From May to September

And while I'm enjoying Giles Foden's Turbulence at the moment, I am looking forward to a number of new publications coming out in the autumn.

One novel I am desperate to get hold of is The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets' Nest by Stieg Larrson, as I have now read the first two instalments of the Millennium trilogy.

Unfortunately the Maclehose Press translation of the Scandinavian bestseller isn't out until October 1, so I might give the publishers a call and request a proof copy.

PD James has written a book for the Bodleian Library about detective fiction which looks interesting, and there are also novels due out by William Boyd and Sebastian Faulks.

Boyd's novel, set in London, is called Ordinary Thunderstorms and it's top of my wish list.

I gather it's about a chap who flies in from the States to London for an interview and then gets caught up in a murder.

I'm also loving Ox-Tales, a series of four collections of short stories by well-known authors including Jonathan Coe, Marti Leimbach and Ian Rankin.

Some people can't be bothered with short stories but I'm not one of them.

The books, costing £5 each, are being sold to raise money for Oxfam.

A week ago, I went with other Oxfam volunteers from the charity's bookshop in St Giles to an auction of valuable books at Bonhams in Kidington.

Forty-five minutes later, quite a few rare books had gone under the hammer for the cool sum of a little under 20 grand.

The last time I was in an Oxfam store was in Abingdon, and I bought three books for a tenner including a 50th anniversary retrospective of the Blue Peter programme by Richard Marson.

I apologise for my brief absence. I've been in news land.