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While at Liverpool Central Library I picked up a copy of a magazine I've not seen before called 'Booktime.' I've been really impressed by its content and will be looking out for further issues. I'm always on the look out for new books to read so a magazine like this can be really helpful. I also like the Waterstone's Books Quarterly and enjoyed Ink magazine which sadly folded after just a few issues. As you'd expect 'Booktime' contains a mixture of reviews, interviews and competitions. There is a lot of children's book related articles including Meg Rosoff's What I Was, The Robber Baron's Daughter by Jamilia Gavin, Joanne Owen's Puppet Master (one I'll be watching out for as I collect puppets and have visited Prague where the story is set) and The Traitor Game by B.R. Collins (another woman writing under initials!). I spent quite a bit of my bank holiday weekend reading and most writers will tell you it is just as important to read lots of books as it is to keep writing. The problem is sometimes you think how on earth can I write anything as good as that? That happened to me after reading in one sitting Siobhan Dowd's 'The London Eye Mystery' I loved Ted the main character and was geniuinelly mystified as to how Salim disappears from one of the eye's pods. Ted has a 'syndrome' and in someways there are parallels to Mark Haddon's 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time' which I also enjoyed but was a darker story. I'll definitely picking up Siobhan's other books, it is such a tragedy she died so young, she was a really talented writer. Another book I read at the weekend was Agatha Christie's 'Murder in Mesopotamia' featuring one of my literary heroes Hercule Poirot. I started reading Christie when I was about twelve and they were the first adult books I read (beginning with 'Peril at End House'). I was hooked immediately and Hercule obviously influenced Dr Midas' fine moustache!" Somehow I'd missed this one when I worked my way through the series and didn't spot the killer for once. I have also started reading 'No Time For Goodbye' (which I got at a discount with The Times newspaper) and found out today that it has been chosen as Richard and Judy's latest Summer Read winner. The premise is really interesting - a girl falls out with her parents and wakes to find they and her brother have disappeared. 25 years later a phone call makes her wonder what happened. I was quite surprised to find the book is written from her husband's point of view, I'm only about 60 pages in so I can't tell yet if its one I'll stick with. I often find I give up with books at around 100 pages in. I've also just realised that all my latest choices were written in the first person. * If you love thrillers, crime and mysteries remember to tune in tonight for the next episode of The ITV Crime Thriller Awards Profiling series on ITV3. The Ian Rankin was one was really good and tonight it's Val McDermid's turn - who wrote the Tony Hill (Wire in the Blood) books and the brilliant 'A Place of Execution.' Next week it's the turn of Morse writer Colin Dexter. Then onto PD James, Lynda La Plante and Ruth Rendell although I don't yet know in which order.