 Downing Street, the British Museum, and the Shard, with everything in between.

It’s structured in chronological order, so it is easy to see the development of the city from the earliest buildings to the newest ones, and some revisited within the book as they changed or were destroyed and rebuilt in a later period. As someone who didn’t really know much about the general architecture of London – I’ve visited places like the Tower of London, Westminster, Windsor, and Hampton Court as part of my love of the Tudors but never really explored the wider development of the city – this was a really handy introduction and there are several places I would like to know more about.

It has an easy-to-follow, clear and concise layout, but I do wish there was just a bit more information, and a bibliography of where you can go for further reading and where the author got their information.

If you’re planning on doing a sightseeing tour of London this little book will give you information you might not get from the London tour guides, and you can strike out on your own quite easily to explore some of the most iconic buildings in London and discover the history of one of the oldest cities in the UK, and the men and women behind some of the architecture as well.

Book Review – ‘The Book Lover’s Guide to London’ by Sarah Milne

~ Helene Harrison ~ Leave a comment

Thanks to Pen and Sword for giving me a copy of this to review.

Anyone who follows me on Instagram @tudorblogger would have seen this morning that I was asked to take part in the InstaTour for this book, and I was thrilled to be asked!

I really loved this book, it’s a little gem full of titbits about authors like Arthur Conan Doyle, Oscar Wilde, Geoffrey Chaucer, Charles Dickens, and George Orwell, some of the greats of literary history, and their connections to London. It discusses not only the connections of the authors to London, but their characters as well.

The book divides London down into sections including south, north, west, east, and central, and then into areas inside that including Bridewell, Clerkenwell, Holborn, Kensington, and Whitechapel. There are also some lovely images demonstrating the places in and around London, including blue plaques marking the places where famous writers lived or worked.

There is a very handy list in the back of the book of all of the books mentioned in the main text, classics and modern texts listed alphabetically by author. Reading this book has certainly expanded by want to read list; and that’s already miles long.

It’s amazing all the places and things that you can walk past in London without realising their significance but now I certainly won’t miss any of the bookish spots in London when I’m wandering around with the help of this guide. It’s a little pocket gem!