World Cup’s impact on my reading is plain to see (I’ve tried to watch every single game and haven’t missed many), but apart from that, I’m rather pleased with this month. It included one of the highlights of my reading year so far and I enjoyed the rest as well. OK, possibly with one exception, but still. I also feel very excited for July, when I’ll have a little bit more time and lots of great things to read.

1. Tangerine by Christine Mangan. It is possibly inauspicious to start with my least favourite book of the month, but let’s get it out of the way. Tangerine is what I would call a literary psychological thriller. Daphne du Maurier and Particia Highsmith have been quoted as influences and I can see why. Mangan is no Maurier, however, and I became rather bored with this story of obsessive female friendship about half-way through. Not that it’s a horribly bad book and the mid-century Tangier setting fits the current weather in Brussels very well. I know people with great taste who enjoyed this one, so if you like that sort of thing and want something to read in the heat, it might be worth checking out. And it could be great as a movie.

2. Circe by Madeline Miller. If you are a regular reader, you already know that I really, really enjoyed reading Circe. ‘Enjoy’ is exactly the right word here: there are books I believe are ‘better’, but reading them isn’t necessarily always a pleasure. Reading Circe was, and I also found it interesting and insightful enough to recommend it to everyone. You can find my review here.

3. No Time to Spare by Ursula K. Le Guin. Le Guin is among the writers I have the most respect for and her The Left Hand of Darkness is one of my favourite books ever. This is a selection of her essays/blog posts from recent years and it’s delightful. In her fiction, Le Guin can sometimes be a little labourious, she takes writing and language very seriously and occasionally, it shows. This is much less of an issue in these short, light pieces that are insightful, witty and full of great one-liners. She covers politics, old age, writing, cats, nature and soft-boiled eggs equally successfully (which essays you’ll like best will probably depend on what topics you find most interesting).

4. The Trip to Echo Spring by Olivia Laing. This book has been on my list since I read – and loved – Laing’s The Lonely City, where she explores loneliness and art. Echo Spring gives similar treatment to alcoholism and writing, focusing on six American authors – Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Williams, Berryman, Cheever and Carver. Laing’s style is a mix of biography, personal musings, travel and nature writing, literary criticism, popular science and just plain talent. I think I still prefer The Lonely City, but Echo Spring is unquestionably excellent as well. A word of warning, though: if you go in expecting Raymond Chandler, he’s not in it. Raymond Carver is. There is an actual mistake on the top of the first page when you google the book.

5. Crudo by Olivia Laing. Yes, more Olivia. Only one book (To The River) to go! Her first novel, just published, is a fast, intense text that could be about the punk writer Kathy Acker (who died in 1997) or Laing herself, getting married at 40, worried about the world, anxious about her ability to commit. I believe it is one of those texts that works much better with some context. If you know Acker, if you are familiar with the current events (in 2017) in the US and the UK, if you have read Laing’s interviews about the book, I believe you’ll enjoy it more. If you like Maggie Nelson and Ali Smith, your chances of liking it are even better. I prefer Laing in non-fiction mode, but she is a great writer in every format.

6. I Have More Souls Than One by Fernando Pessoa. I only read one little Penguin Modern this month and need to up my tempo, if I want to finish them all this year. Pessoa killed two birds with one stone otherwise, though: it’s poetry and it’s by a non-Anglo-American writer. Pessoa with his numerous alter egos is all over the place, epic and ordinary, lyric and ironic, going from The Roses in the Gardens of Adonis to I Have a Terrible Cold. I enjoyed it.

As always, let me know what you have been reading and loving. Or not – rants also welcome!