Happy new year to you all from a distinctly snowy North-West. So snowy and beautiful in fact, that the above picture is not a stock shot, but one I took on Sunday. East Angles was hibernating in December - but we're back with a cultural catch-up and some nice new links (on the right) to interviews with the likes of Sarah Waters, Nowhere Boy and Control writer Matt Greenhalgh, and Barbara Kingsolver.

The interview with Waters was for her new(ish) book The Little Stranger, and it seemed particularly timely as we endure the coldest, snowiest winter I can remember since childhood. There's one scene where a key is thrown into a snowdrift at the eerie post-war Hundreds Hall: of course, the 1950s were when they had proper snow every year. Anyway, it's a really enjoyable ghost story, not least because it might not be a ghost story at all.

So that was pre-Christmas reading: post Christmas it was all about David Peace. And instead of the snow, the oppressive heat of Tokyo. The international edition of Occupied City is out this week and I'm speaking to him about the trilogy soon, so it's a treat to wallow in another one of Peace's murky, claustrophobic worlds. I read The Damned United at the same time as then-Norwich manager Nigel Worthington was teetering towards the sack - while Worthy was no Brian Clough, you did really get a feel for the loneliness of the under pressure football manager.

Music-wise I had great fun doing an alternative Christmas playlist for The National, prompted by seeing Thea Gilmore play her beautiful 'seasonal' record Strange Communion at the new Band On The Wall. By dint of not having a quirky alt.folk version of We Wish You A Merry Christmas anywhere near it, it works rather well as a record to play in January too: particularly, right now, Cold Coming (which you can hear on her MySpace) and her version of Yoko Ono's Listen The Snow Is Falling.

And when the festivities were over, two albums have clamoured for my attention ever since. Lawrence Arabia's first international release, Chant Darling, is out this week and is really fantastic, a mix of Beach Boys, Lennon and quirky indie pop. A blast of New Zealand sunshine should you need reminding that it can get above freezing in this country. Apple Pie Bed won James Milne (for he is Lawrence Arabia) the top Kiwi songwriting prize, and you can see why. In fact, you can literally see why, here (video slightly NSFW - only slightly).

He's touring with Beach House in the UK next month - a great double bill because their third album Teen Dream is the other record that saw me into 2010. It's utterly gorgeous: slow, reflective but never indulgent music to lose yourself completely to. Norway is particularly brilliant in the way it unsettlingly detunes itself but still makes sense.

I began this post by mentioning hibernating. Well, Beach House make music to hibernate to, in the very best sense. I'm off to build a snowman.