Category: 2009

Categories
2009 Booker Prize Recommended books

How to Paint a Dead Man – Sarah Hall

Long listed for the Booker Prize 2009

The great thing about reading the Booker long list is that I read books I would never normally pick up and am occasionally rewarded by finding a gem like this. I shouldn’t have liked this book – it has virtually no plot and has whole chapters about a person who paints bottles. It sounds like the sort of book I’d run a mile from, but for some reason I loved it!

I was transfixed from the first page. The heart-breaking emotions of a woman who has lost her twin brother affected me straight away. I think I had the tissues out within a few pages and it is so rare for me to be moved by a book that I knew this was going to be something special.

The second chapter introduces the life of an Italian painter, and while I found this section the weakest of the three, it was an important lull in the heightened emotions of the surrounding sections.

The final scene describes the father of the twins and his battle for survival after he becomes trapped in the hills. The book weaves together these three separate scenes, and that is all they are really, exceptionally well. There is no plot – just glimpses into the lives of these three characters.

I don’t know how this book managed to grip me from beginning to end when so many seemingly similar books have failed. I can only assume that Sarah Hall has an outstanding talent, or is perfectly in tune with my fears and emotions.

Sarah Hall is from Cumbria, so the occasional snippets of dialect may prove difficult for some to understand, but as I spent my teenage years in the Lake District this wasn’t a problem for me.

Overall, I highly recommend this book. It deserves it’s place on the Booker long list and I plan to seek out all her previous books.

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Have you read any books written by Sarah Hall?

Which one was your favourite?

Categories
2009 Short Story

Nocturnes – Kazuo Ishiguro

I haven’t read any of Kazuo Ishiguro’s books before, although have a few here in the TBR pile and have heard only good things about his writing. I wasn’t planning to read this one, but then I spotted someone returning it at the library. I know how hard these new releases are to borrow and so snapped up the chance to get it, but when I got it home I realised that it wasn’t really my sort of book. I’m not a fan of short stories and  a quick scan through the blurb revealed the stories to be based around music – something I like listening to, but have no real passion for.

I read the first story, and had almost decided to return it to the library when I spotted Jane’s review. She urged me to continue, highlighting the fact that it is a quick, well written read. I agree with her, and in many ways I am pleased that I read it all the way to the end.

The stories are all based around ‘music and nightfall’ and while they are well written, they encounter the major problem I have with short stories, which is that the moment I start to bond with the characters and become interested in their story, they are gone. The depth and complexity of plot which I love in a novel can never be present in a story lasting just a few pages.

Each of the stories was based around the lives of reasonably normal people, and so didn’t give any insight into different lives or ways of thinking, as in The Thing Around Your Neck (one of the only short story collections I’ve ever liked). The plots were all quite gentle, and this book reminded me of Brooklyn, the Booker prize nominated book, which I read recently. I think anyone who loved Brooklyn would enjoy reading this collection, especially if you are a music fan.

If you enjoy reading short stories, then this is a reasonably good collection, but it wasn’t for me.

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I’m planning to read at least one of Kazuo Ishiguro’s books before the end of the year.

Which one do you think is the best?

Categories
2009 Booker Prize

Brooklyn – Colm Tóibín

 Long listed for the Booker prize 2009

Brooklyn is a gentle story about a young woman emigrating from a small town in Ireland to Brooklyn in the 1950s.

The writing is very simple and the plot basic, but this meant it could be read very quickly. The book captures the nostalgia of someone who leaves their home and the culture-shock they encounter when moving to a new country.

I found the book too gentle for my tastes, but I can see that it would appeal to a lot of people. The story is one I’ve heard many times before and although the writing is carefully controlled it didn’t offer anything that I hadn’t seen before.

The characterisation was also a bit flat for me. The central character, Eilis, didn’t display any strong emotions. The story was revealed through her observations and she just seemed to be pulled along by the plot rather than taking an active part in it. I prefer my characters to display a bit more strength or emotion than she did.

Overall I was a bit under-whelmed by this book and would only recommend it to those who enjoy books with a gentle plot.

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I have heard great things about Colm Tóibín, but this is the first of his books which I have read.

Have you read any of his other books?

Are they written in a similar way to this?

Categories
2009 Recommended books

The Invisible Mountain – Carolina De Robertis

A few weeks ago I wrote about the lack of South American books I’d read, so I jumped at the chance to read The Invisible Mountain which is set in both Uruguay and Argentina.

The book follows three generations of women and begins in rural Uruguay at the dawn of the twentieth century. Each of the women has to deal with a different set of problems, but the main theme of the book seems to be freedom; whether this is simply freedom within the home, or the greater, more brutal lack of freedom imposed by governments.

The book is beautifully written, balancing poetic prose with Spanish words, so giving an authentic atmosphere which perfectly captures the lives of these women. Each character is vividly drawn and I loved them all, so felt their pain whenever they had difficult circumstances to to deal with.

Although it felt more like three short stories, connected only by the link of motherhood, it was great for me to be able to see the changes taking place in these countries over the century. I’m ashamed to admit that I know nothing about the history of South America, and so although this book added greatly to my knowledge, it also left me hungry for more. I found myself searching the Internet for more information about the politics of this time-period, something I am rarely inspired to do while reading a book and just shows the effect this book had on me.

The Invisible Mountain is a really good book, which is both thought-provoking and shocking, but with some gentle, tender moments. It has many similarities to A Thousand Splendid Suns, but I found The Invisible Mountain to be the better written of the two.

Highly recommended, especially to people who like reading about different countries and cultures.

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Have you ever read a book set in Uruguay or Argentina?

Do you know much about the history of these countries?

Categories
2008 2009 Books in Translation Chunkster

2666 – Roberto Bolaño. Part 3: The Part About Fate

Steph and Claire are hosting a read-along for the highly acclaimed book, 2666, by Chilean author Roberto Bolaño. The novel is 900 pages long, and divided into 5 parts. We are reading one part a month, for the next five months.

Here are my thoughts on Part 3: The Part About Fate

I loved this part – I found it so much easier to read than the first two. This section reads much more like a normal novel and I now have a fuller understanding of what is happening –  although I guess you can never really tell what Bolaño is up to!

This section focuses on Fate, a reporter sent from New York to cover a boxing match in Saint Terasa, the Mexican city plagued by a serial killer. Fate quickly realises that the killings make a more interesting news story than a boxing match and so starts to investigate them.

This section finally brings things together, connecting the characters so I can finally begin to see their purpose in the book. It was so satisfying to finally discover links between some of the seemingly random events of the first two chapters.

As usual the writing was beautiful. I could have picked quotes from just about every page, but I was struck by the repetitive mention of the sun. It seemed to have great significance within this chapter.

But the sun has its uses, as any fool knows, said Seaman. From up close it’s hell, but from far away you’d have to be a vampire not to see how useful it is, how beautiful.

They crossed the yard and the street and their bodies cast extremely fine shadows that every five seconds were shaken by a tremor, as if the sun were spinning backward.

When the sun comes up everything will be over.

This section was also had a faster pace than the earlier two and had a cliff-hanger ending, making this the first section where I have actually been tempted to dive straight into the next chapter. I’m resisting though, in the hope that the suspense will add to the enjoyment of the book.

It appears this book is improving all the time. I am really looking forward to getting into The Part About The Crimes. I have very high expectations for it. Let’s hope it can live up to them.

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Are you enjoying 2666 more now?

Can you wait a full month before beginning Part 4?

Categories
2008 2009 Other Prizes Recommended books

Blackmoor – Edward Hogan

Winner of the Desmond Elliott Prize 2009

Blackmoor is a small mining village in Derbyshire, England. The book is set during the 1990s, a time of fast decline for the mining industry, which eventually ends in the closure of the pit. The tight-nit community struggle to deal with the loss of employment, but have the added problem of methane building up beneath their homes.

Vincent is a teenager growing up surrounded by these problems, but the mystery of his past is a more pressing concern for him. Why did his mother die? Why is his father so distant from him?

The book flicks backwards and forwards, slowly revealing his mother’s secrets and snippets of Vincent’s confused life.

Vincent’s mother, Beth, is an amazing character. She is an albino, suffers from post-natal depression and is the source of much gossip within the village. The depiction of her strange behaviour was always respectful and gave a great insight into the mind of someone suffering from this type of depression.

Vincent was also amazingly well drawn. The confusion and innocence of a teenager’s mind was perfectly captured.

This is a really good book. The writing is simple, but it grabs your attention from the start. It is packed with twists and turns and had a very satisfying ending.

If you’d like to find out more about a very different side to English life then this is a great choice – it’s a really good first novel, and I will be looking out for more books from this author in the future.

Recommended.

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