Welcome to this week’s blogpost. Here’s our roundup of your comments and photos from last week.

Let’s begin with an old favourite: Captain_Flint is reading JG Farrell’s The Siege of Krishnapur:

Having lots of fun. His writing style is enhanced by a perfect sense of timing and faultless rhythm; humour-wise his punchlines never disappoint.

And “pure nostalgia” from Ieuan, who has been rereading Robert Pirsig’s Zen And The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance:

As the author said it has very little to do with zen or motorcycle maintenance, but is an account of the author’s trip across the US on a motorbike with his teenage son, a travelogue touching on (among much else) mental illness, (a lot of) philosophy and even (a little) politics.

Well, well worth reading, or even rereading if you read it in your youth. In my opinion it has not dated at all, in fact in some ways is more relevant now than it was when first published.

Some good fortune for PatLux:

At my local recycling centre I had the luck to come across Nancy Mitford’s The Pursuit Of Love and Love In A Cold Climate: Oh the laugh-out-loud joy of discovering hideous Uncle Matthew and the equally obnoxious Lady Montdore.

A similarly lucky find in an Oxfam bookshop for pubbore, who picked up Isle of the Dead by Roger Zelazny in a “wonderfully 1970s cover”:

This is great - a bit Iain M Banks with its artificial planets and human personalities being saved to new bodies, but with an intriguing mystery and Zelazny’s interest in mythology and religion too. Plus some really gorgeous passages of writing. I’m coming to the conclusion Zelazny is severely underrated.

“I am nearing the end of Andrea Wulf’s The Invention of Nature: The Adventures of Alexander von Humboldt , The Lost Hero of Science,” says julian6:

This has been terrific in every respect. The style is clear and forceful. Wulf relates the biography with drama and passion … Humboldt could lay claim to being a pioneer of the environmental movement, viewing the interdependence of all living things and the habitats they occupy. He established the concept of the web of life. Wulf propels the drama forward even after Humboldt’s long and fruitful life has ended. She examines his profound influence through the careers of various intellectual disciples - people like George Perkins Marsh, Thoreau and Ernst Haeckel. The reader can only marvel that a man of such prodigious ability, enthusiasm and dedication ever lived.

Japanese Tales by Royall Tyle has entertained RichardMed:

It’s a collection of short translated pieces, some very short, which offer a different perspective on Japan a millennium ago than the elegance of Genji. They’re full of monsters, magic, and low action. Although bear in mind that the cultural gap may be an obstacle to enjoyment, depending on tastes. As with other collections of very short works, dipping in and out might also be a good idea - I just read straight through.

Trollope may provide a useful coping strategy for our current travails, says phinea:

A month or so back, I decided to distract myself from Brexit by rereading Anthony Trollope’s Barchester novels followed by the Palliser novels. I read somewhere that this was what people would do during the second world war to distract themselves from reality. I heard that it was particularly good during air raids.

I’ve finished the Barchester novels and loved them as much as ever, though the standard of writing does improve as the series progresses. I’m now onto the Palliser novels and have reached Lady Eustace’s diamonds. Lady Eustace is one of Trollope’s most vividly awful characters. I still remember the TV series ‘The Pallisers’ from the seventies with Susan Hampshire as Glencora and Donal McCann as Phineas Finn. I take my moniker from that character.

It is often obvious that Trollope wrote in a rush and sometimes got into tricky plot positions which he has to get out of by a clunky piece of exposition, but I find his writing on character very compelling. He is particularly good on how people’s views can change throughout a day and how they can make a decision and then 2 hours later wonder if it was the right one.

It’s comforting to find that a lot of politicians were as venal then as they are now, but I wonder if we would be in such a parlous current state if we had Mr Gresham or Planty Pall in charge.

Sorry for mentioning the B-word. More swearing comes courtesy of Cardellina and Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow:

This Hamilton biography had so many vintage examples of ye olde petty, over-the-top insults, but I think my favourite that I would like to use from now on, was: “Damn John Jay. Damn everyone that won’t damn John Jay. Damn everyone that won’t put lights in his windows and sit up all night damning John Jay.”

I can imagine that coming in very useful.

Interesting links about books and reading

• “Of all the minor literary arts, none is quite so delicate as the production of jacket-copy, known to British editors as ‘blurb-writing’”": so says DJ Taylor.

• William Barr’s book report. I think they’re suggesting something… (Hat tip to Swelter.)

• Bret Easton Ellis has calmed down, says the New York Times.

• “While I Live, I Remember”: Agnès Varda’s Way of Seeing.

• Scott Walker as “vocal auteur.”

If you’re on Instagram, now you can share your reads with us: simply tag your posts with the hashtag #GuardianBooks, and we’ll include a selection in this blog. Happy reading!