As I write, I'm really dying to get back to reading The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke. For some irrational reason I've been avoiding reading this for years. I keep looking at it and thinking I ought to read it because it's such an important book. But of course, we tend to read things either because we want to or because we have to - but rarely because we ought to.

Anyway, last week I overcame my irrational reluctance (I think I thought it was full-on fantasy which isn't my cup of tea) and opened it up. And it is just lovely and brilliant. It's set in the modern day though it has a rather timeless feel about it, despite the mention of television, cinema and so forth. It's about a group of runaway children who make their home in an abandoned Venetian cinema, and are able to buy food and clothes because of the 'Thief Lord' - a mysterious boy barely older than themselves with an incredibly talent for stealing, who visits them late at night with his spoils.

An element of fantasy is creeping in as I read, and I'm dying to get to the end and see how that is going to develop, and whether I think it's a good or bad thing.

I am still a bit perplexed by the software for this blog, so I hope this entry registers as being written by me. Susan, that is...