The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud (Ben Sherwood)

Ugh, this book was AMERICAN. Overly sentimental and unnecessarily violent. With the kind of detail which you know the author has included because they think it gives their work increased depth when really it only acts to make the book longer. Obviously, if you are Dickens, this is important, as you are being paid by the word. However, Dickens had something to say with every one of those words. The superfluous detail in this story was the only thing retaining the integrity of the physical concept of 'the book'. The plot and characters were rendered irrelevant through the extreme use of hyperbolic emotional prose which only ever serves to alienate rather than draw the reader in. Your response is to say "Oh for God's sake, pull yourself together" rather than feel any sort of empathy.

Oh! The family are home! I await their invitation to come down to eat with trepidatious excitement.

And... alas. No invitation has been shouted from below.

Well, I'm not going down to find something to eat. I'll be fine. I have a bottle of water.

If the above interlude confuses you, refer to the post below.

Sherwood's novel tells the story of Charlie St. Cloud, who, whilst driving his mother's car when he was just a kid, inadvertently crashes and his younger brother is killed. Fast forward a few years and now Charlie is a gravedigger. Who can talk to dead people. He meets a woman named Tess who is straight out of a Mills and Boon. A bad Mills and Boon. One of the ones where the woman is irascible and selfish. They... talk and grow fond of each other. From here the book continues to bore the reader until the final, glorious denouement where we get to hear what sort of dog he's going to have in his future life. (A beagle. Bad choice. They're hard to train Charlie.)

The dialogue is plodding at best and I skipped many of the conversations because it was either that or risk becoming so tense that my neck veins would have ruptured. Of course, this meant I was often slightly confused as to what was happening. No matter. Confusion is the lesser of two evils when the other is to be so consummately acquainted with every nuance of Sherwood's writing that there is no conceivable way to escape from the knowledge that you are reading something obscenely pedestrian.

Apparently they are making a film of this book with Zac Efron as Charlie. Which is just perfect. Blocks of concrete deserve wooden rods to realise their full potential.

Rating: 3/10.

The Song is You (Arthur Phillips)

Two posts in one evening... I must be feeling better. As you will all know, I am battling another case of bronchitis. You will all know because I whinge about it on a relatively regular basis. I haven't been feeling up to staying up past eight o'clock and reviewing. This is proving problematic considering I am leaving London in six weeks time. Attempting to cram in quality time with friends I may not see for years and years is hard when you are slumped over the table, weakly waving away offers of an ambulance (friend J is particularly twitchy when it comes to medical matters) and coughing so much you can hear your lungs bouncing off your ribcage (true story!). However, I am now feeling much better, although I am reluctant to give up the marvellous and miraculous cough medicine I have been taking at night. It puts me in an extremely deep sleep about twenty minutes after dosage and I have been waking up this past week feeling well-rested, which I don't think I've felt since Christmas. But it's the dreams that have me coming back for more. Never have I had such vivid, interesting dreams, with the perfect balance of the surreal and the familiar. Not too much menace- enough to keep things interesting, but ultimately not too unsettling. The sort of dreams where you're being chased by a shark but then you find chocolate cake.

I have taken this marvellous medicine (Alcott's not George's) and thus do not exactly have an elegant sufficiency of time to finish this review before I drop off. Probably then, we can all agree that the paragraph I just wrote above was an ill-advised way to spend my limited time.

The Song is You is the sort of novel you want to love but you suspect, before you have even opened the covers, that it is going to be a grave disappointment. A man who uses music to define all the most important moments in his life. A romance with an Irish singer. Reviewers gasping to make their accolades more adoring than everyone else's.

To my happy, happy surprise, the novel was beautiful. A deeply romantic love story told with impeccable modern prose. The musical references throughout felt organic rather than affected or, (as I suspected they might be), a pathetic attempt by the author to prove how hardcore and bohemian he is. Phillips manages to make Julian's attachment to his iPod merely a part of the character rather than a grating plot hook. This is harder than it looks. In many ways it is the easy way out to write historical fiction, where there are thousands of sources to draw from when looking for guidance on the forms of expression that work most eloquently. Internet technology, modern slang and pop culture are infinitely harder to include in effortless prose.

The love story itself has two main elements that prevent it from falling into twee territory. The first is the slight seediness and underground feel to the romance. Julian is much older than Cait, the young singer he has fallen for. He stalks her, lets himself into her apartment, cooks her dinner without having been introduced and leaves an indentation of his head in her pillow so she won't feel so alone. I had chills for a lot of these scenes, but I was always most panicked when I thought the police were going to catch him. "They're going to arrest him and they won't realise he's doing everything out of love!" I thought, distressed. (Although, it must be noted, this is probably the excuse of every stalker out there.)

The other aspect of the romance which made it all the more engaging was the refusal of Phillips to indulge the expectations I have as a Generation Y Instant Gratification Brat. Julian and Cait embody the typical Girl Meets Boy Plus Obstacles scenario, except that the girl doesn't actually physically meet the boy until the end of the novel. This restraint on the part of the characters (because it is a decision they both contribute to) is INFURIATING for the reader but also strangely exciting and compelling. After all, wanting something and being denied it only makes you want it more.

If there are some loose ends not tied up as neatly as I would have liked, if there are some characters that I felt needed further development, that all seems rather irrelevant when you can read a book that actually delivers what it promised to do- tell a love story that is determined to be of this time, a love story that nevertheless reaffirms that romances like these are as old as the songs that are sung about them.

Rating: 8/10.

A Song in The Daylight (Paullina Simons)

This is what happens when you spend two years away from the book trade. Whilst in the past 16 months I have become an absolute virtuoso in the art of 'pretending to care during child-related activities', a masterchef from the school of 'Dinner in 10 Minutes or Less' and a champion in the competitive sport of 'Saving Your Tears for the Privacy of Your Loft', I have NO IDEA what books are out at the moment.

Thus, it was with a squeal of delight that I realised Paullina Simons had a new novel out. Generally speaking, Simons is a very misunderstood author. The publicity and marketing drongos who represent Paullina need to ACTUALLY READ one of her books. Look at these covers-

Disgusting.

VOMIT.

I would go straight for these books only if I had a 39 hour plane trip ahead of me and needed to mindlessly fill the hours. However, I would be disappointed. The reader who buys these covers is not prepared for what lies between them- emotionally destructive tragedies of the heart and mind. The epic struggle of the modern American writer who cannot help but mine her depressing Russian heritage. Extremely explicit sex scenes. (Not the sort of thing you want the person next to you catching a glimpse of. My ex-boyfriend once read one and expressed absolute horror and disgust at what he deemed to be highly inappropriate reading for me.)

I digress...

Marketing gripes aside, I was ridiculously excited to get A Song in the Daylight. Friday afternoon a few weeks ago I made a trip to Sainsbury's and bought the necessities: iced coffee, KitKats and apples. I cancelled my weekend plans. Friday evening, after my duties with the children were complete, I curled up in bed. I opened the covers, already shivering slightly. I took one last look through my skylight at the grey world, anticipating I would next view it from the highly charged emotional state of the post-Paullina meltdown I normally experience at the denouement of her novels.

48 hours later I scoffed one last scoff and slammed the covers shut.

It started off well enough. Larissa, the beautiful, discontent housewife, meets the young, dangerously sexy Kai. Should she leave with him, or stay behind to be with her husband and children? It could have been compelling, if Larissa was in any way likeable. However, instead of a heroine I could sympathise with, I got a heroine who disgusted me with every turn of the page. Selfish, weak, whiny, spiteful, vacuous and stupid. Who cares whether she goes or stays? I didn't become attached to her children or husband enough to worry about their fate. Kai, I felt, was too two-dimensional to warrant the drama he created. He ate sushi! He drove a motorcycle! SWOON. The only interesting characters in the novel were given extremely limited page space, making it hard to care about them either. Maggie and her kidney problem was a particularly unnecessary waste of ink.

Actually, that's not entirely fair. Che was a very interesting character, being a protester in the Philippines and all. Only problem is, that story line was completely incongruous to the rest of the plot.

Simons obviously realised the structure of the novel was a bit off, so she attempted to pull everything together in the last third. Then she realised that wasn't going to work, so she just decided to kill everyone. (Not everyone. That is hyperbolic.) Let's just say she decided to indulge in her tragic Russian side when all else failed.

Was it worth the weekend I set aside? Most definitely. Simons can still write melodrama better than anyone else out there, making it seem honest, necessary and even restrained. I get the feeling a lot of the time with Simons that her novels are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to how much damage she could ACTUALLY do to my heart if she really tried.

If you're a Simons fan this is of course a must-read (although you probably knew about it last September). If you are new to the Simons wagon, I would suggest picking up The Girl in Times Square first. It is my favourite other than The Bronze Horseman, but I would not recommend starting with that. That is not for the faint-hearted. I lost days crying over that book.

I didn't lose any days crying over this book. But I lost a bit of my faith in Paullina. Which is very sad indeed.

Legend of a Suicide (David Vann)

Caveat- it is very late, I cannot sleep for the third night in a row and, as is always the case when I reach such a hypnagogic state, I am thinking too much for my own good. This is why stupid people have a much better time of it- doltishness the great unknown elixir for a happy life. If there were to be a study of the average intelligence of the insomniac I'm betting it would be higher than the average of the general populace. Although it would probably be staffed and researched by actual insomniacs, desperate to fill in the black hours any way they can. Of course, this would bring the credibility and impartiality of the study under scrutiny and all that work could end up being for naught.

OR, perhaps insomniacs are no more intelligent than the next person. It is possible that we, as a group, just HOPE that we are smarter than average, that our thoughts are so important as to warrant stolen extra hours awake. We want there to be a reason that the ranks of the soporified masses are not open to us- some noble, acumen-based reason.

I finished Legend of a Suicide a few days ago and have been mulling over what to write in my review. Vann's novel is about a man attempting to deal with the suicide of his father when he was a young lad. The author's own father committed suicide and whilst he states that this is definitely a work of fiction, the emotion expressed in the novel must have been mined from his own experiences. So, ultimately, this is an incredibly sad book. Sad in a true way. Not sad in a The Kite Runner way.

Sigh. Before I get disgruntled emails- of course, The Kite Runner was sad. But it was Hollywood sad. Brutal caste system, sexual molestation, racial discrimination, terrorism, rape, child trafficking... YE GODS. Got it. This book is sad with a capital S. Of course, these events do occur around the world, but combined in one novel the effect was so overwhelmingly hopeless that I felt quite removed from the story.

Oh dear, I digress. What I mean to say is that Vann's novel was simple and honest in its portrayal of Roy's struggles after his father kills himself; nothing appeared to be magnified for effect. I felt so hideously and selfishly grateful that I was not Roy, that I have a father whom I have relied on my entire life and will continue to do so for as long as he puts up with me. I have a father whose advice is invaluable to me, who does things for my benefit rather than his, whom I trust beyond all imagining. Roy had a drop-kick.

I didn't particularly like this book. It is written beautifully and Vann certainly surprised me in the way he twisted the plot around (a little obtuse, but I don't want to spoil it for those of you who may read it). But, apart from making me realise how much I love my dad, I just didn't enjoy reading it. Maybe I have had enough of these brutal tales of outdoor survival. The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, The Outlander, Jack London's various works... I like roughing it as much as the next spoilt brat but I now know WAY too much about dolly fishing and weather-proofing. Another thing I am grateful to my father for- he never, in all my years growing up, ever suggested we go live in the Alaskan wilderness for a year, hunting and fishing to survive. Much kudos Daddy.

Rating: 7/10.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle (David Wroblewski)

Earhart gave me the push towards this novel and it is probably the best recommendation she has ever given me. We enjoy the same books, but the novels that we absolutely LOVE are always quite different. Of course, the reason I loved this so much is probably because Earhart hasn't actually read it. She just sold it to a bunch of unsuspecting customers when it came out last year.

When I first started reading Edgar I thought to myself "Wow, this is similar in feel to The Outlander." I felt most chuffed when I reached the end of the novel and found an interview with David Wroblewski and Gil Adamson who WROTE The Outlander. I am brilliant.

Edgar tells the story of a young boy who lives on a dog farm with his parents. I'm not sure dog farm is the right term, but it is so much more than a kennel. Edgar's parents raise a special breed of dog- Sawtelle dogs. These dogs are a mix of dogs that Edgar's paternal great grandfather "liked the look of". Whenever he saw a dog that was particularly intelligent and aware he would buy it and breed it into his line of dogs, creating this super race. Combined with a special training technique the family have honed over the years, Sawtelle dogs are highly valued around the country.

Edgar, who was born mute, has a very strong bond with the dogs, probably due to his inability to speak. This bond proves his saving grace when his uncle Claude arrives, fresh out of prison, to live with them. This family reunion ends in tragedy and Edgar is forced to flee into the surrounding forest, several of the dogs following at his heels. What follows is weeks in a relative wilderness as he comes to terms with what he must face back home.

The book is startlingly beautiful. Nothing seems quite real. The characters are slightly heightened; the forest is awesomely majestic and lonely; Edgar's relationship with the dogs seems unearthly, supernatural even. The book clutched at all of my senses, clawing me in to the drama. Wroblewski structured the novel in five acts, like a play, and you can see what this has done to the feel of the story. Slow reading builds to a frenzied turning of the pages as Edgar and Claude are propelled towards a terrible yet magnificent denouement.

The novel has been compared to Macbeth but I see bits of King Lear and even Romeo and Juliet in there as well. Suffice to say Wroblewski most probably found himself inspired by the Bard, a worthy foundation for any novel!

No matter what accolades I give The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, I don't think I can sum it up better than Stephen King's review: "I flat-out loved this book." I did too Stephen.

Rating: 9/10.

New Moon (Stephenie Meyer)

I am already grinning to myself and have yet to write anything.

I just went to see New Moon, the second film of The Twilight Saga.

Ahhh. Where to begin?

I feel I should start with saying that this film is probably 300% better than the first film. (Review here). The new director has obviously not insisted on an insipid blue wash and allows the actors some actual screen time to emote, rather than racing the camera around them psychotically.

However, the film still suffered from the same problem that the Harry Potter films (especially the early ones) had- they are virtually incomprehensible to someone who has not read the novels. I mean, you could understand what was going on. But you would be pardoned for being under the impression that the books are eratically plotted, totally vacuous and remarkably two-dimensional. Not the case (well, not ENTIRELY the case).

The Twilight books are not GOOD... but they are a phenomenon. These books are the pinnacle of guilty pleasure reading. Odd, dangerous, melodramatic and ultimately supremely fulfilling. The films pale in comparison.

Yet still, as I mentioned before, this film was a vast improvement on the first. I almost fell out of my seat when Taylor Lautner appeared on screen, thirty pounds heavier than in the first movie. That, in itself, made the 8 pounds and unimpressive popcorn worth it. Add to the mix the fact that Robert Pattinson was given about three lines and five minute of screen time to sulk and you'll see the movie was positively five star compared to Twilight.

There's been a lot of press about the books as outlets for Stephenie Meyer to publicise her Mormon beliefs and racist, Aryan views. There's probably a lot of truth to this. The portrayal of the Quileutes is definitely questionable and Edward as the supreme enforcer of familial values and chastity is quite unnerving when combined with the stalking, controlling behaviour and omniscience Meyer depicts as charming, loving behaviour.

None of which appears with any sort of prominence in either film. Bella is far more in control in the films and Edward highly ridiculous compared to his written persona. Bella can dismiss him with a withering "Just... shut up." Edward slumps against a wall, defeated. Pathetic. In addition, you can see that the producers seem to be keeping abreast of political correctness. Even if they are from Utah.

At least the books offer some escapist fun. This film is redeemable only as an homage to Jacob Black's amazing abs.

Fine Just The Way It Is (Annie Proulx)

Annie Proulx makes horrendous people, places and events FINE JUST THE WAY THEY ARE. This is her process, her tool, her particular brand of magic, and I never would have spotted it if she hadn't named her last collection of short stories just that.

Admittedly, I have a warped view of what is horrendous. To me, bad coffee is insufferable. Having lunch with someone and not getting the good seat (against the wall) is intolerable. Living without my hair straightener is INCONCEIVABLE. So naturally, I find these stories of poor and broken people in Wyoming cruel beyond all mortal comprehension, because I'm high maintenance and disgustingly entitled in my outlook on life.

Yet still, I rooted for them. I was happy for them, devastated for them. These, the people described as ugly, poor, unlovable, selfish, racist, stupid... utterly pedestrian. Proulx does not bother to take the easy route and write stories about the innocent, the intelligent, the fair and good. Any person would prove to be interesting under scrutiny. Worthy of our time, our eyes, our $22.95. How then, do writers differentiate between those who are passed over and those who deserve their own worded spotlight?

They choose the beautiful, the well-structured, the desirable people to write about. And I'm not talking about the desirability a husband sees in a wife who has a saggy stomach and discontented attitude radiating from beneath a hairstyle long out of fashion and powdered at the roots. Or the girl with average looks and average brains being charmed by the boy whose speech is clogged with the unfortunate spittle that plagues the over-salivating.

Those are the people whose stories are harder to write and still generate empathy with the reader and thus they are so often the people without a strong literary presence. Which is stupid, because when a writer does bother to create a character who is hard to like and rough around the edges it normally becomes as artful as Don Quixote, the book an ode to imperfection, beautiful through the simple fact of its existence.

That's what Annie Proulx does and then she goes one step further. She neglects to include any action whatsoever in her stories. Each event is constructed as a past occurrence, mentioned in passing by one character or another. At any one time, nothing is really happening. Snippets of family mystery, suspense, skeletons are hinted at, but the writing quickly moves on, choosing to focus instead on a wife musing about her dinner plans. It takes a serious talent to keep us engaged through all this, yet we find ourselves also weighing up the beef and pork options. Because she's just that damn good.

I must apologise for the wordiness and general pretension of this review. I have been embroiled in a big fight with a large pile of torn newspaper and glue for two days trying to make an acceptable model of a dolphin for a Year 4 Art Show. Because I have about a teaspoon of artistic ability in my entire genetic makeup... this has been a trying, exhausting time. I felt the need to prove I could still string a sentence together, having failed spectacularly as a sculptor.

Rating: 9/10.

The Heretic's Daughter (Kathleen Kent)

I have this thing about the Salem Witch Trials. It's like my thing with the Amish. I'm don't want to BE Amish, I'm just overly and unnaturally fascinated with them. Salem- I don't wish I'd lived during the trials (with my hair and no straighteners available I'm sure I would have been scruffy enough to create suspicion) but I LOVE reading about it.

I bought this in Hatchards (LOVE this bookshop, want to get married and live and DIE in this bookshop) on Earhart's recommendation. Apparently she sold it to loads of customers last Christmas, not having actually read it herself. We both read it during Earhart's London visit and the sister, having read it first, insisted she would do the review. Well, I am ignoring that and doing the review myself because she has a lot on her plate at the moment and I have to work hard to come up with enough things to do to avoid filling out uni applications.

I know it sounds like Earhart and I did nothing but read whilst she was here on her three week visit, but we did talk to each other! We ate and drank a lot as well. And we spent a seriously enjoyable two hours in Wales sitting in armchairs, eating strawberry sours and quizzing each other from a Film Trivia Book we bought for 50p. Exciting stuff.

I digress... back to the book. Which was so unremarkable I have to go grab it off the shelf to remind myself of the title. Ah yes, The Heretic's Daughter. Meh, meh, meh. I have trouble feeling sympathy for a woman who is hung as a witch when she spends her time physically and emotionally abusing her children.

Sarah, the 'heretic's daughter' as it were, reminds me slightly of a Joanne Harris character. She is wilful and troubled and hard to like and the relationship with her mother Martha seemed overly reminiscent of the tempestuous relationship between Framboise and her mother in Five Quarters of the Orange. Although, not nearly as well-executed.

There is also some mysterious red book with the history of Sarah's father in it which is mentioned once and then all but forgotten. Sarah is allowed to read it when she comes of age, but she never tells us what is in it. A ridiculous and redundant side-plot.

The writing does the job (the job being the telling of an average plot and detailing of average characters) and that's it. If you're in the market for some mildly compelling and clichéd historical fiction, this is it.

Rating: 5/10.

A Confederacy of Dunces (John Kennedy Toole)

I arrive at beginning this review feeling conflicted. Not, it must be stressed, as to the quality of the novel, but rather at how one goes about reviewing a book so transcendentally... loud.

Mmm, that's right, LOUD is the word I have come up with to describe John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces. I toyed with 'brilliant', contemplated 'glorious torrent of cynical social commentary', seriously considered 'rich in passion, laid on thickly with Toole's impressive voice, seasoned with insight and spiced with humour; the book is obese with ambition and serves up a literary dish fit for a king.'

However, I settled on 'loud'.

What other adjective should one use when talking about a book that shouts its revolted social commentary at such decibels? When our hero can be spotted from a satellite, not only because of his size but also because of the voluminous white hot dog vendor smock he wears, surely the best word for him is 'loud'? When the mention of Ignatius J. Reilly inspires giggles and nervous tension in the same breath; when each of the supporting cast beats me over the head with their incessant bleatings that serve to brand every one of them on my memory indelibly... that's BLOODY LOUD.

A Confederacy of Dunces is about nothing and because of that, it is about everything. You know those books that have a hook- making them easy to sell to the undiscerning buyer. "It's about a salmon fishing project in the Yemen. I know right? HAHAHAHAHAHA. That's $22.95." Alternatively: "It's not girly! I mean, I know the cover is hot pink, but it's a retelling of A Room with a View! Obviously you've read that, right? Would you call E.M Forster chick-lit? WOULD YOU? Exactly. That's $22.95".

If I tried to sell A Confederacy of Dunces, I would revert to one tactic and one tactic only: "New Orleans in the 1960s. An obese hot dog vendor with three University degrees and an inflated vocabulary. A crumbling pants factory whose employees are drunk/ancient or delusional. A seedy nightclub whose owner distributes pornography to orphans. TRUST ME."

The novel, in my opinion, is made even more compelling with the foreword written by Walker Percy. He explains that Toole's mother contacted him in 1976 with this manuscript. Her son had killed himself and left it behind and she was determined to get it published. Who was this young man who wrote such a masterpiece? I can't help feeling that many of Ignatius' thoughts on the human condition and the depravity of society are mirrors of what Toole himself may have been thinking, caught in a web of depression that would ultimately end his life. At times Ignatius exhibits an obstructed self-hatred; when denying a customer a hot dog he asks- "Are you unnatural enough to want a hot dog this early in the afternoon?" ignoring the fact he has just consumed three himself. (I know this is not an overly obvious example of self-hatred, there are others, but this was the only one I could find. It's a big book!) It saddens me to think of Toole, perhaps subsumed with self-hatred, churning out the pages of Dunces in an attempt to expurgate and externalise the self-scorn he contained within.

On a slightly removed yet still related note, it's great to meet a new friend who enjoys reading, even more so to discover said friend is not a moron and has seriously stellar taste in literature. I'm always a bit wary when people start recommending books to me. My default position is that I know more about books than most people and if you're recommending a book to me I've never read then it probably isn't any good and I've skipped it for a reason. This new friend, having talked up Toole's novel, has now been elevated to position of a Person Whose Recommendations I Can Trust. Which is always nice in these uncertain times.

Rating: 10/10.

Restless (William Boyd)

This was a very tolerable read. I know that sounds lukewarm but it's actually quite positive compared to the review I was composing in my head before I had even started William Boyd's Restless. This is because it came out at around the same time as Paul Auster's The Brooklyn Follies. I detested The Brooklyn Follies and because Boyd's novel had the unfortunate luck to come out in the same month they are now intrinsically linked in my mind.*

Nonetheless, I was moved to pick it up the other day from a box of books advertised for 50p in Clapham. I came away feeling most pleased with myself, having grabbed Helen Garner's The Spare Room, John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces and something else I have now forgotten the name of. The universe, it seems, was telling me to read Restless.

As I've already said, not a bad read at all. Instead of the cosmopolitan mid-life crisis I was expecting I was pleasantly to find that it was actually a WW2 espionage 'thriller'. I say 'thriller' because the action/adventure part was a bit geriatric. The most exciting thing that happens is a Mexican policeman gets stabbed in the eye with a pencil.

As a relatively anxious person I don't look normally head for the thriller section of a bookshop. If I'm going to be scared I want it to be supernatural so I know there's absolutely no chance whatsoever it could actually happen to me. So I'm not complaining that this didn't have me cowering in terror from the shadows in my loft. I'm just being pedantic and saying that Time Out's comment that it is "heart-stoppingly exciting" would indicate that the reviewer didn't actually read the book.

I particularly liked the way the novel was structured- in ambience as well as tense. The story switches between a young woman who is recruited by the British Secret Service at the beginning of WW2 and her daughter, decades later, whom she enlists to help settle old ghosts. Eva Delectorskaya as an old woman fearing her past demons adds a surreal menace to the text. As the reader I had trouble believing that anyone would actually go after a grandmother who spends all of her time gardening. It is her rising paranoia rather than any actual events which propel the drama along.

Boyd's main problem seems to be his inability to adopt the female mindset and write, realistically, from the point of view of women. Ruth (the daughter) is strong and independent but comes across as cold, which I don't feel is at all deliberate on Boyd's part. Eva as the young, beautiful spy is a mere caricature, sort of like a particularly intelligent Bond girl. Had Boyd managed to inflate these characters into a three-dimensional state the novel could have been quite a bit better. As it stands, it is merely a non-trashy historical fiction novel with some mildly exciting action halfway through.

Rating: 7/10.

* I THINK. I could be wrong and they came out at completely different times. Maybe their covers are the same colour.

Junky (William S. Burroughs)

I actually started writing this review about a week ago whilst on Skype with Alcott, got one sentence in and promptly forgot about it. If my posts are a little sporadic for the next couple of weeks it is because I am currently writing reviews for FOUR publications (if you count this one) and seeing as this is the only one for which I get no money... it may be put on the back burner. This is not to say that I don't love writing reviews here; this is the one place I can write a review and completely slate a book should I so desire. Not so with my other forays into reviewing. Anyway, rejoycement over negative review ability aside here is a book which I LOVED. It is also a book which confirmed my belief that I don't really want to be a heroin addict, and also made me yearn (just a little) to have lived in the Beat Generation. I am talking of course about Junky by William S. Burroughs.

Although published as fiction, it is pretty well accepted that this is an autobiographical (or at least semi-autobiographical) account of Burroughs' own addiction. The main character is called William, last name Lee - the maiden name of Burroughs' mother and a majority of the incidents in the book were, surprisingly enough, incidents in Burroughs' own life. The book starts with Burroughs' first shot of morphine, details his many attempts at 'quitting for good' and lets you in on all kinds of secrets which you probably would know nothing about if you (like myself) have never taken heroin cut with milk sugar (bought from a shady Mexican lady) and cooked it up in a spoon over a Bunsen burner.

Through a series of really interesting musings about junk as a way of life, not just as a trip, you get to see inside Burroughs' head. And what a messed up place it is. We are talking about the man who shot (and killed) his wife when he convinced her to put a shot glass on her head so he could re-enact the William Tell shoots apple off son's head incident. Except with a gun. And he missed the glass and got his wife instead. (The same wife who is pictured on the cool first edition cover which I got thanks to the wonder of the internet - the very pulpy novel cover depicts an actual scene in the book.)

Anyway...I am running out of steam already with this review that never really got off the ground (although it got further off the ground than Alcott's first attempt at a Blackberry Wine review) - But this book is an amazingly written account of a narcotics addiction that spanned Burroughs' entire lifetime... it is fascinating... just go read it. Okay?

(ALSO - I am the proud new owner of a MacBook - have discovered blog looks kind of weird and small in Safari - sorry about that to all you Mac owners who have known this for a while and wondered why we insisted on using such tiny font - not our choice I am afraid.)

Then We Came to the End (Joshua Ferris)

This book is EVERYWHERE. You can't walk into a second-hand bookshop without the offensive neon yellow of the cover jumping out at you. When I first saw Then We Came to the End on Charing Cross Road my reaction was to shy away immediately. The font on the spine looks like a Christopher Brookmyre novel and heavens to Betsy that man hurts my brain. Upon discovering that this was NOT in fact a Brookmyre novel my curiosity was piqued and I picked it up. It then took me a long time to open the covers and have a read. I was worried. One book in that many swap shops is a warning. People do not want this book in the house. It's like when I had to read The Gathering by Isobelle Carmody for English class. The book disturbed me so much I felt compelled to give it away after the exam. Creepy, doomsday teenage fiction set in an ABATTOIR... I did not want it on my bookshelf, giving me goosebumps every time I caught sight of it.

I therefore assumed Ferris' novel to be similar. People do not routinely sell junky, mediocre fiction they purchased for a beach holiday. Those inane titles tend to sit on bookshelves for years, hidden behind The Kite Runner and A Fine Balance, saved for those times when an appendix has ruptured or heart has broken. People sell books that have inherently upset them in some way.

However, I don't know who would be upset by this book. Granted, I haven't finished it. Probably because it was so unbelievably boring that to finish it would have been a feat equal in perseverance to an amputee stumping their way up Everest. From what I have read, I can tell you this. It is about people who work for a publishing company. It details the minutiae of their working lives. I believe it to be narrated from a group perspective, thus giving a lovely, communist vibe to the whole thing. At one point a little girl is abducted and they all spend an afternoon making posters to advertise her disappearance.

That's where I stopped. If you would like to know if she turns up, I suggest you go to ANY second-hand bookshop in the English-speaking world and pick up a copy. It will probably be my copy.

Actually, you will probably be upset by it if you bought the novel based on the endorsement from The New York Times- "One of the ten best books of the year." Ohhh... a bad, bad year for literature then.

The writing is actually very, very good. Ferris has an unusual style to his sentence structure and he has a firm grasp on the tense which is unusual in these long-winded, philosophy of the mundane novels. I think this could have been brilliant if it had the slightest bit of passion, but the whole thing comes across as a bit soulless.

Which may in fact, be the point- highlighting the pedestrian nature of our working experiences. In which case, well done Ferris. You have achieved your goal and subsequently, have written a novel no one can read.

Rating: 4/10.

The Texicans (Nina Vida)

Before I start off properly I think I should give you a definition of 'Texican'. My reason for doing this is that I was a bit prejudiced against this book before I read it. I assumed there was no such word and the author was being a tad pretentious/illiterate (depending on whether or not it was deliberate). Then I looked it up and... oops. Sorry for calling you pretentious Nina; a Texican is either someone who lived in Texas when it was the Republic of Texas, OR it's someone who is Texan of Mexican descent. Either fit within the confines of the novel...thank you urban dictionary.

So misconceptions about the novel out of the way, it was in fact a good read. Historical fiction, set in Texas in 1800s, a period about which I know very little outside what Little House on the Prairie taught me. Which isn't actually set in Texas but they do travel in a wagon 'west' and with my limited geographical knowledge of America that'll do!

Set over the course of a decade, this is one of those family saga stories, mainly focusing on Joseph Kimmel, a Jewish school teacher from Missouri (I think) who travels across Texas after the death of his brother. Despite being quite snarky and extremely solitary, he manages to pick up a wife, a runaway slave, a Mexican witch, an amputee and his family along his journey. He builds a ranch, gets attacked by Comanches, goes up against some very corrupt Texas rangers and generally achieves WAY too much for one character in one book.

I could have done without a few of the more graphic scenes, like when the Comanche chief is eaten alive by a warring tribe. Or when Joseph accidentally eats human meat - my dislike of those scenes is obviously due to my being a bit squeamish. And maybe I missed the point of the book (but I really don't think so) but I believe the ending needed to be altered slightly, i.e. I think it should be changed to the ending I was expecting. Considering I put up with doom and gloom and cannibalism and gratuitous violence I reckon I deserve a happy ending.

6/10.

Jack London: Various Works

Perusing the lamentably slim pickings in the classics section of my local library the other day I came to several conclusions:

1. Library staff who classify Salman Rushdie as a classics author are morons.

2. Libraries who do not possess ONE SINGLE COPY of The Portrait of Dorian Gray are naught but an ode to the socially bureaucratic inefficiencies that this country is riddled with.

3. I ought to read some Jack London.

And thus to a triumphant fanfare I introduce my latest review... Batard and The Call of the Wild. The book had several more stories in it, including White Fang, but at the end of The Call of the Wild I felt that I had delved sufficiently into the mind of London and thus closed the book.

There is little doubt in my mind that London is a talented writer. Batard in particular is a masterpiece of literary wrangling... 18 pages have seldom yielded so potent or powerful a story. London's writing is akin to that of McCarthy and Steinbeck, whose stories of rough and terrible lives are spotlighted by brief moments of humane feeling that could come from any point on the infinite spectrum of human emotion.

NOTE: I said HUMAN emotion. HUMAN. This is where I think London falls down, attributing dogs with the ability to think as people. Batard, the angry and bitter dog of the first story, plots the death of his master for years before finally exacting revenge for the cruel and barbaric existence he has been subjected to. Buck in The Call of the Wild is similarly intuitive and emotional, his journey from privileged pet to wild wolf penned brilliantly by London, apart from the fact that Buck, AS A DOG, does not have the mental acumen that London bequeaths him with.

However, for all this I could suspend disbelief if I had found myself enjoying the stories anyway. But I did not. I reject violence on all levels and I don't even like reading about two fully grown men having a fight. But when said violence is turned against children (see here) or animals, my stomach turns. Page after page London describes dogs being beaten by humans, dogs tearing each other apart, dogs being shot/hung/starved/dragged in the snow. ARGH. Trying to flick ahead to skip the violence ultimately meant reaching the back cover and not having read a thing.

Thus, I could forgive London endowing canines with impressive minds but cannot get on board with the whole incessant physical abuse thing. Have moved onto Lady Chatterley's Lover and this is proving far more enjoyable.

Rating: 3/10.

American Pastoral (Philip Roth)

The long-awaited review! Huzzah huzzah it has arrived! 

Somewhere Philip Roth's eyes are glued to the computer screen, eagerly scanning through my excessive opening prose, yearning to reach the accolades I promised him days, nay WEEKS ago and never delivered. Never fear Philip, you will always be loved here!

American Pastoral is the tale of Seymour "Swede" Levov, a sports star at his local high school in Newark, NY who goes on to marry a former Miss New Jersey and take over his father's glove factory. An idyllic existence is ripped to shreds when his daughter Merry becomes a little too excited about protesting the Vietnam War and blows up the local store and post office. What follows is the Swede's desperate attempt to keep his family together in the wake of his daughter's disappearance.

The first part of American Pastoral is narrated by Nathan Zuckerman, who, five years younger than his hero, has idolised the Swede since he first met him at school. This is a nifty bit of penning on Roth's part: he is able to set up the Swede as this mythic, strong, AMAZING sportsman who was also a great guy going after the American dream. If the whole story had been told by the Swede it would have sounded more than a little naff if the opening chapters had been all "I was so wonderful, I was revered as a Greek GOD, to have met me was to have walked in the shadow of greatness for the briefest of moments..." Yes, I am glad I didn't have to go through that, because it would have made me dislike the Swede and that is something I am NOT PREPARED TO DO.

The Swede is one of the most magnificent characters of modern literature. He is the ultimate martyr yet never insufferably so, he is tall and handsome (Roth SAYS SO, I'm not just imagining this), good at every sport, gentle and thoughtful. Loyal, kind, in control, traditional with a modern twist...*SWOON*. I could go on but will spare you.

Watching the Swede's heart get ripped out as he witnesses his daughter's growing radicalism and subsequent bomb-making expertise that results in four deaths was quite unbearable. I felt tremendously sorry for him, supporting his hysterical wife, consoling the widow of the man his daughter murdered... and all I'm thinking is "Swede! Who is looking after you???" The thought actually crossed my mind, if I was living in Newark, I would have taken him cookies. 

Roth doesn't exactly have an economy of words, like Marquez the anecdotes are packed in until the covers of the book are groaning, but it's all part of the richly textured story and, unlike Marquez, I lapped it all up. I think it's because of the faith I have in Roth. If he wants me to know that much about how to make a leather glove there's gotta be a good reason!

It was also satisfying to read a book about American culture and have it not be a parody or a vitriolic tirade of hatred written by a belligerent youngster. Instead, Roth has created an intelligent comment on America that ultimately, is no comment at all, but rather an offering of characters and events that play themselves out with little obvious manipulation from the author. 

Exceptional, glorious and, above all ELEGANT, Philip Roth I salute you. 

Rating: 9/10. 

And The Hippos Were Boiled In Their Tanks (William S. Burroughs & Jack Kerouac)

To the Kerouac/Burroughs/Beat fans out there - you have got to read this book. And The Hippos Were Boiled In Their Tanks, written in 1945, is Kerouac before On The Road, Burroughs before Naked Lunch. It is so cool.

Burroughs and Kerouac write as 'Will Dennison' and 'Mike Ryko' respectively, telling the story of the Kammerer/Carr murder. (David Kammerer - obsessed with Lucien Carr, Lucien Carr - kills David Kammerer. Kerouac and Burroughs know about it and don't tell police). This murder has been described as 'the murder which gave birth to the Beats', and in Hippos you get to read about it (in a fictionalised-ish form) from Burroughs and Kerouac themselves. You can't tell me you're not excited by that prospect.

This is another one of those read-for-atmosphere-rather-than-plot books, specifically a constantly drunk, 1940s New York atmosphere. You don't read this book as the mystery it is sold as... in fact if you picked it up expecting a mystery you would be seriously disappointed - the killing of Ramsay Allen (Kammerer) happens in one of the last chapters, followed not by any kind of sleuthing, but a confession from Phillip Tourain (Carr) and a couple of dark dark chapters of aimless drinking.

The book remained unpublished until November last year, as Lucien Carr requested it not be released until after he died. Because of this you experience Kerouac/Burroughs' writing in reverse, you get tantalizing glimpses of the writers which they became.

Added tidbit - the book was supposedly named after a line heard in a radio broadcast about a fire in a zoo (although some say circus) and sparked a lively conversation between my housemates and I about Worse Ways To Die Than By Boiling (for example being eaten alive by ants).

8/10

The Plague of Doves (Louise Erdrich)

I know I referenced this book in my post about Olive Kitteridge, saying that I was enjoying it greatly and that it was quite marvellous.

Maybe I can blame what happened next on the rather awful bug I've had... I got bored a few chapters past thinking it was "quite marvellous" and discarded The Plague of Doves, finalist for the Pulitzer this year, for this book:

I am ABSOLUTELY not proud of the fact that I devoured this in about two hours, intermittently sipping green tea, feeling sorry for myself, casting baleful glances at The Plague of Doves and ensuring the cover was face down in case anybody passing by my living room window happened to be close enough to see what the book was called.

I'm not going to lie... this was NOT GOOD. But I feel I do have to share this one little bit o' prose with you, when the hero (Wade) is hinting at his feelings towards the less attractive of a pair of twins (with both of whom he has had an affair): "I love red meat. It doesn't have to be fancy."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Seriously, why would you read anything else when you've got double entendres like that?

Although, truth be told, I feel I may have to give Erdrich's novel another chance, I think I may have been unfair in my quick judgement. Also, Philip Roth said it was a "dazzling masterpiece" and I ADORE Philip Roth. I mentioned him in an earlier post where I said that American Pastoral had definitely deserved to win the Pulitzer. I got to thinking and realised I hadn't actually read it. Oops. This is why I am such a good bookseller.

So, coming up, Philip Roth's American Pastoral!

Ratings:

The Plague of Doves: 8/10 (I'm going on my earlier gut feelings about this).

The Soldier's Seduction: 2/10 (I speak with the authority of having read the entire thing).

Olive Kitteridge (Elizabeth Strout)

AMERICA.

I DON'T UNDERSTAND.

I have just finished Olive Kitteridge, the novel which just won the Pulitzer. It is amazingly meh. Don't get me wrong, it's very well written. The character of Olive is nicely developed. She has enormous flaws and a grating voice that seems to jump off the page and gnaw at your eardrums yet the reader still feels a great liking and empathy for her.

But ye gods, where is the originality? Where is the x-factor? Where (at the risk of sounding like Billy Flynn) is the pizazz?

I also take issue with the plot, or lack thereof. NOTHING HAPPENS. Everything is alluded to, but no events really ever actually take place. As soon as something interesting is about to happen Strout skips ahead and has her characters looking back at the interesting event. Of course, said interesting event will have been traumatic so the characters don't allow themselves to remember it properly and instead we just get fragments that slip through their emotional defenses. I was sitting there mentally screaming at the book: "Have a meltdown. CRACK. PPLLLEEAASSEE. Emotionally purge yourself. Scream at a person passing by in the street. ANYTHING. I just need to know what's happening!"

There are so many characters as well that I got confused. I would read it again for clarification, but I can't be bothered. I think there may have been two Kevins. Either that or poor old Kevin had one hell of a time.

However, I am about a quarter of the way through The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich, which was one of the runners-up and it is MARVELLOUS. So a favourable review should follow shortly, unless Erdrich drops the ball halfway through.

Rating: 7/10.

Author Love: DBC Pierre

Picture this scene, if you will:

A dinner party.

Pork chops are being served by waiters dressed as Etonians.

We are in an old country house.

Elbow's Grounds for Divorce filters from the tasteful sound system.

Earhart and I sit, surrounded by the most distinctively voiced, disturbing and/or angry authors we could think of. Cormac sits at one end, silent and still apart from the occasional twitch of his nose. He leans back in his chair, arms crossed, surveying the crowd. J.D. sits to my left, complaining about the chops and shamelessly listening in on everyone else's conversations. Ian holds court, retelling the story of his long-lost half-brother, so enigmatic that no one notices as he palms his steak knife and requests another from the waiter. Martin is also unimpressed with the chops; he pushes his plate away and tops up his wine goblet from a leather hip flask, adding a pinch of seasoning from a twist of paper. Margaret, to Earhart's right, charms her whilst keeping an ear on the ticking in her handbag. Anthony is demonstrating the correct way to strangle a gerbil and Hunter listens intently, sure he can see an actual gerbil writhing in pain. Bret and Chuck play a lackadaisical game of Snap, ignoring everyone else and taking in turns to stab each other with compasses whenever a point is scored.

At this hypothetical dinner party which I SERIOUSLY hope to attend one day, DBC Pierre sits, almost unnoticed, in the midst of the madness. He doesn't have a notebook on his lap but he is recording it all, filing away the lunacy, the self-involvement, the genius, to use at a later date.

Make no doubt about it, he belongs at the party, can take his rightful place at the table and does so with no trace of hem or haw. But he remains distanced, able to catalogue his own caricatured behaviour alongside that of the others, so socially pulsed and sharp witted with a scary intelligence to rope it all together that the dinner party could soon turn into another socially-ravaging hilarious romp of a read.

You COULD say I think DBC Pierre is quite, quite good at what he does. This would probably be reasonably accurate.

Vernon God Little and Ludmila's Broken English are unwavering in their brilliance, scornful satire and heartbreaking moments of pain. If the latter is slightly lacking the power of the first I hold no grudges, reading it without the expectations of the first I would have still been blown-away. I realised merely referencing DBC Pierre in my earlier post wasn't enough, he needed a segment on his own (even if said segment is a bit too gonzo-esque to be classified as sensible reviewing).

I mean, when the voices of his characters resonate more soundly than Holden Caulfield's, you know he's a ten.

Rating: 10/10.

The Host (Stephenie Meyer)

Wow Stephenie.

Vampires?

You're awesome at that.

But mind-snatchers who invade earth?

You SUCK at that.

Now, I'm not going to talk about Meyer's literary skills here. She can string a sentence together just fine and as for sexual tension, she's got that all tied up. (Tee hee.) But The Host was ABOMINABLE.

Basic premise: Wanderer is a sprite/soul/silvery ghost thing who is part of a species who go to lands that are screwed up in some way, take over their minds and make everyone happy and peaceful. Good in theory but kind of nixes freedom of thought etc. These sprites have come to Earth and before our planet they were on a planet covered in seaweed. (I'm guessing kelp has conflict issues that don't really come to light when we just see it floating past us in the water). However, the body that Wanderer is inserted into belongs to the strong-willed Melanie who refuses to give up her soul. Thus we have two minds in one body.

This is where it gets ridiculous.

Melanie is in love with a guy called Jared and she convinces Wanderer to go find him, hoping he is hiding in the desert and has not been brainwashed. Conveniently, he is and Wanderer plays along, as she is feeling slightly disillusioned with her parasitic race.

Cue unfortunate occurrence:

Wanderer falls in love with Jared.

Melanie is still in love with Jared.

Thus the origin of the marketing tag: "What may be the first love triangle involving only two bodies."

GROAN.

Apart from the ridiculously confusing plot (I over-simplified for you), my other beef is that this was Meyer's first adult book. The Twilight Series is kind of racy for teenagers and I was expecting Meyer to bump up the sex if she was intentionally writing for adults. What kept me going through this doorstop of a novel was the possibility of hot alien sex.

Didn't happen.

We don't even get resolution at the end; I closed the book feeling unsatisfied, unconvinced and depressed. NOT how I normally feel when I read Stephenie Meyer.

Rating: 4/10.