The Best and the Rest

So here’s a run down of the 10 books I liked the most out of my 60, and a few others I thought weren’t that great. They’re not in any particular order, and I cheat a little by including series not just individual books.

Ones I recommend

Last Night in Twisted River – John Irving

The Southern Vampire Mysteries – Charlaine Harris

The Girl in Times Square – Paullina Simons

The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood

The Suspicions of Mr Whicher - Kate Summerscale

Cage of Stars – Jacquelyn Mitchard

Mudbound – Hillary Jordan

The Harper Connelly Mysteries – Charlaine Harris

Garden Spells – Sarah Addison Allen

Eleanor Rigby – Douglas Coupland

 

Ones I’d avoid

Her Fearful Symmetry – Audrey Niffenegger

The Secret Scripture – Sebastian Barry

The Thirteenth Tale – Diane Setterfield

The Other Hand – Chris Cleave

Blackberry Wine – Joanne Harris

Change of Heart – Jodi Picoult

Never Stop Looking – Sarah Jackman

 

Book 60: Last Night in Twisted River

Ah John Irving. At one point if you’d asked me my favourite author, I would have said John Irving with no hesitation. There was a time during my early twenties when I just thought he was the best thing ever. I read his books and was moved and amazed and depressed all at the same time. I would never write like this man. But I thought I’d grown out of it, after reading his last book, Until I Find You, and finding it lacking. I thought maybe I was done.

It seems not, since Last Night in Twisted River reminded me of all the things I loved. Sure, there’s a lot of the Irving staples — bears, sudden death, wrestling, writers, a father’s fears and its own version of the Under Toad — but that’s part of its charm. It’s familiar and new at the same time, and filled with characters you fall in love with, all so delightfully described. The book begins with a death, in a remote logging town in 1950s New Hampshire. We are introduced to Dominic and his son, Daniel. Dominic works as cook and is raising Daniel alone after the death of his wife in a freak accident ten years before. His best friend is Ketchum, a curmudgeonly logger who tells it like it is, and sports various scars, most from his dangerous work, but some from other encounters. It is the early part of the book, with its descriptions of Twisted River and their lives there, that is easily the best, but after Danny accidentally kills the girlfriend of the local policeman, he and his father flee, leaving Ketchum behind.

The rest of the novel is split into sections, each covering a certain time period. After leaving Twisted River they go to Boston, with stints in Iowa and Toronto. Each time they make a life for themselves, but worry about the ‘cowboy’ catching up with them. The story soon focuses on Danny and his struggles as a writer and young father, spanning over fifty years of his life.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book. It’s easy to get lost in its pages and the story being told. I love Irving’s writing style, even if he is a little too fond of repetition (why write one sentence when you can write seven?) and semicolons (man, does the dude love semicolons). At times things seem a bit hammered home, but I’ll take it for the overall feel of his words. The man writes beautfiul descriptions. One problem I had was the motivation behind their flight. I never totally bought the cowboy’s desire to find them and do them harm, it just seemed like a convenient way to keep them moving. Plus, he’s not particularly fearsome, so any tension that should be there when they’re about to be discovered is lost.

It also loses its way a bit towards the end. The focus becomes Danny’s writing, the how and the why of it, and its very autobiographical for Irving. Danny’s style is Irving’s style, his career is Irving’s career. Sure it’s fun if you know this stuff about him, but it becomes a sort of display of metafiction. Who is writing the book, is it Danny or John? Are they one and the same? It doesn’t really add anything to the story, other than a few dozen pages.

If anything, the reason to read this book is Ketchum. He is by no means the main character, but every time he came back I was happy to see him. He adores Danny and sees himself as his protector. He’s a large, gruff man who cannot be felled by anyone other than himself: ‘Only Ketchum could kill Ketchum’, and yet he still has a vulnerability to him. It is his story that moved me, the only one I felt choked up over.

Looking at it now, I feel there’s a lot I could pick apart, but while I was in it, it was almost perfect.

Book 59: Her Fearful Symmetry

I was one of those people who loved, nay, adored The Time Traveler’s Wife. I was absorbed by it, moved by it, and left thinking about it for days after I finished. I couldn’t put it away. So I’ve been waiting rather impatiently for Audrey Niffenegger’s new book. Anyone who could write so beautifully would surely have a great followup.

Hmm.

American twins Julia and Valentina Poole are left a flat in London in their aunt Elspeth’s will. They have never met their aunt, as she and their mother (also identical twins) have been estranged since before Julia and Valentina were born. The girls have a very close, almost suffocating relationship, at least for one of them, and have dropped out of several schools. Having nothing to do, they move to London, as the terms of the will state they must live there for a year before selling. Along with the flat, they inherit Elspeth’s neighbours: Robert, Elspeth’s lover, and Martin, who suffers from OCD so badly he can hardly leave the house. And they have inherited Elspeth who, as a ghost, lingers in her flat watching the girls and missing Robert. Through some plot contrivances, the girls become aware of Elspeth’s presence, leading to a rather ridiculous set of events. Sorry, I was trying to give a rundown of the plot without my opinions, but I failed miserably.

Her Fearful Symmetry is disappointing on so many levels. It’s about so many things that it becomes about nothing at all. The characters seem to have been stuck in the same story without belonging to it, and they are so badly developed it is difficult, if not impossible, to care about them. And so you have several people wandering through a novel, not holding your attention, and a plot that meanders trying to find a point. I found it maddening, and sad, that someone I felt to be such a good writer would come out with something like this.

The story itself is filled with elements we have seen many times before – identical twins, cemeteries, ghosts, mistaken identities – and not used here to any original effect. It’s not haunting, or sad, it doesn’t make you think, and it’s often frustrating. I find it amazing that she could so easily make me believe in a man going back and forth in time, yet make it so difficult for me to accept the reality of a ghost. It’s not so much that there is a ghost, it’s what she, and those around her, do. They behave in ways I couldn’t get behind. No one with any ounce of intelligence would act this way, and so it cheapens everything that goes on.

Story aside, the writing itself is also not as good as I expected it to be. I think she had trouble going from the first person of The Time Traveler’s Wife to the third person here. We don’t really get inside any of the characters’ heads, and the intermittent italicised lines that show their actual thoughts add nothing to the narrative, instead bogging it down. The language is also very clunky. Having just started reading John Irving’s latest, I can tell you that that’s how the third person should be written. It should be effortless. It shouldn’t cause you to trip up at the end of every sentence because it ends so abruptly.

The book has a very slow start, and if you removed the first hundred or so pages you really wouldn’t miss all that much. It is only when we finally get to Julia and Valentina’s arrival that it really gets going, and by that time I’d almost lost the will to continue. If this had been any other author I am not sure I would have. I wasn’t overly interested in the lives of these people, with the possible exception of Martin, who seems like he belongs elsewhere, they were all a mystery to me. I didn’t understand their motivations or their actions, and I couldn’t help but find most of what they did to be immensely stupid. And then there’s Highgate Cemetery, another character in its own right. While I am sure she has outdone herself with her research, does it all need to be in the book? If she had wanted to write a guidebook, she should have written one. And the same goes for her descriptions of London in general. Lots of it is spot on, to the point where it becomes boring (perhaps because I live here and know all this), but there are also things she gets wrong, and that really rubbed me the wrong way.

The problem with the book is all the things it is not. It is not a book I will read again. It is not a book I will treasure. It’s not a book filled with real characters, ones I was sad to leave behind. I think it’s fine to say you can’t expect it to be another Time Traveler’s Wife. That’s true. But I don’t think it’s wrong to expect another strong work from an author with so much obvious talent, or to expect it to be original, well written, moving, a page turner. And overall, this isn’t.

Book 58: The Handmaid’s Tale

This was the first book by Margaret Atwood I ever read. It was assigned reading during my degree, back when reading had become a complete chore and if I had to even look at another book I was going to hurl. And then I started reading, and I was hooked. I didn’t want to put it down, I was totally absorbed in this nightmare world, this twisted version of a not too distant future. I’ve read it a few times since then, and although I think each re-read has lessened the impact some, it’s still an amazing book, and one I always want people to read.

Set in the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian regime runs things through their skewed idea of religion. The government of the United States has been overthrown, and in its place is a military dictatorship, whose purpose includes trying to overcome the high infertility rates brought about by war and radiation poisoning. There’s no more Constitution, there’s no more Congress, there’s just their word, their law, and if you don’t follow it you are shipped to the Colonies to face a slow, lingering death, or strung up on the Wall as an example.

Higher up personnel, all male of course, are given Handmaids. These women have one purpose: get pregnant, or die. They have three chances, and then they’re out. One of these women is Offred (all Handmaids are of-someone, losing their names and identities from post to post), and it is through her eyes we see Gilead, and what came before it.

From the very beginning you are in Offred’s world, you feel her fear, her lack of hope. You worry whether she should trust someone, as the wrong word to anyone could mean death. I remember feeling so outraged the first time I read this, and terrified for Offred. The idea that freedom could be taken away so easily, and without a fight, it’s one of my worst nightmares. One of the first ways they limit a woman’s power is to take away their money, putting it in the hands of their husbands or male relatives. One of my biggest fears is of having no access to cash, of being dependent on other people. It’s easy to lose yourself that way, and it’s one of the reasons there’s so little resistance.

But even in a society with so many hard rules, Offred, and the reader, slowly learn that the system is being twisted for the gains of the few, just as it always has been. Luxury items can be bought on the black market, sex is still bought and sold. These people may claim to be morally superior, to be doing their best for society, and keeping women safe from men’s eyes, from their touch, but it’s all just a lie to justify the power they have.

Part of what is so hard hitting about The Handmaid’s Tale is the section that comes after the main book, the Historical Notes. It’s such a mundane, dry account of Offred’s story. They’re not looking at her struggle with any compassion or feeling, it is so far removed from them it’s just events, not people, a lecture to be read in between announcements about fishing trips and nature walks. But we do this everyday, don’t we? That’s what history is. We can only hope we learn something from it.

This book creeps under my skin and sits there for days afterwards. What people will do with a little bit of power is frightening. But more frightening is that it feels so real. I could see this, or something similar, happening. Hell, similar things happen to women throughout the world everyday. I know how lucky I am to have my own bank account, my own name, my own identity, and the thought of losing it is what makes this book so scary.

In the end, we’re given no real resolution for Offred. We know she left a record of her time in Gilead, but whether she found true freedom and happiness, well that’s up to us to decide. Do we see this story as hopeful, that you can put back together a life that was torn apart? Or is it merely a terrifying vision of our future, one without a happy ending, a tale reduced to the footnotes of history? Me, I swing between the two, but right now, I’m going with hope.

Books 56 + 57: The Southern Vampire Mysteries

Well I’ve finally caught up with everyone else and read the latest Sookie Stackhouse book. Of course that means I have to wait a frickin age for the next one to come out. What am I going to do? I need my Eric fix! I’m going to cave and watch Trueblood, I just know it, especially since it starts here on normal tv soon. Humph. But I will just want to throw things at Bill the whole time, so is it worth it? Hmmm.

Anyway, the books. In From Dead to Worse the supernatural community is attacking Sookie on all fronts. There are deaths and disappearances within the were community, and since Sookie is a friend of the pack she is of course drawn in to the fight between two warring factions. Then there’s a vampire coup to contend with, as vampires from Las Vegas roll up to take over Louisiana now the queen is injured. There’s also her missing boyfriend, her brother Jason and his relationship dramas, and two witches living in her house. Sookie learns more about her family and her fairy connection, finally meeting relatives, one of whom may share more than just blood. And then there are the men. Quinn’s disappearance has Sookie worried, but there’s another betrayal to come (she just can’t catch a break poor love). Bill is still trying to win her favour, and Eric…well she and Eric share a blood bond and are closer than Sookie would like, especially when Eric starts to remember their time together…

Dead and Gone brings a huge turning point for the were population, as they make themselves known to the world. It seems to go well, until one of their own is found crucified in the parking lot of Sam’s bar. And Sookie has a connection to the poor murdered soul. But this is the least of her problems, as the fairy war heats up, and Sookie is in danger. Her great-grandfather may have a soft spot for humans, but not all fairies do, and some are out to kill her. Poor Sookie has to face torture at the hands of her great-grandfather’s enemies. Will she ever be the same?

I’m still greatly enjoying the series, so much so I bought the last four books instead of getting them from the library. I think this was an excellent decision, god knows how long I’d have been waiting. And these last two have been especially enjoyable, being quick reads as so much is going on you can’t put them down. I love how Sookie and Eric’s relationship is developing, and I like her friendship with Amelia. It’s also nice that there’s an increasing body count here, and not just nameless, faceless vamps, or people we’ve met once. There are deaths, both human and supernatural, that have a big impact on the storyline, and on the characters who survive. I don’t know where the next book is going to go, and I’m ok with that, I just wish I didn’t have to wait for it! And I do worry about Eric (I know, I’m a stuck record), mainly because I can’t imagine Sookie being with him for long. She doesn’t want to be a vampire, she wants a family of her own, and he can’t give her that. I worry he’ll end up being killed off, dying to save Sookie, in a way that finally shows he does love her more than himself. But I guess I’ll have to wait and see about that one. Let’s hope I’m wrong.

I am now waiting for the fourth Harper Connelly book, which is out soon and which will hopefully keep me going a little bit longer. Or maybe I need to find a new series to read.

Book 55: The Year of the Flood

I recently picked up The Handmaid’s Tale for about the fourth time, and was happily going to make it my number 55, when I saw Margaret Atwood’s new book was on sale. I hadn’t realised she had a new one coming out, and since I had a Border’s gift card and it was half price, I picked up the hardback and made off with it. OK, I did pay. I wasn’t very far in when it all started to seem very familiar. I knew this world, I’d been here before. A quick Google search told me The Year of the Flood takes place in the same future as that of Oryx and Crake. Great, so I wasn’t going crazy. Unfortunately I hadn’t really enjoyed Oryx and Crake. Crap, was I not going to like this either?

The world these two books are set in is some not too distant future, where apparently people are happy to eat endangered species, gene splicing is common and has created pigoons and rakunks and mo’hairs, and the shady Corporations run everything, poisoning the population for their own gains, and using the CorpSeCorps police to make people disappear if they don’t follow the rules. Living outside these rules are The Gardeners, a sect devoted to nature as well as science, trying to preserve their way of life. They create gardens on rooftops and follow the teachings of Adam One, and the other Adams and Eves. They talk of the Waterless Flood, a natural disaster that will end the world as we know it.

The disaster, when it comes, is not strictly natural. It spreads like a plague, infecting people quickly all over the world. If you’ve read Oryx and Crake you’ll know where it came from and what happened to those infected, but there’s not much explanation here. The story focuses on two survivors. Ren, a trapeze dancer at the strip club Scales, is locked up tight in the Sticky Zone, already quarantined before the outbreak. She’s perfectly safe, only the door doesn’t open from the inside, and her food isn’t going to last forever. Toby is waiting it out in the health spa where she works, fighting off the pigs that attack her garden and wondering if she’s going crazy. Through both women we learn about the Gardeners, about their lives before the flood, and their struggle for survival.

The Year of the Flood is similar to Oryx and Crake for me, in that it doesn’t have the same emotional weight as say The Handmaid’s Tale or The Road. It is beautifully written, as all Atwood’s books are, but the impact of the writing isn’t the same. For much of it we’re in the past, and even when we’re living through Ren and Toby’s present, we don’t get a strong sense of just how desperate their situations are, or how awful the world is. I didn’t feel as much fear for them, or at least not until the very end, when I was definitely invested in the characters and what would become of them.

Also, I find it hard to relate to this version of the future. That was the problem I had with Oryx and Crake. I don’t see it going that way, for whatever reason, it’s just not my idea of a possible future. Perhaps I am naive, or too hopeful. It just didn’t feel true enough I guess, and it’s a little too light-hearted a lot of the time. I’m not saying it’s full of jokes and laugh out loud moments, but there’s something about it that makes it difficult to feel moved by their plight. All these people have died, the world as we know it is over, but I never felt that moved by what was lost, not as a spectator, and not from Toby and Ren. It’s not devastating. Maybe I’m just used to end of the world books being traumatic to read, but if you’re looking for a dark and twisted nightmare vision of the future, I don’t think this is it. I wouldn’t want to live there of course, but there’s been worse.

I think maybe it’s just a bit too clever for its own good. The rakunks and pigoons, the pleebs, the names of the saints and those damn Gardeners hymns, Adam One’s sermons…I think if you’d lifted those last two out you wouldn’t miss much to be honest. It gives you more of an idea of the timeline maybe, but that’s about it. I didn’t find them necessary to my understanding of the story. In fact I think they took away from it somehow.

Having said all that, I still enjoyed it. I really did. I couldn’t put it down and it passed my ‘Just one more chapter, oh look it’s 3am, shit I have work tomorrow’ test. I did need to know what happened to the characters, I was desperate to get to the end and see where it crossed over with Oryx and Crake. I don’t think you need to have read that to understand this book (although it will spoil the ending of that if you don’t read them in order). It’s not a sequel, it’s more of a companion, and the events unfold at the same time. I want to read Oryx and Crake again now to see if I like it any better second time around, and also see where the characters in this one turn up, as I really can’t remember. Some of the crossovers here seemed a little convenient at times, but it might make more sense after a re-read.

I would definitely like to see another continuation of the story, as it’s left open-ended enough to do so, but I don’t know if there will be one. Maybe Atwood has explored all she wanted to explore with this addition to the Oryx and Crake world. Maybe her next one could be a little more depressing though. Maybe it could make me want to put a stop to the madness of the world now before we get there.

Book 54: Crossing the Line

Here’s a confession: I’ve put off reading this book for a while. When Brennig kindly offered to send me his book, I happily said yes. And then it came and I started to worry. I’d have to write a review of this. What if I didn’t like it? What if it was terrible? What if it was a bizarre stream of consciousness rant about how cats are really our masters? What if it didn’t have proper spelling and grammar?? So I did what I always do, I put it off. And then finally I put on my big girl shoes and started to read. Not a rant about cats. Has actual sentence structure. Phew.

Chris and Jacki meet at a work do and quickly fall for each other. The relationship progresses at speed as they spend all their time together, Jacki getting wrapped up in Chris’ world of competitive horse events (you can tell right here I have no idea what I’m talking about when it comes to horses, but go with it). But Jacki is a single mother who needs to be wary of falling for the wrong man, and Chris has his own relationship issues. Their relationship is tested somewhat when Vicky comes on the scene looking to improve her chances in Eventing. Chris steps in to help out, and Jacki is a little jealous. Oh, and also pregnant. Oops.

There’s the gist without giving too much away. I liked the relationship between Chris and Jacki, it seemed to grow quite naturally, if rather quickly, and they’re nicely written characters. As are the others who turn up regularly throughout the book. There’s a fair amount of humour that comes through, especially in the dialogue, which feels real and natural, and I found myself smiling at something said on more than one occasion.

I’m not totally sure how I was supposed to feel about Chris. In the beginning I quite liked him, since he is a very likeable guy. He’s smart and funny, affectionate with Jacki and good with her daughter. But when I learned his back story I started to see him in a different light, and his actions towards the end made me rather dislike him. And I’m afraid I didn’t like the ending. There are a few surprises that come quickly in the last few pages, and I felt they were quite manipulative and not really necessary. They didn’t feel true to me.

I hope it doesn’t sound like I thought it was a terrible book, because it’s not and I don’t, and there’s much to like about it, but there are a few things I would have liked to have gone differently.

So thank you Brennig, for sending it to me.

Book 53: All Together Dead

No waiting for the library to get my book in this time, no sir. I bought this one at the airport and could read at my leisure. I should just buy them all, it’s much nicer. Anyway, this is Sookie Stackhouse post Hurricane Katrina, and things haven’t gone well for the New Orleans vampires. The queen is about to go on trial for murdering her husband, and the surviving vamps will be attending a conference. The queen wants Sookie with her so she can find out who is plotting against her, and Eric is less than impressed not to have her to himself. Sookie is still seeing Quinn, and things are going well, but they’re both busy with the conference. Sookie meets up with Barry the Bellboy, the only other telepath she’s met, and together they read minds for their employers. Of course, there are people who don’t like the idea of vampires walking among us, and they’ll do anything to stop them. The Fellowship of the Sun appears again, but are they responsible for the vamp murders, or is there something darker going on?

First of all, we have more Eric! Boo-yah! He and Sookie are forced to get closer in an effort to save her from a far more unpleasant ordeal, and neither of them really knows what to do with that. I love their awkwardness, and Eric’s hatred of his own feelings for her.

This one was also interesting as we get to see more of vampire politics at play. We’ve seen kings and queens before, and know most of the hierarchy, but here we have vampire justice (or vengeance) on show, with trials, and an ancient judge. There’s also another new otherworldy presence, in the form of supernatural bodyguards, and I’m not even attempting to spell the name right. One problem I had with the plot was the build up to the big finale, where lots of vampires are killed or injured. It was far too easy to see coming, from the moment the thing is mentioned you know its going to come back into play, and in a big way. It’s not subtle at all, and so it makes me think Sookie and the vampires, who are supposed to have better senses after all, are pretty dumb, that they wouldn’t pick up on it straight away, or in the very least have better bloody security going on, especially after an earlier bomb threat. It felt a bit lazy to me, all in all.

It’s going to be interesting to see what happens in the next book, now so many vampires have been lost, and the queen is injured and her power weakened. I’m sure Sookie’s world is going to be shaken up some. Sadly this time I do have to wait for the library. Grr.

Book 52: Definitely Dead

And we’re back with Sookie Stackhouse in the sixth book in Charlaine Harris’ Southern Vampire series. In this one Sookie gets a new man (another one! Although at least a possible reason for her appeal is given), weretiger Quinn, but of course her love life never runs smoothly and they are attacked by weres on a date. Elsewhere, Sookie’s cousin Hadley has died, leaving all her possessions to Sookie, and so she must go to New Orleans to pack up the apartment. Hadley’s death is unusual, since she was already dead. The vampire lover of the Queen of New Orleans, Hadley lived an interesting afterlife, until she was murdered. Now someone doesn’t want Sookie looking too closely at Hadley’s things, and if she gets in the way, well there just might be war.

I have to say I was a little bit lost at the beginning of this book. I had no memory of Hadley being mentioned (although I assume she was), or of her death, or that she’d been a vampire, but I guess this happened off screen, so to speak. I thought I’d missed one of the books out, but I think some of it may have been in a short story instead. New characters are introduced but Sookie has already met them, so I sort of didn’t know how to take them. I suppose this way we get to the action sooner, but I would have preferred seeing Sookie’s reaction about Hadley’s murder and the rest of it.

But I quite liked the story, and Sookie’s trip to New Orleans. There’s plenty going on as usual and it seemed back on form and with a fast pace that was missing a little in the last one. I liked Quinn but I coud have done with more Eric. I know I know, I always say that. But he’s the best bit! More than that I can’t really say, as I read this on the plane coming back from Atlanta so my brain wasn’t totally in gear.

Book 51: The Girl in Times Square

Also by Paullina Simons, also one I’ve read a couple of times, and I still enjoy it with each read. We’re back with Spencer Patrick O’Malley, a little older, now living in New York, still on the force, and with his fair share of demons. His path crosses with Lily, a young woman attempting to finish college, deal with her alcoholic mother, her agoraphobic grandmother and two surprising pieces of life changing luck, one good, one very bad. Her flatmate Amy disappears, and Spencer is on the case. Initially frosty with each other, the two form a bond when Lily becomes ill. Spencer is the only one she can lean on, the one who is always there.

Sure, there’s plenty of melodrama in this one, you’ve got lottery wins and cancer; an older man looking after a much younger woman; alcoholism; extra marital affairs; missing persons and a flashback to the Holocaust, and yet it works for me. I’m a sucker for Spencer O’Malley after all. There are some things that don’t ring all that true, especially Lily’s family and how they react to her illness and lottery win. Her sister arguing for Lily to sign a DNR and always coming around for money…I’m sure there are people like that in the world, but it just seemed a bit too obvious and heavy handed. There’s a lot going on, and it’s a long book, but the main characters are so engaging it whizzes by. I guess not only am I a sucker for Spencer, I’m also a sucker for any kind of love story where it takes a while for the two people to get it together. And then they do…it’s a Pacey/Joey moment, you know? I like that neither character is perfect, and their arguments and reasons for not being together are valid, instead of just to keep the plot going.

This book also revisits the crime from Red Leaves, and we see how Spencer’s actions at the end of that book have consequences for him here. I’m not sure about the ending though. There’s a lot of foreshadowing about a significant event, and I can’t decide whether I am meant to be left with a sense of doom, or if I can feel hopeful for their future. Either way, if you’re after a big, romantic page-turner, this is the one. It’s got everything. And Spencer too.